VV> .. . 
 
 >•■■;;•■■ v: >' 
 
 ■■■^^ 
 
 ': •'•v •■ 
 
 ::^<^:^-V:--;^:-Ci^^^;--,;-..;.v. -..■ 
 
 
 
 
 
 rr 
 
 7, • -^ V 
 
 » .-.J.-- :■■■ ' ■ 
 
 ■4' ,« ■', 
 
 :.*» ■■■'...' 
 
 
 ■ ■•' ■«'">■» : 
 
 
THE 
 
 HISTORY 
 
 07 THE 
 
 CHURCH OF CHRIST. 
 
 BT THE LATE 
 
 REV. JOSEPH MILNER, A.M. 
 
 aSJft]) ^Mitfons anti ©orrections, 
 
 BT THE LATE 
 
 REV. ISAAC MILNER, D.D. F.R.S., 
 
 DEAN or CARLISLE, AND PRESIDENT OF QUEEN'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 FROM THE LAST LONDON EDITION. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 HOGAN AND THOMPSON. 
 183 5. 
 
HASWELL AND BARRINGTON, PRINTERS. 
 
 5^1 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR, 
 
 THE REV. JOSEPH MILNER, M. A. 
 
 In my Proposals for printing this History of the Church of Christ, I 
 promised " an Ecclesiastical History on a new Plan." The Reader there- 
 fore will naturally expect some distinct account of a Plan, which in a sub- 
 ject so generally known, lays claim to novelty, in order that he may judge 
 for himself whether it appe'ars sufficiently interesting to engage his perusal 
 of the Work itself. 
 
 It is certain that, from our Saviour's time to the present, there have ever 
 been persons whose dispositions and lives have been formed by the rules of 
 the New Testament ; men who have been real, not merely nominal 
 Christians : who believed the doctrines of the Gospel, loved them because 
 of their divine excellency, and suffered gladly the loss of all things, that 
 THEY MIGHT WIN Christ, AND BE FOUND IN HIM.* It is the history of these 
 men which I propose to write. It is of no consequence with respect to 
 my plan, nor of much importance, I believe, in its own nature, to what 
 EXTERNAL Church they belonged. I intend not to enter with any nicety into 
 any account of their rites and ceremonies, or forms of Church government, 
 much less into their secular history. Even religious controversies shall 
 be omitted ; except those which seem to bear a relation to the essence of 
 Christ's religion, and of which the history of his real Church requires some 
 account. Let not the Reader expect that the actions of great men— great 
 in a secular view I mean — will be exhibited to his notice. Nothing, but 
 what appears to me to belong to Christ's kingdom, shall be admitted: ge- 
 nuine piety is the only thing which I intend to celebrate. 
 
 It must have struck a careful observer, that such a history is as yet a 
 great desideratum. Enmity against the Gospel has been fed, even to 
 satiety, by the large displays of ecclesiastical wickedness. The wildest 
 and the most visionary heretics have filled the historic page; and their 
 follies, both in principle and practice, have been deemed Avorthy of a par- 
 ticular enumeration. The internal dissentions of Churches have been 
 minutely described. The intricacies and intrigues of Popery, and in- 
 deed of every other secular system which pretends to wear a religious 
 
 * Philipp. iii. 8, 9. 
 
4 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 garb, have been developed with a studious particularity : The connexion 
 between the Church and the State has afforded very ample materials of what 
 is commonly called Church History ; and learning and philosophy have 
 been much more respected than godliness and virtue. 
 
 No doubt, some more ancient voluminous Church Historians, as well as 
 Mosheim in his Compendium, have given as much useful information ; and 
 if one might look on them as civil historians altogether, there would not be 
 much room for blame. Further, if they had incorporated into their secular 
 narratives an account of the progress of godliness itself, I should not have 
 dared to reprehend them as Ecclesiastical Historians : But they evidently 
 give a much larger proportion to the history of wickedness, than to that of 
 piety in general. Hence the evils, which have been practised in Christian 
 countries, seem even greater than they really were ; and the disagreeable 
 inference which the reading of Mosheim produced in my own mind is pro- 
 bably no singular case, viz. — that real religion appears scarcely to have had 
 any existence. Infidel malice has triumphed, though very unreasonably, 
 on account of these things ; the vices of Christians, so called, have certainly 
 been exaggerated on the whole ; and Deists and Sceptics have taken advant- 
 age, partly from such exaggeration and partly from the poverty of our inform- 
 ation concerning Mahometans and Pagans, to represent both as more vir- 
 tuous than Christians. 
 
 What account can be given of this unhappily partial view of Church 
 History ? — Genuine godliness is fond of secrecy : Humility is of its essence : 
 She seeks not the praise of men but the praise of God ; and hides even the 
 good she does from the world more studiously than wickedness conceals 
 its evils : Her sincerest votaries have, likewise, been chiefly private persons, 
 such as have seldom moved in the public and noisy spheres of life. The 
 most celebrated historians, who hitherto have appeared, seem not to have 
 had so much relish for godliness, as to be induced to take any pains to draw 
 her out of her modest obscurity.* The prevalence of wickedness in all 
 ages has heightened the difficulty. t From these causes the scarcity of 
 materials, for what properly deserves the name of Church History, is much 
 greater than any person, who has not examined the subject, can even con- 
 ceive. I have all along, however, to the best of my ability and opportunity, 
 consulted original records, and have never contented myself with copying 
 the sentiments of modern historians. 
 
 * Fox's Book of Martyrs is, however, one striking e-xception to this remark. The 
 Magdeburgensian Centuriators, whom I did not meet with till I had finished this Volume, 
 are likewise, in part, exempted from the charge of writing Ecclesiastical History in the 
 secular manner which I have reprehended. Yet while they omit, or very lamely recount, 
 some most important Christian facts, they relate with tedious exactness many uninterest- 
 ing particulars. They seem, however, to have been men of real piety, industry, and 
 learning, and may be of much use to me in subsequent parts of the history, should I con- 
 tinue it. 
 
 The volume of Mr. Newton is well known, and its merit has been acknowledged by 
 men of piety and judgment. I once thought of beginning only where he ended. But as 
 there is an unity of manner and style which belongs to every author who plans and exe- 
 cutes for himself; and, as in some points I really found myself to differ in sentiment from 
 this very respectable writer, I altered my opinion, contented in this place to acknowledge, 
 that, so far as I can recollect, the perusal of his in'-tructive volume of Ecclesiastical History 
 first suggested to me the idea of this work. 
 
 ■j- A history of the perversions and abuses of religion is not properly a history of the 
 Church ; as absurd were it to suppose a history of the highwaymen that have infested this 
 country to be a history of England. 
 
 / 
 
INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 I hope I shall be allowed to call the plan, I propose, a proper one. Cer- 
 tainly, the terms " Church," and " Christian," do in their most natural 
 and PRIMARY SENSE respect only good men. The Divine Founder of our 
 religion has promised, that the gates of hell shall not prevail 
 AGAINST IT. Such a successioH of pious men in all ages must, therefore, 
 have existed ; and it will be no contemptible use of such a history as this, 
 if it prove, that, in every age, there have been real followers of Christ. 
 Other uses cannot fail to offer themselves. To see and trace the goodness 
 of God taking care of his Church in every age by his Providence and Grace, 
 will be, to the devout mind, a refreshment of the most grateful nature. The 
 honour of Christianity will be supported ; the value of its essential doctrines 
 will be ascertained ; and we shall have frequent occasion to state what the 
 Gospel is, and what it is not. Hence the triumphs of the Sceptic will 
 appear to be unfounded in truth ; when it shall be evident on the whole, — 
 that Christ's religion has ever existed, and brought forth its proper fruits, 
 to which no other system can make any just pretension ; and finally, — that 
 the evils of which Christians, so called, have been guilty, arose not from 
 the Gospel itself, but from the hypocrisy of those who assumed that worthy 
 Name, to which neither their faith nor their practice gave them any right. 
 
 These, and other obvious advantages of such a history, have determined 
 me to attempt it. I feel oppressed with the greatness of the subject: 
 Nevertheless, with God's help, I mean to proceed. In magnis voluisse 
 
 SAT EST. 
 
 I have two things further to promise : 1st, to assure the Reader that I 
 shall think it my indispensable duty to give him real facts ; and, if I be 
 sometimes rather more copious in reflections than the severe laws of history 
 allow, he will do well to observe, that the fashionable misrepresentations of 
 ancient story require considerable attention. 
 
 And, 2dly, I fairly warn the Reader not to expect from me any indul- 
 gence in the modern taste of Scepticism. I shall not affect to doubt the 
 credibility of ancient respectable historians. And, as it is hardly possible 
 to avoid altogether the infection of the age in which one lives, I seem to 
 myself sufficiently secured, by the torrent of prevailing opinions, from the 
 other extreme of superstitious' belief. Both ought to be avoided : but that, 
 which supports itself by the appearance of extraordinary sense, by the 
 authority of ereat names, and by the love of applause, must of course be 
 the more ensnaring. The present age, in matters of religion, may justly 
 be called the age of self-sufficiency : We condemn the ancients by whole- 
 sale, and without giving them a hearing: we suspect their historical 
 accounts, without discrimination: malevolence and profaneness are both 
 encouraged by such conduct : we fancy ourselves so enlightened, as to be 
 without\ny parallels in discernment : we are amazed, that our ancestors 
 should so long have been deluded by absurdities ; and, we are very little 
 aware how niuch some future age will pity and blame us, for follies, of 
 which we imagine ourselves perfectly clear. 
 
 J. M. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 [NOTE TO THE EDITION OF 1810.] 
 
 The Editor* takes this opportunity of most gratefully acknowledging the 
 liberal patronage of the University of Cambridge, in having printed at their 
 own expense four volumes of Mr. M.'s Ecclesiastical History. Their 
 kindness and consideration in this matter makes an indelible impression on 
 his mind : and, if any thing could increase his affectionate attachment to 
 that learned Body, after so long and active a residence among them, it would 
 be this honourable token of respect to the memory of his deceased Brother, 
 who himself, many years ago, as a Student in the same Seminary,! received 
 distinguished marks of approbation. 
 
 * The Rev. Isaac Milner, D.D., Dean of Carlisle, and President of Queen's College, 
 Cambridge. 
 
 ■j- Mr. M. took his degree of B. A. in the year 1 766 ; and obtained, as a prize, one of 
 the Chancellor's gold medals. The candidates were uncommonly numerous and able. 
 
 J\r. B. — Two handsome gold medals are given annually by the Chancellor of the Uni- 
 versity of Cambridge, to such Bachelors of Arts as excel in classical learning. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TO THE SECOND VOLUME,* 
 
 AS OKIGINALLT PUBLISHED, 
 
 BY THE REV. JOSEPH MILNER, M. A, 
 
 The period of time, which the Volume now presented to the Reader em- 
 braces, will exhibit the Church of Christ in a very different situation from 
 any in which it appeared, during the whole course of the three first Cen- 
 turies. 
 
 The fourth Century opens with a persecution more systematically 
 planned, and more artfully conducted, than those which Christians had ever 
 known. Indeed victory at first showed itself in favour of the persecutors, 
 and Christianity seemed to be near an end. All the powers of cruelty and 
 artifice, and of violence and calumny, associated, were exerted to the utmost 
 in the course of these transactions ; and, if the Church still survived the 
 storm, and rose more terrible from her losses, the only reason was, because 
 her DEFENDER is invincible. 
 
 We next behold the Church established and protected by civil polity, and 
 the whole system of Paganism, which had been the pride of ages, gradu- 
 ally dissolved, and sinking into insignificance and contempt. The advan- 
 tages and abuses, attendant on Christian Establishments, display themselves, 
 on this occasion, in a very conspicuous point of view. I have endeavoured, 
 with faithfulness and candour, to point out both ; at the same time that the 
 regard due to truth itself, and to the characters of the most illustrious and 
 the most exemplary Christians in past ages, seemed to require a defence of 
 Ecclesiastical Establishments. I hope no real lover of truth and liberty 
 will censure the attempt : for it must be owned, that the most direct attacks, 
 in the way of argument, and I wish I could say only in that way, have 
 repeatedly been made against them, as if they were unchristian in their 
 whole nature. It cannot, therefore, be reckoned unfair to desire men, 
 freely to give to others the liberty which they allow to themselves, if they 
 would prove that their love of liberty is genuine and sincere. 
 
 The Arian controversy nearly fills the rest of the Century; it was my 
 duty to give a faithful history of its rise, progress, and effects. And, if the 
 personal character of Arians appear more criminal than many of my readers 
 have been taught to imagine, I confidently refer them to the most authentic 
 records of antiquity. I am not conscious of having disguised any one fact, 
 or exaggerated any one enormity. 
 
 But it is with far greater pleasure, that I have contemplated the fifth Cen- 
 
 » Centuries IV., V., from p. 256 to p. 485, Vol. I. of this edition. 
 
8 PREFACE. 
 
 tury. The history of Pelagianism I judged to be a desideratum in our 
 language ; it was necessary to lay it before the reader with some degree of 
 circumstantial exactness, supported too by incontestible documents. If the 
 account of the writings and labours of Augustine be thought to extend to an 
 immoderate length, I can only say, that the importance of the doctrines of 
 GRACE, with their practical effects, will, perhaps, be considered as a suffi- 
 cient apology. Nothing can be introduced more pertinent to the whole 
 design of this History, than the revival of religion, of which he was the 
 providential instrument: its effects remained for many centuries: and I 
 scarcely need say to those, who have read the former Volume even with 
 superficial attention, that my plan often requires me to be brief, where 
 other historians are immoderately tedious; and to be circumstantial, where 
 they say little, or are silent altogether. 
 
 To search out the real Church from age to age, is indeed a work of much 
 labour and difficulty; far more so, I apprehend, than can even be conceived 
 by those whose studies have never been directed to this object. The ore 
 is precious, but it must be extracted from incredible heaps of heterogeneous 
 matter. I cannot pretend to be clear of mistakes ; but it behooved me to be 
 as careful as I could ; and I shall thankfully receive information or correc- 
 tion from studious persons who have carefully investigated antiquity for 
 themselves. I cannot, indeed, expect information or correction from self- 
 created critics, who are carried down the torrent of modern prejudices, and 
 who know no sentiments, but those which they have imbibed from Authors 
 of the present Century. 
 
 The encouragement which I have received from a generous Public in- 
 duces me to persevere. Besides, the peculiar advantage of a work of this 
 kind is, that it is capable of perfection, so far as it proceeds, without need- 
 ing any support from subsequent parts. It is not like a connected thread 
 of argumentation, which must be read throughout, before the full force of 
 any particular portion of it be discerned. 
 
 What real Christianity is, I mean to exhibit historically ; and, in the 
 execution of this plan, I hope I shall be found not altogether to have disap- 
 pointed the expectations of the University of Cambridge. I reflect with 
 peculiar satisfaction, that the University, to which I am now so much in- 
 debted for liberal support in the publication of this Work, and in which 
 several of my earlier years were spent in useful studies, was, under Divine 
 Providence, the principal instrument,* of spreading through these kingdoms 
 at the Reformation, that very light of Evangelical doctrine, which it is the 
 capital object of this History to explore. 
 
 * See Burnet's History of the Reformation, and Strype's Lives of the Archbishops, 
 passim. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TO THE THIRD VOLUME,* 
 
 AS OaiGIITAI.LT PUBLISHED, 
 
 BY THE REV. JOSEPH MILNE R, M.A. 
 
 If the real Church Historian find it a difficult task to extract a connected 
 view of his peculiar subject from the Ecclesiastical materials of the fourth 
 and fifth Centuries, that difficulty is multiplied a hundredfold, while he 
 labours through the long and gloomy period, which in the present Volume 
 engages his attention. 
 
 Impressed, however, with the certain truth of the declaration made by 
 the Divine Author of Christianity, " that the gates of hell shall never pre- 
 vail against his Church," I have endeavoured all along to discover her 
 actual existence. How far I have succeeded, the Reader must determine 
 for himself. If the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel have not been ex- 
 hibited, both as professed in various parts of the world, and as productive 
 of those fruits of holiness, which are peculiarly Christian, my aim has been 
 missed, and the grand design of the whole narration has failed. But I hope 
 the Scriptural Reader will see the lineaments of the Church pervading 
 these dark Centuries ; provided that he divest himself of all partial regards 
 for sects and denominations, ages and countries, and attend exclusively to 
 the remarks and evidences of genuine Christianity. This is the right frame 
 of spirit, which the subject before us requires ; and it is what I have steadily 
 endeavoured to preserve. 
 
 Tros Rutulusve fuat nullo discrimine habebo. 
 
 In the former part of the Volume, Gregory I. of Rome, and the English 
 Christians, will be found objects deserving our serious attention. Nor 
 should we be prejudiced against the real Church, because she then wore a 
 Roman garb. Undoubtedly she was by this means much defiled with 
 superstition ; for that was as much the predominant evil of those times, as 
 profaneness is of our own. The last-mentioned evil admits of no coalition 
 with Christian holiness ; but superstition, to a certain degree, may co-exist 
 with the spirit of the Gospel. When that degree is exceeded, and general 
 idolatry takes place, the system then becomes too corrupt to deserve the 
 name of the Church of Christ. I have marked this limit to the best of my 
 judgment in the course of this History, have exhibited the man of sin 
 
 * Centuries VI., VII., VIII., IX., X., XL, XII., XIII., Vol. I., from p. 486 to the end; 
 and Vol. II., from p. 1 to 102 of this edition. 
 
10 PREFACE. 
 
 matured in all his gigantic horrors, and from that epocha I despair of dis- 
 covering the Church in the collective body of nominal Christians. Every 
 Reader will observe the various features of Antichrist described in this 
 Volume, and some may perhaps be enabled to form a more distinct and ade- 
 quate conception of the nature of Popery, than they had before acquired. 
 
 Leaving therefore the general Church of Rome, after she had entirely 
 ceased to hold the head, I either travel with faithful Missionaries into 
 regions of heathenism, and describe the propagation of the Gospel in scenes 
 altogether new, or dwell with circumstantial exactness on the lives and 
 writings of some particular individuals, in whom the Spirit of God main- 
 tained the power of godliness, while they remained "in Babylon." The 
 former object displays one of the brightest prospects of this whole period, 
 and seems to rebuke the supineness of modern times, in regard to the exten- 
 sion of divine truth among Pagan nations. The latter, I trust, will be found 
 to afford matter of Christian instruction. The pleasure and benefit, which, 
 as I have repeatedly heard, has been derived from the perusal of Augustine's 
 Life and Confessions, in the preceding Volume, encourage me to expect, 
 that the review of the lives and writings of Anselm and of Bernard in this, 
 may not be without similar fruit. 
 
 The History of these seven Centuries, as it has hither appeared in our 
 common Ecclesiastical narratives, it must be confessed, is extremely unin- 
 teresting. If I have had some advantages for enlivening and illuminating 
 the scene, let those be ascribed to the peculiar nature of my plan. 
 
 The account of the Waldenses, which closes the Volume, belongs not 
 to the Thirteenth Century exclusively ; it is, however, ascribed to it, because 
 in the course of that Century most extraordinary persecutions and conflicts 
 took place among this people, and particularly excited the attention of 
 Europe. It was also judged proper to give one unbroken narrative of Wal- 
 densian transactions in Ecclesiastical matters, till the time of the Reforma- 
 tion. 
 
 If the Reader learn some practical lessons concerning the power, wisdom, 
 goodness, and faithfulness of God, from the review of the events which lie 
 before him, I shall have reason to rejoice, nor shall I think my labour to 
 have been in vain. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TO THE FOURTH VOLUME,* 
 
 AS ORIGINALLY PCBLISHED, 
 
 BY THE REV. ISAAC MILNE R, D. D. 
 
 The Editor has no doubt but the subject-matter of this Volume will 
 afford abundant satisfaction to the Christian Reader. Almost every page is 
 replete both with instruction and entertainment ; and what certainly distm- 
 guishes this History through a very large portion of it, — that portion, which 
 peculiarly entitles it to the name of the History of the Church of Christ, — 
 is of such a nature as not to have found its way into our ordinary Ecclesias- 
 tical histories. The learned Reader, when he has perused this book, can 
 scarcely fail to exclaim. How little notice, in general, has been taken of the 
 genuine religious principles and practice of the bishops Grosseteste and 
 Bradwardine ! How are the very best parts of the character of Wickliff 
 almost consigned to oblivion ! What defective and erroneous notions of 
 John Huss, and Jerom of Prague, are inculcated by authors who have 
 attempted to abstract and condense the proceedings of the Council of Con- 
 stance ; and lastly, how little acquainted are even many studious and well- 
 informed persons with the religious part of the character of Martin Luther ! 
 Perhaps few men have been more exposed than this celebrated German, 
 to the extremes of calumny and panegyric. Ecclesiastical histories are 
 full, not only of discordant sentiments relative to his proceedings, but also 
 of contradictory statements of the facts. His bold and enterprising genius, 
 his firm and intrepid temper, and above all, his persevering spirit of inquiry, 
 continue to be the admiration of every Protestant; while those of the papal 
 persuasion have endeavoured to load his memory with charges, which at 
 first originated in chagrin and hatred, and have been kept alive by bigotry 
 and superstition. The infidel writers, who usually affect extraordinary 
 moderation in every thing but religious concerns, have rashly followed the 
 Papists in questioning the purity of the Reformer's motives. Nodody is 
 surprised at this. But it may well seem a wonderful, as it is truly an affect- 
 ing circumstance, that, in our enlightened times, many should be found, 
 who, though they have not only never renounced Christianity, but even 
 profess themselves sincere fiiends of the Reformation, — yet appear to 
 understand very little of the real dispositions of Luther. Some of his 
 natural qualities have been the subject of much observation ; but the ruling 
 principles of the man, those principles which were eminently spiritual and 
 christian, are almost buried in silence. 
 
 * Centuries XIII., XIV., XV., XVI., from p. 103 to p. 322, Vol. II. of this edition. 
 
12 PREFACE. 
 
 There would be little room left for controversy respecting this extra- 
 ordinary personage, if men would turn their attention to the investigation 
 of his private conduct and secret motives, and would accustom themselves 
 to estimate characters by scriptural rules. Happily, the authentic docu- 
 ments for this purpose, — though by no means so plentiful, in some of the 
 earlier years of his life, as might be wished, — are yet, in the main, suffici- 
 ently clear and numerous. They establish, beyond dispute, the singular 
 purity and disinterested integrity of Luther. And one may venture to 
 affirm, that if the refined, philosophical taste of our historians, as well as of 
 the age in which they live, would have allowed them to produce and digest 
 the unexceptionable evidence which actually exists, much juster notions 
 concerning the Saxon Reformer and his proceedings would have been enter- 
 tained by students of history, than they can now possibly deduce from 
 reading several of our best writers. The defects of their performances 
 have not arisen from the want of ability, or of industry, or of learning. 
 Such an insinuation would argue the highest degree of presumption in the 
 Editor. It is his sincere belief that several historical productions of modern 
 times might challenge, almost in any point of comparison, the most cele- 
 brated pieces of antiquity. It is to the neglect of observing, investigating, 
 and illustrating the operations of the genuine principles of the Gospel, that 
 the deficiencies here spoken of are perhaps entirely to be ascribed. The 
 Editor deprecates the charge of censorious criticism, and submits to the 
 judgment of impartial and intelligent readers for a candid construction of 
 his meaning, while, with much grief, he suggests to their consideration,^ 
 Whether some of our ablest historians have not discovered much more 
 anxiety to enumerate the various political and subordinate causes of the 
 Reformation, than to trace diligently, and mark distinctly, the powerful 
 energy of the essential doctrines of Christianity, as, through the gracious 
 assistance of the Holy Spirit of God, they efficaciously influenced the con- 
 duct of the first Reformers ? Should this question be answered in the 
 affirmative, it may then be worth while to inquire further, — Whether this 
 UNPHiLosoPHiCAL, as wcU as unchristian neglect of the operation of Gospel 
 principles on the minds of men who have been distinguished as the chief 
 instruments of Providence in bringing about important ecclesiastical revo- 
 lutions, does not arise from an acquiescence at least in the irreligious taste 
 of the times, if not from the actual contagion of modern scepticism and 
 infidelity. For in seasons of great departure from sound doctrine, when 
 men are apt to be ashamed of the "Son of Man and his words," it requires 
 much courage and piety to be an open and faithful defender of the truth. 
 Also, when the Gospel itself is perpetually assailed under the specious 
 pretence of modest doubt and inquiry, the very best disposed persons have 
 need to be constantly watchful, lest their own minds should imperceptibly 
 be infected with the hostile insinuations of artful enemies of Revelation. It 
 should seem that no writers are in this respect more dangerous, than those 
 learned and able historians of a philosophical stamp, with whom fame is 
 avowedly the motive and the reward of their labours.* 
 
 But it will be said, that the niceties of controversial divinity, are not the 
 proper province either of the polite or of the profound historian. Be it so : 
 Yet surely it must be granted, that the investigation of men's general 
 principles of conduct, must be of singular service towards discovering their 
 
 * Fame is the motive, it is the reward of our labours ; — GiBBOif, Miscell. Vol. II. 
 
PREFACE. 13 
 
 real motives in particular transactions. If, for example, in the case of Mar- 
 tin Luther, it be an undoubted fact, that during all the important scenes in 
 which he was so providentially called to be a principal actor, the peculiar 
 truths "of the Gospel Avere powerfully and practically influential on his 
 mind ; then it will follow that the motives of that great Reformer cannot be 
 explained or comprehended without specially adverting to those truths, and 
 diligendy weighing their effects in the production of human actions, accord- 
 ing to the direction of the Holy Scriptures, " By their fruits ye shall know 
 them."— A due attention to these things surely ought not to be confounded 
 with an improper or an objectionable regard to theological niceties. 
 
 Indeed, if the writers of Ecclesiastical histories have not themselves also 
 some practical, experimental knowledge of the nature of pure Christianity, 
 as well as theoretical and speculative notions concerning it, they must for 
 ever be embarrassed in contemplating the conduct of good men ; and the 
 more they aspire to what is called the philosophy of history, — that is, the 
 more they affect to develop general principles, to form abstract systems, and 
 to unfold the secret motives oC men's hearts, the worse guides will they be- 
 come to their unbiassed, unsuspecting readers, and the more likely to mis- 
 lead and prejudice their minds. 
 
 The histories of Luther and of Lutheranism are so intimately mixed with 
 secular politics, and so pregnant with revolutions of the greatest consequence 
 to kingdoms and empires, that, however little disposed the modern histo- 
 rians may have been to trace the existence of the true Church of Christ, or 
 record the effects of the operation of pure Christian principles, they have 
 found it impossible not to give considerable attention to the transactions of 
 the Saxon Reformer and his associates. In fact, the civil and religious liber- 
 ties of mankind have been found to be closely connected together in prac- 
 tice ; and it is this circumstance, which, in a great measure, has contributed 
 to the celebrity of Luther and other German theologians. 
 
 No person could have a greater esteem for Luther than the Author of this 
 History. The present volume will show how well versed he was in his 
 writings, and with how much care he had studied his character. He loved 
 him as a man of plain dealing and unfeigned piety : he admired him as a 
 champion of truth : he revered him as an instrument of God, highly honoured 
 and expressly chosen for the purpose of defending and propagating the 
 Christian faith ; and he contemplated his success with delight and astonish- 
 ment. But the more thoroughly he had penetrated the secret thoughts of 
 the Reformer, the more deeply was our Author's spirit affected on account 
 of the MANNER in which he saw the righteous views and motives of this ex- 
 cellent man transmitted to posterity by the ablest modern historians. That 
 manner, to say the best of it, he considered as extremely imperfect in ge- 
 neral, and frequently dangerous and illusory. Most of these writers ap- 
 peared to him to employ their chief strength concerning secondary causes, 
 and some of them evidently with an evil design against Christianity: 
 whereas the devout mind of the Author of this History of the Church of 
 Christ, saw the finger of God in every step of the Reformation. With 
 his favourite Luther, he altogether agreed that the real distemper of the 
 Church, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, was corruption of evan- 
 gelical DOCTRINE. It was but gradually that the Saxon Reformer saw this 
 melancholy truth ; but when his eyes were once fairly opened to the nature 
 of the evil, he never more lost sight of it; and he exerted every nerve in 
 administering the specific medicine. It grieved Mr. Joseph Milner, not a 
 Vol. I. B 
 
14 PREFACE. 
 
 little, to see how this very important matter is almost entirely overlooked 
 by historians. He considered the thing not merely as an injury done to the 
 memory of an eminent servant of God, but as an infallible symptom of the 
 decay, at least among the learned, of religious knowledge and religious 
 taste. 
 
 Unbelievers and sceptics do their utmost in every way to exclude God 
 and his Christ from being supposed to exercise any superintending influence 
 over those great events which prove favourable to the propagation and esta- 
 blishment of pure rehgion; and when, for private reasons, they do not 
 choose to speak plainly, they usually shelter themselves under equivocal 
 and ironical expressions ; and try to wound the Gospel of Jesus by depre- 
 ciating his most distinguished servants. Thus, pride, opposition, singu- 
 larity, self-interest, ambition, enthusiasm, have been insinuated to the un- 
 suspecting minds of many readers, as the ruling motives of the Saxon 
 Reformer. 
 
 The Writer, in the management of this part of his History of the Church, 
 has endeavoured to rescue the memory of Luther from unjust aspersions of 
 every kind ; and he does this, not by indecisive effusions of praise and cen- 
 sure, or of affected candour and concession, but by a scriptural display of 
 the nature of the new creature in Christ Jesus, as exemplified in the con- 
 duct of this eminent Theologian. The former method might have ensured 
 to him the commendation of modern critics, but the latter only could be ad- 
 mitted into a History which has for its single object the celebration of the 
 honour of the Divine Government, as made manifest in the conversion of 
 sinners and the extension of the kingdom of Christ. 
 
 The Reader will however observe, that his Historian is not blind either 
 to the excellencies or to the faults of liUther, considered as a natural* man. 
 But he must keep in mind, that the Writer's chief business with the Re- 
 former consisted in exhibiting the operation of his genuine Christian prin- 
 ciples. The German theologian, in the Author's views, was a distinguished 
 subject of Almighty grace, which, by enlightening his understanding, 
 changing his affections, and animating his hopes, prepared him in a most 
 wonderful manner, for the extraordinary part he was appointed to sustain. 
 When the intelligent Reader shall have perused this portion of the sixteenth 
 century, he will be a better judge of the Author's penetration, and of the 
 soundness and impartiality of his conclusions. 
 
 Mr. Joseph Milner, in his Introduction to the First Volume of this His- 
 tory, complains of the Ecclesiastical historians, " That they had developed, 
 with a studious particularity, the intricacies and intrigues of Popery; that 
 the connexion between the Church and State had afforded very ample ma- 
 terials of what is commonly called Church-history ; but that learning and 
 philosophy had been much more respected than Godliness and virtue." A 
 treatment of this sort was to be expected from Deistical historians ; but that 
 the same lamentable truth should be exemplified in the writings of those 
 who believe Christianity, and are bound to support its cause, is discouraging 
 and vexatious in the highest degree. The fact, however, is not to be denied ; 
 it is not to be denied, for example, that Luther's practical interpretation of 
 the scriptural doctrines of the salvation of mankind, as well as his argu- 
 ments against the reigning corruptions of the same doctrines, scarcely ap- 
 pear at all in modern descriptions of the reformation of the church. The 
 
 * 1 Cor. ii. 14. 
 
PREFACE. 15 
 
 Editor is at a loss to assign any other causes for the omission, than those 
 already mentioned in this Preface, namely, the contagion of the times, and 
 the actual decay of a religious taste. Men learn not only to undervalue, but ^ 
 absolutely to overlook the very existence and operation of the most precious 
 Evangelical principles. 
 
 A short quotation from an elegant, and in general, a very accurate histo- 
 rian, will serve to illustrate the preceding reflections. He informs us, 
 that "there was scarcely any opinion or practice of the Romish church, 
 which Luther endeavoured to reform, but what had been previously 
 animadverted upon by Erasmus, and had afforded him subject either of 
 censure or raillery."* 
 
 To this assertion of the incomparable historian it would not be diilicult 
 to produce very considerable exceptions, were we disposed to examine se- 
 parately those opinions and practices of the Papal system, which the rulers 
 of that establishment considered as essential to the maintenance of the ex- 
 isting domination ; but it is by no means the design of the Editor, in quoting 
 this passage, to cavil at a general assertion, which in substance has often 
 been made before, and which is true in the main, when taken in the sense 
 the writer intended it to be understood. Dr. Robertson had his eye 
 chiefly on the scandalous vices of the monks ; the intrigues, avarice, 
 and encroachments of the dignified clergy ; and many abominable impi- 
 eties and superstitions of the Romish church. And these, most certainly, 
 had often afforded to Erasmus matter for satirical animadversion or sarcas- 
 tical stricture, before they became the object of Luther's grief, indignation 
 and remonstrance. So far therefore the sentiment of the quotation is supported 
 by fact. But, neither before nor after the commencement of Luther's attack 
 on the Roman Catholic opinions and practises, did Erasmus ever concur with 
 him in the grand' article of contention. It may be admitted, that he skirmished, 
 as it were, and with great success, against many of the auxiliaries of Po- 
 pery ; but never once in his life did he look in the face what, according to 
 Luther's judgment, was the real efUcient enemy of Christ and his rehgion ; 
 never did he lay siege to the strong-holds of self-righteousness. To 
 pull down THESE with all his miglU was both the object and the practice of 
 the Saxon Reformer. Erasmus said many excellent things, in an elegant 
 Avay, concerning Christ and the Gospel, concerning piety, purity of life. Chris- 
 tian charity, meekness, and peaceable tempers. He exposed with great 
 ability, and with exquisite humour — and it may truly be added, with much 
 advantage to the Reformation — the ambition, covetousness, and luxurious 
 excesses of the clergy. Luther, who cordially agreed with him in all these 
 just animadversions, went to the root both of the Evil and of the Good. 
 The depraved nature of man, he taught as the root of the evil ; contrition 
 and humility, with a lively faith in the Redeemer, as the only cure of the 
 reigning evil, and the only source of future good. While the former 
 courted Popes and Cardinals, and temporized with them, fancying that Re- 
 formation of Ecclesiastical abuses might be brought about by mild and pruden- 
 tial management ; the latter refused to make any sinful compromises, boldly 
 opposed all Anti-christian notions of the merit of avorks, defended the im- 
 portant doctrine of justification by faith, and committed his cause to God. 
 The doctrine of justification by faith was the article, which, of all others, 
 this great man had most at heart. If that were preserved, he conceived no- 
 
 * Robertson's Charles V. B, II, p, 118. 
 
16 PREFACE. 
 
 thing could go materially wrong ; if that were lost, nothing would go right ; 
 and in no great length of lime he was convinced, that this fundamental doc- 
 trine could be established, only on the ruins of Popery. 
 
 The opinions of Erasmus and Luther on this subject were substantially 
 different, and in some important views the reverse of each other. Erasmus, 
 however, was so dexterous and wary a disputant, that it is no easy matter 
 to say precisely what his sentiments were on this leading article of faith ; 
 and to enlarge further in this place, either on the comparative excellencies or 
 defects of these two great men, so celebrated in Ecclesiastical history, would be 
 to anticipate a considerable portion of the contents of the Fourth and Fifth Vol- 
 umes. These brief observations may be sufficient to show how inconsiderately 
 our very best writers have sometimes expressed themselves concerning reli- 
 gious matters. Whether Martin Luther was, or was not, sound and rational 
 in his expositions of the leading doctrines of Christianity, makes no part of 
 the present question. The existing records demonstrate two things : first, 
 the real nature of his theological creed ; and, secondly, that his religious 
 sentiments in essential points, constituted the main spring both of his private 
 and his public conduct : and therefore the omission of so important a part 
 of Ecclesiastical information, especially by a reverend, learned, and philo- 
 sophical historian, from whatever cause it may have proceeded, is not to be 
 defended. 
 
 The quotation above mentioned, from Dr. Robertson, is but a single spe- 
 cimen of that sort of defective and erroneous representation of religious 
 characters, Avhich is to be found in numerous pages of modern histories, in 
 other respects of deservedly great reputation. However, as it was the Plan 
 of the Author of this History of the Church to illustrate the nature and effi- 
 cacy of Christian principles, throughout different ages, by the conduct of 
 good men, — those eminent servants of God, whose memories have most 
 materially suffered from the treatment here alluded to, are regarded by him 
 as having a strict claim to peculiar attention. 
 
 The Editor, in concluding, cannot but sincerely lament that the Author 
 of this History had no opportunity of rendering his own performance more 
 perfect, by revising his own manuscripts in a more finished state, exercising 
 his judgment again upon the arrangement of the materials, and applying 
 his last corrections to the composition. In that case, this volume might 
 have been presented to the public with greater confidence ; and the Editor 
 would most certainly have been freed, in various instances, from much 
 doubt, trouble and uncertainty. In supplying deficiencies, he has constantly 
 endeavoured to adhere as closely as possible to the general plan of the de- 
 ceased Historian ; ' and he requests the candid Reader, if he should be 
 disposed to censure the Fourth Volume as inferior in execution to the three 
 former, to recollect that the deprivation of the finishing hand of the Author 
 is an irreparable loss. 
 
 The Editor had once designed to distinguish the original Manuscripts 
 from every addition that has been made to them ; and this, no doubt, would 
 have been the most effectual way to secure the reputation of their Author. 
 But, he found it almost impossible to proceed upon that system ; Li many 
 instances, the sentences of Mr. Joseph Milner were left so abrupt and 
 unfinished, and the references to the authorities so general, ambiguous, and 
 indecisive, that he has often been compelled to mix, according to the best 
 of his judgment, both his own matter and expression with the original ma- 
 terials of the Historian. 
 
PREFACE. 17 
 
 In these Memoirs uncommon pains are taken with the affairs of Luther, 
 especially during the first years of the wonderful exertions of this great 
 Reformer. To furnish the Reader with solid and luminous information, 
 concerning the interesting transactions of that memorable period, and at the 
 same time to compress the narrative into a moderate compass, was no easy 
 task. — Those, who are best acquainted with the original documents of the 
 times, will be the most competent judges of the execution of this part of 
 the work. 
 
 Such as it is, — the Author, in composing it, certainly believed himself 
 to be employed in the service of his Heavenly Master ; and, in the humble 
 hope of His blessing and protection, it is now committed to the judgment 
 of candid and impartial readers. 
 
 The Fifth Volume will be crowded still more than the fourth, with sur- 
 prising and important matter. Great events rapidly succeed one another 
 during all the former part of the sixteenth century ; and great Actors appear 
 on the stage. Erasmus lived till the year 1536 ; and it pleased a kind 
 Providence to continue the inestimable lives of Luther and Melancthon some 
 years longer ; and also to raise up many other Worthies, who should con- 
 tend for Christian truth and Christian liberty with wisdom and courage. 
 On the contrary, the powers of darkness summoned all their forces in 
 determined opposition. Our Historian studiously exerts himself to mark 
 the growth of Infant-Protestantism. It was his opinion, "that no scenes, 
 since the Apostles' days, were more instructive." 
 
 [NOTA BENE TO THE EDITION OF 1810.] 
 
 To many Readers, no part of the book will, probably, be more inte- 
 resting, than the matters contained in the Appendix.-^Several things are 
 placed there, which, it is thought, might too much interrupt the thread of 
 the narrative ; and many additions are made by the Editor, from sources 
 which the Author had no opportunity of examining. It will, however, be 
 very easy for any one, as he goes through the several Chapters of the His- 
 tory, always to peruse, if he chooses, the corresponding part of the Ap- 
 pendix. 
 
 In this Second Edition, some parts of the Appendix are introduced into 
 the History ; and the whole of the very interesting account of John Wes- 
 selus of Groningen, is entirely new. The Editor had not seen the writings 
 of this eminent divine when the first edition of this volume was published. 
 
 B '2 
 
PREFACE 
 
 *T0 THE FIFTH VOLUME,* 
 
 AS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED, 
 
 BY THE REV. ISAAC MILNE R, D. D. 
 
 A FULL conviction, that in our times the principles and motives of Lu- 
 ther are not well understood, induced me to bring forward, in the preced- 
 ing Volume, a number of authentic documents, which have been either 
 entirely omitted, or imperfectly stated, by Historians. The approbation 
 Avith which my endeavours to elucidate this part of Ecclesiastical history 
 have been received, has encouraged me to spare no pains in attempting to 
 place in its true light the character of the Saxon Reformer ; and though 
 the Reader may at first be surprised that a Volume of so many pages should 
 bring down this History of the Church of Christ only to the Diet of Augs- 
 burg in 1530, I have no fear that, when he has perused the work, he will 
 think either the writer prolix, or the matter unimportant. 
 
 A mere cursory inspection of the Volume will convince^him, that every 
 Chapter contains materials which distinguish this History from all others. 
 
 In order to communicate a full and faithful exhibition of facts, the Author 
 has availed himself of all the means of information within his reach ; and 
 particularly of the curious and instructive contents of three quarto volumes 
 of the Private Letters of Luther ; two of which he in vain sought a^ter, for 
 several years, both in these Dominions and on the Continent. 
 
 The learned Dr. Mosheim, in his Compendium, refers to a long list of 
 eminent Authors, who, he says, are to be consulted, in confirmation of his 
 brief statements.! Now such an intimation appears to me, to have the 
 eflect of at once overwhelming tlie courage and resolution of any ordinary 
 student of Ecclesiastical history. 
 
 The Historian of the Church of Christ, in several instances of difficult 
 and important inquiry, cannot exactly follow any one of the numerous Au- 
 thors who have handled the points in question; and to have always detailed 
 his reasons for dissent, would have swelled the Volume too much. He 
 constantly, however, refers to the very pages where the best opinions and 
 the original records are to be found; and then leaves it to his Reader to 
 judge how far he has made legitimate use of the collective evidence. 
 And though this may not be the best way of sheltering himself from the 
 detection of erroneous judgment, or of mis-statement of facts, it certainly 
 
 * Century XYI., Vol. II. p. 322, to the end. 
 f Laur. Mosh. Historia Reform, p. 646. 
 
PREFACE. 19 
 
 contributes to the discovery of truth, by rendering future examination and 
 criticism more easy and agreeable. 
 
 Add, that a strict and continued attention to the opinions of contemporary 
 writers, and, whenever they can be procured, to original documents, re- 
 quires great labour and perseverance ; as any one may soon convince him- 
 self, who will take the trouble, only in one or two cases, to turn to the 
 numerous passages referred to in this Volume. The writer has no scruple 
 to affirm that he could have tiuished the Volume in one-fourth of the time, 
 had he contented himself with less accurate investigations ; had he ventured 
 to give general and bold representations of things, and guarded these after- 
 wards (as is often done) by sceptical concessions and plausible conjectures, 
 which, while they save the time and trouble of patient research, serve 
 rather to perplex than to unfold the truth ; and all this under great appear- 
 ances of candour and impartiality. 
 
 Tkue candour consists in forming just decisions upon evidences collected 
 with diligence and judgment. It never tempts a man to descant, with spe- 
 cious parade, on liberality and moderation, to depress or dilute virtues, to 
 lessen or palliate vices, and to say and unsay, till all manly and worthy 
 sentiments are utterly lost in a confusion of opposite or incongruous asser- 
 tions. 
 
 The modern taste, I fear, too much encourages a tendency to false can- 
 dour. 
 
 Some Authors of eminence, make no mention of their authorities ; and 
 much may be said for this practice. Perhaps it is preferable to a vague 
 and general reference. My experience entirely agrees with that of the 
 late Mr. C. J. Fox, who says, he found it one of his greatest difficulties to 
 discover the authorities upon which Historians advance their facts.* To 
 this day, notwithstanding the general reference of Dr. Mosheim, I search 
 in vain for the grounds of several of his most positive assertions. 
 
 The Preface to the Fourth Volume might supersede the necessity of 
 further remark. But as the times are awful, and as questions concerning 
 the nature of the Roman Catholic Religion are revived, it may be useful to 
 observe, that they who wish to acquire a thorough knowledge of what 
 Popery was, will do well to study carefully the history of the first twelve 
 or thirteen years of the Lutherian opposition to the established hierarchy. 
 By this PRACTICAL method, they will find the mysteries of the papacy 
 more effectually unveiled, than by any formal or theoretical description 
 of that Antichristian system. It' is by a view of our Romish Adversary's 
 conflicts with the Founders of Protestantism, that we become best ac- 
 quainted with his cruel and despotic designs, his contemptible artifices, and 
 his ridiculous superstitions. 
 
 Several persons, and even some of our leading Senators, suppose that 
 Popery has long since been abundantly meliorated. But I wish they 
 may not be nearer the truth, who think that the spirit of Protestantism 
 has sadly degenerated. Both these points may receive much illustration 
 from that part of this History which is yet unfinished. In the mean time, 
 the true nature and character of Protestantism, as well as of Popery, ought 
 to be carefully examined, and ascertained with all possible accuracy. And 
 for this purpose, the diligent study of the same memorable period, and 
 especially of the first eight years of it, namely, from 1517 to 1525, will be 
 
 • Preface, p. xviii. 
 
20 PREFACE. 
 
 found peculiarly useful. During these years, Luther stood almost alone ; 
 and the documents contained in this and the preceding Volume will leave 
 no doubt on the mind of the inquisitive Reader as to the real motives by 
 which he was actuated. Then the doctrines of Luther are well known to 
 be, in the main, the doctrines of every branch of the Protestant Reforma- 
 tion. These, with the rapidity of lightning, penetrated almost every part 
 of Europe ; became the fruitful source of various Christian institutions and 
 establishments ; and, as hitherto they were supported rather by the blood 
 of the martyrs, than the power of princes and prelates, they beautifully ex- 
 hibit the native vigour of the reviving Church of Christ.* 
 
 Doubtless, in describing thus at length the interesting scenes which im- 
 mediately led to our blessed deliverance from papal darkness and iniquity, 
 the Historian's progress through the sixteenth century is inevitably retard- 
 ed; but it should be remembered, that he is in no degree deviating from 
 the original plan of the work ; and that he is hereby laying a good founda- 
 tion for brevity, precision and perspicuity, in the continuation of the 
 History. 
 
 * Com. de Luth. Prseloq. 
 
CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 CENTURY I. 
 
 A snMMAHY VIEW OF THE CHURCH, SO FAR 
 AS IT 5IAT BE COLLECTED FROM THE 
 SCRIPTURE. 
 
 and some other 
 
 Chap. I. Jerusalem 
 
 Chap. II. Judea and Galilee - 
 
 Chap. III. Samaria 
 
 Chap. IV. Ethiopia 
 
 Chap. V. Caesarea 
 
 Chap. VI. Antioch 
 
 Asiatic Churches ... 
 
 Chap. VII. Galatia 
 
 Chap. VIII. Philippi - 
 
 Chap. IX. Thesseilonica 
 
 X. Berea and Athens - 
 
 XL Corinth ... 
 
 XII. Rome ... 
 
 XIII. Colosse . 
 
 XIV. The Seven Churches of 
 
 Chap 
 Chap 
 Chap 
 Chap, 
 Chap, 
 
 Asia 
 Chap. XV 
 
 Century 
 
 The Remainder of the first 
 
 CENTURY II. 
 
 PAGE 
 25 
 
 40 
 41 
 42 
 43 
 
 45 
 48 
 50 
 52 
 54 
 55 
 57 
 59 
 
 60 
 
 65 
 
 Chap. I. The History of Christians 
 during the reign of Trajan 
 
 Chap. II. The History of Christians 
 during the reigns of Adrian and 
 Antoninus Pius ... 
 
 Chap. III. Justin Martyr - , - 
 
 Chap. IV. The Emperor Marcus Anto- 
 ninus, and his Persecution of the 
 Christians .... 
 
 Chap. V. Martyrdom of Polycarp . 
 
 Chap. VI. The Martyrs of Lyons and 
 Vienne ..... 
 
 Chap. VII. The State of Christians 
 under the reigns of Commodus, Per. 
 tinax, and Julian — The Story of Pe- 
 regrinus ..... 
 
 Chap. VIII. Some Account of Chris- 
 tian Authors who flourished in this 
 Century ..... 
 
 Chap. IX. The Heresies and Contro- 
 versies of this Century reviewed; 
 and an idea of the State and Progress 
 of Christianity during the course of it 
 
 86 
 
 98 
 103 
 
 110 
 113 
 
 119 
 
 126 
 
 129 
 
 132 
 
 CENTURY IIL 
 
 PACK 
 
 Chap. I. Irenseus - - - - 138 
 
 Chap. IL Tertullian ... 141 
 
 Chap. III. Pantsenus - - - 145 
 
 Chap. IV. Clemens Alexandrinus - 146 
 
 Chap. V. The State of the Church du- 
 ring the reigns of Severus and Cara- 
 calla 148 
 
 Chap. VI. State of Christianity during 
 the reigns of Macrinus, Heliogabalus, 
 Alexander, Maximinus, Pupienus, 
 Gordian, and Philip - - - 157 
 
 Chap. VII. The Conversion of Cyprian 160 
 
 Chap. VIII. The beginnings of the 
 Persecution of Decius. — The Go- 
 vernment of Cyprian till his retire- 
 ment 164 
 
 Chap. IX. The History of Cyprian, 
 and of the Western Church, during 
 his retirement of two years - 166 
 
 Chap. X. Cyprian's Settlement of his 
 Church after his Return, and the 
 History of the Western Church till 
 the Persecution under Gallus - 181 
 
 Chap. XL The effects of the Perse- 
 cution of Decius in the Eastern 
 Church 187 
 
 Chap. XIL The History of the Church 
 during the reign of Gallus - - 197 
 
 Chap. XIII. The pacific part of Vale- 
 rian's reign .... 203 
 
 Chap. XIV. The last Acts and Martyr- 
 dom of Cyprian - - - 211 
 
 Chap. XV. Cyprian compared with 
 Origen 215 
 
 Chap. XVI. Other particulars of Vale- 
 rian's Persecution - - - 221 
 
 Chap. XVII. From the reign of Gallie- 
 nus to the end of the Century - 225 
 
 Chap. XVIII. Some Account of Gre- 
 gory Thaumaturgus, Theognostus, 
 and Dionysius of Rome - - 234 
 
 Chap. XIX. The further extension of 
 the Gospel in this Century - 237 
 
 Chap. XX. A short View of the exter- 
 nal State of the Church in the Third 
 Century 238 
 
 Chap. XXI. Testimonies to the Church 
 of Christ from its Enemies - - 244 
 
82 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chap. XXII. Connexion between the 
 Doctrine and Practice of Primitive 
 Christians ... 
 
 251 
 
 CENTURY IV. 
 
 Chap. I. The Persecution of Diocle- 
 
 sian ..... 256 
 
 Chap. II. A View of the State of the 
 Christian Religion on its Establish- 
 ment under Constantino - - 272 
 Chap. III. The Progress of the Avian 
 Controversy, till the Death of Con- 
 
 stantine 276 
 
 Chap. IV. The Progress of the Arian 
 Controversy during the reign of Con- 
 
 stantius 287 
 
 Chap. V. A View of Monasticism and 
 other Miscellaneous Circumstances, 
 from the Establishment of Christian- 
 ity under Constantine to the Death 
 of Constantius .... 295 
 Chap. VI. The Extension of the Gos- 
 pel, from the beginning of the Fourth 
 Century to the Death of Constan- 
 tius 298 
 
 Chap. VII. The Decline of Idolatry in 
 this Century, to the Death of Con- 
 stantius 300 
 
 Chap. VIII. Julian's Attempts to re- 
 store Idolatry .... 302 
 Chap. IX. The Church under Ju- 
 lian 308 
 
 Chap. X. The Church under Jo- 
 vian 316 
 
 Chap. XI. The Church under Valens. 
 — The Death, Character, and W^rit- 
 ings of Athanasius - - - 321 
 Chap. XII. The Church under Valen- 
 tinian. — The beginnings of Am- 
 brose 326 
 
 Chap. XIII. The Church of Christ 
 under Gratian and Theodosius, till 
 the Death of the former - .• 330 
 Chap. XIV. The Heresy of Priscillian 
 — The Conduct of Martin of Tours 
 — The Progress of Superstition - 334 
 Chap. XV. The Conduct of Ambrose 
 under the Emperor Valentinian the 
 Second, and the Persecution which 
 he endured from the Emperor's mo- 
 ther Justina .... 337 
 Chap. XVI, The Church under Theo- 
 dosius ..... 340 
 Chap. XVII. Reflections on Ecclesias- 
 tical Establishments ... 343 
 Chap. XVIII. The Private Life and 
 
 the Works of Ambrose . . 351 
 Chap. XIX. The Propagation of the 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Gospel among Barbarians ; the Pro- 
 gress of Novatianism, and of Mo- 
 
 nastieism 355 
 
 Chap. XX. Christian Authors in this 
 
 Century ..... 357 
 
 Chap. XXI. Ephraim the Syrian . 360 
 
 Chap. XXII. Hilary of Poictiers - 364 
 
 Chap. XXIII. Basil of Cssarea . 366 
 
 Chap. XXIV. Gregory Nazianzen - 369 
 
 CENTURY V. 
 
 Chap. I. John Chrysostom 
 
 Chap. II. Augustine's " Confessions" 
 abridged • . . . . 
 
 Chap. III. The Pelagian Controver- 
 sy 
 
 Chap. IV. Pelagian Documents 
 
 Chap. V. A short View of Augustine's 
 " City of God" .... 
 
 Chap. VI. Augustine's Conduct to- 
 ward the Donatists ... 
 
 Chap. VII. The rest of Augustine's 
 Works reviewed . . - 
 
 Chap. VIII. Miscellaneous Particulars 
 concerning Augustine 
 
 Chap. IX. The Theology of Augus- 
 tine 
 
 Chap. X. The Life and Works of 
 Jerom 
 
 Chap. XI. The Church of Christ in 
 the West 
 
 Chap. XII. The Church of Christ in 
 
 the East 
 
 Christian Writers of this 
 
 Chap. XIIL 
 Century 
 
 372 
 
 380 
 
 409 
 418 
 
 428 
 
 432 
 
 435 
 
 445 
 
 448 
 
 452 
 
 457 
 
 472 
 
 476 
 
 CENTURY VI. 
 
 Chap. I. The Life of Fulgentius, and 
 the State of the African Churches in 
 his time 486 
 
 Chap. II. The State of the Church in 
 other Parts of the Roman Empire 
 till the Death of Justin, including 
 the Life of Csesarius ... 489 
 
 Chap. III. State of the Church during 
 the reign of Justinian - - 491 
 
 Chap. IV. Miscellaneous Affairs, to the 
 end of the Century ... 496 
 
 Chap. V. Gregory the First, Bishop of 
 Rome ; — His Pastoral Labours - 498 
 
 Chap. VI. Gregory's Conduct toward 
 the Emperors Mauritius and Phocas 510 
 
 Chap. VII. Gregory's conduct with re- 
 spect to England - - - 514 
 
 Chap. VIII. The Works of Gregory 521 
 
 Chap. IX. Writers of this Century 524 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 23 
 
 CENTURY VII. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 526 
 
 Chap. I. The English Church 
 
 Chap. II. The Propagation of the Gos- 
 pel in Germany and its Neighbour- 
 hood 532 
 
 Chap. III. General History of the 
 Church in this Century - - 534 
 
 Chap. IV. Authors of this Century 540 
 
 CENTURY VIII. 
 
 Chap. I. Venerable Bede, the English 
 Presbyter 
 
 Chap. II. Miscellaneous Particulars 
 
 Chap. III. The Controversy on Images. 
 — The Maturity of Antichrist 
 
 Chap. IV. The Propagation of the Gos- 
 pel in this Century, including the 
 Life of Boniface, Archbishop of 
 Mentz . . - - - 
 
 Chap. V. Authors of this Century 
 
 542 
 545 
 
 547 
 
 558 
 565 
 
 CENTURY IX. 
 
 Chap. I. A general View of the State 
 
 of Religion in this Century - 569 
 
 Chap. II. The Paulicians - - 571 
 Chap. III. The Opposition made to the 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Corruptions of Popery in this Cen- 
 tury, particularly by Claudius, Bish- 
 op of Turin .... 575 
 Chap, IV. The Case of Gotteschalcus 579 
 Chap. V. The Propagation of the Gos- 
 pel in this Century - - - 581 
 
 CENTURY X. 
 
 Chap. I. A general View of the Church 
 in this Century . - - - 590 
 
 Chap. II. The Propagation of the Gos- 
 pel in this Century - - 593 
 
 Chap. III. An Apology for Christian 
 Missions 598 
 
 Chap. IV. Writers and Eminent Men 
 in this Century ... - 600 
 
 CENTURY XL 
 
 Chap. I. A general View of the Church 
 
 in this Century ... 606 
 
 Chap. II. The Opposition made to the 
 
 Errors of Popery ... 607 
 Chap. III. The Propagation of the 
 
 Gospel in this Century - - 609 
 Chap. IV. The State of the Church in 
 
 England - ... - 613 
 Chap. V. Anselm - - - 616 
 
CENTURY I. 
 
 A SUMMARY VIEW OF THE CHURCH, 
 
 SO FAR AS IT MAY BE COLLECTED FROM THE 
 
 SCRIPTURE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 JERUSALEM. 
 
 That "repentance and remission of 
 sins should be preached in the name of 
 Jesus Christ, beginning at Jerusalem,"* 
 is a passage of Scripture, which at once 
 poiats out what the Christian Religion 
 is, and where we may look for its begin- 
 ning and for its character. We are to 
 describe the rise of a dispensation the 
 most glorious to God, and the most be- 
 neficent to man. Christianitj'^ found man- 
 kind in an universal state of sin and mi- 
 sery. In Judea alone something of the 
 worship of the true God existed. The 
 forms of the Mosaic economy subsisted, 
 but were greatly obscured and corrupted 
 with Pharisaic traditions and Sadducean 
 profaneness. The ancient people of God 
 had defiled themselves with heathen pro- 
 fligacy: and, though there wanted not a 
 multitude of teachers among them, yet, 
 when He who knew what was in man, 
 saw the spiritual condition of this people, 
 "he was moved with compassion toward 
 them, because they fainted, and were as 
 sheep without a shepherd." Certainly 
 they were in possession of a degree at 
 least of moral information, though it was 
 extremely defective, and, in many points 
 of view, fundamentally erroneous. But, 
 of that knowledge which relates to re- 
 pentance and remission of sins, they were 
 totally destitute. Notwithstanding the 
 light of the Old Testament, the provision 
 of sacrifices, the declaration of so many 
 prophecies concerning the Messiah, and 
 the examples of so many holy men, who, 
 in that dark and preparatory dispensation, 
 had learned to fear God, and to believe 
 in his promises of grace, it does not ap- 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 * Luke xxiv. 47. 
 
 c 
 
 pear that the body of the Jewish nation 
 were, in their religious state, materially 
 better than the rest of the world. That 
 men needed such a change of disposition 
 as in Scripture is expressed by the term 
 ^sT^v3(a, that they must become new crea- 
 tures, and receive the forgiveness of sins 
 by faith in the sacrifice of the Lamb of 
 God, were ideas unknown in Judea: — if 
 indeed we except the dim light which 
 visited the souls of Zacharias, of Simeon, 
 of Anna, and of a few other devout per- 
 sons, who looked for redemption in Je- 
 rusalem. 
 
 Such was the dismal night, in which 
 the Sun of Righteousness made his ap- 
 pearance in the world. Scarcely in any 
 age had ignorance and wickedness a more 
 general prevalence. The history of Jo- 
 sephus evinces this. This author dwells 
 chiefly indeed on public and policical af- 
 fairs ; yet he throws a sufficient light on 
 the manners of the times, and shows, that 
 the extreme impiety and profligacy of the 
 Herodian princes, were but too faithfully 
 transcribed into the lives of their sub- 
 jects. There had been periods of Jewish 
 story more favourable to godliness: for 
 instance, the age of Joshua, of David, of 
 Ezra, and of Nehemiah. For some per- 
 sons there ever were who, at least, im- 
 plicity rested on the God of Israel, and 
 trusted in the Redeemer that was to come. 
 But the darkest season was chosen for 
 the exhibition of the Light of Life by 
 him, "who hath put the times and sea- 
 sons in his own power." 
 
 To know our own depravity and help- 
 lessness ; and, by faith in Christ, to know 
 "experimentally" the suitable and the 
 efficacious cure, is doubtless the genuine 
 secret of true piety. But wherever wick- 
 edness and profaneness have spread very 
 generally, the knowledge of these doc- 
 
26 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 trines is usually lost. Amidst a thousand 
 disputes even on religious subjects, these 
 are erased out of men's creed, — the very 
 doctrines — which alone can be the means 
 of freeing them from vice and folly. It 
 vi^as their ignorance of these things, which 
 moved the Son of God to lament the un- 
 informed condition of the Jews at that 
 time. To dwell on the history of Christ 
 himself is foreign to my design. Indeed 
 a few souls were converted during His 
 abode on earth : but the five hundred 
 brethren, who saw him all at one time 
 after his resurrection, seem to have made 
 the sum total of his disciples. And it 
 may further be observed, that all these, 
 and the eleven sincere Apostles them- 
 selves, were possessed with notions of a 
 temporal kingdom, the rock on which 
 their countrymen fatally split in their ex- 
 positions of the Scriptures relating to the 
 expected Messiah ; and that they had not 
 yet learned, with any clearness and stea- 
 diness of apprehension, to set their affec- 
 tions on things above. 
 
 And now was the critical moment, when 
 
 it pleased God to erect the first Christian 
 
 Church at Jerusalem. This 
 
 sioifof the ^^^ *^® ^""^^ ^^ ^^"^^ EFFV- 
 Spirit. ' siONs of the Spirit of God, 
 which from age to age have 
 visited the earth, since the coming of 
 Christ, and prevented it from being quite 
 overrun with ignorance and sin. It is an 
 unspeakable advantage, that we have the 
 sacred narrative to unfold this to our un- 
 derstandings. The want of such an ad- 
 vantage will appear too fully in the his- 
 tory of the succeeding effusions* of the 
 Divine Spirit. Our duty, however, is not 
 to complain, but to be thankful. If we 
 carefully attend to this first instance, it 
 will serve as a specimen, by which to try 
 other religious pha^nomena : and whether 
 they lead to genuine piety or not, may 
 generally be judged from their agree- 
 ment or disagreement with this. 
 
 Let us then observe the circumstances 
 in which this effusion of the Holy Spirit 
 
 • In the term effusion there is not here in- 
 cluded the idea of the miraculous or extraor- 
 dinary operations of the Spirit of God, but 
 only of such operations as he vouclisafes in 
 every age to his church. The pl^n of this 
 History has little connection with the former. 
 It is, however, to he remembered, that a re 
 markahle display of the Divine Grace, at some 
 particular season, is always intended bv the 
 expressions effusion of the Spirit of God, or 
 KFFUSiojf of the Divine or Holy Spirit. 
 
 was vouchsafed. As repentance and re- 
 mission of sins were leading doctrines of 
 Christ's religion, the most ample room 
 had been made for them by the completion 
 of his redemption. He had offered him- 
 self a sacrifice for the sins of men, " was 
 risen" from the dead "for our justifica- 
 tion," and in the sight of his disciples 
 was just ascended up to heaven. That 
 the Gospel, the good news for penitent 
 sinners, the good news of reconciliation 
 with God, should begin at Jerusalem, the 
 scene of so much wickedness perpetrated, 
 and of so much grace abused, was itself 
 no mean argument of the riches of Divine 
 Goodness, and was an illustrious exem- 
 plification of the grand purpose of the 
 Gospel, — to justify the ungodly, and to 
 quicken the dead. By the order of their 
 Divine Master, the Apostles remained at 
 Jerusalem, waiting for the promised Holy 
 Spirit "M'hich they had heard of him,"* 
 and abode in mutual charity, and in the 
 fervent exercise of prayer and supplica- 
 tion. What the Holy Spirit was to do 
 for them, they seemed little to under- 
 stand; if one may conjecture from their 
 last question to their Master, " Wilt thou 
 at this time restore the kingdom to Is- 
 rael V it is natural to apprehend, that they 
 were feasting their imaginations with the 
 delightful prospect of a splendid kingdom, 
 attended with all the circumstances of 
 external pomp and grandeur. Principa- 
 lities and lordships were, in their fancy, 
 soon to be assumed in the room of fisher- 
 men's nets and boats, and they pleased 
 themselves with the notion of their Mas- 
 ter's external dominion in the world. 
 Not that they were without a genuine 
 taste for something infinitely better. At 
 any rate, they afford us a useful les- 
 son; — "they continued in prayer and 
 supplication." In every age, they who 
 do so, shall doubtless understand, in 
 God's due time, what the kingdom of 
 heaven means, and find by happy experi- 
 ence that kino-dom established in their 
 own souls, even "righteousness, and 
 peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." 
 
 Matthias 
 substituted 
 
 Durinof this interesting cri- 
 
 sis, we do not find them em- 
 ployed in any other business 
 than this of prayer, except in 
 filling up the apostolical col- 
 lege of twelve, by the substitution of 
 Matthias in the room of the unhappy Ju- 
 das, who, for the love of a little gain of 
 
 in the place 
 of Judas 
 Iscariot. 
 
 * Acts i. 4. 
 
Cest. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 27 
 
 this world, had unfitted himself for the 
 riches of the next, and rendered himself 
 unworthy to partake of the marvellous 
 scene now about to be exhibited. Behold 
 then the twelve Apostles, Peter, James, 
 John, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartho- 
 lomew, Matthew, James the son of Al- 
 pheus, Simon Zeloies, Judas the brother 
 of James, and Matthias, expecting and 
 longing for the unspeakable blessings of 
 true Christianity! 
 
 The Pentecost, one of the Jewish fes- 
 tivals, was the era of the Divine Visita- 
 tion. The Apostles were all in harmony 
 assembled together; when lo! suddenly 
 there came a sound from heaven, as of a 
 rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the 
 house where they were sitting. Their 
 Master in his conference with Nicode- 
 mus,* had compared the operations of the 
 Holy Spirit to the wind, and the sound 
 from heaven on this occasion was a just 
 emblem of the power of the Divine Influ- 
 ence now commencing. And there ap- 
 peared " unto them cloven tongues like as 
 of fire, and it sat upon each of them:"f 
 Another emblem no less just, which the 
 Church of England uses in her hymn to 
 the Holy Ghost in the ordination-office, 
 
 "Thy blessed unction from above. 
 Is comfort, life, and fire of love." 
 
 In truth they now found they were "bap- 
 tized with the Holy Spirit and with 
 fire."+ And the effects in purifying their 
 hearts, in enlightening their understand- 
 ings, and in furnishing them with gifts, 
 and zeal, and boldness, hitherto unknown, 
 were very soon exhibited. They were 
 all filled with the " Holy Ghost, and be- 
 gan to speak with other tongues, as the 
 Spirit gave them utterance." Of the 
 many miraculous gifts now imparted, this 
 of tongues, at once so useful for the pro- 
 pagation of the Gospel, and so striking 
 an attestation of its truth, first displayed 
 itself to the amazement of a number of 
 Jews, out of every nation under heaven, 
 who heard these Galileans speak each in 
 his own language. There is reason to 
 believe, that, as many of them were de- 
 vout men, they had been prepared by 
 Divine Grace for the eflectual reception 
 of the Gospel, and that a considerable 
 part of the first converts were of their 
 body. 
 
 While many were expressing their ad- 
 miration at this strange event, others. 
 
 John iii. t Acts ii. :t^ Matt. iii. l\. 
 
 whom we may suppose to have been 
 chiefly the native Jews, who understood 
 not these several languages, derided the 
 Apostles as intoxicated with wine : and 
 now the zeal of Peter was stirred up to 
 preach both to those who admired, and 
 
 to those who scorned. He r. . , 
 
 "ctcr s 
 begged them to have so much discourse 
 candour, as not rashly to sup- 
 pose them to be men overcome with li- 
 quor, which the very time of the day ren- 
 dered improbable, the third hour of the 
 day, answering to our nine in the morn- 
 ing, when it should seem the Jews were 
 rarely known to be in that situation. And 
 as his audience professed a regard for the 
 sacred oracles, he pointed out to them 
 a remarkable prophecy, in the second 
 chapter of Joel, then fulfilling, namely, 
 the promise of an effusion of the Spirit 
 upon all flesh, attended with dreadful pu- 
 nishments on those who should despise 
 it : — yet that whoever, in the deep sense 
 of his sinfulness and misery, should call 
 on the name of the Lord, should be saved. 
 He then shows them how God had ful- 
 filled his own purposes in the death of 
 Jesus, at the very time when they had 
 been executing the dictates of their own 
 malice. He proceeds to testify also of 
 his resurrection, according to the testi- 
 mony of David, in Psalms xvi. and ex., in 
 both which Psalms it was evident, that 
 not David himself, but Christ, was the 
 subject of the prophecy. He openly de- 
 clares that he himself and his brethren 
 were witnesses of the resurrection of their 
 Master, that he was exalted to heaven, 
 and had received of the Father the pro- 
 mise of the Holy Ghost which he had now 
 shed forth on the Apostles, and concern- 
 ing which they now had the plain demon- 
 stration of their senses. The conclusion 
 which he draws from this chain of argii- 
 ment, supported by the mutual strength of 
 facts and prophecies, was this, — that the 
 despised person whom they had thought 
 unworthy to live, and had exposed to the 
 most painful and ignominious death, was 
 owned by the God of their fathers to be 
 the Lord and Messiah, who was the ex- 
 pectation of the Jews, and through whom 
 alone salvation was offered to sinful 
 men. 
 
 The design of the whole sermon was 
 evidently to produce conviction of sin in 
 the hearers ; and it pleased God to crown 
 it with success. Multitudes were pricked 
 in their hearts : they found themselves 
 guilty of murdering the Christ of God ; 
 
28 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. L 
 
 and so powerfully were they struck with 
 a sense of their extreme unworthiness, 
 that they found themselves also destitute 
 of all resources in themselves. They cry 
 to Peter and to the rest, "Men and hreth- 
 ren, what shall we do ]" Similar indeed 
 is the beginning of all true repentance, 
 when men find themselves really lost, 
 helpless, and willing to be led in any way 
 Avhich God shall please, because they 
 have no ability in themselves, and "there 
 is no health in them."* Peter said unto 
 them, " Repent, and be baptized every one 
 of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for 
 the remission of sins, and ye shall receive 
 the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the pro- 
 mise is unto you, and to yoxir children, 
 and to all that are afar off, even as many 
 as the Lord our God shall call. 
 
 Thus the doctrine of repentance and re- 
 mission of sins, in the name of Jesus, 
 began at Jerusalem. Thep^o- 
 Repent- pjg y^Qj-e called upon to " loath 
 
 ance, and themselves for their past in- 
 remission . . . ,, , , ■ ^ ,, 
 of sins. iquilies, ' and to give them- 
 
 selves up to God for an entire 
 renovation of soul ; and the Grace of God 
 in Christ was offered to every one of them. 
 The Apostle exhorted them all to receive 
 this grace, by believing on Jesus for the 
 remission of sins, with a submission to 
 his ordinance of baptism as an emblem of 
 washing away their sins; and he assured 
 them, that God would receive them into 
 his favour in this way : that however guil- 
 ty they were, all their sins should be par- 
 doned, as if they had never been commit- 
 ted ; and the Holy Ghost should be poured 
 on them also : for the promise of it was 
 very general; to them, to their children, 
 to the most distant lands, wherever God 
 should call men to reconciliation by Jesus 
 Christ. Thus did St. Peter convince his 
 hearers of sin, and instruct them in the 
 way of salvation. 
 
 They, whose hearts God had smitten 
 with a sense of guilt, were consoled by 
 the grace of forgiveness ; and " with many 
 other words did he testify and exhort, say- 
 ing. Save yourselves from this untoward 
 generation. Then they that gladly re- 
 ceived his word, were baptized : and the 
 same day there were added to them about 
 three thousand souls." 
 
 In this manner did the convictions and 
 consolations of the Holy Ghost attend 
 the first preaching of St. Peter. And this 
 great multitude appear to have been fully 
 
 * The Church of England Confession. 
 
 converted to Christianity : For they con- 
 tinued " steadfastly in the Apostles' doc- 
 trine and fellowship, and in breaking of 
 bread, and in prayers." 
 
 Here we see the regular appearance of 
 the first Christian Church. These men 
 were not Christians in name 
 only ; they understood and be- Q|[pfgjij,„ 
 lieved the apostolical doctrine church, 
 concerning repentance and re- 
 mission of sins in the name of Jesus 
 Christ: they continued united to the pas- 
 tors whom God had made instruments of 
 their conversion ; they received constant- 
 ly the ordinance of the Lord's Supper, in 
 which they enjoyed real communion with 
 their Saviour : and prayer was their daily 
 employment and delight. Their holy bold- 
 ness towards God, and their joyful sensa- 
 tion of forgiveness, were tempered with 
 a godly fear. Every soul was possessed 
 with this consistent mixture of holy joy 
 and fear. They had felt the pangs of 
 guilt : they had seen what a price was paid 
 for their redemption : they " rejoiced with 
 trembling," as men just escaped from the 
 pit of destruction ; and the same spirit 
 which cried, Abba, Father,* in their 
 hearts, taught them to reverence His jus- 
 tice and His holiness, to fear him, and 
 to dread sin above all other evils. And 
 though it does not appear to have been any 
 injunction of the Apostles, that they should 
 live together in a community of goods, 
 and though experience soon taught the 
 first Christians, that the general estab- 
 lishment and continuance of such a usage 
 was impracticable, yet, doubtless, this 
 practice for the present was a rare and 
 convincing instance of mutual charity, and 
 proved how soon the operations of Divine 
 Grace had loosened their minds from the 
 love of this world. They "sold their 
 goods and possessions, and parted them 
 to all men, as every man had need." In 
 this happy frame of mind they spent much 
 of their time in the temple, and in dis- 
 charging the mutual offices of social kind- 
 ness : even their bodily food was received 
 with a gladness before unknown. The 
 Grace of God gave a pleasant tincture to 
 every object with which they conversed ; 
 and while they extolled it with their 
 hearts and lips, they, as yet, found favour 
 with all the people. The natural enmity 
 of the heart against the Gospel of Christ 
 did not at 'first show itself, and the purity 
 of their lives could not but recommend 
 
 * Galatians iv. Q. 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 29 
 
 them to the esteem of others. " The Lord 
 added to the Church daily such as shouhl 
 be saved." Thus plainly St. Luke in- 
 timates WHOSE grace it was that effected 
 all this, and that his hand, in the Divine 
 Effusion here described, ought ever to be 
 acknowledged. 
 
 A miracle wrought soon after by Peter 
 and John on a lame man, a well-knov.-n 
 beggar above forty years old, gave a farther 
 attestation to their Divine authority. Pe- 
 ter was hence led to preach* to the ad- 
 mirino- multitude, the same doctrine of 
 repentance and remission, and thus he ex- 
 alted the Lord Jesus as the Holy One, 
 and the Just, and the Prince of Life, to 
 whom they had wickedly preferred even 
 a murderer, Barabbas. lie disclaims all 
 merit in himself or in his colleagues in 
 the miracle : he shows that God had glo- 
 rified his Son Jesus; and that it was 
 through faith in his name, that the act 
 had been performed. He charitably al- 
 leges their ignorance, as the only possible 
 alleviation of their guilt; and which in- 
 deed alone prevented it from being un- 
 pardonable. He exhorts them to repent- 
 ance and conversion, and lays open to 
 tlieir view the prospect, not of a tempo- 
 ral, but of a spiritual kingdom; in the 
 hope of which they were to rejoice, and 
 patiently bear the afflictions of this pre- 
 sent life : he warns them at the same time 
 of the threats denounced by Moses against 
 the despisers of the Messiah, through 
 whom alone salvation was offered to all 
 nations, though the first invitation was 
 addressed to the Jews. 
 
 The Church was now increased to five 
 
 thousand ; and the signal for persecution 
 
 was raised by the magistrates of Jerusa- 
 
 -, lem,manyof whom were Sad- 
 
 Increase J •' • X xl J 
 
 of ihe ducees, enemies to the doc- 
 
 Church, trine of a resurrection, and, in 
 truth, to every thing that had 
 any tendency to raise men's minds above 
 the world. The two Apostles were im- 
 prisoned that evening, but their examina- 
 tion was deferred till the next day. The 
 high priest, and the persons of greatest 
 authority, looked on this matter as an oc- 
 casion of sufficient consequence to require 
 the calling of a solemn court. Peter to 
 their interrogatories frankly answers, that 
 the miracle had been " wrought in the 
 name of Jesus, whom ve crucified, whom 
 God raised from the dead." He boldly 
 rebukes them for their contempt of Him, 
 
 who is the only Saviour: For "there is 
 none other name under heaven given to 
 men, whereby we must be saved." 
 
 The wisdom and boldness of two un- 
 lettered fishermen, who had been com- 
 panions of Jesus, struck the court with 
 astonishment. But finding no present op- 
 portunity of gratifying their malice, on 
 account of the splendour of the miracle, 
 they dismissed them with a strict charge 
 to be silent in future concerning the name 
 of Jesus, though the Apostles ingenuously 
 confessed their inability to comply with 
 such an order, because, " they must obey 
 God rather than men." 
 
 The Apostles returned to their compa- 
 ny,* and reporting the threats of the ma- 
 gistrates, they all, with united supplica- 
 tion, intreated the Lord to grant them 
 boldness to persevere, notwithstanding 
 the menaces of His and their enemies. 
 They were filled with the Holy Ghost, 
 and enabled to proceed with calm intre- 
 pidity. 
 
 The most perfect unanimity as yet pre- 
 vailed among the Christians; and thej' 
 not only professed to have all things com- 
 mon, but also practised the rule accord- 
 ingly with the greatest cheerfulness. Di- 
 vine Grace was largely diffused amono- 
 them. The poor lacked nothing : the rich- 
 er brethren converted their possessions 
 into money, and left the distribution of 
 the whole to the discretion of the Apos- 
 tles. And, in this liberality, Barnabas 
 of Cyprus, a Levite, who had lands of 
 his own, most probably in his native 
 country, was eminently distinguished. 
 
 It appeared very manifest, that the 
 Apostles enjoyed much more of the power 
 of Christ's religion than they had ever 
 done while their Master was with them on 
 earth. Such was the effect of the effu- 
 sion of the Spirit. We hear no more of 
 their dreams concerning a temporal king- 
 dom. The courao-e of Peter in confrontinsr 
 the magistrates, forms a perfect contrast 
 to his timidity in denying his Master. 
 Wherever the same repentance, faith, 
 hope, charity, heavenly-mindedness ap- 
 pear, THERE is true Christianity; and 
 there also the enmity of the world will be 
 excited. Of this, something has already 
 discovered itself, and more is now calling 
 for our attention, as well as something 
 much more grievous, — the detection of 
 hypocrisy in certain professors of Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 • Acts iii. 
 c2 
 
 Acts ir. 
 
30 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 The case of Judas had already prepared 
 the Church to expect the appearance of 
 tares among the wheat; and our Lord's 
 parable alluded to, had assured them of it. 
 Yet when such things occur, good men 
 are often too much surprised, and the 
 wicked unreasonably triumph. There 
 was one Ananias among the disciples, 
 whose conscience had so far been im- 
 pressed, as to respect that doctrine and 
 fellow^ship to which he had joined him- 
 self, but whose heart was never divorced 
 from the love of the world. A regard for 
 his reputation induced him to sell his pos- 
 sessions with the rest: but the_ fear of 
 poverty, and the want of faith in God, 
 disposed him to reserve part of the price, 
 while he brought the other to the Apostles. 
 Peter upbraided him with his being under 
 the influence of Satan, "in lying to the 
 Holy Ghost T' showed him that^the guilt of 
 his hypocrisy was aggravated by this con- 
 sideration, that the action was committed 
 not against man, but against God; and 
 that nothing could be said to extenuate 
 his baseness, because he was under no 
 necessity of selling his property at all, or 
 of laying it at the Apostle's feet, after he 
 had sold it. Immediately the unhappy 
 man fell down dead : and, about three 
 hours after, his wife Sapphira was made 
 a similar monument of divine justice and 
 provocation, as she had been partaker of 
 her husband's guilt. 
 
 Such a proof of the discernment of 
 spirits, and of the power of punishing hy- 
 pocrisy, resting in the governors of the 
 Church, filled all, who heard these things, 
 with awe. The Lord had now shown his 
 holiness, as well as his grace; and the 
 love of the world, the standing heresy, 
 which infects his Church in all ages, was 
 a second time punished by a signal inter- 
 position of heaven. Multitudes of both 
 sexes were added to the Church, chiefly 
 of the common people. Of the rest in- 
 deed, though some could not but entertain 
 favourable sentiments of Christianity, yet, 
 among the rich and great, none durst ha- 
 zard his character so far as to espouse 
 it.* 
 
 The Sadducees appear at this time to 
 have had the chief sway in the Jewish 
 state. These formed a licentious, world- 
 ly-minded sect; and in their 
 opinions they were the most 
 corrupt of all those which at 
 that time were maintained in 
 
 Persecu- 
 tion ol" the 
 Apostles. 
 
 Acts 
 
 Judea. The high priest and his party 
 were of this sect, and were filled with 
 indignation, to see the progress of the 
 Gospel. Their first step was to imprison 
 the Apostles, who, by night, through the 
 ministry of an angel, were set free, and 
 ordered to preach in the temple. The 
 next morning a full Sanhedrim was con- 
 vened, and the Apostles were ordered to 
 be brought into court. An angel had open- 
 ed the prison doors ; and the court was 
 astonished to find that the prisoners had 
 escaped out of prison : they were, how- 
 ever, informed, that they were preaching 
 in the temple. The favourable regard 
 of the common people obliged the Sanhe- 
 drim to use some address in conducting 
 their prisoners in a gentle manner before 
 the court. The high priest upbraids them 
 with their disobedience to the foriner in- 
 juction of silence, to whom they returned 
 their former answer, that "they ought to 
 obey God rather than men." They bore 
 witness to the resurrection of Christ, and 
 declared, that " God had exalted him with 
 his right hand to be a Prince and a Sa- 
 viour, to give repentance to Israel, and 
 forgiveness of sins," and that the "Holy 
 Ghost, Avhom God bestows on those who 
 obey him, witnessed" the same thing. 
 With such plainness did these first Chris- 
 tians lay open the real nature of the Gos- 
 pel, and exhibit it as something extremely 
 different from a mere s-ysteni of morals, 
 though it included all good morality in 
 its nature. The testimony of Jesus, the 
 forgiveness of sins through his blood, and 
 the operations of the Holy Ghost, as they 
 were doubtless the peculiarcharacteristics 
 of Christianity, so they were those things 
 which most offended the Jewish rulers, 
 and have been indeed the chief object of 
 the enmity of unconverted men in all 
 ages. 
 
 The spirit of persecution was proceed- 
 ing to exercise itself in violent counsels. 
 There was however one Gamaliel among 
 them, a Pharisee, of a sect not indeed 
 inimical to the doctrine of a resurrection, 
 and by no means so heterodox in general 
 as the Sadducees, though on the whole 
 agreeing with them in the hatred of Chris- 
 tianity. This man w^as judicious, learn- 
 ed, and respectable, and possessed much 
 worldly prudence. Beyond this no evi- 
 dence appears. Providence made an im- 
 portant use of him, at this time, to pro- 
 long twelve most valuable lives, who 
 were designed to spread the Gospel 
 throuo-h the world; and by their inspired 
 
Ceitt. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 31 
 
 writings (not one of -niiich was yet pub- 
 lished) to speak to us at this day. Ga- 
 maliel, by some authentic historical pre- 
 cedents, instructed the members of the 
 court, that persons, who rose up to pro- 
 pagate new sects, if not sent of God, 
 were soon annihilated. He wished them 
 to exercise forbearance and moderation 
 toward the Apostles, whose influence 
 would soon come to nothing, if it were 
 merely human ; if divine, to attempt its 
 destruction would be equally foolish and 
 impious. This sage advice was follow- 
 ed, and the Apostles were dismissed, but 
 not without stripes, and a severe charge 
 given them, no more to preach in the 
 name of Jesus. They ceased not how- 
 ever to "teach and preach Jesus Christ, 
 and rejoiced that they were counted wor- 
 thy to suffer shame for his name." 
 
 The Church was now much enlarged, 
 consisting partly of native, partly of for- 
 eign Jews, who used the Greek language, 
 called on that account Hellenists, or Gre- 
 cians. These supposed, that in the daily 
 supply of the poor, the Apostles had not 
 ministered equal relief to their widows, 
 as to those of the Hebrews. Men who 
 know any thing of the work of God, in 
 the visitation of his Holy Spirit, and 
 have any acquaintance with the fulness 
 of employ, which Christian ministers 
 have in great and populous cities, in 
 instructing, warning, consoling, and di- 
 recting awakened and serious minds, 
 will not wonder, if, through inadvert- 
 ance, some temporary neglects might 
 have taken place. The Apostles, how- 
 ever, with great mildness and wisdom, 
 soon regulated this affair. They inform- 
 ed the disciples, that the ministry of the 
 word of God must be attended to in the 
 first place, and must not be neglected for 
 the sake of providing for the poor. They 
 therefore advised the disciples to look 
 out for seven holy and wise men, to 
 whom this business should be commit- 
 ted. "But we," say they, "will give 
 ourselves continually to prayer, and to 
 the ministry of the word."* O that those 
 
 nur.- = ^e who call themselves their 
 Choice 01 1 T 
 
 Deacons. successors, were always dis- 
 posed in like manner! — The 
 whole multitude consented with pleasure. 
 Seven deacons were amicably elected, 
 Stephen, Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, 
 Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas, every 
 one of whom has a Grecian name, and 
 
 ♦Acts vi. 
 
 therefore may have been an Hellenist; 
 and in this easy way the first appear- 
 ances of contention were blasted in the 
 Church, and seven coadjutors were ap- 
 pointed to the Apostles, some of whom, 
 at least, were of signal service, not only 
 in temporal, but also in spiritual things. 
 So happy is it to be under the conduct of 
 the Holy Spirit, and so amiably did the 
 Love of Christ then rule in the hearts of 
 his people. Even many of the priests 
 now obeyed the Gospel, and Jerusalem 
 saw continually large accessions made to 
 the Church. 
 
 Of these deacons, Stephen was at first 
 the most distinguished. A synagogue of 
 Hellenist Jews held a contest with him, 
 the result of which filled them with such 
 vexation, that they suborned men to ac- 
 cuse him of blasphemy against Moses, 
 and against God. By this artifice, Ste- 
 phen was brought before the Sanhedrim, 
 where God threw a lustre over his coun- 
 tenance, which even his enemies could 
 not but observe. In his defence he bold- 
 ly rebuked the Jews, and showed that 
 their conduct was but too faithful a copy 
 of that of their fathers, who had treated 
 !\Ioses and the prophets with contempt, 
 and had murdered a number of those, 
 who had prophesied of the coming of the 
 Just One — of whom they had now been 
 the betrayers and murderers, while they 
 vainly gloried in the magnificence of 
 their temple, and put external services 
 in the room of genuine piety. 
 
 Thus did Stephen aim at the same point 
 with Peter, to convince his audience of 
 sin in the first place, and to leave them 
 no hope in their own right- 
 eousness. Seldom has the ^If'rtjT- 
 contrast between the spirit of gtenhen 
 the world and the Spirit of 
 God appeared more striking. "They 
 were cut to the heart, and gnashed upon 
 him with their teeth." But he, "full of 
 the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly 
 to heaven, and saw the glory of God, and 
 Jesus standing at the right hand of God," 
 and what he saw, he openly confessed. 
 Their patience was exhausted, and they 
 stoned him to death, while he was call- 
 ing upon his Divine Master, and saying, 
 "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Thus 
 firm and constant was his faith: and his 
 charity was no less conspicuous. For, 
 he kneeled down, and cried with a loud 
 voice, "Lord, lay not this sin to their 
 charge;" thus showing how entirely 
 void of malice were those very vehement 
 
32 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. L 
 
 rebukes, which he had uttered against 
 their wickedness, and which men of pu- 
 sillanimous prudence are in all ages dis- 
 posed to condemn. And when he had 
 said this he fell asleep;* — the usual 
 beautiful phrase of the New Testament, 
 to express the death of saints, and at the 
 same' time to intimate their expectation 
 of a happy resurrection. 
 
 The eloquence of a Cicero would be 
 mere feebleness on this occasion. All 
 praise is below the excellency of that 
 spirit, which shone in this first of Mar- 
 tyrs. Let it stand as an example of the 
 genuine temper of martyrdom, of real 
 faith in Christ, and of real charity to 
 men ; — and let heroes of the world, on 
 the comparison, hide their heads in con- 
 fusion. 
 
 Pontius Pilate having been disgraced, 
 Judea seems at this time to have been 
 without a procurator; and Vitellius, the 
 governor of Syria, was a man of great 
 moderation toward the Jews. In these 
 circumstances the mildness of the Ro- 
 man government was eventually the oc- 
 casion of a severe persecution to the 
 Church. The Jewish magistrates, who 
 a little before had not the power of life 
 and death, and could not murder the 
 Lord of Life without the intervention of 
 their Roman masters, were now left to 
 themselves, at least in religious concerns, 
 and Stephen was their first Christian 
 victim. He was buried with great la- 
 mentation by the Church; and a consi- 
 derable number suffered soon after his 
 decease. 
 
 A young man called Saul, an Hellen- 
 ist,! of Tarsus, a person of an active 
 ambitious spiat, who had been educated 
 at Jerusalem, under Gamaliel, and out- 
 stripped all his equals in Judaical learn- 
 ing, distinguished himself in this perse- 
 cution. He took care of the clothes of 
 the witnesses who were employed in 
 stoning Stephen,:}; and made havoc of the 
 church, entering into "every house, and 
 haling men and women, he committed 
 them to prison; and when they were pui 
 to death, he gave his voice against them." 
 In truth, the disciples seemed now to be 
 left to the rage of men disposed to show 
 them no mercy; and a superficial obser- 
 ver might have supposed, that the fate 
 
 * Acts vii. 
 
 tTliat is, one born and bied a .Tew in some 
 sountry where the Greek language was spoken. 
 ^ Acts viii. 
 
 of Theudas and Judas, mentioned by 
 Gamaliel, was about to attend the Chris- 
 tians. Men had not yet learned that the 
 " blood of the Martyrs was the seed of 
 the Church." The religious worship of 
 the disciples must, doubtless, have suf- 
 fered a grievous interruption. Indeed 
 none of them found it safe to remain at 
 Jerusalem. The Apostles alone thought 
 good to stand their ground, and, by the 
 watchful care of their God, they were 
 preserved. The Christians, dispersed 
 throughout Judea and Samaria, preached 
 the word wherever they went. And thus 
 this persecution was the first occasion of 
 the diffusion of the Gospel through vari- 
 ous regions, and what was designed to 
 annihilate it was overruled to extend it 
 exceedingly. But we shall confine our- 
 selves in this section to the Church of 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 Saul, who was all attention to the 
 work of persecution, was vexed to hear, 
 that a number of the Christians had 
 escaped to Damascus, an an- 
 cient city of Syria; and he V°"^'^r" 
 
 procured a commission irom c:„„i „„ 
 1 1 • 1 • 1 • 1 aaui, or 
 
 the high priest to bring them p^ul ■ 
 
 bound to Jerusalem. It was A. D. 36. 
 a considerable journey, but 
 religious glory was his idol. When he 
 was near to Damascus, a sudden light 
 from heaven, exceeding even that of the 
 sun,* arrested the daring zealot, and 
 struck him to the ground. At the same 
 time a voice called to him, saying, Saul, 
 vSaul, why persecutest thou me? And he 
 said, Who art thou. Lord? And the Lord 
 said, "I am Jesus, whom thou persecu- 
 test: It is hard for thee to kick against 
 the pricks." In this marvellous manner 
 did the Son of God make known his 
 truth, his majesty, and his power, to this 
 enterprising persecutor, and evince to all 
 ages, what he can do to the " praise of 
 the glory of his grace." The will of 
 Saul was broken, and for the first time 
 made submissive to God, " Lord what 
 wilt thou have me to do?" was his cry; 
 and whenever this is uttered from the 
 heart, it will not fail to bring down the 
 divine blessing. He was directed to go 
 into Damascus, where he remained three 
 days without sight and without food, yet 
 constantly employed in prayer for divine 
 grace and mercy. Thus the necessity of 
 the conviction of sin was preached to 
 him, with circumstances more extraordi- 
 
 • Acts ix. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 33 
 
 nary than those which took place upon 
 the preaching to the three thousand first 
 converts; but the spiritual instruction 
 conveyed was precisely the same. The 
 work of converting grace may vary very 
 much in non-essential circumstances, — 
 its nature never varies. The grace of 
 forgiveness by Jesus Christ would have 
 been no welcome news to this Pharisee, 
 had he still remained in the confidence 
 of his own righteousness; but now it was 
 as life from the dead. After three days, 
 by the particular direction of a vision 
 from the Lord Jesus, Ananias, a disciple 
 of Damascus, was sent to him with the 
 tidings of peace. He had heard of the 
 active malice of Saul, but was encour- 
 aged to go by a positive declaration that 
 Saul was a chosen vessel. Ananias 
 opened his commission by informing Saul, 
 that the Lord Jesus had sent him, to the 
 end that he might receive his sight, and 
 be filled with the Holy Ghost. Both 
 these effects immediately took place. 
 Ananias exhorted him to delay no longer, 
 but to " wash away his sins, calling on 
 the name of the Lord."* He was bap- 
 tized, and soon refreshed both in mind 
 and body ; and from that time the whole 
 vehemence of his natural character, and 
 the whole power of his intellectual facul- 
 ties, which were doubtless of the first 
 magnitude among men, were sanctified 
 to the service of Jesus Christ; and until 
 his death, he was enffa^ed in a course of 
 labours in the Church with unparalleled 
 success. For this is he who is common- 
 ly known by the name of St. Paul, and 
 "his memorial is blessed for ever." He 
 was particularly commissioned to preach 
 to the Gentiles ; and of all the Apostles 
 he seems to have entered with the great- 
 est penetration into the nature of Chris- 
 tianity. Salvation by grace through faith 
 was his darling theme, a doctrine diame- 
 trically opposite to the self-righteous 
 scheme in which he had been wont to 
 glory. His countrymen, the Jews, were 
 particularly fierce in opposing this grand 
 article of the Gospel, and were stung to 
 the quick when attacked by their once 
 favourite champion. No doubt he had 
 been sincere in his religion formerly ; yet 
 is he far from exculpating himself on 
 this account. On the contrary, he mag- 
 nifies the grace of the Lord Jesus, as 
 extended to him, a blasphemer, a perse- 
 cutor, injurious, and the chief of sinners,")" 
 
 * Acts xxii. 16. 
 
 1 1 Tim. i. 
 
 in whom the long-sufFerino- of the Lord 
 had been exhibited, "for a pattern to 
 them who shall hereafter believe on him 
 to live everlasting:" — that mankind may 
 know, that God accepts sinners on Christ's 
 account alone, and through faith in his 
 blood ; and that nothing can be more con- 
 trary to the whole design of the Gospel, 
 than to seek salvation by our own works 
 of any kind. He seems ever after to 
 have lamented deeply the miserable state 
 of his countrymen, who " had a zeal for 
 God, but not according to knowledge."* 
 He pitied their self-righteous notions : he 
 knew by his own experience how deceit- 
 ful such notions were to those, who were 
 under the power of them: and, while he 
 rejoiced on account of that grace which 
 had redeemed himself from hell, he com- 
 miserated those, who were fast advanc- 
 ing thither in fearless presumption. In 
 the third chapter of the Philippians, he 
 gives us a very particular view of him- 
 self. To trust in any thing for salvation, 
 except Christ alone, is with him "to 
 have confidence in the flesh." No man 
 appeared once to have had more just pre- 
 tensions to such confidence than himself. 
 His regular circumcision on the eighth 
 day, Hebrew descent, Pharisaic strict- 
 ness, zealous Judaism, and blameless 
 morals, seemed to exalt him above the 
 common level of his countrymen : but he 
 declares that he "reckoned all these 
 thinjjs as dunof, that he mi^ht win 
 Christ;" and in him alone he desires to 
 be found, without his own righteousness 
 to trust in ; and he maintains the settled 
 determination of his soul in this article of 
 justification. Were it not for the per- 
 verse blindness of fallen nature, one 
 might be astonished to find many persons 
 of learnincr and o-ood sense, after reading 
 this account of the Apostle by himself, 
 still endeavouring to represent him as 
 mixing grace and works in the subject of 
 justification, and describing him as only 
 excludino- ceremonial works from the of- 
 fice of justifying a sinner. But to pro- 
 ceed : 
 
 Having preached Christ for three years 
 abroad, he went up to Jerusalem. Here 
 he attempted tojoinhimselfto the Church, 
 but the remembrance of what he had been, 
 and the very imperfect account which they 
 had received of what he then was, pre- 
 vented the Christians from receiving him, 
 till Barnabas brought him to the Apostles 
 
 * Rom. X. 
 
34 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 (two of them only, Peter and James* the 
 Lord's brother) and informed them of his 
 genuine conversion. This cleared up all 
 doubts; and he was now engaged in the 
 work of the ministry at Jerusalem, and 
 wonld gladly have remained there, but 
 the Lord, by a vision, assured him, that 
 the Jews would not receive his testimony : 
 and that the great scene of his labours 
 was to be among the Gentiles. 
 
 In fact, some address was needful in 
 his brethren to save his life from the rage 
 of the Jews, and he was conducted to his 
 native city of Tarsus. By this time, how- 
 ever, the fury of persecution subsided : 
 the Lord gave rest to his Church: and 
 the disciples both at Jerusalem and else- 
 where, walked in the very best manner, 
 in which they can walk on this side hea- 
 ven, "in the fear of the Lord, and in the 
 comfort of the Holy Ghost." Where 
 these go together, excesses of all sorts 
 are prevented; and inward jny and out- 
 ward obedience conspire to demonstrate, 
 that there Christ reigns indeed. 
 
 Yet so slow are men to receive new 
 divine truths, especially those which mili- 
 tate against old prejudices, that the Chris- 
 tians of Jerusalem contended with Peter 
 on account of his intercourse with the 
 Gentiles of Caesarea. The fierceness of 
 Peter's natural character was now abated ; 
 with great meekness he reasoned ou the 
 case with his bigoted brethren, and con- 
 vinced them, by the evident proofs of 
 the grace of God being vouchsafed to 
 Gentiles, that it was lawful to have com- 
 munion with them.f They glorified God, 
 saying, "Then hath God also to the Gen- 
 tiles granted repentance to life." Unut- 
 terable grace indeed to us, confessed at 
 length and owned by our elder brethren 
 the Jews ! David had just reason to say, 
 "Let me fall into the hand of the Lord, 
 for his mercies are great, and let me not 
 fall into the hand of man.":j: Even a 
 converted Jew, admits with difficulty, that 
 the grace of God may visit a Gentile! 
 
 The visits of Paul to Jerusalem seem 
 to have been but short. The body of the 
 Jewish nation sought his destruction; and 
 his Gentile connections and very reserved 
 practice of Mosaical ceremonies, rendered 
 him no peculiar favourite in the mother- 
 church, though they "could not but glori- 
 fy the grace of God which was in him."§ 
 
 But the Church is not perfect on earth. 
 His next return to Jerusalem was, how- 
 ever, of a popular kind, namely, to convey 
 ihe alms of Gentile converts to the Jewish 
 Christians oppressed by a " famine, which 
 came to pass in the days of Claudius 
 Caesar."* His companion to Jerusalem 
 was Barnabas, whose liberality in the be- 
 ginning had been so eminent. This ser- 
 vice being discharged, they both returned 
 to minister to the Gentiles. 
 
 The civil power of Judea was now in 
 the hands of Herod Agrippa, a great fa- 
 vourite of the Roman emperor, a person 
 of considerable talents, and full of that 
 specious virtue, which, in secular annals, 
 would entitle him to great renown. In 
 the church of Christ he stands a persecu- 
 tor, and his virtues e-re, in the strong but 
 justlanguage of Augustine, fsplendid sins. 
 Yet his persecution was not the effect of 
 a cruel temper. Had the Jews regarded 
 Christianity with a favourable eye, he, 
 at least, would have protected it. But 
 long before this time the general favour of 
 the common people toward the Christians 
 had been dissipated by the active malice 
 of the rulers, and Christ was found to have 
 no lasting friends, but those Avhom he 
 made so by effectual grace. The first 
 victim of this political persecution was 
 James the son of Zebedee : he was slain 
 with the sword, the first of the Apostles, 
 who departed from tlve Church below, to 
 join that which is above. 
 
 Finding that the act was popular, He- 
 rod attempted to dispatch Peter also.:^ 
 But God had reserved him for more ser- 
 vices; and yet, in all appearance, there 
 was no hope of his preservation. He was 
 imprisoned, and strictly guarded, with a 
 view, after the passover, when the con- 
 course of Jews at Jerusalem was very 
 large, to have him publicly executed. 
 The king was pleased with the idea of in- 
 gratiating himself with his subjects; but 
 the Church has arms which men of the 
 the world understand not, and they were 
 vigorously used on this occasion. 
 
 A spirit of earnest persevering prayer 
 was poured on the Church of Jerusa- 
 lem. The Lord delayed to answer till 
 the critical moment; — a method not un- 
 common of exercising the faith, and zeal, 
 and patience of his people. By the mi- 
 raculous interposition of an angel, Peter, 
 the niffht before his intended execution. 
 
 • Gal. i. 18, 19. 
 t Acts xi. 
 § Gal. i. ult. 
 
 Acts ix. 27. 
 
 ^ 2 Sam. xxiv. 14. 
 
 * Acts xi. toward the end. 
 
 t Spleiulida peccata. ^ Acts xii 
 
CSHT. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 35 
 
 was delivered from prison. At first he 
 imag-ined that to be done in a vision, 
 which was a reality. At length being 
 fully come to himself, and reflecting on 
 what the Lord had done, he came to the 
 house of Mary the mother of John Mark, 
 a woman of eminent piety and of some 
 opulence, where many Christians were 
 gathered together in the religious employ- 
 ment of prayer. Those only, who know 
 what the spirit of prayer is, can conceive 
 tlie vehemence of wrestling, which then 
 eno-asred Christian hearts. The scene 
 which followed was at once most aston- 
 ishing and most pleasing. They hear a 
 person knocking at the door; a young 
 woman named Rhoda comes to hearken ; 
 she knows Peter's voice; joy prevents 
 her from opening the gate ; she returns to 
 inform the supplicants, that Peter stood 
 before it ; they are induced to suspect her 
 of insanity, rather than to believe that their 
 prayers were heard ; so slow are even the 
 best to believe the goodness of God. She 
 perseveres in her first assertion ; it must 
 then, say they, be his angel.* Peter con- 
 tinues knocking; they open at length; 
 they behold him, and are astonished. 
 Having waved his hand, and brought them 
 to silence, he informs them of the Lord's 
 wonderful interposition in his favour. Go, 
 says he, and show these things to James, 
 and the brethren. James, who was the 
 Lord's brother, with himself and John had 
 the greatest concern in the government 
 of the mother Churchf at that time. Pe- 
 ter retires then to a place of concealment. 
 Little did Herod apprehend that his own 
 death should precede that of his prisoner. 
 On a public occasion, in which 
 he appeared in great splen- 
 dour, he delivered an oration, 
 so pleasing to his audience, 
 that they shouted, "It is the voice of a 
 god, and not of a man." That moment he 
 was smitten with an incurable disease by 
 an angel, because he "gave not God the 
 glory." That pride and ambition, which 
 had gained him the character of a patriot, 
 orator, and statesman, were punished with 
 death by Him, who "seeth not as man 
 seeth;" and he fell a warning to princes, 
 not to seek glory in opposition to God. 
 
 The next memorable circumstance in 
 the history of the mother-church will 
 
 * The idea of the ministry ofangels among 
 men was popular rviih the Jews ; j)ossiljly 
 
 First 
 Christian 
 Council : 
 A. D. 52. 
 
 Death of 
 Herod : 
 A. D. 44. 
 
 deserve our particular atten- 
 tion. This was the first Chris- 
 tian council. The controversy 
 which occasioned it, involved 
 a subject of vast consequence 
 in real religion. 
 
 *About twenty years had elapsed since 
 the effusion of the Spirit had commenced ; 
 a period of time in which, even in the 
 midst of one of the most wicked nations 
 in the world, in Jerusalem and in its neigh- 
 bourhood, God had erected his kingdom 
 in the hearts of thousands who had lived 
 in great unanimity and charity, "keeping 
 the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace," 
 conscious of their Divine Master's spiritu- 
 al presence, and rejoicing in the hope of 
 his second coming to complete their fe- 
 licity. In his strength, they had sustain- 
 ed, with much patience, two very severe 
 persecutions, in the former of which a 
 Deacon, in the second an Apostle, had 
 sealed the truth with their blood. In an 
 earlier part of this period their holy har- 
 mony had been a little interrupted by a 
 secular contention, but this was soon com- 
 posed. The time was not yet arrived, 
 when those, who called themselves Chris- 
 tians, could so much forget the dignity of 
 their profession, as to contend passionate- 
 ly for worldly things. The present con- 
 troversy had a more intimate connexion 
 with the Christian religion itself, and 
 therefore seemed more likely to disturb the 
 union of men, with whom spiritual objects 
 were the chief ground of concern. The 
 Jews were strongly attached to their own 
 religious national peculiarities. Under 
 the influence of pride, envy, and other 
 evil passions, this disposition supported 
 the spirit of self-righteousness. Nothing 
 could be more contrary to the genius of 
 the Gospel than the attempt of some 
 Christian Jews, who endeavoured to in- 
 fuse into the Gentile converts an idea of 
 the necessity of circumcision, and of obe- 
 dience to the whole of the Mosaic cere- 
 monial, in order to salvation. Some of 
 the Pharisees themselves were now real 
 Christians, but they were displeased to 
 see and hear of so many Gentiles admit- 
 
 these good men miglit carry it too far 
 pretend not to settle the point, 
 t Gal. ii.9. 
 
 but I 
 
 * I once for ail observe here, that the nice- 
 lies of Chronology make no part of my study 
 in this Work. Yet I sliall endeavour to attend 
 so much to historical connexion, as to be gen- 
 erally right wiiliin a few years. This seems 
 sufficient for my purpose ; and whoever at- 
 tends to the second and third chapters to the 
 Galatians will see, that 1 cannot err much ia 
 this instance. 
 
36 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 ted into the Christian Church, and re- 
 garded by the Apostles as on an equal 
 footing with themselves in the favour of 
 God. Thus were their minds darkened 
 with respect to the article of justification; 
 and, before they were aware, by thus in- 
 sisting on the necessity of circumcision, 
 they practically averred, that the grace of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ was not sufficient 
 for man's salvation; that the favour of 
 God was to be purchased by human works, 
 in part at least; and that their ritual ob- 
 servances contributed to their acceptance 
 with God. 
 
 This was the first time that the natural 
 pride and ignorance of the human heart, 
 disguised under the pretence of religious 
 zeal, attempted to undermine the simpli- 
 city of the faith, by which hitherto Chris- 
 tians had rested with complacency on 
 Jesus alone, had enjoyed peace of con- 
 science, and had been constrained to obe- 
 dience by love. The Apostles Paul and 
 Barnabas looked on the growing evil with 
 a jealous eye, and after no small fruitless 
 altercation with the zealots, thought it 
 better to refer the full consideration of the 
 question to a council of Apostles and El- 
 ders at Jerusalem. And now Paul re- 
 turned to Jerusalem the third time since 
 his conversion, and about seventeen years 
 after it; and, in his progress with Barna- 
 bas, reported the conversion of the Gen- 
 tiles, which gave great joy to the Chris- 
 tian Jews in general. 
 
 At the Council, Peter, who had return- 
 ed to Jerusalem, and since Agrippa's 
 death was no longer molested, opened the 
 debate by observing, that a considerable 
 time ago, God had selected him to preach 
 to the Gentiles, and had blessed his la- 
 bours with unequivocal success, in puri- 
 fying their hearts by faith, and in dis- 
 pensing the Holy Ghost among them, no 
 less than on the Jews. After God him- 
 self had thus decided, he said it appeared 
 presumptuous in any person to impose a 
 yoke on the Gentiles, from which the Di- 
 vine Indulgence had exempted them. He 
 insisted that the yoke itself, especially 
 when laid on the conscience as necessary 
 to salvation, was intolerable . and he con- 
 cluded, that even they, who still, for cha- 
 ritable and prudential reasons, persisted 
 in the ritual observances, were yet obliged 
 to repose for salvation only on the " grace 
 of the Lord Jesus Christ," as well as 
 these Gentiles, who never had observed 
 them at all. This full testimony of Peter 
 was supported by Paul and Barnabas, 
 
 who gave ample proof of the Divine Grace 
 vouchsafed to -the Gentiles. James, who 
 seems to have been the standing pastor 
 of Jerusalem, confirmed the same argu- 
 ment, by the prophets of the Old Testa- 
 ment, agreeably to Peter's declaration of 
 the mercy of God in visiting the Gentiles. 
 He gave his opinion, that the Gentiles 
 should no longer be molested with notions 
 subversive of the grace of God, and tend- 
 ing to teach them dependence on human 
 works instead of the atonement of Christ 
 for salvation. Only he recommended, 
 that the Council should direct them to 
 abstain from the pollutions of idols, and 
 from fornication, and from things stran- 
 gled, and from blood.* For the number 
 of Jews dispersed through Gentile cities, 
 who heard Moses read every Sabbath- 
 day, required these precautions. 
 
 A letter was sent according to these 
 views; nor does it appear that there was 
 one dissenting voice in the Council. It 
 is remarkable, that the synod used this 
 striking expression of censure against the 
 zealots, they "troubled you with words, 
 subverting your souls." Certainly the 
 charitable Apostles would not so strongly 
 have rebuked a trifling error. Nor is 
 there, I think, any other method of under- 
 standing this aright, but on the principle 
 already stated, that the harm did not con- 
 sist in practising these ceremonies, though 
 virtually abrogated by the death of Christ. 
 For these were practised by the Apostles 
 themselves, constantly by such as lived 
 in Judea, and occasionally by the rest. 
 The real fault was the depending upon 
 them for salvation, in opposition to the 
 grace of Christ. Here the Apostles knew 
 it behoved them to be jealous, that God 
 might be glorified, and souls comforted: 
 and the joy, and consolation, and esta- 
 blishment in the faith, j which ensued 
 amongst the Gentiles, confirms this in- 
 terpretation. 
 
 It is to be feared, that the Church of 
 Jerusalem received not all the benefit, 
 which was to be wished from the wisdom 
 and charity of the Council, though it 
 
 * Though an idol was nothing, and what 
 was offered to it was nothing, yet St. Paul has 
 given solid reasons wiiy Christians should ab- 
 stain from such meats. Fornication was a 
 sin, concerning the evil of which the heathen 
 converts miglit be, he apprehended, as yet un- 
 informed ; and to abstain from tilings stran- 
 gled, and from blood, was necessary, in order 
 to have anv intercourse with Jews. 
 
 t Acts XV. 31. andxvi. 5. 
 
Ceht. I.] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 37 
 
 doubtless would be of service to many. 
 But its most wholesome effects were felt 
 among the Gentiles. The account, which 
 we have in the Epistle to the Galatians, 
 leads us to suspect that the self-righteous 
 spirit had a very deep influence among 
 some members of the Church at Jerusa- 
 lem. The Apostle Paul was obliged to 
 exercise a particular caution among them, 
 and to confer in private with the pillars 
 of the Church, lest he should give um- 
 brage to the Jewish Christians, and injure 
 his own usefulness among his country- 
 men.* In this he acted with equal pru- 
 dence and charity: yet nothing could in- 
 duce him to act inconsistently with the 
 faith. To press the Gentile converts to 
 Jewish conformity, appeared to him in 
 this light, as no reasons but those of 
 peace, charity, and prudential expediency, 
 could be pleaded for the continuance of 
 such observances, even among Jews : and 
 therefore amono- Gentiles, who never had 
 been under the yoke, no other construc- 
 tion could, be put on the practice, than 
 that it was necessary to salvation, and 
 that the primary doctrine of the Cliristian 
 religion, the sufficiency of the blood of 
 Christ for pardon of sin, was disbelieved. 
 The same Apostle therefore, who, on 
 another occasion circumcised Timothyf 
 because of the Jews in the neighbourhood, 
 he being by the mother's side of Hebrew 
 extraction, now insisted, that Titus, a 
 perfect Gentile, should not be circum- 
 cised,:}: because of false brethren, who 
 had craftily introduced themselves among 
 the Christians, with a view to undermine 
 their dependence on Jesus, and to draw 
 them back to the self-righteousness of 
 Judaism. The liberty of Christ was what 
 he was zealous to support; and he would 
 not, for an hour, allow any self-righteous 
 mixtures, "that the truth of the Gospel 
 might continue with them;" an expres- 
 sion, which throws farther light on the 
 controversy we have reviewed ; and shows 
 distinctly, that not circumcision itself, 
 but the dependence on it for salvation in 
 the room of Christ, was the great object 
 of the Apostle's opposition. 
 
 He had hitherto found, to his satisfac- 
 tion, that all his brethren of the Apostolic 
 college had heartily concurred in check- 
 ing the progress of self- righteousness. 
 But a lamentable instance of human im- 
 becility soon appeared. Peter, after hay- 
 
 * Gal. ii. 
 ;t Gal. ii. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 t Acts xvi. 5» 
 
 D 
 
 ing* taken a social meal with some Gen- 
 tile converts, afterwards withdrew from 
 their company, on the arrival of certain 
 Jewish zealots, who came to him from 
 James: and thus, for fear of their cen- 
 sure, he durst not keep company with 
 men, whose fellowship he yet inwardly 
 reverenced, and expected to enjoy in hea- 
 ven. An error committed by a respecta- 
 ble character is infectious. Other Jews 
 dissembled in a similar way: — even Bar- 
 nabas was carried away with their dis- 
 simulation, and the truth of the Gospel 
 was in danger of being forsaken on the 
 authority of those, who had hitherto up- 
 held its standard in the world. Such in- 
 firmities of the wise and good prove, be- 
 yond doubt, to whom alone we are obliged 
 for the preservation of Christian trutii in 
 the earth. The Lord roused the spirit of 
 Paul on the occasion : he vindicated the 
 truth of the Gospel by an open and manly 
 rebuke of Peter: and thus a seasonable 
 check was put to the growing torrent of 
 Pharisaism, — that dark but deadly foe of 
 the Gospel, — which, in one form or an- 
 other, is ever ready to cloud the light oi 
 truth, and to sap the foundation of Chris- 
 tian peace and life. 
 
 St. Paul's fourth visit to Jerusalem is 
 but just mentioned in Scripture. j" His 
 fifth was attended with more memorabLe 
 events. It was seen by the spirit ot 
 prophecy, that he would undergo bitter 
 persecution from the infidel Jews; and 
 the guarded kindness with which he was 
 received by many, even of the believers 
 there, formed no pleasing inducement to 
 him to repeat hia visits. But divine 
 charity prevailed in St. Paul's mind over 
 all objections, difficulties, and dangers: 
 he rebuked his friends at Caesarea, who 
 dissuaded him from prosecuting his jour- 
 ney, by professing his readiness "not 
 only to be bound, but also to die at Jeru- 
 salem, for the name of the Lord Jesus. ":{: 
 His resignation silenced them : they said, 
 "the will of the Lord be done." On his 
 arrival he went to James, and in tha 
 presence of all the elders, recounted the 
 work of God among the Gentiles. They 
 glorified the Lord, and rejoiced sincerely 
 on the account: but at the same time 
 they expressed what concern it gave 
 them, to find how jealous of Paul the 
 brethren were, having heard a false re- 
 port of his teaching all the Jews to for- 
 
 * Gal. ii. 12. 
 t Acts sxi.13. 
 
 t Acts xviii. 22. 
 
38 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Paul and 
 
 James 
 agree in 
 sentiment. 
 
 sake the Mosaic observances. Doubtless 
 he had not done this : but, he liad done 
 what displeased the Jewish zealots: he 
 had insisted on the exemption of Gentiles 
 from the yoke; and men, once out of 
 humour, are disposed to hearken to ma- 
 levolent exaggerations. In this exigency 
 the advice of James was at the same 
 time prudent and charitable, namely, that 
 he should join with four men, who were 
 bound by a Nazarite vow, in the custo- 
 mary services of the temple, till a sacri- 
 fice should be offered for each of them. 
 With this Paul concurred ; and thus he 
 gave the clearest proof that he was ready 
 to conform both to Jew and Gentile in 
 things indifferent, with a view to pro- 
 mote the salvation of men. A few re- 
 marks, suggested by these transactions, 
 shall close this chapter. 
 
 1. We see here that really there was 
 no difference of sentiment be- 
 tween Paul and James in re- 
 ligious opinions, as from a 
 few expressions in the epis 
 tie of the latter,* some are 
 
 glad to insinuate. These two Apostles, 
 and indeed the whole college, were per- 
 fectly agreed in their views of the nature 
 of the Gospel. 
 
 2. In Peter there evidently was, in one 
 instance, a duplicity of conduct with re- 
 spect to the Mosaic rites, — in Paul a 
 steady uniformity. He lived as a Jew 
 himself: vows, synagogue-worship, and 
 the various rites of the law he observed, 
 not even sacrifices excepted, on occasion. 
 He could not indeed look on them now 
 in any other light than as branches of a 
 human establishment; since the death of 
 Christ had annulled their divine authori- 
 ty. The establishment itself he knew 
 was soon to cease by the destruction of 
 Jerusalem. To him and to the rest of 
 the Apostles it appeared more charitable, 
 to submit to the inconveniences of con- 
 formity, than to irritate the whole body of 
 the Jews on account of circumstantials. 
 On this ground pious men in all ages 
 have acted, and those, who have most 
 excelled in Christian fruitfulness, have 
 been most remarkable for their candour. 
 At the same time the inflexible firmness 
 of Paul in vindicating the doctrine of 
 justification, by allowing on no account 
 the circumcision of Gentiles, informs us 
 where he laid the stress for salvation 
 This union of candour and firmness 
 
 the same person, acting variously in op- 
 posite circumstances, has led some wri- 
 ters to accuse him of inconsistency, 
 who seem not to have understood the 
 principles of the controversy. This was 
 the case of Jerom of old. His controver- 
 sy with Augustine on the subject is yet 
 extant in the epistle of the latter, whose 
 statement of the affair I think perfectly 
 just; and it is agreeable to the views in 
 which the conduct of the Apostle has now 
 been exhibited. 
 
 3. We see here how infinitely impor- 
 tant is the doctrine of justification! What 
 excellent fruits it had brought forth* in 
 the Jewish Church, now consisting of 
 many thousands, has been shown. It 
 appears how naturally the human heart 
 departs from the faith of Christ, before 
 it is aware. The penetrating and zeal- 
 ous spirit of Paul was employed by the 
 divine goodness to uphold still the stand- 
 ard of truth. Many, no doubt, received 
 benefit from his example; but the glory 
 of this Church was now on the decline. 
 
 4. The evil of bigotry is no less evi- 
 dent; and how naturally it connects itself 
 with self-righteousness is also sufficient- 
 ly apparent. An eager stress laid on any 
 rite, or form, or external work whatever, 
 easily thus degenerates. Steadfastness 
 in the faith, and candour, and charity, are, 
 under God, our preservatives against it. 
 
 There was little opportunity of trying 
 on the minds of Christians, the effect of 
 the charitable scheme, concerted between 
 the two Apostles, because before the 
 seven days were expired, the malice of 
 the infidel Jews broke out against Paul. 
 vSt. Luke's narrative, from the twenty- 
 first chapter to the end of his history, is 
 spent on the consequences of this. The 
 cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and 
 piety of the Apostle Paul : the convinc- 
 ing force of his reasoning, which caused 
 Felix to tremble, and Agrippa to confess 
 himself almost a Christian : his preser- 
 vation from Jewish malice by the privi- 
 lege of Roman citizenship : 
 the perils he underwent by 
 sea and land, till he arrived 
 a prisoner at Rome, and his 
 labours for two years in the 
 ministry among them who 
 visited him in his imprison- 
 ment: these things are so cir- 
 cumstantially, and, I may justly add, so 
 beautifully related by the sacred writer. 
 
 in 
 
 Paul was 
 sent in 
 bonds 
 from 
 Sidon by 
 sea : 
 
 A. D. 62. 
 
 * James ii., latter part. 
 
 * Acts xxi. 20. 
 
Cent. L] 
 
 OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 39 
 
 that I shall refer my reader to him alto- 
 gether, especially as neither the history 
 of the mother-church, nor of any other 
 particular churches, is connected with 
 the account. 
 
 The malice of the Jews having failed 
 of its object in Paul', by his appeal to 
 Caesar, would gladly have gratified itself 
 on James. But he, though no Roman 
 citizen, was shielded a little longer by 
 the lenity of the Roman government.* 
 His long residence at Jerusalem, where 
 he was stationary for the most part, had 
 given him an opportunity, by a blameless 
 life, to abate the prejudice of his unbe- 
 lieving countrymen, and to extort the 
 
 A. D. 60. 
 
 tribute of praise from the pop 
 ulace in general. About the 
 year of our Lord sixty, he wrote his 
 Catholic epistle. It is addressed to Jews 
 in general ; sometimes he speaks to Chris- 
 tians, sometimes to infidels, like a person 
 well known, and of considerable inilu- 
 ence among both. The covetousness, 
 inhumanity, and persecuting spirit of the 
 nation are described in strong colours; 
 and he writes like one who foresees the 
 speedy desolation which was to overtake 
 them. By the practical turn of his doc- 
 trine, by his descanting on the vices of 
 the tongue, f of partiality to the rich, and 
 of contemptuous treatment of the poor in 
 Christian assemblies,:): and by his direc- 
 tion against vain swearing,§ it is but too 
 evident, that the Church had considera- 
 bly declined from its original purity and 
 simplicity ; and that the crafts of Satan, 
 aided ever by human depravity, were 
 wearing out apace the precious fruits of 
 that effusion of the Spirit, which has 
 been described. Such is the common 
 course of things in all similar cases, 
 within the like period of about thirty 
 years. The Lord had not however for- 
 saken his Church; though its members 
 were in a persecuted state, and were 
 brought before Jewish magistrates, || and 
 vexed, so far as the rage of this infatuat- 
 ed nation had power to exert itself. He 
 particularly exhorts them to patience un- 
 der their trials, and a resignation to the 
 Divine Will. 
 
 About the same time, or a little after, 
 this Church was favoured with the Epis- 
 
 tle to the Hebrews, which seems to have 
 been written by St. Paul.* 
 
 As apostasy, partly through the fash- 
 ionable and natural evil of self-righteous- 
 ness, and partly through the cruelty of 
 persecution, was the great mischief to be 
 feared among them, he directs them par- 
 ticularly to maintain the Christian faith. 
 St. Paul, in this Epistle, largely and dis- 
 tinctly shows the accomplishment of all 
 the Mosaic types in Jesus. His priest- 
 hood, sacrifice, and intercession, are am- 
 ply described. The privileges and bene- 
 fits of his salvation are distinctly stated. 
 He exhorts them to constancy in the 
 simple faith of Christ. He urges them 
 to persevere in supporting their Christian 
 assemblies, from which somef had de- 
 clined, probably through fear of persecu- 
 tion. He reminds them of the severities 
 they had patiently undergone after their 
 first illumination, of the compassion 
 which his sufferino-s had excited among 
 them, and of the cheerfulness with which 
 they had sustained the spoiling of their 
 goods, from the confidence they "had of 
 havino- in heaven a better and enduring: 
 substance." The whole turn of his ex- 
 hortation shows, that they were in a 
 state of grievous molestation at the time 
 of writing this Epistle. And yet from 
 their dulness in divine things, which he 
 so warmly censures,^ it is certain their 
 spiritual taste had declined. The perse- 
 cution of St. Paul at Jerusalem probably 
 excited a general hostility against the 
 Church. That it did not proceed to 
 blood, § seems owing to no other cause 
 than the protection of the Roman govern- 
 ment. The Apostle is particularly earn- 
 est in exhorting them to remember and 
 hold fast the grace of the Gospel, which 
 their first ministers had taught them, and 
 to consider that Jesus Christ was their 
 great object, and that a return to Jewish 
 dependencies would ruin their souls. On 
 the whole, we have here the most glori- 
 ous views of the Gospel, and the most 
 distinct information of the nature of a 
 true adherence to it; though I see no 
 evidence on the face of the Epistle for 
 concluding, that he forbad them tliat 
 same occasional and prudential compli- 
 ance with Judaism in external observan- 
 ces, which all the Apostles practised. It 
 
 • The first persecution of the Christians 
 began about a.d. 64, the lllh year of the 
 reign of the Emperor Nero. See Cliap. XV. 
 
 t Chap. iii. ^ Chap. ii. 
 
 § Chap. V, I Chap. ii. 6. 
 
 * St. Peter, in liis second epistle to the 
 Jews, reminds them of St. Paul's letter to 
 them ; which probably, could have been no 
 other than this epistle. 
 
 t Heb. X. 25. I lb. v. 12. § lb. xii. 4. 
 
40 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. 11. 
 
 was the departure of the heart from the 
 Lord Jesus, against which he warned 
 them. He dwells not largely on particu- 
 lar duties. He had not lived much among 
 them ; and special details of practical 
 matters came belter from the pastoral 
 pen of James. 
 
 Thus earnestly did these tv/o Apostles 
 instruct and warn a declining Church. 
 But grace has its seasons ! God will not 
 always strive with man ; yet the use of 
 the Epistles will remain, till time shall 
 be no m.ore. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 JUDEA AND GALILEE. 
 
 The Holy Land was divided into three 
 provinces, Judea, Galilee, and Sama- 
 mx. This last was in a situation so 
 peculiar, as to deserve to be considered 
 distinctly. And of the Churches of the 
 two former I have not much more to say, 
 than that their state, by fair analogy, may 
 be estimated from that of the mother- 
 church. Lideed a strong foundation had 
 been laid for their conversion by the min- 
 istry of John the Baptist, and by that of 
 our Lord in the days of his flesh. The 
 angel Gabriel had foretold of the son of 
 Zacharias, "that many of the children of 
 Israel he should turn to the Lord their 
 God."* Repentance was his theme, and 
 by this he prepared the way of the Lord. 
 Jesus himself condescended in his subor- 
 dinate capacity of prophet and teacher 
 to pursue the same method, though no 
 regular churches were yet formed. He 
 promised that the gift of the Holy Ghost 
 should be vouchsafed to his disciples ; and 
 we have several intimations, f that a 
 greater degree of success, of ])urity, of 
 knowledge, and of glory, should attend 
 his religion after he should leave this 
 world, than during his personal rninis- 
 
 Judea and Galilee being thus prepared 
 for the Gospel, the blessed tidings began 
 to be spread through them, and to be at- 
 tended with rapid success, soon after the 
 first persecution which arose concerning 
 Stephen. Those, who had felt the flame 
 
 * Luke i. 2. -j- Join: xiv. and xvi. 
 
 ^ Let this account, oiu-e Cor iill, tor the iiuicli 
 greater use vliieli 1 urake of the Acts and of 
 the Epistles, tlian of the loui- Gosijels. These 
 last are indeed inestiniHble ; but tlieir uses are 
 of another kind, and fall not so much within 
 the ^jlan of this work. 
 
 of Divine Love in Jerusalem, being 
 obliged to flee, preached through these 
 regions, and, as we have seen, many 
 thousands were converted. The mother- 
 church, no doubt, was the most numer- 
 ous, but various churches in the country 
 must have contributed to make up the 
 sum. The small size of Palestine may 
 tempt some to wonder, how, if many 
 thousands became Christians, the main 
 body of the nation could yet remain in 
 infidelity. The amazing populousness 
 and fertility of the country accounts for 
 this. The number of populous towns, in 
 Galilee particularly, is astonishing, as 
 appears from Josephus's narrative of the 
 Jewish war. The single town of Gada- 
 ra, near the lake of Gennezaret, by no 
 means a town of the first magnitude, 
 maintained two thousand swine.* If then 
 the importance of regions be measured by 
 the number of inhabitants, rather than by 
 the extent of ground, this small country 
 might vie perhaps with modern Russia. 
 
 Of these Churches the first instruments 
 were not the Apostles themselves, though 
 they doubtless visited them afterwards, 
 and confirmed them. James the son of 
 Zebedee would not confine his labours to 
 Jerusalem, till the time of his martyr- 
 dom, no more than the rest of the twelve, 
 if perhaps we except James the son of 
 Alpheus, who was the first standing Pas- 
 tor of Jerusalem. 
 
 These Churches, most probably, fol- 
 lowed the example of the parent-church, 
 both in its first love and comfortable pro- 
 gress, and also in its unhappy declension. 
 Peter's activity in establishing them was 
 very conspicuous. "The Lord wrought 
 effectually" in him always for the con- 
 version of the Jews.f He passed through 
 all quarters, and visited the places most 
 remote from the capital, such as Lydda, 
 vSaron, and Joppa.:]: In all these places the 
 Spirit of CJod accompanied his work. It 
 was in this last city that the Lord by him 
 raised Tal)itha from the dead. I should 
 scarcely have mentioned this miracle, in 
 a work which professes all along to re- 
 cord the ordinary, not the extraordinary 
 operations of the Holy Ghost, were not 
 this woman distinguished by "her good 
 works and alms-deeds which she did." 
 All the widows stood by Peter weeping, 
 and showing the " coats and garments 
 which she had made, while she was with 
 them." Thus had this woman's faith 
 
 * Mark v. 15. f Gal. ii. 8. | Acts ix. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 OF SAMARIA. 
 
 41 
 
 evidenced itself by good works ; and the 
 Spirit of piety and of prayer had gone hand 
 in hand with that of industrious benefi- 
 cence. Hail, Tabitha! thou hast the 
 highest glory, and of the most solid kind, 
 which is attainable on earth! But the 
 reader sees how simple and low Chris- 
 tian exploits must appear in the eyes of 
 worldly men. They are not like the 
 swelling deeds of heroes and statesmen, 
 which have hitherto, for the most part, 
 monopolized the historic page. But the 
 persons who are influenced by the Spirit 
 of Christ like Tabitha, will yet know 
 with whom they would wish to be num- 
 bered. The female sex, almost excluded 
 from civil history, will appear perhaps 
 more conspicuous in ecclesiastical. Less 
 immersed in secular concerns, and less 
 haughty and independent in spirit, they 
 seem, in all ages, to have had their full 
 proportion, or more than the other sex, of 
 the grace of the Gospel. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SAMARIA. 
 
 This country lay in the midst between 
 Judea and Galilee, though distinguished 
 from them both in its polity and religion. 
 The inhabitants possessed a large part of 
 the district, which had belonged to the 
 ten tribes, whom the kings of Assyria had 
 carried into captivity. These conquerors 
 had filled their vacant place with various 
 colonists,* who mixed the worship of 
 Jehovah with their idols, vainly boasted 
 of their relation to Jacob,"]' professed to 
 regard the law of Moses, and despised or 
 at least depreciated the rest of the Old 
 Testament. Our Saviour clearly decides 
 the contest, which, for ages, had been 
 carried on between them and the Jews, 
 in favour of the latter. :J: But though the 
 Samaritan was an idolater in his very 
 foundation, yet in moral practice he ap- 
 pears not worse than the Jew. Both, in- 
 deed, were at this time extremely cor- 
 rupt, and gloried in cherishing an enmity, 
 which forbad them the exercise of com- 
 mon humanity to one another. 
 
 The Divine Saviour pitied this people. 
 He visited them himself,§ and some sin- 
 ners were thereby converted. He made 
 a second attempt ;|| but the bigotry of the 
 village to which he approached, prevented 
 
 * 2 Kings xvii. 
 ^ John iv. 22. 
 II Luke ix. 52. 
 
 f John V. 12. 
 ^ John iv. 
 
 them from receiving him there, a circum- 
 stance which excited the fiery zeal of the 
 two sons of Zebedee, and gave occasion 
 to our Lord to say, " The Son of man is 
 not come to destroy men's lives, but to 
 save them." He meekly bore the re- 
 pulse, and went to another village. But 
 the effusions of his kindness toward this 
 unhappy people vi^ere now to appear in 
 abundance. 
 
 Among the seven deacons, the next 
 person to Stephen, in zeal and activity, 
 was Philip. Driven from Jerusalem by 
 the persecution, he was directed to go to 
 the city of Samaria, perhaps to the same 
 city called Sychar, where our Lord had 
 conversed with the woman over Jacob's 
 well. There he preached Christ, and the 
 Gospel entered the hearts of many, so 
 "that there was great joy in that city."* 
 The inhabitants appear to have been a 
 very ignorant simple people; but now 
 that the spirit of God was poured upon 
 them, none received the Gospel with more 
 cordial satisfaction. One effect immedi- 
 ately appeared, which indeed never fails 
 to attend the hearty reception of the Gos- 
 pel. Superstition and diabolical delu- 
 sions vanished. A person, named Simon, 
 had deceived this people with sorceries ; 
 I dare not say with pretended sorceries : 
 We shall see sufficient proof, before we 
 have done with the apostolical history, 
 that sorcery was a real thing. For a long 
 time they had been infatuated ; but Phi- 
 lip's doctrine expelled their regard for 
 these things, and numbers of both sexes 
 were baptized. Simon himself, though 
 a stranger to the nature and power of 
 Christ's religion, was yet convinced, that 
 Christianity in general was true ; aad this 
 seems the just idea of a mere historical 
 believer. 
 
 The Apostles hearing of the happy re- 
 ception of the Gospel at Samaria, sent 
 down Peter and John, who prayed on the 
 behalf of the people, that the Holy Ghost 
 might be imparted through the imposition 
 of hands. The Spirit was communicated, 
 not only in extraordinary gifts, but also 
 in an effusion of the same holy graces, 
 which had appeared in Judea. The for- 
 mer were those which only attracted the 
 attention of Simon. His avaricious heart 
 immediately conceiving the prospect of 
 vast wealth to be acquired were he only 
 once possessed of this supernatural power, 
 he offered the Apostles a sum of money 
 
 * Acts viii. 8. 
 
 D 2 
 
42 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 for the communication of the secret. Pe- 
 ter, who saw distinctly both his cove- 
 tousness and his io-norauce, rebulced liim 
 in the severest manner, assured him that 
 his heart was wrong altogether, and his 
 state accursed, notwithstanding' his bap- 
 tism and profession of Cliristianity. At 
 the same time he exhorted him to repent, 
 and to seek the divine forgiveness. Here 
 we see how singularly remote the reli- 
 gion of Jesus Christ is from all worldly 
 plans and schemes, and what an awful 
 ditference there ever is between a real 
 and a nominal Christian. The conscience 
 of Simon felt the reproof: he begged the 
 Apostles' prayers; but it does not appear 
 that he prayed for himself. Peter and 
 John preached through many Samaritan 
 villages, and then returned to Jerusalem. 
 The Samaritans, a sort of half Jews, — 
 for they were all circumcised, — being 
 favoured with the same spiritual bless- 
 ings as the rest, the minds of Christians 
 were prepared to expect a similar exten- 
 sion of heavenly grace to uncircumcised 
 idolaters. And among the wonders of 
 divine love which we have reviewed, 
 these are pleasing circumstances, that 
 Jews and Samaritans, who, for ages, had 
 disagreed in rites, should now be united 
 in Jesus; and while each felt the same 
 obligations to grace, should have learned 
 mutual charity for the first time. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ETHIOPIA.^ 
 It is instructive to observe, by what 
 gentle degrees the goodness of God was 
 preparing the way for the general diffu- 
 sion 01 his grace in the world. The first 
 Christians, even the Apostles themselves, 
 were by no means disposed to think with 
 any particular compassion of Gentiles, 
 and would scarcely have thought of 
 aprsading the Gospel beyond the bounds 
 of their own nation, had not the persecu- 
 tion driven many out of Jerusalem. The 
 teachers themselves needed to be taught 
 of God in this part of their office. So 
 helpless is man in divine things, even 
 
 * The Ethiopia to which this chapter is 
 confined, seems to be that part of the country, 
 whose loetropolis is called Meroe, situated in 
 a large island encompassed by the Nile and 
 tbe rivers of Astapus and Astoborra : For in 
 these parts (as the elder Pliny informs us), 
 Queens had a long time governed under the 
 title of Candace.— See Cave's Life of Fhilip, 
 
 after he has been favoured with some 
 spiritual light, that only by fresh com- 
 munications, he can be induced to make 
 any additional improvement. After Phi- 
 lip had finished his work at Samaria, he 
 was, by an extraordinary coimnission, or- 
 dered to travel southward toward the 
 desert. He soon discovered the reason : 
 he fell in with an Ethiopian eunuch, a 
 minister of Candace, Queen of the Ethio- 
 pians, who had been worshipping at Je- 
 rusalein, and was returning home in his 
 chariot. Men, who feel the worth of 
 their souls, will not be unemployed when 
 alone. Their concern for their best inter- 
 ests will operate most powerlully, when 
 they are most disengaged from business. 
 The man was reading the prophet Esaias, 
 and the adorable providence of God had 
 directed him at that particular time to the 
 fifty-third chapter, which gives so clear 
 a description of Christ crucified, Philip 
 asked him, if he understood what he was 
 reading. The man confessino- his iorno- 
 ranee, desired Philip to come and sit with 
 him. The Evangelist took the opportu- 
 nity of expounding to him the Gospel, 
 from the passage he was then reading, 
 which at once lays open the guilty and 
 the miserable condition of mankind, their 
 recovery only by the grace of Jesus Christ, 
 the nature, end, and efficacy of his death 
 and resurrection, and the doctrine of jus- 
 tification before God by the knowledge 
 of the same Jesus and by his merits. 
 The Ethiopian's mind had been prepared 
 for the doctrine : he had been at the pains 
 to attend Jewish instructions, the best 
 then to be had in the world, except the 
 Christian, which he now heard, for the 
 first time ; nor had the scandalous wick- 
 edness of the Jewish nation hindered him 
 from attending that Avorship, which he 
 believed to be of divine origin. The ig- 
 norance of his own country suited not 
 even the weakest and most glimmering 
 light of a serious mind. His case is an 
 encourao-ementformen, however ignorant 
 and mistaken at present, to seek earnestly 
 to God, for HE will take care that they 
 shall FixD. The man felt himself guilty 
 and wicked, and the views of the pro- 
 phetical chapter before us, laid open by 
 the preacher, discovered to him the re- 
 medy, which it pleased God so power- 
 fully to apply to his heart, that as soon 
 as they came to a certain water, he de- 
 sired to be baptized. Philip assured him 
 that there was no impediment, if he was 
 sincere in the faith of Christ, On which 
 
Cejtt. I.] 
 
 OF C^ SAKE A. 
 
 43 
 
 he professed his belief, that the Jesus of 
 Nazareth, Avhom Philip had preached to 
 him, was indeed the Son of God prophe- 
 sied of by Isaiah, and that he answered the 
 character of Saviour there g-iven to him. 
 Philip then baptized the Ethiopian, who, 
 though his instructor was, by the Spirit 
 of the Lord, immediately taken from him, 
 went on his way into his own country 
 rejoicincr.* Doubtless this joy had a 
 solid and powerful cause ; and if this case 
 be compared with that of the three thou- 
 sand first converts, and both of them with 
 the doctrine of the fifty-third chapter of 
 Isaiah, conversion Avill appear to be a 
 spiritual internal work, humbling- men 
 for sin, and comforting them with for- 
 giveness by Christ. The nominal pro- 
 fession, with which great numbers of 
 persons content themselves, may seem 
 to fit them for little else, than to disgrace 
 Christianity by their practice. 
 
 It is impossible that the Ethiopian, 
 thus powerfully enlightened and rejoicing 
 in God, could be silent when he returned 
 home. His influence and character 
 would at least secure to him a respectful 
 attention from some of his countrymen ; 
 and thus, the Gospel, most probably, was 
 first planted in Ethiopia. But we have 
 no more scripture-light on the subject. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 C^ESAREA. 
 
 The great mixture of .Tews and Gen- 
 tiles, in some of the extreme parts of the 
 Holy Land or its neighbourhood, afforded 
 a providential opportunity for the gradual 
 illumination of the latter, for the abate- 
 ment of Jewish bigotr)'^, for the demon- 
 stration of Divine Grace in the salvation 
 of all sorts of rnen, and for the union of 
 Christian hearts. Thus we find that a 
 Church was planted at Tyre, another at 
 Ptolemais,! places which must have 
 abounded with Gentiles. But Ca^sarea 
 affords the most remarkable instance of 
 the observation just now made. It was 
 tlie residence of the Roman Governor, 
 and was so situated in the confines of 
 Syria and Judea, that it was a matter of 
 doubt to which resrion it ought to be as- 
 signed. And the final determination of 
 this question in favour of the Syrians is 
 mentioned by Josephus, as one of the 
 immediate causes of the war, which ended 
 
 * Acts viii. 
 
 t Acts xxi 
 
 with the destruction of Jerusalem. This 
 circumstance shows the great importance 
 of this city, and the strong interest which 
 both parties had in it. 
 
 Philip, after a laborious journey from 
 Azotus, preaching in all the cities through 
 which he passed, settled at length in 
 Cffisarea. Here he was stationary for 
 many years.* We find him, toward the 
 conclusion of the period of about thirty 
 years, which takes in the history of the 
 Acts, still fixed in the same place, with 
 four virgin daughters, where he entertain- 
 ed St. Paul in his last journey to Jerusa- 
 lein. I can no more conceive Philip to 
 have been idle and unfruitful all this time, 
 than James to have been so at Jerusalem. 
 A Church, mixed of Jews and Gentiles, 
 would naturally be formed under so zeal- 
 ous a pastor, whose observation of the 
 Grace of God in the case of the Eunuch, 
 must have opened his mind to an affection- 
 ate reception of Gentile converts. 
 
 Indeed the abuse, which the malignant 
 pride of the Jews had made of the Mosaic 
 prohibition of intercourse with the Gen- 
 tiles, was a great bar to the extension of 
 the Gospel. They refused to keep com- 
 pany with foreigners, and seem to have 
 looked on them as devoted to destruction. 
 The Apostles themselves were, as yet, 
 under the power of similar bigotry, till a 
 vision from heaven instructed Peter, as 
 he was praying on the house-top at Joppa, 
 that he ought not to call any man com- 
 mon or unclean. f By this he was pre- 
 pared for the work which the Lord was 
 immediately assigning him. The Holy 
 Spirit suggested to him that tliree men 
 were at that time inquiring for him, and 
 directed him to go with them; "for I 
 have sent them. "t Peter was 
 soon informed by the men, g^° j"^ fj,"].' 
 that they had been sent to him pgtgj,_ 
 from Caesarea§ by Cornelius, 
 
 * Acts viii. 40 : all compared whh xsi. 8. 
 
 f Actsx. 
 
 i The proper personality and divinity of the 
 Holv Ghost, and the unlimited subjection due 
 to iiim from Christian pastors, and, of course, 
 from all ClH-istians,are solidly deducible from 
 this and various similar passages in the Acts of 
 the Apostles. 
 
 § ^Iuch has been written concerning two 
 sorts of Proselytes to the Jewish religion, cir- 
 cumcised ones, and incomplete ones, called 
 Proselytes of the Gate. Two learned critics, 
 Dr. Lardnerand Dr. Doddridge, seem to have 
 shown, however, tiiat the latter had no exist- 
 ence. Cornelius was a Gentile altogether, and 
 was treated as such by the Jews, though from 
 
44 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 a Roman centurion there, a devout man, I 
 and one that feared God with all liis fa- 
 mily, gave much alms to the people, and 
 prayed to God alway; who had been 
 warned from God by a holy angel to send 
 for him. — Peter lodged the three men that 
 night ; two of them were household ser- 
 vants, and the third — rare character! — a 
 devout soldier, who waited on the centu 
 rion continually. 
 
 On the next day Peter went with them, 
 but had the precaution to take with him 
 six Jewish Christians from Joppa as wit- 
 nesses of his proceedings. The follow- 
 ing day they entered Csesarea, and came 
 into the house of Cornelius, who had 
 called together his kinsmen and near 
 friends, with that charity for their souls, 
 which fails not to influence the minds of 
 those, who have real charity for their own. 
 On the entrance of Peter he falls down 
 and worships. Peter corrects his mistaken 
 devotion. Cornelius informs him, that 
 having been particularly engaged in fast- 
 ing and prayer, he was assured by an an- 
 gel that his prayers and alms were accep- 
 table to God, and that he had obeyed the 
 divine direction in sending for him. Pe- 
 ter now preached the Gospel to the com- 
 pany, frankly owning, that he was at 
 length fully convinced, that God was no 
 respecter of persons ; but that he equally 
 regarded Jew and Gentile, whoever the 
 person was that " feared God, and wrought 
 righteousness." On this broad basis of 
 encouragement, he was enabled to preach 
 to them the sfood news of forgiveness of 
 sins by Jesus Christ, whose history they 
 knew, though they did not understand 
 the nature of his doctrine. He directed 
 tliem now to receive that doctrine cordi- 
 ally for their peace with God. The per- 
 fect holiness and the supeinatural works of 
 Jesus, he observed, demonstrated him to 
 be no impostor, but sent of God unques- 
 tionably: that he himself and the other 
 Apostles were witnesses of Christ's re 
 surrection, and had received a commis 
 sion from him to preach to the people, 
 and to urge men's acceptance of him here 
 if ever they expected to be welcomed by 
 him, when he should j udge the quick and 
 dead at his second coming: and that 
 all the prophets had testified, that who- 
 
 his pious attention to the Jewish religion lie 
 must have been at least a Proselyte ot" the se- 
 cond sort, if any ever were so. In that case 
 it seems difficult to conceive, why any Jew 
 should liave made such a difficulty of convers- 
 ing with persons of this description. 
 
 ever placed his confidence for salvation 
 in the name of Jesus Christ, should re- 
 ceive remission of sins. 
 
 Where God himself powerfully oper- 
 ates on the mind, few words suffice. 
 The whole company were converted to 
 God. The Holy Ghost, both in an extra- 
 ordinary and in an ordinary way, sealed 
 the Apostle's sermon. The Jewish breth- 
 ren were astonished to find Gentiles put 
 on an equal footing with Jews. Peter, 
 after observing how unreasonable it would 
 be to deny baptism to persons who had 
 received the Holy Ghost no less than 
 themselves, baptized the whole company; 
 and at their desire spent a few days with 
 them, to instruct them farther in Chris- 
 tian principles; and then left them to the 
 care of Philip, whose character at Caesa- 
 rea would probably from this time in- 
 crease in public esteem. 
 
 A remark or two on this important 
 transaction will be proper. 
 
 1. The Grace of God acts very vari- 
 ously in converting sinners. There are 
 considerable shades of difference in the 
 cases of Saul, of the Eunuch, and of Cor- 
 nelius. The preaching of the Gospel 
 found the first a determined enemy, the 
 second an ignorant inquirer, the third a 
 person already prepared by spiritual grace, 
 though with no more than the Old Testa- 
 ment-light. But to all these different cases 
 the doctrine itself is the same : and the 
 work of God in humbling man for his sins, 
 and leading him to Christ alone for justi- 
 fication, is the same also. 
 
 2. How necessary is it, that the way 
 of peace by Jesus Christ only, be distinct- 
 ly explained and understood ! Cornelius, 
 with an enlightened mind and a tender 
 conscience, would never have found peace 
 of conscience, unless he had understood 
 the doctrine of forgiveness, by the blood 
 of the Redeemer. Imperfections still 
 attending his best actions, he must 
 have remained miserable in his spirit. 
 The doctrine of forgiveness, accompanied 
 by the Holy Spirit, brought him at once 
 to a peace before unknown. How care- 
 ful should we be to understand this doc- 
 trine aright ! how zealous, in proportion 
 to our ability, to transmit the precious 
 jewel to posterity ! 
 
 3. How narrow are the hearts of men! 
 how circumscribed the charity even of the 
 best! With difliiculty even Christian 
 Jews are brought to admit as brethren the 
 Gentile converts. Self-righteousness is 
 natural to mankind. That God should 
 
CXXT. I.] 
 
 IN ASIA. 
 
 45 
 
 Teceive as his children idolatrous Gen- 
 tiles, as well as religious Jews, provokes 
 tlie pride of narrow-minded selfish men, 
 who have long been accustomed to con- 
 sider themselves as the peculiar favourites 
 of heaven. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ANTIOCII AND SOME OTHER ASIATIC 
 CHURCHES. 
 
 We have not yet seen all the good 
 effects which Providence brought out 
 of Stephen's persecution. Though the 
 Apostles thought it their duty to continue 
 to water the flocks of Judea and Galilee, 
 and to look on Jerusalem as a sort of cen- 
 tral metropolis to them all, they encourag- 
 ed the inferior pastors, who fled from the 
 rage of persecution, to disseminate the 
 Gospel in Gentile regions. Damascus, 
 we have seen, reaped the benefit of this 
 
 none at least; "for a prophet is not hon- 
 oured in his own country ;" and he brought 
 him to Antioch. This populous city em- 
 ployed them a whole year. Here Chris- 
 tian societies were regularly formed, con- 
 sisting, in a great measure, a r\ ^n 
 of Gentiles. And here the ' ' ' 
 followers of Christ were first called Chris- 
 tians. It is not probable, that they would 
 give themselves that name. The terms 
 
 BRETHREN, ELECT, FAITHFUL, SAINTS, Were 
 
 the names which they would rather ap- 
 prove. The name of Christian seems to 
 have been given by their adversaries. It 
 is now a term of honour ; at that time a 
 more opprobrious one could scarcely be 
 thought of by the learned and the polite. 
 Were a man allowed to possess many 
 good qualities; "but he is a Christian," 
 would have been deemed more than a 
 counterbalance to them all. And other 
 terms invented by the malevolence of un- 
 regenerate men, in different a^es, to stio-- 
 
 dispensation, and so did Tarsus. Some matize the same sort of persons, have prO' 
 
 travelled as far as Phenice, Cyrus, and - . .- - 
 
 Antioch, still preaching only to Jews. 
 At length certain Cypriot and Cyrenian 
 Jews ventured to break through the pale 
 of distinction : and at Antioch, the me- 
 tropolis of Syria, they preached the Lord 
 Jesus to the Gentiles. The Greek lan- 
 guage here prevailed, and, on this account, 
 the inhabitants were called Grecians,* 
 being the descendants of a Macedonian 
 colony, planted there by the successor of 
 Alexander the Great. And now the Lord, 
 willing to overcome effectually the rehic 
 tances of self-righteous bigotry, attended 
 their ministry with remarkable success. 
 The idolaters felt the renovating power of 
 the Gospel, and in great numbers turned 
 to the Lord. The mother-church hearing 
 of this, sent Barnabas, whose piety and 
 charity were renowned, to carry on and 
 propagate a work, which required more 
 labourers. His benevolent heart was 
 feasted with the prospect ; and the reality 
 of salvation by the grace of Christ thus 
 exemplified in persons, who had hither- 
 to been involved in pagan darkness, was 
 evidenced in a manner which, till then, 
 had never been known. Finding many 
 converts, he exhorted them to perseve- 
 rance ; and the addition of believers was 
 still so large, that he began to look out 
 for a coadjutor. He sought for Saul, who 
 was then labouring at Tarsus perhaps 
 Avith no great success: we are told of 
 
 * Acts xi. 20. 
 
 duced, by the bare sound, similar effects 
 on prejudiced minds. 
 
 The faith of the Antiochians was sig- 
 nally operative. Warmed with the love 
 of Christ, and rejoicing in the prospect 
 of heavenly treasures, they cheerfully 
 contributed to the relief of the poor Chris- 
 tians in Judea, distressed by a famine. 
 A large extension of Christ's kingdom 
 in any place, naturally calls together a 
 large number of pastors. It is pleasant 
 indeed to labour among the faithful, en- 
 circled with sincere friends. It is not 
 every real saint, who has the fortitude 
 and charity to quit so agreeable a scene, 
 for the sake of breaking up fresh ground. 
 How much longer these teachers would 
 have remained at Antioch, if left to them- 
 selves, we know not. But the Holy 
 Ghost now selected Barnabas and Saul 
 for other labours. They obeyed the call; 
 and Seleucia in the neighbourhood was 
 their first destination. At this port they 
 found a convenient passage to the fertile 
 and voluptuous island of Cyprus. Me- 
 thinks the evil spirits, who there sup- 
 ported the religious rites and the sensual 
 practices of the devotees of Venus, began 
 to tremble for this capital scene of their 
 dominions. 
 
 From Salamis, the eastern point of the 
 island, to Paphos the western, they spread 
 the glad tidings of the Gospel. In this 
 last place they found Elymas, a Jewish 
 sorcerer and false prophet, in company 
 with Sergius Paulus, the Roman gover- 
 
46 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 nor of the island, a man of sense and can- 
 dour, who sent for Barnabas and Savil, 
 and desired to hear the word of God. 
 The sorcerer endeavoured to prevent the 
 good effects of their labours ; till Paul, 
 full of holy indignation at his diabolical 
 malice, was enabled miraculously to 
 strike him blind for a season. Sergius 
 was astonished, w^e are told, "at the 
 doctrine" of the Lord,* and commenced 
 a Christian from that hour. 
 
 The two Apostles sailed now to the ad- 
 joining continent, and arrived at Perga 
 in Pamphylia. And here John Mark, 
 who had thus far attended them as mi- 
 nister, left them and returned to Jerusa 
 lem. It was, perhaps, more agreeable 
 to him to profess and practise Christian- 
 ity at home with his mother and friends, 
 than to expose himself to heathens. 
 Even then, traces of the love of the 
 world were to be seen among Christians.! 
 Pisidia, lying to the north of Pamphy- 
 lia, was the next scene. Here was 
 another Antioch; and the Apostles on 
 the Sabbath-day attended the Jewisli 
 synagogue. After the usual reading of 
 the law and the prophets, the rulers gave 
 them a friendly invitation to exhort the 
 people, which Paul embraced with his 
 usual zeal. His sermon is much of the 
 same strain with those of Peter, and of 
 Stephen, tending to beget in the hearers 
 a conviction of sinfulness, and to give 
 testimony to Jesus, concluding with a 
 remarkably plain declaration of the grand 
 doctrine of justification by faith in Jesus 
 only, and a solemn warning against the 
 dreadful consequences of hardness of 
 heart, and of contempt of the divine mes- 
 sage. The Gentiles, powerfully impress- 
 ed with the new doctrine, desired to hear 
 more of the subject the next Sabbath 
 Many Jews and proselytes were convert 
 ed; and almost the whole city came on the 
 next Sabbath-day to hear.:^ The sight 
 was too much for the envy of the infidel 
 Jews, who opposed Paul with all their 
 might. The two Apostles boldly assured 
 
 * Acts xiii. 12. The expression is remark- 
 able, but has a peculiar propriety. A mere 
 historical believer would have been astonish- 
 ed at the miracle merely. Sergius, a true 
 convert, who entered into the holy nature of 
 the Gospel by a spiritual perception, is aston- 
 ished "at the doctrine." 
 
 _+ Perhaps we are not sufficiently acquainted 
 with the circumstances of the case, to form a 
 fair judgment how far the conduct of John 
 Mark is to be justified. 
 ■^ Acts xiii. 44. 
 
 them, that though it was their duty to 
 carry the news of salvation to the Jews 
 first, yet as they despised God's Gift of 
 Eternal Life, it would now be offered to 
 the Gentiles, agreeably to the glorious 
 prophecy of Isaiah,* where the experi- 
 mental influence of the Gospel on Gen- 
 tile hearts is clearly described. The 
 Pagans, not so proud as the Jews, felt 
 that they Tiad no righteousness to plead 
 before God, thankfully embraced the 
 Gospel, and believed in great numbers. 
 
 Pisidia was now full of the Gospel; 
 and the Apostles proceeded with vast 
 success, till a persecution, stirred up by 
 the Jews, induced some self-righteous 
 women of rank, in conjunction with the 
 magistrates, to drive them out of their 
 coasts. From thence they came to Ico- 
 nium, the northern extremity of the coun- 
 try; and the disciples whom they left, 
 though harassed with persecution, were 
 yet " filled with Joy and the Holy Ghost." 
 The internal consolation of their religion 
 supported their souls. In Iconium the 
 two Apostles continued a long time, and 
 delivered the message of Divme Recon- 
 ciliation with much freedom and energy, 
 to the conversion of a great multitude 
 both of Jews and Gentiles. The unbe- 
 lieving Jewsf exerted their usual malev- 
 olence, and filled the Gentiles with the 
 strongest prejudices against the Chris- 
 tians. In truth, their conduct, though by 
 no means uncommon, affords a dreadful 
 instance of human depravity. It cannot 
 be denied, that those Jews must in re- 
 ligious knowledge have far exceeded the 
 idolatrous inhabitants of Iconium. They 
 held the Unity of the Godhead; they 
 worshipped him in their synagogue; 
 they heard his precepts from Sabbath to 
 Sabbath out of the law of Moses and the 
 prophets. They must have known thus 
 far, that the Messiah was foretold in the 
 latter, and they could not but be acquaint- 
 ed with their duty both to God and man 
 in many respects by means of the former. 
 Yet so unreasonable are they, as to la- 
 bour to prevent their pagan neighbours 
 from being instructed in any thing that 
 deserved the name of religion, and to 
 persecute with unceasing acrimony two 
 of their owm countrymen, who agreed 
 with them in the profession of the wor- 
 ship of the one living and true God. Of 
 so little influence is what some call the 
 " Unitarian" religion, if it be unconnect- 
 
 * 49th Chap. 
 
 + Acts xiv. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 IN ASIA. 
 
 47 
 
 ED with the knowledge and Love of 
 Jesus Christ. Persons, who make that 
 the whole of their religion, can, it seems, 
 rather see mankind remain buried in the 
 depths of the most senseless idolatry in 
 worship, and of vicious profligacy in life, 
 than brought over to the real Christian 
 religion, to the hearty renunciation of their 
 own righteousness, and to a humble de- 
 pendence on the atoning blood of Jesus! 
 The preaching of Paul and Barnabas ex- 
 cited a variety of speculations in this 
 city. The Gentiles were divided ; and part 
 ranged themselves with the Jews, and part 
 with the Apostles. But the former had the 
 advantage for the present, because they 
 had the arms — which Christian soldiers 
 cannot use — of violence and persecution. 
 The Apostles, aware of their designs, 
 fled into Lycaonia, a country to the east 
 of Pisidia; and there preached the Gos- 
 pel, particularly in Lystra and Derbe. 
 In the former of these places, a poor 
 cripple, who never had had the use of 
 his feet, heard Paul with the most re- 
 spectful attention, and was so far wrought 
 upon already in his mind, as to believe 
 that there was virtue in the name of 
 Jesus Christ to heal him. To confirm 
 him in his yet infant views of the Chris- 
 tian religion, to attest the truth, and to 
 convince men that Jesus was both able 
 and willing to save, Paul was enabled 
 by a word to restore the man to the full 
 use of his limbs. Immediately these 
 poor idolaters concluded, that the gods 
 were come down to them in the likeness 
 of men. Through this whole country of 
 Asia Minor, the Greek literature, and 
 with it the numerous fables of Hellen- 
 istic vanit}", abounded. They had heard 
 of Jupiter and Mercury particularly as 
 visiting mankind ; and now Barnabas, as 
 the elder perhaps, and more majestic 
 figure of the two, must, they conceived, 
 be Jupiter; and Paul, as the more elo- 
 quent speaker, must be INIercury, the 
 classical god of eloquence. The priest of 
 Jupiter brought oxen and garlands to the 
 gates, and, together with the people, 
 would have done sacrifice to the Apostles. 
 It was a grievous circumstance; but 
 our grief and regret is mitigated, when 
 we reflect that one of the finest opportu- 
 nities was <i-iven to Paul and Barnabas of 
 demonstrating the spirit of real godliness. 
 However pleasing it might be to corrupt 
 nature to receive the idolatrous* homage 
 
 of a deluded people, nothing could be 
 more abhorrent from the nature of the 
 Gospel itself, and from the humble char- 
 acter of its teachers. They could not 
 bear the sight: they rent their clothes; 
 and ran in among the people, and expos- 
 tulated with them on the absurdity of 
 their conduct; assuring them that they 
 were no more than frail men like them- 
 selves, and that their intention in preach- 
 ing to them was, to turn them from these 
 vanities to the living God, who formerly 
 indeed had left all nations to follow their 
 own ways, but now had sent his servants 
 to preach a method of salvation from 
 such idolatries. Not that the worship 
 of false gods was excusable ; the con- 
 stant benefits of Providence callinof for 
 thankfulness, and pointmg out the Su- 
 preme Creator to the consciences of 
 men. Thus faithfully did they preach 
 conviction of sin to the Lycaonians, and 
 with difficulty prevent the actual per- 
 formance of the sacrifice, which would 
 have given them more pain than the per- 
 secution that followed. 
 
 The fickle multitude, who had so re- 
 cently been even idolatrously attached to 
 Paul and Barnabas, were soon persuaded 
 by some Jews, who came from Antioch 
 and Iconium, to harbour the worst opi- 
 nion of them ; and, doubtless, the dislike 
 of secular glory, which these excellent 
 Apostles, with a truly Christian spirit, 
 showed on all occasions, would not a litr 
 tie contribute to increase this alienation 
 of mind. In a tumult Paul was stoned, 
 and dragged out of the city, as a dead 
 corpse; and while the disciples stood 
 
 round about him, he rose up, and came 
 into the city, miraculously restored, as it 
 seems : and he departed the next day with 
 Barnabas to Derbe. There many were 
 converted ; and the persecuting spirit in- 
 termitting, they visited again, in circuit, 
 the regions of Pisidia and Lycaonia, en- 
 couraging the disciples to persevere in the 
 faith of Jesus in confidence of divine sup- 
 port, and in full expectation of the king- 
 dom of heaven, into which real Chris- 
 tians must not expect to enter without 
 much tribulation. 
 
 The}' now ordained some ofthebrethren 
 
 • The historical reader can scarcely fail to 
 
 contrast with this behaviour of the Apostles 
 tiie ambitious arts of Jesuit missionaries, and 
 to res^ret tlie want of a similar piety and in- 
 tegrity in a late celebrated naval commander 
 ill a scene of trial of the same kind, which 
 happened a little before his lamented catas- 
 trophe. 
 
48 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chip< VIL 
 
 to minister in every Church, and devoutly 
 recommended poth pastors and flocks to 
 the care of that gracious Lord on whom 
 they believed : Solemn fasting and prayer 
 were used on this occasion. Returning 
 through Pamphylia, they preached again 
 at Perga, and from Attalia sailed to the 
 great Antioch, whence they had been, by 
 the prayers of the Church, recommended 
 to the grace of God for the work which 
 they had fulfilled. 
 
 Here they remained a considerable time 
 previous to their attendance at the Coun- 
 cil of Jerusalem, after which they returned 
 to the same Church in company with Ju- 
 das and Silas, who, with authority from 
 the mother-church, confirmed them in the 
 liberty of the Gospel, in conjunction with 
 many other teachers. The Christians of 
 Antioch walked now in genuine consola- 
 tion, and while they dared to rest on 
 Christ alone, they practised good works 
 in a filial spirit. Thankful for the assist- 
 ance of Judas and Silas, they dismissed 
 them to the Apostles who had sent them.* 
 Silas, however, loved his situation, and 
 remained in the service of the Gentiles. 
 
 Some days after, Paul proposed to Bar- 
 nabas a second circuitous visit of the 
 Asiatic Churches. Barnabas, fond of 
 Mark, his nephew, proposed 
 Contest j^Q j-g^jj^g }ji,^ ^yitj^ them. Paul, 
 
 etween remembering his former de- 
 Faul and , " , , , • ^. ,• 
 
 Barnabas, sertion, thought him unfit lor 
 the work. On which side 
 there was more blame in this contest, 
 may be hard to determine. Probably both 
 were too positive ; but to us, at this dis- 
 tance of time, Paul's view of the question 
 seems the most just. The consequence 
 was a separation between these two 
 Christian leaders ; and it does not appear 
 that they ever saw one another afterwards, 
 though it ought not to be doubted, but 
 that, on the whole, their mutual esteem 
 and regard continued ; the best men are 
 but men. The progress of the Gospel was 
 not, however, retarded. Barnabas sailed 
 with Mark to Cyprus, and here he is dis- 
 missed from the sacred memoirs. Paul 
 took with him Silas, having the recom- 
 mendation of the brethren to the Grace of 
 God, which would lead one to conclude, 
 that the Antiochians preferred his cause 
 to that of Barnabas. He now went 
 through Syria and Cilicia, confirming the 
 Churches. 
 
 In Lycaonia, he found the pious Timo- 
 
 * Acts XV. 33. 
 
 thy, whom he took as an associate, and 
 confirmed the Gentile converts every 
 where in Christian Liberty : Thus the 
 Churches were established in the faith, 
 and increased in number daily. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 GALATIA. 
 
 The Love of God, where it rules in an 
 ardent degree, is insatiable. The Apos- 
 tle's heart is not content with the trophies 
 already erected in many parts of Asia 
 Minor. As the miser thinks no acquisi- 
 tions great, while any prospects of farther 
 gain are still open to his view, so Paul 
 could not with complacency rest in the 
 attainments already made, while so much 
 ground still lay before him, to the north 
 and to the west, in the hands of Satan, 
 He travelled throughout Phrygia and Ga^ 
 latia.* The plantation of the Churches 
 in the former country will afterwards en- 
 gage our attention ; the latter, whose his- 
 tory in point of time is much sooner con- 
 cluded in sacred story, will be now most 
 conveniently exhibited. The epistle writ- 
 ten to that Church affords us almost the 
 only materials we have ; but little as they 
 are, they are inestimable. I am entirely 
 convinced by Dr. Lardner,f that this was 
 an early epistle, and by no means dated 
 from Rome, as the subscription at the end 
 of the epistle intimates. Nor is this the 
 only place in which those subscriptions, 
 which the unlearned reader should know 
 make no part of the Apostolical writings, 
 deceive us. 
 
 The people of this country received the 
 Gospel in great numbers, insomuch that 
 several Churches were planted through 
 the district. They understood St. Paul's 
 doctrine, and received it in its true sense, 
 namely, that justification before God is 
 attainable only by faith in Christ cruci- 
 fied. He clearly laid before them the 
 riches of Divine Grace. And they had so 
 deep an impression of the truths, which 
 he taught, and felt so much of their 
 energy, that they seemed as it were to 
 see the Son of God crucified among 
 them::|: they received the promised Spirit 
 of adoption, by which they rejoiced itx 
 God as their Father,§ and they cheerfully 
 suffered much persecution for the name 
 of Christ.ll Before this, they had lived 
 
 * Acts xvi. 6. 
 4 Gal. iii. 1. 
 
 f See his Supplement. 
 §Ib. iv. 6. 11 lb. iii. iv. 
 
Gejtt. I.] 
 
 IN GALATIA. 
 
 49 
 
 in the darkest idolatry ; for these Churches 
 were formed almost, if not entirely, of 
 Gentiles.* The true God was made 
 known to them, and Unitarianism, of it- 
 self unable to emancipate men from sin, 
 as the case of the Jews evinced, was with 
 them attended with the distinct know- 
 ledge and lively faith of Jesus. 
 
 What proves the divine taste of this 
 people was, that no disadvantage in the 
 circumstances of the delivery of the Gos- 
 pel operated with them to its prejudice. 
 Some remarkable infirmity this great man 
 was afflicted with; — what it was pre- 
 cisely we are no where told ; — but it pre- 
 sented something contemptible in the 
 eyes of profane persons. And it is no 
 small proof of the Galatians being much 
 humbled and awakened in their minds by 
 the Spirit of God, that this circumstance 
 lessened not at all their regard to the 
 Apostle or to his message. " They re- 
 ceived him as an angel of God, even as 
 Christ Jesus."! They confessed the 
 blessedness, which they felt on account 
 of the Gospel, and were ready to give 
 even the most painful proofs of their af- 
 fection to him. In all this we see, what 
 the Gospel is, what it does for men who 
 truly understand and embrace it in an 
 humbled heart, what was St. Paul's man- 
 ner of preaching, and how different a 
 thing Christianity then appeared from 
 the frigid speculations which in modern 
 times bear that name. 
 
 But soon after Paul had left them with 
 the most pleasing hopes of their spiritual 
 growth, he was astonished to hear of a 
 change for the worse, which took place 
 among them. Some Jews, who were 
 either their own countrymen, or who had 
 lately arrived at Galatia from other parts 
 of Asia Minor where Paul had laboured, 
 took pains to pervert them. They made 
 no attempts indeed to unsettle their minds 
 in the views of the unity of the Godhead, 
 and the principal facts of Christianity; 
 nor did they endeavour to draw them back 
 to the worship of idols. They neither 
 formally denied the atonement of Christ, 
 nor persuaded the people to desist from 
 Christian worship. Yet was it another 
 gospel, though it deserved not the name 
 of Gospel,:^: to the love of which they se- 
 duced them. They assured them, that 
 they could not be saved without circum- 
 cision, and prevailed on them to judaize 
 so far, as to observe the rites of IMoses in 
 
 • Galat. iv. 8. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 + Iv. 14. 
 E 
 
 \ i. G, 7. 
 
 various instances.* They took pains to 
 estrange them from Paul, and to draw 
 them over to themselves, and to a worldly 
 spirit of conformity, loving to appear fair 
 in the eyes of men, and pretending to be 
 zealous for good works, while their real 
 view was to avoid the persecution, which 
 attended the Cross of Christ. f To give 
 the better eifect to their insinuations, they 
 instilled into them disrespectful ideas of 
 Paul, as though he were far inferior to the 
 other xVpostles: and, as it seems, they 
 represented the mother-church of Jerusa- 
 lem, with the college of Apostles there, 
 as coinciding with themselves in doc- 
 trine. 
 
 Thus the self-righteous poison, which 
 first issued from Jerusalem, was brought 
 into this distant province, where the ig- 
 norance and simplicity of the people, un- 
 acquainted with Jewish modes and habits, 
 gave it the freest room to operate. These 
 false teachers still called themselves 
 Christians, and the mischief which they 
 introduced, may be deemed at first sight 
 no great one. So, I doubt not, some 
 fashionable perversions of Evangelical 
 truth at this day, of a similar kind, ap- 
 pear to many to be of no great conse- 
 quence. I am not, however, to disguise 
 that this Galatian delusion appears strong- 
 ly to resemble the perversions to which I 
 allude. I have represented things as they 
 appear to me from the epistle. The great 
 evil lurking under all this art and zeal 
 was the adulteration of the faith of Jesus^ 
 the sole Author of our salvation. In no 
 epistle does the A])ostle speak so sharp- 
 ly, or express himself so vehemently. 
 His exhortation and rebuke came warm 
 from a charitable heart, just after the re- 
 ception of the disagreeable tidings. He 
 professes himself astonished at the defec- 
 tion of the Galatians from Christ; and 
 execrates any man or even angel, who 
 should preach any other way of salvation. 
 If such a person still call himself a Chris- 
 tian, and hold the historical facts of the 
 Gospel, the case is not altered for the bet- 
 ter; the deception only passing more cur- 
 rent on that account.:}: He asserts, that if 
 they mixed circumcision, or any work of 
 the law, with Christ in the article of jus- 
 tification, Christ would be of no effect to 
 them.§ He must be their whole Saviour, 
 or he would profit them nothing ; law and 
 o-race in this case being quite opposite. 
 
 * Galat. iv. 10. 
 \ Chap. i. 
 
 t vi. 12. 
 ^ Chap. T. 
 
50 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. Vni. 
 
 He marks the mere worldly nature of the 
 doctrine they were embracing:* it would 
 make them bigotted Jews indeed, proud, 
 self-righteous, void of the love of God 
 and man,f and no better in their spiritual 
 state than they were while idolaters4 
 Thus they would lose all the liberty of 
 tlie Gospel, and be mere slaves in reli- 
 o-ion, like all unconverted persons, who 
 in reality are self-righteous, and devoid of 
 holy principle. He points out to them the 
 peculiar nature of the Gospel, as perfectly 
 distinct from any thing that man in his 
 depraved state is apt to teach or ready to 
 embrace. In the historical part of the 
 epistle he vindicates his own Apostolical 
 character, inculcates throughout, in all 
 possible variety of language, and with his 
 usual copiousness both of clear argument 
 and strong diction, the all-important arti 
 cle of justification, and presses the neces 
 sity of continuing in it, in order to be 
 benefited by it. Otherwise we make 
 Christ the minister of sin, or of con- 
 demnation : we build again what we have 
 destroyed ; and as far as in us lies, make 
 him to have died in vain. He appeals to 
 their own experience of the happy fruits 
 of the Gospel, which they had felt in- 
 ternally, and represents himself as tra- 
 vailing in birth for them, till Christ be 
 formed in them. He expresses himself 
 dubious of their condition, and desirous 
 of visiting them, that he might adapt his 
 language to their perilous situation. He 
 wishes that their evil advisers were cut 
 off, so mischievous were they to souls ; 
 and assures them, that the Divine Ven- 
 geance would overtake those that troU' 
 bled them. He informs them, that the 
 persecution, which he himself endured, 
 was on account of this very doctrine. 
 This it was that stirred up the enmity of 
 the human heart; and this doctrine being 
 lost, the Gospel becomes a mere name, 
 and Christianity is lost in the group of 
 common religions. 
 
 It will be proper for us to bear in mind 
 tlie Apostle's reasonings on this subject, 
 and to apply them to every period of 
 Church-history; since it is evident, that 
 the rise or fall of this great Ch;istian ar- 
 ticle, must determine the vigour or de- 
 cline of true religion in all ages. He ne- 
 glects not, however, to inculcate in his 
 usual manner the necessity of good 
 works, as the just fruits and evidences of 
 
 a real Christian state ;* and he particu- 
 larly encourages them to works of mercy, 
 attended with a patient and cheerful pros- 
 pect into eternity, and animated with 
 genuine charity. j" 
 
 There is reason to hope, that the best 
 effects were produced by the epistle. No 
 very long time after, the Apostle again 
 visited these Churches, and went over 
 the whole country, strengthening " all 
 the disciples.":]: This is the substance of 
 what I can collect from Scripture con- 
 cerning the history of this Church, — ex- 
 cept a single hint in another epistle,§ in 
 which he recommends to the Corinthians 
 to use the same plan for the relief of the 
 poor saints, which he had suggested to 
 the Galatians. From the influence which 
 he hence appears to have had in Galatia, 
 it is probable, that the Judaical perver- 
 sion was overcome. 
 
 * Chap. \\., towards the end. f Chap. 
 1 iv. 9. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 PHILIPPI. 
 
 The dispensation of the Gospel is 
 doubtless the greatest blessing that can 
 be vouchsafed to any country. But the 
 times and the seasons God hath reserved 
 to himself. Even in this sense salvation 
 is of graee ; and Divine Providence alone 
 orders and appoints, that the Gospel 
 shall be preached here or there, as he 
 pleases. Paul and Silas, if left to them- 
 selves, in their progress to the west, 
 would have evangelized Pergamus or 
 Asia propria and Bithynia,|| but were 
 prevented by special intimations of the 
 Holy Spirit. They came now to Troas, — 
 so called from its being the place, or near 
 the place, where old Troy had stood, by 
 the sea-coast, — uncertain whither they 
 should go next, and perhaps little appre- 
 hensive that God, now for the first time, 
 was introducing his Gospel into Europe. 
 A nightly vision, in which a Macedonian 
 intreated Paul to come over into his coun- 
 try and help them, determined at once 
 their destination. They sailed from Troas 
 to the island of Samothracia, and the next 
 day to Neapolis, a Macedonian sea-port, 
 whence, through the gulf of Strymon, 
 they came to Philippi, the first city of 
 that part of Macedonia, which they would 
 meet with in their way from Neapolis. 
 
 * Chap, v., toward the end. t Chap. vi. 
 
 I Acts xviii. 23. § 1 Cor. xvi. 1. 
 
 il Acts xvi. 7. 
 
Cent. L] 
 
 AT PHILIPPI. 
 
 51 
 
 So I understand St. Luke's expression 
 UpaiTii; for Thessalonica was the capital 
 of Macedonia. The city of Philippi, 
 thoug^h originally Macedonian, and so 
 named from Philip the father of Alexan- 
 der, was then a Roman colony, inhabited 
 by Roman citizens, and regulated by Ro- 
 man laws and customs. The region in 
 which it stood, had been renowned for 
 constituting the third of the four great 
 monarchies under the arms of Alexander, 
 and the place itself had been, something 
 more than half a century ago, the scene 
 of a famous battle, between two Roman 
 parties engaged in a civil war. Neither 
 of THOSE seasons would have been at all 
 convenient for the Gospel. The present 
 was a scene of tranquility and order un- 
 der the Roman government: and Mace- 
 donia, though now only a Roman province, 
 was g;oing to be the subject of transactions 
 infinitely more noble than those, which 
 adorn the history of its greatest princes. 
 The appearances on their arrival did 
 not promise any thing remarkable. They 
 spent a few days at first with little pros- 
 pect of success. They found a few Jews 
 there, who used on the Sabbath day to 
 frequent an oratory out of the city by the 
 river side : and some women, religiousl}^ 
 disposed, resorted thither. It was the 
 constant method of the Apostles to join 
 themselves to Unitarians, wherever they 
 could find them, as the first opening for 
 the Gospel of Christ. They did so on 
 this occasion, and spake to the women. 
 One of them was Lydia, a person of some 
 property. Her heart the Lord opened, 
 that "she attended to the things which 
 were spoken by Paul." She was bap- 
 tized with her family ; and with affection- 
 ate importunity she prevailed on the 
 Apostle and his companions to make her 
 house their home in Philippi. Here we 
 have the beginnings of the Philippian 
 Church; but the conversion was sound 
 and stable, and the progress of Lydia in 
 the divine life seems of the same kind as 
 that of Cornelius. Vexed at the pros- 
 pect, Satan employed a young woman 
 possessed with a spirit of Python to bring 
 the Gospel into contempt if possible. She 
 constantly followed the Christian preach- 
 ers, and bore them the most honourable 
 testimony. Paul was grieved, as being 
 fully sensible of the ill effect, which a 
 supposed union between Christ and Py- 
 thon* must occasion in the minds of men. 
 
 * The very term leads me to apprehend, that 
 
 He was at length enabled miraculously 
 to eject the demon. The proprietors of the 
 yoiuig woman, who had made a traffic of 
 her oracular powers, finding that she was 
 dispossessed of the demon, wreaked their 
 vengeance on Paul and Silas, and by 
 slanderous accusations induced the ma- 
 gistrates to scourge them severely, and 
 to commit them to prison. The jailer 
 thrust them into the inner prison, and fas- 
 tened their feet in the stocks. 
 
 In this situation, distressing indeed, 
 and in the eyes of many contemptible, 
 these two servants of God, at midnight, 
 though oppressed with pain and hunger, 
 and every disagreeable circumstance, 
 were yet enabled to pray and sing praises 
 to God. So powerful are the consolations 
 of the Holy Ghost, and so much did the 
 love of Christ constrain them ! And now 
 the Lord caused a great earthquake, 
 which opened all the doors of the prison, 
 and loosed every one's bonds. The jailer 
 awaking, in his first trepidation, by a 
 practice which I wish had been credita- 
 ble among Pagans only, was about to de- 
 stroy himself. Paul kindly assured him 
 that none of the prisoners had escaped. 
 And now being struck with horror at the 
 thought of the world to come, to which 
 he had been hastening in all his guilt, and 
 being divinely convinced of his danger, 
 he came trembling, and fell down before 
 Paul and Silas, and brought them out, 
 and asked what he must do to be saved. 
 The answer was plain and direct. Why 
 do any persons who call themselves 
 Christian ministers ever give any other 1 
 "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
 thou shalt be saved and thy house." 
 They then instructed him and his house- 
 hold in the nature of the Gospel, and 
 opened to him the doctrine of forgive- 
 ness of sins by the blood of Christ. His 
 conversion appears evidently of the same 
 kind, as that of the three thousand at Je- 
 rusalem. He was humbled for his sins, 
 and he received pardon by faith in Jesus. 
 His ready submission to baptism, his 
 affectionate treatment of those, who had 
 just before been the objects of his seve- 
 rity, and his joy in the Lord, demon- 
 strated, that he was turned from Satan to 
 
 the oracular work of the Pythian Apollo 
 among the Pagans had something iliabolical in 
 it ; and tiie story before us demonstrates the 
 reality of such delusions, and that human fraud 
 and sagacity alone are not sufiicient to account 
 for them. 
 
52 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 God. — His whole family shared with him 
 in the same blessing-s. 
 
 In the morningf the mag-istrates sent an 
 order for the dismission of the prisoners. 
 But Paul thought it not inconsistent with 
 Christian meekness, to demand from them 
 an apology for their illegal behaviour to 
 Roman citizens ; for such it seems Silas 
 was, as well as Paul. The magistrates, 
 alarmed, came personally to make con- 
 cessions, which were easily accepted. 
 Being dismissed from prison, they en- 
 tered into Lydia's house, comforted the 
 disciples, and left Philippi for the pre- 
 sent. 
 
 Some years after the Apostle again 
 visited the Philippians, and found them 
 still in a flourishing state. He always 
 took a peculiar pleasure in this Church; 
 and, in his epistle written from Rome, he 
 thanks God for their sincere fellowship 
 in the Gospel from the beginning. He 
 expresses liis expectation of liberty, and 
 of being enabled to see them ao-ain, and 
 exhorts them to bear patiently the perse- 
 cutions to which they were exposed, as 
 being an evidence of the divine favour.* 
 
 Liberality was a shining virtue among 
 tliese converts. They had sent once and 
 again to his relief at Thessalonica.f And 
 now they had sent Epaphroditus to 
 Rome, to minister to his wants. A dan- 
 gerous illness had brought that disciple 
 to the borders of the grave. Upon his 
 recovery he was afflicted to think of the 
 distress, which the news of his sickness 
 must have brought on the minds of the 
 Philippians. Paul was therefore the more 
 anxious to send him back. The sensibility 
 of that love, with which the Holy Ghost 
 had influenced all concerned in this af- 
 fair, is finely described in this part of the 
 epistle.:): The Apostle, toward the close 
 of it, even exults in the pleasure which 
 the charity of these disciples gave him ; 
 and "he assures them, that his God would 
 ♦'supply all their need according to his 
 riches in glory by Christ Jesus." He 
 warns them however against the dangers 
 of seduction. Judaizing teachers desired 
 to pervert them. He reminds them, there- 
 fore,§ of his own simple dependence on 
 the Lord Jesus, though he had fairer pre- 
 tensions than most men to self-righteous- 
 ness; and with tears in his eyes declares, 
 that, even then, many pretended Chris- 
 
 tians walked like enemies of the Cross 
 of Christ. 
 
 Such was the work of God at Philippi. 
 A considerable number of persons, once 
 worshippers of idols, devoted to the bas- 
 est lusts, and sunk in the grossest igno- 
 rance, were brought to the knowledge 
 and love of the true God, and to the hope 
 of salvation by his Son Jesus. In this faith 
 and hope they persevered amidst a world 
 of persecutions, steadily brought forth the 
 fruits of charity, and lived in the joyful 
 expectation of a blessed resurrection. 
 
 *Plulip. i. 28,29. + Philip, iv. 16. 
 
 i Chap.ii., toward the end, 
 ^ Chap, iii. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THESSALONICA. 
 
 Of Amphipolis and Apollonia, the next 
 cities of Macedonia through which St. 
 Paul passed, nothing particular is re- 
 corded. But at Thessalonica another 
 European Church was formed inferior in 
 solid piety to none in the primitive times. 
 This city had been rebuilt by Philip of 
 Macedon, and had its name from his con- 
 quest of Thessaly. Here Paul followed 
 his usual practice of preaching first to 
 the Jews in their synagogue; and he 
 spent the first three Sabbaths in pointing 
 out the evidences of Christianity. The 
 custom of the Jews in allowing any of 
 their countrymen to exhort in their syna- 
 gogues, gave the Apostle an easy oppor- 
 tunity of preaching to this people, till 
 tlieir accustomed enmity and obstinacy 
 began to exert itself. Some of the Jews 
 were however converted,* and a great 
 multitude of religious Gentiles who used 
 to attend the synagogue, and not a few 
 females of quality. So difficult is it for 
 even Satan himself to erase all perception 
 of the one true God from the minds of 
 men, so powerful is the voice of natural 
 conscience, and so totally unreasonable 
 is the polytheism of the Pagans, that not- 
 Avithstanding the extreme depravity of 
 human nature, we find, Avherever the 
 Jews carried on the public worship of the 
 God of Israel, it was common for some 
 Gentiles to join in their worship. Within 
 the bounds of the Holy Land there were 
 a number of this sort. And I observe 
 through the whole tenour of Josephus's 
 history, that the Romans treated with re- 
 spect what the Jews held sacred ; and 
 whoever was distinguished by any reli- 
 gious thoughtfulness from others, such a 
 
 * Acts xvii. 
 
Cejtt. I.] 
 
 AT THESSALONICA. 
 
 53 
 
 one found nothing to suit him in Gentile 
 rites, but preferred the worship of the 
 Jews. The devout Greeks converted at 
 Thessalonica were of this class ; and this 
 is not the first instance we have seen of 
 the Lord's preparing persons, by an at- 
 tention to a more imperfect light, for the 
 Sun of Righteousness. But HE is not 
 confined to one method. The major part 
 of the Thessalonian converts were idola- 
 ters,* who now turned to the living and 
 true God, in the faith and hope of Jesus, 
 who "delivered them from the wrath to 
 come." Faith, hope, and charity evinced 
 this people to be God's elect: the word 
 came to their hearts in much power and 
 assurance; and, though it exposed them 
 to great affliction, this did not prevent 
 their joy of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 The restless Jews were not ashamed 
 to join with the most profligate Pagans 
 in persecuting the new converts; and 
 decent hj^ocrites and open sinners were, 
 once more, seen united in opposing the 
 Church of God. They assaulted the 
 house of Jason, at whose house Paul and 
 his companions were entertained. Pre- 
 cautions having been used to secrete 
 them, Jason and some other Christians 
 were brought before the magistrates, and 
 calumniated with the usual charge of se- 
 dition. The Roman governors, however, 
 were content with exacting a security 
 from Jason and his friends for the peace 
 of the state. But the Apostle knew too 
 well the malice of the Jews to confide in 
 any present appearances of their modera- 
 tion ; and therefore felt himself oblig-ed 
 abruptly to leave the infant Church, 
 The first epistle, however, which he sent 
 to them, not long after, plainly proves 
 that they were not without pastors, whom 
 he charges them to honour and obey.f 
 
 The growth of this people in godliness 
 was soon renowned through the Chris- 
 tian world. Their persecution appears to 
 have been grievous ; and hence the com- 
 fort of God their Saviour, and the pros- 
 pect of the invisible world, became more 
 precious to them. The Apostle made 
 two attempts to return to them, but was 
 as often disappointed by the malice of 
 Satan. :t^ Fearing, lest the weight of af- 
 fliction might crush their religion in its 
 infancy, he sent Timothy to them, to 
 establish and comfort them. From § him, 
 on his return, he learnt the strength of 
 
 their faith and love, and their affectionate 
 remembrance of the Apostle, whose be- 
 nevolent effusions of joy and gratitude on 
 the occasion exceed all encomium. The 
 influence of the Holy Spirit in enlighten- 
 ing, comforting, and invigorating this 
 Church, seemed in a good measure to 
 supply any want of pastoral instruction, 
 in which, from their circumstances, they 
 might probably be defective. They were 
 tau'ght of God to love one another, and 
 they exercised this brotherly affection in 
 the strongest manner toward all around.* 
 Fornication indeed was a sin so com- 
 monly practised among the Gentiles, 
 without the least suspicion of its evil, 
 that Paul thought proper to warn them 
 against it expressly and distinctly. f 
 °In his second epistle he congratulates 
 them on their great proficiency in faith 
 and love: and while he comforts them 
 with the prospect of the second coming 
 of Christ, he takes occasion to correct a 
 mistake, into which they had fallen from 
 what he had mentioned in his former 
 epistle, of imagining that the last day 
 was at hand. Men, who had suddenly 
 passed from the grossest ignorance, in- 
 to the full blaze of Gospel-day, might 
 easily make such a mistake, especially 
 since their affections were now so strong- 
 ly captivated with heavenly objects, and 
 since they found so little in a world of 
 persecution to cheer their minds. There 
 appears only one fault in this people 
 which he thought necessary to rebuke. 
 He intimated something:^ of it in the for- 
 mer epistle, in the latter he was more 
 express. § It was the want of industry in 
 their callings, with which he charged 
 some of them ; for this was not a general 
 evil. How they might fall into it, is 
 easy to conceive. Persons all alive for 
 God and his Christ, and knowing little 
 of the deceitfulncss of the heart, and of 
 the crafts of Satan, might find it irksome 
 to attend to the concerns of this life. It 
 was a fault indeed, and very dangerous, 
 if persisted in ; but as it was, in all pro- 
 bability, soon corrected, and in part occa- 
 sioned by the strength of heavenly affec- 
 tions, one cannot be very severe in cen- 
 suring them. 
 
 It may be worth while for those, who 
 feel themselves much irritated against 
 similar evils attendant on the effusion of 
 the Holy Spirit in our days, to consider 
 
 • 1 Thess. 
 ^ii. 18. 
 
 i. 9. 
 
 e2 
 
 1 Thess. V. 
 iii. 9, 10. 
 
 * 1 Thess. iv. 9, 10. 
 tiv. 11, 12. 
 
 f iv. 3-9. 
 
 4 2 Thess. iii. 11. 
 
54 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [CUAP. X. 
 
 whether they do not exercise more can- 
 dour towards the Thessalonians, than 
 they do towards those, who are actually 
 walking in their steps ; whether they are 
 not apt to respect the former as real 
 Christians, and to scorn the latter as de- 
 luded enthusiasts ! 
 
 This Church bears the strongest signa- 
 tures of godliness, the effect of no com- 
 mon effusion of the Spirit. They adorn- 
 ed the Gospel, with faith, hope, and 
 charity; yet showed, by their faults and 
 ignorance, the importance of diligent and 
 much pastoral instruction, in which their 
 circumstances suffered them not to abound; 
 and which, under God, would have soon 
 cured the former, and removed the latter. 
 
 They were exposed to such blemishes, 
 as are most apt to attend great attain- 
 ments in the divine life made with vast 
 rapidity. 
 
 It appears, that St. Paul visited this 
 people a considerable time after, and gave 
 them much exhortation; but we have 
 00 particular further account of thenj.* 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 BEREA AND ATHENS. 
 
 Paul was conducted from Thessaloni 
 ca to Berea, a city of Macedonia. Here 
 also was a Jewish synagogue, and here, 
 for the first time, the preaching of the Cross 
 was candidly received by Jews. A very 
 singular character is given of the Jews 
 of this place ;— they possessed a liberal- 
 ity of mind, which disposed them to 
 listen with attention, and to search the 
 Scriptures of the Old Testament with 
 daily assiduity. The grace of God seems 
 to have prepared these persons for the 
 Gospel; and Paul had the pleasure to 
 find a number of the stamp of Cornelius, 
 who were groping their way to happi- 
 ness, and were ready to hail the light as 
 soon as it should dawn upon them. Many 
 Jews of Berea believed, and not a few 
 
 * In the first epistle he "charges them hy 
 the Lord," that it be "read to all the holy 
 brethren." As this seems to have been his 
 first epistle, and indeed the newest part of the 
 •whole New Testament, the solemnity of the 
 abjuration (oe^.j;-.) has a peculiar propriety, as 
 Dr. Lardner observes. The Thessalonians 
 were no doubt disposed to receive it as matter 
 of apostolical inspiration, and the importance 
 of bringing every Christian to be well ac- 
 quainted with the word of God is fairly in- 
 ferred. 
 
 Gentiles also of both sexes: those of the 
 female sex were persons of quality. The 
 rage of the Thessalonian Jews soon how- 
 ever disturbed this pleasing scene, and 
 stirred up a persecution, which obliged 
 the Christians to use some art in saving 
 the Apostle's life. His conductors at 
 first took the road toward the sea, which 
 might lead the persecutors to suppose he 
 had quitted the continent. They then 
 brought him safe to Athens,* once the 
 first city of Greece in all views, and still 
 renowned for taste and science, the school 
 in which the greatest Romans studied 
 philosophy. Here, while he waited for 
 the arrival of Silas and Timothy, he be- 
 held the monuments of the city with 
 other eyes than those of a scholar and a 
 gentleman. No place in the world could 
 more have entertained a curious and phi- 
 losophical spirit than this. Temples, 
 altars, statues, historical memorials, liv- 
 ing philosophers of various sects, books 
 of those who are deceased, a confluence 
 of polite and humanized persons of vari- 
 ous countries, enjoying the luxury of 
 learned leisure, — these things must at 
 once have obtruded themselves on his 
 notice: and no man in any age, by 
 strength of understanding, warmth of 
 temper, and justness of taste, seems to 
 have been more capable of entering into 
 the spirit of such scenes than Saul of 
 Tarsus. But Divine Grace had given 
 his faculties a very different direction; 
 and the Christian in him predominated 
 extremely above the philosopher and the 
 critic. He saw here, that even the ex- 
 cess of learning brought men no nearer 
 to God.. No place on earth Avas more 
 given to idolatry. He could not there- 
 fore find pleasure in the classical luxuries 
 presented before him: he saw his Maker 
 disgraced, and souls perishing in sin. 
 Pity and indignation swallowed up all 
 other emotions: and ministers of Christ, 
 by their own sensations in similar scenes, 
 may try how far they are possessed of the 
 mind of Paul, which, in this case, cer- 
 tainly was the mind of Christ. If aff"ec- 
 tions be lively, some exertions will fol- 
 low. He laid open the reasons of Chris- 
 tianity to Jews in their synagogue, also 
 to Gentile worshippers, who attended 
 the synagogue, and, daily, to any per- 
 sons whom he met with in the forum. 
 There were two sects very opposite to 
 one another among the pagan philoso- 
 
 * Acts xvii. 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 AT BEREA AND ATHENS. 
 
 55 
 
 phers, namely, the Epicureans and the jby the two Apostles are as different, as 
 " " the circumstances of a Jewish and Athe- 
 
 nian audience were : The end aimed at by 
 both was the same. 
 
 There is reason to apprehend, that God 
 never suffers the plain and faithful de- 
 nunciation of his Gospel to be altogether 
 fruitless. A few persons believed in 
 reality and with steadfastness, among 
 whom was Dionysius, a member of the 
 court, and a woman named Damaris. 
 These Paul left to the care of that gra- 
 cious God who had opened their eyes, 
 and he departed from a city as yet too 
 haughty, too scornful, and too indifferent 
 concerning things of infinite moment, to 
 receive the Gospel. A church could 
 hardly be said to be formed here, though 
 a few individuals were converted. The 
 little success at Athens evinces that a 
 spirit of literary trifling in religion, where 
 all is theory, and the conscience is uncon- 
 cerned, hardens the heart effectually. 
 What a contrast between the effects of 
 the same Gospel dispensed to the illiter- 
 ate Macedonians, and the philosophical 
 Athenians! Yet there want not many 
 professing Christians, who, while they 
 stigmatize men of the former sort with 
 the name of barbarians, bestow on the 
 latter tlie appellation of enlightened phi- 
 losophers. 
 
 Stoics. The former placed the chief 
 good in pleasure, the latter in, what they 
 called, virtue, correspondent to the two 
 chief sects among the Jews, the Saddu- 
 cees and the Pharisees, and indeed to 
 the two sorts among mankind in all ages, 
 who yet are in a state of nature, namely, 
 men of a licentious and dissipated turn of 
 mind on the one hand, and on the other 
 self-righteous persons who substitute 
 their own reason and virtue in the room 
 of divine grace and divine influence. As 
 these will in any age unite against the 
 real friends of Jesus Christ, so it was 
 here : the Apostle appeared a mere bab- 
 bler in their eyes. Jesus and the resur- 
 rection, which he preached, were ideas, 
 from which their minds were so abhor- 
 rent, that they took them for a new god 
 and goddess. 
 
 It belonged to the court of Areopagus 
 to take cognizance of things of this nature. 
 This court had unjustly condemned the 
 famous Socrates, as if he had depreciated 
 the established religion, though he had 
 given as strong proofs of his polytheistic 
 attachments as he had of philosophical 
 pride. It ought not however to be denied, 
 that in a lower sense he suffered for 
 righteousness' sake. His honest rebukes 
 of vice and improbity exposed him to 
 death ; — so unsafe is even the least ap- 
 proximation to goodness in a world like 
 this. That St. Paul escaped condemna- 
 tion here, seems owing to peculiar cir- 
 cumstances. The court, under the toler- 
 ating maxims of its Roman superior, 
 seems now to have had only the privilege 
 of examining tenets as a synod, without 
 the penal power of magistracy.* 
 
 It would carry me too far to dwell on 
 the excellent apology of Paul delivered 
 before this court. He reproved their 
 idolatory in language and by arguments 
 perfectly classical ; and he announced so 
 much of the Gospel, as was adapted to 
 the very ignorant state of his audience. 
 Whoever duly examines this short mas- 
 terpiece of eloquence, may see that he la- 
 bours to beget in them the spirit of con- 
 viction, and to prepare them for Gospel- 
 mercy, just as Peter did in his first ser- 
 mon at Jerusalem. The means used 
 
 * In this liowever I am not very i)Osilivt; : A 
 greater degree of sceptical indifference niinlit, 
 in tlie progress of refinement, have prevaik-d 
 at Athens in the days of St. Paul, and the 
 court might itself be as little disposed to per- 
 secute, as the Roman powers. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CORINTH. 
 
 Corinth was, at this period, the me- 
 tropolis of Greece. Its situation in an 
 isthmus rendered it remarkably conve- 
 nient for trade. It was the residence of 
 the Roman governor of Achaia, the name 
 then given to all Greece ; and it was, at 
 once, full of opulence, luxury, and sen- 
 suality. Hither the Apostle came from 
 Athens, and laboured both among the 
 Jews and the Gentiles. Here Providence 
 favoured him with the acquaintance and 
 friendsliip of Aquila and his wife Pris- 
 cilla, two Jewish Christians lately ex- 
 pelled from Italy with other Jews, by an 
 edict of the emperor Claudius. With 
 them he wrought as a tent-maker, being 
 of the same occupation : for every Jew, 
 whether rich or poor, was obliged to fol- 
 low some trade. After the arrival of Silas 
 and Timothy, the Apostle with much ve- 
 hemence preached to his countrymen ; 
 but opposition and abuse were the only 
 
56 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 returns he met with. The modern notions 
 of charity will scarcely be reconciled to 
 the zealous indignation which he showed 
 on this occasion. He shook his garment, 
 and told them, that he was clear of their 
 destruction ; and that he would leave 
 them, and apply himself to the Gentiles 
 in the city. With this denunciation he 
 left the synagogue, and entered into the 
 house of one Justus, a devout person, 
 well affected to the Gospel. Crispus 
 also the ruler of the synagogue, with his 
 whole family, received the truth. But 
 we hear of no more Jewish converts at 
 this place. However, many Corinthians 
 were converted. And a gracious vision 
 of the Lord Jesus* who said to Paul in the 
 night, " I have much people in this city," 
 encouraged him to continue here a year 
 and half. — The rage of the Jews would 
 doubtless be raised to the highest pitch ; 
 but, as usual, the moderate spirit of the 
 Roman government prevented its san- 
 guinary exertions. Gallio the proconsul, 
 brother of the famous Seneca, was per- 
 fectly indifferent concerning the progress 
 of Christianity, and refused to pay the 
 least attention to their complaints against 
 Paul, who now found himself so effectual- 
 ly preserved from the fury of his coun- 
 trymen, that he remained in Corinth a 
 considerable time longer than the above- 
 mentioned year and a half. After his 
 departure, Apollos, a zealous and elo- 
 quent Alexandrian Jew, came to this city, 
 and was made a very powerful instru- 
 ment of building up this Church, and of 
 silencing the opposition of the Jews. 
 The modesty of this man was as conspi- 
 cuous as his spirit. Till he was instruct- 
 ed more perfectly by Aquila and Priscilla, 
 he knew no more of Christianity, than 
 what was contained in the system of 
 John the Baptist. That so able a man 
 could submit to profit by others, was a 
 proof of an humble frame. 
 
 It appears, that St. Paul, so far as cir- 
 cumstances admitted, kept up a constant 
 correspondence with the Churches. The 
 care of them, as he says, " came upon 
 him daily." The Corinthians wrote to 
 him to ask his advice on some cases of 
 conscience ; and he understood that a 
 variety of evils and abuses had crept in 
 among them. On these accounts he 
 wrote the two epistles to the Corinthians. 
 In reviewing them, we are astonished to 
 find how faulty many persons of tliis 
 
 * Acts xviii. 
 
 Church were; and the scene, which they 
 exhibit, more resembles modern than 
 primitive times, in a variety of circum- 
 stances. It falls not within the design of 
 this history to enlarge. Former writers 
 have, with more than sufficient accuracy, 
 detailed the evils ; let one at least be al- 
 lowed briefly to record the good things 
 of the Church of Christ. In regard to 
 the people of Corinth, their exemption 
 from persecution under Gallio, and their 
 state of ease and prosperity, so uncom- 
 mon with other Churches, in a great 
 measure account for the little spirituality 
 which they manifested. Perhaps no 
 Church was more numerous, and none 
 less holy in the Apostolic age. And it may 
 teach us not to repine at the want of the 
 MIRACULOUS operations of the Holy Spirit, 
 when we consider that these Corinthians 
 abounded in them. But many of them 
 were proud of gifts, contentious, self- 
 conceited, and warm partisans of Paul, 
 Apollos, or Peter; and by the indulgence 
 of this sectarian spirit, showed how little 
 they had learned of true wisdom, which 
 gives the Apostle occasion* to recom- 
 mend the wisdom that is from above, to 
 point out the nature and properties of 
 spiritual understanding, and to pour a just 
 contempt on that which is merely natural. 
 
 With the pride of false wisdom they 
 joined a very blameable neglect in prac- 
 tice. One of their Church lived in incest, 
 and the offender was not excommuni- 
 cated. f St. Paul rebukes them also for 
 thier litigiousness and lasciviousness.if: 
 In answer to their queries, he recom- 
 mends celibacy as preferable to matri- 
 mony where a man can practise it, and 
 that I think from general reasons, § as 
 more favourable to holiness, without 
 however depreciating matrimony, or giv- 
 ing the least countenance to the flood of 
 monastic abuses, which afterwards pre- 
 vailed in Christendom. But mankind 
 are ever prone to extremes ; and the 
 extreme which is opposite to superstition 
 so much prevails at present, that I should 
 not wonder, if some persons should star- 
 tle at what I have mentioned as the sen- 
 timents of St. Paul, though it be almost 
 impossible for any unprejudiced person 
 to understand him otherwise. 
 
 So little were the Corinthians exposed 
 to persecution, that they were invited by 
 their idolatrous neighbours to partake of 
 
 * 1 Cor. four first chapters, t Cha]). v. 
 I Chap. vi. § Cliap. vii. 
 
Cejtt. I.] 
 
 AT CORINTH. 
 
 57 
 
 their idol feasts ; and there were among 
 tliem those who complied.* There were 
 also among' them false apostles, who, by 
 pretendinor to instruct them gratis, endea- 
 voured to depreciate Paul as a mercenary 
 person. f Hence, while he rebukes the 
 faults or defects of this people, he ob- 
 serves that HE laboured among them free- 
 ly, which the false apostles pretended to 
 do. He proceeds to correct an abuse which 
 obtained in their assemblies, in the article 
 of decency of dress ; and another much 
 worse, — the profanation of the Lord's 
 Supper.:{: He insists also on the correc- 
 tion of their abuse of spiritual gifts, par- 
 ticularly those of languages. § It appears 
 that gifts were more prized by them, in 
 some respects, than grace itself; and that 
 love, which he beautifully describes, was 
 at a low ebb among them. He occasion- 
 ally mentions, however, a very common 
 effect attendant on the preaching of the 
 Gospel even at Corinth: If an ignorant 
 idolater came into their assemblies, he 
 was so penetrated with the display of the 
 truth as it is in Jesus, that he could not 
 but discover the very secrets of his soul : 
 he would prostrate himself in the wor- 
 ship of God, and report that God was in 
 them of a truth. || And, if where the 
 Gospel was so little honoured by the 
 lives of its professors as at Corinth, such 
 power attended the dispensation of it, 
 how much more of the same kind, may 
 we suppose, happened at Philippi and at 
 Thessalonica 1 For we have not yet men- 
 tioned all the evils of this outwardly 
 flourishing, but inwardly distempered 
 Church. There were some, who even 
 denied the resurrection of the body, which 
 gives occasion to the Apostle to illustrate 
 that important article.^ 
 
 Though he had promised to revisit them 
 soon, yet in the next epistle, he assigns 
 a reason why he delayed longer than he 
 had intended. Their Christian state was 
 very imperfect; and he wished to be ena- 
 bled, by their reformation, to come amono- 
 
 • 1 Cor. viii. 10. 
 
 1 1 Cor. ix., compared with 2 Cor. xi. 13-20. 
 
 t 1 Cor. xi. § Chap. xii. xiii.xiv. 
 
 II This is a proof of the Divine Influence at- 
 tendant on Christianity. General proofs of 
 its authenticity may be drawn also from the 
 subject of miraculous gifts. The Apostle's 
 manner of describing these things proves their 
 reality and their frequency. For no man could 
 have convinced these Corinthians, that they 
 were in possession of those gifts, if they them- 
 selves had not been conscious of them. 
 
 5 1 Cor. XV. 
 
 them with more pleasure. In truth, he 
 wrote the first epistle in much anguish and 
 affliction.* His soul was deeply affected 
 for this people, and while great prooress 
 in profession seemed so inconsistent with 
 their experience and their practice, he 
 felt the sincerest grief. He was relieved 
 at length by the coming of Titus, f from 
 whose account it appeared, that the ad- 
 monitions were by no means fruitless. 
 The case of the incestuous person at 
 length was attended to by them as it 
 ought : they proceeded even Avith more 
 severity than the Apostle desired ; for, 
 though the man gave the strongest proof 
 of repentance, they refused to readmit 
 him into their Church, till St. Paul sig- 
 nified his express desire that they would 
 do so. 
 
 There can be no doubt but that many 
 persons belonging to this Church were 
 recovered to a state of affection and prac- 
 tice worthy of Christianity. In particu- 
 lar the Apostle commends their liberality 
 towards the distressed Christians.:}: But 
 there was still an obstinate party among 
 the Corinthians, attached to the false 
 apostles, whose conduct extorted from 
 him a zealous and honest commendation 
 of himself, his endowments, and his of- 
 fice, which yet he manages with great 
 address and delicacy, while he bewails 
 the scandalous practices still existing 
 among them.§ 
 
 On his arrival at Corinth after these 
 epistles, he doubtless executed what he 
 had threatened, namely, some wholesome 
 severities on offenders, unless their spee- 
 dy and sincere repentance prevented the 
 necessity of such a step. He spent three 
 months || in his second visit. But we 
 have no particular account in Scripture 
 of this Church. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ROME. 
 
 It may seem to have been purposely 
 appointed by Infinite Wisdom, that our 
 first accounts of the Roman Church should 
 be very imperfect, in order to confute the 
 proud pretensions to universal dominion, 
 which its bishops have with unblushino- 
 arrogance supported for so many ages. 
 If a line or two in the Gospels concern- 
 ing the keys of St. Peter have been made 
 
 *2Cor. ii. 4. 
 i 2 Cor. ix. 
 U Acts XX. 
 
 t 2 Cor. vii. 
 ^ Chap. xi. xii. 
 
58 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 the foundation of such lofty pretensions 
 in his supposed successors to the prima- 
 cy, how would they have gloried, if his 
 labours at Rome had been so distinctly 
 celebrated, as those of St. Paul in several 
 Churches'? What bounds would have 
 been set to the pride of ecclesiastical 
 Rome, could she have boasted of herself 
 as the mother-church, like Jerusalem, or 
 even exhibited such trophies of Scriptural 
 fame, as Philippi, Thessalonica, Co- 
 rinth, or Ephesus? The silence of Scrip- 
 ture is the more remarkable, because the 
 Church itself was in an early period by 
 no means insignificant, either for the 
 number or the piety of its converts. Their 
 faith was spoken of through the whole 
 world.* The Apostle thus commends 
 them ; nor does he in his epistle to them 
 intimate any thing peculiarly faulty in 
 their principles or conduct. The epistle 
 to the Romans itself, while the world en- 
 dures, will be the food of Christian minds, 
 and the richest system of doctrine to 
 scriptural theologians. By the distinct 
 directions which he gives for the mainte- 
 nance of charity between Jews and Gen- 
 tiles, it appears that there must have been 
 a considerable number of the former 
 among them. If one might indulge a 
 conjecture, I should suppose that Aquila 
 and Priscilla, who had laboured with St. 
 Paul at Corinth, botli in a spiritual and 
 temporal sense, and had been expelled 
 from Italy by the emperor Claudius, and 
 whom he here salutes as at Rome, were 
 first concerned in the plantation of this 
 Church, which was numerous, before any 
 Apostle had been there. Andronicus and 
 Junias are saluted also in the epistle : 
 they were men of character among the 
 Apostles, whose conversion was of an 
 earlier date than St. Paul's : they were 
 also his kinsmen, and had suffered in 
 conjunction with him for the faith. He 
 salutes also a number of others, though 
 they might not all be residents of Rome. 
 The work of Divine Grace in distinguish- 
 ing persons of various families and con- 
 nections is ever observable. There were 
 saints at Rome of the two families of 
 Aristobulus and Narcissus. The former 
 was of the royal blood of the Maccabees, 
 and had been carried prisoner to Rome 
 by Pompey. He himself had suffered a 
 variety of hardships incident to a life of 
 turbulent ambition like his ; yet some of 
 his family, of no note in civil history, are 
 
 * Rom. i. 
 
 marked as the disciples of Christ, and 
 heirs of the true riches. Narcissus is 
 distinguished in Roman history, as the 
 ambitious prime minister of Claudius ; yet 
 some of his household were in the Lord. 
 Paul had long wished and even pro- 
 jected a visit to this Church. He did not 
 expect that his journey thither at last was 
 to be at Cfesar's expense. Confident 
 however he was, that when he did come 
 to them, it should be " in the fulness of 
 the blessing of the Gospel of Christ." 
 And he intreats the prayers of the Ro- 
 mans, that he may be delivered from the 
 infidel Jews, and be acceptable in his 
 ministry to his believing countrymen at Je- 
 rusalem, whither he was then hastening, 
 that " he might come to them with joy by 
 the will of God," and be with them re- 
 freshed. Thus did Christians in those 
 days intreat the prayers of their brethren 
 through the world, and sympathize with 
 one another. And the prayers were an- 
 swered : Paul was saved from Jewish 
 malice : was acceptable to the Jewish con- 
 verts, " who had compassion on him in 
 his bonds ;" and was conducted safe to 
 Rome. At Appii Forum and the three 
 taverns he was met by the Roman Chris- 
 tians : he thanked God and took courage,* 
 refreshed, as he had been confident he 
 should be, whenever he might arrive 
 among them. None but those, who know 
 what is meant by the communion of saints, 
 can conceive the pleasure which he felt 
 on the occasion. After a charitable but 
 fruitless attempt to do good to the princi- 
 pal Jews at Rome, he employed the two 
 years of his imprisonment in receiv- 
 ing all who came to him, preaching with 
 all confidence, and without molestation. 
 On account of his imprisonment and ex- 
 amination at Rome, the nature of the 
 Gospel began to be inquired intof in Ne- 
 ro's court, and the conclusion of the epis- 
 tle to the Philippians makes it evident, 
 that some of the imperial household be- 
 came Christians indeed. And as the 
 court was by no means disposed to treat 
 him with rigfour, but rather to favour him 
 with indulgences as a Roman citizen, 
 hence many preachers in Rome and the 
 neighbourhood exerted themselves with 
 more courage than formerly they dared 
 to do. Yet certain persons even then 
 could preach Christ with malevolent views 
 of depreciating the Apostles : others did 
 it with sincere charity. But as real bene- 
 
 Acts xxviii. 15. 
 
 t Philippians i. 
 
Cestt. I.] 
 
 AT COLOSSE. 
 
 59 
 
 fit accrued to the souls of men from the 
 labours of the former as well as of the lat- 
 ter, the heart of Paul, ■svith a charity, the 
 wonderful effect of heavenly teacMng, 
 could rejoice in both. 
 
 Some writers seem to have gone too 
 far, in denying that Peter ever was at 
 Rome. But the cause of Protestantism 
 needs not the support of an unreasonable 
 scepticism. Undoubtedly the account of 
 Peter's martyrdom there, with that of 
 Paul, rests on a foundation sufficiently 
 strong, namely, the concurrent voice of 
 antiquity. His first epistle, by an ex- 
 pression at the close of it,* appears to have 
 been dated thence ; for the Church at 
 Babylon, according to the style of Chris- 
 tians at that time, could be no other 
 than the Church at Rome. — Of the literal 
 Babylon we find nothing in the writings 
 of those days. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 COLOSSE. 
 
 This city of Phrygia was in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Laodicea and Hierapolis, and 
 all three seem to have been converted by 
 the ministry of Epaphras the Colossian, 
 a companion and fellow-labourer of 
 Paul, who attended him at Rome during 
 his imprisonment, and informed him of 
 the sincerity and fruitfulness of their 
 Christian profession. For though he 
 speaks to the Colossians onl}'', yet the re- 
 ligious state of the two neighbouring cities 
 may be conceived to be much the same. 
 The example of Epaphras deserves to be 
 pointed out to the imitation of all minis- 
 ters. He always laboured fervently for 
 them in prayers, "that they might stand 
 perfect and complete in all the will of 
 God. "I And this was indeed one of the 
 best methods of evincing the sincerity of 
 his zeal, which Paul owns to have been 
 great for these Churches. 
 
 The Apostle himself, in the fulness and 
 fervency of his charity, wishes, that the 
 Colossians knew how strong the conflict 
 of his soul was for them, that they might 
 feel the comfort, understand the mystery, 
 and enjoy the riches of the Gospel.:]: 
 They had never seen his face in the flesh ; 
 but he felt for them as Christian breth- 
 ren, and honoured them as those, in whom 
 the word brought forth fruit, and who had 
 
 • 1 Pet. V. 13. 
 i Chap. ii. 1, 2. 
 
 f Col. iv. 12. 
 
 a lively hope in Christ beyond the grave. 
 But there must have been some particu- 
 lar dangers incident to their situation, to 
 give propriety to the cautions in his 
 epistle against philosophy and vain deceit, 
 against Judaical dependencies and rites, 
 and against an illegitimate humility and 
 self-righteous austerities. Such things, 
 he observes, carry indeed the appearance 
 of wisdom and goodness,* but lead only 
 to pride and an extravagant self estimation. 
 And the tendency of them is, to draw the 
 mind from that simplicity of dependence 
 on Christ, which is the true rest of the 
 soul, and the right frame of a Christian. 
 
 In truth, the Jew by his ceremonies, 
 and the Gentile by his philosophy, equal- 
 ly laboured to overturn the Gospel of 
 Christ. And their self-rio-hteous efforts 
 are then only effectually opposed, when 
 Christians know their "completeness in 
 Christ, and walk in him." After deliver- 
 ing a number of beautiful precepts closely 
 interwoven with Christian doctrine, the 
 Apostle directs them to read his epistle 
 in their assembly, and then to send it to 
 be read by the Laodiceans ; and also to 
 receive an epistle from Loadicea to be 
 read in their own Church, which, most 
 probably, was the epistle to the Ephe- 
 sians; none of these places being at a 
 great distance from one another.| And 
 he gives a plain, but very serious charge, 
 to Archippus their present pastor. We 
 see hence with what care these precious 
 apostolical remains were preserved among 
 primitive Christians; and we may con- 
 ceive, how, in the infancy of spiritual 
 consolation, they fed on those lively ora- 
 cles, which we now so indolently pos- 
 sess. 
 
 I see nothing more to be collected from 
 the Scriptures concerning the state of this 
 Church, except the instructive anecdote 
 in the epistle to Philemon. This man, 
 a Colossian Christian, had a slave, named 
 Onesimus, who deserted from his master, 
 probably not without some depredations 
 of his property, and wandered to Rome. 
 That, like all great cities, was the sink, 
 which received the confluence of various 
 vices and crimes. There the wonderful 
 Grace of God seized his heart. Provi- 
 dence brought him to hear Paul preach, 
 which we have seen that Apostle con- 
 tinue to do for two years in his imprison- 
 ment. Though former means of instruc- 
 tion under his Christian master had failed, 
 
 *Col. ii. ult. 
 
 t Chap. iv. 16, 17. 
 
60 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIV, 
 
 now, at length, his eyes were opened, 
 and he became a Christian indeed. Paul 
 would have found him a useful assistant 
 at Rome, but thought it most proper to 
 send him back to his master at Colosse ; 
 and this he did with a short letter, which 
 may justly be considered as a master- 
 piece of Christian politeness, address, 
 and sincerity. In his Colossian epistle 
 he mentions him also as a faithful and 
 beloved brother. — What important chan- 
 ges Divine Grace can effect in the hearts 
 of men, even of slaves, whom proud phi- 
 losophers despised, appears very evident 
 from this instance ! 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 
 
 There are some countries, to which we 
 understand that the Gospel was carried 
 during the first effusion of the Holy Spirit, 
 "which are only incidentally mentioned 
 without any detail of facts. 
 
 Extensive as we have seen, from St. 
 Luke's narrative, the labours of the Apos- 
 tle Paul were, it is evident from the epis- 
 tles, that he is far from relating the whole 
 of them. We cannot learn, for instance, 
 from the acts, when he visited Crete. Yet 
 the short epistle to Titus, whom he left 
 there with episcopal authority to ordain 
 ministers in every city, and to regulate 
 the churches, shows that that island of a 
 hundred cities had been considerably evan- 
 gelized ; and that many persons, among 
 a people proverbially deceitful, ferocious, 
 and intemperate, had received the whole- 
 some yoke of Christ. 
 
 And though I cannot but think, that the 
 strangers scattered throughout Pontius, 
 Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, 
 to whom St. Peter addresses his two epis- 
 tles,must mean the Jews of those countries, 
 yet their conversion would doubtless be 
 attended with that of many Gentiles. Of 
 tliree of these we know nothing particu- 
 larly: the work of God in Galatia has 
 been reviewed ; and Asia propria alone, 
 of all the evangelized regions mentioned 
 in scripture history, so far as I can dis- 
 cover, remains now to be considered. 
 
 It was on his first departure from Co- 
 rinth, that Paul first visited Ephesus,* 
 which name stands at the head of the se- 
 ven Churches of Asia, to whom St. John 
 dedicates the book of the Revelation. The 
 
 * Acts xviii. 19. 
 
 impression made on his hearers during 
 this visit, must have been remarkably 
 great, as it was but a short one, and as 
 they pressed his longer continuance among 
 them. He left them however for their 
 comfort and instruction Aquila and Pris- 
 cilla, whose labours were afterwards as- 
 sisted by ApoUos. 
 
 Paul himself returning to Ephesus, bap- 
 tized in the name of Jesus about twelve 
 disciples, who had hitherto received only 
 John's baptism.* From this circumstance 
 we learn, that from the first preacliing of 
 the Baptist nothing had been done in vain. 
 The imperfect elements of that harbinger 
 of Christ had paved the way for clearer 
 discoveries, and a variety of preparatory 
 works had tended to ripen the Church of 
 God into the fulness of light and holi- 
 ness. 
 
 Paul preached three months in the Jew- 
 ish synagogue at Ephesus, till the usual 
 perverseness of the Jews induced him to 
 desist, and to form the converts into a dis- 
 tinct Church. One Tyrannus lent his 
 school for the service of Christianity ; and 
 in that convenient place, for the space of 
 two years, the Apostle daily ministered, 
 instructed, and disputed. And thus the 
 whole region of Asia propria had at differ- 
 ent times an opportunity of hearing the 
 Gospel. 
 
 In no place does the word of God seem 
 so much to have triumphed as at Ephe- 
 sus. No less numerous than those of 
 Corinth, the believers were much more 
 spiritual. The work of conversion was 
 deep, vigorous, and soul-tausforming to 
 a great degree. Many persons, struck 
 with the horror of their former crimes, 
 made an open confession ; and many, who 
 had dealt in the abominations of sorcery, 
 now showed their sincere detestation of 
 them by burning their books before all 
 men, the price of which amounted to a 
 large sum. " So mightily grew the word 
 of God, and prevailed." — ^Thus triumphs 
 the sacred historian. — Satan must have 
 trembled for his kingdom: the emptiness 
 of all the systems of philosophy appeared 
 no less palpable, than the flagitiousness 
 of vice, and the enormities of idolatry : 
 The spiritual power of Jesus was never 
 seen in a stronger light since the day of 
 Pentecost; and the venal priesthood of 
 Diana the celebrated goddess of Ephesus, 
 apprehended the total ruin of their hie- 
 rarchy. 
 
 * Acts xix. 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 THE SEVEN CHURCHES IN ASIA. 
 
 61 
 
 Idolatry 
 of the 
 Ephesians. 
 
 No place on earth was more devoted 
 to idolatr}'. A number of ingenious artists 
 were enriched by making silver shrines 
 for Diana. They felt a sen- 
 sible diminution of their com- 
 merce, and found themselves 
 bound by interest to support 
 the credit of the goddess. INIost people 
 through almost all Asia had been induced 
 to believe, that manufactured gods were 
 mere nothings ; and it seemed high time 
 to make some strong efforts in favour of 
 the declining superstition. They soon 
 prevailed so far as to fill the city with 
 tumult; and they hurried two of Paul's 
 companions with them into the theatre, 
 where the whole mob assembled. The 
 daring spirit of Paul would have led him 
 into the same place. His Christian friends 
 interposed, and even some of the Asi- 
 archs, — persons who presided over the 
 games, — who had a personal esteem for 
 him, kindly dissuaded him. His zeal 
 seems not void of rashness, but it was the 
 rashness of a hero vexed to the soul to 
 think that Gains and Aristarchus, his two 
 friends, were likely to suffer in his ab- 
 sence. Now I apprehend was that season 
 of extreme distress, which he felt in Asia, 
 and which he describes so pathetically* 
 in his epistle to the Corinthians. Human 
 resources failed ; and God alone, he learnt, 
 could support him. The prudent and elo- 
 quent harangue of a magistrate, called the 
 town clerk, was the providential instru- 
 ment of his deliverance. He calmed the 
 spirit of the Ephesians, and silenced the 
 uproar; after which Paul affectionately 
 embraced the disciples, and left Ephesus.' 
 Three years he had laboured with great 
 success ; and he had the precaution to 
 leave pastors to superintend that and the 
 neighbouring Churches. But he foresaw 
 with grief, as he afterwards told these 
 pastors in a very pathetic address, when 
 he had sent for them to ]Miletus,f that 
 their present purity would not continue 
 unstained. Wolves would enter among 
 them to devour the flock ; and, among 
 themselves heretical perverseness would 
 find countenance, and produce pernicious 
 separations. He did all, however, which 
 man could do ; he warned them of the 
 danger ; and exhorted them to the perse- 
 vering discharge of their duty. 
 
 The parting between the Apostles and 
 these ministers cannot be read without 
 emotion. The elegant and affecting nar- 
 
 rative of St. Luke is before the reader, 
 and ought not to be abridged. The cor- 
 ruption of this excellent Church, seems 
 not, however, to have taken place, Vfhen 
 he wrote to them his epistle. It Is full 
 of instruction ; and next to that to the 
 Romans, may be looked on as a most 
 admirable system of divinit)-. It has this- 
 remarkable recommendation, that it will 
 serve for any Church and for any age. 
 Not a vestige appears in it of any thing 
 peculiarly miraculous, or exclusiveijr pri- 
 mitive. The controversies of the Chris- 
 tian world concerning doctrine would soou 
 be decided, if men would submit to be 
 taught by the simple, literal, and gratn- 
 matical meaning of this short treatise. 
 Every thing of doctrine and of duty is in 
 it: and what the Gospel really is, srf^iy 
 thence be collected with the greatest cer- 
 tainty. 
 
 It appears that Timothy was the cfiief 
 pastor at Ephesus in Paul's abser.cfil* 
 The Apostle's first epistle to hifhlhi;0ws 
 some light on the state of this Onurch 
 during his administration. There were 
 some persons of a Jadaical and legal turn 
 of mind, wiio endeavoured, bj' contentious 
 questions, to pervert the simplicity of 
 evangelical faith, hope, and love. There 
 were others in the opposite extreme : Two 
 are particularly characterized, Hymenajus 
 and Alexander, who abused the profession 
 of the faith to such open licentiousness, 
 as to render their ejection from the Church 
 a necessary measure. So oarly ^?ere the 
 Churches of Christ infected with the 
 same evils, which at this day fail not to 
 attend the propagation of Divine truth ! 
 From the directions which he gives to 
 Timothy concerning the regulatioii of pub- 
 lic worship, and the character and conduct 
 of church officers, it appears, indeed, that 
 ecclesiastical polity had taken a firm root 
 in this Church. But modern partizans 
 and bigots will still search the Scriptures 
 in vain to find their own exact model, ia 
 matters which the word of God hath left 
 indifferent, or at least to be decided only 
 by various circumstances of prudential ex- 
 pediency : Churches will, doubtless, be 
 much better employed, in establi>hing 
 and in observing useful practical ruless, 
 which are compatible with very different 
 forms of government. ■ I should suspect, 
 that the superstitious and self-righteous 
 spirit, which, under a thousand austeri-. 
 ties afterwards supported itself in the 
 
 * 2 Cor. i. 8, 9, 10. f Acts xx. 
 
 Vol. I. F 
 
 1 TiraotHy i. 
 
62 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XlV. 
 
 eastern Churches, and proved one of the 
 most powerful ensjines of popery, had even 
 then begun to show itself in Ephesus, and 
 Lad given occasion to the apostolical 
 cautions, as well as to the prophetical de- 
 claration of the vast increase of those 
 evils in after times.* It was the charita- 
 ble practice of the Church of Ephesus, to 
 maintain Christian widows at the public 
 expense. But I fear this liberality had 
 been abused. Young widows, who had 
 been living a life of ease, had thrown 
 themselves as a burden on their religious 
 brethren ; and however high they might 
 appear in Christian profession, some of 
 them exchanged the love of Christ for the 
 love of the world, and the indulgence of 
 sensuality. f As an idle life is a great 
 source of these evils, the Apostle recom- 
 mends that these should be encouraged 
 to enter again into the matrimonial state, 
 which would furnish laudable domestic 
 employments, rather than that they should 
 be maintained by the Church, in a state of 
 indolence. The widows, who should be so 
 maintained by the public stock, he recom- 
 mends to be those, who were far advanced 
 in life, of eminent laborious piety, and 
 distinguished for their works of charity. 
 
 On the whole, we may discover among 
 these excellent people some appearances 
 of the very worst of evils ; which, as yet, 
 made feeble efforts, were kept down by 
 the superior light and grace that prevail- 
 ed, and which seemed in indignant silence 
 to be expecting future opportunities of 
 diffusing themselves. 
 
 We know nothing more of this Church 
 during the remainder of St. Paul's life, nor 
 after his death, till towards the close of 
 tire first century. St. John, the only sur- 
 vivor of the Apostles, long continued his 
 fatherly care of the Churches of Asia 
 propria. During his exile at Patmos he 
 was favoured with an astonishing and 
 magnificent vision of the Lord Jesus,:}: 
 from whom he received several distinct 
 charges, addressed to the seven Churches 
 of Asia, descriptive of their spiritual state 
 at that time, and containing suitable di- 
 rections to each of tliem. The pastors of 
 the Churches are called angels ; and what 
 has been observable ir all aares was then 
 the case, — the character of the pastors 
 was much the same with that of tlie peo- 
 ple. We have here then, from the high- 
 est authority, some account of the state 
 of these Churches at the close of the first 
 
 * 1 Tim. iv. 
 
 t V. 15. 
 
 t Rev. i. 
 
 century. — It is short, but important. — Let 
 us endeavour to comprise it into as clear a 
 view as possible. 
 
 The Ephesians were still alive in the 
 faith.* Attempts had been made to per- 
 vert them, but in vain. How- 
 ever subtile the poison of he- Character 
 resy be, here it could find no ;;.,,'J^,, ^^ 
 admission. JNor could the Ephesus. 
 abominations of the Nicolai- 
 tanes, who appear to have been a sect 
 extremely corrupt in morals, make any 
 progress among them. They patiently 
 bore the cross ever attendant on the real 
 faith of Jesus, but could endure nothing 
 that tended to adulterate it. The taste 
 and spirit of the Gospel continued with 
 them : they laboured in good works with- 
 out fainting or weariness ; and their spi- 
 ritual discernment was not to be imposed 
 on by any pretences. Yet they had de- 
 clined from the intenseness of that love 
 which they had at first exhibited : Their 
 hearts panted not after Christ with that 
 steady ardour which formerly had ani- 
 mated this people ; and, with all the 
 marks of sound health remaining, their 
 vigour had much abated. 
 
 How exactly does this account agree 
 with the common case of the best Chris- 
 tian Churches. Because it is a common 
 case, and far from being the worst case, 
 Christians are apt to be content under 
 such a decline, and to impute it to neces- 
 sity, or to the loss of sudden fervours of 
 no great value, and to plume themselves 
 on the solidity of an improved judgment. 
 But true zeal and true charity should be 
 shown habitually, and not only now and 
 then when occasional inroads of the ene- 
 my may happen to call for particular ex- 
 ertions. These affections ought to grow 
 as the understanding is improved. The 
 spirit of prayer, of love to Christ, of ac- 
 tive services for his name, was now abated 
 at Ephesus, and a cool prudence w^as too 
 much magnified at the expense of charity. 
 The eternal salvation of real Christians 
 there was safe ; but real Christians should 
 have more in view than their own salva- 
 tion, — namely, the propagation of godli- 
 ness to posterity. These cautious Chris- 
 tians did not consider that their decline 
 pa,ved the way for farther and more me- 
 lancholy declensions in the divine life : 
 tliat the influence of their example was 
 likely to be mischievous to those who 
 followed; that their juniors would much 
 
 * Rev. ii. 
 
Cex-t. I.] 
 
 THE SEVEN CHURCHES IN ASIA. 
 
 63 
 
 more readily imitate their defects than 
 their virtues; in fine, that a foundation 
 was already laid for the unchurching of 
 this people, and for the desolation in 
 which this very region now remains un- 
 der Mahometan wickedness and igno- 
 rance. 
 
 The Church of Smyrna is next address- 
 ed. They were at once in a state of great 
 purity of doctrine, and holiness of heart 
 
 and life. The divine Saviour 
 J'*^ , . commends them in general. 
 Smyrna. That toward the end of the 
 
 first century, they should have 
 preserved the divine life in such vigour, — 
 a period of about forty years most proba- 
 bly, if indeed there had been no intermis- 
 sions, — is somewhat extraordinary, and 
 except in the case of Philadelphia, not 
 easily paralleled in history : — So natural- 
 ly does depravity prevail, in a course of 
 time, over the best constituted churches. 
 But their tribulation and poverty are par- 
 ticularly marked. Tliey were rich in 
 heavenly grace, poor in worldly circum- 
 stances. If poor Churches were fully 
 sensible of the mischiefs which often 
 arise from the accession of opulent indi- 
 viduals, they would not plume themselves 
 so much on the admission of such mem- 
 bers as they often do. The Smyrnean 
 Christians were chiefly of the poorer sort 
 of inhabitants; yet were they infested 
 with pretenders, of the same spirit as 
 those, who attempted to adulterate the 
 Gospel at Ephesus. Of the Smyrneans 
 it may be sufficient to say, that they made 
 large pretensions to pure religion; that 
 their corruptions were Judaical ; and that 
 they were under the influence of Satan. 
 This Church is taught to expect a severe 
 persecution which was to last some time ; 
 and they are exhorted to persevere in 
 faith. 
 
 The Church of Pergamus was also ap- 
 proved of in general. They lived in the 
 midst of a very impious people, who, in 
 
 eflect, worshipped Satan him- 
 
 J, , c self, and did all that in them 
 Church 01 , ' ,. i • i • j 
 
 Pei-o-a- y '^ support his kmgdom. 
 
 Yet was their zeal firm and 
 steady. Nor was its object a 
 few trifling punctilios, or some little nice- 
 ties of a doubtful disputation, but the 
 precious name of Christ himself, and the 
 faith of his Gospel. Hence they were 
 exposed not only to contempt, but to dan- 
 ger of life itself, and to cruel sufferings. 
 Our Lord mentions one person with par- 
 ticular complacency, "my faithful mar- 
 
 mus. 
 
 tyr Antipas." We know no more of him 
 than what is here recorded, — that "he 
 was slain among them where vSatan 
 dwelt," But what an honour to be thus 
 distinguished ! Volumes of panegyric 
 have been composed for mere statesmen, 
 heroes, and scholars. How frigid do 
 they all appear taken together, compared 
 with this simple testimony of Jesus ! But 
 this Church does not escape censure en- 
 tirely. There were among them certain 
 wicked and dangerous characters, who, 
 acting like Balaam of old, were employed 
 by Satan to entice persons to eat things 
 sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornica- 
 tion; — two evils often closely connected : 
 Even the abominations of the Nicolai- 
 tanes were practised by some. All these 
 are exhorted to repent, from the fear of 
 divine vengeance. On the whole, with a 
 few exceptions, and those indeed of an 
 extraordinary degree of malignity, the 
 Church of Pergamus was pure and livel\% 
 and upheld the standard of truth, though 
 encircled with the flames of martyrdom. 
 
 The Church of Thyatira was in a thriv- 
 ing state. Charity, active services, pa- 
 tient dependence on God, and 
 a steady reliance on the di- „,^^ , g. 
 Vine promises, marked their xhyatira. 
 works : and, what is peculiar- 
 ly laudable, their last works were more 
 excellent than their first.* A sounder 
 proof of genuine religion than such a 
 gradual improvement can scarcely be con- 
 ceived. Yet it is imputed as a fault tq 
 this Church, that they suffered an artful 
 woman to seduce the people into the same 
 evils, which had infected Pergamuf?. ]icT 
 real name we know not : her allegorical 
 name is Jezebel : she resembled the wif.; 
 of Ahab, who kept four hundred proph ts 
 at her table, and exerted all her influe.ica 
 to promote idolatry. The people of God 
 should have counteracted her, but they 
 did not; an advantage which deceit tul 
 guides have often gained through the 
 neo-liaence of the sincere. The Vtry s<?x. 
 of the pretended prophetess was a sutti. 
 cient reason why she should h;ive been 
 restrained. " Let your women keep si- 
 lence in the Churches,"]" is an exjjress 
 prohibition of females from the otlice of 
 teaching, however useful in other respects 
 pious women may be in the Church. Our 
 Lord informs the Church in Thyatira, 
 that he gave her space to repent, but to 
 no purpose, and therefore now denounces 
 
 * Rev. ii. 19. 
 
 + 1 Cor. xiv. J-i. 
 
64 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XIV. 
 
 The 
 
 Cli«rph 
 
 Sardis, 
 
 of 
 
 severe threatenings against her and her 
 asspciatcs, at the same time vindicating 
 bis claim to divine worship hy the in- 
 communicable title of him who searches 
 the hearts, and declaring that he would 
 make himself known to be such in all the 
 Churches. To those who had kept them- 
 selves unspotted from these evils, he de- 
 dares "he would put no other burden on 
 tliem :" only he exhorts them to hold fast 
 what they already had to the day of judg- 
 ment. The unsound Christians in this 
 place pretended to great depths of know- 
 ledge, which were, in reality, depths of 
 Satan. Such persons often impose on 
 others, and ?.re imposed on themselves. 
 by pretences to profound knowledge and 
 to superior degrees of sanctity. 
 
 The ( "hurch of Sardis presents us with 
 an unpleasing' spectacle. Their great in- 
 feriority to Thyatira evinces, 
 how possible it is for two so- 
 cieties of Christians holding 
 the same doctrines, to be in a 
 ▼erj different state. He who " walks in 
 the' midst of the Churches," extols the 
 growiiig faith and charity of the first, and 
 <»nd»,mns the drooping condition of the 
 secoud. They had neglected that course 
 of i)raTer and watchfulness, which is ne- 
 ^C5sarv to preserve the divine life in vi- 
 <iour. " Their Avorks were now faintly dis- 
 tinguishable from those of persons alto- 
 gether dead 'in sin. Some* good things 
 remained in fliem, which yet were ready 
 to die : but their lives brought no glory to 
 God, nor bcne.-it to the cause of Christ; 
 aaid could scarcely prevent its being sean- 
 daliied in the world. A few names in- 
 deed iWere were in Sardis, whom Jesus 
 lo6ki-d on witll coinplacency : they had 
 not defiled their garments. But most of 
 Hie Christians there had contracted deep 
 stains, probably by freely mixing with 
 tlie world, and by conforming to its cus- 
 toms. And we see here an awful fact 
 authenticated in the highest possible man- 
 ner, — that amon<T a society of persons all 
 J-Toiessing the Gospel, the greater part 
 mav be very dead in their souls. It should 
 CTer be rememberfMl, that human nature 
 Is averse to real faith, heavenly hope, and 
 genuine charity. An omnipotent energy 
 alone can produce or preserve true holi- 
 ness. This had been the case at Sardis, 
 when the Church partook of the first ei 
 fusion of the Spirit. Quite contrary to 
 the usual course of natural things, which 
 
 * Rev. jii. 
 
 are brought to perfection by slow and 
 gradual improvements, in Christ's reli- 
 gion godliness starts up in the infancy of 
 things in its best form. Seldom are the 
 last works, as was the case at Thyatira, 
 more abundant or more excellent. Here- 
 sies, refinements, human cautions, com- 
 monly adulterate the work of m^^^^ 
 God. An abuse, perhaps, of causes of 
 some frantic enthusiast ap- the de- 
 pears: the correction of it by clension 
 some presumptuous pretender 
 to reason introduces another 
 
 of the 
 Church of 
 Sardis. 
 
 more specious, but more dura- 
 ble one. The love of the world increases 
 with the abatement of persecution. The 
 natural propensity of inan to sin exerts 
 itself more and more: lively Christians 
 are removed by death: their juniors infe- 
 rior in all solid godliness, superior only 
 in self-estimation, reduce the standard of 
 Christian grace lower and lower : apolo- 
 gies are invented for sin ; what was once 
 experimentally known, becomes matter 
 of barren speculation : Even Scriptural 
 terms expressive of vital religion are de- 
 spised or sparingly used : fainter and more 
 polite modes of speech, better adapted to 
 classical neatness, but proper to hide and 
 disguise the ambiguities of scepticism, 
 are introduced: the pride of reasoning 
 grows strong : and men choose rather to 
 run the risk'of hell itself, than to be tho- 
 roughly humbled. The strong hand of 
 God alone, in overbearing convictions and 
 terrors, and in the sweetest, but most 
 powerful attractions of ffrace, can conquer 
 this contemptuous spirit. No wonder 
 then, that those who never felt, or who 
 have quenched in a great measure these 
 terrors and these attractions, relapse into 
 an impatient fastidiousness. And then 
 the infiuence of the Holy Spirit itself is 
 reasoned against with petty cavils, and 
 aspersed by illiberal suspicions. Un- 
 faithful and unexperienced persons, who 
 undertake to teach in these circumstances, 
 will often, in attempting to discriminate 
 the operations of the Spirit of God from 
 delusions, be unfeeling, rough, and un- 
 skilful. To them weeds and flowers in 
 the garden of Paradise will be the same 
 thing. A malignant instinct of profane 
 propensity tempts them to pull up alto- 
 gether, till they leave only the love of the 
 world, and, what they proudly call, com- 
 mon sense ; which last expression will be 
 found, at bottom, to denote a very mis- 
 chievous engine in religious matters; for, 
 so applied, it means neither more nor less 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 THE SEVEN CHURCHES IN ASIA. 
 
 65 
 
 than simply, the natural, unassisted pow- 
 ers of the human mind, darkened and cor- 
 rupted, as they are, by the fall. And 
 now, by frequent disuse, prayer and re- 
 ligious exercises, grow disagreeable : 
 Sensual and worldly objects allure the 
 carnal mind "with success : Lucrative 
 speculations in commerce devour the spi- 
 rit of godly meditation : The seasons of 
 religious duty are justled out by the 
 throng of business ; and excuses of neces- 
 sity are easily admitted : Men find a plea- 
 sure in being no longer reputed fanatics; 
 and professors of Christianity will nov^ ask 
 leave of the world, how far it will permit 
 them to proceed in religion without otltnce. 
 I dare not say, that all this exactly took 
 place at Sardis; but much of it did, no 
 doubt; and on occasion of this first in- 
 stance of a general declension, it seemed 
 not unreasonable to point out its ordinary 
 progress and symptoms. 
 
 The Christians of Philadelphia are 
 highly extolled. They were an humble, 
 charitable, fervent people, deeply sensi- 
 1-1 r^i ^^^ ^^ their own weakness, 
 
 SphiluleT'' .^earful of being seduced by 
 phia ' * Satan and their own hearts. 
 The Spirit assures them, that 
 they had a little strength, which had at 
 once been proved and exerted in holding 
 fast the simplicit)'' of the Gospel, and in 
 detecting and resisting all adulterations 
 of it. They are further assured, that the 
 Judaical heretics should be brought at 
 length to submit to become their disciples 
 in religion: And a promise of strong sup- 
 port is held out to them, because they had 
 maintained a true patience in sufferincr. 
 
 cious ; and this call to their souls demon- 
 strates that they had learnt to maintain, 
 in easy indolence, an orthodoxy of senti- 
 ments without any vivid atlention to the 
 Spirit of God : — In a word, his influence 
 was only not despised in Laodicea. 
 
 Such were the situations of the seven 
 Churches of Asia. The criticism is in- 
 deed inestimable : It is candid, impartial, 
 and penetrating. He, who has indulged us 
 with it, intended it for the use of all suc- 
 ceeding Churches : — and " he that hath 
 an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith 
 to the Churches." 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 The Church 
 of Laodi- 
 cea. 
 
 To them, as to all the rest of the Clmrch- 
 es, the rewards be^'ond the grave are pro- 
 posed as the grand motives of persever- 
 ance. 
 
 Laodicea too much resembled Sardis. 
 The people were in a lukewarm state, 
 a religious mediocrity, most odious to 
 Christ; because his religion 
 calls for the whole vehemence 
 of the soul, and bids us to be 
 cool only in worldly things. 
 The foundation of this lukewarmness 
 was laid in pride: They had lost the con- 
 viction of their internal blindness, mise- 
 ry, and depravity. When men go on for 
 years in a placid unfeeling uniformit)', 
 this is always the case. They were satis- 
 fied Avith themselves, and felt no need of 
 higher attainments. The counsel, which 
 is given to them, — to buy of him gold, 
 white raiment, and eye-salve, — is pre- 
 f2 
 
 THE REMAINDER OF THE FIRST 
 CEXTURY. 
 
 It is the observation of one of the an- 
 cients, that St. Luke, in the close of his 
 Apostolical history, leaves the reader 
 thirsting for more. I feel the force and 
 justness of the thought at this moment. 
 I have hitherto sailed by the compass of 
 Scripture ; and now find myself at once 
 entering into an immense ocean without a 
 guide. In fact I have undertaken to con- 
 duct the reader tlirough a long, obscure, 
 and difficult course, with scarcely a bea- 
 con here and there set up to direct me :— 
 but I must make the best use I can of the 
 very scanty materials before me. 
 
 It seems plain, that the Apostles in ge- 
 neral did not leave Judea, till after the 
 first council held at Jerusalem. They 
 seem never to have been in haste to quit 
 the land of their nativity. Probably the 
 tlirealening appearances of its desolation 
 by the Romans, hastened their departure 
 into distant regions. It is certain that be- 
 fore the close of this century, the power 
 of the Gospel was felt throughout the 
 
 Roman empire. 1 shall divide this 
 
 chapter into four parts, and review, first, 
 — The progress and persecution of the 
 Church. Secondly, — The lives, charac- 
 ters, and deaths of the Apostles and most 
 celebrated Evangelists. Thirdly, — The 
 heresies of this period. And, lastly, — 
 Tiie general character of Christianity in 
 this first age- 
 It was aboiil the year of our Lord 64, 
 that the city of Rome sustain- -o,,,., •„„ 
 ed a general conflagration, of Rome: 
 
 A. D. 64. 
 
 The emperor Nero, lost as he 
 
 was to all sense of reputation, 
 
 and hackneyed in flagitiousness, was yet 
 
 studious to avert the infamy of being 
 
GO 
 
 IIISTOKY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 reckoned tlie author of this calamity, 
 v-hich was orpjierally imputed to him. 
 y,Kt no steps that he coukl take were suf- 
 tictent to do away the suspicion. There 
 ■was, however, a particular class of peo- 
 ])le, so singularly distinct from the rest of 
 mankind, and so much hated on account 
 of the condemnation which their doctrine 
 and purity of life affixed to all except 
 themselves, that they might be calum- 
 niated with impunity. These were then 
 known at Rome by the name of Christians. 
 Unless we transplant ourselves into those 
 times, we can scarcely conceive how odi- 
 ous and contemptible the appellation then 
 was. The judicious Tacitus calls their re- 
 ligion a detestable superstition,* "which 
 at" first was suppressed, and afterwards 
 broke out afresh, and spread not only 
 through .Tudea the origin of the evil, but 
 through the metropolis also, the common 
 sewer in which every thing filthy and tla- 
 gilious meets and spreads." If so grave 
 and cautious a writer as Tacitus can thus 
 asperse the Christians without proof, and 
 without moderation, we need not wonder 
 that so impure a wretch as Nero should 
 not hesitate to charge them with the fact 
 of burning Rome. 
 
 Now it was that the Romans legally 
 persecuted the Church for the first time: 
 And those, who know the vir- 
 ulence of man's natural enmi- 
 tjs will rather wonder that it 
 commenced not earlier, than 
 that it raged at length with 
 such drea'dful fury. " Some 
 persons were apprehended, 
 who confessed themselves 
 Christians; and by their evidence, says 
 Tacitus, a great multitude afterwards 
 were discovered and seized: — and they 
 were condemned not so much for the 
 burning of Rome as for being the ene- 
 mies ol" mankind." A very remarkable 
 accusation ! It may be explained as fol- 
 lows : — True Christians, though the ge- 
 nuine friends of all their fellow-creatures 
 cannot allow men, who are not true Chris 
 tians, to be in the favour of God. Their 
 very earnestness, in calling on their neigh- 
 bours to repent and believe the Gospel, 
 proves to those neighbours in what a dan- 
 gerous state they are then apprehended to 
 be. All, who are notmoved by the admoni- 
 tions of Christian charity to flee from the 
 wrath to come, will naturally be disgust- 
 ed ; and thus the purest benevolence will 
 
 be construed into the most merciless bi- 
 gotry. Thus Christians incurred the ge- 
 
 Fh'st per- 
 secution of 
 tl\e Chris- 
 tians by 
 tlie Ro- 
 mans: 
 
 A. D. 64. 
 
 neral hatred, to which the conduct neither 
 of Jews nor heretics rendered them ob- 
 noxious. — And the same cause produces 
 similar effects to this day. 
 
 Their execution was aggravated with 
 insult. They were covered with skins of 
 wild beasts and torn by dogs : they were 
 crucified, and set on fire, that they might 
 serve for lights in the night-time. Nero 
 offered his gardens for this spectacle, and 
 exhibited the games of the circus. Peo- 
 ple could not, however, avoid pitying 
 them, base and undeserving as they were 
 in the eyes of Tacitus, because they suf- 
 fered not for the public good, but to gra- 
 tify the cruelty of a tyrant. It appears 
 from a passage in Seneca,* compared with 
 Juvenal, that Nero ordered them to be co- 
 vered with wax, and other combustible 
 materials : and that, after a sharp stake 
 was put under their chin, to make them 
 continue upright, they were burnt alive 
 to give light to the spectators."!" 
 
 We have no account how the people of 
 God conducted themselves under these 
 sufferino-s. What we know of their be- 
 haviour in similar scenes, leave us in no 
 doubt of their having been supported by 
 the power of the Holy Ghost. Nor is it 
 credible, that the persecution sho\]ld have 
 been confined to Rome. It would natu- 
 rally spread through the empire ; and one 
 of Cyriac's inscriptions found inSpain,:|: 
 demonstrates at once two important facts, 
 — that the Gospel had already penetrated 
 into that country, and — that the Church 
 there also had her martyrs. 
 
 Three or four years were probably the 
 utmost extent of this tremendous perse- 
 cution, as in the year 68 the tyrant was 
 himself, by a dreadful exit, 
 summoned before the divine A. D. 68. 
 tribunal. He left the Roman 
 world in a state of extreme confusion. — 
 Judea partook of it in a remarkable de- 
 gree. About forty years after our Lord's 
 sufTerings, wrath came on the body of the 
 Jewish nation to the uttermost, in a man- 
 ner too well known to need the least re- 
 lation in this history. What became of 
 the Christian Jews alone concerns us. — 
 The cono-regation were commanded, by an 
 
 * Tacitus, B. XV. 
 
 * Seneca, Ep. 14, Juv. 1 and 8, with liis 
 Scholiast. 
 
 t Bullet's History of Established Christian- 
 ity- 
 
 I See Gibbon's Account of Christianity con- 
 sidered, p. 94. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 67 
 
 oracle revealed to the best approved among 
 them, that before the wars betjan, they 
 should depart from the cit3% and inhabit a 
 village beyond Jordan, called Pella.* — 
 Thither they retired, and were saved from 
 the destruction, which soon after over- 
 whelmed their countrymen : and in so re- 
 tiring they at once observed the precept, 
 and fulfilled the well-known prophecy of 
 their Saviour. The death of Nero, and 
 the destruction of Jerusalem, would na- 
 turally occasion some respite to them from 
 their sufferings ; and we hear no more of 
 their persecuted state, till the 
 A. D. SI. reign of Domitian, the last of 
 the Flavian family, who suc- 
 ceeded to the empire in the year 81. 
 
 He does not appear to have raged 
 against the Christians, till the latter cud 
 oi his reign. Indeed, in imitation of his 
 father Vespasian, he made inquiry for 
 such of the Jews as were descended from 
 the royal line of David. His motives 
 were evidently political. But there want- 
 ed not those who were glad of any op- 
 portunity of wreaking their malice on 
 Christians. Some persons, who were 
 brought before the emperor, were charged 
 with being related to the royal family. — 
 They appear to have been related to our 
 Lord, and were grandsons of Jude the 
 Apostle, his cousin. Domitian asked them, 
 if they were of the family of David, which 
 they acknowledged. He then demanded, 
 what possessions they enjoyed, and what 
 money they had. They laid open the po- 
 verty of their circumstances, and owned 
 that they maintained themselves by their 
 labour. The truth of their confession was 
 evinced by their hands, and by their ap- 
 pearance in general. Domitian then in- 
 terroo-ated them concernino- Christ and 
 his kingdom, — when and where it should 
 appear ? They answered, like their mas- 
 ter when questioned by Pilate, — that his 
 kingdom was not of this world, but heav- 
 enly: that its glory should appear at the 
 consummation of the world, when he 
 should judge the quick and dead, and re- 
 ward every man according to his works 
 Poverty is sometimes a defence against 
 oppression, though it never shields from 
 contempt. Domitian was satisfied, that 
 his throne was in no danger from Chris- 
 tian ambition : and the grandsons of Jude 
 were dismissed with the same sort of de- 
 rision with which iheir Saviour had for- 
 merly been dismissed by Herod. Thus 
 
 had the Son of God provided for his indi- 
 gent relations : — they were poor in cir- 
 cumstances, but rich in faith, and heirsof 
 his heavenly kingdom. 
 
 As Domitian increased in cruelty, to- 
 ward the end of his reign he renewed the 
 horrors of Nero's persecution. He* put 
 to death many persons ac- 
 cused of atheism,the common Domitian's 
 charge against Christians, peisecution: 
 on account of their refusal A. D. 95. 
 10 worship the pagan gods. 
 Am.ong these was the consul Flavins Cle- 
 mens his cousin, who had espoused Fla- 
 via Domitilla his relation. Suetonius ob- 
 serves, that this man was quite despicable 
 on account of his slothfulness. iNIany 
 others were condemned likewise, who had 
 embraced Jewish customs, says Dion ; 
 part of them were put to death, others 
 spoiled of their goods, and Domitilla her- 
 self was banished into the island of Pan- 
 dataria. E usebius records the same facts 
 with some little variation : but, as he pro- 
 fesses to borrow from the pagan writers 
 in this instance, 1 shall be content with 
 their account. 
 
 It is not hard to conceive the real cha- 
 racters of those two noble persons. It 
 ought not to be doubted that they were 
 genuine Christians, whom God had dis- 
 tinguished by his grace, and enabled to 
 live upon it, and to suffer for it. The 
 blood of the Ceesars, and the splendour of 
 the imperial house, rendered them only 
 more conspicuous objects of distrust. It 
 is well known that no positive crime is 
 ascribed to either of them. The charge 
 of indolence against the husband is natu- 
 ral enough, and does honour to the heav- 
 enly-mindedness of the man, whose spi- 
 rit could not mix with the evils of secular 
 ambition, and with the vices of the impe- 
 rial court. The humanity of the times 
 in which we live, and the blessings of 
 the civil freedom which the subjects of 
 these kingdoms enjoy, protect us, it is 
 true, from similar dangers of life or pro- 
 perty; nevertheless, who has not observed, 
 that even rank and dignity are among us 
 exposed to considerable contempt, when- 
 ever a man is conspicuous and eminent 
 for a zealous profession and diligent prac- 
 tice of truly Evangelical doctrines and 
 precepts 1 
 
 In the year 9G Domitian was slain : and 
 Nervathe succeeding emperor,t published 
 
 Euseb., B. iii. c. 5. 
 
 » Euseb., B. 
 t Dion. 
 
 17. Dion Cassias. 
 
68 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 a pardon for those who were 
 A. D. 96. condemned for impiety, re- 
 called those who were ban- 
 ished, and forbad the accu-inor of any men 
 on account of impiety, or Judaism. Oth- 
 ers, who were under accusation or under 
 sentence of condemnation, now escaped 
 by the lenity of Nerva. This brings us to 
 the close of the century, in which we be- 
 hold the Christians for the present, in a 
 state of external peace. Only one per- 
 son enjoyed not the benefit of Nerva's 
 mildness. Domitilla still continued in 
 exile, probably because she was a rela- 
 tion of the late tyrant, whose name was 
 now odious through the world. Doubt- 
 less she was not forsaken of her God and 
 Saviour. 
 
 II. The Apostles and Evangelists of 
 this period, were their story dintinctly 
 known, and circumstantially related, 
 would afford materials indeed of the rar- 
 est pleasure to every Christian mind. — 
 But there never arose in the Church any 
 historians like Thucydides and Livy, to 
 illustrate and celebrate the actions of 
 saints. Heroes and statesmen have their 
 reward here, — saints hereafter. Christ's 
 kino-dom must not appear to be of this 
 world ; and while large volumes have 
 been filled with the exploits of heroes, 
 and the intrigues of statesmen, the men, 
 who were the divine instruments of evan- 
 gelizing souls, — the New Testament his- 
 tory excepted, — are for the most part un- 
 known. 
 
 The first of the twelve Apostles who 
 suffered martyrdom, we have seen, was 
 James the son of Zebedee : He fell a sa- 
 crifice to Herod Agrippa's ambitious de- 
 sire of popularity. I recal him to the 
 reader's memory on account of a remark- 
 able circumstance attending his death.* 
 The man, who had drawn him before the 
 tribunal, when he saw the readiness with 
 which he submitted to martyrdom, was 
 struck with remorse ; and, by one of those 
 sudden conversions not infrequent amidst 
 the remarkable effusions of the Spirit, 
 was himself turned from the power of 
 Satan to God. He confessed Christ with 
 great cheerfulness. James and this man 
 were both led to execution ; and in the 
 way thither the accuser requested the 
 Apostle's forgiveness, which he obtained. 
 James turning to him answered, " Peace 
 be to thee;" and kissed him; and they 
 were beheaded together. The efficacy of 
 
 * Euseb. i. 9. 
 
 Divine Grace, and the blessed fruit of 
 holy example, are both illustrated in this 
 story, of which it were to be wished we 
 knew more than ithe very scanty account 
 which has been delivered. 
 
 The other James was preserved in Ju- 
 dea to a much later period. His martyr- 
 dom took place about the year G2; and 
 his epistle was published a lit- 
 tle before his death. As he Martyr- 
 always resided at Jerusalem, j^rnes the 
 and was providentially pr&- just : 
 served through various perse- \ j) q^ 
 cutions, he had an opportu- 
 nity of overcoming enmity itself, and 
 abating prejudice, in some measure. The 
 name of Just was generally given him 
 on account of his singular innocence and 
 integrity. And as he conformed to Jew- 
 ish customs with more than occasional 
 regularity, he was by no means so odious 
 in the eyes of his unbelieving country- 
 men, as the Apostle of the Gentiles. But 
 we are to observe, that if he had fully 
 overcome their enmity, he could not have 
 been faithful to his Lord and Master. 
 Many Jews respected the man, and ad- 
 mired the FRUITS of the Gospel in him. 
 The root and principle of these fruits was 
 still their abhorrence ; and from the re- 
 lation of Eusebius, the testimony of 
 Hegesippus, an early Christian historian 
 whom he quotes, and of Josephus, it is 
 plain, that it was thought a pitiable thing, 
 that so good a man should be a Christian. 
 Paul's escape from Jewish malice, by 
 appealing to Csesar, had sharpened the 
 spirits of this people; and they were de- 
 termined to wreak their vengeance on 
 James, who was merely a Jew, and could 
 plead no Roman exemptions. Festus 
 died president of Judea; and, before his 
 successor Albinus arrived, Ananias the 
 high-priest, a Sadducee and a merciless 
 persecutor, held the supreme power in 
 the interim. He called a council, before 
 which he summoned James with some , 
 others, and accused them of breaking the 
 law of Moses. But it was not easy to pro- 
 cure his condemnation. His holy life had 
 lono- secured the veneration of his coun- 
 trymen.* 
 
 The leading men were uneasy on ac- 
 count of the vast increase of Christian 
 
 * I have compared Josephus's account with 
 that of Hegesippus, wliich last appears com- 
 patible eiiougli witli tlie former, and no n-ay 
 inii)robable ;'tliOUgh I lliink lie gives liis cha- 
 racter more of the ascetic, tlian I l>elieve to be 
 consistent with that of a Christian Apostle. 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 69 
 
 converts, added to the Church by his la- 
 bours, example, and authority : and they 
 endeavoured to entangle him, by persuad- 
 ing him to mount a pinnacle of the temple, 
 and to speak to the people assembled at the 
 time of the passover, against Christianity. 
 James being placed aloft, delivered a 
 frank confession of Jesus ; and declared 
 that he was then sitting at the right hand 
 of power, and that he would come in the 
 clouds of heaven. Upon this Ananias 
 and the rulers were highly incensed. To 
 disgrace his character was their first in- 
 tention — they failed. To murder his per- 
 son was their next attempt ; and this was 
 of much more easy execution. Crying 
 out that Justus himself was seduced, they 
 threw the Apostle down, and stoned him. 
 He had strength to fall on his knees, and 
 to pray, " I beseech thee, Lord God and 
 Father, for them ; for they know not what 
 they do." One of the priests moved 
 with the scene, cried out, " Cease, what 
 do you mean] This just man is praying 
 for you." A person present with a ful- 
 ler's club beat out his brains, and com- 
 pleted his martyrdom. 
 
 Very remarkable is the acknowledg- 
 ment of Josephus. "These things" — 
 meaning the miseries of the Jews from 
 the Romans — "happened to 
 them by way of revenging 
 the death of James the Just, 
 the brother of Jesus whom 
 they call Christ. For the Jews slew 
 him, though a very just man."* And 
 
 Observa- 
 tion of Jo 
 sephus. 
 
 * I see no good reason to doubt the authen- 
 ticity of tills passage; which gives abundant 
 confirmation to his famous testimony of 
 Christ ; which is as follows : " About this lime 
 lived Jesus a wise man ; if indeed we may call 
 him a man ; for he performed marvellous 
 things ; he was an instructor of such as em- 
 braced the truth with pleasure. He made 
 many converts both among the Jews and 
 Greeks. This was the Christ. And when 
 Pilate, on the accusation of the principal men 
 among us, had condemned him to the cross, 
 those, who before entertained a respect for 
 him, continued still so to do ; for he appeared 
 to them alive again on the third day; the di- 
 vine prophets having declared these and many 
 other wonderful things concerning him. And 
 the sect of Christians so named from him sub- 
 sists to this very time." 
 
 I have examined, as carefully as I can, the 
 doubts which have been started on the authen- 
 ticity of this passage. To me they seem mere 
 surmises. One of them, the supposed incon- 
 gistency of the historian, in testifying so much 
 of Christ, and yet remaining an unconverted 
 Jew, affoi-ds an argument in its favour. In- 
 consistencies ought to be expected from incon- 
 
 from the same writer we learn, that Al- 
 binus severely reprimanded Ananias, and 
 soon after deprived him of the high priest>' 
 hood. 
 
 After the death of James and desola- 
 tion of Jerusalem, the Apostles and dis- 
 ciples of our Lord, of whom many were 
 yet alive, gathered themselves together 
 with our Lord's kinsmen, to appoint a 
 pastor of the Church of Jerusalem in the 
 room of James. The election fell on 
 Simeon, the son of that Cleopas, men- 
 tioned by St. Luke as one of the two who 
 went to Emmaus, and who was the bro- 
 ther of Joseph our Lord's reputed father. 
 We shall leave Simeon, at the end of 
 this century, the chief pastor of the Jew- 
 ish church. 
 
 Paul the Apostle seems to have labour- 
 ed with unwearied activity from about 
 the year 36 to the year G3, that is, from 
 his conversion to the period in which St. 
 Luke finishes his history. Within thia 
 period he wrote fourteen epistles, which 
 will be the blessed means of feeding the 
 souls of the faithful to the end of time. 
 The second epistle to Timothy has been 
 commonly supposed to have been written 
 just before his martyrdom. I am con- 
 vinced by Dr. Lardner's reasonings,* 
 that it was more probably written during 
 his two years' imprisonment at Rome,' 
 and that he was under no particular ap- 
 prehension of suffering immediately.! 
 From this epistle it is evident that he 
 had already been called before Nero, 
 agreeably to the prediction, "thou must 
 be brought before Csesar;" and that no 
 Christian, not even any of those who had 
 welcomed his arrival in Italy, durst ap- 
 pear in support of him ; — He feelingly 
 complains, "all men forsook me." Yet 
 he knew how to distinguish between ma- 
 levolence and timidity; and therefore, 
 though he could not excuse their neglect 
 of him, he prays God that it might not 
 be laid to their charge. The terror of 
 
 sistent persons. Such are many in the Chris- 
 tian world at this day, who in like circumstan- 
 ces would have acted a similar part. Such 
 was Josephus. He knew and had studied 
 something of all sorts of opinions in religion ; 
 and his writings show him to have been firm 
 in noliiing but a regard to his worldly inter- 
 est. To me he seems to say just so much and 
 no more of Christ, as might be expected from 
 a learned sceptic, of remarkable good sense, 
 and supreme love of worldly things. 
 
 * See the Supplement to the Credibility. 
 
 f This seems evident by his charging Timo- 
 thy to come to him before winter. 
 
TO 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 Nero seems to have overawed the Ro- 
 man Christians, many of whom might 
 have borne witness in his favour. Even 
 Demas forsook him, from the love of the 
 worhl, and departed to Thessalonica. 
 There are seasons of critical danger, 
 which try the hearts of the truest Chris- 
 tians : It was yet a new thing for a Chris- 
 tian to be brought before an emperor, and 
 they had not prepared themselves by 
 watching and prayer for the imcommon 
 occasion. But the grace of the Lord 
 Jesus which had hitherto been so emi- 
 nently with the Apostle, forsook him not 
 in his trying moments : The Lord " stood 
 with him, and strengthened him:"* He 
 was enabled to testify for Christ and his 
 Gospel before Nero, with the same frank- 
 ness, fortitude, and eloquence, that he 
 had formerly done before Felix, Festus, 
 and Agrippa; and for the first time, and 
 probably the last, the murderous tyrant 
 Nero heard the glad tidings of salvation. 
 It seems, by the expression, — "that all 
 the Gentiles might hear," — that Paul was 
 heard in a very full and solemn assembly, 
 r.nd had an opportunity of giving a clear 
 account of Christianity. And as some of 
 Caesar's household are mentioned as saints 
 in the epistle to the Philippians, there is 
 reason to apprehend, that the preaching 
 was not in vain. He was, as he owns, 
 "delivered from the mouth of the lion." 
 Nero had not then begun to persecute ; 
 and at least he would see the justness of 
 his plea as a Roman citizen, and be dis- 
 posed to favour it. Nor ought the adora- 
 ble Providence of God to be passed in 
 silence, who gave this man of abandoned 
 wickedness an opportunity of hearing the 
 word of salvation, though it made no 
 useful impression on his mind. Paul 
 seems to have had this audience during 
 the former part of his imprisonment at 
 Rome, and to have been remanded to his 
 confinement for the present. 
 
 Here he wrote the epistle to the Phi- 
 lippians and Colossians before the end of 
 
 A D 62 *^^ y®^"^ ^'^' •^''°™ ^^^^ former 
 of these it appears, that the 
 whole court of Nero was made acquaint- 
 ed with his case, and that the cause of 
 the Gospel was promoted by these means 
 In the epistle to Philemon, which ac- 
 companied that to the Colossians, he ex 
 {•resses a confidence of being soon set at 
 iberty, and promises, in that case, short- 
 ly to pay them a visit.f And as he 
 
 * 2 Tim. iv. 17. 
 
 + 1 follow Dr. Lardiier in the dates of the 
 
 mentions Demas with respect as his fel- 
 low-labourer, both in this epistle to the 
 Colossians, and in that to Philemon, I 
 apprehend Demas had repented of his 
 pusillanimity, and was returned to the 
 Apostle and to his duty. This is the 
 second case in which it pleased God to 
 make use of this extraordinary man, St. 
 Paul, for the preservation of the Church. 
 The former instance respected the doc- 
 trine of justification, from which even 
 Apostles were indirectly declining; The 
 latter consisted in the exhibition of a 
 godly spirit of zeal, and an open confes- 
 sion of Christ. Such is the sloth and 
 cowardice of man in divine things, and 
 so little need is there to teach us caution 
 and reserve, that unless God now and 
 then stirred up the spirits of some emi- 
 nent Christian heroes, to venture through 
 difficulties, and to stand foremost for the 
 truth against opposition, Satan would 
 l)ear down all before him. Paul was one 
 of the first of these heroes : and we shall 
 see in every age, that God raises up some 
 persons' of this hardy temper, whom 
 worldly men never fail contemptuously 
 to denominate fanatics, because they dis- 
 cover that greatness of soul in a heaven- 
 ly cause, which, in an earthly one, would 
 excite respect and admiration. 
 
 Having' obtained his liberty in the year 
 63, he most probably would soon fulfil 
 his promise to visit the Hebrews; after 
 which he midit see his Co- ^_ -q 63. 
 lossian triends. There is no 
 certain account of his coming either to 
 Jerusalem or to Colosse ; but most pro- 
 bably he executed what he had a little 
 before promised. That he ever visited 
 Spain, or our island, is, to say no more, 
 extremely doubtful. Of the last there is 
 a very unfounded report, and of the form- 
 er no other proof, than the mention of his 
 intention in the epistle to the Romans, 
 which had been written in the year 58, 
 since which time all his measures had 
 been disconcerted. And if he once more 
 made an Asiatic tour after his departure 
 from Rome, there seems not time enough 
 for his accomplishing the western jour- 
 ney, as he suffered martyrdom on his re- 
 turn to Rome about the year G5* He 
 could have had no great pleasure at Jeru- 
 
 epistles, wliich he has investigated with sin- 
 gular diligence and sagacity ; and I once for 
 all acknowledge my repeated obligations to 
 him in things of this nature. 
 
 * Some very respectable Chronologersplace 
 the martyrdom of St. Paul, a. d. 67. 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 REMAIXDER OF FIRST CEXTURY. 
 
 71 
 
 salem: every thin^ was there hastening 
 to ruin. No man was ever possessed of 
 a more genuine patriotic spirit than this 
 A D C6 Apostle. The Jewish war, 
 
 which commenced in G6, 
 would have much afflicted him, had he 
 lived to see it. But returning to Rome 
 about a year before, he fell in with the 
 very time when Rome was burnt, and 
 Christians were accused as incendiaries. 
 He now found no mercy in Xero, who 
 would naturally be displeased at the ef- 
 fect, which he had observed the preach- 
 ing of the Apostle had produced in his 
 own household. A cupbearer and a con- 
 cubine of the emperor had been, through 
 
 Paul's means, converted to 
 Martyr- ^^^ ^^j^j^^ ^g Chrysostom as- 
 
 Pa?l ° sures us: and this hastened 
 
 his death. lie was slain with 
 the sword by Nero's order.* 
 
 He had many fellow-labourers, whose 
 names he has immortalized in his writ- 
 ings. He calls Titus his own son after 
 the common faith. | Timothy was also a 
 particular favourite. Antiquity regards 
 the former as the first bishop of Crete, and 
 the latter as the first bishop of Ephesus. 
 Luke of Antioch, the writer of the third 
 Gospel, and the faithful relater, in the 
 Acts of the Apostles, of this Apostle's 
 transactions, of which he was an eye- 
 witness, is, by him, affectionately deno- 
 
 4 T. <•- minated the beloved Physi- 
 A. D. 60. fj ^ u 
 
 cian. He seems to have re- 
 tired into Greece after St. Paul's first 
 dismission by the emperor, and there to 
 have written both his inestimable trea- 
 tises about the year 63 or 6 1. 
 
 Crescens, whom Paul sent to Galatia, 
 is another of his fellow-labourers. Linus, 
 the first bishop of Rome, may be added 
 to the list, and Dionysius the Areopagite 
 of Athens, whom Eusebius reckons the 
 first bishop of the Church in that city. 
 
 We have now finished the lives of two 
 men, of singular excellence unquestion- 
 ably, James the Just, and Paul of Tarsus. 
 The former by his uncommon virtues, at- 
 tracted the esteem of a whole people, 
 who were full of the strongest prejudices 
 against him : and in regard to the latter, 
 p. the question may be asked 
 
 of St. Paul "^'i^^ great propriety, whether 
 
 such another man ever existed 
 among all those, who have inherited the 
 comiptfd nature of Adam? He had evi- 
 dently a soul larofe and capacious', and 
 
 • Orosius, B. 7. 
 
 7 Titus i. 4. 
 
 possessed of those seemingly contradic- 
 tory excellencies which, wherever they 
 appear in combination, fail not to form an 
 extraordinary character. But not only 
 his talents were great and various — his 
 learningalso was profound and extensive; 
 and many persons with far inferior abili- 
 ties and attainments have effected national 
 revolutions, or otherwise distinguished 
 themselves in the history of mankind. 
 His consummate fortitude was tempered 
 with the rarest gentleness, and the most 
 active charity. His very copious and 
 vivid imagination was chastised by the 
 most accurate judgment, and was connect- 
 ed with the closest argumentative powers. 
 Divine grace alone could effect so won- 
 derful a combination ; insomuch, that for 
 the space of near thirty years after his 
 conversion, this man, whose natural 
 haughtiness and fiery temper had hurried 
 him into a very sanguinary course of per- 
 secution, lived the friend of mankind ; re- 
 turned good for evil continually; was a 
 model of patience and benevolence, and 
 steadily attentive only to heavenly things, 
 while yet he had a taste, a spirit, and a 
 genius, which might have shone among 
 the greatest statesmen and men of letters 
 that ever lived. 
 
 We have then in these two men, a 
 strong specimen of what Grace can do, 
 and we may fairly challenge all the infi- 
 dols in the world, to produce any thing 
 like them in the whole list of their he- 
 roes. Yet amidst the constant display of 
 every godly and social virtue, we learn 
 from Paul's own account, that he ever felt 
 himself " carnal, sold under sin," and 
 that sin dwelt in him continually. From 
 his WTitings we learn, what the depth of 
 human wickedness is : and none of the 
 Apostles seem to have understood so much 
 as he did, the riches of Divine Grace, and 
 the peculiar glory of the Christian reli- 
 gion. The doctrines of election, justifi- 
 cation, regeneration, adoption; of the 
 priesthood and oflUces of Christ, and of 
 the internal work of the Holy Ghost, as 
 well as the most perfect morality found- 
 ed on Christian principle, are to be found 
 in his WTitings ; and what Quintilian said 
 of Cicero, may be justly applied to the 
 Apostle of the Gentiles : "77/e se profe- 
 cme sciaf, cui Paulus valdeplacebit." 
 
 During this whole effusion of the Spirit, 
 — of so little account in the sight of God 
 are natural human excellencies and tal- 
 ents, — I see no evidence that any person of 
 extraordinary genius and endowments, 
 
72 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Cbap. XV. 
 
 St. Paul excepted, were employed in the 
 divine work of propagating the Gospel. 
 St. Luke, indeed,appearsby his writings 
 to have been a classical sholar of a chas- 
 tised and regular taste ; and to approach 
 more nearly to attic purity of diction than 
 any of the New Testament writers. But 
 to St. Paul, the greatness of his concep- 
 tions, and the fervour of his zeal, give a 
 magnificent kind of negligence in compo- 
 sition, — in the midst of which there is 
 also, if I mistake not, a vast assemblage of 
 the most sublime excellencies of oratory, 
 which demonstrate how high he might 
 have stood in this line of eminence, had he 
 been ambitious, or rather had he not been 
 perfectly careless of such kind of fame. 
 But that men so unlearned as the rest of 
 the Apostles were, — none of whom ap- 
 pear by nature to have been above the or- 
 dinary standard of mankind, though by 
 no means below that standard, — that such 
 men should have been able of themselves 
 to speak, to act, and to write as they did ; 
 and to produce such an amazing revolu- 
 tion in the ideas and manners of mankind, 
 would require the most extravagant cre- 
 dulity to believe. — ^The power of God is 
 demonstrated from the imbecility of the 
 instruments. 
 
 The minds of men void of the love of 
 God are always apt to suspect, as connect- 
 ed with fanaticism the most precious 
 mysteries of the Gospel, and the whole 
 work of experimental religion. And the 
 more vigorously these things are describ- 
 ed, the stronger the suspicion grows. — 
 May not this have been one reason why 
 St. Paul was directed to expose himself 
 tlie most to this unjust censure, by dwell- 
 ing more copiously than any of the rest 
 Qf the Apostles on views most directly 
 
 evangelical ; St. Paul, I say, — because 
 he must be allowed by all who are not 
 willing to betray their own want of dis- 
 cernment, to have been a man of eminent 
 solidity of understanding 1 If Christian 
 experience be a foolish thing indeed, it is 
 strange that the wisest of all the Chris- 
 tians should have been the most abund- 
 ant in describing it. 
 
 Of St. Peter we have by no means so 
 large an account as of St. Paul. The 
 last view we have of him in Scripture 
 presents him to us at Antioch. This was 
 
 probably about the year 50. — 
 A. D. 50. After this he was employed 
 
 in spreading the Gospel, — 
 principally among his own countrymen, 
 but one cannot suppose exclusively of 
 
 Gentiles, — in Pontus, Galatia, Cappado- 
 cia, Asia, and Bithynia. His two epis- 
 tles were directed to the Hebrew converts 
 of these countries. And if he was far 
 less successful than Paul among the Gen- 
 tiles, he was much more so than that 
 great man was among the Jews. He, 
 who wrought eflfectually in Paul among 
 the former, was mighty in Peter among 
 the latter.* It should ever be remem- 
 bered, WHO alone did the work, and gave 
 the increase. 
 
 Peter probably came to Rome about the 
 year G3. Thence, a little before his mar- 
 tyrdom, he wrote his two epistles. — 
 Strange fictions have been in- 
 vented of his acts at Rome, A. D. 63. 
 of which I shall sufl[iciently 
 testify my disbelief by silence, — the me- 
 thod which I intend constantly to use in 
 things of this nature. It is evident how- 
 ever, that he here met again with that 
 same Simon the sorcerer, whom he had 
 rebuked long ago in Samaria, and who 
 was practising his sorceries in a much 
 higher style in the metropolis. No doubt 
 the Apostle opposed him successfully ; 
 but we have no account of this matter, 
 except a very vague and declamatory one 
 bjf E usebius. At length, when Paul was 
 martyred under Nero, Peter suffered with, 
 him by crucifixion with his head down- 
 ward, — a kind of death which he himself 
 desired, — most probably from an un- 
 feigned humility, that he might not die 
 in the same manner as his Lord had done. 
 Nicephorus informs us, that he had spent 
 two years at Rome. St, Peter in his se- 
 cond epistle, observes, that his Lord had 
 shown him, that his death was soon to 
 take place. And this gives a degree of 
 credibility to a story of Ambrose related 
 in one of his discourses, the purport of 
 which is, that the Pagans being infiamed 
 against him, the brethren begged him to 
 retreat during the violence of the perse- 
 cution. Their intreaties, ardent as he 
 was for martyrdom, moved him. He be- 
 gan to go out of the city by night. But 
 coming to the gate,| he saw Christ en- 
 tering into the city. Whereupon he said. 
 Lord, whither art thou going? Clirist 
 answered, I am coming hith- 
 er to be crucified again. Pe- Crucifixion 
 ter hence understood that of Peter. 
 Christ was to be crucified A. D._66 
 again in his servant. This ^'■' ^'^• 
 induced him voluntarily to 
 
 * Gal. ii. 8. f Sermon cont. Aux. i. 11. 
 
Cest. I.] 
 
 EEMAIXDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 73 
 
 return ; and he satisfied the minds of the 
 brethren with this account, and was soon 
 after seized and crucified. Whoever con- 
 siders the very solemn manner in which 
 our Lord foretold the violent death of this 
 Apostle, in the close of St. John's Gos- 
 pel ; and that, in his second epistle, he 
 himself declares that his divine Master 
 had shown him, that he should quickly 
 put off his tabernacle, will find no diffi- 
 culty in conceiving, that the vision* novi' 
 related from Ambrose miglit have taken 
 place a little before the writing cf this 
 epistle : and, that the writing of the epis- 
 tle may have a little time preceded his 
 seizure and violent death. I mention this 
 as a probable conjecture only. The story 
 itself is consonant to the miraculous pow- 
 ers then in the Church ; and its evidence 
 rests on the character of Ambrose himself, 
 an Italian bishop, Avhose integrity and 
 understanding are equally respectable. 
 
 Peter's v/ife had been called to martyr- 
 dom a little before himself. He saw her 
 led to death ; and rejoiced at the grace 
 of God vouchsafed to her ; and address- 
 ing her b}' name, exhorted and comforted 
 her with " Remember the Lord."| 
 
 There are two striking attestations to 
 the character of St. Peter, which may be 
 fairly drawn from the sacred writings.^ 
 As it is allowed on all hands, that he au- 
 thorized the publication of St. IMark's 
 Gospel, had he been disposed to spare 
 his own character, he would not have suf- 
 fered the shameful denial of his ^Master 
 to have been described, as it is in that 
 Evangelist, with more aggravated cir- 
 cumst'ances of guilt, and with fainter 
 views of his repentance, than are to be 
 found in the other Evangelists. I am in- 
 debted for the other remark to Bishop 
 Gregory, the first of that name. In his 
 second epistle, St. Peter gives the most 
 honourable attestation to the Apostle 
 Paul's epistles, though he must know 
 that in one of them — that to the Gala- 
 tians — his own conduct on a particular 
 occasion was censured. This is evident- 
 ly above nature. The most unfeigned 
 humility appears to have been an emi- 
 nent part of the character of this Apos- 
 tle, who, in his early days, was remark- 
 able for the violence of his temper. His 
 natural character was no uncommon one 
 Frank, open, active, courageous ; san- 
 
 * There is no necessity to consider Christ's 
 appearance as any thing more than a vision. 
 f Clement. Strom. 7. 
 
 Vol. I. G 
 
 guine in his attachments and in his pas- 
 sions ; no way deficient, but not eminent, 
 in understanding, — a plain honest man ; 
 yet, by grace and supernatural wisdom, 
 rendered an instrument of the greatest 
 good in the conversion of numbers, and 
 only inferior to St. Paul. He seems to 
 have lived long in a state of matrimony ; 
 and l)y Clement's account, was industri- 
 ous in the education of his children. 
 
 Mark was sister's son to Barnabas, the 
 son of Mary, a pious woman of Jerusalem. 
 He was probably brought up in Chris- 
 tianity from early life ; and his conduct, 
 for some time, gives credibility to an opin- 
 ion, tolerably confirmed by experience, 
 that early converts, or those who have 
 been religiously brought up, do not make 
 that vigorous progress in divine things 
 generally, which those do, whose con- 
 version has commenced after a life of 
 much sin and vanity. Their views are 
 apt to be comparatively faint, and their 
 dispositions in religion languid and indo- 
 lent. We are told by Epiphanius, that 
 Mark was one of those who were offend- 
 ed at the words of Christ recorded- in 
 the Gth chapter of St. John ; and that he 
 then forsook him, but was afterwards re- 
 covered to his Saviour by means of Pe- 
 ter. After our Lord's ascension, he at- 
 tended his uncle Barnabas with Paul ; 
 but soon left them and returned to Jeru- 
 salem. Barnabas however hoping the 
 best from one whom he held so dear, pro- 
 posed him to Paul as their companion on 
 some future occasion. After the rupture, 
 which this occasioned, between the two 
 Apostles, Barnabas took him as his com- 
 panion to Cyprus. Undoubtedly his cha- 
 racter improved. Some plants are slow of 
 growth, but attain at length great vigour, 
 and bear much fruit. Even Paul him- 
 self, who had been so much offended with 
 him, at length declared, "he is profitable 
 to me for the mlnistr}%"* — 
 From the epistle to the Co- 
 lossians, it is evident that he 
 was with the Apostle in his 
 imprisonment at Rome. This 
 was in the year 6'2. His Gos- 
 pel was written by the desire of the be- 
 lievers at Rome about two years after. I 
 know not when to fix the time of his com- 
 ing to Egypt. But he is allowed to 
 have founded the Church of Alexandria^ 
 and to have been buried there. He was 
 succeeded by Anianus, of whom Euse- 
 
 Mark was 
 at Rome 
 with Paul : 
 
 A. D. 62. 
 
 • 2 Tim. iv. 2. 
 
74 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 Jerusa- 
 lem: 
 
 bins gives the highest eulogium. It is 
 evident that the society of those three 
 great men, Barnabas, Paul, and Peter, at 
 different times was very useful to him — 
 Probably his natural indolence needed 
 such incentives. In Mark then we seem 
 to have noticed one of the first promoters 
 of Christianity, of a cast of mind differ- 
 ent from any we have hitherto reviewed. 
 The variety of tempers and talents em- 
 ployed in the service of God, and sancti- 
 fied by the same divine energy, affords a 
 field of speculation neither unpleasing nor 
 unprofitable. 
 
 Of the labours of nine Apostles, James, 
 Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Tliomas, 
 Matthivv, Jude, Simon, and Matthias, 
 scarcely any thing is recorded. 
 
 Of John the Apostle a few valuable 
 fragments may be collected. He was 
 present at the council of Jeru- 
 Council of salem, which was held about 
 the year 50 : nor is it proba- 
 ble, that he left Judea till that 
 ■ ■ ■ time. Asia Minor was the 
 great theatre of his ministry, particularly 
 Ephesus, the care of which Church re- 
 mained with him after the decease of the 
 rest of the Apostles. The breaking out 
 of the war in Judea most probably obliged 
 the Apostle to bid a total farewell to his 
 native country. While he resided at 
 Ephesus, going once to bathe there, he 
 perceived that Cerinthus was in the bath : 
 He came out again hastily : Let us flee, 
 says he, "lest the bath should fall, while 
 Cerinthus, an enemy of truth, is within 
 it. The same story is told of Ebion as 
 well as of Cerinthus: they were both be- 
 Tetics, and of a similar character : and it 
 is an easy mistake for a reporter of the 
 story to confound names; but if the whole 
 should have had no foundation, it is not 
 easy to account for the fiction. The tes- 
 timony of Irenaeus, who had it from per- 
 sons who received their information from 
 Polycarp the disciple of St. John, seems 
 sufficiently authentic. Irenajus, a man 
 of exquisite judgment, evidently believed 
 the story himself; and surely the opinion 
 of such a person, who lived near those 
 times, must outweigh the fanciful criti- 
 cisms and objections of modern autliors. 
 The fashion of the present age, humanely 
 sceptical, and clothing profane indiffer- 
 ence with the name of candour, is ever 
 ready to seduce even good men into a 
 disbelief of facts of this nature, however 
 well attested. But let the circumstances 
 of St. John be well considered. He was 
 
 a surviving apostolical luminar}'-. He- 
 retical pravity was deeply spreading its 
 poison. Sentiments, very derogatory to 
 the person, work, and honour of Jesus 
 Christ, were diffused with great perverse- 
 ness of industry. What should have been 
 the deportment of this truly benevolent 
 Apostle] I doubt not but he was ever 
 forward to relieve personal distresses: 
 but to have joined the company of the 
 principal supporters of heresy, Avould 
 have been to countenance it. He well 
 knew the arts of seducers. They were 
 ready always to avail themselves of the 
 seeming countenance of Apostles or of 
 apostolical men ; and thence to take an 
 opportunity of strengthening themselves, 
 and of diffusing their poison. Such has 
 been their conduct in all ao-es. Having 
 no ground of their own to stand on, they 
 have continuall)'^ endeavoured to rest on 
 the authority of some great man of al- 
 lowed evangelical respectability. This 
 artful management, clothed with the pre- 
 tence of charity, points out to the real 
 friends of the Lord Jesus, what they 
 ought to do, from motives of real benevo- 
 lence to mankind, — namely, to bear pa- 
 tiently the odious charge of bigotry, and 
 to take every opportunity of testif}'ing 
 their abhorrence of heretical views and 
 li3q)ocritical actions. Humanly speaking, 
 I see not how divine truth is to be sup- 
 ported in the world, but by this procedure ; 
 and I scruple not to say, that St. John's 
 conduct appears not only defensible, but 
 laudable, and worthy the imitation of 
 Christians. It is agreeable to what he 
 himself declares in one of his short epis- 
 tles, addressed to a Christian lady, — that 
 if " any come to her house, and bring not 
 the true doctrine of the Gospel, she ought 
 not to receive him, nor bid him God speed ; 
 because to bid him God speed, would 
 make her partake of his evil deeds." His 
 menaciuij lano"uasfe concerning Diotre- 
 phes, in the other epistle to Gaius, 
 breathes, what some would call, the same 
 uncharitable spirit. And when I see St. 
 Paul shaking his garment against the in- 
 fidel Jews, and hear him saying, " Your 
 blood be on your own heads, I am clean ;" 
 and when I find him warning the Gala- 
 tians thus, " If an angel from heaven 
 should preach any other doctrine, let him 
 be accursed," and wishing that they 
 which troubled them, "were even cut 
 ofi'," — I s"i instructed how to judge of 
 the indignation of holy St. John against 
 Cerinthus. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 EEMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 75 
 
 Indeed the primitive Christians were 
 even more careful to avoid the society of 
 false Christians than of open unbelievers. 
 "With the latter they had, at times, some 
 free intercourse; with the former they re- 
 fused even to eat.* We have already 
 seen, how our Savionr commends the im- 
 patience and discernment of the Ephe- 
 sians, who could not bear false profes- 
 sors. They had tried those who call 
 themselves " Apostles, and are not ; and 
 had found them liars." , 
 
 It is one of the designs of this History, 
 to show the actual conduct of real Chris- 
 tians in life and conversation : and the re- 
 lation before us, of John's behaviour to 
 Cerinthns, illustrates this. But, — if we 
 must so far humour the taste of Socinians 
 and sceptics as to allow ourselves to 
 doubt the existence of well-attested facts 
 because they contradict the fashionable 
 torrent, we shall injure the faithfulness of 
 history, make present manners the stand 
 ard of credibility, and practically adopt 
 a very absurd modish position, — that the 
 divine charity of a sound Christian, is the 
 same thing as the refined humanity of a 
 philosophical heretic — I would ask any 
 person, to whom the infection of modern 
 manners renders this reasoning of difficult 
 digestion, whether he uught more to ap- 
 prove of the conduct of one gentleman 
 who should mix in easy familiarity with 
 a company of murderers, or of another 
 who should fly from it with horror. If 
 we believe spiritual murderers, who la 
 bour to ruin souls by propagating Anti 
 christian views, to be still more perni- 
 cious than the former, we shall not be un- 
 der any dilhculty in vindicating St. John. 
 
 The unreasonable doubts that have 
 arisen in our times concerning the fact 
 we have been considering, appear to me 
 to originate in a spirit of heresy. There 
 is another fact, respecting the same Apos- 
 tle, which comes before us loaded with 
 similar sceptical objections : and these 
 are to be ascribed, I fear, to the preva- 
 lence of deism. Tertullianf tells us, 
 that, by order of Domitian, John was 
 cast into a caldron of boiling oil, and 
 came out again without being hurt. This 
 must have happened, most probably, dur- 
 ing the latter part of the reign of that 
 emperor; and Tertullian was certainly 
 competent to relate such a fact as this : — 
 Yet it is now generally disbelieved or 
 doubted. Is it because we see no miracles 
 
 in our own times ? Let the reader trans- 
 port himself into the first century; and 
 he will see no more improbability, in the 
 nature of the thing, that a miracle should 
 be wrought in favour of St. John, than 
 in favour of Paul, as recorded in the last 
 chapter of the Acts. The miracle soften- 
 ed not the heart of Domitian, who would 
 probably suppose the Apostle to have 
 been fortified by magical incantations. 
 He banished him into the solitary isle of 
 Patmos, where he was favoured with the 
 visions of the Apocalypse. After Domi- 
 tian's death, he returned from Patmos, 
 and governed the Asiatic churches. There 
 he remained till the time of Trajan. At 
 the request of the bishops, he went to the 
 neighbouring churches, partly to ordain 
 pastors, and partly to regulate the con- 
 oreo-ations. At one place in his tour, ob- 
 serving a youth of a remarkable interest- 
 ing countenance, he warmly recommend- 
 ed him to the care of a particular pastor. 
 The young man was baptized; and for a 
 time, lived as a Christian. But being 
 gradually corrupted by company, he be- 
 came idle and intemperate ; and at length 
 so dishoHest, as to become a captain of a 
 band of robbers. Some time after John 
 had occasion to inquire of the pastor con- 
 cerning the young man, who told him, 
 that he was now dpnd to Cod ; and that 
 he inhabited a mountain over against his 
 church.* John, in the vehemence of his 
 charity, went to the place, and exposed 
 himself to be taken by the robbers. 
 " Bring me, says he, to your captain." 
 The young robber beheld him coming; 
 and as soon as he knew the aged and 
 venerable Apostle, he was struck with 
 shame, and fled. — St. John followed him 
 and cried. My son, why fliest thou from 
 thy Father, unarmed and old? Fear not;, 
 as yet there remaineth hope of salvation. 
 Believe me, Christ hath sent me. Hear~ 
 ing this, the young man stood still, trem-^ 
 bled, and wept bitterly. John prayed, 
 exhorted, and brought him back to the 
 society of Christians; nor did he leave 
 him, till he judged him fully restored by 
 Divine Grace. 
 
 Even the truth of this last relation has 
 been questioned by Basnage. But as I 
 know no reason for hesitation, I shall 
 leave it with the serious reader, who 
 loves to behold the tokens of Grace frora 
 age to age dispensed to sinners. 
 
 We have yet another story of St. John, 
 
 1 Cor. V. 10, 11. t Prtescript. Ihei-. 
 
 * Clem. Alex, apud Euseb. 
 
76 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 short, but pleasing, and which has had 
 the good fortune to pass uncontradicted. 
 Being now very old, and unable to say 
 much in Christian assemblies, " Children, 
 love one another," was his constantly 
 repeated sermon. Being asked, why he 
 told them only one thing, he answered, 
 that "nothing else was needed." This 
 account rests on the single testimony of 
 Jerom, so far as I have found. But as it 
 seems to fall in with the spirit of the age 
 more than the others, its truth is allowed. 
 We may hence observe how little regard 
 is paid to real evidence by many critics, 
 who seem to make modern manners the 
 test of historical credibility. Whatever 
 fact shows the spirit of zeal, the reality 
 of miracles, or the work of the Divine 
 Spirit on tlie heart, must be questioned : 
 What indicates feeling or humanity, this 
 only must be allowed to stand its ground. 
 In truth, I should be sorry to have so 
 beautiful a story called in question; but 
 its evidences are by no means superior to 
 those of the three former. 
 
 John lived three or four years after his 
 return to Asia, having been preserved to 
 the age of almost a hundred years, for 
 tlie benefit of the Church of Christ, an 
 inestimable pattern of charity and good- 
 ness. 
 
 Of tho Apostle; Damabas nothing is 
 known, except what is recorded in the 
 Acts. There we have an honourable en- 
 comium of his character, and a particu- 
 lar description of his joint labours with 
 St. Paul. It is a great injury to him, to 
 apprehend the epistle, which goes by his 
 name, to be his. 
 
 The work of Hermas, though truly 
 pious and probably written by the per- 
 son mentioned in the PJpistle to the Ro- 
 mans, is yet a composition of inferior 
 merit; nor is it worth while to detain the 
 reader concerning it. Indeed we have 
 no ecclesiastical work, exclusive of the 
 Scriptures, except one, which does any 
 peculiar honour to the first century. To 
 believe, to suffer, to love, — not to write, 
 was the primitive taste. 
 
 The work which I except is Clement's 
 Epistle to the Corinthians. This is he, 
 whom Paul calls his fellow-labourer, 
 whose "name is in the book of life."* 
 He long survived Paul and Peter, and 
 was no doubt a blessing to the Roman 
 Church, over which he presided nine 
 years. His epistle was read in many 
 
 * Philip, iv. 
 
 primitive churches, and was admired ex- 
 ceedingly by the ancients. It has a sim- 
 plicity and a plainness, not easily relish- 
 ed by a systematic modern; but there be- 
 longs to it, also, a wonderful depth of 
 holiness and wisdom. A few quotations 
 relating to its history, its doctrine, and 
 its spirit, will not improperly close this 
 account of the pastors of the first century. 
 Its history will bring again to our view 
 the Church of (>orinth, which we have 
 already seen distracted with schisms and 
 contentions, and more disgracing its high 
 calling with secular ambition than any 
 other primitive Church. From the testi- 
 mony of Clement it appears that St. 
 Paul's two epistles had been abundantly 
 useful; and that he had reason to rejoice 
 in the confidence which he reposed ia 
 the sincerity of profession, which prevail- 
 ed in many of them, notwithstanding 
 these evils. The account which he gives 
 of their good situation, may justly be 
 considered as the proper fruit of apostoli- 
 cal admonitions. — "What strang-ers that 
 came among you, did not take honoura- 
 ble notice formerly of the firmness and 
 fulness of your faith ? Who of them did 
 not admire the sobriety and gentleness of 
 your godly «pirit in Christ 1 Who did 
 not pvtol the liberal practice of your 
 Christian hospitality? How admirable 
 was your sound and mature knowledge ' 
 of divine things ] Ye were wont to do 
 all things without respect to persons; 
 and }'e walked in the ways of God in 
 due subjection to your pastors, and sub- 
 mitting yourselves the younger to the 
 elder. Ye charged young men to attend 
 to the gravity and moderation becoming 
 the Christian character; young women 
 to discharge their duties with a blame- 
 less, holy, and chaste conscientiousness; 
 to love their husbands with all suitable 
 tenderness and fidelity ; and to guide the 
 house in all soberness and gravity. Then 
 ye all showed an humble spirit, void of 
 boasting and arrogance, more ready to 
 obey than to command, more ready to 
 give than to receive. Content with the 
 divine allotments, and attendinsf diligrent- 
 ly to the word of Christ, ye were enlarg- 
 ed in your bowels of love; and his suf- 
 ferings on the cross were before your 
 eyes. Hence a profound and happy 
 peace was imparted to you all : an un- 
 wearied desire of doing good, and a plen- 
 tiful effusion of the Holy Ghost was. with 
 you. Full of holy counsel, in all readi- 
 ness of mind, with godly assurance of 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 77 
 
 faith, ye stretched forth your hands to 
 the Lord Almighty, entreating him to be 
 gracious to yon, if in any thing ye un- 
 willingly offended. Your care was, day 
 and night, for all the brethren: that the 
 number of his elect might be saved in 
 mercj'^ and a good conscience. Ye were 
 indeed sincere and harmless, and forgiv- 
 ing one another. All dissension and 
 schism in the Church was abominable to 
 you : ye mourned over the faults of your 
 neighbours; ye sympathized with their 
 infirmities as your own ; ye were unwear- 
 ied in all goodness, and ready to every 
 good work. Adorned with a venerable 
 and upright conversation, ye performed 
 all things in his fear ; and the law of God 
 was Avritten deep indeed on the tables of 
 your hearts." 
 
 It is pleasing to see this numerous 
 Church, of whom our Saviour had so long 
 ago declared that " he had much people 
 in this city," toward the close of the cen- 
 tury, still alive in the faith, hope, and 
 charity of the Gospel, free in a great de- 
 gree from the evils, which had cost St. 
 Paul so much care and grief, and preserv- 
 ing the vigour of tnie Christianity. But 
 history must be faithful : and their decline 
 is described in the same epistle. Pride 
 and a schismatical spirit, which have 
 since tarnished so many churches, and 
 which were evils particularly Corinthian, 
 defaced this agreeable picture. But let 
 Clement speak for himself: 
 
 "Thus, when all glory and enlarge- 
 ment were given to you, that Scripture 
 was fulfilled, 'Jeshurun waxed fat and 
 kicked.' Hence, env^", strife, dissension, 
 persecution, disorder, war, and desolation 
 have seized your church. 'The child 
 has behaved himself proudly against the 
 ancient, and the base against the honour- 
 able, the mean against the eminent, and 
 the foolish against the wise.' Hence 
 righteousness and peace are far from you ; 
 because ye all leave the fear of God ; and 
 your spiritual sight is become too dim to 
 be guided by the faith of the Gospel. Ye | 
 walk not in his ordinances, nor walk 
 worthy of the Lord Christ; but ye all 
 walk too much according to your own evil 
 lusts, nourishii^ and cherishing a malig- 
 nant spirit of envy, by which the first 
 death came into the world." 
 
 The schism pregnant with so many 
 evils gave occasion to this epistle. It 
 seems the distracted Corinthians asked 
 counsel of the Church of Rome; and her 
 venerable pastor wrote this epistle in con- 
 g2 
 
 sequence of their request. He apologizes, 
 indeed, for the delay of writing, which 
 he imputes to the afflictions and distresses 
 wliich befel the Christians of Rome,* 
 most probably on account of Domitian's 
 persecution, the letter itself being written 
 about the year 94, or 95. In these times 
 the sin of schism was looked on with the 
 greatest horror. Clement calls the pro- 
 moters of it, "the haughty, disorderly 
 leaders of the abominable schism." — It is 
 no trifling guilt, which men incur, by pre- 
 cipitately giving themselves up to the 
 will of those, whose aim is strife and the 
 advancement of a sect or party, not the 
 interest of godliness. He speaks of per- 
 sons, who talk of peace with their lips, 
 while their conduct shows, that they love 
 to break the unity of the Church ; like 
 the hvpocrite, who draws nigh to "the 
 Lord with his lips, while his heart is far 
 from him." 
 
 Th e attentive reader cannot but ob serve, 
 how the same evil prevails in our days to 
 the great injury of real piety; and yet 
 how little it is deplored ; rather, how 
 much encouraged and promoted by spe- 
 cious representations of liberty, of the 
 right of private judgment, of a just con- 
 tempt of implicit faith, and of pleas of 
 conscience. Doubtless, from these topics 
 there are deducible arguments of great mo- 
 ment, and which deserve the most serious 
 attention in practical concerns : but, at pre- 
 sent, it is not my province to explain the 
 middle path in this subject, nor to prove 
 that modern evangelical Churches are far 
 gone into the vicious extreme of schism. 
 
 Vera renim vocabula ajiiisimies. 
 
 However some persons may triumph 
 in effecting separations from faithful 
 pastors, it is a shameful and an unchristian 
 practice ; and perhaps humble spirits may, 
 from Clement himself, acquire sufficient 
 instruction, how to discriminate the spirit 
 of conscientious zeal from that of schism, 
 and to know when they oujht not to se- 
 parate from the Church to which they be- 
 long. 
 
 "The Apostles," says he, "with the 
 greatest care ordained the rulers of the 
 Church, and delivered a rule of succes- 
 sion in future, that after their decease other 
 approved men might succeed. Those then 
 who, by them, or in succession by other 
 choice, were ordained rulers with the ap- 
 probation and concurrence of the whole 
 
 * The second perseculiou of the Chrislians, 
 was bj- Domitiaii, a. d. 95. 
 
78 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chaf. XV. 
 
 Church ; and who in a blameless conduct 
 have ministered to the flock of Christ in 
 humility ; who for a series of years have 
 been well reported of by all men, these we 
 tliink it unrio;hteous to deprive of the 
 ministry. Nor is it a sin of small mag- 
 nitude, to eject from the sacred office 
 men whose ministry hath been thus blame- 
 less and holy. Happy those presbyters, 
 who have finished their course, and have 
 departed in peace and in the fruitful dis- 
 charge of their duties ! They at least, 
 remote from envy and faction, are not 
 subject to popular caprice, nor exposed 
 to the danger of outliving the affections 
 of their flocks, and their own unfruitful- 
 ness. We see with grief, brethren, that 
 ye have deprived of the ministry some of 
 your godly pastors, whose labours for 
 your souls deserved a different treatment." 
 And he goes on to show, that godly men 
 in Scripture "were indeed persecuted, 
 but by the wicked; were imprisoned, but 
 by the unholy ; were stoned, but by tlie 
 enemies cf God ; were murdered, but by 
 the profane. Was Daniel cast into the 
 den of lions by men who feared God '? 
 Were Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego 
 cast into the midst of the burning fiery 
 furnace by men who worshipped the Most 
 High r' 
 
 What the sin of schism is, — in what 
 manner the Corinthians were 
 guilty of it, — and how far ail 
 this is applicable to the case 
 of Churches at this day, will 
 need but little comment. 
 Clement afterwards reminds them of 
 their former guilt in St. Paul's time. " Do 
 take up the writings of the blessed Apos- 
 tle ; what did he say to you in the be- 
 ginning of the Gospel 1 Truly, by Di- 
 vine Inspiration, he gave you directions 
 concerning himself, and Cephas and Apol- 
 los, because even then ye were splitting 
 into parties. But your party-spirit at that 
 time had less evil in it, because it was 
 exercised in favour of Apostles of eminent 
 holiness, and of one much approved of by 
 them. But now consider who they arc 
 that have subverted you, and broken the 
 bonds of brotherly love. These are shame- 
 ful things, brethren, very shameful ! Oh, 
 tell it not on Christian ground, that the 
 ancient and flourishing Church of Corinth, 
 have quarrelled with their pastors, from 
 a weak partiality for one or two persons. 
 This rumour hath not only reached us 
 Christians, but is spread among infidels : 
 so that the name of God is blasphemed 
 
 Schisms 
 among the 
 Corin- 
 thians. 
 
 through jrour folly ; and your own spirit- 
 ual health is endangered indeed." After 
 exhorting them with much pathos to heal 
 the breaches, he, towards the close, be- 
 seeches them — "to send back our mes- 
 sengers shortly in peace with joy, that 
 they may quickly bring us the news of 
 your concord, which we so ardently long 
 for ; that we may speedily rejoice on your 
 account." 
 
 What effect on the Corinthians this 
 kind animadversion produced we know 
 not : The whole history of the schism 
 certainly deserved to be noticed : It is 
 related by the faithful pen of Clement; 
 and the spirit of declension from simple 
 Christianity, and the way by which the 
 Spirit of God is commonly provoked to 
 depart from churches once flourishing in 
 holiness, are well described. Human 
 nature appears to have been always the 
 same : And this example affords a stand- 
 ing admonition to Christian churches to 
 beware of that nice, factious, and licenti- 
 ous spirit, which, under pretence of su- 
 perior discernment and regard for liberty 
 of conscience, has often broken the bonds 
 of peace, and sometimes subjected the best 
 of pastors to suffer, from a people profess- 
 ing godliness, what might have been ex- 
 pected only from persons altogether impi- 
 ous and profane. 
 
 No apology, I trust, can be necessary 
 for laying before the reader, from the same 
 excellent author, the following occasional 
 exhortation. "Set before your eyes the 
 holy Apostles. — Through the enmity of 
 the human heart Peter underwent a varie- 
 ty of afflictions ; and having suflTered mar- 
 tyrdom, departed to the due place of glo- 
 ry. Through the hatred of a wicked 
 world Paul having been scourged, stoned, 
 and seven times cast into prison, obtained 
 at length the reward of his patience: 
 Having preached the Gospel in the east 
 and west, he obtained a good report 
 through faith : Having preached righte- 
 ousness to the utmost bounds of the West, 
 and having suffered martyrdom from prin- 
 ces, he let^t this world, and reached the 
 shore of a blessed immortality : — He was 
 an eminent pattern of those, who suffer for 
 
 righteousness' sake. By the godly conver- 
 sation and labours of these men, a great 
 multitude of the elect was gathered toge- 
 ther ; who, through similar hatred of the 
 world, were afflicted with cruel torments, 
 and obtained a similar good report among 
 us through faith. Through the operation 
 of tlie'same principle, even women among 
 
Cent. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 79 
 
 us have sustained the most cruel and un- 
 righteous sufferings, and finished in pa- 
 tient faith their course, and received, not- 
 withstanding the weakness of their sex, 
 the prize of Christian heroines." 
 
 The nature of the epistle being practi- 
 cal, and those to whom it was written 
 not being corrupted in their sentiments, 
 much of doctrine by accurate exposition 
 and enforcement is not to be expected. 
 Yet the fundamentals of godliness are 
 very manifest: Salvation only by the 
 blood of Christ, the necessity of repent- 
 ance in all men, — because all men are 
 guilty before God, — these great truths 
 he supposes, and builds on continually. 
 " Let us steadfastly behold the blood of 
 Christ, and see how precious it is in the 
 sight of God, which being slied for our 
 salvation, hath procured the Grace of Re- 
 pentance for all the world." 
 
 And the nature and necessity of lively 
 faith, as a principle of all true goodness 
 and happiness, and perfectly distinct from 
 the dead historical assent, with which it 
 is by many so unhappily confounded, is 
 well illustrated in the case of Lot's wife. 
 "She had another spirit, another heart: 
 hence, she was made a monument of the 
 Lord's indignation, a pillar of salt to this 
 day; that ail the earth in all generations 
 may know, that the double-minded, who 
 stago-cr at the promises of God, and dis- 
 trust the power of grace in unbelief, shall 
 obtain nothing of the Lord, but the signal 
 display of his vengeance." 
 
 The divine dignity and glory of our 
 Saviour, is well described in these words : 
 "Our Lord Jesus Clirist, the Sceptre of 
 the Majesty of God, came not in the 
 pomp of arrogance or pride ; for, notwith- 
 
 standing his power, he was meek and 
 lowly." 
 
 The doctrine of Election, in connexion 
 with holiness, as the Scripture always 
 states it, appears remarkably distinct in 
 this epistle. A passage may properly be 
 introduced here, to show that it was a 
 primitive doctrine, and made use of for 
 the promotion of a holy life: 
 
 " Let us go to him in sanctification of 
 heart, lifting up holy hands to him, in- 
 fluenced by the love of our gracious and 
 compassionate Father, who liath made us 
 for himself a portion of the election. For 
 thus it is written, 'When the Most High 
 divided to the nations their inheritance, 
 and as it were separated tlie sons of 
 Adam, he set the bounds of llie people 
 according to the number of his e-'^rvants. 
 
 The Lord's portion is his people : Jacob 
 is the cord of his inheritance.' And in 
 another place he says, ' Behold the Lord 
 taketh to himself a nation from tlie midst 
 of the nations, as a man taketli to himself 
 the first fruits of his threshing floor ; and 
 from that nation shall proceed the most 
 holy things.' 
 
 " Since therefore we are the holy one's 
 portion, let us be careful to abound ia all 
 things which appertain to holiness."* 
 
 But the distinoruishinor doctrine of 
 Christianity, without which indeed the 
 Gospel is a mere name, and incapable of 
 consoling sinners, is doubtless justifica- 
 tion by the Grace of Christ through faith 
 alone. See the following testimony to it 
 in this author. It deserves to be distinct- 
 ly remembered, as an unequivocal proof 
 of the faith of the primitive Church. 
 
 " All these," he is speaking of the Old 
 Testament fathers, " were magnified and 
 honoured, not through themselves, not 
 through their own works, not tlirough the 
 righteous deeds which they performed, 
 Ijut through HIS will. And we also by 
 his will being called in Christ Jesus, are 
 justified not by ourselves, nor by our 
 own wisdom, or understanding, or godli- 
 ness, or by the works which we have 
 wrought in holiness of heart, but by 
 FAITH ; — ^by which the Almiglity hath 
 justified all, who are or have been justified 
 from the beginning." 
 
 His quick perception of the common ob- 
 jection, — whr.t need then of good works? 
 — liis ready answer to it, and his manner 
 of stating the necessity of good works, 
 and of placing them on their proper basis, 
 show how deeply he had studied, and 
 how exquisitely he relished and felt St. 
 
 Paul's doctrines ; 
 
 "But what then? Shall we neglect 
 good works'? Does it hence follow, that 
 we should leave the law of loving obe- 
 dience ? God forbid ; — ^let us rather hasten 
 with all earnestness of mind to every 
 good work; for the Lord himself rejoices 
 in his works. Having such a pattern, 
 how strenuously should we follow his 
 will, and worlv the works of righteous- 
 ness with all our might." 
 
 The doctrine of the work of the Spirit 
 on the heart, and of the experience of his 
 consolations in the soul, which, in our 
 days, is so generally charged with enthu- 
 siasm, appears from the following pas- 
 sasfc : 
 
 Ep. ad Cor. 1. 29 sect. 
 
80 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 " How blessed, how amazing the gifts 
 of God ; beloved ! Life in immortality,— 
 splendour in righteousness, — truth in li- 
 berty, — faith in assurance, — sobriety in 
 holiness !— And thus far in this life we 
 know experimentally. If the earnests of 
 the Spirit be so precious, what must be 
 the things which God hereafter hath pre- 
 pared for them that wait for him ]" 
 
 I forbear to produce his views of the 
 resurrection, and his beautiful manner of 
 supporting the doctrine by the analogy of 
 nature, after the manner of St. Paul. His 
 mistake in applying the story of the Ara- 
 bian Phoenix has been, I think, too severe- 
 ly censured. None in truth ought to cen- 
 sure it as a blemish, except those who 
 can so much compliment their own sa- 
 gacity, as to say, that they in like circum- 
 stances would not have done the same. 
 If the fact had been true, it doubtless 
 would have afforded a happy illustration 
 of the doctrine of a resurrection. The 
 story was generally believed in his days. 
 That Clement believed it, is no proof of 
 weakness of judgment: and nobody con- 
 tends, that his epistle, in the proper and 
 strict sense of the word, is written by in- 
 spiration. 
 
 What men are by nature, — how dark and 
 miserable ; — what they become by con- 
 verting grace in the renewal of the under- 
 standing, is thus expressed : " Through 
 him, that is, through Jesus Christ, let us 
 behold the glory of God shining in his 
 face : Through him the eyes of our hearts 
 were opened : Through him our under- 
 standing, dark and foolish as it was, rises 
 again into his marvellous light : Through 
 him the Lord would have us to taste of 
 immortal knowledge." 
 
 This epistle seems to come as near to 
 apostolical simplicity, as any thing we 
 have on record : The illustration of its 
 spirit would show this abundantly. It 
 is difficult to do this by single passages : 
 A temper so heavenly, meek, holy, cha- 
 ritable, patient, yet fervent, pious, and 
 humble, runs through the whole. The 
 following specimen deserves the reader's 
 notice : 
 
 "Christ is their's, who are poor in 
 spirit, and lift not up themselves above 
 the flock ; but are content to be low in the 
 Church." — " Let us obey our spiritual 
 pastors, and honour our elders, and let the 
 younger be disciplined in ^^ le fear of God. 
 Let our Avives be directed to what is good ; 
 to follow chastity, modesty, meekness, 
 sincerity. Let them evidence their power 
 
 of self-government by their silence ; and 
 let them show love, not in the spirit of a 
 sect or party, but to all who fear God." 
 Again, " Let not the strong despise the 
 weak: and let the weak reverence the 
 strong. liCt the rich communicate to the 
 poor ; and let the poor be thankful to God, 
 for those through whom their wants are 
 supplied. Let the wise exert his wisdom, 
 not merely in words, but in good works. 
 Let the humble prove his humility, not 
 by testifying of himself how humble he 
 is; but by a conduct that may occasion 
 others to give testimony to him : Let not 
 the chaste be proud of his chastity, know- 
 ing that from God he has received the 
 gift of continency." " Have we not all 
 one God, one Christ, one spirit of Grace 
 poured upon us, and one calling in Christ? 
 Why do we separate and distract the 
 members of Christ, and fight against our 
 own body, and arrive at such a height of 
 madness, as to forget that we are mem- 
 bers one of another]" 
 
 " Is any among you strong in faith, 
 mighty in knowledge, gifted in utterance, 
 judicious in doctrines, and pure in con- 
 duct ] The more he appears exalted above 
 others, the more need has he to be poor 
 in spirit; and to take care, that he look 
 not to his own things; but that he study 
 to promote the common good of the 
 Church." 
 
 " E very one, whose heart has any good 
 degree of the fear and love, wliich is the 
 result of our common hope, would rather 
 that he himself be exposed to censure 
 than his neighbours; and would rather 
 condemn himself, than break that beauti- 
 ful bond of brotherly love, which is de- 
 livered to us." 
 
 After pressing the beautiful example 
 of the charity of Moses recorded in the 
 book of Exodus,* he says, " Who of you 
 has any generosity of sentiment, or bow- 
 els of compassion, or fulness of level 
 Let him say, if the strife and schism be on 
 my account : I will depart, wherever you 
 please, and perform whatever the Church 
 shall require. Only let Christ's flock 
 live in peace with their settled pastors. 
 Surely the Lord will smile on such a cha- 
 racter."]' 
 
 * Ex. xxxii. 
 
 f Sutli sentiments as these, coming from the 
 pen of a writer, wliom St. Paul (4 c-li. Pliil. 
 and 3(1 v.) describes as liis fellow-labourer, 
 and also as one whose name is in the book ot 
 life, cannot fail to be grateful to every sound 
 and pious Christian. 
 
Cext. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 81 
 
 Heresies 
 of the first 
 Century. 
 
 III. The reader will not expect that I 
 should solicitously register the names, 
 and record the opinions and 
 acts of those who are com- 
 monly called heretics. I have 
 only to view them in one sin- 
 gle light, namely, as they deviated from 
 the SPIRIT of the Gospel. Let us keep 
 in view what that really is. The simple 
 faith of Christ as the only Saviour of lost 
 sinners, and the effectual influences of the 
 Holy Ghost in recovering souls altogether 
 depraved by sin, — these are the leading 
 ideas. 
 
 When the effusion of the Holy Ghost 
 first took place, these things were taught 
 with power; and no sentiments, which 
 militated against them, could be sup- 
 ported for a moment. As, through the 
 prevalence of human corruption and the 
 crafts of Satan, the love of the truth 
 was lessened, heresies and various abuses 
 of the Gospel appeared : and in estimat- 
 ing them, we may form some idea of the 
 declension of true religion toward the 
 end of the century, which doubtless was 
 not confined to the Jewish Church, but 
 appears, in a measure, to have affected 
 tlie Gentiles also. 
 
 The epistolatory part of the New Tes- 
 tament affords but too ample proof of cor- 
 ruptions. The Apostle Paul guards the 
 Romans against false teachers, one mark 
 of whose character was, that "by good 
 words and fair speeches they deceive the 
 hearts of the simple."* Corinth was 
 full of evils of this kind. Their false 
 apostles transformed themselves into the 
 appearance of real ones. The Jewish 
 corruption of self-righteousness, which 
 threatened the destruction of the Galatian 
 Church, has been distinctly considered. 
 Many Christians, so called, walked as ene- 
 mies of the cross of Christ, "whose end 
 was destruction, whose god was their bel- 
 ly, whose glory was in their shame, who 
 minded earthly things." f So Paul tells 
 the Philippians, and with tears of chari- 
 ty. — The epistle to the Colossians proves, 
 that pretty strong symptoms of that amaz- 
 ing mass of austerities and superstitions 
 by which, in after ages, the purity of the 
 faith was so much clouded, and of that self- 
 righteousness which superseded men's 
 regard to the mediation of Jesus and the 
 glory of Divine Grace, had begun to dis- 
 cover themselves, even in the Apostles' 
 days. 
 
 The prophecy of Antichrist, in the first 
 epistle of Timothy, chapter the fourth, 
 expressly intimates, that its spirit had 
 already commenced by the excessive es- 
 teem of celibacy and abstinence. The 
 corrupt mixtures of vain philosophy ha,d 
 also seduced some from the faith. Under 
 the gradual increase of these complicated 
 evils, a meaner religious taste was form- 
 ed, at least in several churches, which 
 could even bear to admire such injudi- 
 cious writers as Hermas and the Pseudo- 
 Barnabas.* — Peter, and Jude,f have 
 graphically described certain horrible en- 
 ormities of nominal Christians, little, if 
 at all, inferior to the most scandalous 
 vices of the same kind in these latter 
 ages. The spirit of schism we have seen 
 again breaking out in the Church of Co- 
 rinth. — But let us observe more distinctly 
 the HERETICAL opinio^if of the first cen- 
 tury. 
 
 Ecclesiastical historians, who have 
 passed by the most glorious scenes of 
 real Christianity, liave yet with minute 
 accuracy given us the lists of heretics, 
 subtilized by refined subdivisions with- 
 out end. It seems more useful to notice 
 them, as they stand contradistinguished 
 to that FAITH which was once delivered 
 to the saints. TertuUian reduces the 
 heretics of the apostolic times to two 
 classes, the Doceta;, and the Ebionites. 
 Theodoret also gives the same account of 
 them. 
 
 Of the instruments of Satan in these 
 things, Simon, who had been rebuked by 
 Peter in Samaria, was the most remarka- 
 ble ; he was the father of the Gnostics or 
 Docetaj, and of a number of heretical 
 opinions and practices of the first centu- 
 ry. However obscure the history of Si- 
 mon himself may be, the leading opin- 
 ions of the Docetas are sufficiently obvi- 
 ous. They held that the Son of God 
 had no proper humanity, and that he died 
 on the cross only in appearance. — Ce- 
 rinthus allowed him a real human nature: 
 he considered Jesus as a man born of 
 Joseph and Mary; but supposed that 
 Christ, — ^whom yet all the heretics look- 
 ed on as properly inferior to the supreme 
 God, — descended from heaven, and unit- 
 ed liimself to the man Jesus. 
 
 The Ebonites were not much different 
 from the Cerinthians : they removed the 
 appearance of mystery from the subject : 
 In general they looked on Jesus Christ 
 
 * Horn, xvi 
 
 t Philipp. iii. 
 
 * 2 Pet. 
 
 t Jude's Epistle. 
 
82 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 as a mere man born of Mary and her 
 husband, though a man of a most excel- 
 lent character. — Whoever thinks it need- 
 ful to examine these thing's more nicely, 
 may consult Irenasus and Eusebius: The 
 account of Ebion in the latter is short, 
 but sufficiently clear. 
 
 It is not to be wondered at, that with 
 such low ideas of the Redeemer's person, 
 the Ebionites denied the virtue of his 
 atoning blood ; and laboured to establish 
 justification by the works of the law. 
 Their rejection of the divine authority of 
 St. Paul's epistles, and their accusation 
 of him as an Antinomian, naturally arise 
 from their system. TertuUian tells us, 
 that this was a .Jewish sect: and their 
 observance of Jewish rites makes his ac- 
 count the more credible. 
 
 These two heretical schemes, the one 
 opposing the humanity of Christ, the 
 other annihilating the divinity, were the 
 inventions of men leaning to their own 
 understandings, and unwilling to admit 
 the great mystery of godliness, — " God 
 manifest in the flesh." The primitive 
 Christians held, that the Redeemer was 
 both God and man, equally possessed of 
 the real properties of both natures ; and 
 no man, willing to take his creed from the 
 New Testament, ever thought otherwise ; 
 the proofs of both natures in one person, 
 Christ Jesus, being abundantly diffused 
 through the sacred books. One single 
 verse in the ninth chapter to the Romans,* 
 expressing both, is sufficient to confound 
 all the critical powers of heretics : and 
 therefore on the slightest grounds, they 
 have been compelled to have recourse to 
 their usual method of suspecting the 
 soundness of the sacred text. The only 
 real difficulty in this subject is, for man 
 to be brought to believe, on divine au- 
 thority, that doctrine, the grounds of 
 which we cannot comprehend. Though 
 we have just as good reason to doubt the 
 union of soul and body in man, from our 
 equal ignorance of the bond of that union, 
 yet proud men, unacquainted with the 
 internal misery and depravity of nature, 
 which renders a complete character, like 
 that of Christ, so divinely suitable to our 
 wants, and so exactly proper to mediate 
 between God and man, soon discovered 
 a disposition to oppose the doctrine of the 
 Incarnation of Jesus ; and, as there were 
 
 * Verse 5. Whose are the fatliers, and 
 of whom, as concerning the flesh, Clirist came, 
 who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen. 
 
 two ways of doing this — by taking away 
 either one or the other of the two natures — 
 we see at once the origin of the two sects 
 before us. The doctrine of the atone- 
 ment was opposed by both ; — by the Do- 
 ceta3 in their denial of the real human 
 nature of Jesus; and by the Ebionites in 
 their denial of the Divine Nature, which 
 stamps an infinite value on his sufferings. 
 Such were the perversions of the doc- 
 trines of the incarnation and atonement 
 of the Son of God. Nor did the doctrine 
 of justification by faith only, which St. 
 Paul had so strenuously supported, es- 
 cape a similar treatment. In all ages 
 this doctrine has been either fiercely op- 
 posed, or basely abused. The epistle to 
 the Galatians describes the former treat- 
 ment ; the epistle of Jude the latter. — The 
 memoirs of these heretics, short and imper- 
 fect as they are, inform us of some, who 
 professed an extraordinary degree of sanc- 
 tity, and affected to be abstracted alto- 
 gether from the flesh, and to live in ex- 
 cessive abstemiousness. W^e find also 
 that there were others, who, as if to sup- 
 port their Christian liberty, lived in sin 
 with greediness, and indulged themselves 
 in all the gratifications of sensuality. 
 Nothing short of a spiritual illumination 
 and direction can indeed secure the im- 
 provement of the grace of the Gospel to 
 the real interests of holiness. At this 
 day there are persons, who think that the 
 entire renunciation of all our own works 
 in point of dependence must be the de- 
 struction of practical religion ; and they 
 are thence led to seek salvation "by 
 the works of the law:" while others, ad- 
 mitiino- in words the grace of Jesus 
 Christ, encourage themselves m open sm. 
 A truly humbled frame, and a clear in- 
 sight into the beauty of holiness, through 
 the effectual influence of the Divine Spi- 
 rit, will teach men to live a sanctified 
 life by the faith of Jesus. The Gentile 
 converts by the Gnostic heres)^, and the 
 Jewish by that of Ebion, were considera- 
 bly corrupted towards the close of the 
 century. The latter indeed of these here- 
 sies had been gradually making progress 
 for some time. We have seen, that the 
 object of the first council of Jerusalem 
 was to guard men against the imposition 
 of Mosaic observances, and to teach them 
 to rely on the grace of Christ for salva- 
 tion. But self-righteousness is a weed 
 of too quick a growth to be easily eradi- 
 cated. The Pharisaic Christians, we may 
 apprehend, were not immediately ad- 
 
Cejjt. I.] 
 
 EEMAINDER Ox^ FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 83 
 
 vanced to the full size of heresy. But 
 when they proceeded to reject St. Paul's 
 writings, we may fairly conclude, that 
 they fully rejected the article of justifica- 
 tion. — A separation was made ; and the 
 Ebionites, as a distinct body of men, de- 
 served the name of heretics. 
 
 St. Paul indeed, who, with an eag-Ie's 
 eye, had explored the growing evil, was 
 now no more in the world. But the Head 
 of the Church prolonged the life of his 
 favourite John to the extreme age of al- 
 most a hundred : and his authority check- 
 ed the progress of heretical pravity. He 
 resided much at Ephesus, where Paul had 
 declared, thatgievous wolves would make 
 their appearance. Jerom says, that he 
 wrote his Gospel at the desire of the bish- 
 ops of Asia, against Cerinthus and Eb- 
 ion. Indeed such expressions as these, 
 " the passover, a feast of the Jews," — 
 and, " that Sabbath day was a high day," 
 seem to indicate that the Jewish polity 
 was now no more, it not being- natural to 
 give such explications of customs, ex- 
 cept to those, who had no opportunity of 
 ocular inspection. I cannot but think, 
 that Dr. Lardner, who is no friend to the 
 vital doctrines of Christianity, has be- 
 trayed his predilection for Socinianism, 
 in his attempts to show that St. John in 
 his Gospel did not intend to oppose any 
 particular heresies.* In truth, there are 
 various internal proofs which corroborate 
 the testimony of Jerom. The very be- 
 ginning of his Gospel is an authoritative 
 declaration of the proper Deity of Jesus 
 Christ. The attentive reader cannot but 
 recollect various discourses to the same 
 purport : The confession of Thomas, 
 after his resurrection, stands single in St. 
 John's Gospel : Tlie particular pains, 
 which he takes, to assure us of the real 
 death of his Master, and of the issuing 
 of real blood and water, from his wound- 
 ed side, are delivered with an air of one, 
 zealous to obviate the error of the Do- 
 cetaj : Nor can I understand his layincr so 
 great a stress on Jesus Christ's coming 
 in the fleshf in any other manner. 
 
 While this Apostle lived, the heretics 
 were much discountenanced. And it is 
 certain that Gnostics and Ebionites were 
 always looked on as perfectly distinct 
 from the Christian Church. There needs 
 no more evidence to prove this, than their 
 
 * See his Supplement to tlie Credibility, in 
 the liLslnt y of St. John, 
 f 1 John iv. 
 
 arrangement by Irenaeus and Eusebius 
 under heretical parties. Doubtless they 
 called themselves Christians ; and so did 
 all heretics, for obvious reasons ; and, 
 for reasons, equally obvious, all, who 
 are tender of the fundamentals of Christ's 
 religion, should not owntheir right to the 
 appellation. Before we dismiss them I 
 would remark, — 
 
 1. That it does not appear by any evi- 
 dence which I can find, that these men 
 were persecuted for their religion. Re- 
 taining the Christian name; and yet glo- 
 rifying man's righteousness, wisdom, and 
 strength, " they spake of the world, and 
 the world heard them." The Apostle 
 John in saying this, had his eye, I be- 
 lieve, on the Docetae particularly. In our 
 own times persons of a similar stamp 
 would willingly ingratiate themselves 
 with real Christians ; and yet at the same 
 time avoid the cross of Christ, and what- 
 ever would expose them to the enmity of 
 the world. We have the testimony of 
 Justin Martyr, that Simon was honoured 
 in the pagan world, even to idolatry.* — 
 What stress is laid on this circumstance 
 in the New Testament, as an evidence of 
 the characters of men in religious con- 
 cerns, is well known. 
 
 2. If it be made an objection against 
 evangelical principles, that numbers, who 
 profess them, have run into a variety of 
 abuses, perversions and contentions, we 
 have seen enough, even in the first cen- 
 tury, of the same kind of evils, to convince 
 us, that such objections militate not 
 against divine truth, but might have been 
 made with equal force against the apostol- 
 ical age. 
 
 3. A singular change in one respect 
 has taken place in the Christian world. — 
 The two heretical parties above described, 
 were not much unlike the Arians and So- 
 cinians at this day. The former have, 
 radically, the same ideas as the Docetae, 
 though it would be unjust to accuse them 
 of the Antinomian abominations which 
 defiled the followers of Simon : The lat- 
 ter are the very counterpart of the Ebi- 
 onites. The Trinitarians were then the 
 body of the Church ; and so much supe- 
 rior was their influence and immbers, that 
 the other two were treated as heretics. — 
 At present the two parties, who agree in 
 lessening the dignity of Christ, though 
 in an unequal manner, are carrying on a 
 vigorous controversy against one another, 
 
 Apud Euseb. B. ii. E. H. 
 
84 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 while the Trinitarians are despised by 
 botli as unworthy the notice of men of 
 reason and letters. Serious and hurnble 
 minds will, however, insist on the neces- 
 sity of our understanding that certain 
 fundamental principles are necessary to 
 constitute the real Gospel. The Divinity 
 of Christ, his atonement, — justification 
 by faith, — regeneration, — these they will 
 have observed to be the principles of the 
 primitive Church : and, within this in- 
 closure, the whole of that piety which 
 produced such glorious effects has been 
 confined : and it is worthy the attention 
 of learned men to consider^ whether the 
 same remark may not be made in all 
 ages. 
 
 4. Thus have we seen a more astonish- 
 ing revolution in the human mind and in 
 human manners, than ever took place in 
 any age, effected without any Imman pow- 
 er, legal or illegal, and even against the 
 united opposition of all the powers then 
 in the world, and this too not in countries 
 rude or uncivilized, but in the most hu- 
 manized, the most learned, and the most 
 polished part of .the globe, — within the 
 Roman empire, no part of which was ex- 
 empted from a sensible share in its ef- 
 fects. — ^This empire, within the first cen- 
 tury at least, seems to have been the pro- 
 per limit of Christian conquests.* 
 
 If an infidel or sceptic can produce any 
 thing like this, effected by Mahometan- 
 ism or by any other religion of the hu- 
 man invention, he may then with some 
 plausibility compare those religions with 
 Christianity : But, as the Gospel stands 
 unrivalled in its manner of subduing the 
 minds of men, — the argument for its di- 
 vinity, from its propagation in the world, 
 will remain invincible. 
 
 And, surely, every dispassionate ob- 
 server must confess, that the chansre was 
 from BAD to GOOD. No man will venture 
 to sajr, that the religious and moral prin- 
 ciples of Jews and Gentiles, before their 
 conversion to Christianity, were good. — 
 The idolatries, abominations, and ferocity 
 
 * Indeed, that France had 9.ny sliare in the 
 blessings of the Gosijel witliin this century, 
 can only he inferred from the knowledge we 
 have, that it was introduced into Spain. Whe- 
 ther our own country was evangelized at all 
 ia this century, is very doubtful. Nor can we 
 be cei-tain that any ministers as yet had passed 
 into Africa. The assertion, therefore, that 
 the Gospel had spread through the Roman 
 empire, must be understood with a few excep- 
 tions, though I think scarcely any more than 
 those which have been raenlioaed. 
 
 of the Gentile world will be allowed to 
 have been not less than they are described 
 in the first chapter to the Romans : and the 
 writings of Horace and Juvenal wiU 
 prove, that the picture is not exaggerated. 
 The extreme wickedness of the Jews 
 is graphically deliniated by their own 
 historian, and is neither denied nor doubt- 
 ed by any one. What but the influence 
 of God, and an effusion of his Holy Spi- 
 rit, — the first of the kind since the com- 
 ing of Christ, and the measure and stand- 
 ard for regulating our views of all suc- 
 ceeding ones, — can account for such a 
 change 1 From the Acts of the Apostles 
 and their Epistles, I have drawn the 
 greatest part of the narrative ; but the 
 little that has been added from other 
 sources is not heterogeneous. — Here are 
 thousands of men turned from the practice 
 of every wickedness to the practice of 
 every virtue : many, very suddenly, or at 
 least in a short space of time, reformed in 
 understanding, in inclination, in affection ; 
 knowing, loving, and confiding in God ; 
 from a state of mere selfishness converted 
 into the purest philanthropists : living 
 only to please God and to exercise kind- 
 ness toward one another ; and all of them, 
 recovering really, what philosophy only 
 pretended to, — the dominion of reason over 
 passion : unfeignedly subject to their Ma- 
 ker ; rejoicing in his favour amidst the se- 
 verest sufferings : and serenely waiting 
 for their dismission into a land of blissful 
 immortality. That all this must be of God, 
 is demonstrative : but the important infer- 
 ence, which teaches the divine authority 
 of Christ, and the wickedness and dan- 
 ger of despising, or even neglecting him, 
 is not always attended to by those who 
 are most concerned in it. 
 
 But the Christian Church was not yetia 
 possession of any external dignity or po- 
 litical importance. No one nation as yet 
 was Christian, though thousailds of in- 
 dividuals were so ; — but those chiefly of 
 the middling and lower ranks. The mo- 
 dern improvements of civil society have 
 taught men, however, that these are the 
 strenofth of a nation ; and that whatever 
 is praiseworthy is far more commonly 
 diffused among them, than among the 
 noble and great. In the present age then 
 it should be no disparagement to the 
 character of the first Christians, that the 
 Church was chiefly composed of persons 
 too low in life, to be of any weight in the 
 despotic systems of government which 
 then prevailed. We have seen one per- 
 
Ck>-t. I.] 
 
 REMAINDER OF FIRST CENTURY. 
 
 85 
 
 son* of uncommon genius and endow- 
 ments, and twof belonging to tlie Impe- 
 rial family, but scarcely any more, either 
 of rank or learning, connected with Chris- 
 tianit)^ We ought not then to be sur- 
 prised, that Christians are so little no- 
 ticed by Tacitus and Josephus : These 
 historians are only intent on sublunary 
 and general politics ; they give no atten- 
 tion even to the eternal welfare of indi- 
 viduals. — Nor is this itself a slight ex- 
 emplification of the genius of that reli- 
 gion, which is destined to form men for 
 the next life, and not for this. 
 
 In doctrines the primitive Christians 
 agreed : They all worshipped the one 
 living and true God, who 
 Doctrines made himself known to them 
 °^}^^ . in three persons. Father, .Son, 
 
 ChrTs-'^^ and Holy Ghost: Each of 
 tians. these they were taug-ht to wor- 
 
 ship by the very office of bap- 
 tism performed in the name of the Father, 
 the Son, and the Holy Ghost : — And the 
 whole economy of grace so constantly re- 
 minded them of their obligations to the 
 Father who chose them to salvation, to 
 the Saviour who died for them, and to the 
 Comforter who supported and sanctified 
 them, and was so closely connected with 
 their experience and practice, that they 
 ■were perpetually incited to worship the 
 Divine Three in One. They all concur- 
 red in feeling conviction of sin, of help- 
 lessness, of a state of perdition: in rely- 
 ing on the atoning blood, perfect righte- 
 ousness, and prevalent intercession of 
 Jesus, as their only hope of heaven. Re- 
 generation by the Holy Ghost was their 
 common privilege, and without his con- 
 stant influence they owned themselves 
 obnoxious only to sin and vanity. Their 
 community of goods, and their love 
 feasts,:j: though discontinued at length, — 
 probably because found impracticable, — 
 demonstrated their superlative charity 
 andheavenly-mindedness. — Yet a gloomy 
 cloud hung over the conclusion of the 
 first century. 
 
 The first impressions made b)'' the ef- 
 fusion of the Spirit are generally the 
 strongest and the most decisively distinct 
 from the spirit of the world. But human 
 
 * Paul. + Clemens and Domitilla. 
 
 :|: See Jude's Epistle. 
 
 Vol. I. H 
 
 depravity, overborn for a time, arises 
 afresh, particularly in the next generation. 
 Hence the disorders of schism and heresy. 
 Their tendency is to destroy the pure 
 work of God. The first Christians, with 
 the purest charity to the persons of here- 
 tics, gave their errors no quarter; but 
 discountenanced them by every reasona- 
 ble method. 
 
 The heretics, on the contrary, endea- 
 voured to unite themselves with Chris- 
 tians. If the same methods be at this 
 day continued ; — If the heretic endeavour 
 to promote his false religion by pretended 
 charity, and the Christians stand aloof 
 from him, without dreading the charge of 
 bigotry, each act in character, as their 
 predecessors did. The heretics by weak- 
 ening mien's attachment to Christ, and 
 the schismatics by promoting a worldly 
 and uncharitable spirit, each did consider- 
 able mischief; but it was the less, be- 
 cause Christians carefully kept them- 
 selves distinct from heretics, and thus 
 set limits to the infection. 
 
 It has been of unspeakable detriment 
 to the Christian religion, to conceive that 
 all who profess it, are believers of it, 
 properly speaking. Whereas very many 
 are Christians in name only, never attend- 
 ing to the NATURE of the Gospel at all. 
 Not a few glory in sentiments subversive 
 of its genius and spirit. And there are 
 still more who go not so far in opposition 
 to godliness ; yet, by making light of the 
 whole work of Grace on the heart, they 
 are found, on a strict examination, to be 
 as decidedly void of true Christianity. 
 We have seen the first Christians indi- 
 vidually converted : and, as human na- 
 ture needs the same change still, the par- 
 ticular instances of conversion described 
 in the Acts are models for us at this day. 
 National conversions were then unknown ; 
 nor has the term any proper meaning. 
 But when whole countries are supposed 
 to become Christians merely because 
 they are so termed ; when conversion of 
 heart is kept out of sight ; and when no 
 spiritual fruits are expected to appear in 
 practice ; — when such ideas grow fash- 
 ionable, opposite characters are blended 
 with each other ; the form of the Gospel 
 stands, and its power is denied. — But let 
 us not anticipate ; — These scenes appear- 
 ed not in the first century. 
 
86 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY II. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF CHRISTIANS DURING 
 THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 The master of the Roman world in the 
 beginning of this century was the renown- 
 ed Trajan. His predecessor Nerva had 
 restored the Christian exiles, and granted 
 a full toleration to the Church. Hence 
 the last of the Apostles had recovered his 
 station at Ephesus, and slept in the Lord, 
 before the short interval of tranquillity 
 was closed by the persecuting spirit of 
 Trajan. Whatever explication may be 
 given or conjectured of the cause of his 
 dislike of Christians, he had a confirmed 
 prejudice against them, and meditated»the 
 extinction of the name : nor does it ap- 
 pear that he ever changed his sentiments, 
 or retracted his edicts against them. 
 
 There is an account of his persecution 
 The 3d '" ^^^ correspondence with 
 
 Persecu- PHny the governor of Bithy- 
 tion of the nia, a character well known 
 Chris- in classical history. The two 
 
 epistles between the emperor 
 and the governor deserve to 
 be transcribed at length :* 
 they seem to have been written in 106 or 
 107.t 
 
 C, Pliny to Trajan Empercyr. 
 " Health. — It is my usual custom. Sir, 
 to refer all things, of which I harbour 
 ., any doubts, to you. For who 
 
 leiter to ^^" better direct my judgment 
 Trajan. ^" '^^ hesitation, or instruct 
 
 my understanding in its igno- 
 rance ] I never had the fortune to be pre- 
 sent at any examination of Christians, be- 
 fore I came into this province. I am 
 therefore at a loss, to determine what is 
 the usual object either of inquiry or of pun- 
 ishment, and to what length either of them 
 is to be carried. It has also been with 
 me a question very problematical, — 
 whether any distinction should be made 
 
 * Pliny's Epistles, x. 97, 98. 
 
 t Or perhaps in 102 or 103 of the vulgar rera. 
 The reader will do well to keep in mind, that 
 many disagreements in chronology are account- 
 ed for hy considering that the Birth of our 
 Saviour is placed by some of the best chrono- 
 logers four years before our vulgar »ra. 
 
 tians : 
 A. D. 106 
 or 107. 
 
 between the young and the old, the ten- 
 der and the robust ; — whether any room 
 should be given for repentance, or the 
 guilt of Christianity once incurred is not 
 to be expiated by the most unequivocal 
 retractation ; — whether the name itself, ab- 
 stracted from any flagitiousness of con- 
 duct, or the crimes connected with the 
 name, be the object of punishment. In 
 the mean time this has been my method, 
 with respect to those who were brought 
 before me as Christians. I asked them, 
 whether they were Christians : if they 
 pleaded guilty, I interrogated them twice 
 afresh, with a menace of capital punish- 
 ment. In case of obstinate perseverance, 
 I ordered them to be executed. For of 
 this I had no doubt, whatever was the 
 nature of their religion, that a sullen and 
 obstinate inflexibility called for the ven- 
 geance of the magistrate. Some were in- 
 fected with the same madness whom, on 
 account of their privilege of citizenship, 
 I reserved to be sent to Rome, to be re- 
 ferred to your tribunal. In the course of 
 this business, informations pouring in, as 
 is usual when they are encouraged, more 
 cases occurred. An anonymous libel was 
 exhibited, with a catalogue of names of 
 persons, who yet declared, that they were 
 not Christians then, or ever had been ; and 
 they repeated after me an invocation of the 
 gods and ofyourimage,which, for this pur- 
 pose, I had ordered to be brought with 
 the images of the deities : They perform- 
 ed sacred rites with wine and frankin- 
 cense, and execrated Christ, — none of 
 which things I am told a real Christian 
 can ever be compelled to do. On this 
 account I dismissed them. Others named 
 by an informer, first affirmed, and then 
 denied the charge of Christianity ; de- 
 claring that they had been Christians, but 
 had ceased to be so, some three years ago, 
 others still longer, some even twenty 
 years ago. All of them worshipped your 
 image, and the statues of the gods, and 
 also execrated Christ. And this was the 
 account which they gave of the nature of 
 the religion they once had professed, 
 whether it deserves the name of crime or 
 error, — namely — that they were accus- 
 tomed on a stated day to meet before day- 
 light, and to repeat among themselves a 
 
Cbnt. II.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 87 
 
 hymn to Christ as to a orod, and to bind 
 themselves by an oath, with an obligation 
 of not committing' any wickedness; — but 
 on the contrary, of abstaining from thefts, 
 robberies, and adulteries ; — also, of not 
 violating their promise, or denying a 
 pledge ; — after which it was their custom 
 to separate, and to meet again at a pro- 
 miscuous harmless meal, from which last 
 practice they however desisted, after the 
 publication of my edict, in which, agreea- 
 bly to your orders, I forbad any socie- 
 ties of that sort. On which account I 
 judged it the more necessary, to inquire 
 Bv TORTURE, from two females, who were 
 said to be deaconesses, what is the real 
 truth. But nothino- could I collect, ex- 
 cept a depraved and excessive supersti- 
 tion. Deferring therefore any farther in- 
 vestigation, I determined to consult ycu. 
 For the number of culprits is so great, as 
 to call for serious consultation. Many 
 persons are informed against of every age 
 and of both sexes; and more still will be 
 in the same situation. The conuigion 
 of the superstition hath spread not only 
 through cities, but even villagfes and the 
 country. Not that I think it impossible 
 to check and to correct it. The success 
 of my endeavours hitherto forbids such 
 desponding thoughts : for the temples, 
 once almost desolate, begin to be frequent- 
 ed, and the sacred solemnities, which had 
 long been intermitted, are now attended 
 afresh ; and the sacrificial victims are now 
 sold every where, which once could scarce- 
 ly find a purchaser. Whence I conclude, 
 that many might be reclaimed, were the 
 hope of impunity, on repentance, abso- 
 lutely confirmed." 
 
 Trajan to Pliny. 
 
 " You have done perfectly right, my 
 dear Pliny, in the inquiry which you have 
 made concerning Christians. For truly 
 no one general rule can be laid down, 
 which will apply itself to all cases. These 
 people must not be sought after : — If they 
 are brought before you and convicted, let 
 them be capitally punished, yet with this 
 restriction, that if any one renounce Chris- 
 tianity, and evidence his sincerity by sup- 
 plicating our gods, however suspected he 
 may be for the past, he shall obtain par- 
 don for the future, on his repentance. 
 But anonymous libels in no case ought to 
 be attended to; for the precedent would be 
 of the worst sort, and perfectly incongru- 
 ous to the maxims of my government." 
 
 The moral character of Pliny is one of 
 
 the most amiable in all pagan authority; 
 yet does it appear, that he joined with his 
 master Trajan in his hatred of Christians. 
 In the course of this history, many in- 
 stances of the same kind will occur. 
 Trajan's character is doubtless much infe- 
 rior to Pliny's ; — it is indeed illustrious 
 by reason of great talents, and great ex- 
 ploits ; but by the testimony of Dio, Spar- 
 tian, and Julian, stained with flagrant 
 vices;* and, as is generally confessed, 
 tarnished by an extravagant ambition. 
 But how is it to be accounted for, that 
 men, who seem enamoured with the beau- 
 ty of virtue, should turn from it with 
 perfect disgust, and even persecute it 
 with rancour, when it appears in the most 
 genuine colours? Let those who imagine 
 such men as Pliny to be good and virtu- 
 ous in the proper sense of the words, try 
 to solve this phenomenon on their own 
 principles. On those of the real Gospel, 
 the question is not hard to be determined. 
 Admitting;- that Plinv migrht at first be 
 prejudiced against Christians from mis- 
 representation, how happens it, that he 
 continues so after better information, even 
 when he is convinced that no moral evil 
 is to be found in the Christians of Bithy- 
 nia, that their meetings are peaceable, and 
 the ends aimed at by them, not only in- 
 nocent, l)ut laudable? The truth is, vir- 
 tue in Pliny's writings, and virtue in St. 
 Paul's, mean not the same thing. For 
 humility, the basis of a Christian's vir- 
 tue, the Pagan has not even a name in his 
 language. The glory of God is the end 
 of virtue in the system of one, — his own 
 glory is the end of virtue in the system 
 of the other. The Christians of Bithy- 
 nia would be able to give the severe in- 
 quisitor "a reason of the hope that was 
 in them with meekness and fear," and 
 then suffering according to the will of 
 God, to commit the keeping of their souls 
 to him in well doing, as to a faithful Crea- 
 tor. Tliese and other precious sentiments 
 in >St. Peter's first epistle, which was ad- 
 dressed to some of their fathers, possibly 
 to some of themselves then alive, would 
 now be rememljered with peculiar force. 
 A vain-glorious mind like Pliny's, elated 
 with conscious rectitude, would scorn to 
 hear of being saved by the atoning blood 
 of Jesus, would not believe the represen- 
 tation of human nature which the Chris- 
 tians would give him, and would prefer 
 his own reason before the instniction of 
 
 * See Larduer's Collections, v. ii, c. 
 
88 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the Holy Spirit. Had he been, like Ci- 
 cero, deeply tinged with the academical 
 philosophy of Greece, like him he would 
 have gloried in sceptical ambiguity, or 
 have inclined to the atheistic views, to 
 which most of the old philisophers were 
 devoted. But as he seems to have imi- 
 tated him, rather in his passion for orato- 
 rical glory, than in his philosophical 
 spirit, he rested in the vulgar creed, high- 
 ly absurd as it was, and preferred it to 
 the purest dictates of Christianity. The 
 former thwarted not his pride and las 
 lusts: the latter required the humiliation 
 of the one, and the mortification of the 
 other. 
 
 In all ages, men even of amiable mo- 
 rals, if destitute of true holiness, are ene- 
 mies of the Gospel. We here see the 
 true reason of this enmity; which is not 
 capable of being abated by argument: for 
 if that had been the case, Pliny might 
 have seen the iniquity of his proceedings. 
 To call a thing madness and depraved 
 superstition, on the face of which he sees 
 much good and no evil, is the height of 
 unreasonableness. But it is practised by 
 many at this day, who call themselves 
 Christians, and yet are really as averse 
 to the Gospel as Pliny was. Now if we 
 were not willing to be deceived by mere 
 names, but would enter into the spirit of 
 things, it would not be difficult to under- 
 stand, who they are that resemble Pliny, 
 and who they are that resemble the Chris- 
 tians of Bithynia. 
 
 In fact, as there are now, so there were 
 then, persons, who worshipped Christ as 
 their God, who loved one another as bre- 
 thren united in him : men who derived 
 from his influence support under the se- 
 verest pressures : who were calumniated 
 by others : who were treated as silly peo- 
 ple, on account of that humble and self- 
 denying spirit, by which they kept up 
 communion with their Saviour on earth ; 
 and who expected to enjoy him in hea- 
 ven. It was not the fault of Trajan and 
 Pliny, that such principles were not ex- 
 terminated from the earth. They hated 
 the men and their religion. 
 
 The difference between the persecutors 
 and the sufferers is remarkable with re- 
 spect to the spirit of politics. The reli- 
 gion of Trajan was governed by this 
 spirit : And his minister thinks it needful 
 to force men to follow the pagan religion, 
 whether they believed it to be right or 
 not. Persecuting edicts appear to have 
 been in force against Christians before 
 
 the correspondence which we have seen ; 
 and Nerva's toleration seems to have 
 ceased. But the Christians showed, that 
 their Master's kingdom was not of this 
 world : They were meek and passive, as 
 Christ himself had been, and as Peter 
 had exhorted them to be. Their number 
 was very large in Bithynia, capable sure- 
 ly of raising a rebellion troublesome to 
 the state ; and they would have done so, 
 if their spirits had been as turbulent as 
 those of many pretended Christians. — 
 " But they were subject not only for 
 wrath, but also for conscience' sake." 
 If there had been the least suspicion of a 
 seditious spirit among them, Pliny must 
 have mentioned it; and their discontinu- 
 ance of their feasts of charity, after they 
 found them disagreeable to government, 
 is a proof of their loyal and peaceable 
 temper. 
 
 In Asia, Arrius Antoninus persecuted 
 them with extreme fury. I am not cer- 
 tain whether Jais persecution belongs to 
 the reign of Trajan; but as there was an 
 Antoninus very intimate with Pliny, the 
 following story of him, from Tertullian,* 
 may not improperly be introduced here. 
 The whole body of Christians, wearied 
 with constant hardships, presented them- 
 selves before his tribunal: He ordered a 
 few of them to execution, and said to the 
 rest, " Miserable people, if you choose 
 death, you may find precipices and hal- 
 ters enow." — I am willing to believe that 
 the Christians hoped to disarm the per- 
 secutor by the sight of their numbers. 
 
 One of the most venerable characters 
 at this time was Simeon, bishop of Jeru- 
 salem, the successor of St. James. Jeru- 
 salem indeed was no more, but the Church 
 still existed in some part of Judea. Some 
 heretics accused him, as a Christian, be- 
 fore Atticus the Roman governor. He 
 was then a hundred and twenty years 
 old, and was scourged many days. The 
 persecutor was astonished at his hardi- 
 ness; but not moved with pity for his 
 sufl'erings : — at last he ordered him to be 
 crucified. f 
 
 It was in the year 107, that Ignatius, 
 bishop of Antioch, was martyred for the 
 faith of Jesus. On the death of Euodius, 
 abouttheyear 70,he had been ^ j^ j^^ 
 appointed in his room by the 
 Apostles who were then alive, jj^^^^f" 
 He governed the Church dur- icrnatius. 
 ing this long period : Nor was 
 
 Ad. Scapul. C. ult. f Euseb.B. iii. c. 29. 
 
Cent. II.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 89 
 
 it a small indication of the continued 
 grace of God to that city, to have been 
 blessed so long with such a luminary. 
 We must be content with the short cha- 
 racter given of his ministry in the Acts 
 of Ignathis, a piece of martyrology first 
 published in 1647 by Archbishop Usher, 
 from two old manuscripts which have 
 stronger marks of credibility than is usual 
 in such compositions. 
 
 " He was a man in all things like to 
 the Apostles. As a good governor, by 
 the helm of prayer and fasting, by the 
 constancy of his doctrine and spiritual la- 
 bour, he opposed himself to the floods of 
 the adversary: he was like a divine lamp 
 illuminating the hearts of the faithful by 
 his exposition of the Holy Scriptures: 
 and lastly, to preserve his Church, he 
 scrupled not freely to expose himself to a 
 bitter death." These Acts were compiled 
 by those who went with him from Anti- 
 och, and were eye-witnesses of his suf- 
 ferings.* 
 
 Ambition and the lust of power were 
 not stronger features in the character of 
 Caesar, than the desire of martyrdom was 
 in that of Ignatius. Divine Providence 
 however preserved him for the benefit of 
 the Church during the persecution of Do- 
 mitian, and reserved him to the time of 
 Trajan. This prince being 
 come to Antioch about the 
 tenth year of his reign, in the 
 year 107, in his way to the 
 Parthian war, Ignatius, fear- 
 ing for the Christians, and hoping to avert 
 the storm by offering himself to suffer in 
 their stead, came voluntarily into the pre- 
 sence of Trajan. I shall deliver the con 
 ference, as it stands in the Acts of Igna- 
 tius, — a monument of false glory shroud- 
 ing itself under superstition and igno- 
 rance, on the one hand ; and of true glory, 
 supported by the faith and hope of Jesus, 
 on the other. 
 
 Being introduced into the emperor's 
 presence, he was thus addressed by Tra- 
 jan.]" What an impious spirit art thou, 
 both to transgress our com- 
 mands, and to inveigle others 
 into the same folly, to their 
 mini Ignatius answered. 
 
 Trajan 
 comes to 
 Ant'och: 
 
 A. D. 107. 
 
 Ignatius 
 examined 
 by Trajan. 
 
 * Wake's Epistles. 
 
 t See the Acts of Ignatius; and the Preface 
 of the Life of Itjnatius prefixed to a Tragedy 
 written by the Rev. Mr. GHmbold, which re- 
 presents the spirit of primitive Christianity. 
 The tragedy, considered as a composition, is 
 h2 
 
 Theophorus ought not to be called so; 
 forasmuch as all wicked spirits are de- 
 parted far from the servants of God. But 
 if you call me impious because I am hos- 
 tile to evil spirits, I own the charge in 
 that respect. For I dissolve all their 
 snares, through the inward support of 
 Christ the heavenly King. — Traj. Pray, 
 who is Theophorus'? — Ign. He who has 
 Christ in his breast. — Traj. And thinkest 
 thou not that gods reside in us also, who 
 fight for us against our enemies? — Ign. 
 You mistake in calling the demons of the 
 nations by the name of gods. For there 
 is only one God, who made heaven and 
 earth, the sea, and all that is in them; 
 and ONE Jesus Christ, his only begotten 
 Son, whose kingdom be my portion I — 
 Traj. His kingdom do you say, who was 
 crucified under Pilate] — Ign. His, who 
 crucified my sin with its author; and has 
 put all the fraud and malice of Satan 
 under the feet of those who carry him in 
 their heart. — Traj. Dost thou then carry 
 him who was crucified within thee? — 
 Ign. I do; for it is written; " I dwell in 
 them, and walk in them." Then Trajan 
 pronounced this sentence against him : 
 " Since Ignatius confesses, that he carries 
 within himself him that was crucified, we 
 command, that he be carried bound by 
 soldiers to Great Rome, there to be thrown 
 to the wild beasts, for the entertainment 
 of the people." 
 
 The learned Scaliger was puzzled to con- 
 ceive what could induce Trajan to order 
 his being sent so long a journey for execu- 
 tion. It might seem more natural for him 
 to have directed that he should suffer in 
 the view of his own flock, in order to 
 deter them from Christianity. But Tra- 
 jan might think the example much more 
 striking and extensive, by using the 
 method which he took. At any rate, 
 Providence undoubtedly displayed, in 
 this way, much more abundantly the ho- 
 nours of the cross, as will appear by what 
 follows. — The doctrine of Union with 
 Christ by faith, now so much ridiculed, 
 appears here in its full glory : And if ever 
 we be called to scenes like these, we 
 shall feel the need of it strongly, and be 
 sensible of the impotence of those schemes 
 of mere human invention, which are often 
 substituted in its room. Only Christ 
 within can support the heart in the hour 
 of severe trial: The boasted moral virtue 
 
 unequal; but it contains many beautiful pas- 
 
90 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chip. I. 
 
 of proud philosophers is radically defec- 
 tive and unsound. 
 
 The scene before us is august; and the 
 state of Christendom at that time is much 
 illustrated by it. The seven epistles of 
 this great man, undoubtedly genuine as 
 they are, and accurately distinjruished 
 from all corrupt interpolations,* will come 
 in aid to the Acts of his martyrdom : By 
 them he being dead, yet speaketh; and 
 what the Gospel can do for men, who 
 really believe it, and feel the energy of 
 the Spirit of its divine Author, has not 
 often Ijeen more illustriously displayed. 
 
 From Antioch he w^as hurried by his 
 guards to vSeleucia: Sailing thence, after 
 great fatigue, he arrived at Smyrna. 
 While the ship remained in port, he was 
 allowed the pleasure of visiting Polycarp, 
 who was bishop of the Christians there. 
 They had been fellow-disciples of St. 
 John; and the holy joy of their interview- 
 may be conceived by such persons as 
 know what the love of Christ is, and how 
 it operates in the breasts of those in whom 
 he dwells. Deputies were sent from the 
 various churches of Asia to attend and 
 console him, and to receive some benefit 
 by his spiritual communications. Bish- 
 ops, presbyters, and deacons, conversed 
 with him : a general convocation seems 
 to have taken place. Four of Ignatius's 
 seven epistles were written from Smyrna, 
 to the Churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, 
 Tralles, and Rome. 
 
 The Church of Ephesus appears, from 
 his epistle to them, still to have main- 
 tained its character of evangelical purity. 
 Their zeal indeed had decayed, but was 
 revived: and the rage of persecution was 
 the hot-bed, which reanimated their souls, 
 and made them fruitful again in faith, 
 hope, and charity. The very titles, by 
 which he addresses them, demonstrate 
 what their faith was in common with 
 that of the whole Church at that time; 
 and abundantly show the vanity of those, 
 whose dislike of the peculiar truths of 
 Christianity induces them to suppose, 
 that the ideas of predestination, election, 
 and grace, were purely the systematic 
 inventions of Augustine, and unknown to 
 the primitive Christians. We are cer- 
 tain, that St. Paul's epistles, and that par- 
 ticularly addressed to this Church, are 
 full of the same things. 
 
 "Ignatius, who is also called Theo- 
 
 * Archbishop Usher has preserved, or ra- 
 ther restored, these Epistles to us. 
 
 ])horus, to the worthily happy Church in 
 Ephesus of Asia, blessed in the majesty 
 and fulness of God the Father, predesti- 
 nated before the world to be perpetually 
 permanent in glory, immovable, united, 
 and elect in the grenuine suffering for the 
 truth,* by the will of the Father, and of 
 Jesus Christ our God, much joy in Jesus 
 Christ, and in his spotless grace." The 
 character, whicli he gives of their bishop 
 Onesimus, raises our idea of him to a 
 great degree. He calls him " inexpressi- 
 h\e in charity, whom I beseech you to 
 love according to Jesus Christ, and all of 
 you to imitate him. Blessed be his name, 
 who has counted you worthy to enjoy 
 such a bishop." With him he honoura- 
 bly mentions also some presbyters or 
 deacons of their Church, " Through 
 whom," says he, "I have seen you all 
 in love." Onesimus probably was the 
 fugitive slave of Philemon, a growing 
 plant in St. Paul's time. 
 
 The unaffected charity and humility of 
 Ignatius deserve our attention. He alone 
 seemed unconscious of his attainments, 
 while the whole Christian world admired 
 him. "I do not," says he, "dictate to 
 you, as if I were a person of any conse- 
 quence. For though I am bound for the 
 name of Christ, I am not yet perfected in 
 Christ Jesus. For now I begin to be a 
 disciple, and speak to you as my teachers. 
 For I ought to be sustained by you in 
 faith, in admonition, in patience, in long 
 suffering. But since charity will not 
 suffer me to be silent concerning you, for 
 this reason I take upon me to exhort 31'ou 
 to run together with me according to the 
 mind of God." 
 
 Nothing lies more on his heart in all 
 his epistles, than to recommend the most 
 perfect union of the members of the 
 Church, and to reprobate schisms and 
 dissensions. He represents the Chris- 
 tians as all united to Jesus Christ; all 
 partaking of the same spiritual life. To 
 separate from the Church ; and to lose 
 that subordination in which they stood to 
 their pastors, was to tear in pieces the 
 body of Christ, and to expose themselves 
 to the seductions of those who would 
 draw them from the faith and hope of the 
 Gospel. In modern times this language 
 is judged not very consonant to the spirit 
 of liberty, on which we are so apt to fe- 
 licitate ourselves. And I am persuaded, 
 
 * Alluding, doubtless, to the Errors of the 
 Docetse. 
 
Ce:tt. II.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 91 
 
 that the strong manner, in which submis- 
 sion to the Bishop is inculcated, has been 
 the most weighty argument with several 
 persons to encourage themselves in doubts 
 of the authenticity of these pieces. But 
 to doubt the genuineness of these epistles 
 on this account, is to be the slaves of 
 prejudice. Usher, and after him Vossius, 
 have sufficiently distinguished the genu- 
 ine from the false and the interpolated : 
 and the testimony of antiquity, and the 
 agreement of the epistles, as thus puri- 
 fied, with the quotations of the ancients, 
 render them superior to all exceptions.* 
 
 The circumstances in which the Church- 
 es were, sufficiently justify the strong 
 expressions of Ignatius. Heretics of va- 
 rious kinds abounded ; and their specious 
 artifices were likely to seduce the minds 
 of the weak. What then could be so 
 just a preservative to them, as to stick 
 close to the society of their faithful pas- 
 tors, the successors of the Apostles ] Hu- 
 milit}' is the guard of real Christian 
 goodness : nothing but the want of it 
 could have tempted them to desire a se- 
 paration : and in every age the same con- 
 duct toward godly pastors is, doubtless, 
 the true wisdom of the Church : The 
 spirit of schism, of ambition, of self-con- 
 ceit, disguising itself under the specious 
 pretences of liberty and of conscience, 
 has constantly produced the most fatal 
 eflects. Ignatius certainly would not 
 have wished the Ephesians to follow un- 
 sound and unfaithful pastors : but much 
 more caution in iudo-ino-, and a much 
 greater degree of submission to ministers 
 confessedly upright, are doubtless re- 
 quisite, than many persons in our days 
 are willing- to admit. — " Let no one," 
 sa)'S Ignatius, "mistake; — if anj'' man 
 is not within the altar, he is deprived 
 of the bread of God. If the prayer of 
 one or two has so much strength, how 
 much more that of the Bishop and of the 
 whole Church: He, who separates from 
 it, is proud, and condemns himself: For 
 it is written, God rcsisteth the proud. 
 Let us stud)^ therefore obedience to the 
 Bishop, that we may be subject to God. 
 And the more silent and gentle any one 
 observes the Bishop to be, the more on 
 
 * I shall not enter into so large a field of 
 criticism : — whoever has leisure and temper 
 sufficient for the subject, may read with ad- 
 vantage Dii Pin's statement of the controversy 
 concerninglgnatins'se])! sties ; and may thence, 
 I believe, learn all that is needful to lie known 
 concerning it. 
 
 that account should he reverence him. 
 Every one, to whom the Master commits 
 the stewardship, ought to be received as 
 the Master himself." — "Indeed," says 
 he, " Onesimus exceedingly commends 
 your godly order : — and that you live ac- 
 cording to truth, and that no heresy 
 dwells with you." — " Some indeed, with 
 much ostentation, make specious but fal- 
 lacious pretensions, whose works are un- 
 worthy of God, whom you ought to avoid 
 as wild beasts. For they are raging 
 dogs, biting in secret, whom you should 
 shim, as being persons very difficult to 
 be cured. One physician there is bodily 
 and spiritual, begotten and unbegotten, 
 God appearing in flesh, in immortal true 
 life, both from Mary and from God, — 
 first suffering, — then impassible" — "I 
 have known some who went from this 
 place,* whom you did not suffer to sow 
 tares among you : you stopped your ears; 
 so that you would not receive their seed, 
 as being stones of the temple of your 
 Father, prepared for the building of God 
 the Father, lifted up into heavenly places 
 by the engine of Jesus Christ, which is 
 his cross, using the Holy Spirit as a 
 cord." — " Yet pray earnestly for other 
 men without ceasing; for there is hope 
 of conversion in them, that they also may 
 be brought to God. Give them an op- 
 portunity to be instructed, at least, by 
 your works." — "Without Christ, think 
 nothing becoming; — in whom I carry 
 about my bonds, — spiritual jewels; — in 
 which may I be found at the resurrection 
 through your prayer, that my lot may be 
 cast among the Ephesian Christians, who 
 have always harmonized with the Apos- 
 tles in the power of Jesus Christ!" 
 
 "Ye are partakers of the mysteries 
 with Paul the holy, the renowned, the 
 blessed, whose footsteps may I follow !" 
 " Neglect not assemblies for thanksgiv- 
 ing and prayer: For when you assidu- 
 ously attend on these things, the powers 
 of Satan are demolished, and his perni- 
 cious kingdom is dissolved by the unani- 
 mity of your faith" — "Remember me, 
 as Jesus Christ also does you. Pray for 
 the Church in Syria, whence I am led 
 bound to Rome, — the meanest of the 
 faithful who are there." 
 
 I know not how the reader may con- 
 ceive ; but to my mind, under all the dis- 
 advantages of a style bloated with Asi- 
 
 * From Smyrna, I suppose, where the here- 
 sy of the DocetK was more common. 
 
92 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 atic tumour, and still more perhaps of a 
 text very corrupt, the ideas contained in 
 these passages of Ignatius's epistle — and 
 indeed the greatest part of it is little in- 
 ferior to this specimen, — while they re- 
 present partly the faith, discipline, and 
 spirit of the Ephesian Church, and part- 
 ly the charitable and heavenly mind of 
 the author, give the fairest pattern of 
 real Christianity alive in its root and in 
 its fruits. We see here what Christians 
 once were, and what the doctrines of 
 divine grace are. And that happy union, 
 order, and peace, which flourished so 
 long at Ephesus, untainted with heresy, 
 and ever preserving the simplicity of re- 
 liance on the Lord Jesus Christ, calls for 
 our commendation of their obedience to 
 their faithful pastors ; the want of a ten- 
 der conscientiousness in which matter, 
 so soon dissipates the spirit of the Gos- 
 pel in many modern Churches, and fa- 
 vours very much the growth of a contrary 
 spirit of fickleness, turbulence, and self- 
 importance : which at the same time that 
 it feeds the pride of corrupt nature, re- 
 duces large societies of Christians into 
 contemptible little parties at variance with 
 one another, and leaves them an easy 
 prey to the crafty and designing. 
 
 The letters of Ignatius add something 
 to the stock of history, as they introduce 
 to our acquaintance the two Asiatic 
 Churches of Magnesia and Trallcs, which 
 else had been unknown to us. In triuli, 
 that whole fertile region of Asia propria 
 seems to have been more thoroughly 
 evangelized than any other part of the 
 world at that period. From the time of 
 St. Paul's labours at Ephesus, "when 
 all they, which dwelt in Asia, heard the 
 word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and 
 Greeks,"* to the martyrdom of Ignatius, 
 that is for half a century or upwards, — 
 the truth as it is in Jesus was preserved 
 in its purity in these Churches : The op- 
 posers of the Gospel could gain no foot- 
 ing at all in some of them : In others 
 they made no great, or ai least, no abiding 
 impressions : In some the fervour of piety 
 was much declined ; and in others it still 
 retained a considerable strength. A 
 strong sense of the infinite value of Jesus 
 in his Godhead, his priesthood, and his 
 blood, prevailed in this region : Faith and 
 love were fed by the view of the Saviour; 
 and patience in suffering for his name 
 was one of their most common virtues. 
 
 Damas, the Bishop of Magnesia, was 
 a young person, whom Ignatius calls 
 "worthy of God." Eminent grace in 
 persons of tender years was sometimes 
 in the primitive Church distinguished by 
 their advancement to the Episcopacy. 
 In his letter to the Magnesians, he warns 
 them not to despise his youth, but to im- 
 itate the holy Presbyters, who gave place 
 to him, but not to him so properly, as to 
 the Father of Jesus Christ. — " Some per- 
 sons, indeed, call a man a Bishop, but do 
 every thing independently of him. Such 
 seem to me to have lost a good conscience, 
 because their assemblies are not regulat- 
 ed with steadfastness and Christian or- 
 der." He mentions also with honour 
 Bassus and Apollonius as Presbyters, and 
 Sotio the deacon, "whose happiness," 
 says he, "may I partake of ! because he 
 is subject to the Bishop, as to the grace 
 of God, and to the Presbytery, as to the 
 law of Jesus Christ." 
 
 Here, as elsewhere, he evidently points 
 out three distinct ranks in the primitive 
 Church, — the Bishop, the Presbyters, and 
 the Deacons, A blind and implicit sub- 
 mission to a hierarchy, however corrupt, 
 worthless and ignorant, was then un- 
 known. But a just and regular subor- 
 dination, according to the ranks of men 
 in the Church was much attended to; 
 and nothing like it, humanly speaking, 
 so much encourages and enables godly 
 pastors to discharge their office with zeal 
 and alacrity. Nor is it difficult to con- 
 ceive, what was the most customary 
 mode ofchurch-governmont in those times. 
 In vain, I think, will almost any modern 
 church whatever set up a claim to exact 
 resemblance. Usher's model of reduced 
 Episcopacy seems to come the nearest to 
 the plan of the primitive Churches, At 
 first, indeed, or for some time, church 
 governors were only of two ranks. Pres- 
 byters and Deacons : At least, this ap- 
 pears to have been the case in particular 
 instances; as at Philippi* and at Ephe- 
 sus :| and the term Bisbop was confound- 
 ed with that of Presbyter. The Church 
 of Corinth continued long in this state, 
 so far as one may judge by Clement's 
 epistle ; and thence we may in part ac- 
 count for the continuance of tjieir conten- 
 tious spirit. As these Churches grew 
 numerous, they could never be all assem- 
 bled in one place : the Presbyters must 
 have ministered to different congrega- 
 
 * Acts xix. 10, 
 
 Lh. i. Philipp, 
 
 f Acts XX, 17, 
 
Cist. II.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 93 
 
 tions, though the Church continued one. 
 Toward the end of the first century, all 
 the churches followed the model of the 
 mother-church of Jerusalem, where one 
 of the Apostles was the first Bishop. A 
 settled presidency obtained, and the name 
 of Angel was first given to the supreme 
 
 indeed, must have been at this time in a 
 very low state ; yet the same Pharisa- 
 ism is so congenial to the human mind, 
 that ministers in all ages will see occar 
 
 agamst 
 
 It, as 
 
 sion to warn their people 
 Ignatius did. 
 
 " Be not deceived with heterodox opin- 
 
 ruler, "though that of Bishop soon sue- ions, nor old unprofitable fables. For if 
 
 ■ ■ we still live according to Judaism, we 
 confess that we have not received grace. 
 For the Divine Prophets lived according 
 to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this 
 they were persecuted, being inspired by 
 his grace, to assure the disobedient, that 
 there is one God, who manifested him- 
 self by Jesus Christ his Son, who is His 
 eternal Word. — If then they have indeed 
 cast off their old principles, and are come 
 to a new hope in Christ, let them no Ion 
 ger observe the Jewish Sabbath, but live 
 according to the resurrection of the Lord* 
 in whose resurrection from the dead our 
 resurrection also is ensured, by him and 
 by his death, which some deny ; through 
 whom and by whom we have received 
 the mystery of believing ; and on account 
 of this we endure, that we may be found 
 disciples of Jesus Christ our only teacher. 
 How can we live without him, whose 
 disciples even the prophets were ] for in 
 spirit they expected him as their teacher. 
 Let us not then be insensible of his lov- 
 ing-kindness : For if he measured to us 
 according to what we have done, we 
 should be ruined. Therefore being his 
 disciples, let us learn to live according to 
 Christianity : he who follows any other 
 name than this, is not of God. Lay aside 
 then the old bitter leaven, and be trans- 
 
 ceeded. That this was the case in the 
 seven churches of Asia, is certain. The 
 address of the charges to him in the book 
 of the Revelation demonstrates his su- 
 periority. The Deacon, it is well known, 
 was chosen to administer in sacred em- 
 ployments of an inferior kind. These 
 three ranks appear to have been general 
 through the Christian world in the former 
 part of this century. 
 
 It has been an error common to all par 
 ties, to treat these lesser matters, as if 
 they were jure diving, or like the laws 
 of the Medes and Persians, unalterable. 
 Could it, however, conveniently be done, 
 it may perhaps be true that a reduced 
 Episcopacy, in which the dioceses are of 
 small extent, as those in the primitive 
 Church undoubtedly were, and in which 
 the President, residing in the metropolis, 
 exercises a superintendency over ten or 
 twelve Presbyters of the same city and 
 neio-hbourhood, would bid the fairest to 
 promote order, peace, and harmony. 
 
 But the Christian world has been more 
 anxious to support different modes of 
 government, than to behave as Christians 
 ought to do in each of them. A subject 
 of much greater importance is suggested 
 to us by a passage in the epistle to the 
 Magnesians, " As there are two coins, 
 one" of God, the other of the world, 
 and each of them is impressed with its 
 own character : the unbelievers are of 
 this world, the believers in love have the 
 character of God the Father through Je- 
 sus, into whose sufferings if we are un 
 ■willing to die, his life is not in us."— 
 Thus does Ignatius call our attention to 
 the grand distinction of men into two sorts 
 before God ; of which whoever has felt 
 the force, will be little solicitous concern- 
 ing other distinctions. 
 
 "Let us hear Ignatius's testimony to the 
 Deity of Christ, and to justification by 
 his grace through faith, and to the con- 
 stant influences of the Holy Spirit : And 
 we may observe at the same time, how 
 tlie Jewish leaven of self-righteousness 
 had not ceased, to attem])t at least, to 
 darken and to corrupt these essentials 
 of the Gospel. The religion of the Jews, 
 
 formed into a new leaven, which is Jesus 
 Christ — for Christianity is not converted 
 to Judaism, but Judaism to Christianity, 
 that every tongue confessing God might 
 be gathered together. These things I 
 warn you, my beloved, not because I have 
 known some of you thus ill-disposed; 
 but, as the least of you, I am willing to 
 admonish you, that ye fall not into the 
 snares of vain-glory, but that ye may 
 be well assured of that nativity, suf- 
 fering, and resurrection, during the gov- 
 ernnient of Pontius Pilate, of which lit- 
 erally and really Jesus Christ was the 
 subject, who is our hope, from which 
 may none of you be turned aside ! — I 
 know that ye are not puffed up, for ye 
 have Jesus Christ in yourselves ; and 
 
 * Kufianiii' ^cuMf—A manifest intimation to 
 them to observe the Lord's day. 
 
94 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the more I praise you, the more I know 
 that ye will be lowly-minded." Beauti- 
 ful view of their genuine humility ! — He 
 proceeds thus : — " Study then to be con- 
 firmed in the doctrines of the Lord and of 
 the Apostles, that in all things which ye 
 do, ye may have good success in flesh and 
 spirit, in faith and love, in the Son, and the 
 Father and the Spirit. — Knowing that ye 
 are full of God, I have briefly exhorted 
 you. Remember me in your prayers, that 
 I may come to God, and to the Church 
 in Syria, of which I am unworthy to be 
 called a member. For I need your united 
 prayer in God, and your charity, that the 
 Churchjn Syria may be thought worthy to 
 partake of the dew of heavenly grace 
 through your Church. The Ephesians at 
 Smyrna, whence I write, together with 
 Polycarp, Bishop of the Smyrneans and 
 the rest of the Churches in the honour of 
 Jesus Christ, salute you : They live as in 
 the presence of the glory of God, as ye do 
 also, who have refreshed me in all things : 
 Continue strong in the concord of God : 
 Possess a spirit of union in Jesus Christ." 
 
 From Smyrna he wrote also to the 
 Church of Tralles, the Bishop of which 
 was Polybius, "who so rejoiced with 
 me," says he, " that I beheld all your mul- 
 titude in him. Receiving therefore your 
 divine benevolence through him, I seemed 
 actually to find you, as I Jiave known you 
 to be, followers of God. For since ye are 
 subject to the Bishop as to Jesus Christ, 
 ye appear to live, not after man, but after 
 Jesus Clrist: who died for us, that be- 
 lieving in his death ye might escape 
 death." 
 
 In what follows we have an intimation of 
 the weak and infant state of this Church ; 
 which though sound, had probably not been 
 so long planted as the rest. And the mar- 
 tyr seems to express some consciousness 
 of superior attainments and gifts, though 
 nevertheless restrained by deep humility. 
 
 " I have a strong savour of God ; but 
 I take a just measure of myself, lest I 
 perish by boasting. For now I must more 
 abundantly fear, and not attend to those 
 who would inflate me with pride — I love 
 indeed to suflTer, but do not know whe- 
 ther I am worthy. I need gentleness of 
 spirit, by which the prince of this world 
 is subdued. Cannot I write to you of 
 heavenly things ? — Ye are infants ; and 
 I fear lest I should hurt you : — I fear lest, 
 through incapacity of receiving stronger 
 meat, ye should be injured in your spirit- 
 nal growth." He goes on to guard them 
 
 against schisms and heresies, to remind 
 them of the foundation of the Gospel, 
 viz : Christ and him crucified ; and, in 
 his usual manner, to recommend obedi- 
 ence to their pastors : — He modestly thus 
 concludes, — " As yet I am not out of the 
 reach of danger; but the Father is faith- 
 ful in Jesus Christ to fulfil my petition 
 and yours, in whom may we be found 
 blameless !" 
 
 The subject of his letter to the Roman 
 Christians was, to intreat them not to use 
 any methods for his deliverance. He had 
 the prize of martyrdom before him, and 
 he was unwilling to be robbed of it. He 
 speaks with uncommon pathos : 
 
 " I fear your charity, lest it should in- 
 jure me. It will be easy for you to do 
 what you Avish : But, it will be diflicult 
 for me to glorify God, if I should be 
 spared through your entreaties. — If you 
 be silent in my behalf, I shall be made 
 partaker of God ; but if you love to re- 
 tain me in the flesh, I shall again have 
 my course to run. I write to the Churches, 
 and signify to them all, that I die wil- 
 lingly for God, unless you prevent me : 
 I beseech you, that you show not an un- 
 reasonable love toward me : Suffer me to 
 be the food of beasts, by which means I 
 shall attain to the kingdom of God. — 
 Rather encourage the wild beasts, that 
 they may become my sepulchre ; that 
 nothing of my body may be left; that I 
 may give no trouble to any one, when I 
 fall asleep. From .Syria to Rome, I fight 
 with wild beasts — in human form, — by 
 land and sea, by night and day, chained 
 to ten leopards, who are made even worse 
 by kind treatment. By their injuries I 
 learn the more to be a disciple of Jesus, — 
 yet am I not hereby justified. May I 
 enjoy the real wild beasts, which are 
 prepared for me : May they exercise all 
 their fierceness upon me ! I will encou- 
 rage them, that they may assuredly devour 
 me, and not use me as some, whom they 
 have feared to touch. But if they will 
 not do it willingly, I will provoke them 
 to it : — Pardon me, — I know what is 
 good for me. Now I begin to be a disci- 
 ple : nor shall any thing, of things visi- 
 ble and invisible, move me : — Let fire and 
 the cross, let the companies of wild 
 beasts, let breaking of bones and tearing 
 of limbs, let the grinding of the whole 
 body, and all the malice of the Devil 
 come upon me ; be it so, only may I enjoy 
 Jesus Christ ! All the ends of the world, 
 and the kingdoms of it will profit me 
 
CEjfT. n.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 95 
 
 nothinor ; It is better for me to die for 
 Jesus Christ, than to reign over the ends 
 of the earth : Him I seek who died for 
 us : Him I desire who rose again for us 
 He is my gain laid up for me : Suffer 
 me to imitate the Passion of my God. — 
 If any of you have Him within you, let 
 him conceive what I feel, and let him 
 sympathize with me, and know what a 
 conflict I have. The prince of this world 
 wishes to corrupt my purpose toward 
 God : Let none of you present assist 
 him : My worldly affections are crucified: 
 the fire of God's love burns within me, and 
 cannot be extinguished: Itlives: itspeaks, 
 and says, ' Come to the Father.' I have 
 no delight in the bread that perisheth, nor 
 in the pleasures of this life: I long for 
 the bread of God ; the flesh of Jesus 
 Christ of the seed of David : and I desire 
 to drink his blood — incorruptible love." 
 
 Certainly no words can express in a 
 stronger manner the intenseness of spirit- 
 ual desire : and one is disposed to look 
 down with contempt and pity on the mag- 
 nanimity of secular heroes and patriots, 
 as compared with it. Yet I have some 
 doubt, whether all this flame, strong and 
 sincere as it unquestionably was, had not 
 something mixed with it by no means of 
 so pure a kind. For I would not carry 
 the reader's admiration or ray own be- 
 yond the limits of human imbecility. — 
 Ought not the Roman Christians to have 
 endeavoured to save Ignatius's life by all 
 honest means 1 — Has any man a right to 
 hinder others from attempting to save the 
 life of the innocent] — or, Will his entrea^ 
 ties give them a right to be as indifferent 
 for his preservation as he himself is ] — 
 Ought not every man, however prepared 
 for death, and preferring it, if God please, 
 to use all possible methods, consistent 
 with a good conscience,to preserve his life? 
 
 I cannot answer these queries to the 
 advantage of Ignatius's determination. — 
 Was not his desire of martyrdom exces- 
 sive'? If he was wrong, it was doubtless 
 a mistake of judgment. I fear the exam- 
 ple of Ignatius did harm in this respect 
 in the Church. Martyrdom was, we 
 know, made too much of in the third cen- 
 tury : — so hard is it to be kept from all 
 extremes : — ours are generally of the op- 
 posite kind. 
 
 These reflections are suggested, in 
 part by the example of St. Paul. He, 
 indeed, "would go to Jerusalem," though 
 he knew he should be bound. But the 
 certainty of death was not before his 
 
 eyes, and therefore his resolution, in this 
 case, is not similar to that of Ignatius. 
 As for the rest, he took no pains to dis- 
 suade others from saving his life: He 
 took pains to save it himself: Ho blames 
 his friends at Rome for deserting him: 
 And that eagerness for martyrdom which 
 Ignatius expresses, I see neither in Paul 
 nor in any of the Apostles. They rather 
 refer themselves calmly to the will of 
 God in things which concern themselves. 
 On the whole, there appears in Ignatius, 
 the same zeal for God and love to Jesus 
 Christ, and the same holy contempt of 
 earthly things, which was so eminent in 
 the Apostles; but, I suspect, not an 
 equal degree of calm resignation to the 
 Divine Will. 
 
 The time which he was allowed to 
 spend at Smyrna, in company with his 
 beloved Polycarp and other friends, must 
 have been highly agreeable to him. But 
 his keepers were impatient of their long 
 stay: the reasons were, most probably of 
 a maritime nature. The season, how- 
 ever, for the public spectacles at Rome 
 was advancing, and, perhaps, they were 
 afraid of not arriving in time. They now 
 set sail for Troas, where, at his arrival, 
 he was refreshed with the news of the 
 persecution ceasing in the Church of An- 
 lioch. He had been attended hither by 
 Burrhus, the deacon of Polycarp; and 
 him he despatched with an epistle to the 
 Philadelphians, by way of return for the 
 visit which their Bishop had paid him at 
 Troas. For here also several Churches 
 sent their messengers to visit and to sa- 
 lute him : and Providence so far restrain- 
 ed the inhumanity of his guards, that he 
 was allowed to have intercourse with 
 them. — He wrote three epistles more at 
 this place. 
 
 The Philadelphians, from his account, 
 were still favoured with the same spirit 
 of grace, by which they had been already 
 so honourably distinguished among the 
 seven churches of Asia. He recommends, 
 as usual, unity, concord, obedience; — not 
 that he had found any thing amiss in 
 them, in these respects. 
 
 One may form some idea of the man- 
 ner in which these primitive Christians 
 enjoyed the grace of God, and admired 
 and loved it, as it appeared in one an- 
 other, by his way of speaking of the Phi- 
 ladelphian Bishop, whose name is not 
 given to us, "whom," says he, "I know 
 to have obtained the ministry, not by any 
 selfish or worldly means or motives, but 
 
96 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 for the common good of saints ; nor 
 through vain glory; but from the love of 
 God the Father, and the Lord Jesus 
 Christ. I am perfectly charmed with 
 his meekness : When silent, he exhibits 
 more power than vain speakers." 
 
 He recommends to them to preserve a 
 unity in the administration of the Lord's 
 Supper: "For there is one body of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup in the 
 unity of his blood; one altar, as also one 
 Bishop, with the Presbytery and the Dea- 
 cons my fellow servants. — Whatever ye 
 do, do all according to the will of God." 
 
 The firmness of the Christian faith, 
 and his zeal against the spirit of self- 
 righteousness, are observable in the fol- 
 lowing passage : — " If any interpret Ju- 
 daism to you, hear him not. For it is 
 better to hear the Gospel from a circum- 
 cised person, than Judaism from an un- 
 circumcised one. But if both speak not 
 of Jesus Christ, they are to me pillars 
 and sepulchres of the dead, on which are 
 written only the names of men. — The ob- 
 jects dear to me are Jesus Christ, his 
 cross, his death, his resurrection, and the 
 faith which is in him; by which I desire, 
 through your prayer, to be justified." 
 He begs them to send a Deacon to Anti- 
 och, to congratulate his people on the 
 cessation of persecution. Toward the 
 conclusion he speaks of Philo, the Dea- 
 con from Cilicia, who ministered to him, 
 together with Agathopes, a choice saint, 
 who, renouncing the world, had followed 
 him from Syria. 
 
 He wrote also from Troas to the Smyr- 
 nians, and his commendations of them 
 are consonant to the character they bear 
 in the book of the Revelation. They had 
 •apeathered the storm of persecution, 
 which was there predicted, and had pro- 
 bably enjoyed the ministry of Poly carp 
 from St. John's time. The most striking 
 thing in this epistle, is the zeal with 
 which he warns them against the Do- 
 cetae. In his view the evil of their here- 
 sy consisted in taking away the atoning 
 blood of Christ, and the hope of a bless- 
 ed resurrection : — Let modern Divines 
 hear him, and be instructed. "I glorify 
 Jesus Christ our God, who hath given 
 you wisdom. For I understand, that ye 
 are perfect in the immovable faith of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ; who really was of 
 the seed of David according to the flesh, 
 and born of a virgin really ; who real- 
 ly suffered under Pontius Pilate. — For 
 these things he suffered for us, that we 
 
 might be saved. And he truly suflfered: 
 as also he truly raised up himself: not 
 as some infidels say that he seemed to 
 suffer. — I forewarn you of those beasts, 
 who are in the shape of men ; whom you 
 ought not only not to receive, but if pos- 
 sible not even to meet with. Only you 
 ought to pray for them — if they may be 
 converted, — which is a difficult case. — 
 But Jesus Christ, our true life, has power 
 to save to the uttermost." — An humble 
 and thankful sense of the unspeakable 
 value of Christ, leads naturally to this 
 charity, and the want of it leaves men al- 
 ways, under the appearance of candour, 
 to a cruel insensibility of heart and an 
 undistinguished scepticism. It seems, 
 that these heretics, with the usual arti- 
 fices of such persons, laboured to work 
 themselves into the good graces of Igna- 
 tius. He sees through their designs, and 
 says, — " for what does it profit me, if any 
 man commend me, and yet blaspheme 
 my Lord, denying him to have come in 
 the flesh? — They separate from the Eu- 
 charist and from prayer, because they 
 confess not the Eucharist to be the body 
 of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who suffer- 
 ed for our sins. — They who contradict 
 the gift of God, die in their reasonings." 
 — Union with the Bishop he strenuously 
 insists on. " It is not lawful without the 
 Bishop, to baptise, or to make a love 
 feast." 
 
 We see the practice of true Christians 
 in those times. They carefully separated 
 themselves from heretics : they beheld 
 their views with horror: they stuck close 
 to Christ. — His Godhead, Manhood, 
 Atonement, Priesthood, were inestima- 
 bly precious in their eyes. They could 
 not allow those to be Christians at all, 
 who denied the fundamentals : In fine, 
 they preserved order and close connexion 
 with their pastors: they did nothing in 
 religion without them. — These were the 
 means of protecting truth among them : 
 and the long course of evangelical pros- 
 perity in these Churches, under God, may 
 be ascribed to the use of these means. 
 
 One letter only remains to be men- 
 tioned, — that to Polycarp. — It contains a 
 just picture of pastoral integrity, wisdom, 
 and charity : The whole of it deserves to 
 be studied by all ministers. The more 
 holy any Pastor is, the more will he be 
 sensible of the need of divine wisdom and 
 strength. — The disadvantages in which a 
 poor sinful worm is involved, who has to 
 contend against the united powers of the 
 
Cekt. II.] 
 
 DURING THE REIGN OF TRAJAN. 
 
 sr 
 
 world and the devil, against the corrupt 
 workings of his own nature, the open op- 
 position of the profane, and the faults of 
 God's own people, cannot even be con- 
 ceived by a mere secular Clergy, intent 
 only on ease and preferment, or, at best, 
 on literary indulgences and external deco- 
 rum : as little will they be conceived by 
 those ambitious and turbulent teachers, 
 who are so swallowed up in political 
 dreams, as to forget that Christ's king- 
 dom is not of this world. 
 
 " I exhort thee, by the grace with which 
 thou art clothed, to apply thyself to thy 
 course of duty; and to admonish all, that 
 they may all be saved. Do justice to thy 
 station in all dil'.gence,both temporal and 
 spiritual : Be studious of that best of all 
 blessings, unity : Bear with all, as also 
 the Lord doth with thee : Bear with all 
 in charity, as indeed thou also dost. Find 
 time for prayer without ceasing: Ask for 
 more understanding than thou hast at 
 present: Watch, — and possess a spirit 
 ever attentive : Speak to each separately, 
 as Almighty God shall enable thee to do : 
 Bear with the diseases of all, as a perfect 
 combatant: — The more labour, the more 
 reward. — If thou love only the obedient 
 disciples, thou evidencest no grace : Ra- 
 ther bring into orderly subjection the tur- 
 bulent through meekness : Every wound 
 is not cured by the same method of appli- 
 cation : Watch as a divine wrestler : Thy 
 theme is immortality and eternal life. — 
 Let not those who seem experienced 
 Christians, and are yet unsound in the 
 faith, stagger thee : Stand firm as an 
 anvil continually struck. It is the cha- 
 racter of a great wrestler to be mangled, — 
 and yet to conquer : — Be more studious 
 than thou art: — Consider the times ; and 
 expect Him who is above all time, who 
 is unconnected with time, the invisible 
 one made visible for us, — the impassible, 
 but passible for us; who bore all sorts of 
 sufferings for us. — Let not widows be ne- 
 glected : Next to the Lord, do thou take 
 care of them : Let nothing be done with- 
 out thy cognizance: Do thou nothing 
 without the mind of God. — Let assem- 
 blies be more frequently held : Seek out 
 all by name : Despise not slaves of either 
 sex; yet let them not be puffed up, but 
 serve more faithfully to the glory of God, 
 that they may obtain a better liberty from 
 God : Let them not desire to be set at 
 liberty at the charge of the Church, lest 
 they be found slaves of lust. If any can 
 remain in chastity for the honour of the 
 Vol. I. I 
 
 Lord, let them do so without boasting. 
 If they boast, they are lost : and if the 
 man set himself up above the Bishop, he 
 is lost. It behoves the married to enter 
 into that connection with the consent of 
 the Bishop, that the marriage may be 
 after the will of God, and not to fulfil the 
 lusts of the flesh." 
 
 From Troas, Ignatius, being brought 
 to Neopolis, passed by Philip])! through 
 Macedonia, and that part of Epirus, 
 which is next to Epidamnus. Having 
 found a ship in one of the sea-ports, his 
 conductors sailed over the Adriatic : and 
 thence, entering into the Tuscan sea, and 
 passing by several islands and cities, at 
 length they came in view of Puteoli, 
 which being shown to him, he hastened 
 to go forth, desirous to tread in the steps 
 of the Apostle Paul ; but a violent wind 
 arising would not permit him to accom- 
 plish this design. His attendants, the 
 relaters of the martyrdom, say, that the 
 wind then became favourable for one day 
 and night; — and that they were hurried 
 on contrary to their wishes: They sor- 
 rowed at the thought of being separated 
 from him : but he rejoiced in the prospect 
 of soon leaving the world and departing 
 to his Lord, whom he loved : — They 
 sailed into the Roman port Ostia; and 
 when the impure sports were at an end, 
 the soldiers began to be offended with 
 his slowness ; but the Bishop joyfully 
 complied with their hastiness. Ostia 
 was son^ miles from Rome; and he was 
 met by me Roman Christians, who inti- 
 mated their strong desire for his preser- 
 vation. Some of them probably had in- 
 fluence v/ith the great; and they were 
 willing to try it: Ignatius, however, was 
 inflexible. He was brought to Rome, 
 and presented to the prefect of the city. 
 
 When he was led to execution, he was 
 attended by a number of the brethren, and 
 was allowed to join in prayer with them. 
 And he prayed to the Son 
 of God* in behalf of the 
 Churches, — that he would 
 put a stop to the persecution, 
 and continue the love of the 
 brethren toward each other, 
 then led into the amphitheatre, and speedi- 
 ly thrown to the wild beasts. He had 
 here also his wish: The beasts were his 
 o-rave : A few bones only were left, which 
 
 * I use the expression of the Narrative: let 
 tlie reader make the obvious iuference for 
 himself. 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom of 
 Ignatius: 
 
 A. u. lor. 
 
 He 
 
 was 
 
06 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 the Deacons gathered, carefully pre- 
 served, and afterwards buried at Antioch. 
 
 The writers thus conclude : " We have 
 made known to you both the day and the 
 time of his martyrdom, — that being as- 
 sembled together according to that time, 
 we may jointly commemorate the mag- 
 nanimous martyr of Christ, who trode 
 under foot the devil, and completed the 
 course which he had devoutly wished in 
 Christ Jesus our Lord, by whom and 
 with whom all glory and power be to the 
 Father with the blessed Spirit for ever. 
 Amen." 
 
 Usher has preserved, or rather restored 
 to us also an epistle of Polycarp to the 
 Philippians. It breathes the same spirit 
 as those of his fellow-disciple, but has 
 less pathos and vigour of sentiment. Ci- 
 tations from it will be needless. — He begs 
 the Philippians to communicate to him 
 what they knew of Ignatius, whom they 
 had seen at Philippi, after his departure 
 from Smyrna. We hence see how the 
 Churches then formed one large fraterni- 
 ty, abstracted from partial views of sup- 
 porting little factions and interests. He 
 exhorts them to obey the word of right- 
 eousness, and to exercise all patience, 
 which they had seen exemplified in Igna- 
 tius, and in others among themselves, 
 and in Paul himself, and the rest of the 
 Apostles : for these loved not this present 
 world, but him, who died and w^as raised 
 again by God for us. By his account it 
 appears, that the Philippians still retained 
 the Christian spirit. — One of th^ Presby- 
 ters, Valens, together with his wife, had 
 sinned through covetousne|s. — Would to 
 God such spots in the pastoral character 
 were as singular in our times ! Polycarp 
 beautifully expresses his charitable con- 
 cern for them, and exhorts them, in affec- 
 tionate sympathy, to endeavour to restore 
 their spiritual health. 
 
 These facts and observations throw 
 some light on the persecution of Trajan, 
 on the spirit of Christians so far as it can 
 be collected at that time, on the martyr- 
 dom of Ignatius, and on the signal glory 
 which God was pleased to diffuse around 
 it amonar the Churches. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF CHRISTIANS DURING 
 THE REIGNS OF ADRIAN AND ANTO- 
 NINUS PIUS. 
 
 Trajan died in the year 117. The lat- 
 
 ter part of his reign had been employed 
 in his great military expedi- f)pj,th of 
 tion into the East, whence he Trajan, 
 lived not to return. His ex- j^ ^ j^^^ 
 ploits and triumphs fall not 
 within my province : — 1 have no concern 
 with him except in that line, in which to 
 a Christian he must appear to the great- 
 est disadvantage ; and out of which, it 
 were heartily to be wished, that he had 
 ever given any evidence of a desire to re- 
 move. His successor, Adrian, appears 
 not to have issued any persecuting edicts. 
 But the iniquity of his predecessor sur- 
 vived ; and Adrian's silent acquiescence 
 for a time, gave it sufficient scope to exert 
 itself in acts of barbarity.* 
 
 In the mean time the Gospel spread 
 more and more. A number of apostolical 
 persons demonstrated by their conduct, 
 that the Spirit which had influenced the 
 Apostles, rested upon them. Filled with 
 divine charity, they distributed their sub- 
 stance to the poor, and travelled into re- 
 gions, which, as yet, had not heard the 
 sound of the Gospel : and having planted 
 the faith, they ordained pastors, com- 
 mitted to them the culture of the new 
 ground, and then passed into other coun- 
 tries. Hence numbers, through grace, 
 embraced the doctrine of salvation, at the 
 first hearing, wdth much alacrity. f It is 
 natural to admire here the power of the 
 Holy Spirit of God in the production of 
 so pure and charitable a temper ; to con- 
 trast it with the illiberal selfishness too 
 prevalent even among the best in our 
 days ; and to regret how little is done for 
 the propagation of the Gospel through the 
 world, by nations whose aids of commerce 
 and navigation are so much superior to 
 those enjoyed by the ancients. — One ad- 
 vantage those Christians possessed in- 
 deed, which we have not : They were all 
 one body, one Church, of one name, and 
 cordially loved one another as brethren : 
 The attention to fundamentals, to real 
 Christianity, was not dissipated by schis- 
 matic peculiarities, nor was the body of 
 Christ rent in pieces by factions ; There 
 were indeed many heretics ; but real 
 Christians admitted them not into their 
 communities : the line of distinction was 
 drawn with sufficient precision ; and a dis- 
 like of the person or offices of Christ, 
 and of the real spirit of holiness, discrimi- 
 
 * The persecution of the 2(] year of Adrian, 
 is commonly called the Fourth Persecution of 
 the Christians. 
 
 t Euseb. B. iii. c. 33. 
 
Cejtt. n.] 
 
 ADRIAN AND ANTONINUS PIUS. 
 
 99 
 
 Character 
 of Quad- 
 ratus. 
 
 nated the heretics : and separation from 
 them, while it was undoubtedly the best 
 mark of charity to their souls, tended to 
 preserve their faith and love of true Chris- 
 tians in genuine purity. 
 
 Among these holy men Quadratus was 
 much distinguished. He succeeded Pub- 
 lius in the bishopric of Athens, 
 who had suffered martyrdom 
 either in this or in the forego- 
 ing reign. He found the flock 
 in a dispersed and confused state :* Their 
 public assemblies were deserted : their 
 zeal was grown cold and languid : their 
 lives and manners were corrupted; and 
 they seemed likely to apostatize from 
 Christianity. Quadratus laboured to re- 
 cover them with much zeal and with equal 
 success.! Order and discipline were re- 
 stored, and with them the holy flame of 
 godliness. One of the strongest testimo- 
 nies of these things, is the account which 
 the famous Origen, in the second book of 
 his treatise against Celsus, gives of the 
 Athenian Church. While this great man 
 is demonstrating the admirable efficacy of 
 Christian faith on the minds of men, he 
 exemplifies his positions by this very 
 Church of Athens, on account of its good 
 order, constancy, meekness, and quiet- 
 ness : — He represents it as infinitely su- 
 perior, in these respects, to the common 
 political assembly in that city, which was 
 factious and tumultuary. He affirms that 
 it was evident, that the worst parts of the 
 Church were better than the best of their 
 popular assemblies. This is a very pleas- 
 ing testimony to the growth of Christiani- 
 ty, since the time that a handful of seed 
 was sown there by St. Paul : and let the 
 testimony of so penetrating and saga- 
 cious an observer as Origen be considered, 
 as one of the many proofs that might be 
 given of the happy effect which real Chris- 
 tianity has on human society. To a mind 
 not intoxicated with vain ideas of secular 
 glory, the Christian part of Athens must 
 appear infinitely more happy and more 
 respectable, than that commonwealth ever 
 had been in the meridian of its glory. — 
 But we hope in future pages to give much 
 stronger proofs of the advantages derived 
 to society from the Gospel. 
 
 In the sixth year of his reign, Adrian 
 came to Athens, and was initiated in the 
 Eleusinian mysteries. This prince was 
 remarkably fond of pagan institutions ; 
 
 • Euseb. B. iv. c. 22. 
 
 + Cave's Life of Quadratus. 
 
 and by this very circumstance demon- 
 strated a spirit extremely foreign to Chris- 
 tianity. The persecutors were proceed- 
 ing with sanguinary vigour, when Quad- 
 ratus, at length, presented an apology to 
 the emperor, in which he defended the 
 Gospel from the calumnies of its enemies ; 
 and in which he particularly took notice 
 of our Saviour's miracles, his curing of 
 diseases, and raising of the dead, — some 
 instances of which, he says, namely, of 
 persons raised from the dead, were alive 
 in his time. 
 
 Aristides, a Christian writer at that 
 time in Athens, addressed himself also to 
 Adrian in an apology on the same subject. 
 The good sense of the emperor at length 
 was roused to do justice to his innocent 
 subjects. The apologies of the two writers 
 may be reasonably supposed to have had 
 some effect on his mind. Yet a letter 
 from Serenius Granianus, proconsul of 
 Asia, may be conceived to have moved 
 him still more. He wrote to the emperor, 
 " that it seemed to him unreasonable, that 
 the Christians should be put to death, 
 merely to gratify the clamours of the peo- 
 ple, without trial, and without any crime 
 proved against them." This seems the 
 first instance of any Roman governor dar- 
 ing publicly to suggest ideas contradic- 
 tory to Trajan's iniquitous maxims, which 
 inflicted death on Christians as such, ab- 
 stracted from any moral guilt. And it 
 seems to me a sufficient proof, that the 
 severe sufferings of Christians at this 
 period, which appear to have been very 
 remarkable in Asia, were more owing to 
 the active and sanguinary spirit of perse- 
 cution itself, — which, from Trajan's exam- 
 ple, was become very fashionable, — than 
 to any explicit regard to his edicts. We 
 have Adrian's rescript addressed to Minu- 
 cius Fundanus, the successor of Granian- 
 us, whose government seems to have been 
 near to its conclusion when he wrote to th* 
 emperor. 
 
 To Minucius Fundanus. 
 
 " I have received a letter written to me 
 by the very illustrious Serenius Granian- 
 us, whom you have succeeded. — To me 
 then the affair seems by no means fit to 
 be slightly passed over, that men may 
 not be disturbed without cause, and that 
 sycophants may not be encouraged in their 
 odious practices. If the people of the 
 province will appear publicly, and make 
 open charges against the Christians, so 
 as to give them an opportunity of answer- 
 
100 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 ing for themselves, let them proceed in 
 that manner only, and not by rude demands 
 and mere clamours. For it is nmch more 
 proper, if any person will accuse them, 
 that YOU should take cognizance of these 
 matters. If any then accuse, and show 
 that they actually break the laws, do you 
 determine according to the nature of the 
 crime. But, by Hercules,* if the charge 
 be a mere calumny, do you estimate the 
 enormity of such calumny, and punish 
 it as it deserves." 
 
 Notwithstanding the obscurity, which 
 I find Dr. JorUn and Dr. Lardner suppose 
 to be in this rescript, I cannot but think 
 it clearly shows that it was the intention 
 of the emperor to prevent Christians from 
 being punished as such. The only reason 
 for liesitation, which I can see, is the in- 
 consistency of it with Trajan's rescript. 
 But it does not appear that Adrian intend- 
 ed the conduct of his predecessor to be 
 the model of his own : and we shall see, 
 in the next reign, still clearer proofs of 
 the equity of Adrian's views. It is but 
 justice due to this emperor, to free his 
 character from the charge of persecution ; 
 and Christians of that or of any age could 
 not object to the propriety of being pun- 
 ished equally with other men, if they vio- 
 lated the laws of the state. But it is the 
 glory of the times we are now reviewing, 
 that no men were more innocent, peacea- 
 ble, and well-disposed citizens than the 
 Christians. Yet the enmity of men's 
 minds against real godliness, — so natural 
 in all ages, — laid them under extreme dis- 
 advantages unknown to others, in vindi- 
 cating themselves from unjust aspersions ; 
 and This forms, indeed, one of the most 
 painful crosses which good men must en- 
 dure in this life. For example, many he- 
 retics, who wore the name of Christians, 
 were o-uilty of the most detestable enormi- 
 ties ; these were indiscriminately charged 
 by the Pagans on Christians in general — 
 This circumstance, in addition to other 
 still more important reasons, rendered 
 them careful in preserving the line of se- 
 paration distinct; and, by the excellency 
 of their doctrine, and the purity of their 
 lives, they were enabled gradually to 
 overcome all uncandid insinuations. 
 
 There is extant also a letter of Adrian,! 
 in which he speaks of Christian bishops 
 in as respectable a manner as of the priests 
 
 * This is an oath, (lemonstfating only the 
 earnestness of the writer in liis declarations, 
 according to the usual profaneness of men. 
 
 •)■ Vopiscus, b. ii. 67. 
 
 of Serapis ; and of Christians in general 
 as very numerous at Alexandria. Since 
 St. Mark's time, therefore, it is evident, 
 though we have scarcely any particular 
 accounts, that the Gospel must have flour- 
 ished abundantly in Egypt. 
 
 But the same equitable rule of govern- 
 ment, which forbad Adrian to punish the 
 innocent Christians, led him to be very 
 severe against the guilty Jews : for now 
 appeared Barchochebas, who pretended to 
 be the star prophesied of by Balaam. — 
 This miserable people, who had rejected 
 the true Christ, received the impostor 
 with horrid arms ; and were by him led 
 into open crimes; and amongst the rest 
 into a cruel treatment of the Christians.* 
 The issue of the rebellion was the entire 
 exclusion of the Jews from_ the city and 
 territory of Jerusalem. Another city was 
 erected in its stead, and called, after the 
 emperor's name, ^lia. This leads us 
 to consider how the slate of the mother- 
 church of Jerusalem was affected by this 
 great revolution. The Christian Jews, 
 previous to the destruction of Jerusalem 
 by Titus, as it has been observed, had 
 retired to Pella, a little town beyond Jor- 
 dan, inhabited by Gentiles : The unex- 
 pected retreat of Cestius had given them 
 this opportunity of effecting their escape. 
 How long they continued here, is uncer- 
 tain. Tliey must, however, have re- 
 turned before Adrian's tiine, 
 who, comino- to Jerusalem 47 Adrian 
 years after "the devastation, fJ^'^^H" 
 found there a few houses and iJ"^"/^" 
 a little Church of Christians 
 built on mount Sion. Here A. D. 127. 
 the Church of Jerusalem kept 
 their solemn assemblies, and seemed to 
 have acquired a splendid accession by 
 the conversion of Aquila, the eiriperor's 
 kinsman, whom he made governor and 
 overseer of the new city. But as he 
 continued to pursue his magic and astro- 
 logical studies he was excluded from 
 the Church. — A strong proof that the mo- 
 ther-church sLill retained a measure of its 
 pristine purity and discipline ! — Corrupt 
 churches are glad to retain persons of 
 eminence in their communion, however 
 void of the spirit of the Gospel.— Aquila, 
 incensed, apostatized to Judaism, and 
 translated the Old Testament into G reek.f 
 
 * Justin jMailyr, in bis first, commonly call- 
 ed second Apology, observes that Barchoche- 
 bas cruelly tortured such Christians as refused 
 to deny aiid blaspheme Jesus Christ. 
 
 t Cave's Life of Simeon. 
 
Cent. II.] 
 
 ADRIAN AND ANTONINUS PIUS. 
 
 101 
 
 Eusebius, b. iv. c. 5. gives us a list of 
 the bishops who successively presided in 
 Jerusalem. The first was the Apostle 
 James, the second Simeon ; both whose 
 histories have been recorded. He men- 
 tions thirteen more : but we have no ac- 
 count of their characters or actions. — 
 During all this time something judaical 
 seems to have continued in their practice ; 
 though Jewish ideas would naturally de- 
 cay by degrees. The revolution under 
 Adrian, at length put a total end to the 
 Jewish Church, by the extirpation and 
 banishment of this people. — To such out- 
 ward changes is the Church of Christ 
 subject ; a new Church, however, arose 
 in^lia, of the Gentiles, whose bishop 
 was named Mark. 
 
 Adrian, after a reign of twenty-one 
 years, was succeeded by Antoninus Pius, 
 who appears to have been, at least in his 
 own personal character and intentions, 
 always guiltless of Christian blood. It 
 was now very difficult for the enemies of 
 Christ to support their persecuting spirit, 
 with any tolerably specious pretensions : 
 The abominations of heretics, whom ig- 
 norance and malice will ever confound 
 with real Christians, furnished them with 
 some : Probably these were much ex- 
 aggerated : but, whatever they were, the 
 whole Christian name was accused of 
 them. They were charged with incest, 
 and the devouring of infants ; and thus 
 a handle was afforded for the barbarous 
 treatment of the best of mankind ; till 
 time detected the slanders, and men be- 
 came at length ashamed of affecting to 
 believe what was in its own nature im- 
 probable, and was supported by no evi- 
 dence. It pleased God at this time to 
 endow some Christians with the power 
 of defending his truth by the manly arms 
 of rational argumentation. — 
 Justin Martyr presented his 
 first Apology to the emperor 
 Antoninus Pius, about the 
 third year of his reign, a. d. 
 140. He was of that class 
 of men, who, in those days, were usu- 
 ally called philosophers. His conversion 
 to Christianity, his views and spirit, his 
 labours and sufferings, will deserve to be 
 considered in a distinct chapter. Suffice 
 it here to say, that the information and 
 arguments, which his first Apology con- 
 tained, were not in vain. Antoninus was 
 a man of sense and humanity. Open to 
 conviction, uncorrupted by the vain and 
 chimerical philosophy of the times, he 
 i2 
 
 was desirous of doing justice to all man- 
 kind. Asia propria was still the scene- 
 of vital Christianity and of cruel perse- 
 cution. — Thence the Christians applied 
 to Antoninus ; and complained of the 
 many injuries which they sustained from 
 the people of the country. — Earthquakes, 
 it seems, had lately happened ; and the 
 Pagans were much terrified, and ascribed 
 them to the vengeance of Heaven against 
 the Christians. We have, both in Eu- 
 sebius* and at the end of Justin's first 
 Apology, the edict sent to the common 
 council of Asia ; every line of which de- 
 serves attention. 
 
 Justin's 
 Apology. 
 
 A. D. 139, 
 or 140. 
 
 The Empercrr, to the Common Council 
 of Asia. 
 
 " I am quite of opinion, that the god* 
 will take care to discover such persons. 
 For it much more concerns tliem to pun- 
 ish those who refuse to worship them, 
 than you, if they be able. But you ha- 
 rass and vex the Christians, and accuse 
 them of Atheism and other crimes, which 
 you can by no means prove. To them it 
 appears an advantage to die for their re- 
 ligion, and they gain their point, while 
 they throw away their lives, rather than 
 comply with your injunctions. As to the 
 earthquakes which have happened ia 
 past tim«s, or lately, is it not proper to 
 remind you of your own despondency,, 
 when they happened ; — and to desire you 
 to compare your spirit with theirs, and- 
 to observe how serenely they confide ia 
 God 1 In such seasons you seem to be 
 ignorant of the gods, and to neglect their 
 worship : You live in the practical ig- 
 norance of the supreme God himself, 
 and you harass and persecute to death 
 those who do worship him. Concerning 
 these same men, sonie others of the pro- 
 vincial governors wrote to our divine 
 father Adrian, to whom he returned 
 answer, — ' That they should not be mo- 
 lested, unless they appeared to attempt 
 something against the Roman govern- 
 ment.' Many also have signified to me 
 concerning these men, to whom I have 
 returned an answer agreeable to the max- 
 ims of my father. But if any person 
 will still persist in accusing the Chris- 
 tians merely as such, — Let the accused 
 be acquitted, though he appear to be a 
 Christian ; — and let the accuser be pun- 
 ished." — Set up at Ephesus in the com- 
 mon assembly of Asia. 
 
 B. iv. 11, 12, 13. 
 
102 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [CuiP. n. 
 
 Eusebius inforins us, that this was no 
 empty edict, but was really put in execu- 
 tion. Nor did this emperor content him- 
 self with one edict. He wrote to the 
 same purport to the Larisseans, the 
 Thessalonians,the Athenians, and all the 
 Greeks. 
 
 As this prince reigned 23 years, such 
 vigorous measures must, after some time 
 at least, have had their effect. And we 
 may fairly conclude that during a great 
 part of this reign the Christians were 
 permitted to worship God in peace. A 
 few remarks ontheconduct of this prince, 
 and on the facts which appear on the 
 face of his edict, may be judged not im- 
 proper. 
 
 1. There are, it seems, some instances 
 of princes, even in ancient history, not 
 unacquainted with the just principles of 
 religious liberty, which are now more 
 generally understood. The most intelli- 
 gent legislator, in any age, never under- 
 stood the natural rio-hts of conscience bet- 
 ter than Antoninus Pius. He saw that 
 Christians, as such, ought not to be pun- 
 ished. His subjects, bigoted and barbar- 
 ous, were far from thinking so ; and it 
 was not till after repeated edicts and 
 menaces, that he forced them to cease 
 from persecution. 
 
 2. In the conduct of this emperor, one 
 may observe how far human nature can 
 advance in moral virtue by its natural re- 
 sources, while it remains destitute of the 
 grace of God and the superior principle 
 of holiness. If the advocates of natural 
 morality, considered as abstracted from 
 Christianity, were to fix on a character 
 the most able to support the weight of 
 their cause, it would be their interest to 
 put it into the hands of Antoninus Pius. 
 He would defend it, not with pompous 
 systems and declamatory flourishes, but 
 by an amiable, generous, and magnani- 
 mous conduct. I have been astonished 
 at the character that is recorded of him. 
 Doubtless a more distinct and explicit de- 
 tail of his life would lessen our admira- 
 tion. We have not the opportunity of 
 knowing him so thoroughly as we do So- 
 crates and Cicero. The former, by the 
 writings of his scholars, the latter by his 
 own, are known as minutely as if they 
 were our contemporaries. Could the 
 emperor be as accurately scrutinized, pos- 
 sibly something of the supercilious pride 
 of the Grecian, or of the ridiculous vain- 
 glory of the Roman patriot, might ap- 
 pear. They are ')oth allowed to be very 
 
 eminent patterns of moral virtue ; but yet 
 with all the disadvantages of such im- 
 perfect historians as Victor and Julius 
 Capitolinus, they must concede the palm 
 to Antoninus. Despotic power, in his 
 hands, seems to have been only an instru- 
 ment of doing good to mankind. His 
 temper was mild and gentle in a very 
 high degree; yet the vigour of his go- 
 vernment was as striking, as if he had 
 been of the most keen and irritable dis- 
 position. He consulted the welfare of his 
 subjects with great diligence : He attend- 
 ed to all persons and things with as mi- 
 nute an exactness, as if his own private 
 property had been concerned.* — Scarcely 
 any fault is ascribed to him, but that of a 
 temper excessively inquisitive. His suc- 
 cessor, the second Antoninus, owns, that 
 he was religious without superstition ; 
 and in particular, that he was not super- 
 stitious in the worship of the gods. This" 
 we have in his Stoical Meditations, still 
 extant.")- We cannot therefore doubt but 
 that a person of this stamp would find 
 opportunities of knowing what Chris- 
 tianity was. He certainly did know 
 something of it, and he approved of the 
 moral conduct of Christians. He gives 
 them the most honourable character, has 
 no fear of them as disloyal or turbulent, 
 and makes comparisons between them 
 and Pao-ans to the advantage of the 
 former. From an expression in the edict, 
 — " if they be able," — one might be 
 tempted to suspect, that he had very little 
 INTERNAL rcspcct for the gods. Were 
 there no God, no divine providence, and 
 no future state, the virtue of this man 
 would doubtless be as complete, and as 
 consistent as so absurd an hypothesis will 
 permit : — but his case shows, that it is 
 possible, by the united influence of good 
 sense and good temper, for a man to be 
 extremely beneficent to his fellow-crea- 
 tures without due regard to his Maker. 
 Surely — if the holiness of a truly-con- 
 verted Christian, and the mere moral vir- 
 tue of a " natural man," were the same 
 thino-s, — Antoninus ought to be esteemed 
 a Christian.. — Yet it does not appear that 
 he ever seriously studied the Gospel. — A 
 sceptical carelessness and indifference, 
 not unlike that temper, which, under the 
 names of candour and moderation, has 
 now overspread the face of Europe, ap- 
 
 * Juli. C!ii)hol. Vit. Ant. chap. vii. See 
 Lariliier's Colk-ctions, chap. xiv. 
 tiJook\i. c. 30. 
 
Cest. II.] 
 
 JUSTIN MARTYR. 
 
 103 
 
 pears to have possessed the mind of this 
 amiable prince : and, while he attended 
 to the temporal advantag-es of mankind, 
 and felicitated himself on his good ac- 
 tions, he seemed to forget that he had a 
 soul accountable to the Supreme Being-; 
 and scarcely to think it possible, that it 
 should have any guilt to answer for be- 
 fore HIM. The evil of such a contempt of 
 God is what mankind are of all things 
 least inclined to discern: Yet it is the 
 evil of all others the most vehemently 
 reprobated in Scripture under the several 
 branches of idolatry, unbelief, self-righte- 
 ousness, and pride. No wonder; — for, 
 without a knowledge of this evil, and an 
 humble sense of guilt in consequence, 
 the very nature of the Gospel itself can- 
 not be understood. The conclusion re- 
 sulting from this consideration is, that 
 godliness is perfectly distinct from mere 
 morality: The latter indeed always flour- 
 ishes where godliness is; but it is capa- 
 ble of a separate existence. 
 
 3. The edict of this good emperor is a 
 singularly valuable testimony in favour of 
 the Christians of that time. It appears 
 that there were then a race of men de- 
 voted to the sbrvice of .Christ, ready to 
 die for his name and for his religion. 
 These men exemplified the superior worth 
 of their religion by a superior probity and 
 innocence of manners, so as to appear 
 the best of subjects in the opinion of an 
 emperor of the highest candour, intelli- 
 gence, and acute observation. They were 
 not inferior to the most excellent of the 
 heathens in morality : and they possessed, 
 further, — what this emperor confesses 
 their enemies were void of, — a sincere 
 spirit of reverence for the Supreme Be- 
 ing, — an unaffected contempt of death, — 
 and that to which Stoicism pretends, — a 
 real serenity of mind under the most 
 pressing dangers; — and all this grounded 
 on an unshaken confidence in God. — We 
 cannot but hence conclude — that the effu- 
 sion of the Spirit of God, which began 
 at the feast of Pentecost, was still con- 
 tinued. By the testimony of a heathen 
 prince, Christians were so in power, and 
 NOT IN NAME ONLY : and those, who would 
 substitute the virtue of the morality of 
 fallen man in the place of the religion of 
 Christians, would do well to consider, 
 that sound virtue and sound morality 
 themselves know no support like that of 
 Christianity. — This divine religion com- 
 prehends every possible excellence that 
 can be found in f>ll others; and has, over 
 
 and above, its own peculiar virtues : — 
 It possesses a fund of consolation, and 
 an energy of support under the prospect 
 of death itself; and it points out the only 
 safe and sure road to a blissful immorta- 
 lity. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 JUSTIN MARTYR. 
 
 This great man was born at Neapolis 
 in Samaria, anciently called Sichem. 
 His father was a Gentile, — probably one 
 of the Greeks, belonging to the colony 
 transplanted thither: He gave his son a 
 philosophical education. — Justin in his 
 youth travelled for the improvement of 
 his understanding; and Alexandria afford- 
 ed him all the entertainment which an 
 inquisitive mind could derive from the 
 fashionable studies. The Stoics appear- 
 ed to him at first the masters of happi- 
 ness. He gave himself up to one of this 
 sect, till he found he could learn from 
 him nothing of the nature of God. It is 
 remarkable — as he tells us himself,* — 
 that his tutor informed him, — this was 
 a knowledge by no means necessary; 
 which fact very much illustrates the 
 views of Dr. Warburton, concerning 
 these ancient philosophers : namely, that 
 they were Atheists in reality. He next 
 betook himself to a Peripatetic, whose 
 anxious desire of settling the price of his 
 instructions convinced Justin that truth 
 did not dwell with him. A Pythagorean 
 next engaged his attention, who, requir- 
 ing of him the previous knowledge of 
 music, astronomy, and geometry, dis- 
 missed him for the present, when he un- 
 derstood that he was unfurnished with 
 those sciences. In much solicitude he ap- 
 plied himself to a Platonic philosopher; 
 and with a more plausible appearance of 
 success from this teacher than from any 
 of the foregoing. He now gave himself 
 to retirement. "As I was walking," 
 says Justin, "near the sea, I was met by 
 an aged person of a venerable appear- 
 ance, whom I beheld with much atten- 
 tion. We soon entered into conversa- 
 tion ; and upon my professing a love for 
 private meditation, the venerable old 
 man hinted at the absurdity of mere 
 speculation, abstracted from practice : 
 
 * His (liiilogiie witli Tryplio, whence the 
 account of his conversion is cxtiacted. 
 
104 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 This," continues Justin, " gave occasion 
 to me to express my ardent desire of 
 knowing God, and to expatiate on the 
 praises of philosophy. The stranger by 
 degrees endeavoured to cure me of my 
 unmeaning admiration of Plato and Py- 
 thagoras : He pointed out the Avritings of 
 the Hebrew prophets as much more an- 
 cient than any of those called philoso- 
 phers ; and he led me to some view of 
 the nature of the evidences of Christian- 
 ity : He added, ' above all things, pray, 
 that the gates of light may be opened to 
 you : for they are not discernible, nor to 
 be imderstood by any one, except God and 
 his Christ enable a man to understand.' 
 He said many other things to the same 
 effect : He then directed me to follow 
 his advice; and he left me. I saw him 
 no more; but — immediately a fire was 
 kindled in my soul, and I had a strong 
 affection for the prophets and for those 
 men who are the friends of Christ : I 
 weighed within myself the arguments of 
 the aged stranger; and, in the end, I 
 found the divine Scriptures to be the on- 
 ly sure philosophy." — We have no more 
 particulars of the exercises of his mind in 
 religion. — His conversion took place, from 
 this beginning, some time in the reign of 
 Adrian. But he has shown us enough 
 to make it evident, that conversion was 
 then looked upon as an inward spiritual 
 work in the soul, — the same work of 
 grace which the Spirit operates at this 
 day on real Christians. There appear, 
 in his case, an earnest thoughtfulness at- 
 tended with a strong desire to know God, 
 and also an experimental sense of his 
 own ignorance and of the insufficiency of 
 human resources. Then there appear far- 
 ther, — the providential care of God in 
 bringing him under the means of Chris- 
 tian instruction, — a direction to his soul 
 to pray for spiritual illumination, — the 
 divine hunger created in his heart, — and, 
 in due time, the satisfactorj'^ comforts and 
 privileges of real Christianity ; which 
 with him was not mere words and de- 
 clarations ; for he says. He found Chris- 
 tianity to have a formidable majesty in 
 its nature, adapted to terrify those who are 
 in the way of trangression, as well as a 
 sweetness, peace, and serenity for those 
 who are conversant in it. He owns in 
 another of his works,* that the example 
 of Christians suffering death so serenely 
 
 * Apology second, tlmugh misnamed the 
 first, in all the copies of Justin. 
 
 for their faith, moved his mind not a lit^ 
 tie : This is an obvious consideration, 
 and needs not be insisted on, however 
 worthy it may be the notice of those 
 called philosophers in any age. — Justin 
 after his conversion still wore the usual 
 philosophic garb, which demonstrates 
 that he retained, perhaps, too great an 
 affection for the studies of his youth :* 
 and if I mistake not, he always preserved 
 a very strong tincture of the spirit of 
 philosophy, though not in such a manner 
 as to prevent his sincere attachment to 
 the Gospel. 
 
 Coming to Rome in the time of Anto- 
 ninus Pius, he there wrote a confutation 
 of the heretics : particularly of Marcion, 
 the son of a bishop born in Pontus; who 
 for lewdness,! was ejected from the 
 Church, and had fled to Rome, where he 
 broached errors of an Antinomian tenden- 
 cy. It makes no part of my plan to de- 
 fine the systems of heretics ; but only to 
 speak of them as they come in my way, 
 with a special reference to the opposition, 
 which they made to the fundamentals of 
 the Gospel. That holiness, "without 
 which no man shall see the Lord," and 
 which it was the great design of Christ 
 to promote, found in this pretended Chris- 
 tian a bitter enemy. Justin, who had 
 tasted of the holy nature of the Gospel 
 in his own experience, withstood him 
 both in conversation and by his writings. 
 About the year 140, he pub- Justin's 
 lished his excellent Apology 
 for the Christians, addressed 
 to Antoninus Pius, which 
 may reasonably be supposed to have had 
 a considerable influence on that emperor's 
 political conduct towards the Christians. 
 
 It appears from this performance, that 
 it was common to accuse Christians 
 merely as such ; and to charge the faults 
 of any persons, who bore the name of 
 the whole body. — Thus there is no new 
 thing under the sun. — The term Chris- 
 tian was matter of obloquy at that time : 
 Various other terms of scoff and contempt 
 have been invented since; and it requires 
 no great degree of rational power to show, 
 as Jastin has done completely, the ab- 
 surdity and inconelusiveness of such 
 methods of attacking religion, whether 
 they be ancient or modern. He takes 
 notice also of the happy effects which 
 
 * Cave's I>ife of Justin. 
 f The truth of this ciiarge ngainst liis mor- 
 als has heen disputed, and possibl)- with justice. 
 
 Apology : 
 A. D. 140. 
 
Cewt. II.] 
 
 JUSTIN MARTYR. 
 
 105 
 
 the conduct of Christians had then on 
 mankind. " We have many instances," 
 says he, "to show the powerful effects of 
 example among men : Many persons have 
 been impressed in favour of the Gospel 
 by observing the sobriety and temperance 
 of their neighbours. — or the unparalleled 
 meekness of their fellow-travellers under 
 cruel treatment; or the uncomnDon integ- 
 rity and equity of those with whom they 
 transacted business." Tiiese are fresh 
 proofs of the continuance of vital religion 
 in the time of Justin: — A man calling 
 himself a Christian, without any practi- 
 cal power of the religion, would scarcely 
 have then been classed among the breth- 
 ren. I find also fresh proofs, in this 
 apology, of the strong line of distinction 
 kept up in those days between Christians 
 and heretics. The author observes that 
 the latter wee fond of the name of Chris- 
 tians, and yet were not persecuted. There 
 was nothing in their spirit and conduct 
 that provoked persecution. He takes no- 
 tice also of the small number of Jewish 
 converts in comparison of the main body 
 of the nation. But this, he observes, 
 •was agreeable to the prophecies of the 
 Old Testament. He describes likewise 
 the custoiTis of the primitive Christians 
 in public worship, and in the administra- 
 tion of the sacraments, in order to show 
 the falsehood of the charges generally 
 urged against them. 
 
 Not long after his first Apology, Justin 
 left Rome and went to Ephesus, where he 
 had a discourse with Trypho the .lew; — 
 the substance of which he has given us 
 in a dialogue. In this work he notices 
 the common calumnies acrainst Christians, 
 — of their eating men, — of their extin- 
 guishing the lights, — and of their promis- 
 cuous sensuality ; but treats these charges 
 as not credited by men of sense and can- 
 dour among their enemies ; and therefore 
 as not meriting a serious confutation. 
 
 On his return to Rome, he had frequent 
 contests with Crescens the philosopher, — 
 a man equally remarkable for malignity 
 to Christians, and for the most horrid 
 vices. Justin now presented his second 
 Apology to M. Antoninus Philosophus, 
 the successor of Pius, and a determined 
 eneiny to Christians. He had conceived 
 hopes of softening his mind toward them, 
 as he had done that of his predecessor, — 
 but in vain. Marcus was their enemy 
 during his whole reign ; and they scarce- 
 ly ever had an enemy more implacable. — 
 The immediate occasion of a second Apo- 
 
 logy, as he himself informs the Emperor, 
 was this : — 
 
 " A certain woman at Rome, had, to- 
 gether with her husband, lived in extreme 
 profligacy and licentiousness. But oa 
 her conversion to Christianity, her own 
 conduct being changed, she endeavoured 
 to persuade her husband also to iinitate 
 her example, by representing to him the 
 punishment of eternal fire, which in a fu- 
 ture state would be inflicted on the diso- 
 bedient. But he persisting in his wick- 
 edness, she was induced to wish for a 
 separation. By the advice of her friends, 
 she continued, however, to live with him, 
 hoping that in process of time he might 
 be brought to repentance. Upon his com- 
 ing to Alexandria, he proceeded to great- 
 er lenofths of wickedness, so that finding 
 the connexion now no longer tolerable, 
 she procured a divorce from him. He, 
 not impressed with the happy change 
 which had taken place in her dispositions, 
 and unmoved with her compassionate at- 
 tempts to rescue him from ruin, accused 
 her of being a Christian. Upon which 
 she presented a petition to yuu, O empe- 
 ror, that she might have time to dispose 
 and regulate her household affairs : and 
 she promised that after that was done, she 
 would answer to the charge; — which pe- 
 tition you granted. The husband, finding 
 his wife to have gained a respite from his 
 malice, diverted it to another object, — to 
 one Ptolemy, who had instructed her in 
 Christianity, and who had been punished 
 by Urbicius the prefect of Rome. He 
 persuaded a centurion, his friend, to im- 
 prison Ptolemy; and to ask him whether 
 he was a Christian. He, no flatterer or 
 dissembler, ingenuously confessed, and 
 was a long time punished with imprison- 
 ment. At last, when he was brought be- 
 fore Urbicius, and was asked only this 
 question — whether he was a Christian, 
 he confessed himself a teacher of the Di- 
 vine Truth. For no true Christian can 
 act otherwise. — Urbicius, nevertheless, . 
 ordered him to be led to execution : Upon 
 this, a Christian, named Lucius, expostu- 
 lated with him on the absurdity of these 
 proceedings, — on the iniquity of putting 
 men to death merely for a name, abstract- 
 ed from any one specific charge of guilt ; 
 — a conduct unworthy of emperors such as 
 Pius the last, or Philosophus the present,* 
 
 * I ;im aware that the Greek in Justin would 
 make it jirohable tliat Pius was llieii reigning ; 
 hut Eusibius's contrary testimony determines 
 me to think otiierwise. 
 
106 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 or of the sacred Senate. ' You too appear 
 to me to be of the same sect,' was all 
 that the prefect deigned to reply. Lucius 
 confessed that he was ; and was himself 
 led also to execution ; which he bore with 
 triumphant serenity; declaring that he 
 was now going from unrighteous gover- 
 nors to God his gracious Father and King. 
 A third person was sentenced also to 
 death on the same occasion. And I also," 
 continues Justin, " expect by persons of 
 this sort to be murdered, perhaps by 
 Crescens the pretended philosopher. For 
 he deserves not the name of a philoso- 
 pher, who, with the view of pleasing 
 many deceived persons, publicly accuses 
 Christians of Atheism and impiety, though 
 he himself be totally ignorant of their 
 real character. I, Justin, have interro- 
 gated him, and proved that he is quite 
 unacquainted with the subject. I am 
 willing to undergo an examination before 
 you in company with him. And my ques- 
 tions and his answers will make it evident 
 to yourself, that he knows nothing of our 
 affairs ; or, at least, conceals what he 
 does know." 
 
 But Marcus was not a man disposed 
 to exercise common justice towards Chris- 
 tians. The philosophic garb was no shield 
 to Justin, even in the eyes of an emperor, 
 who piqued himself on the surname of 
 philosopher. The sincerity of his Chris 
 tian attachments outweighed every argu- 
 ment and every plausible appearance in 
 his favour. Crescens procured him im- 
 prisonment for the crime of being a Chris- 
 tian, — the greatest evil of which a human 
 being could be guilty in the eyes of this 
 emperor. The acts of his martyrdom, 
 which carry more marks of truth than 
 many other martyrologies, give the fol- 
 lowing account:* "He and six of his 
 companions having been apprehended, 
 were brought before Rusticus the prefect, 
 — who, I suppose, had succeeded Ur- 
 bicius, — a person of considerable emi- 
 nence, and famous for his attachment to 
 Stoicism. He had been tutor to the em- 
 peror, who acknowledges, in the first 
 Ijook of his Meditations, his obligations 
 to him on several accounts, and particu- 
 larly for his teaching him to be of a placa- 
 ble and forgiving temper. This is one in- 
 stance, among thousands, that it is pos- 
 sible for a man to be strongly impressed 
 with many beautiful ideas of morality, 
 and still to remain an inflexible enemy to 
 
 * Cave's Life of Justin. 
 
 the Gospel. Rusticus undertook to per- 
 suade Justin to obey the gods, and to 
 comply with the emperor's edicts. — The 
 martyr defended the reasonableness of his 
 religion. — Upon which the governor in- 
 quired in what kind of learning and dis- 
 cipline he had been educated. He told 
 him, that he had endeavoured to under- 
 stand all kinds of discipline, and had tried 
 all methods of learninsr, but finding satis- 
 faction in none of them, he at last had 
 found rest in the Christian doctrine, how- 
 ever fashionable it might be to despise 
 it ! Wretch ! replies the indignant ma- 
 gistrate, art thou captivated then by that 
 RELIGION ] I am, says Justin ; I follow 
 the Christians, and their doctrine is right. 
 ' What is their doctrine V It is this : 
 we believe the one only God to be the 
 Creator of ail things visible and invisible ; 
 and we confess our Lord Jesus Christ to 
 be the Son of God ; foretold by the pro- 
 phets of old ; and that he is now the Sa- 
 viour, teacher, and master of all those 
 who are duly submissive to his instruc- 
 tions, and that he will hereafter be the 
 Judge of mankind. — As for myself, I am 
 too mean to be able to say any thing be- 
 coming his infinite Deity : This was the 
 business of the prophets, who, many ages 
 ago, had foretold the coming of the Son 
 of God into the world. ' Where do the 
 Christians usually assemble 1' The God 
 of the Christians is not confined to any 
 particular place. ' In what place do you 
 instruct your scholars ]' Justin mention- 
 ed the place in which he dwelt, and told 
 him that there he explained Christianity 
 to all who resorted to him. The prefect, 
 having severally examined his compa- 
 nions, again addressed Justin. 'Hear thou, 
 who hast the character of an orator, and 
 imaginest thyself to be in the possession 
 of the truth. If I scourge thee from head 
 to foot, thinkest thou that thou shalt go 
 to heaven ]' Although I suffer what you 
 threaten, yet I expect to enjoy the portion 
 of all true Christians ; as I know that the 
 divine grace and favour is laid up for all 
 such, and shall be so, while the world 
 endures. ' Do you think that you shall 
 go to heaven, and receive a reward ■?' I 
 not only think so, but I know it, and have 
 a certainty of it which excludes all 
 doubt. — Rusticus insisted that they should 
 all go together, and sacrifice to the gods. 
 No man, whose understanding is sound, 
 replies Justin, will desert true religion for 
 the sake of error and impiety. ' Unless 
 you comply, you shall be tormented with- 
 
Cewt. n.] 
 
 JUSTIN MARTYR. 
 
 107 
 
 out mercy.' We desire nothing more 
 sincerely than to endure tortures for 
 our Lord Jesus Christ, and to be saved. 
 Hence our happiness is promoted; and 
 we shall have confidence before the aw- 
 ful tribunal of our Lord and Saviour, 
 before which, by the divine appointment, 
 the whole world must appear. The rest 
 assented, and said, — ' Despatch quickly 
 your purpose; we are Christians, and 
 cannot sacrifice to idols.' The governor 
 then pronounced sentence, — 'As to those, 
 who refuse to sacrifice to the gods, and 
 to obey the imperial edicts, let them be 
 first scourged, and then beheaded accord- 
 Martyr- ^"o *° ^^® laws.' The mar- 
 dom of tyrs rejoiced and blessed God, 
 Justin, &c. and being led back to prison, 
 A. D. 163. ^^'sre whipped and afterwards 
 beheaded. Their dead bodies 
 were taken by Christian friends, and de- 
 cently interred." 
 
 Thus slept in Jesus the Christian phi- 
 losopher Justin, about the year 1G3, and 
 about the third or fourth j^ear of the reign 
 of Marcus. Like many of the ancient 
 fathers, he appears to us under the great- 
 est disadvantage. Works really his have 
 been lost; and others have been ascribed 
 to him ; part of which are not his ; and 
 the rest, at least, of ambiguous authority. 
 He is the first Christian since the Apos- 
 tle's days, who added to an unquestionable 
 zeal and love for the Gospel, the charac- 
 ter of a man of learning and philosophy. 
 His early habits were retained ; and yet 
 were consecrated to the service of God. 
 This man, surely, should not be suspect- 
 ed of unreasonable impulses and fancies. 
 His religion was the effect of serious and 
 long deliberation : and the very best and 
 most important use which a gentleman 
 and a scholar can make of his rational 
 faculties, — namely, — to determine his 
 choice in religion, — was made by Justin. 
 He examined the various philosophic 
 sects, not merely for the purpose of 
 amusement or ostentation, but to find out 
 God; and in God true happiness: He 
 tried and found them all wanting : He 
 sought him in the Gospel : He found him 
 there : He confessed him : He gave up 
 every thing for him : He was satisfied 
 with his choice ; and he died in serenity. 
 His persevering in the profession of phi- 
 losophy might probably have another 
 view besides the gratification of his own 
 taste : He might hope to conciliate the 
 affections of philosophers, and allure them 
 to Christianity. The charity of his heart 
 
 appears indeed to have been great : He 
 prayed for all men : He declined no dan- 
 gers for the good of souls; and he in- 
 volved himself in disputes with philoso- 
 phers for their benefit, to his own extreme 
 hazard. His house was open for the in- 
 struction of all who consulted him ; 
 though he seems to have never assumed 
 the ecclesiastical character. To draw 
 gentlemen and persons of liberal educa- 
 tion to pay attention to Christianity, ap- 
 pears to have been his chief employment. 
 But he found it easier to provoke opposi- 
 tion, and to throw away his own life, 
 than to persuade a single philosopher to 
 become a Christian. The danger of 
 learned pride, the vanity of hoping to 
 disarm the enmity of the wise of this 
 world by the most charitable concessions, 
 and the incurable prejudice of the great 
 against the humble religion of Jesus, are 
 much illustrated by his story. So is the 
 victorious efficacy of Divine Grace, which 
 singled out Justin from a race of men, of 
 all others the most opposite to Christ. 
 We have seen a philosopher persecut- 
 ed to death : informed against by one of 
 his brethren ; condemned by another, and 
 suffering by the authority of an emperor 
 who gloried more in the philosophic than 
 in the imperial name. A man of his learn- 
 ing and sagacity should not rashly be 
 supposed destitute of argument and sys- 
 tem in his views. Men of sense will 
 scarcely think the ideas of such a person 
 unworthy of their regard. — Let us see 
 then briefly what were Justin's sentiments 
 in religion. We may possibly be led to 
 conclude that Christian principles may 
 be seriously maintained in consistence 
 with the love of science and letters; 
 though perhaps we may observe some 
 degree of adulteration, which these prin- 
 ciples received, by passing through a 
 channel of all others the most unfavoura- 
 ble for the conducting of their course, — 
 the channel of philosophy.* 
 
 It is certain that Justin worshipped 
 Christ as the true God in the full and 
 proper sense of the words. We have 
 seen one testimony of it already in his 
 examination before Rusticus. But let the 
 
 * It scarcely need be repeated, that by this 
 term I mean all along that philosophy of the 
 ancients, wliicli was founded in [)ride, was 
 chiefly speculative and metaphysical, and at 
 bottom atheistical: — no one objects to those 
 moral maxims of the ancient philosophers, 
 which were in many instances excellent, 
 though defective in principle. 
 
108 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HL 
 
 reader hear his own words. Trypho* 
 tlie Jew finds fault with the Cliristians 
 on account of this very sentiment. " To 
 me it appears," says he, " a paradox in- 
 capable of any sound proof, to say, that 
 this Christ was God before all time ; and 
 that then he was made man and suffered : 
 And to assert that he was any thing more 
 than a man, and of men, appears not only 
 paradoxical, but foolish." " I know," 
 answered Justin, "that it appears para- 
 doxical ; and particularly to those of your 
 nation, who are determined neither to 
 know nor do the will of God, but to fol- 
 low the inventions of your teachers, as 
 God declares of you. However, if I could 
 not demonstrate that he existed before all 
 time, beino- God the Son of the Maker of 
 the universe, and that he was made man 
 of the Virgin ; yet, as this personage was 
 shown by every sort of proof to be the 
 Christ of God, be the question as it may 
 respecting his Divinity and Humanity, 
 you have no right to deny that he is the 
 Christ of God, even if he were only mere 
 man : you could only say, that I was mis- 
 taken in my idea of his character. For 
 there are some who call themselves Chris- 
 tians, who confess him to be the Christ, 
 but still maintain that he is a mere man 
 only, with whom I agree not; neither do 
 most of those who bear that name agree 
 with them ; because we are commanded 
 by Christ himself not to obey the pre- 
 cepts of men, but his own injunctions, and 
 those of the holy prophets." "Those," 
 says Trypho, "who say that he was man 
 only, and that he was in a particular man- 
 ner anointed, and made Christ, appear to 
 me to speak more rationally than you. 
 For we all expect Christ a man, of men ; 
 and that Elias will come to anoint him." 
 The purport of this whole passage is 
 plain: The general body of Christians 
 in the second century held the proper 
 Deity of Jesus Christ: They believed 
 that this was a part of Old Testament 
 revelation; and they looked on a small 
 number, who held his mere humanity, to 
 be men who preferred human teachers to 
 divine. They considered the Jews also, 
 the most implacable enemies of Christ- 
 ianity, as choosing to be directed rather 
 by liuman teachers than by the divine 
 oracles; and as inexcusable in denying 
 the Divine Mission of Christ, whatever 
 opinion they might have formed of his 
 person. — Let the learned reader judge for 
 
 Dialogue, p. 63. 
 
 himself, by turning to the passage in 
 Justin, whether it will not bear the weight 
 which I have laid upon it. — The testimo- 
 ny of a man so thoughtful, judicious, and 
 honest as Justin, must be decisive, or 
 nearly so; and therefore, must, in a great 
 measure, determine the question much 
 agitated in our times, relative to the opi- 
 nion of the Ancients, concerning the per- 
 son of Christ. 
 
 In another part of the same dialogue,* 
 he speaks of Christ as the God of Israel 
 who was with Moses ; and explains his 
 meaning when he said that true Chris- 
 tians regarded what they were taught by 
 the prophets. In his first Apology, he 
 tells the emperor in what sense Chris- 
 tians were Atheists : They did not wor- 
 ship the gods commonly so called, but 
 theyf worshipped and adored the true 
 God, and his Son, and the prophetic Spi- 
 rit, honouring them in word and in truth. 
 If those, who call themselves Unitarians, 
 were as candid and impartial as they pro- 
 fess, the controversy concerning the Tri- 
 nity would be soon at an end. — That the 
 primitive Christians worshipped one God 
 alone, all who espouse the doctrine of the 
 Trinity will allow. Let the Unitarians 
 with equal frankness acknowledge that 
 they worshipped the one God in the three 
 persons just now mentioned ; and then 
 we have the Trinity in Unity. Further 
 — Justin uses two terms usually expres- 
 sive of that worship and adoration, which 
 incommunicably belongs to the Deity. ij: — 
 But, till there be a disposition in men, 
 without disputation, to humble them- 
 selves before divine Revelation, neither 
 frankness in concession, nor unity of sen- 
 timent, is to be expected. 
 
 The all-important doctrine of Justifica- 
 tion he states§ in the same manner as St. 
 Paul does ; believing, that to press the 
 necessity of Mosaic rites on others was 
 to fall from the fiuth of Christ. The 
 learned reader may see more at large his 
 views of Regeneration and Forofiveness 
 of all past sins through Christ Jesus, || 
 and how extremely different they were 
 from the nominal Christianity which con- 
 tents so many persons. 
 
 He appears to have had the clearest 
 views of that special illumination, with- 
 out which no man will understand and 
 
 * P. 56. 
 
 + P. 137. 
 
 § Dialogue 62. 
 
 II 1st Apology, 159, 160, and 68 Dialogue, 
 
CEIfT. II.] 
 
 JUSTIN MARTYR. 
 
 109 
 
 relish real godliness. His first unknown 
 instructor had taught him this; and he 
 seems never to have forgotten it. He in- 
 forms Trypho, — that, for their wicked- 
 ness, God had hidden from the Jews the 
 power of knowing- divine wisdom, except 
 from a remnant, who according to the 
 grace of his compassion were reserved, 
 that their nation might not be like Sodom 
 and Gomorrah. — The eternal punishment 
 of the wicked he avows so plainlj^, that 
 I shall spare quotations upon that subject. 
 In fundamentals he was unquestionably 
 sound : Yet there seems, however, some- 
 thing in his train of thinking, which was 
 the effect of his philosophic spirit; and 
 which produced notions not altogether 
 agreeable to the genius of the Gospel. 
 Thus, toward the close of the second 
 Apology, he declares that the doctrines 
 of Plato were not heterogeneous to those 
 of Christ; but only not altogether si- 
 milar. And he seems to assert, that 
 Plato, and the Stoics, and the Pagan 
 writers, in prose and verse, saw some- 
 thing of truth from the portion of the seed 
 of the Divine Word, which he makes to 
 be the same as the Word, the only begot- 
 ten Son of God. The reader, who chooses 
 to consult the last folio page of the Apolo- 
 ^g'Y' ni^)^ judge for himself, whether he 
 does not there confound together two 
 things perfectly distinct, — the light of 
 natural conscience which God has given 
 to all men ; — and the light of divine grace 
 peculiar to the children of God. Certain 
 it is that St. Paul, who speaks of both, 
 in the epistle to the Romans, always care 
 fully distinguishes them, as of a kind en- 
 tirely different one from the other. He 
 never allows unconverted men to have 
 any portion at all of that light which is 
 peculiarly Christian : But thus it was 
 that this excellent man seems to have 
 forgotten the guard, which can scarcely 
 be too often repeated, against philosophy. 
 We may see hereafter how mystics and 
 heretics and platonizing Christians jum- 
 bled these things together entirely, and 
 what attempts were made by the philoso- 
 phers to incorporate their doctrine of the 
 To iv with the Gospel.* Justin seems, 
 unwarily, to have given them some han- 
 
 • An abstruse and mystical opinion, which 
 prevailed very generally amons* the ancient 
 philosophers; but which it is difficult to make 
 intelligible by an explanation. It differs, how- 
 ever, very little, if at all, from downright 
 Atheism. 
 
 Vol. I. K 
 
 die for this : and, if I mistake not, he was 
 the first sincere Christian who was se- 
 duced by human philosophy to adulterate 
 the Gospel, though in a small degree. 
 It should ever be remembered, that Chris- 
 tian light stands single and unmixed ; and 
 will not bear to be kneaded into the same 
 mass with other systems, religious or 
 philosophical. — We may here mark the 
 beginning of the decay of the first spi- 
 ritual EFFUSION among the Gentiles, 
 through false wisdom : as, long before, — 
 namely, — from the first council of Jerusa- 
 lem, — we noticed a similar decay in the 
 Jewish Church, through self-righteous- 
 ness. 
 
 The same prejudice in favour of the 
 instructor of his youth leads him to pay 
 to Socrates a very great compliment, as 
 if that extraordinary man had really known 
 the true God, and had lost his life for at- 
 tempting to draw men from idolatry. — 
 Whereas almost every line of the narra- 
 tive left us b)^ his disciples shows, that 
 he was as much an idolater as the rest 
 of his countrymen. — The last words he 
 uttered, it is well known, were entirely 
 idolatrous. — Justin had not learnt so fully 
 as St. Paul would have taught him, 
 that "the world by wisdom knew not 
 God." In the last page of his Trypho 
 there is also a phraseology extremely 
 suspicious. He speaks of a self-deter- 
 mining power in man,* and uses much 
 the same kind of reasoning on the obscure 
 subject of free-will as has been fashiona- 
 l)le with many since the days of Armin- 
 ius. He seems to have been the first of 
 all sincere Christians, who introduced 
 this foreign plant into Christian ground. 
 I shall venture to call it foreign till its 
 right to exist in the soil shall be proved 
 from scriptural evidence. — It is very plain 
 that I do not mistake his meaning, — be- 
 cause he never explicitly owns the doc- 
 trine of Election; though, with happy 
 inconsistency, like many other real Chris- 
 tians, he involved it in his experience, 
 and implies it in various parts of his 
 writings. 
 
 But, — the novelty, once admitted, was 
 not easily expelled: — The language of 
 the Church was silently and gradually 
 changed, in this respect, from that more 
 simple and scriptural mode of speaking 
 used by Clement and Ignatius: Those 
 primitive Christians knew the doctrine 
 of the Election of Grace, but not the self- 
 
 * AuTeJurtov, 
 
110 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 determining power of the human will : — 
 We shall see hereafter the progress of 
 the evil, and its arrival at full maturity 
 under the fostering hand of Pelagius. 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 Marcus 
 Antoninus 
 made em- 
 peror : 
 
 A. D. 161. 
 
 against 
 
 THE EMPEROR MARCUS ANTONINUS, AND 
 HIS PERSECUTION OF THE CHRIS- 
 TIANS. 
 
 He succeeded Pius in the year 161, and 
 appears very soon after to have com- 
 menced the persecution against the Chris- 
 tians, in wich Justin and his 
 friends were slain. It excites 
 a curiosity, not foreign from 
 the design of this History, to 
 discover what could be the 
 cause of so much enmity 
 a people confessedly harmless, 
 in a prince so considerate, so humane, 
 and, in general, so well-intentioned as 
 Marcus is allowed to have been. — Be- 
 sides ; he acted in this respect directly 
 contrary to the example of his predeces- 
 sor, whose memory he doubtless much 
 revered, from whose intelligent and in- 
 vestigating spirit he must have derived 
 ample information concerning the Chris- 
 tians, and whom in all other matters of 
 government he imitated so exactly. The 
 fact, however, is certainly so: Marcus 
 Antoninus was, during all his reign, 
 which continued 19 years, an implacable 
 persecutor of Christians; and this not 
 from mere ignorance of their moral char 
 acter. — He knew them, — yet hated them, 
 and showed them no mercy : He allowed 
 and encouraged the most barbarous treat- 
 ment of their persons ; and was yet him- 
 self a person of great humanity of tem- 
 per: just and beneficent to the rest of 
 mankind : He was free from all reproach 
 in his general conduct; and in several 
 parts of it was a model worthy the imi- 
 tation even of Christians. 
 
 I think it impossible to solve this phe- 
 nomenon on any other principles than 
 those by which the enmity of many 
 philosophers of old, and of many devotees 
 and exact moralists of modern times 
 against the Christian religion, is to be 
 explained. The Gospel is in its own na- 
 ture Qot only distinct from careless and 
 dissolute vice, but, also from the whole 
 religion of philosophers: I mean of those 
 philosophers who form to themselves a 
 religion from natural and self-devised 
 
 sources, either in opposition to the re- 
 vealed word of God, or with the neglect 
 both of that word and of the influence of 
 the Holy Spirit, who is the great agent 
 in applying the Scriptures to the heart of 
 man. — In all ages it will be found that 
 the more strenuously men support such 
 RELIGION the more vehemently do they hate 
 Christianity. Their religion is pride and 
 self-importance : It denies the fallen state 
 of man, the provision and efficacy of 
 grace, and the glory of God and the Re- 
 deemer. — The enmity hence occasioned 
 is obvious. — It must be considered also, 
 that Marcus Antoninus was of the Stoical 
 sect, — who carried self-sufficiency to the 
 utmost pitch. 
 
 He fancied that he carried God within 
 him. Like most of the philosophers, he 
 held the mystical doctrine of the To iv ; but 
 he held it in all its detestable impiety and 
 arrogance. With him to be good and vir- 
 tuous was the easiest thing in the world : 
 It was only to follow nature, and to obey 
 the dictates of the Deity, — that is, of the 
 human soul, which was divine and self- 
 sufficient. W'ith these views, he could 
 neither be humble; nor pray earnestly; 
 nor feel his own internal wickedness and 
 
 misery ; nor endure the idea of a Saviour 
 and Mediator. — If, like his predecessor, 
 Pius, he had been contented to be an or- 
 dinary person in religion, the humanity of 
 his temper would probably have led him, 
 as it did the emperor Pius, to have re- 
 spected the excellent character and vir- 
 tues of Christians ; and he would have 
 felt it his duty to have protected such 
 peaceable and deserving subjects. — I say, 
 PROBABLY ; and I express myself with 
 some reserve, because I much doubt, 
 whether he possessed an understanding 
 equally sound with that of Antoninus 
 Pius. — But, be that as it may, the pride 
 of philosophy appears to have been 
 wounded and exasperated. Whoever has 
 attended to the spirit which pervades his 
 twelve Books of Meditations, and duly 
 compared them with the doctrines of the 
 Gospel, must acknowledge a total oppo- 
 sition ; and then he will not wonder that 
 Christians suffered from a serious Stoic, 
 what might have been expected only from 
 a flagitious Nero. — Pride and licentious- 
 ness are equally condemned by the Gos- 
 pel; and they equally seek revenge. — If 
 this be a true state of the case, the phi- 
 losophic spirit explained and stated as 
 above, however differently modified in 
 . different ages, will always be inimical to 
 
Cest. II.] 
 
 UNDER MARCUS ANTONINUS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 the Gospel ; and the most decorous mo- 
 ralist belonging to the class of which we 
 are now speaking, will be found in union, 
 on this subject, with the basest charac- 
 ters. "Beware of philosophy," is a pre- 
 cept which as much calls for our atten- 
 tion now as ever. 
 
 Yet so fascinating is the power of pre- 
 judice and education, that many would 
 look on it as a grievous crime to attempt 
 to tear the laurels of virtue from the brow 
 of Marcus Antoninus. Certainly, how- 
 ever, if his virtue had been genuine; or 
 at all of a piece with that of the Scrip- 
 tures, he could never have treated Chris- 
 tians so cruelly, as we shall see he did. 
 
 Is this, then, the man, whom Mr. Pope 
 celebrates in the following lines 1 
 
 Who noble ends by noble means obtains, 
 Or failing, smiles in exile or in chains, 
 Like good* Aurelius let him reign or bleed 
 Like Socrates, that man is great indeed. 
 
 — Providence seems however to have de- 
 termined, that those who, in contradiction 
 to the feelings of human nature, dark and 
 indigent as it is, and needing a divine 
 illumination, will yet proudly exalt their 
 own ability and sufficiency, shall be frus- 
 trated and put to shame. Socrates, with 
 his last breath, gave a sanction to the 
 most absurd idolatry : and Aurelius was 
 guilty of such deeds as human nature 
 shudders to relate. 
 
 It is remarkable that Gataker, the edi- 
 tor of Antoninus's Meditations, repre- 
 sents himself in the most humiliating 
 terms, as quite ashamed to behold the su- 
 perior virtues of this prince as described 
 in this book. — To say and to do, are, 
 however, not the same things ; nor is 
 there much reason to believe, that iNIar- 
 cus performed in practice, what he de- 
 scribes in theory. — But exclusively of 
 these reflections, suppose we were inclin- 
 ed to draw a comparison between the au- 
 thor and his commentator with respect to 
 humility, such comparison would certain- 
 ly be much to the disadvantage of the 
 former. I pretend not to have studied 
 the writings of Marcus Aurelius with so 
 much anxious care as to be assured, that 
 there appear in them no traces of this 
 virtue in the emperor ; but the general 
 TURN of the whole book leads me to con- 
 clude, that the writer felt no abasing 
 thoughts of himself. I have already de- 
 fined in what sense I use tlie term philo- 
 sopher, as contrasted with the humble 
 
 follower of Jesus Christ: and in that 
 sense I affirm that no philosopher made 
 such a confession of himself as Gataker 
 does. — Such is the natural effect of some 
 knowledge of Christianity on the human 
 mind ! 
 
 If we attend to the notices of history 
 on the education and manners of Marcus, 
 the account which has been given of his 
 enmity against the Gospel will be amply 
 confirmed. Adrian had introduced him 
 among the Salian priests when eight 
 years old, and he became accurately vers- 
 ed in the rituals of his priesthood. At 
 twelve he began to wear the philoso- 
 pher's cloak : he practised austerities : he 
 lay on the bare ground ; and was with 
 difficulty persuaded by his mother to use 
 a mattress and slight coverlet. He 
 placed in his private chapel gold statues 
 of his deceased masters; and visited 
 their sepulchral monuments ; and their 
 offered sacrifices, and strewed flowers. — 
 So devoted was he to Stoicism, that he 
 attended the schools after he became em- 
 peror ; and the faith which he put in 
 dreams sufficiently proves his supersti- 
 tious credulity. From a man so much 
 lifted up by self-sufficiency, bigotry, and 
 superstition, an illiberal censure of the 
 Christians* is not matter of surprise. 
 •'This readiness," says he, " of being 
 resigned to the prospect of death, ought 
 to proceed from a propriety of deliberate 
 judgment, not from mere unintelligent ob- 
 stinacy, as is the case with the Chris- 
 tians ; it should be founded on grounds 
 of solid reason, and be attended with 
 calm composure without any tragical 
 raptures, and in such a way as may in- 
 duce others to admire and imitate." If 
 this emperor had ever attended, with any 
 degree of candour and impartiality, to 
 the dying scenes of Christians tortured 
 to death by his orders, he might have 
 seen all these circumstances exemplified. 
 Thousands of them chose to suffer with 
 deliberate judgment; preferred heavenly 
 things to earthly ; counted the cost ; and 
 made a reasonable decision ; not doubt- 
 ful, as the emperor was, concerning a fu- 
 ture life; but calmly resigning this life 
 in firm expectation of a better, and with- 
 out any circumstances to justify the sus- 
 picion of pride or ostentation ; on the 
 contrary, they were adorned with meek- 
 ness, cheerfulness, and charity. — Hence 
 thousands and ten thousands have been 
 
 * Antoninus was called also Aurelius. 
 
 * 11th B. Sect, 3. 
 
112 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 induced to examine what that hidden en- 
 ergy of Christian life must be, which 
 produces such exalted sentiments and 
 such grandeur of spirit. In fact the 
 power of prejudice was never more strong- 
 ly exhibited than in this malignant cen- 
 sure of Antoninus; which in truth is the 
 more inexcusable, because he laboured 
 under no involuntary ignorance of Chris- 
 tians. For, besides the knowledge of 
 them which he must have acquired under 
 his predecessor, he had an opportunity of 
 knowing them from various Apologies 
 published in his own reign. Justin's 
 second Apology, as we have seen, was 
 published during his reign ; one sen- 
 tence of which demonstrates, in how 
 striking a manner our Saviour's prophecy 
 was then fulfilled, " A man's foes shall 
 be they of his own household !" — Every 
 where, he observes, if a Gentile was re- 
 proved by a father or relation, he would 
 revenge himself by informing against the 
 reprover; in consequence of which he 
 was liable to be dragged before the go- 
 vernor, and put to death. Tatian also, 
 Athenagoras, Apollinaris bishop of Hie- 
 • ^. rapolis, and Theophilus of 
 for°Chfis- Antioch, and Melilo of Sar- 
 tians : dis, published Apologies. — 
 
 A D 177 This last published his about 
 the year 177, of which some 
 valuable remains are preserved in Euse- 
 bius. A part of his address to Marcus 
 deserves our attention,* both on account 
 of the justness of the sentiments, and 
 the politeness with which they are deli- 
 vered. " Pious persons, aggrieved by 
 new edicts published throughout Asia, 
 and never before practised, now suffer 
 persecution. For audacious sycophants, 
 and men who ccvet other persons' goods, 
 take advantage of these proclamations 
 openly to rob and spoil the innocent by 
 night and by day. If this be done through 
 your order, — let it stand good ; — for a just 
 emperor cannot act unjustly; and we 
 will cheerfully submit ito the honour of 
 such a death: — This only we humbly 
 crave of your Majesty, that, after an im- 
 partial examination of us and of our ac 
 cusers, you would justly decide whether 
 we deserve death and punishment, or life 
 and protection. But, if these proceed 
 ings be not yours, and the new edicts be 
 nol the effects of your personal judgment, 
 — edicts which ought not to be enacted 
 even against barbarian enemies, — in that 
 
 * B. iv. C. 25. 
 
 case we entreat you not to despise us, 
 who are thus unjustly oppressed." He 
 afterwards reminds him of the justice 
 done to Christians by his two immediate 
 predecessors.* 
 
 From this account it is evident that 
 Marcus, by new edicts, commenced the 
 persecution, and that it was carried on 
 with merciless barbarity in those Asiatic 
 regions which had been relieved by Pius. 
 There is nothing pleasant that can be 
 suggested to us by this view of the cruel 
 treatment of Christians, and of the au- 
 thor of it, except one circumstance — that 
 the effusion of the spirit of God still con- 
 tinued to produce its holy fruits in those 
 highly-favoured regions. 
 
 In the two next chapters I propose to 
 describe distinctly two scenes of this em- 
 peror's persecution ; and I shall now con- 
 clude this general account of j^ypeiiug 
 him, with briefly mentioning conquers 
 the remarkable story of his the Mar- 
 danger and relief in the war comanni : 
 
 * It can make no material difference, wheth- 
 er these edicts were absolutely new, or wheth- 
 er they were only the continuation of former 
 edicts, with the knowledge and support, or 
 even the connivance of Marcus : 
 
 t. It is with pain that I read in a celebrated 
 author, "That the Meditations of Marcus 
 Antoninus have contributed more perhaps to 
 tlie general admiration of his character, than 
 all the difft-rent transactions of his just, 
 MEHCirrL, and bexeficent reign." — Adam 
 Smith's Moral Sent. Vol. I. p. 416. 
 
 2. Let the Christian reader compare this 
 with Mosheim, Cent. II. Part I. Ch. II. sect. 
 5 : " Most writers," says he, " have celebrat- 
 ed Marcus beyond measure, on account of his 
 extraordinary wisdom and virtue. It is not, 
 however, in'his conduct towards the Chris- 
 tians that we are to look for the reasons of 
 these pompous encomiums; for here the cle- 
 mency and justice of that emperor suffers a 
 strange eclipse ... So th:it if we except Nero, 
 there was no reign under which the Christians 
 were more injuriously and cruelly treated . . . 
 Among the victims of his persecution, were 
 the holy and venerable Polycarp bishop of 
 Smyrna ; and also Justin Martyr, so deserved- 
 ly renowned for his erudition and philosophy." 
 ' 3. Consult also Lardner'sTestim. 4to. Vol. 
 II. 215 : " Marcus certainly deserves to be 
 reckoned among the persecuting emperors. -- 
 The governor in Gaul applied to him for di- 
 rections, and he wrote back, that they who 
 confessed themselves Christians should be put 
 to death, but that they who denied it might be 
 set at liberty." 
 
 4. There is no doubt of the authenticity ot 
 this last-mentioned rescript; and it is an in- 
 delilde blot on the memory of this celebrated 
 emperor. 
 
Cent.IL] 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP. 
 
 113 
 
 of the Marcomanni.* He 
 A. D. 174. and his army being hemmed 
 
 in by the enemy, were ready 
 to perish with thirst ; when suddenly a 
 storm of thunder and lightning affrighted 
 the enemies, whilst the rain refreshed the 
 Romans. It is evident that the victory 
 was obtained by a remarkable providen- 
 tial interposition. The Christian sol- 
 diers in his army, we are sure, in their 
 distress would pray to their God, even if 
 Eusebius had not told us so. All Chris- 
 tian writers speak of the relief as vouch- 
 safed in answer to their prayers, and no 
 real Christian will doubt of the sound- 
 ness of their judgment in this point. 1 
 have only to add, that Marcus, in a man- 
 ner agreeable to his usual superstition, 
 ascribed his deliverance to his gods. — 
 Each party judged according to their own 
 views ; and those moderns who ascribe 
 the whole to the ordinary powers of na- 
 ture, or to accident, judge also according 
 to THEIR usual profaneness or irreligious 
 turn of thinking. Whether the Divine 
 interposition deserves to be called a mir- 
 acle or not, is a question rather concern- 
 ing propriety of language than religion. 
 This seems to me all that is needful to be 
 said on a fact, which on one side has 
 been magnified beyond all bounds ; and 
 on the other has been reduced to mere 
 insignificancy. It happened in the year 
 174. The emperor lived five years after 
 this event, and as far as appears, conti- 
 nued a persecutor to the last. 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom of 
 Poljcarp: 
 
 A. D. 167, 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP. 
 
 In or about the year 167, the sixth of 
 Marcus, Smyrna was distin- 
 guished by the martyrdom of 
 her bishop, Polycarp. 
 
 We mentioned him before 
 in the account of Ignatius. — 
 He had succeeded Bucolus, 
 a vigilant and industrious bishop, in the 
 charge of Smyrna. The Apostles, — and 
 we may suppose St. John particularly, — 
 ordained him to this ofiice. He had been 
 familiarly conversant with the Apostles, 
 and received the government of the 
 Church from those who had been eye- 
 witnesses and ministers of our Lord ; — 
 and he continually taught that which he 
 
 had been taught by them.* Usherf has 
 laboured to show:^: that he was the angel 
 of the Church of Smyrna addressed by our 
 Saviour. If he be right in this, the cha- 
 racter of Polycarp is indeed delineated by a 
 hand divine ; and the martyrdom before us 
 was particularly predicted By this ac- 
 count he must have presided 74 years over 
 that Church : certainly, as we shall hereaf- 
 ter see, his age must have been extreme- 
 ly great : he long survived his friend Ig- 
 natius ; and was reserved to suffer by 
 Marcus Antoninus. Some time before 
 that event he came to Rome to hold a 
 conference with Anicetus, the bishop of 
 that see, concerninn- the time of observ- 
 ing Easter. The matter was soon deci- 
 ded between them, as all matters should 
 be, which enter not into the essence of 
 godliness. They each observed their 
 own customs without any breach of cha- 
 rity between them, real or apparent. But 
 Polycarp found more important employ- 
 ment while at Rome. The heresy of 
 IVIarcion was strong in that city ; and the 
 testimony and zealous labours of one 
 who had known so much of the Apostles 
 were successfully employed against it ; 
 and many were reclaimed. It was not 
 in Marcion's power to undermine the au- 
 thority of this venerable Asiatic. To 
 procure a seeming coalition was the ut- 
 most he could expect ; and it was as suit- 
 able to his views to attempt this, as it 
 was to those of Polycarp to oppose such 
 duplicity and artifice. Meeting him one 
 day in the street, he called out to 
 him, " Polycarp, own us." " I do own 
 thee," says the zealous bishop, "to be 
 the first born of Satan." I refer the rea- 
 der to what has been said already of St. 
 John's similar conduct on such occa- 
 sions ; and shall add only that Irenssus, 
 from whom Eusebius relates the story, 
 commends his conduct, and speaks of it 
 as commonly practised by the Apostles 
 and their followers. Irenaeus informs 
 us,§ that he had a particular delight in 
 recounting what had been told by 
 those who had seen Christ in the flesh ; 
 that he used to relate also what he had 
 heard concerning his doctrine and mira- 
 cles ; and when he was informed of any 
 heretical attempts to overturn Christian 
 fundamentals, he would cry out, " To 
 
 * Euseb. B. V. 
 k2 
 
 C. 5. 
 
 * Euseb. iv. 14. 
 ■f In his Piolegom. to Ignatius. 
 t Cave's Life of Polycai-p. 
 § Irenseus's Epistle to Florin. 
 
114 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 what times, O God, hast thou reserved 
 me !" and would leave the place. 
 
 Indeed when it is considered what Mar- 
 cion maintained, and what unquestiona- 
 ble evidence Polycarp had against him 
 in point of matter of fact, we shall see he 
 had just reason to testify his disapproba- 
 tion. This man was one of the Docet^: 
 According to him, Christ had no real 
 human nature : He rejected the whole 
 Old Testament, and mutilated the New. 
 He held two principles, after the manner 
 of the Manichees, in order to account for 
 the origin of the evil. If men, who as- 
 sert things so fundamentally subversive 
 of the Gospel, would openly disavow the 
 Christian name, they might be endured 
 with much more composure by Chris- 
 tians ; nor would there be any call for so 
 scrupulous an absence from their society ; 
 for St. Paul has so determined the case.* 
 But for such men, whether ancient or 
 modern, to call themselves Christians, is 
 an intolerable insult on the common sense 
 of mankind. — We know nothing more of 
 the life of this venerable bishop : — Of the 
 circumstances of his death we have an 
 account, and they deserve a very particu- 
 lar relation. 
 
 The greatest part of the ancient nar- 
 rative is preserved by Eusebius.t The 
 beginning and the end, which he has not 
 given us, have been restored by the care 
 of archbishop Usher. It is an epistle 
 written in the name of Polycarp's Church 
 of Smyrna : I have ventured to trans- 
 late the whole myself, yet not without 
 examining what Valesius, the editor of 
 Eusebius, and archbishop Wake, have 
 left us on the subject. It is doubtless 
 one of the most precious ornaments of an- 
 tiquity ; and it seemed to deserve some 
 notes and illustrations. 
 
 " The Church of God which sojourns 
 at Smyrna, to that which sojourns at Phi- 
 lomelium,:j: and in all places where the 
 Holy Catholic Church sojourns through- 
 out the world, may the mercy, peace, and 
 love of God the Father, and of the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, be multiplied ! W^e have 
 written to you, brethren, as well concern- 
 ing the other martyrs, as particularly the 
 blessed Polycarp ; who, as it were, seal- 
 
 * 1 Cor. V. 10. 
 
 t B. iv. Euseb. Hist. ch. 15. 
 
 ■{ A city of Lycaonia. I thought it right to 
 give the English reader the precise term — of 
 sojourning — used in the original. It was the 
 ordinary language and also the spirit of the 
 Church at that time. 
 
 ing by his testimony, closed the persecu- 
 tion. For all these things, which were 
 done, were so conducted, that the Lord 
 from above might exhibit to us the nature 
 of a martyrdom perfectly evangelical. 
 Polycarp did not precipitately give him- 
 self up to death, but waited till he was 
 apprehended, as our Lord himself did, 
 that we might imitate him ; not caring 
 only for ourselves, but also for our neigh- 
 bours. It is the office of solid and genu- 
 ine charity not to desire our own salvation 
 only, but also that of all the brethren.* 
 Blessed and noble indeed are all martyr- 
 doms which are regulated according to 
 the will of God : for it behoves us, who 
 assume to ourselves the character of Chris- 
 tians, — a name professing distinguished 
 sanctity, — to submit to God alone the 
 disposal of all events. f Doubtless their 
 magnanimity, their patience, their love 
 of the Lord, deserve the admiration of 
 every one ; who, though torn with whips 
 till the frame and structure of their bodies 
 were laid open even to their veins and ar- 
 teries, yet meekly endured ; so that those 
 who stood around pitied them and lament- 
 ed. But such was their fortitude, that 
 no one of them uttered a sigh or groan : 
 Thus they evinced to us all, that at that 
 hour the martyrs of Christ, though tor- 
 mented, were absent, as it were, from the 
 body; or rather that the Lord, being pre- 
 sent, conversed familiarly with them: thus 
 they were supported by the grace of 
 Christ ; thus they despised the torments 
 of this world, and by one hour redeemed 
 themselves from eternal punishment. The 
 fire of savage tormentors was cold to them : 
 for they had steadily in view a desire to 
 avoid that fire which is eternal and never 
 to be quenched. And with the eyes of 
 their heart they had respect to the good 
 things reserved for those who endure, — 
 
 * I translate according to the Greek. But, 
 though common candour may put a favourable 
 construction on the expressions, the honour 
 then put on martyrdom seems excessive. 
 
 f They doubtless mean to censure the self- 
 will of those who threw themselves on their 
 persecutors before they were providentially 
 called to suffer. The calm patience of Polycarp, 
 in this respect, was more commendable than 
 the impeiuosily of Ignatius. But Polycarp 
 now was much older tlian he was when Ignatius 
 suftered, and very probably had cnowN in 
 grace. The Asiatic churches seem to have 
 corrected the errors of excessive zeal, which 
 even in the best Christians had formerly pre- 
 vailed. The case of Quintus will soon throw 
 light on this subject. 
 
CEIfT. II.] 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP. 
 
 115 
 
 THINGS WHICH EYE HATH NOT SEEN, NOR 
 
 EAR HEARD, NOR HATH IT ENTERED INTO 
 THE HEART OF MAN TO CONCEIVE. But 
 
 these good things were then exhibited to 
 them by the Lord : They were indeed 
 then no longer men, but angels. In like 
 manner those, who were condemned to 
 the wild beasts, underwent for a time 
 cruel torments, being placed under shells 
 of sea fish, and exposed to various other 
 tortures, that, if possible, the infernal 
 tjTant, by an uninterrupted series of suf- 
 fering, might tempt them to deny their 
 Master. Much did Satan contrive against 
 them:* but, thanks to God, without ef- 
 fect against them all. The magnani- 
 mous Germanicus, by his patience and 
 courage, strengthened the weak : He 
 fought with wild beasts in an illustrious 
 manner; for when the proconsul besought 
 him to pity his own old age, he irritated 
 the wild beasts by provocation, and was 
 desirous of departing more quickly from 
 a world of wickedness. — And now the 
 whole multitude, astonished at the forti- 
 tude of Christians, that is, of the true 
 friends and worshippers of God, cried 
 out, ' Take away the atheists,f let Poly- 
 carp be sought for.' One Christian, by 
 name Quintus, lately came from Phrygia, 
 his native country, on sight of the beasts, 
 trembled. He had persuaded some per- 
 sons to present themselves before the tri- 
 bunal of their own accord. Him the pro- 
 consul, by soothing speeches, induced to 
 swear and to sacrifice. On this account, 
 brethren, we do not approve of those who 
 offer themselves to martyrdom ; — ' for 
 we have not so learned Christ.' 
 
 "• The admirable Polycarp, when he 
 heard what passed, was quite unmoved. 
 and resolved to remain in the city. 
 But, induced by the intreaties of his 
 people, he retired to a village at no great 
 distance ; and there, with a few friends, 
 he spent his time entirely, day and 
 night, in praying, according to his usual 
 custom, for all the churches in the 
 world. — Three days before he was seized, 
 he had a vision while he Avas praying : 
 He saw his pillow consumed by fire : and 
 turning to the company, he said propheti- 
 cally, ' I must be burnt alive.' — Upon 
 
 * The lansfuasre of these ancient Christians 
 deserves to be noticed ; they have their eye 
 more steadily on a divine influence on the one 
 hand, and on a diabolical one on the other, 
 than is fashionable in our limes. 
 
 f The term of reproach then commonly af- 
 fixed to Cliristiaus. 
 
 hearing that the persons in search of him, 
 were just at hand, he retired to another 
 village : Immediately the officers came 
 to his house ; and not finding him, they 
 seized two servants, one of whom was 
 induced, by torture, to confess the place of 
 his retreat. Certainly it was impossible 
 to conceal him, since even those of his 
 own household discovered him. And the 
 tetrarch, called Cleronomus Herod, has- 
 tened to introduce him into the Stadium ; 
 that so he might obtain his lot as a follow- 
 er of Christ ; and that those, who betrayed 
 him, might share with Judas. Taking 
 then the servant as their guide, they went 
 out about supper-time, with their usual 
 arms, as against a robber ; and arriving 
 late, they found him lying in an upper 
 room at the end of the house, whence he 
 might have made his escape,* but he 
 would not, saying, — 'The will of the 
 Lord be done.' Hearing that they were 
 arrived, he came down and conversed 
 with them ; and all, who were present, 
 admired his age and constancy : Some 
 said, " Is it worth while to take pains to 
 apprehend so aged a person"?" He im- 
 mediately ordered meat and drink to be 
 set before them, as much as they pleased, 
 and begged them to allow him one hour 
 to pray without molestation ; which being 
 granted, he prayed standing ; and was 
 so full of the grace of God, that he could 
 not cease from speaking for two hours : 
 The hearers were astonished ; and many 
 of them repented that they were come to 
 seize so divine a character. 
 
 " When he had finished his prayers, 
 having made mention of all whom he had 
 ever known, small and great, noble and 
 vulgar, and of the whole Catholic church 
 throughout the world, the hour of depart- 
 ing being come, they set him on an ass 
 and led him to the city.f The irenarch 
 Herod, and his father Nicetes, met him, 
 who taking him up into their chariot, be- 
 gan to advise him, asking, ' What harm 
 is it to say, Lord Caesar! — and to sacri- 
 fice, and be safe V At first he was si- 
 lent, but being pressed, he said, ' I will 
 not follow your advice.' When they 
 could not persuade him, they treated him 
 abusively, and thrust him out of the cha- 
 
 * Those who know the eastern custom of 
 flat-roofed houses, will not be surprised at 
 this. 
 
 f I have not thought it worth while to trans- 
 late what relates to the time when Polycarp 
 suffered, on which point the learned disagree 
 in the mode of inteiprelatioa. 
 
116 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 riot, so that in falling he bruised his thigh. 
 But he, still unmoved as if he had sulfer- 
 ed nothing, went on cheerfully under the 
 conduct of his guards to the Stadium. 
 There the tumult being so great that few 
 could hear any thing, a voice from hea- 
 ven said to Polycarp, as he entered on 
 the Stadium, ' *Be strong, Polycarp, and 
 behave yourself like a man.' — None saw 
 the speaker, but many of us heard the 
 voice." 
 
 " When he was brought to the tribu- 
 nal, there was a great tumult, as soon as 
 
 it was generally understood 
 Martyr- that Polycarp was apprehend- 
 dom of g(j^ The proconsul asked him, 
 Polycarp. j£ -^^ ^^g Polycarp ; to which 
 
 he assented. The former then 
 began to exhort him : — ' Have pity on 
 thy own great age — and the like. Swear 
 by the fortune of Caesar — repent — say — 
 Take away the atheists.' Polycarp, 
 with a grave aspect, beholding all the 
 multitude, waiving his hand to them, and 
 looking up to heaven, said, 'Take away 
 the atheists.' The proconsul urging 
 him, and saying, ' Swear, and I will 
 release thee, — reproach Christ ;' Poly- 
 carp said, ' Eighty-and-six years have I 
 served him, and he hath never wronged 
 me, and how can I blaspheme my King 
 who hath saved me V The proconsul 
 still urging, ' Swear by the fortune of Ca;- 
 sar ;' Polycarp said, ' If you still vainly 
 contend to make me swear by the fortune 
 of Csesar, as you speak, affecting an ig- 
 norance of my real character, hear me 
 frankly declaring what I am : I am a 
 Christian ; and if you desire to learn the 
 Christian doctrine, assign me a day, and 
 hear.' The proconsul said, ' Persuade 
 the people.' Polycarp said, ' I have 
 thought proper to address you ; for we 
 are taught to pay to magistracies and 
 powers appointed by God, all honour, 
 which is consistent with a ofood con- 
 science. But I do not hold them worthy 
 that I should apologize for them.'j- 'I 
 have wild beasts,' says the proconsul : 
 'I will expose you to them, unless you 
 repent.' ' Call them,' replies the mar- 
 tyr. 'Our minds are to be changed 
 from the better to the worse : but it is a 
 
 good thing to be changed from evil to 
 good.' 'I will tame youi spirit by fire;' 
 says the other, ' since you despise the 
 wild beasts, unless you repent.' ' You 
 threaten me with fire,' answers Poly- 
 carp, ' which burns for a moment, and 
 will be soon extinct : but you are igno- 
 rant of the future judgment, and of the 
 fire of eternal punishment reserved for 
 the ungodly. But why do you delay ] — 
 Do what you please.' vSaying this and 
 more, he w'as filled with confidence and 
 joy ; and grace shone in his countenance : 
 so that he was far from being confounded 
 iiy these menaces : On the contrary the 
 proconsul was visibly embarrassed : he 
 sent, however, the herald to proclaim 
 thrice, in the midst of the assembly, 
 ' Polycarp hath professed himself a 
 Christian.' Upon this all the multitude, 
 both of Gentiles and of Jews, who dwelt 
 at Smyrna, with insatiate rage shouted 
 aloud, "This is the doctor of Asia, 
 the father of Christians, the subver- 
 ter of our gods, who hath taught many 
 not to sacrifice nor to adore.' They 
 now begged Philip, the Asiarch, to let 
 out a lion against Polycarp. But he re- 
 fused, observing that the amphitheatri- 
 cal spectacles of the wild beasts were 
 finished. They then unanimously shou- 
 ted, that he should be burnt alive ; — for 
 bis vision was of necessity to be accom- 
 plished. — Whilst he was praying, he ob- 
 served the fire kindling; and turning to 
 the faithful that were with him, he said 
 prophetically, — ' I must be burnt alive.' 
 The business was executed with all pos- 
 sible speed ; for the people immediately 
 gathered fuel from the workshops and 
 baths, in which employment the Jews* 
 distinguished themselves with their usual 
 malice. As soon as the fire was prepar- 
 ed, stripping off his clothes, and loosing 
 his girdle, he attempted to take off his 
 shoes, — a thinn- unusual for him to do 
 formerly, — because each of the fiiithful 
 were wont to strive who should be most 
 assiduous in serving him. For, before 
 his martyrdom, his integrity and blame- 
 less conduct had always procured him 
 the most unfeigned respect. Immediately 
 
 * The reader should remember that miracu- 
 lous interpositions of various kinds were still 
 frequent in the ciiurch. 
 
 fl cannot tliink that this was said in con- 
 tempt of the vulgar, but on account of the 
 prejudices and enmity which their conduct 
 exhibited at that time. 
 
 * I scai'cely know a more striking view of 
 the judicial curse inflicted on the Jews than 
 this. Indeed this people all along exerted 
 themselves in persecution ; and Justin Martyr 
 tells us of a charge wliich had been sent from 
 Jerusalem by the chief priests against Chris- 
 tians, directed to their brethren through the 
 world. 
 
Cejtt. it.] 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP. 
 
 117 
 
 the usual appendages of burning were pla- 
 ced about him. And when they were going 
 to fasten him to the stake, he said, ' Let 
 me remain as I am : for He who giveth 
 me strength to sustain the fire, will enable 
 me also, without your securing me with 
 nails, to remain unmoved in the fire.' — 
 Upon which they bound him without 
 nailing him. And he, putting his hands 
 behind him, and being bound as a distin- 
 guished ram, selected from a great flock, 
 aburnt-offering acceptable to God Almigh- 
 ty, said, ' O Father of thy beloved and 
 blessed Son Jesus Christ, through whom 
 we have attained the knowledge of thee, 
 God of angels and principalities, and of all 
 creation, and of all the just who live in thy 
 sight, I bless thee, that thou hast counted 
 me worthy of this day, and this hour, to re- 
 ceive my portion in the number of mar- 
 tyrs, in the cup of Christ, for the resurrec- 
 tion to eternal life both of soul and body, in 
 the incorruption of the Holy Ghost ; among 
 whom may I be received before thee this 
 day as a sacrifice well-savoured and ac- 
 ceptable, which thou, the faithful and 
 true God, hast prepared, promised before- 
 hand, and fulfilled accordingly. Where- 
 fore I praise thee for all those things, I 
 bless thee, I glorify thee, by the eternal 
 High Priest, Jesus Christ, thy well-be- 
 loved Son : through whom, with him in 
 the Holy Spirit, be glory to thee both 
 now and for ever. Amen." 
 
 " And when he had pronounced Amen 
 aloud, and finished his prayer, the officers 
 lighted the fire ; and a great flame burst- 
 ing out, — We, to whom it was given to 
 see, and who also were reserved to relate 
 to others that which happened, — saw a 
 wonder — For the flame, forming the ap- 
 pearance of an arch, as the sail of a ves- 
 sel filled with wind, was as a wall round 
 about the body of the martyr ; which was 
 in the midst, not as burning flesh, but as 
 gold and silver refined in the furnace. 
 We received also in our nostrils such a 
 fragrance, as arises from frankincense, or 
 some other precious perfume. At length 
 the impious, observing that his body 
 could not be consumed by the fire, order- 
 ed the confector* to approach, and to 
 plunge his sword into his body. Upon 
 this a quantity of blood gushed out, so 
 that the fire was extinguished ; and all 
 the multitude were astonished to see the 
 difference thus providentially made be- 
 
 * An officer, whose business it was in ifie 
 Roman games to dispatch any beast that was 
 unruly or dangerous. 
 
 tween the unbelievers and the elect ; of 
 whom the admirable personage before 
 us was, doubtless, one, in our age an 
 apostolical and prophetical teacher, the 
 bishop of the Catholic church of Smyrna. 
 For, whatever he declared, was fulfilled 
 and will be fulfilled. But the envious, 
 malignant, and spiteful enemy of the just, 
 observed the honour put on his martyr- 
 dom, and his blameless life ; and know- 
 ing that he was now crowned with im- 
 mortality and the prize of unquestionable 
 victory, studied to prevent us from ob- 
 taining his body, though many of us 
 longed to have communion* with his 
 sacred flesh. For some persons suggest- 
 ed to Nicetes, the father of Herod, and 
 the brother of Alce,f to go to the procon- 
 sul, and entreat him not to deliver the 
 body to the Christians, 'lest, said they, 
 leaving the Crucified One, they should 
 begin to worship him.' And they said 
 these things upon the suggestions and 
 arguments of the Jews, who also watch- 
 ed us, when we were going to take liis 
 body from the pile ; unacquainted indeed 
 with our views, namely, that it is not 
 possible for us to forsake Christ, who 
 suffered for the salvation of all who are 
 saved of the human race, nor ever to wor- 
 ship any other.:): For we adore him as 
 being the Son of God ; but we justly love 
 the martyrs as disciples of the Lord, and 
 followers of him, on account of that dis- 
 tinguished affection which they bore to- 
 wards their King and their Teacher; — 
 and may we be ranked at last in their 
 number ! The Centurion, perceiving the 
 malevolence of the Jews, placed the body 
 in the midst of the fire, and burnt it. 
 Then we gathered up his bones, — more 
 precious than gold and jewels, — and de- 
 posited them in a proper place ; where, if 
 it be possible, we shall meet, and the 
 Lord will grant us, in gladness and joy, to 
 celebrate the birthday of his martyrdom, 
 both in commemoration of those who 
 have wrestled before us, and for the in- 
 
 * I see no ground for the well-known Pa- 
 pistical inference hence usually drawn respect- 
 ing the virtues ascribed to relics. To express 
 an affectionate regard to the deceased by a 
 decent attention to the funeral rights, is all 
 that is necessarily meant by the expression. 
 
 t Alee is spoken of with honour in Ignatius's 
 Epistle to the Smyrneans. She, it seems, had 
 found, in her nearest relations, inveterate foes 
 to whatever she held dear. 
 
 i^ The faith of Christ, and a just honour 
 paid to true Christians, abstracted from su- 
 perstiliou and idolatry, appear in this passage. 
 
118 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 struction and confirmation of those who 
 come after.* Thus far concerning the 
 blessed Polycarp. — Eleven brethren from 
 Philadelphia suffered with him, — but he 
 alone is particularly celebrated by all : — 
 Even by Gentiles he is spoken of in 
 every place. He was in truth, not only 
 an illustrious teacher, but also an eminent 
 martyr, whose martyrdom all desire to 
 imitate, because it was regulated exactly 
 by evangelical principles. For by pa- 
 tience he conquered the unjust magis- 
 trate; and thus receiving the crown of 
 inmiortality, and exulting with Apos- 
 tles and all the righteous, he glorifies 
 God, even the Father, and blesses our 
 Lord, even the Ruler of our bodies, and 
 the Shepherd of his Church dispersed 
 through the world. — You desired a full 
 account; and we, for the present, have 
 sent you, what will, perhaps, be thought 
 a compendious one, by our brother Mark. 
 "When you have read it, send it to the 
 brethren beyond you, that they also may 
 glorify the Lord, who makes selections 
 from his own servants of holy men, who 
 shall thus honour him by their deaths. 
 To him who is able to conduct us all by 
 his grace and free mercy into his heaven- 
 ly kingdom, by his only-begotten Son 
 Jesus Christ, to him be glory, honour, 
 power, majesty, for ever. Amen. Salute 
 all the saints: those with us salute you, 
 particularly Evaristus the writer, with all 
 his house. Polycarp suffered martyr- 
 dom on the second day of the month 
 Xanthicus, on the seventh day before the 
 calends of March, on the great sabbath, 
 at the eighth hour. He was apprehend- 
 ed by Herod, under Philip the Trallian 
 Pontifex, Statins Quadratus being pro- 
 consul, but Jesus Christ reigning for ever, 
 to whom be glory, honour, majesty, an 
 eternal throne from age to age ! We pray 
 that you may be strong, brethren, walk- 
 ing in the word Jesus Christ, according 
 to the Gospel, with whom be glory to 
 God, even the Father, and to the Holy 
 Spirit, for the salvation of his elected 
 saints, among whom the blessed Polycarp 
 hath suffered martyrdom, with whom may 
 we be found in the kingdom of Jesus 
 Christ, having followed his steps ! 
 
 "These things Caius hath transcribed 
 
 * If we were in our times subject to such 
 sufferings, I suspect these anniversary mar- 
 tyrdoms of antiquity might be thought useful 
 to us also. The superstition of after-times 
 appears uot, I think, in this epistle. 
 
 from the copy of Irenaeus, the disciple of 
 Polycarp, who also lived with Irenaeus. 
 And I Socrates of Corinth have transcrib- 
 ed from the copy of Caius. Grace be 
 with you all. And I Pionius have tran- 
 scribed from the fore-mentioned, having 
 made search for it, and received the know- 
 ledge of it by a vision of Polycarp, as 
 I shall show in what follows, collect- 
 ing it when now almost obsolete. So 
 may the Lord Jesus Christ gather me 
 with his elect, to whom be glory with 
 the Father and the Holy Spirit to the 
 ages of ages. Amen."!! 
 
 I thought it not amiss for the English 
 reader to see the manner in which books 
 were then successively preserved in the 
 church. Of Irenaeus we shall hear more 
 hereafter. Nor ought Pionius's account 
 of his vision to be hastily slighted, by 
 those who consider the scarcity of useful 
 writings in those days. Whether the 
 case was worthy of such a divine inter- 
 position, we, who indolently enjoy books 
 without end, can scarcely be judges. 
 However, if any choose to add this to 
 the number of pious frauds, which cer- 
 tainly did once much abound, the authen- 
 ticity of the account will still, in sub- 
 stance, remain rmimpeached, as very near 
 the whole of it is in Eusebius. This 
 historian mentions Metrodorus, a presby- 
 ter of the sect of Marcion, who perished 
 in the flames among others who suflfered 
 at Smyrna. It cannot be denied that 
 heretics also have had their martyrs. 
 Pride and obstinacy will in some minds 
 persist even to death. But as all, who 
 have been classed among heretics, have 
 not been so in reality, Metrodorus might 
 be a very different sort of a man from 
 Marcion. 
 
 A comparative view of a sound Chris- 
 tian hero suffering as we have seen Poly- 
 carp did, with a Roman Stoic or untutor- 
 ed Indian undergoing afflictions, where 
 we could have an opportunity of survey- 
 ing all circumstances, mi^ht show, in a 
 practical light, the peculiar genius and 
 spirit of Christianity, and its divine su- 
 periority. At the same time, those who 
 content themselves with a cold, specula- 
 tive, and as they term it, rational religion, 
 may ask themselves how it would have 
 suited their principles to endure what 
 Polycarp did ; — and whether something 
 of what is falsely called enthusiasin, and 
 which the foregoing epistle breathes so 
 abundantly, be not really divine and tru- 
 ly rational in the best sense. 
 
CSXT. II.] 
 
 MARTYRS OF LYONS AND VIENNE. 
 
 119 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE MARTYRS OF LYONS AND VIENNE. 
 
 *The flame of the persecution by An- 
 toninus reached a country, which hither- 
 to has aiforded us no ecclesiastical mate- 
 rials; I mean that of France, in those 
 times called Gallia. Two neighbouring 
 cities, Vienne and Lyons, appear to have 
 been much favoured with evangelical 
 light and love. Vienne was an ancient 
 Roman colony ; Lyons was more modern, 
 and her present bishop was Pothinus. 
 His very name points him out to be a 
 Grecian. Irenaeus was a presbyter of 
 Lyons, and seems to have been the author 
 of the epistle which Eusebius has pre 
 served, and wiiich the reader shall see 
 presently. Other names concerned in 
 these events are evidently of Greek ex- 
 traction, and it is hence most probable 
 that some Asiatic Greeks had been the 
 founders of these Churches. Whoever 
 casts his ej'e on the map of France, and 
 sees the situation of Lyons, at present 
 the largest and most populous city in that 
 kingdom, next to Paris, may observe how 
 favourable the confluence of the Rhine 
 and the Soane — anciently called the Arar 
 — on which it stands, is for the purposes 
 of commerce.! The navigation of the 
 Mediterranean, in all probability, was 
 conducted by merchants of Lyons and of 
 Smyrna; and, hence, the easy introduc- 
 tion of the Gospel from the latter place 
 and from the other Asiatic churches is 
 apparent. How much God hath blessed 
 the work in France, the accounts of their 
 sufierings will evince. Lyons and Vienne 
 appear to be daughters, of whom their 
 Asiatic mothers needed not to be ashamed. 
 
 THE EPISTLE OF THE CHURCHES OF VIENNE 
 AND LYONS, TO THE BRETHREN IN ASIA 
 AND PHRVGIA.:|: 
 
 The servants of Christ, sojourning in 
 Vienne and Lyons in France, to the 
 brethren in Asia propria and Phrygia, 
 who have the same faith and hope of re- 
 demption with us, peace, and grace, and 
 
 • Euseb. iv. c. 1. 
 
 f When will the moderns, notwithstanding 
 all their enliglitened views and improvements, 
 learn to connect navigation and commerce with 
 the propagation of tlie Gospel? 
 
 I Eusebius does not give the whole of the 
 epistle at length, but omits some parts, and in- 
 terrujjts the thread of the narrative. It is not 
 necessary to uolice the particular instances. 
 
 glory from God the Father and Christ 
 Jesus our Lord. 
 
 We are not competent to describe with 
 accuracy, nor is it in our power to express 
 the greatness of the aflliction sustained 
 here by the saints, the intense aniinosity 
 of the heathen against them, and the com- 
 plicated sufferings of the blessed martyrs. 
 The grand enemy assaulted us with all 
 his might; and by his first essays, ex- 
 hibited intentions of exercising malice 
 without limits and without control. He 
 left no method untried to habituate his 
 slaves to his bloody work, and to prepare 
 them by previous exercises against the 
 servants of God. Christians were abso- 
 lutely prohibited from appearing, in any 
 houses except their own, in baths, in the 
 market, or in any public place whatever. 
 The grace of God however, fought for 
 us, preserving the weak and exposing the 
 strong; who, like pillars, were able to 
 withstand him in patience, and to draw 
 the whole fury of the wicked against 
 themselves. These entered into the con- 
 test, and sustained every species of pain 
 and reproach. What was heavy to others, 
 to them was light, while they were hast- 
 ening to Christ, evincing indeed, that 
 
 THE SUFFERINGS OF THIS PRESENT TIME 
 ARE NOT WORTHY TO BE COMPARED WITH 
 THE GLORY THAT SHALL BE REVEALED IN 
 
 US. The first trial was from the people 
 at large ; shouts, blows, the dragging of 
 their bodies, the plundering of their 
 goods, casting of stones, and the confin- 
 ing of them within their own houses, and 
 all the indignities which may be expected 
 from a fierce and outrageous multitude, 
 these were magnanimously sustained. 
 And now, being led into the Forum by 
 the tribune and the magistrates, they were 
 examined before all the people, whether 
 they were Christians; and, on pleading 
 guilty, were shut up in prison till the ar- 
 rival of the governor.* Before him they 
 were at length brought; and he treated 
 us with great savageness of manners. 
 The spirit of Vettius Epagathus, one of the 
 brethren, was roused, a man full of chari- 
 ty both to God and man, v/hose conduct 
 was so exemplary, though but a youth, 
 that he might justly be compared to old 
 Zacharias : for he walked in all the com- 
 mandments and ordinances of the Lord 
 
 * It is probable, but not quite certain, that 
 this gnveriior was Severus, afterwards empe- 
 ror. 'l"he conduct of this governor was worthy 
 of so inimniaa a prince. 
 
120 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 blameless, a man ever unwearied in acts 
 of beneficence to his neio^hbours, full of 
 zeal towards God, and fervent in spirit. 
 He could not bear to see so manifest a 
 perversion of justice; but, being moved 
 with indig-nation, he demanded to be 
 heard in behalf of the brethren, and 
 pledged himself to prove that there was 
 nothing atheistic or impious among them. 
 Those about the tribunal shouted against 
 him: He was a man of quality: and the 
 governor, being vexed and irritated by so 
 equitable a demand from such a person, 
 only asked him if he were a Christian ; 
 and this he confessed in the most open 
 manner: — the consequence was, that he 
 was ranked among the martyrs. He was 
 called, indeed, the Advocate of the Chris- 
 tians ; but he had an advocate* within, 
 the Holy Spirit more abundantly than 
 Zacharias, which he demonstrated by the 
 fulness of his charity, cheerfully laying 
 down his life in defence of his brethren; 
 for he was, and is still, a genuine disci 
 pie of Christ, following the Lamb whi 
 thersoever he goeth.j" The rest began 
 now to be distinguished. The capital 
 martyrs appeared indeed ready for the 
 contest, and discharged their part with 
 all alacrity of mind. Others seemed not 
 so ready ; but rather, unexercised, and as 
 yet weak, and unable to sustain the shock 
 of such a contest: Of these, ten in num- 
 ber lapsed, whose case filled us with 
 great and unmeasurable sorrow, and de- 
 jected the spirits of those who had not 
 yet been apprehended, who, though they 
 sustained all indignities, yet deserted not 
 the martjj^rs in their distress. Then we 
 were all much alarmed, because of the 
 uncertain event of confession ; not that 
 we dreaded the torments with which we 
 were threatened, but because we looked 
 forward unto the end, and feared the dan- 
 ger of apostacy. Persons were now ap- 
 prehended daily of such as were counted 
 worthy to fill up the number of the lapsed, 
 so that the most excellent were selected 
 
 * It is not easy to translate this, liecause of 
 the ambiguous use of the term Ux^xxki^tov^ 
 ■which signifies both a comforter and an advo- 
 cate. Besides their only advocate in heaven, 
 Jesus Ciu'ist, Christians have the comfort and 
 power of his Spirit within. 
 
 t Every man who reads this must see the 
 iniquity and absurdity of the governor! A 
 term of reproach stands in the room of argu- 
 ment. The term Christian has long ceased to 
 be infamous. But tjie words, Lollard, Puri- 
 tan, Pietist, and Methodist, have supplied its 
 place. 
 
 from the two churches, even those by 
 whose labour they had been founded and 
 established.* There were seized at the 
 same time some of our heathen servants, 
 — for the governor had openly ordered us 
 all to be sought for, — ^who, by the im- 
 pulse of Satan, fearing the torments which 
 they saw inflicted on the saints, at the 
 suggestion of the soldiers, accused us of 
 eating human flesh, and of various unnatu- 
 ral crimes, and of things not fit even to be 
 mentioned or imagined, and such as ought 
 not to be believed of mankind. | These 
 things being divulged, all were incensed 
 even to madness against us; so that if 
 some were formerly more moderate on 
 account of any connexions of blood, afiini- 
 ty, or friendship, they were then trans- 
 ported beyond all bounds with indigna- 
 tion. Now it was that our Lord's word 
 was fulfilled, ' The time will come when, 
 whosoever killeth you, will think that he 
 doeth God service.' The:}^ holy martyrs 
 now sustained tortures which exceed the 
 powers of description; Satan labouring, 
 by means of these tortures, to extort 
 something slanderous against Christiani- 
 ty. The whole fury of the multitude, the 
 governor, and the soldiers, was spent in 
 a particular manner on Sanctus of Vienne, 
 the deacon ; and on Maturus, a late con- 
 vert indeed, but a magnanimous wrestler 
 in spiritual things; and on Attains of 
 Pergamus, a man who had ever been the 
 pillar and support of our church ; § and, 
 lastly, on Blandina, through whom Christ 
 showed, that those things, that appear 
 unsightly and contemptible among men, 
 are most honourable in the presence of 
 God, on account of love to his name, ex- 
 hibited in real energy, and not in boasting 
 and pompous pretences. For while we 
 all feared ; and among the rest while her 
 mistress according to the flesh, who her- 
 self was one of the noble army of martyrs, 
 dreaded that she would not be able to 
 witness a good confession, because of the 
 
 * Hence I judge that their churches were of 
 no great antiquity. 
 
 f Hence we see again the usual charge of 
 unnatural crimes objected to the Christians, 
 believed in the paroxysm of the persecution, 
 but afterwards generally disclaimed by sober 
 persons. 
 
 :); Surely they needed much the aid of the 
 heavenly Comforter, promised in those dis- 
 courses, to enable them to sustain the load of 
 calumny so injurious and distressing. 
 
 § A farther confirmation of the idea, that 
 the Gospel had been brought into France by 
 I the charitable zeal of the Asiatic Christians. 
 
Cent. II.] 
 
 MARTYRS OF LYONS AND VIENNE. 
 
 121 
 
 weakness of her body, Blandina was en- 
 dued with so much fortitude, lliat those, 
 who successively tortured her from morn- 
 ing' to night, were quite worn out with 
 faticrue, and owned themselves conquered 
 and exhausted of their whole apparatus 
 of tortures, and were amazed to see her 
 still breathing- whilst her body was torn 
 and laid open: they confessed that any 
 single species of the torture would have 
 been sufficient to despatch her, much 
 more so great a variety as had been ap- 
 plied. But the blessed woman, as a 
 generous wrestler, recovered fresh vigour 
 in the act of confession ; and it was an 
 evident refreshment, support, and an an- 
 nihilation of all her pains to say, " I am 
 a Cliristian, and no evil is committed 
 among us." 
 
 In the mean time Sanctus, having sus- 
 tained in a manner more than human the 
 most barbarous indignities, while the im- 
 pious hoped to extort from him something 
 injurious to the Gospel, through the du- 
 ration and intenseness of his sufferings, 
 resisted with so much firmness, that he 
 would neither tell his own name, nor that 
 of his nation or state, nor whether he 
 was a freeman or slave ; but to every in- 
 terrogatory he answered in Latin, " 1 am 
 a Christian." This, he repeatedly owned, 
 was to him both name, and state, and 
 race, and every thing; and nothing else 
 could the heathen draw from him. Hence 
 the indignation of the governor and of the 
 tortures was fiercely levelled against this 
 holy person, so that having exhausted all 
 the usual methods of torture, they at last 
 fixed brazen plates to the most tender 
 parts of his body. These were made red 
 hot for the purpose of scorching him, and 
 yet he remained upright and inflexible, 
 and firm in his confession ; being, no 
 doubt, bedewed and refreshed by the hea- 
 venly fountain of the water of life which 
 flows from Christ.* His body witnessed 
 indeed the ghastly tortures which he had 
 sustained, being one continued wound 
 and bruise, altogether contracted, and no 
 longfer retaining the form of a human 
 creature : In this man the view ot Christ 
 sutfering wrought great marvels, con- 
 
 * An illustrious testimony to the doctrine of 
 the Spirit's influences, now so raucii depreci- 
 ated, but which was then the support of suf- 
 fering Christians. The allusion is to St. John, 
 7th cliapter, " He that believeth in me, out of 
 his belly shall flow r'vers of living water 
 And this spake he of the Spirit." 
 Vol. I. L 
 
 founded the adversary, and showed, for 
 the encouragement of the rest, that no- 
 thing is to be feared where the love of the 
 Father is; and that nothing is painful 
 where the glory of Christ is exhibited. 
 For, when after some days, the impious 
 had renewed his tortures, and imagined 
 that a fresh application of the same me- 
 thods of punishment to his wounds, now 
 swollen and inflamed, must either over- 
 come his constancy, or, by despatching 
 him on the spot, strike a terror into the 
 rest, as he could not even bear to be 
 touched by the hand, this was so far from 
 being the case, that contrary to all expec- 
 tation, his body recovered its natural po- 
 sition in the second course of torture; he 
 was restored to his former shape and to 
 the use of his limbs ; so that, by the 
 grace of Christ, this cruelty proved not a 
 punishment, but a cure. 
 
 One of those who had denied Christ 
 was Biblias, a female. Satan, imagining 
 that he had now devoured her, and desir- 
 ous to augment her condemnation, by in- 
 ducing her to accuse the Christians falsely, 
 caused her to be led to the torture ; and 
 supposing her to- be a weak and timorous 
 creature, tempted her to charge us with 
 horrid impieties. But in her torture she 
 recovered herself, and awoke as out of a 
 deep sleep, being admonished, by a tem- 
 porary punishment, of the danger of eter- 
 nal fire in hell ; and, in opposition to the 
 impious, she said, " How can we eat in- 
 fants, — we, to whom it is not lawful to 
 eat the blood of beasts."* And now she 
 professed herself a Christian, and was 
 added to the army of martyrs. ' The pow- 
 er of Christ, manifested in the patience 
 of his people, had now exhausted the 
 usual artifices of torment; and the devil 
 was driven to new resources. Christians 
 were thrust into the darkest and most 
 noisome parts of the prison : their feet 
 were distended in a wooden trunk, even 
 to the fifth hole; and in this situation 
 they suflfered all the indignities which 
 diabolical malice could inflict. Hence 
 many of them were suffocated in prison, 
 whom the Lord, showing forth his own 
 glory, was pleased thus to take to him- 
 self. The rest, though afllicted to such a 
 
 * Hence it appears that the eating of blood 
 was not practised among the Christians of Ly- 
 ons; and, that they understood not Christian 
 liberty in this point, will not be wondered at 
 by those who consider the circumstances of the 
 first Christians. 
 
123 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 degree as to seem scarcely capable of re- 
 covery under the kindest treatment, desti- 
 tute as they were of all help and support, 
 yet remained alive, strengthened by the 
 Lord, and confirmed both in body and 
 mind : and these encouraged and comfort- 
 ed the rest. 
 
 Some young persons who had been late- 
 ly seized, and whose bodies had been un- 
 exercised with sufferings, unequal to the 
 severity of the confinement, expired. The 
 blessed Pothinus, bishop of Lyons, up- 
 wards of ninety years of age, and very in- 
 firm and asthmatic, yet strong in spirit, and 
 panting after martyrdom, was dragged be- 
 fore the tribunal ; his body was worn cut 
 indeed with age and disease, yet he re- 
 tained a soul through which Christ might 
 triumph. Borne by the soldiers to the 
 tribunal, and attended by the magistrates 
 and all the multitude, shouting against 
 him as if he were Christ himself, he 
 made a good confession. Being asked 
 by the governor, who was the God of the 
 Christians, he answered, If ye be worthy, 
 ye shall know. He was then unmercifully 
 dragged about, and suffered variety of ill 
 treatment: those, who were near, insult- 
 ed him with their hands and feet, with- 
 out the least respect to his age; and 
 those at a distance threw at him what- 
 ever came to hand : every one looked 
 upon himself as deficient in zeal, if he 
 did not insult him in some way or an- 
 other. For thus they imagined they re- 
 venged the cause of their gods: He was 
 thrown into prison almost breathless ; 
 and after two days expired. 
 
 And here appeared a remarkable dis- 
 pensation of Providence, and the immense 
 compassion of Jesus, rarely exhibited in- 
 deed among the brethren, but not foreign 
 to the character of Christ. Many, who, 
 when first apprehended, had denied their 
 Saviour, were notwithstanding shut up in 
 prison and suffered dreadful severities, 
 as this denial of Christ had availed them 
 not. But those, who confessed him, were 
 imprisoned as Christians, abstracted from 
 any other charge. Now the former, as 
 murderers and incestuous wretches, were 
 punished much more than the rest: Be- 
 sides, the joy of martyrdom supported 
 the latter, and the hope of the promises, 
 and the love of Christ, and the Spirit of 
 the Father. The former were oppressed 
 with the pangs of guilt; so that, while 
 they were dragged along, their very coun- 
 tenances distinguished them from the rest: 
 but the faithful proceeded with cheerful 
 
 steps: Their countenances shone with 
 much grace and glory : Their bonds were 
 as the most beautiful ornaments, and they 
 themselves looked as lirides adorned with 
 their richest array, breathing the fra- 
 grance of Christ so much, that some 
 thought they had been literally perfumed. 
 The others went on dejected, spiritless, 
 and forlorn, and in every way disgraced, 
 even insulted by the heathen as cowards 
 and poltroons, and treated as murderers : 
 they had lost the precious, the glorious, 
 the soul-reviving appellation. The rest, 
 observing these things, were confirmed 
 in the faith, confessed without hesitation 
 on their being apprehended, nor admitted 
 the diabolical suggestion for a moment. 
 
 The martyrs were put to death in va- 
 rious ways: Or, in other words, they 
 wove a chaplet of various odours and 
 flowers, and presented it to the Father. 
 In truth, it became the wisdom and good- 
 ness of God to appoint that his servants, 
 after enduring a great and variegated 
 contest, should, as victors, receive the 
 great crown of immortality. — Maturus, 
 Sanctus, Blandina, and Attalus, were led 
 to the wild beasts into the amphitheatre, 
 to the common spectacle of Gentile inhu- 
 manity. 
 
 One day extraordinary of the shows 
 being afforded to the people on our ac- 
 count, Maturus and Sanctus again under- 
 went various tortures in the amphithea- 
 tre, as if they had suflfered nothing be- 
 fore. Thus were they treated like those 
 wrestlers, who, having conquered several 
 times already, were obliged afresh to 
 contend with other conquerors by fresh 
 lots, till some one was conqueror of the 
 whole number, and as such was crowned. 
 *Here they sustained again, as they were 
 led to the amphitheatre, the blows usual- 
 ly inflicted on those who were condemn- 
 ed to wild beasts ; they were exposed to 
 be dragged and torn by the beasts, and 
 to all the barbarities which the mad pop- 
 ulace with shouts exacted, and above all 
 to the hot iron chair, in which their bodies 
 were roasted, and emitted a disgusting 
 smell. Nor was this all: the persecu- 
 tors raged still more, if possible, to over- 
 come their patience. But not a word 
 could be extorted from Sanctus, besides 
 
 * Tlie allus'ons to the savage shows, so fre- 
 quently made in this narrative, point out their 
 frequency in these ferocious times; and give 
 us occasion to reflect on the mild appearances 
 which society has assumed, since even the 
 form of Christianity has prevailed in the world. 
 
Cext. II.] 
 
 MARTYRS OF LYONS AND VIENNE. 
 
 123 
 
 what he first had uttered — the word of 
 confession. These then after remaininof 
 alive a long time, expired at length, and 
 became a spectacle to the world, equiva- 
 lent to all tlie variety usual in the tights 
 of gladiators. 
 
 Blandina, suspended from a stake, was 
 exposed as food to the wild beasts ; she 
 was seen suspended in the form of a 
 cross, and employed in vehement suppli- 
 cation. The sight inspired the combat- 
 ants with much alacrity, while they be- 
 held with their bodily eyes, in the per- 
 son of their sister, the figure of Him who 
 was crucified for them, that he might 
 persuade those who believe in him, that 
 every one who suffers for the glory of 
 Christ, always has communion with the 
 living God. None of the beasts at that 
 time touched her: she was taken down 
 from the stake, thrown again into prison, 
 and reserved for a future contest ; that hav- 
 ing overcome in various exercises, she 
 might fully condemn the old serpent, 
 and fire the brethren with a noble spirit 
 of Christian emulation. Weak and con- 
 temptible as she might be deemed, yet 
 when clothed with Christ, the mighty and 
 invincible champion, she became victori- 
 ous over the enemy in a variety of encoun- 
 ters, and was crowned with immortality. 
 Attalus also was vehemently demand- 
 ed by the multitude ; for he was a person 
 of great reputation among us. He advanc- 
 ed in all the cheerfulness and serenity of a 
 good conscience; — an experienced Chris- 
 tian, and ever ready and active in bearing 
 testimony to the truth. He was led round 
 the amphitheatre, and a tablet was car- 
 ried before him, inscribed in Latin, "This 
 is Attalus the Christian." The rage of 
 the people would have had him despatch- 
 ed immediately; but the governor under- 
 standing that he was a Roman, ordered 
 him back to prison : and concerning him 
 and others, who could plead the same 
 privilege of Roman citizenship, he wrote 
 to the emperor, and Avaited for his in- 
 structions. 
 
 The interval which this circumstance 
 occasioned was not unfruitful to the 
 Church. — ^The unbounded compassion of 
 Christ appeared in the patience of many : 
 *Dead members were restored to life by 
 the means of the living; and the martyrs 
 became singularly serviceable to the laps- 
 ed; and thus the Church rejoiced to re- 
 ceive her sons returning to her bosom : 
 
 * Dead in their spiritual affections. 
 
 for by THESE means most of those who 
 iiad denied Christ were recovered, and 
 dared to profess their Saviour : they 
 felt again the divine life in their souls: 
 they approached to the tribunal ; and 
 their God, who willeth not the death 
 of a sinner, being again precious to their 
 souls, they desired a fresh opportunity 
 of being interrogated by the governor. 
 
 Cassar* sent orders that the confessors 
 of Christ should be put to death; and 
 that the apostates from their divine ]Mas- 
 ter should be dismissed. — It was now the 
 general assembly, held annually at Ly- 
 ons, and frequented from all parts ; and 
 this was the time when the Christian 
 prisoners were again exposed to the po- 
 pulace. The governor again interrogated. 
 Roman citizens had the privilege of dying 
 by decollation; the rest were exposed to 
 wild beasts ; and now it was that our Re- 
 deemer was magnified in those who had 
 apostatized. They were interrogated se- 
 parate from the rest, as persons soon to 
 be dismissed, and made a confession to 
 THE surprise OF THE Gentiles, and 
 were added to the list of martyrs. A 
 small number still remained in apostasy ; 
 but they were those who possessed not 
 the least spark of divine faith, had not 
 the least acquaintance with the riches of 
 Christ in their souls, and had no fear of 
 God before their eyes ; whose life had 
 brought reproach on Christianity, and 
 had evidenced them to be the children of 
 perdition ;f but all the rest were added to 
 the Church. 
 
 During their examination, a man who 
 had lived many years in France, and was 
 generally known for his love of God and 
 zealous regard for divine truth, a person 
 of apostolical endowments, a physician 
 by profession, a Phrygian by nation, and 
 named Alexander, stood near the tribunal, 
 and by his gestures encouraged them to 
 
 *It must be confessed, that the power of 
 Stoicism in tiai-deniiig the heart was never 
 more strongiy illustrated than in the case of 
 Marcus Antoninus ; thus breaking all the 
 rights of Roman citizenship, and all the feel- 
 ings of humanity. It puts me in mind of Mr. 
 Pope's lines, 
 
 In lazy apathy let Stoics boast 
 
 Their' virtue fix'd — 'tis fix'd as in a frost. 
 
 + The difference between true and merely 
 professing Christians is well stated, and de- 
 serves to be noticed. A season of persecution 
 separates real believers and real exjjerienced 
 Clu-istians from others, much more visibly 
 llian ministers can now do by the most judi- 
 cious distinctions. 
 
124 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 profess the faith. He appeared to all 
 who surrounded the tribunal as one who 
 travailed in much pain on their account. 
 And now the multitude, incensed at the 
 Christian integrity exhibited at the con- 
 clusion by the lapsed, made a clamour 
 against Alexander as the cause of this 
 change. Upon which the governor or- 
 dered him into his presence, and asked 
 him who he was : He declared that he 
 was a Christian : The former, in great 
 wrath, condemned him instantly to the 
 wild beasts ; — and the next day he was 
 introduced with Attains. For the gover- 
 nor, willing to gratify the people, deliv- 
 ered Attains attain to the wild beasts; 
 and these two underwent all the usual 
 methods of torture in the amphitheatre : 
 indeed they sustained a very grievous 
 conflict, and at length expired. Alexan- 
 der neither groaned nor spake a word, 
 but in his heart conversed with God. At- 
 tains, sitting on the iron chair and being 
 scorched; when the smell issued from 
 him, said to ihe multitude in Latin, 
 "This indeed which ye do is to devour 
 men; but we devour not our fellow-crea- 
 tures, nor practise any other wickedness." 
 Being asked what is the name of God, 
 he answered, " God has not a name as men 
 have." 
 
 On the last day of the spectacles, 
 Blandina was again introduced with Pon- 
 ticus, a youth of fifteen : they had been 
 daily brought in to see the punishment of 
 the rest. They were ordered to swear 
 by the idols; and the mob perceiving 
 them to persevere immoveably, and to 
 treat their menaces with superior con- 
 tempt, were incensed ; and no pity was 
 shown either to the sex of the one or to 
 the tender age of the other. Their tor- 
 tures were now aggravated by all sorts 
 of methods ; and the whole round of bar- 
 barities was inflicted ; but menaces and 
 punishments were equally ineffectual. 
 Ponticus, animated by his sister, who 
 was observed by the heathen to strength- 
 en and confirm him, after a magnanimous 
 exertion of patience, yielded up the ghost. 
 
 And now the blessed Blandina, last of 
 all, as a generous mother havintj exhor- 
 ted her children, and sent them before 
 her victorious to the King, 
 Martyr- reviewing the whole series of 
 (lom of their sufferings, hastened to 
 lilandina. u„dero-o the same herself, re- 
 joicing and triumphing in her 
 exit, as if invited to a marriage supper, 
 not going to be exposed to wild beasts. 
 
 After she had endured stripes, the tearing 
 of the beasts, and the iron chair, she 
 was enclosed in a net, and thrown to a 
 bull : and having been tossed some time 
 by the animal, and proving quite superior 
 to her pains, through the influence of 
 hope, and the realizing view of the ob- 
 jects of her faith and her fellowship with 
 Christ, she at length breathed out her soul. 
 E ven her enemies confessed that no wo- 
 man among them had ever suffered such 
 and so great things. But their madness 
 against the saints was not yet satiated. For 
 the fierce and savage tribes of men, beino- 
 instigated by the ferocious enemy of man- 
 kind, were not easily softened ; and they 
 now began another peculiar war against 
 the bodies of the saints. That they had 
 been conquered by their patience produced 
 no stings of remorse : Indeed the feelinors 
 ot common sense and humanity appear to 
 have been extinguished among them : dis- 
 appointment increased their fury: the devil, 
 the governor, and the mob equally show- 
 ed their malice ; that the Scripture might 
 be fulfilled, " He that is unjust, let him 
 be unjust still," as well as, "" He that is 
 holy, let him be holy still."* They now 
 exposed to dogs the bodies of those who 
 had been sufibcated in prison, and care- 
 fully watched night and day, lest any of 
 our people should by stealth perform the 
 funeral rites. And then exposing what 
 had been left by the wild beasts or by the 
 fire, relics partly torn, and partly scorch- 
 ed, and the heads with the trunks, they 
 preserved them by military guards unbu- 
 ried for several days. Some gnashed on 
 them with their teeth, desirous, if possi- 
 ble, to make them feel still more of their 
 malice. Others laughed and insulted 
 them, praising their own gods, and as- 
 cribing tJie vengeance inflicted on the 
 martyrs to them. All, however, were not 
 of this ferocious mould. Yet even those 
 who were of a gentler spirit, and who 
 sympathized with us, in some degree, 
 upbraided us, often saying, " Where is 
 your God, — and what profit do ye derive 
 from their religion, which ye valued 
 above life itself r'f 
 
 As for ourselves, our sorrow was great- 
 ly increased because we were deprived of 
 
 * Rev. xxii. 11. A striking- proof of the 
 sacred rep;ard paid to thai divine work — the 
 book of the Revelation, — in the second century. 
 
 t A diversity of temper or eihication pro- 
 (hiced a diversity of conduct among these men, 
 wiiile yet all seem to have been equally void of 
 the fear and love of God. 
 
Cent. II.] 
 
 MARTYRS OF LYONS AND VIENNE. 
 
 125 
 
 the melancholy satisfaction of interring 
 our friends. Neither the darkness of the 
 night could befriend us, nor could we pre- 
 vail by prayers or by price. They watch- 
 ed the bodies with unremitting vigilance, 
 as if to deprive them of sepulchre was 
 to them an object of great importance. — 
 The bodies of the martyrs having been 
 contumeliously treated and exposed for 
 six days, were burnt and reduced to 
 ashes, and scattered by the wicked into 
 the Rhone, that not the least particle of 
 them might appear on the earth any 
 more. And they did these things as if 
 they could prevail against God, and pre- 
 vent their resurrection — and that they 
 might deter others, as they said, from 
 the hope of a future life, — " On which re- 
 lying they introduce a strange and new 
 religion, and despise the most excruciating 
 tortures, and die with joy. Now let us 
 see if they will rise again, and if their 
 God can help them and deliver them out 
 of our hands."* 
 
 Eusebius observes here, that the reader 
 may judge, by analogy, of the fierceness 
 of this persecution in other parts of the 
 empire, from this detail of the affairs at 
 Lyons : and then adds something from 
 the epistle concerning the humility, meek- 
 ness, and charity of the martyrs ; and 
 this he contrasts with the unrelenting 
 spirit of the Novatians, which afterwards 
 appeared in the Church. "They were 
 such sincere followers of Christ, who, 
 
 THOUGH HE WAS IN THE FORM OF A MAN, 
 THOUGHT IT NOT ROBBERY TO BE EQUAL 
 
 WITH GOD," that though elevated to such 
 height of glory, and though they had 
 borne witness for Christ not once or thrice 
 only, but often, in a variety of sufferings, 
 yet thej'' assumed not the venerable name 
 of martj-rs, nor permitted us to address 
 them as such. But if any of us by~let- 
 ler or word gave them the title, they re- 
 proved us vehemently. For it was with 
 much pleasure that they gave the appel- 
 lation in a peculiar sense to Him who is 
 
 the FAITHFUL AND TRUE WITNESS, the 
 
 first-begotten from the dead, and the 
 Prince of divine life. And they remem- 
 bered with respect the deceased martyrs, 
 
 * The natural enmity of the human mind 
 against the tilings of God was never more 
 strongly exemplified than in this persecution. 
 The tolly of thinking to defeat the councils 
 of Go<l appears very conspicuous : and so does 
 the faith and hope of a blessed resurrection; 
 the peculiarly animating theme of true Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 l2 
 
 and said ; They indeed were martyrs 
 whom Christ hath deigned to receive to 
 himself in their confession, sealing their 
 testimony by their exit ; but we are low 
 and mean professors. With tears they 
 entreated the brethren to pray fervently 
 for them, that they might be perfected. 
 
 They exhibited, however, in real facts, 
 the energy of the character of martyrs, 
 and answered with much boldness to the 
 Gentiles : Their magnanimity, undaun- 
 ted, calm, and intrepid, was visible to all 
 the world, though the fear of God in- 
 duced them to refuse the title of martyrs. 
 They humbled themselves under the 
 mighty hand by which they are now ex- 
 alted.* They were ready to give a mo- 
 dest reason of the hope that was in them 
 before all : They accused none : They 
 took pleasure in commending, none in 
 censuring ; and they prayed for their 
 murderers, as Stephen, the accomplished 
 martyr did, " Lord, lay not this sin to 
 their charge." And if he prayed thus 
 for those who stoned him, how much 
 more ought Christians to pray for the 
 brethren ] — They never gloried in an un- 
 becoming way over the lapsed ; but, on 
 the contrary, they supplied their weak- 
 nesses with maternal tenderness, and shed 
 many tears over them to the Father : 
 they asked life for them, and he gave them 
 it, which they were glad to communicate 
 to their neighbours. Thus in all things 
 they came off victorious before God, — 
 ever cultivating peace, — ever commend- 
 ing peace ; — In peace they went to God, 
 leaving neither trouble to their mother 
 the church, nor faction and sedition to the 
 brethren ; but joy, peace, unanimity, and 
 charity. 
 
 Eusebius has given us another passage 
 also which deserves attention. Alcibi- 
 ades, one of the martyrs, had led, before 
 the persecution, the life of an ascetic : — 
 he used to subsist only on bread and wa- 
 ter. As he continued the same regimen 
 while in confinement, it was revealed in 
 a vision to Attains, after his first contest 
 in the amphitheatre, that Alcibiades did ill 
 not to use the creatures of God, and that he 
 gave an occasion of scandal to others. Al- 
 cibiades was hence induced to change his 
 diet, and to partake of the bounty of God 
 with thanksgiving. — Eusebius tells us 
 also of an epistle directed by these mar- 
 tyrs to Eleutherus, the bishop of Rome, 
 in which they give a very honourable en- 
 
 • 1 Pet. V. 
 
126 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 cotnium of Irenseus the presbyter. Of 
 him we shall have occasion to speak 
 more hereafter. He was appointed succes- 
 sor to Pothinus ; he outlived the storm, 
 and governed the Church afterwards with 
 much ability and success. The letter to 
 the Churches of Asia and Phrygia, of 
 which Eusebius has given such large and 
 valuable extracts, furnishes strong proofs 
 of his piety and judgment. 
 
 The superstitions, which afterwards 
 arose in so great abundance, and with so 
 much strength ; and which, like a dense 
 cloud, so long obscured the light of the 
 Church, seem scarcely to have shaded 
 the glory of those Gallic martyrs in any 
 degree. The case of Alcibiades, and 
 the wholesome check which the divine 
 goodness put to his well-meant austeri- 
 ties, demonstrate that excesses of this 
 nature had not yet gained any remarka- 
 ble ascendency in the Church. And the 
 description of the humility and charity 
 of the martyrs shows a spirit much su- 
 perior to that which we shall have occa- 
 sion, with regret, to notice in some suc- 
 ceeding annals of martyrdom. In a word, 
 the pov/er of Divine Grace appears little 
 less than apostolical in the Church at 
 Lyons. The only disagreeable circum- 
 stance in the whole narrative is the too 
 florid and tumid style, peculiar to the 
 Asiatic Greeks ; and which Cicero, in his 
 rhetorical works, so finely contrasts with 
 tlie attic neatness and purity. In a trans- 
 lation it is scarcely possible to do jus- 
 tice to thoughts extremely evangel- 
 ical and spiritual, clothed originally in 
 so tawdry a garb. Yet under this great 
 disadvantage a discerning eye will see 
 much of the "unction" of real godli- 
 ness. — At first sight we must be struck 
 with the difference between primitive 
 scriptural Christianity, and that affectation 
 of rational divinity, which has so remark 
 ably gained the ascendant in Christendom 
 in our times. In the account we have 
 read, the good influence of the Holy Spi- 
 rit on the one hand, and the evil influ- 
 ence of Satan on the other, are brought 
 forward every where to our view. In 
 our times both are concealed, or almost 
 annihilated ; and little appears but what 
 is merely human. Whether of the two 
 methods is most agreeable to the plan of 
 the sacred writings, must be obvious to 
 every serious and honest inquirer. — 
 Christ's kingdom, in the narrative before 
 us, appears truly scriptural and divine 
 Christian faith, hope, and charity, do 
 
 their work under the direction of his Spi- 
 rit : Christians are humble, meek, heav- 
 enly-minded, patient, sustained continu- 
 ally with aid invisible ; and we see Sa- 
 tan actively, but unsuccessfully, engaged 
 against them. In the degenerate repre- 
 sentations of the Christian religion by 
 many moderns, what a different taste and 
 spirit ! — Every thing is of this world Im- 
 policy and ambition leave no room for 
 the exhibition of the work of God and 
 the power of the Holy Ghost : The be- 
 lief of Satanic influence is ridiculed as 
 weak superstition ; and natural, unassist- 
 ed reason, and the self-sufficiency of the 
 human heart, triumph without measure ! 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE STATE OF CHRISTIANS UNDER THE 
 REIGNS OF COMMODUS, PERTINAX, 
 
 AND JULIAN. THE STORY OF PERE- 
 
 GRINUS. 
 
 The reigns of the two last-mentioned 
 emperors, which close the century, are 
 short, and contain no Christian memoirs. 
 That of Commodus is remarkable for the 
 peace granted to the Church of Christ 
 through the world.* The method which 
 Divine Providence used for this purpose 
 is still more so. Marcia, a woman of 
 low rank, was the favourite concubine of 
 this emperor. She had, on some account 
 not now understood, a prediliction for the 
 Christians, and employed her interest with 
 Commodus in their favour.| He was 
 himself the most vicious and profligate 
 of all mortals, though the son of the grave 
 Marcus Antoninus. Those, who looked 
 at secular objects and moral decorum 
 alone, might regret the change of empe- 
 rors. In one particular point only, name- 
 ly, in his conduct towards the Christians, 
 Commodus was more just and equita- 
 ble than his father. And the power and 
 goodness of God in making even such 
 wretched characters as Commodus and 
 Marcia, to stem the torrent of persecution, 
 and to afford a breathing-time of twelve 
 years under the son, after eighteen years 
 of the most cruel sufferings under the 
 father, deserve to be remarked. For cer- 
 tainly the Church of Christ has no com- 
 muninn with debauchees; and though it 
 he abhorrent, also, in its plan and spirit 
 from the systems of proud philosophers, 
 yet it is always friendly to every thing 
 
 * Euseb. B. V. c, 19. t Dion. Cassius. 
 
Cent. II.] 
 
 UNDER COMMODUS, ETC. 
 
 127 
 
 virtuous and laudable in society. — The 
 fact is, it has a taste peculiarly its own : 
 God's ways are not like ours. — The Gos- 
 pel now flourished abundantly ; and many 
 of the nobility of Rome, with their whole 
 families, embraced it. Such a circum- 
 stance would naturally excite the envy 
 of the great. The Roman senate felt its 
 dignity defiled by innovations, which to 
 them appeared to the last degree contemp- 
 tible ; and to this malignant source, I 
 think, is to be ascribed the only instance 
 of persecution in this reign. 
 
 ApoUonius, at that time a person re- 
 nowned for learning and philosophy in 
 Rome, was a sincere Christian ; and as 
 such was accused by an informer before 
 Perennis, a magistrate of considerable in- 
 fluence in the reign of Commodus. The 
 law of Antoninus Pius had enacted griev- 
 ous punishments against the accusers of 
 Christians. One cannot suppose his edict 
 had any force during the reign of his suc- 
 cessor Marcus ; but under Commodus it 
 was revived ; or rather, a new one, still 
 more severe, was enacted, that the accus- 
 ers should be put to death.* Perennis 
 sentenced the accuser accordingly, and 
 his legs were broken. Thus far he seems 
 to have complied with the injunctions 
 of the law : in what follows he obeyed 
 the dictates of his own malice, or rather 
 that of the senate. He begged of the 
 prisoner wdth much earnestness, that he 
 would give an account of his faith before 
 the senate and the court. ApoUonius 
 complied, and delivered an apology for 
 Christianity ; in consequence of which, 
 by a decree of the senate, he was behead- 
 ed. It is not quite easy to account for 
 this procedure. It is perhaps the only 
 trial recorded in history where both the 
 accuser and the accused suffered judicial- 
 ly. Eusebius observes, that the laws 
 were still in force, commanding Chris- 
 tians to be put to death, who had been 
 presented before the tribunal. But Adri- 
 an, or certainly Antoninus Pius, had ab- 
 rogated this iniquitous edict of Trajan. 
 Under Marcus it might be revived, — as 
 what severity against Christians was not 
 to be expected from that cruel persecutor 1 
 Now Commodus, by menacing accusers 
 with death, probably supposed he had 
 sufficiently secured the Christians. Yet, 
 if a formal abrogation of the law against 
 Christians did not actually take place, 
 one may see how ApoUonius came to 
 
 Peregrin- 
 US. 
 
 * Euseb. B. V. c. 19. 
 
 suffer as well as his adversary. In truth, 
 if he had been silent, it is very likely he 
 would have saved his own life. Insidi- 
 ous artifices, under the pretence of much 
 respect and desire of information, seem 
 to have drawn him into a measure which 
 cost him so dear : — He died, however, in 
 the best of causes ! 
 
 There is, in the work of Lucian, a re- 
 markable story of a person named Pere- 
 grinus, which, as it falls in with this cen- 
 tury, and throws light on the 
 character of the Christians 
 who then lived, deserves to 
 be here introduced. "In his youth," 
 says this author, " he fell into shameful 
 crimes, for which he was near losing his 
 life in Armenia and Asia. I will not 
 dwell on those crimes ; but I am persuad- 
 ed that what I am about to say is worthy 
 of attention. There is none of you but 
 knows, that being: chagrined because his 
 father was still alive, after being upwards 
 of sixty years of age, he strangled him. 
 The rumour of so black a crime being 
 spread abroad, he betrayed his guilt by 
 flight. He wandered about in divers 
 countries to conceal the place of his re- 
 treat, till, upon coming into Judea, he 
 learnt the admirable doctrine of the Chris- 
 tians, by conversing with their priests 
 and teachers. In a little time he show^ed 
 them that they were but children com- 
 pared to himself: for he became not only 
 a prophet, but the head of their congrega- 
 tion : in a word, he was every thing to 
 them : he explained their books, and com- 
 posed several tracts himself; insomuch 
 that they spoke of him sometimes as a 
 god, and certaianly considered him as a 
 lawgiver and a ruler. — However, these 
 people, in fact, adore that great person 
 who had been crucified in Palestine, as 
 beino- the first who tauo-ht men that re- 
 ligion. — While these things were going 
 on, Peregrinus was apprehended and put 
 in prison on account of his being a Chris- 
 tian. This disgrace loaded him with ho- 
 nour : it was the very thing he ardently 
 desired : it made him more reputable 
 among those of that persuasion, and fur- 
 nished him with a power of performing 
 wonders. The Christians, grievously af- 
 flicted at his confinement, used their ut- 
 most efforts to procure him his liberty ; 
 and as they saw they could not com- 
 pass it, they provided abundantly for all 
 his wants, and rendered him all imagina- 
 ble services. There was seen, by the 
 break of day, at the prison-gate, a com- 
 
128 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 pany of old women, widows, and orphans, 
 some of whom, after having corrupted the 
 guard with money, passed the night with 
 him. There they partook together of ele- 
 gant repasts, and entertained one another 
 with religious discourses. They called 
 that excellent man the New Socrates. 
 There came even Christians, deputed 
 from many cities of Asia, to converse 
 with him, to comfort him, and to bring 
 him supplies of money ; for the care and 
 diligence which the Christians exert in 
 these junctures is incredible : they spare 
 nothing in such cases. They sent, there- 
 fore, large sums to Peregrinus ; and his 
 confinement was to him an occasion of 
 amassing great riches ; for these poor 
 creatures are firmly persuaded they shall 
 one day enjoy immortal life : therefore 
 they despise death with wonderful cou- 
 rage, and offer themselves voluntarily to 
 punishment. Their first lawgiver has put 
 it into their heads that they are all breth- 
 ren. Since they separated from us, they 
 persevere in rejecting the gods of the 
 Grecians, and in worshipping that deceiv- 
 er who was crucified ; they regulate their 
 manners and conduct by his laws ; they 
 despise, therefore, all earthly possessions, 
 and use them in common. Therefore if 
 any magician, or juggler, any cunning 
 fellow, who knows how to make his ad- 
 vantage of opportunity, happens to get 
 into their society, he immediately grows 
 rich ; because it is easy for a man of this 
 sort to abuse the simplicity of these silly 
 people. Peregrinus however was set at li- 
 berty by the president of Syria, who was 
 a lover of philosophy and of its professors ; 
 and who, having perceived that this man 
 courted death out of vanity and a fond- 
 ness of renown, released him, despising 
 him too much to have a desire of inflict- 
 ing capital punishment on him. Pere- 
 grinus returned into his own country, and 
 as some were inclined to prosecute him 
 on account of his parracide, he gave all 
 his wealth to his fellow-citizens, who, 
 being gained by this liberality, imposed 
 silence on his accusers. He left his coun- 
 try a second time in order to travel, reck- 
 oning he should find every thing he want- 
 ed in the purses of the Christians, who 
 were punctual in accompanying him 
 wherever he went, and in supplying bin) 
 with all things in abundance. He sub- 
 sisted in this manner for a considerable 
 time ; but having done something which 
 the Christians abhor, — they sav/ him, I 
 think, make use of some meats forbidden 
 
 amongst them, — he was abandoned by 
 them ; insomuch that having not any 
 longer the means of support, he would 
 fain have revoked the donation he had 
 made to his country."* 
 
 The native place of this extraordinary 
 man was Parium in Mysia. After his 
 renunciation of Christianity, he assumed 
 the character of a philosopher. In that 
 light he is mentioned by several heathen 
 authors ; and this part he acted till the 
 time of his death; when, in his old age, 
 he threw himself into the flames, proba- 
 bly because suicide was honourable in 
 the eyes of the Gentiles, and because 
 Empedocles, a brother philosopher, had 
 thrown himself into the volcano at mount 
 j?*]tna. — A remark may here be made on 
 the writer, on the hero, and on the Chris- 
 tians of those times. 
 
 It will not be necessary to give an anx- 
 ious answer to the railleries, cavils and 
 insinuations of Lucian in this narrative. 
 Whoever knows any thing of real Chris- 
 tianity, and the usual obloquy thrown 
 upon it, will easily make just deductions, 
 and separate what is true from what is- 
 false. Lucian was one of the most face- 
 tious authors of antiquity. He doubtless 
 possessed the talents of wit and satire in 
 a supreme degree. But truth and can- 
 dour are not usually to be expected from 
 writers of this sort : Lucian, like others 
 of the same vein, had his eyes turned ma- 
 lignantly towards all objects but himself: 
 He was intolerably self-conceited, and 
 may be ranked with Voltaire, Rousseau, 
 Hume, and other modern writers of that 
 stamp: He was sarcastic, unfeeling; and 
 suspicions of evil every where, except in 
 his own heart. The common consequence 
 of such a temper, indulged without re- 
 straint, is a sceptical indifference to all 
 sorts of religion, a contempt of every mode 
 of it without distinction, and supercilious 
 self-applause on account of superior dis- 
 cernment. Such men, of all others, seem 
 most to fall under the censure of the wise 
 man. He that trusteth his own heart 
 IS A fool. They take for granted the 
 sincerity, humanity, and benevolence of 
 their own hearts, with as much positive- 
 ness as they do the obliquity and hypo- 
 crisy of other men's. Antiquity had one 
 Lucian ; and, it must be confessed the ab- 
 surdities of paganism afforded him a large 
 field of satire, which, eventually, was not 
 
 * Lanlner's Collect. Vol.ii.c. 19.— Bullet's 
 Establishment of Christianit}'. 
 
Cekt. II.] 
 
 CHRISTIAN AUTHORS. 
 
 129 
 
 unserviceable to the progress of Chris- 
 tianity : Our times have abounded with 
 writers of this stamp ; and it is one of the 
 most striking characteristics of the de- 
 pravity of modern taste, that they are so 
 much read and esteemed. 
 
 Peregrinus is no very uncommon cha- 
 racter. On a less extended scale, men 
 of extreme wickedness in a similar way 
 may frequently be noticed, viz. men, 
 whose early life has been devoted to no- 
 thing but vices : Then, afterwards, sorne- 
 thing of the garb and mode of real Chris- 
 tians is assumed by these deceivers. But 
 it is not every one who has the abilities 
 of Peregrinus to wear the hypocritical 
 garb so assumed with consummate ad- 
 dress, and to impose on genuine Chris- 
 tians of undoubted discernment. The 
 unfeeling heart of Lucian appears to re- 
 joice in the impositions of Peregrinus ; 
 and particularly, that he was able to im- 
 pose on Christians so long and so com- 
 pletely. A philanthropic mind would 
 rather have been tempted to mourn over 
 the depravity of human nature, that it 
 should be capable of such wickedness. 
 Providence, however, often sets a dismal 
 mark upon such men in this life. Pere- 
 grinus lived long enough to be proved a 
 complete impostor, and to be rendered in- 
 tolerable to Christians ; he acted the phi- 
 losopher afterwards, it seems, a long time : 
 for what is often called philosophy is con- 
 sistent enough with much hypocrisy ; and 
 HIS dreadful end is awfully instructive to 
 mankind. 
 
 Yet, what is there in all this account 
 of the Christians, discoloured as it is by 
 the malignant author, which does not tend 
 to their honour ? While Peregrinus made 
 a creditable profession, they received and 
 rejoiced in him: They did not pretend to 
 infallibility. His superior parts and ar- 
 tifice enabled him a long time to deceive. 
 It is probable that he avoided as much as 
 possible the society of the most sagacious 
 and penetrating among the Christians. 
 The followers of Jesus had learnt to spare 
 the mote in their brother's eye, and to 
 feel the beam in their own. They were 
 most solicitously guarded against that 
 species of deception which is the most 
 fatal, namely, the delusion of a man's 
 OWN heart. If many of them were hence 
 too much exposed to the snares of design- 
 ing men, the thing tells surely to their 
 honour, rather than to their disgrace. As 
 for the rest ; their liberality, their zeal, 
 their compassion, their brotherly love, 
 
 their fortitude, their heavenly-minded- 
 ness, are confessed in all this narrative 
 to have been exceedingly great. I re- 
 joice to hear from the mouth of an enemy 
 such a testimony to the character of Chris- 
 tians : it is one of the best which I can 
 meet with in the second century : Amidst 
 such a dearth of materials it was not to 
 be omitted. In morals. Christians must 
 then have been, at least, much superior 
 to the rest of mankind ; and it is only to 
 be lamented, that he who could relate 
 this story, had not the wisdom to make 
 a profitable use of it for himself. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 SOME ACCOUNT OF CHRISTIAN AUTHORS 
 WHO FLOURISHED IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 It may throw additional light on the 
 history of Christian doctrine and manners 
 in this century, to give a brief view of 
 Christian authors. Some of the most re- 
 nowned have been already spoken to, and 
 a few more of great respectability must 
 be deferred to the next century, because 
 they outlived this. 
 
 Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, lived 
 under the reign of Marcus Antoninus and 
 his son Commodus. He wrote many 
 epistles to various churches, Dionysius. 
 which demonstrate his care 
 and vigilance in support of Christianity; 
 — a pleasing proof that Corinth was sin- 
 gularly favoured by being possessed of a 
 zealous and charitable pastor; though of 
 his labours there, and of the state of the 
 numerous society of Christians under his 
 ministry, we have no account. He wrote 
 to the Lacedemonians an instruction con- 
 cerning the doctrine of the Gospel, and 
 an exhortation to peace and unity. He 
 wrote to the Athenians also ; and, by his 
 testimony, he confirms the account before 
 o-iven of their declension after the mar- 
 tyrdom of Publius; and of their revival 
 under the care of Quadratus ; and he here 
 informs us that Dionysius the Areopagite 
 was the first bishop of Athens. In his 
 letter to the Christians in Crete, he high- 
 ly commends Philip the bishop, and 
 guards them against heresies. In his 
 epistle to the churches of Pontus, he di- 
 rects that all penitents should be re- 
 ceived who return to the Church, what- 
 ever their past crimes have been, even if 
 guilty of heresy itself. One may hence 
 fnfer, that discipline was as yet adminis- 
 
130 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VHI. 
 
 tered with much strictness in the church- 
 es; and that purity of doctrine, as well as 
 of life and manners, were looked on as 
 of high importance, insomuch that some 
 were inclined to a degree of rigour in- 
 compatible with the Gospel, which pro- 
 mises full and free forgiveness through 
 Christ to every returning sinner, without 
 limitations or exceptions. Such infer- 
 ences concerning the manners and spirit 
 of the Christians at that time seem obvi- 
 ous and natural : The present state of 
 church-discipline among all denomina- 
 tions of Christians in England, would 
 undoubtedly suggest very different reflec- 
 tions. — He writes also to Pinytus, bishop 
 of the Gnossians in Crete, advising him 
 not to impose on the Christians the heavy 
 burden of the obligation to preserve their 
 virginity, but to have respect to the weak- 
 ness incident to most of them. It seemed 
 worth while to mention this also as a 
 proof that monastic austerities were be- 
 ginning to appear in the Church ; and 
 that the best men, after the example of 
 the Apostles, laboured to control them. 
 Pinytus, in his reply, extols Dionysius, 
 and exhorts him to afford his people more 
 solid nourishment ; lest, being always fed 
 with milk, they should remain in a state 
 of infancy. This answer speaks some- 
 thing of the depth of thought and know- 
 ledge m godliness, with which Pinytus 
 was endowed. 
 
 In his letter to the Romans, directed to 
 Soter their bishop, he recommends to 
 them to continue a charitable custom, 
 which, from their first plantation, they 
 had always practised ; namely, — to send 
 relief to divers Churches throughout the 
 world, and to assist particularly those 
 who were condemned to the mines ; — a 
 strong proof both that the Roman church 
 continued opulent and numerous, and 
 also that they still partook much of the 
 spirit of Christ.* 
 
 Theophilus of Antioch is a person of 
 whom it were to be wished that we had 
 a larger account. He was brought up a 
 Gentile ; was educated in all 
 Theophi- the knowledge then reputa- 
 Jus. ble in the world, and was 
 
 doubtless a man of consider- 
 able parts and learning. His conversion 
 to Christianity seems to have been the 
 most reasonable thino- imag-inable. The 
 Holy Spirit in his operations ever appears 
 to adapt himself much to different tem- 
 
 * Euseb. B. iv. c. 23. 
 
 pers. Theophilus was a reasoner; and 
 the grace of God, while it convinced him 
 of his own inability to clear up his 
 doubts, effectually enlightened his under- 
 standing. The belief of a resurrection ap- 
 pears to have been a mighty impediment 
 to his reception of the Gospel : It contra- 
 dicted his philosophy. — The notions of 
 proud philosophers vary in different ages; 
 but they seldom fail in some form or 
 other to withstand the religion of Jesus. 
 
 Of his labours in his bishopric of Anti- 
 och we have no account. He carried on 
 a correspondence with a learned man 
 named Autolycus ; but with what success 
 we are not told. He appears to have 
 been very vigilant against fashionable 
 heresies. He lived thirteen years in his 
 bishopric; and died in peace about the 
 second or third year of Commodus.* 
 
 Melito, bishop of Sardis, from the very 
 little of his remains that are extant, may 
 be conceived to be one whom God might 
 make use of for the revival of 
 godliness in that drooping Melito. 
 church. The very titles of 
 some of his works excite our regret for 
 the loss of them. One of them is on the 
 submission of the senses to faith : an- 
 other on the soul, the body, and the spi- 
 rit; another on God incarnate. A frag- 
 ment of his, preserved by the author of 
 the Chronicle, called the Alexandrian, 
 says, " that the Christians do not adore 
 insensible stones, but that they worship 
 one Gbd alone, who is before all things 
 and in all things, and Jesus Christ who is 
 God before all ages." He lived under the 
 reign of Marcus Antoninus. His unsuc- 
 cessful but masterly apology presented 
 to that emperor has already been noticed. 
 He travelled into the east on purpose to col- 
 lect authentic ecclesiastic information ; 
 and he gives us a catalogue of the sacred 
 books of the Old Testament. He died and 
 was buried at Sardis; a man whom Poly- 
 crates, bishop of Epliesus, his contempo- 
 rary, calls an eunuch, that is, one who 
 made himself an eunuch for the kingdom 
 of heaven's sake.f Several such, I appre- 
 hend, were in the primitive times. But 
 the depravity of human nature is ever 
 pushing men into extremes. There soon 
 arose some, who made a self-righteous 
 use of these instances of self-denial ; and 
 clogfo-ed them with unwarrantable ex- 
 
 * Euseb. B. iv. c. 23. and Cave's Life of The- 
 ophilus. 
 
 f Matthew, xix. Euseb. B. iv. c. 25. Du 
 Pin and Cave. 
 
Ceut. II.] 
 
 CHRISTIAN AUTHORS. 
 
 131 
 
 Bardasa- 
 nes. 
 
 cesses. The contrary extreme is now so 
 prevalent, that, — if a person were to fol- 
 low the example of Melito on the same 
 generous principles which our Saviour 
 expresses, — it would be thought very ex- 
 traordinary, and even ridiculous. Bat, 
 whatever has the sanction of Holy Writ, 
 should be noticed to the honour of those 
 who practise it, whether agreeable to the 
 taste of the age we live in or not, unless 
 we mean to set up the eighteenth century 
 as a sort of Pope, to judge the foregoing 
 seventeen. — The same Polycrates ob- 
 serves of him, that his actions were regu- 
 lated by the motions of the Holy Ghost; 
 and that he lies interred at Sardis, where 
 he expects the judgment and resurrec- 
 tion. 
 
 Bardasanes of Mesopotamia, a man re- 
 nowned for learning and eloquence, es- 
 caped not the pollution of the fantastic 
 heresy of Valentinian. His 
 talents and his love of refine- 
 ment were probably his snare ; 
 but, as he afterwards condemned the fa- 
 bulous dreams by which he had been in- 
 fatuated, and as he is allowed to be sound 
 in the main, some relics of his former he- 
 resy might be left without materially in- 
 juring either his faith or his practice. I 
 know no particular reason for mentioning 
 him at all, but for the sake of introducing 
 a remarkable passage of his writings, pre- 
 served by Eusebius,* which shows at 
 once the great progress and the powerful 
 energy of Christianity. 
 
 " In Parthia," says he, " polygamy is 
 allowed and practised, but the Christians 
 of Parthia practise it not. In Persia the 
 same may be said with respect to incest. 
 In Bactria and in Gaul the rights of ma- 
 trimony are defiled with impunity. The 
 Christians there act not thus. In truth, 
 wherever they reside, they triumph in 
 their practice over the worst of laws and 
 the worst of customs." This eulogium 
 is not more strong than just. — In what 
 age did human inventions, whether phi- 
 losophical or religious, produce such 
 fruits as these 1 
 
 Miliiades was usefully engaged in dis- 
 criminating the genuine influences of the 
 Holy Spirit from the fictitious, — of which 
 ,,.,.. , , unhappy instances had then 
 ■ appeared. False prophets 
 evinced at first the most stupid ignorance, 
 and afterwards a distempered imagination 
 and furious frenzy. Miltiades showed 
 
 that the influence of the Holy Spirit de- 
 scribed in Scripture, was sober, consis- 
 tent, reasonable. There is no new thing 
 under the sun : impostures and delusions 
 exist at this day; — and why should it 
 not be thought as reasonable now, as it 
 was then, to discriminate genuine from 
 fictitious or diabolical influencss, by lay- 
 ing down the true marks and evidences 
 of each, instead of scornfully treating all 
 alike as enthusiastic ? The extraordinary 
 
 Athena- 
 goras. 
 
 * Euseb. 
 marks, ir. 
 
 Prsecep. Evang. Jortin's Re- 
 
 and miraculous influences chiefly come 
 under Miltiades's inspection; for these 
 were at that time very common in the 
 Christian church; so were delusive pre- 
 tences also ; particularly those of Mon- 
 tanus and of his followers. — Let the dis- 
 cerning reader apply the observations to 
 be made on these and similar facts to our 
 own times. 
 
 Apollinaris of Hierapolis wrote several 
 books under the reign of Marcus Anto- 
 ninus. We have at present only their 
 titles. One of them was a nllina- 
 Defence of Christianity, dedi- ^-^^ 
 cated to the emperor. The 
 work of which we know the most, from 
 a fragment preserved in Eusebius, is that 
 against the Montanists, which will fall 
 under our observation in the next chapter. 
 Athenagoras, towards the latter end of 
 this century, wrote an Apology for the 
 Christian Religion. His tes- 
 timony to the doctrine of the 
 Trinity, contained in that 
 work, expresses something beyond a mere 
 speculative belief. This article of the 
 Christian faith appeared to him of es- 
 sential consequence in practical godliness. 
 He is a writer not mentioned by Eusebi- 
 us. Du Pin does him injustice by ob- 
 servino- that he recommends the worship 
 of angels. I have not access to ms Apo- 
 logy, but shall give a remarkable quota- 
 tion from Dr. Waterland, to whom 1 am 
 obliged for the only valuable information 
 I have of this author.* Speaking of 
 Christians, he describes them as " men 
 that made small account of the present 
 life, but were intent only upon contem- 
 plating God and knowing his Word, who 
 is from him, — what union the Son has 
 with the Father, what communion the 
 Father has with the Son, what the Spirit 
 is, and what the union and distinction 
 are of such so united, the Spirit, the Son, 
 and the Father." 
 
 * Eijiphar.ius Heres. 5k 1. See Di-. Wa- 
 terlaiid's Importance of the Doctrine of the 
 Trinity. 
 
132 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHUKCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 If this be true, — and Athenagoras may 
 well be credited for the fact, — it is not to 
 be wondered at, that the primitive Chris- 
 tians were so anxiously tenacious of this 
 doctrine. It was the climate in which 
 alone Christian fruit could grow. Their 
 speculations were not merely abstracted. 
 They found in the view of the Father, 
 Son, and Holy Ghost, something of that 
 energy which could raise them from earth 
 to heaven : That is, they found the pecu- 
 liar truths of the Gospel, which are so 
 closely interwoven with the doctrine of 
 the Trinity. The right use of the doc- 
 trine is briefly, but strongly intimated in 
 this passage ; — and the connexion between 
 Christian principles and practice appears. 
 In truth, a Trinitarian speculatist may 
 be as worldly-minded as any other per- 
 son. His doctrine, however, contains 
 that which only can make a man fix "his 
 affections on things above." 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE HERESIES AND CONTROVERSIES OF 
 THIS CENTURY REVIEWED, AND AN 
 IDEA OF THE STATE AND PROGRESS OF 
 CHRISTIANITY DURING THE COURSE 
 OF IT. 
 
 My plan calls me not to notice minutely 
 all the heresies which appeared in this 
 century ; but I would not omit them, 
 whenever they may throw light on the 
 work of God's Holy Spirit and the pro- 
 gress of godliness. — On their own account, 
 they deserved not much attention ; yet it 
 was necessary to examine and confute 
 some of them ; and Irenajus acted charita- 
 bly in so doing. It is, however, to be 
 regretted, that in his celebrated work 
 against heresies, he should be obliged to 
 employ so much time on scenes of non- 
 sense. — Let it be remarked in general, 
 that the same opposition to the Deity of 
 Christ, or his manhood, and the same in- 
 sidious methods of depreciating or abusing 
 the doctrines of grace, continued in the 
 second century, which had begun in the 
 first, with this difference, that they were 
 now multiplied, varied, complicated, and 
 refined by endless subtleties and fancies, 
 in which the poverty of taste and genius, 
 so common in a period when letters are 
 declining, discovers itself no less than 
 the Christian doctrine. Like spots in 
 the sun, however, they vanished and dis- 
 appeared from time to time ; though re- 
 
 vived again in different forms and circum- 
 stances. Not one of the heresiarchs of this 
 century was able to create a strong and 
 permanent interest; and it is no little 
 proof of the continued goodness and grace 
 of God to his Church, that the sound 
 Christians still kept themselves separate 
 and distinct, and preserved the purity of 
 discipline. 
 
 It has often been said, that many have 
 been enlisted among heretics, who were 
 real Christians. When I see a proof of 
 this, I shall take notice of it. But of the 
 heretics of the second century, I fear, in 
 general, no such favourable judgment 
 ought to be passed. The state of Chris- 
 tian affairs, in truth, was such as to af- 
 ford no probable reason for any real good 
 man to dissent. Where was there more 
 of piety and virtue to be found than 
 among the general society of Christians 1 
 And how could any persons be more ex- 
 posed to the cross of Christ than they 
 were 1 
 
 1. The first set of heretics of this cen- 
 tury, were those who opposed 
 or corrupted the doctrines of 
 the person of Christ. A single 
 quotation from Eusebius may 
 be sufiicient as a specimen. 
 
 Speaking of the books, which were 
 published in these times, he observes,* 
 " Among them there is found a volume 
 written against the heresy of Artemon, 
 which Paulas of Samosata in our days 
 endeavoured to revive. When this book 
 had confuted the said presumptuous he- 
 resy, which maintained Christ to be a 
 mere man, and that this was an ancient 
 opinion ; after many leaves tending to the 
 confutation of this blasphemous falsehood, 
 the author writes thus : ' They affirm that 
 all our ancestors, even the Apostles them- 
 selves, were of that opinion, and taught 
 the same with them, and that this their 
 true doctrine was preached and embraced 
 to the time of Victor, the thirteenth bishop 
 of Rome after Peter, and was corrupted 
 by his successor Zephyrinus. This might 
 carry a plausible appearance of truth, 
 were it not, in the first place, contradicted 
 by the Holy Scriptures, and in the next, 
 by the books of several persons, which 
 they published long before the time of 
 Victor, against the Gentiles, in the de- 
 fence of the truth, and in confutation of the 
 heresies of their times. I mean Justin, 
 Miltiades, Tatian, and Clement, with 
 
 Heresy re- 
 specting 
 the person 
 of Christ. 
 
 * B. V. c. 25. 
 
Ce5T. II.] 
 
 PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 133 
 
 many others ; in all which works Christ 
 is preached and published to be God. 
 Who knoweth not that the works of Ire- 
 naeus, Melito, and all other Christians, 
 do confess Christ to be both God and 
 Man? In fine, how manj' psalms, and 
 hymns, and canticles were written from 
 the beginning by faithful Christians, 
 which celebrate Christ, the Word of God, 
 as no other than God indeed ] How then 
 is it possible, according to their report, 
 that our ancestors, to the days of Victor, 
 should have preached in that way, when 
 the creed of the Church for so many 
 years is pronounced as certain, and known 
 to all the world 1 And oucrht they not to 
 be ashamed to report such falsehoods of 
 Victor, when they know it to be a fact, 
 that this very Victor excommunicated 
 Theodotus, a tanner, the father of this 
 apostasy, who denied the divinity of 
 Christ, because he first affirmed Christ 
 to be only man. If Victor, as they report, 
 had been of their blasphemous sentiments, 
 how could he have excommunicated The- 
 odotus the author of the heresy ]" 
 
 Victor's government was about the 
 close of the second century. The anony 
 mous author before us writes most pro- 
 bably in the former part of the third. 
 Nor is his testimony much invalidated 
 by his being anonymous. The facts to 
 which he speaks were notorious and nn- 
 deniable. We see hence, that all parties, 
 notwithstanding the contempt, which 
 some affect, of the testimony of antiquity 
 and tradition, are glad to avail them- 
 selves of it where they can; which is 
 itself a proof of the tacit consent of all 
 mankind, that this testimony, though by 
 no means decisive, nor such as ought 
 ever to be put in competition with Scrip- 
 ture, yet weighs something, and ought 
 not to be treated with unreserved disdain. 
 In our own days the same attempt has 
 been made in the same cause ; with what 
 probability of success, in the way of 
 sound argument, let the reader, who has 
 considered the passage I have quoted 
 from Eusebius, judge for himself. In 
 fact, it appears that a denial of the Deity 
 of Christ could not find any patron with- 
 in the pale of the Church for the first 
 two hundred years. The prevalence of 
 sentiments derogatory to the person and 
 ofiices of Christ was reserved for a later 
 period. Every person of any eminence 
 in the Church for judgment and piety, 
 holds unequivocally an opposite language. 
 In some of the most renowned we have 
 Vol. I. M 
 
 seen it all along in the course of this 
 century. 
 
 This Theodotus was a citizen of By- 
 zantium, a tanner, but a man of parts 
 and learning. Heretical perversions of 
 Scripture have often been invented by 
 such persons. Pride and self-conceit 
 seem to have a peculiar ascendency over 
 men who have acquired knowledge in 
 private by their own industry : And doubt- 
 less one of the best advantages of public 
 seminaries is this, — that modesty and 
 reasonable submission are inculcated in 
 them ; and men, by seeing and feeling 
 their own inferiority, are taught to think 
 more lowly of their own attainments. 
 This self-taught tanner speculated ; felt 
 himself important enough to be singular; 
 and revived the heresy of Ebion. He was 
 brought with some other Christians before 
 persecuting magistrates: His companions 
 honestly confessed Christ, and suffered: 
 He was the only man of the company who 
 denied him. In truth, he had no principles 
 stroncr enough to induce him to bear the 
 cross of Christ. Theodotus lived still a 
 denier of Christ, and being afterwards 
 upbraidt'd for denying his God; "No," 
 says he, " I have not denied God, but 
 man ; for Christ is no more."* His 
 heresy hence obtained a new name, that 
 of the God-denying apostasy. j" Perse- 
 cution frequently does in this life, in part, 
 what the last day will do completely, — 
 separate wheat from tares ! 
 
 2. The' controversy respecting the pro- 
 per time of the observation of Easter, 
 which had been amicably adjusted be- 
 tween Polycarp of Smyrna 
 and Anicetus of Rome, who Controver- 
 had agreed to diff-er, was un- -.^Ej^teJ; 
 happily revived towards the 
 close of this century : Synods were held' 
 concerning it : and an uniformity was at- 
 tempted in vain throughout the Church. 
 Victor of Rome, with much arrogance and 
 temerity, as if he had felt the very soul 
 of the future papacy formed in himself, 
 inveighed against the Asiatic churches, 
 and pronounced them excommunicated 
 persons. The firmness, moderation, and 
 charity of one man was of great service in 
 quashing this dangerous contention. Ire- 
 nKus, bishop of Lyons, rebuked the un- 
 charitable spirit of Victor, reminded him 
 of the union between Polycarp and his 
 predecessor Anicetus, notwithstanding 
 
 * Damascen. Heres. 54. 
 
134 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 their diiference of sentiment and practice 
 in this point, and pressed the strong ob- 
 ligation of Christians to love and unity, 
 though they might differ in smaller mat- 
 ters ; and surely a smaller matter of di- 
 versity was scarcely ever known to occa- 
 sion contention. 
 
 The particulars of the debate are not 
 worthy of recital. Certain fundamentals 
 being stated in the first place, in which 
 all real Christians are united, they may 
 safely be left, each society to follow its 
 private judgment in other things ; and,— 
 surely, — yet hold the unity of the Spirit 
 in the bond of peace. But that this was 
 effected with so much difficulty, and that 
 so slight a subject should appear of so 
 great "moment at this time, seems no 
 small proof that the power of true godli- 
 ness had suffered some declension; and 
 was an omen, towards the close of this 
 century, of the decay of the happy effects 
 of the first great Effusion of the Spirit. 
 When faith and love are simple, strong, 
 and eminently active, such subjects of 
 debate are ever known to vanish like 
 mists before the sun. 
 
 3. The Church was internally shaken 
 and much disfigured by the heresy of 
 Montanus. This is the account of it 
 given by Apollinaris of Hierapolis, who 
 took pains to confute it.* 
 Heresy of n Being lately at Ancyra in 
 Montanus. Q^iatia, I found the Church 
 throughout filled, — not with prophets, as 
 they call them, but with false prophets; 
 where, with the help of the Lord, I dis- 
 puted publicly for many days against 
 them, so that the Church rejoiced and 
 was confirmed in the truth ; and the ad- 
 versaries were vexed and murmured. It 
 originated in the following manner : There 
 is a village in Mysia, a region of Phrygia, 
 called Ardaba, where we are told that 
 Montanus, a late convert in the time of 
 Gratus, proconsul of Asia, gave advan- 
 tage to Satan by being elated with ambi- 
 tion. The man behaved in a frantic man- 
 ner, and pretended to prophesy. Some 
 who heard hiin, checked him as a luna- 
 tic and forbad his public exhibitions, 
 mindful of our Saviour's predictions and 
 warnings against false prophets : but 
 others boast'ed of him as endued with 
 the Holy Ghost, and forgetting the di- 
 vine admonitions, were so ensnared by 
 his arts as to encourage the imposture. 
 Two women were by Satan possessed of 
 
 * Euseb. B. C. 14. 
 
 the same spirit, and spake foolish and 
 fanatical things. They gloried in their 
 own supposed superior sanctity and hap- 
 piness ; and were deluded with the most 
 flattering expectations. — Few of the Phry- 
 gians were seduced, though they took 
 upon them to revile every Church under 
 heaven which did not pay homage to 
 their pretended inspirations. The faith- 
 ful throughout Asia in frequent synods 
 examined and condemned the heresy." 
 
 It has ever been one of the greatest trials 
 to men really led by the Spirit of God, — 
 besides the open opposition of the pro- 
 fane, — to be obliged to encounter the 
 subtile devices of Satan, who often raises 
 up pretended illuminations, and so con- 
 nects them with delusion, folly, wicked- 
 ness, and self-conceit, that they expose 
 true godliness to the imputation of en- 
 thusiasm, and to contempt and disgrace. 
 The marks of distinction are plain to 
 minds which are serious and of tolerable 
 judgment and discretion; but, men, void 
 of The fear of God, will not distinguish. 
 We see here an instance of what has 
 often been repeated from that day to the 
 present in the Church of Christ; and 
 Christians should never fail to do now, 
 what they then did, namely, they should 
 examine, expose, condemn, and separate 
 themselves from such delusions : The 
 enthusiasts of every age follow the patr 
 tern of Montanus in folly, pride, and un- 
 chariiableness : Nothing happens here 
 but what is foretold in Scripture : and in 
 truth, delusions of this sort so generally 
 accompany the real work of God, that 
 wherever that appears, these very seldom 
 fail to appear also. 
 
 4. But the eruptions of fanaticism are 
 too wild and unnatural to remain long in 
 any degree of strength. Whatever high 
 pretensions they make to the influences 
 of the Divine Spirit, they are ever unfa- 
 vourable to them in reality ; not only by 
 their unholy tendency during the par- 
 oxysm of zeal, but much more so by the 
 effects of contemptuous profaneness and 
 incredulous scepticism which they leave 
 behind them. It is for the sake of these 
 chiefly that Satan seems to invent and 
 support such delusions. — But his grand 
 resource against the Gospel is drawn 
 from contrivances more congenial with 
 the nature of man. Human philosophy 
 after the rudiments of the world and not 
 after Christ, formed the last corruption 
 of this century ; which I shall lay open, 
 to the best of my judgment, from the 
 
CE:fT. II.] 
 
 PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY, 
 
 135 
 
 lights of history. It was toward the 
 close of the century that it made its ap- 
 pearance, nor were the effects of it very 
 great at present : in the next century they 
 appeared very distinctly. 
 
 Alexandria was at this time the most 
 renowned seminary of learning. A sort 
 of philosophers there appeared who call- 
 ed themselves Eclectics, because with- 
 out tying themselves down to any one 
 set of rules, they chose what they thought 
 most agreeable to truth from different 
 masters and sects. Their pretensions 
 were specious ; and while they preserved 
 the appearance of candour, moderation, 
 and dispassionate inquiry, they adminis- 
 tered much fuel to the pride of men lean- 
 ing to their own understandings. Am- 
 monius Saccas, a famous Alexandrian 
 teacher, seems to have reduced the opin- 
 ions of this sect to a system. Plato was 
 his principal guide ; but he invented many 
 things of which Plato never dreamed. 
 What his religious profession was is dis- 
 puted among the learned. Undoubtedly 
 he was educated a Christian; and though 
 Porphyry, in his enmity against Chris- 
 tianity, observes that he forsook the Gos- 
 pel and returned to Gentilism, yet the 
 testimony of Eusebius,* who must have 
 known, seems decisive to the contrary ; — 
 it proves, that he continued a Christian 
 all his days : his tracts on the agreement 
 of Moses and Jesus, and his harmony of 
 the four Gospels, demonstrate that he 
 desired to be considered as a Christian. 
 This man fancied that all religions, vul- 
 gar and philosophical, Grecian and bar- 
 barous, Jewish and Gentile, meant the 
 same thing at bottom. He undertook by 
 allegorizing and subtilizing various fables 
 and systems, to make up a coalition of 
 all sects and religions ; and, from his la- 
 bours, continued by his disciples — some 
 of whose works still remain, — his follow- 
 ers were taucrht to look on Jew, Philoso- 
 pher, vulgar Pagan, and Christian, as all 
 of the same creed. 
 
 Dr. Lardner, in opposition to Mosheim, 
 who seems to have very successfully il- 
 lustrated this matter, contends that there 
 were no such motley-mixed characters, 
 and that the scheme is chimerical. I 
 have attended closely to Dr. Lardner's 
 own account of this teacher; and also to 
 his review of philosophers in the third 
 and following centuries ; and it appears 
 to me, that persons of the class described 
 
 am- 
 among the 
 
 * B. 6. C. 18. £c. Hist. 
 
 did actually exist. Ammonius himself 
 seems to have been, if I may be allowed 
 the expression, a Pagan-Christian. That 
 Eusebius and Porphyry should each claim 
 him for their own, is no little proof of his 
 ambiguous character: and I wish we may 
 not have too melancholy proofs of the 
 same thing, when we come to consider 
 the characters of many of the fathers 
 who followed. Longinus, who was of 
 the same school, though more a philolo- 
 gist than a philosopher, in his well-known 
 respectful quotation from Moses, evinces 
 that he was tinctured with a similar 
 spirit. Plotinus is largely and fully in 
 the same scheme. Who knows whether 
 to call Ammianus the historian, and 
 Chalcidius, Christian or Pagan 1 They 
 affected to be both ; or rather pretended 
 that both meant the same thing ; and in 
 the fourth and fifth century, though some 
 with Porphyry, through the virulence of 
 their opposition, were decided enemies 
 of Christ, it is certain that many 
 biguous characters abounded 
 Christians. 
 
 In truth, we see in every age similar 
 scenes. The Gospel in its infancy has 
 to struggle with the open and avowed 
 enmity of all mankind. He, whose de- 
 cisive power alone can do it, after floods 
 of persecution and a thousand discour- 
 agements, gives his religion a settlement 
 in the world too strongly to be over- 
 turned, as its enemies hoped at first 
 would be the case. The light of divine 
 truth fails not to make some impressions 
 on minds by no means converted through 
 it to God. Christianity, though it enfor- 
 ces its truths with much greater clearness 
 than natural religion does; and though it 
 proves its superiority, by exhibiting men 
 who practise accordingly, still has many 
 truths in common with natural religion : 
 Thence ingenious persons are ready to 
 persuade themselves, that their philoso- 
 phy and the Gospel mean the same in 
 substance: They compliment Christi- 
 anity with some respectful attention, and 
 yet studiously avoid the cross of Christ, 
 and the precise peculiarities of the Gos- 
 pel, in order to preserve their credit in 
 the world. We may all have so much 
 noticed this disposition in men, and the 
 number of doubtful characters in conse- 
 quence, that Mosheim's account cannot, 
 I think, appear difficult of admission. 
 
 Undoubtedly the appearance of persons 
 of this sort is a sure symptom that the 
 Gospel is raised to some degree of emi- 
 
136 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 nence and stability in the world. In the 
 first century such an ambiguous charac- 
 ter would have been a rare phenomenon. 
 Philosophers found no desire to coalesce 
 with a religion contemptible in their eyes 
 in all respects. It was not till numbers 
 gave it some respectability, that a coali- 
 tion of that kind took place. Seneca 
 would have thought himself sufficiently 
 liberal in not persecuting, but only des- 
 pising the same religion, which Ammon- 
 ius, a century afterwards, deigned to in- 
 corporate, in pretence at least, with his 
 philosophy.— It has been observed, that 
 the attempt of the' court of Charles 
 the First to draw over some of the par- 
 liamentary leaders to their interest, was 
 a sure sign of the diminution of regal 
 despotism. Satan beheld the decay of 
 his empire of idolatry and philosophy in 
 tlie same light ; and it behooved him to 
 try the same arts to preserve what re- 
 mained. Melancholy and disastrous as 
 was the evil we are contemplating, and 
 even more decisively destructive to the 
 progress of vital godliness than any other 
 whrch had yet appeared, it was, however, 
 an evidence of the victorious strength of 
 the Gospel, and a confession of weakness 
 on the part of paganism. 
 
 In carrying on these arts of seduction, 
 the insidiousness of such middle charac- 
 ters consisted much in expatiating on the 
 truths which lie in common, as of the 
 greatest importance ; and in reducing, as 
 far as in them lay, the peculiar truths of 
 the Gospel into oblivion. It was just in 
 this manner, I remember, that a clergy- 
 man* speaks in a celebrated sermon 
 preached on the accession of James the 
 Second. While he deals out strains of 
 fulsome adulation on the sovereign, he 
 answers the objection against him drawn 
 from his religion, by observing of what 
 little importance opinions were ; and that 
 moral and practical matters were alone 
 worthy of consideration. The conduct 
 of James, in a little time after, showed 
 the weakness of his reasoning : and the 
 effects of this philosophical evil, which, 
 like leaven, soon spread in some faint 
 degree over the whole Church, manifest- 
 ed too plainly that pure and undefiled 
 sentiments of religion are of high impor- 
 tance. 
 
 We have hitherto found it no hard 
 matter to discover, in the teachers and 
 writers of Christianity, the vital doc- 
 
 * The Vicar of Newcastle. 
 
 trines of Christ. We shall now per- 
 ceive that the most precious truths of the 
 Gospel begin to be less attended to, and 
 less brought into view. Even Justin 
 Martyr, before the period of eclectic cor- 
 ruption, by his fondness for Plato adul- 
 terated the Gospel in some degree, as we 
 have observed particularly in the article 
 of free-will. Tatian, his scholar, went 
 bolder lengths, and deserved the name of 
 heretic. He dealt largely in the merits 
 of continence and chastity; and these 
 virtues, pushed into extravagant exces- 
 ses, under the notion of superior purity, 
 became great engines of self-righteous- 
 ness and superstition; obscured men's 
 views of the faith of Christ, and darken- 
 ed the whole face of Christianity. Un- 
 der the fostering hand of Ammonius and 
 his followers, this fictitious holiness, dis- 
 guised under the appearance of eminent 
 sanctity, was formed into a system ; and 
 it soon began to generate the worst of 
 evils. That man is altogether fallen, — 
 that he ie to be justified wholly by the 
 faith of Christ, — that his atonement and 
 mediation alone procure us access to God 
 and eternal life,— ^that holiness is the pro- 
 per work of the Holy Spirit on the heart 
 of man, and that for its production Di- 
 vine Grace is absolutely necessary ; — 
 these, — and if there be any other similar 
 evangelical truths, — as it was not possi- 
 ble to mix them with Platonism, faded 
 gradually in the Church, and were at 
 length partly denied and partly forgot- 
 ten.* 
 
 St. Paul's caution against philoso- 
 phy and vain deceit, it appears, was 
 now fatally neglected by the Christians. 
 False humility, "will-worship," curious 
 and proud refinements, bodily austerities 
 mixed with high self-righteous preten- 
 sions, ignorance of Christ and of the true 
 life of iaith in him, miserably supersed- 
 ed by ceremonies and superstitions, — all 
 these things are divinely delineated in 
 the second chapter to Colossians; and, 
 so far as words can do it, the true de- 
 fence against them is powerfully describ- 
 ed and enforced. 
 
 Even the cultivation of the human mind, 
 when carried on in the best manner, is 
 
 * N. B. The tenth article of our Church is 
 remaikahly precise and accurate on this sub- 
 ject. "We have no power to do good works, 
 pleasant and acceptable to God, without the 
 grace of Clu'ist preventing us that we may 
 iiave a good will, and working with us when 
 we have that good will. 
 
Cekt. II.] 
 
 PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 137 
 
 apt to be abused by fallen man, to the 
 perversion of the Gospel. Yet I would 
 not place the mathematics and natural 
 philosophy on the same footing as the 
 Platonic or Stoical doctrines. In truth, 
 philosophy is too respectable a name for 
 these last : As they were managed in 
 the school of Ammonius or of Antoninus, 
 they displayed little that deserved the 
 attention of a wise man : They were 
 either romantic, or absolutety false. The 
 philosophy of the moderns, when applied 
 to abstract quantity, or to the works of 
 nature, is, doubtless, possessed of truth 
 and solidity, yet great care is requisite to 
 keep even modern philosophy within its 
 due bounds ; and to prevent its encroach- 
 ments on Christianity ; and the danger of 
 being elated by pride, and of being made 
 too wise for the teaching of God's Holy 
 Spirit, is common to this with all other 
 sorts of secular knowledge. In regard to 
 what is called moral philosophy and meta- 
 physics, these seem much more nearly al- 
 lied to the ancient philosophical evils, and 
 have ever been dano-erous to relio-ion : fatal 
 mistakes have been made through their 
 means ; and in general, if we except a very 
 small portion of natural truths which are 
 agreeable to the moral senseand conscience 
 of mankind, they appear — at least, when 
 conducted, as they have usually been, by 
 un-evangelical persons, — to be the very 
 same sort of mischievous speculation and 
 refinement against which the Apostle to 
 the Colossians speaks. Certainly his 
 cautions against philosophy are equally 
 applicable to them ; — for they have been 
 
 found to militate against the vital truths 
 of Christianity, and to corrupt the Gos- 
 pel in our times as much as the cultiva- 
 tion of the more ancient philosophy cor- 
 rupted it in early ages. — I would here be 
 understood, in both cases, to refer to matter 
 of fact, and not to imaginary suppositions. 
 — In fact, the systems of the moral and 
 metaphysical writers have rarely been 
 founded on Christian principles, and yet 
 they have pretended to incorporate them- 
 selves with the Gospel. The effect of such 
 combination must ever prove mischievous, 
 particularly when addressed to the reason 
 of man, prejudiced by self-conceit and the 
 love of sin. 
 
 And here we close the view of the se- 
 cond century ; which, for the most part, 
 exhibited proofs of divine grace as strong, 
 or nearly so, as the first. We have seen 
 the same unshaken and simple faith of 
 Jesus, the same love of God and of the 
 brethren ; and, — that in which they sin- 
 gularly excelled modern Christians, — the 
 same heavenly spirit and victory over the 
 world. But a dark shade is enveloping 
 these divine glories. The spirit of God 
 is grieved already by the ambitious in- 
 trusions of self-righteousness, argumen- 
 tative refinements, and Pharisaic pride ; 
 and though it be more common to repre- 
 sent the sensible decay of godliness as 
 commencing a century later, to me it seems 
 already begun. The surviving effects, 
 however, of the first Effusion of the Spirit, 
 and also the effects of some rich additional 
 communications of the same Spirit, will 
 appear in the third century. 
 
 M 2 
 
138 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY III. 
 
 CHAPTER I, 
 
 IREN^US. 
 
 Before we proceed with the orderly 
 coxirse of events in this century, it may 
 be convenient to continue the account of 
 authors who properly belonged to the last, 
 though they survived the conclusion of it. 
 We meet with four celebrated cliaracters 
 of this description ; Irenaeus, TertuUian, 
 Pantaenus, and Clement of Alexandria. 
 
 Of Irenffius it were to be wished that we 
 had a more copious account : The place 
 of his birth is quite uncertain. His name, 
 however, points him out to be a Grecian. 
 His instructors in Christianity were Pa- 
 pias, bishop of Hierapolis, and the re- 
 nowned Polycarp. The former is gen- 
 erally allowed to have been a man of real 
 sanctity, but of slender capacity. He, as 
 well as Polycarp, had been a disciple of 
 St. John ; and with all the imbecility of 
 judgment which is ascribed to him, 
 might, under God, have been of signal 
 service to Irenceus. The instructions of 
 Polycarp, however, seem to have made 
 the deepest impressions on his mind from 
 early liie. 
 
 The church of Lyons, we have seen, 
 was a daughter of the church of Smyrna, 
 or of the other neighbouring churches. 
 Pothinus, the bishop, must have been a 
 Greek as well as Irenasus ; who, as pres- 
 byter, assisted the venerable prelate in 
 
 A D 169 ^^^ °^^ ^S^' After the death 
 'of Pothinus, about the j^ear 
 169, Irenaeus succeeded him. Never was 
 any pastor more severely tried by a tem- 
 pestuous scene. Violent persecution with- 
 out, and subtile heresies within, called 
 for the exertion, at once, of consummate 
 dexterity and of magnanimous resolution. 
 Irenseus was favoured with a large mea- 
 sure of both ; and he weathered out the 
 storm. But heresy proved a more con- 
 stant enemy than persecution. The mul- 
 tiplication of it, in endless refinements, 
 induced him to write his book against 
 heresies, which must have been at that 
 time a very seasonable work. His vigour 
 and charity also in settling the insignifi- 
 cant disputes about Easter, as well as 
 his share in writing the account of the 
 
 martyrdoms of Lyons, have already been 
 mentioned. 
 
 The beginning of the third century was 
 marked with the persecution under Septi- 
 mus Severus, the successor of Julian. 
 Severus himself had, most probably, di- 
 rected the persecution at Lyons, in which 
 Pothinus suffered ; and when he began 
 to perscute as emperor, he would naturally 
 recall the idea of Lyons, and of the per- 
 secution in which he had had so large a 
 share. Gregory of Tours, and the ancient 
 martyrologists inform us, " that after se- 
 veral torments Irenaeus was put to death, 
 and together with hini almost all the 
 Christians of that populous city, whose 
 numbers could not be reckoned, so that 
 the streets of Lyons flowed with the blood 
 of Christians." We may easily allow 
 that this is a rhetorical exaggeration. Yet 
 I see no reason with some to deny alto- 
 gether the truth of this second persecu- 
 tion at Lyons, or of Irenaeus suffering 
 martyrdom under it. Gregory of Tours 
 is not the best authority, l)ut there is no 
 circumstance of improbability here. The 
 silence of Eusebius affords no argument 
 to the contrary, because he is far from 
 relating the deaths of all celebrated Chris- 
 tians. Of those in the West particularly, 
 he is by no means copious in his narra- 
 tive ; and the natural cruelty of Severus, 
 added to his former connexion with Lyons, 
 gives to the fact a strong degree of credi- 
 bility. 
 
 The labours of Irenaeus in Gaul were 
 doubtless of the most solid utility. Nor 
 is it a small instance of the humility and 
 charity of this great man, — accurately 
 versed as he was in Grecian literature, — 
 that he took pains to learn the barbarous 
 dialect of Gaul, conformed himself to the 
 rustic manners of an illiterate people, and 
 renounced the politeness and elegant traits 
 of his own country, for the love of souls ! 
 Rare fruit of Christian charity ! and high- 
 ly worthy the attention of pastors in an 
 age like this, in which so many imder- 
 take to preach Christianity ; and yet seem 
 little desirous of distinguishing them- 
 selves in what peculiarly belongs to their 
 office ! 
 
 His book of heresies is nearly the 
 whole of his writings that have escaped 
 
Cest. III.] 
 
 IREX-EUS. 
 
 139 
 
 the injuries of time. His assiduity and 
 penetration are equally remarkable in an- 
 alyzing and dissecting- all the fanciful 
 schemes with which heretics had dis- 
 graced the Christian name. It is easy 
 to notice that his views of the Gospel are 
 of the same cast as those of Justin,* whom 
 he quotes, and with whose works he ap- 
 pears to have been acquainted. Like him 
 he is silent, or nearly so, on the election 
 of grace ; which from the instructors of 
 his early age he must often have heard : 
 And, like him, he defends the Arminian 
 notion of free-will ; and by similar argu- 
 ments. f His philosophy seems to have 
 had its usual influence on the mind, — in 
 darkening some truths of Scripture, and 
 in mixing the doctrine of Christ with hu- 
 man inventions. 
 
 There is not much of pathetic, practi- 
 cal, or experimental religion in the work. 
 The plan of the author, which led him to 
 keep up a constant attention to specula- 
 tive errors, afforded it no opportunities or 
 incitements. Yet, there is every where 
 so serious and grave a spirit, and now and 
 then such displays of godliness, as show 
 him very capable of writing what might 
 have been singularly useful to the Church 
 in all ages. 
 
 He makes a strong use of the aro-u- 
 ment ot tradition in support of the apos- 
 tolical doctrine against the novel heresies. 
 His acquaintance with primitive Chris- 
 tians justified him in pressing this argu- 
 ment. The force of it, in a certain de- 
 gree, is obvious, though the papists have 
 perverted his declarations in favour of 
 their own church. But what may not 
 men pervert and abuse ? The reasonable 
 use of tradition, as a collateral proof of 
 Christian doctrines, is not hence invali- 
 dated. What he observes here concern- 
 ino- the barbarous nations is remarkable.! 
 — " If there were any doubt concerning 
 the least article, — ought we not to have 
 recourse to the most ancient churches 
 where the Apostles lived ? What — if the 
 Apostles had left us no writings what- 
 ever] Ought we not to follow the tra- 
 dition which they left with those to whom 
 they committed the care of the churches ? 
 It is what several barbarous nations do, 
 who believe in Jesus without paper or 
 
 * B. 4. C. 14. 
 
 f B. 4. C. 72. — Quia in nobis sit, seems 
 equivalent to Justin's uunl^Ttx. 
 
 4: B. 3. C. 4.— See Fleury's Church History 
 on the subject of the Works of the Fatliers, 
 Vol. l.B.4. 
 
 ink, having the doctrine of salvation 
 written on their hearts by the Holy 
 Ghost, and faithfully keeping up to an- 
 cient tradition concerning one God the 
 Creator and his Son Jesus Christ. Those, 
 who have received this faith without 
 Scripture, are barbarians as to their man- 
 ner of speaking, compared with us ; but 
 as to their sentiments and behaviour, they 
 are very wise and very acceptable to God; 
 and they persevere in the practice of jus- 
 tice and charity. And if any one should 
 preach to them in their language, what 
 the heretics have invented, they would 
 immediately stop their ears and flee afar 
 otT, and would not even hear those blas- 
 phemies." 
 
 Thus it appears, that to the illiterate 
 barbarians, tradition, though a poor sub- 
 stitute, supplied the place of the written 
 word. We may not, however, suppose 
 tliat their faith was blind and implicit. 
 Our author gives a strong testimony to 
 their godliness ; and those of them who 
 were taught indeed of God would have 
 in themselves the strongest and most rea- 
 sonable of all proofs of the divinity of 
 their religion. — ^This is a valuable evi- 
 dence of the Holy Spirit's influences, and 
 of the native energy of divine truth on 
 the hearts and lives of very illiterate men. 
 
 There is no new thing under the sun : 
 — The artifices of the Valentinians in al- 
 luring men to their communion are speci- 
 mens of the wiles of heretics in all ages. 
 — " In public," says Irenasus,* " they 
 use alluring discourses, because of the 
 common Christians, as they call those 
 who wear the Christian name in general; 
 and to entice them to come often, they 
 pretend to preach like us : and they com- 
 plain that, though their doctrine be the 
 same as ours, we abstain from their com- 
 munion, and call them heretics. When 
 they have seduced any persons from the 
 faith by their disputes, and made them 
 willing to comply, th^y then begin to 
 open their heretical mysteries." 
 
 He doubtless agrees with all the primi- 
 tive Christians in the doctrine of the Tri- 
 nity : He makes use of the forty-fifth 
 Psalm particularly to prove the Deity of 
 Jesus Christ. He is no less clear and 
 sound in his views of the incarnation : j- 
 and, in general, notwithstanding some 
 philosophical adulterations, he certainly 
 maintained all the essentials of the Gos- 
 pel. 
 
 * B. 3. C. 15. 
 
 t C. 6. B. v. 15. 
 
140 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chaf. I. 
 
 The use of the mystic union between 
 the Godhead and manhood of Christ in 
 the work of redemption; and, in general, 
 the doctrine of the fall and of the reco- 
 very, are scarcely held out more instruc- 
 tively by any writer of antiquity. The 
 learned reader, who has a taste for what 
 is peculiarly Christian, will not be dis- 
 pleased to see a few quotations.* 
 
 " He united man to God : For if man 
 had not overcome the adversary of man, 
 the enemy could not, according to the 
 plan of God's justice, have been eifectu- 
 ally overcome. — And again, if God had 
 not granted salvation, we should not have 
 been put into firm possession of it ; and 
 if man had not been united to God, he 
 could not have been a partaker of immor- 
 tality. It behooved then the mediator be- 
 tween God and man, by his affinity with 
 both, to bring both into agreement with 
 each other." 
 
 "Thef Word of God, all powerful and 
 perfect in righteousness, justly set him- 
 self against the apostasy, redeeming his 
 own property from Satan, who had borne 
 rule over us from the beginning, and had 
 insatiably made rapine of what was not 
 his own ; — and this redemption was ef- 
 fected not by violence ; but the Lord re- 
 deemed us with his own blood, and gave 
 his life for our life, and his flesh for our 
 flesh, and so effected our salvation." 
 
 He beautifully expresses our recovery 
 in Christ.+ " Our Lord would not have 
 gathered together these things to him- 
 self, and have saved through himself in 
 the end what had perished in the begin- 
 ning through Adam, if he had not actu- 
 ally been made flesh and blood. He, 
 therefore, had flesh and blood, not of a 
 kind different from what men have ; but 
 he gathered into himself the very origi- 
 nal creation of the Father, and sought 
 that which was lost."§ 
 
 Undoubtedly the intelligent scriptural 
 reader will recollect the divine reasoning 
 of the author to the Hebrews to be very 
 similar to all this. And those, who see 
 how well the views of Irena3us are sup- 
 ported by him, will know how to judge 
 of the opinions of those who call this 
 scholastic theology, will see also how ac- 
 curately the primitive fathers understood 
 and maintained the doctrines now deemed 
 
 fanatical ; and lastly, will observe the 
 propriety of being zealous for Christian 
 peculiarities. — Another short extract shall 
 conclude this account of the book of he- 
 resies. 
 
 "The Word of God, Jesus Christ, on 
 account of his immense love, became what 
 we are, that he might make us what he 
 
 IS 
 
 "* 
 
 •B. 3. 20. j-L. 5. C. 1. 
 
 ^ Avaztfaxcjittirif, Eph. i. 10. — See Dr. Ow- 
 en's Preface to his " XfisoMyia." 
 § B. 5. C.14. 
 
 Of the few fragments of this author, 
 there is nothing that seems to deserve any 
 peculiar attention, except that of an epis- 
 tle to Florinus, whom he had known in 
 early life, and of whom he had hoped 
 better things than those into which he 
 was afterwards seduced. " These doc- 
 trines," says he, " those who were pres- 
 byters before us, — those who had walked, 
 with the Apostles, did not deliver to you. 
 For I saw you, when I was a boy, in the 
 lower Asia, with Poly carp ; and you were 
 then, though a person of rank in the em- 
 peror's service, very desirous of being 
 approved by him. I choose rather to 
 mention things that happened at that time 
 than facts of a later date. The instructions 
 of our childhood grow with our growth, 
 and adhere to us most closely, so that I 
 can describe the very spot in which Poly- 
 carp sat and expounded, and his coming 
 in and going out, and the very manner of 
 his life, and the figure of his body, and 
 the sermons which he preached to the 
 multitude, and how he related to us his 
 converse with John, and with the rest of 
 those who had seen the Lord, how he men- 
 tioned their particular expressions, and 
 what things he had heard from them of the 
 Lord, and of his miracles and of his doc- 
 trine. As Polycarp had received from 
 the eye-witnesses of the Word of Life, 
 he told us as all things agreeable to the 
 Scriptures. These things, then, through 
 the mercy of God visiting me, I heard 
 with seriousness ; I wrote them not on 
 paper, but on my heart ; and ever since, 
 through the grace of God, I retain a genu- 
 ine remembrance of them, and I can wit- 
 ness before God, that if that blessed apos- 
 tolical Presbyter had heard some of the 
 doctrines which are now maintained, he 
 would have cried out, and stopped his ears, 
 and in his usual manner have said, ' O 
 good God, to what times hast thou reserved 
 me, that I should endure these things !' 
 And he would immediately have fled from 
 the place in which he had heard such 
 doctrines." 
 
 * Book 5. Preface. 
 
Cist. III.] 
 
 TERTULLIAN. 
 
 141 
 
 How superficially, in this age, which] 
 calls itself enlightened, numbers are con-j 
 tent to think on religious matters, appears 
 from the satisfaction with which two con- 
 fused lines of a certain author, great in-^ 
 deed as a poet, but very ill-informed in 
 religion, are constantly quoted : 
 
 For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight ; 
 His can't be wrong, whose life is in the right. 
 
 Proud and self-sufficient men, to whom 
 these lines appear full of oracular wis- 
 dom, may, if they please, pronounce Ire- 
 naeus a " graceless zealot." But those 
 in every age, to whom evangelical truth 
 appears of real importance, will regret 
 that so little of this zeal, " in earnestly 
 
 CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH WHICH WAS 
 ONCE DELIVERED TO THE SAINTS," disCOVerS 
 
 itself in our times : — They will regret, I 
 say, this want of zeal, because they think 
 it absolutely necessary to preserve prac- 
 tical as well as theoretical Christianity 
 in the world. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 TERTULLIAN. 
 
 We have not yet had any occasion to 
 take notice of the state of Christianity in 
 the Roman province of Africa. This 
 whole reo-ion, once the scene of Carthage- 
 nian greatness, abounded with Christians 
 in the second century, though of the man- 
 ner of the introduction of the Gospel, and 
 of the proceedings of its first planters we 
 have no account. In the latter part of 
 the second, and in the former part of the 
 third century, there flourished at Carthage 
 the famous TertuUian, the first Latin wri- 
 ter of the Church, whose works are come 
 down to us. Yet, were it not for some 
 light which he throws on the state of 
 Christianity in his own times, he would 
 scarcely deserve to be distinctly noticed. 
 I have seldom seen so large a collection 
 of tracts, all professedly on Christian sub- 
 jects, containing so little matter of useful! 
 instruction. The very first tract in thei 
 volume, namely, that de Pallio, shows; 
 the littleness of his views. The dress of 
 the Roman Toga oflfended him : He ex- 
 horted Christians to wear the Pallium, 
 a more vulgar and rustic kind of garment, 
 and therefore more becoming their re- 
 ligion. All his writings betray the same 
 sour, monastic, harsh, and severe turn of 
 mind. — " *Touch not, taste not, handle 
 
 * Coloss. xi. 
 
 not," might seem to have heen the maxims 
 of his religious conduct. The Apostle 
 Paul, in the chapter alluded to, warns 
 Christians against "will-worship and vo- 
 luntary humility," and shows that while 
 the flesh outwardly appears to be hum- 
 bled, it is inwardly puflTed up by these 
 things, and induced to forsake the Head, 
 Christ Jesus. This subtile spirit of self- 
 righteousness may, in all likelihood, in 
 Tertullian's time, have very much over- 
 spread the African church ; — otherwise, 
 his writings would scarcely have rendered 
 him so celebrated amongst them. 
 
 All his religious ideas seem tinged 
 deeply with the same train of thinking : 
 his treatise of Repentance is meagre and 
 dismal throughout ; and while it enlarges 
 on outward things, and recommends pros- 
 tration of our bodies before the priests, is 
 very slight on the essential spirit of re- 
 pentance itself. 
 
 A Christian soldier, who had refused 
 to wear a crown of laurel which his com- 
 mander had given him with the rest of 
 his regiment, was punished for the diso- 
 bedience, and was also blamed by the 
 Christians of those times, because his 
 conduct had a tendency to irritate need- 
 lessly the reigning powers. I am apt to 
 think that he might have worn it as in- 
 nocently as St. Paul committed himself 
 to a ship whose sign was Castor and Pol- 
 lux. It was a military ornament merely, 
 and could no more be said to have any 
 connexion with idolatry than almost every 
 custom of civil life must have had at that 
 time. The Apostle, I think, would have 
 concurred in disapproving the soldier's 
 want of obedience to his lawful superiors ; 
 and he might have referred Christians to 
 his own determination in the case of eat- 
 ing things sacrificed to idols. — "Eat of 
 such things as they set before you, asking 
 no questions, for conscience' sake." But 
 TertuUian decides on the other side of 
 the question, and applauds the disobedi- 
 ence of the soldier. His reasons are dis- 
 honourable to his understanding. He 
 owns that there is no scripture to be 
 found against compliance in this case. 
 Tradition, he. thinks, a sufficient reason 
 for contumacy ; and then he proceeds to 
 relate some traditional customs main- 
 tained in the African churches, among 
 which the very frequent signing of them- 
 selves with the sign of the cross is one. 
 
 Superstition, it seems, had made deep 
 inroads into Africa. It was rather an 
 unpolished region; — certainly much in- 
 
142 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 ferior to Italy in point of civilization. 
 Satan's temptations are suited to tem- 
 pers and situations. But surely it was 
 not by superstitious practices that the 
 glad tidings of salvation had been first 
 introduced into Africa. — There must have 
 been a deep decline. — One of the strongest 
 proofs that the comparative value of the 
 Christian religion in different countries is 
 not to be estimated by their distance from 
 the apostolic age, is deducible from the 
 times of Tertullian. — If my life be spared, 
 that I may proceed with this History, we 
 shall see Africa exhibit a much more 
 pleasing spectacle. 
 
 All this man's casuistical determina- 
 tions savour of the same asperity. He 
 approved not of flight in persecution, — 
 in direct contradiction to our Saviour's 
 determination.* He takes notice of a 
 martyr named Rutilius ; who, having fled 
 several times from place to place to avoid 
 persecution and save himself by money, 
 was suddenly seized, and carried before 
 tlie Governor, when he thought himself 
 secure. He adds, that having undergone 
 several previous torments, he finished 
 his martyrdom by fire. 
 
 I would much rather quote Tertullian 
 as an historian than a reasoner. — We 
 may make useful reflections on this fact, 
 without concerning ourselves with the 
 inferences of the writer. 
 
 He disapproved also, — at least after 
 his separation from the Church, — of se- 
 cond marriages, and called them adul- 
 tery. For as he does not appear to have 
 been much acquainted with the depravi- 
 ty, misery, and imbecility of human na- 
 ture, most of his precepts carry rather a 
 stoical than a Christian appearance. He 
 was, in his own disposition, doubtless a 
 man of great natural fortitude; and most 
 probably of great strength of body : He 
 lived to an advanced age. — He seems not 
 to have had any thing of that sympathy 
 with the weak and timid, which forms so 
 beautiful a part of the Christian charac- 
 ter. The Church in general was not se 
 vere enough, according to his ideas of 
 discipline; yet, it must be confessed, they 
 were by no means wanting in that re 
 spect. In our licentious times, when 
 sloth and dissipation, — the very opposite 
 extremes to those which pleased the ge- 
 nius of Tertullian, — abound, all, who 
 love the ways of Christ, regret that dis- 
 cipline is at so low an ebb. 
 
 * Matthew x. 23. 
 
 The Montanists, whose austerities were 
 extreme, and whose enthusiasm was real, 
 seduced at length our severe African; 
 and he not only joined them, but wrote 
 in their defence, and treated the body of 
 Christians, from whom he separated, with 
 much contempt. — I have the satisfaction 
 however, as yet, to find that the largest 
 body of Christians, so called, was the 
 soundest. 
 
 Tertullian, we are told, resented cer- 
 tain treatment which he met with from 
 some Roman Christians. But of this I 
 know no particulars ; only, that an acci- 
 dent of this sort is said to have influenc- 
 ed his secession from the Church. Er- 
 ror, however, is very inconstant: He 
 afterwards left the Montanists either en- 
 tirely, or nearly so ; and formed a sect of 
 his own, called Tertullianists, who con- 
 tinued in Africa till Augustine's time, by 
 whose labours their existence, as a dis- 
 tinct body, was brought to a close. The 
 character of Tertullian is very strongly 
 delineated by himself in his own writings; 
 if there had been any thing peculiarly 
 Christian, which he had learnt from the 
 Montanists, his works must have shown 
 it ; but they are all of the same uniformly 
 sable complexion : nor does he seem to 
 have increased in any thing but in seve- 
 rity. 
 
 It is but an unpleasing picture which 
 truth has obliofed me to draw of this au- 
 thor. One agreeable circumstance, how- 
 ever, attending his history, is this: — It 
 was not on account of any fundamental 
 error in principle, that he left the Church. 
 The faith of Christ, and the practice of real 
 godliness, existed there, beyond doubt, to 
 a much greater degree than amongst the 
 heretics of those times, though it be al- 
 lowed and hoped, as it ought to be, that 
 some good persons might belong to them. 
 The abilities of Tertullian, as an orator 
 and a scholar, are far from being con- 
 temptible ; and have, doubtless, given 
 him a reputation to which he is by no 
 means entitled on account of his theolo- 
 gical knowledge. Yet the man appears 
 always serious and earnest; and there- 
 fore, much more estimable than thou- 
 sands who would take a pleasure in de- 
 spising him, while they themselves are 
 covered with profaneness. Nor is it for 
 us, after all, to condemn a person, who 
 certainly honoured Christ, defended seve- 
 ral fundamental Christian doctrines, took 
 large pains in supporting what he took 
 to be true religion, and ever meant to 
 
Cbjtt. III.] 
 
 TERTULLIAN. 
 
 143 
 
 TertuUian 
 
 asjainst 
 
 Praxeas. 
 
 serve God. He might even in his latter 
 days, if not before, be favoured with ihat 
 humbling and transforming knowledge of 
 Christ which would fit him for the en- 
 joyment of the kingdom of heaven. — Su- 
 perstition and enthusiasm are compatible 
 with real godliness: profaneness is not 
 so. — It were to be wished, that those, 
 who are most concerned in this remark, 
 were more disposed to attend to it than 
 they generally are. 
 
 In his treatise against Praxeas, he ap- 
 pears to have had very clear and sound 
 views of the doctrine of the Trinity. He 
 speaks of the Trinity in Uni- 
 ty, "Father, Son, and Holy 
 Ghost, yet one God." He 
 speaks of the Lord Jesus as 
 both God and man, son of man and son 
 of God, and called Jesus Christ. He 
 speaks also of the Holy Spirit, the com- 
 forter, the sanctifier of the faith of those 
 who believe in the Father, Son, and Ho- 
 ly Spirit. He observes, "that this rule 
 of faith had obtained from the beginning 
 of the Gospel, antecedent to any former 
 heretics, much more to Praxeas, who 
 was of yesterday." To those who know 
 the primitive times I need not say, that 
 TertuUian's own heresy lessens not the 
 credibility of his testimony to these things. 
 His Montanism altered not in the least 
 his views of the Trinity. 
 
 The heresy of Praxeas consisted in 
 making the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, 
 all one and the same : and this notion is 
 no other than what has since been better 
 known by the name of Sabellianism. In 
 this way the distinction of persons in the 
 Godhead is denied ; and no doubt the 
 mystery of the Trinity removed ; but then 
 what becomes of the divine Revelation 
 itself? — All attempts to subvert the faith 
 of Scripture on this subject, labour under 
 the same error, namely, a desire to ac- 
 commodate divine truths to our narrow 
 reasoning faculties : — let men learn to 
 submit; and on no account attempt to 
 strip the almighty of his attribute of In- 
 comprehensibility : TertuUian informs us 
 that Praxeas first brought this evil from 
 Asia into the Roman world ; and that he 
 seduced many; but at last was confuted 
 and silenced by " an instrument* whom 
 God pleased to make use of: — and the 
 evil appeared to be eradicated." Even 
 Praxeas himself had the ingfenuousness 
 
 Tertul- 
 lian's 
 
 Apology. 
 
 * A modest periphrasis, I apprehend, de- 
 notinsr TertuUiaa himself. 
 
 to retract his mistake, and his hand-writ- 
 ing still remains among the natural men 
 — so TertuUian calls the Christians ia 
 general from whom he had separated ;— 
 and he no more revived his heresy. 
 (3thers revived it afterward, which occa- 
 sioned the treatise from which I have ex- 
 tracted this brief account. 
 
 In his Apology, the eloquence and ar- 
 gumentative powers of our author appear 
 most conspicuous. He refutes, in the 
 usual manner, the stale heath- 
 en calumnies of Christians 
 feeding on infants. Their re- 
 markable power over demons 
 he states in the same manner as various 
 of the fathers have done. — As a proof of 
 the unity of the Godhead, he appeals to 
 the consciences of mankind, and to a 
 common practice, even among idolaters, 
 founded on the supposition of one God. 
 His description is remarkably striking— 
 " What God hath given," " God sees it," 
 and "I recommend to God," and "God 
 will restore to me ;" "These," says he, 
 "are universal modes of speaking and of 
 appealing to the one supreme. O testi- 
 mony of the soul, naturally in favour of 
 Christianity! — When men seriously pro- 
 nounce these words, they look not to the 
 Capitol at Rome, but to heaven above. 
 For the soul knows the seat of the living 
 God, whence it had its own origin." — -I 
 scarcely remember a finer observation 
 made by any author in favour both of the 
 natural voice of conscience and of the 
 patriarchal tradition of true religion ; for 
 both may fairly be supposed concerned 
 in the support of this practice. It shows 
 how difficult it was for Satan to eradicate 
 entirely every vestige of truth ; and every 
 classical reader may observe how com- 
 mon it is for the Pagan writers to speak 
 of God as one, when they are most seri- 
 ous ; and instantly to slide into the vul- 
 gar polj'theism, when they begin to trifle. 
 This Apology exhibits a beautiful view 
 of the manners and spirit of the Chris- 
 tians of his time; and shows what real 
 Christianity does for men. — ^The follow- 
 ing passages merit particular attention.— 
 " We pray," says he, " for the safety of 
 the em])erors to the eternal God, the true, 
 the living God, whom emperors them- 
 selves would desire to he propitious to 
 them above all others who are called 
 gods. We, looking up to heaven, with 
 outstretched hands because they are 
 harmless, with naked heads because we 
 are not ashamed, without a prompter be- 
 
144 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 cause we pray from the heart, constantly 
 pray for all emperors, that they may have 
 a long life, a secure empire, a safe pa- 
 lace, strong armies, a faithful senate, a 
 well-moralized people, a quiet state of the 
 world, — whatever Caesar would wish for 
 himself in his public and private capacity. 
 I cannot solicit these things from any 
 Whet than from Him from whom, I know , 
 I shall obtain them, because he alone can 
 do these things, and I am he who may 
 expect them of him, being his servant 
 who worship him alone, and am ready to 
 lose my life for his service. Thus then 
 let the claws of wild beasts pierce us, or 
 their feet trample on us, while our hands 
 are stretched out to God : let crosses sus- 
 pend us, let fires consume us, let swords 
 pierce our breasts, — a praying Christian 
 is in a frame for enduring anything. How 
 jg this — ye generous rulers ? — Will ye 
 kill the good subject who supplicates God 
 for the emperor 1 We^e we disposed to 
 return evil for evil, it were easy for us to 
 revenge the injuries which we sustain. 
 But God forbid that his people should 
 vindicate themselves by human fire; or 
 be reluctant to endure that by which their 
 sincerity is evinced. Were we disposed 
 to act the part, I will not say of secret as- 
 sassins, but of open enemies, should we 
 want forces and numbers 1 Are there not 
 multitudes of us in every part of the 
 world ? It is true we are but of yesterday, 
 anc;! yet we have filled all your towns, 
 cities, islands, castles, boroughs, coun- 
 sels, camps, courts, palaces, senate, fo- 
 rum: — We leave you only your tem- 
 ples. — For what war should we not be 
 ready and well prepared, even though 
 unequal in numbers ; we, — who die with 
 so much pleasure, were it not that our re- 
 ligion requires us rather to suffer death 
 tkin to inflict it? — If we were to make a 
 general secession from your dominions, 
 you would be astonished at your soli- 
 tude. — We are dead to all ideas of world- 
 ly honour and dignity : nothing is more 
 foreign to us than political concerns : The 
 whole world is our republic. — We are a 
 body united in one bond of religion, dis- 
 cipline, and hope. We meet in our as- 
 semblies for prayer. We are compelled 
 to have recourse to the divine oracles for 
 caution and recollection on all occasions. 
 We nourish our faith by the word of God, 
 we erect our hope, we fix our confidence, 
 we strengthen our discipline, by repeat- 
 edly inculcating precepts, exhortations, 
 corrections, and by excommunication. 
 
 when it is needful. This last, as being 
 in the sight of God, is of great weight; 
 and is a serious warning of the future 
 judgment, if any one behave in so scanda- 
 lous a manner as to be debarred from holy 
 communion. Those who preside among 
 us, are elderly persons, not distinguished 
 for opulence, but worthiness of character. 
 Every one pays something into the pub- 
 lic chest once a month, or when he 
 pleases, and according to his ability and 
 inclination; for theYe is no compulsion* 
 These gifts are, as it were, the deposites 
 of piety. Hence we relieve and bury the 
 needy, support orphans and decrepit per- 
 sons, those who have suffered shipwreck, 
 and those who, for the word of God, are 
 condemned to the mines, or imprison- 
 ment. This very charity of ours has 
 caused us to be noticed by some ; — see, 
 say they, how these Christians love one 
 another !" 
 
 He afterwards takes notice of the ex- 
 treme readiness with which Christians 
 paid the taxes to the existing government, 
 in opposition to the spirit of fraud and 
 deceit, with which so many acted in these 
 matters. But I must not enlarge ; — the 
 reader may form an idea of the purity, 
 integrity, heavenly-mindedness, and pas- 
 siveness under injuries, for which the 
 first Christians were so justly renowned. 
 The effect of that glorious effusion of the 
 divine Spirit was the production of this 
 meek and charitable conduct in external 
 things : Every evidence that can be de- 
 sired is given to evince the truth of this 
 narrative : — The *confession of enemies 
 unites here with the relations of friends. 
 
 I shall close the account of TertuUian 
 with a few facts taken from his Address 
 to Scapula, the persecuting governor, 
 without any remarks. 
 
 Claudius Herminianus, in Cappadocia, 
 was vexed because his wife was become 
 a servant of Christ, and for that reason 
 he treated the Christians cruelly. — Being 
 eaten with worms, " Let no one," says 
 he, "know it, lest the Christians rejoice." 
 Afterward, convinced of his error in hav- 
 ing, by force of torments, caused persons 
 to abjure Christianity, he died almost a 
 Christian himself. 
 
 At Thistrum, Cincius Severus himself 
 taught Christians how to answer so as to 
 obtain their dismission. 
 
 Asper, having moderately tortured a 
 
 * See the foregoing account of Peregrinus, 
 page 127. 
 
Ceht. hi.] 
 
 PANTiENUS. 
 
 145 
 
 person and brought him to submit, would 
 not compel him to sacrifice ; and he made 
 a public declaration among the advocates, 
 " that he was grieved that he had any 
 thing to do with such a cause." 
 
 The emperor Severus himself was, in 
 one part of his life, kind to the Chris- 
 tians. Proculus, a Christian, had cured 
 him of a disorder by the use of a certain 
 oil ; and he kept him in his palace to his 
 death. This man was well known to 
 Caracalla, the successor of Severus, 
 whose nurse was a Christian. Even 
 some persons of the highest qualit)'-, of 
 both sexes, were openly commended and 
 protected by Severus against the raging 
 populace. 
 
 Arrius Antoninus, in Asia, persecuted 
 so vehemently, that all the Christians of 
 the state presented themselves in a body : 
 He ordered a few of them to be put to 
 death, and dismissed the rest, saying, 
 " If you wish to die, wretched men, ye 
 may find precipices and halters." 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 PANT^NUS. 
 
 One of the most respectable cities 
 within the precincts of the Roman em- 
 pire was Alexandria, the metropolis of 
 Eg\'pt. Here the Gospel had been plant- 
 ed by St. Mark ; and, from the consider- 
 able success which had attended it in 
 most capital towns, it is probable that 
 many persons were converted. But of 
 the first pastors of this Church, and of 
 the work of God among them, we have 
 no account. Our more distinct informa- 
 tion begins with what is evil. The Pla- 
 tonic philosophers ruled the taste of this 
 city, which piqued itself on its superior 
 erudition. Ammonius Saccas had, as we 
 have seen, reduced there the notions of 
 the learned into a system, which pre- 
 tended to embrace all sorts of sentiments ; 
 and his successors, for several ages, fol- 
 lowed his plan. We are told, that from 
 St. Mark's time, a Christian catechetical 
 school was supported in Alexandria. 
 Whether it be so or not, Pantaenus is the 
 first master of it of whom we have any 
 account. It should seem, from a passage 
 of Eusebius,* that he was a Hebrew by 
 desceftt. By tradition he had received 
 the true doctrine from Peter, James, John, 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 B. 
 
 5. C. 
 
 N 
 
 10, 
 
 and Paul ; and, no doubt, he deserved this 
 testimony of Eusebius, notwithstanding 
 the unhappy mixture of philosophy which 
 he imbibed in this region. For Pantae- 
 nus was much addicted to the sect of the 
 Stoics, a sort of romantic pretenders to 
 perfection, which doctrine flattered human 
 pride, but was, surely, ill adapted to our 
 natural imbecility, and to scriptural views 
 of innate depravity. The combination of 
 Stoicism with Christianity in the system 
 of Pantcenus must have very much de- 
 based the sacred truths; and we may be 
 assured that those who were disposed to 
 follow implicitly the dictates of such an 
 instructor, must have been furnished by 
 him with a clouded light of the Gospel ; — 
 still, it is not improbable but that many 
 of the simple and illiterate Christians 
 might happily escape the infection, and 
 preserve, unadulterated, the genuine sim- 
 plicity of the faith of Christ : — The bait 
 of reasoning pride lies more in the way 
 of the learned ; and, in all ages, they are 
 more prone to be caught by it. 
 
 Panta?nns always retained the title of 
 The Stoic Philosopher, after he had been 
 admitted to eminent employments in the 
 Christian church.* For ten years he la- 
 boriously discharged the office of Cate- 
 chist, and freely taught all that desired 
 him: whereas the school of his predeces- 
 sors had been more private. 
 
 Certain Indian ambassadors, — it is not 
 easy to determine from what part of India 
 they came, — intreated Demetrius, then 
 bishop of Alexandria, to send them some 
 worthy person to preach the faith of Je- 
 sus in their country. Pantaenus was 
 chosen ; and the hardships he must have 
 endured, were, doubtless, great. But 
 there were at that timef many Evangel- 
 ists, who had the apostolical spirit to pro- 
 pagate the faith;at the hazard of their lives. 
 And, as Pantaenus very freely complied 
 with this call, we have here one of the 
 best proofs of his being possessed of the 
 spirit of the Gospel. His labours among 
 ignorant Indians, where neither fame, nor 
 ease, nor profit, were attainable, appear 
 to me much more substantial proofs of his 
 godliness, than any which can be drawn 
 from his catechetical employments at 
 Alexandria. The former would oblio-e 
 him to attend chiefly to Christian funda- 
 mentals, and could afford little opportu- 
 nity of indulging the philosophic spirit. 
 
 * Cave's Life of Pantaenus. 
 t Euseb. B. 5. C. 9. 
 
146 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 We are told he found in India the Gospel 
 of St. Matthew, which had been carried 
 thither by the Apostle Bartholomew, who 
 had first preached amongst them. — I men- 
 tion this,'but much doubt the truth of it. — 
 Of the particular success of his labours 
 we have no account : He lived to return 
 to Alexandria, and resumed his catecheti- 
 cal office. He died not long after the 
 commencement of the third century. He 
 wrote but little : Some commentaries on 
 the Scriptures are all that are mentioned 
 as his, and of them not a fragment re- 
 mains. 
 » Candour, I think, requires us to look 
 on him as a sincere Christian, — whose 
 fruitfulness was yet much checked by 
 that very philosophy for which Eusebius 
 so highly commends him. — A blasting 
 wind it surely was ; but it did not entirely 
 destroy Christian vegetation in all whom it 
 infected. — Let us now turn our eyes to his 
 disciple from whom we may collect more 
 clearly what the master was, because we 
 have more evidence concerning him. — 
 But the Christian reader must be prepared 
 to expect a declension in divine things, 
 in the state of the Church before us. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CLEMENS ALEXANDRINUS. 
 
 He was, by his own confession, a scho- 
 lar of PantiEUUS, and of the same philo- 
 sophical cast of mind. He was of the 
 eclectic sect. It is sincerely to be regret- 
 ted that Clemens had any acquaintance 
 with them ; for so far as he mixed their 
 notions with Christianity, so far he tar- 
 nished it: and though we may admit, 
 that by his zeal, activity, learning, and 
 reputation, he did good to many in in- 
 structing and inducing them to receive 
 the fundamentals of the divine religion, 
 it is nevertheless not to be denied that he 
 clouded the pure light of the Gospel : — 
 Let us hear himself: " *I espouse neither 
 this nor that philosophy, neither the Stoic 
 nor the Platonic, nor the Epicurean, nor 
 that of Aristotle; but whatever any of 
 these sects hath said, that is fit and just ; 
 whatever teaches righteousness with a 
 divine and religious knowledge, all this 
 I select; and call it philosophy." 
 
 Is it not hence very evident, that from 
 tlie time that this philosophizing spirit had 
 entered into the Church through Justin, it 
 
 ♦ Strom. L. i. See Cave's Life of Clemens, 
 
 had procured to itself a respect to which 
 its merits no way entitled it 1 For what 
 is there even of good ethics in all the 
 philosophers, which 'Clemens might not 
 have learnt in the New Testament ; and 
 much more perfectly, and without the dan- 
 ger of pernicious adulterations 1 Doubt- 
 less many valuable purposes are an- 
 swered by an acquaintance with these 
 writers ; — but to dictate to us in religion, 
 Clemens should have known, was no part 
 of THEIR business. — " The Avorld by wis- 
 dom knew not God ;" — " Beware of phi- 
 losophy." The Christian world was now 
 gradually learning to neglect these Scrip- 
 tural cautions, and divine knowledge is 
 certainly much too high a term for any 
 human doctrine whatever. 
 
 He succeeded his master Panta;nus in 
 the catechetical school, and under him 
 were bred the famous Origen, Alexander 
 bishop of Jerusalem, and other eminent 
 men. I read the following passage of 
 Clemens with no pleasure, — "As the hus- 
 bandman first waters the soil, and then 
 casts in his seed, so the notions which I 
 derive out of the writings of the Gentiles 
 serve first to water and soften the earthy 
 parts of the soul, that the spiritual seed 
 may be the better cast in, and take vital 
 root in the minds of men." 
 
 This, certainly, is not a Christian dia- 
 lect : The Apostles neither placed Gen- 
 tile philosophy in the foundation, nor be- 
 lieved that it would at all assist in raising 
 the superstructure of C hristianity . O n the 
 contrary, they looked on the philosophi- 
 cal religion of their own times, as so much 
 rubbish ; but, in all ages, the blandish- 
 ments of mere reason on such subjects 
 deceive us ; — " vain man would be wise." 
 Besides his employments in the office 
 of Catechist, he was made Presbyter in the 
 Church of Alexandria. During the per- 
 secution under Severus, most probably 
 he visited the East, and had a peculiar 
 intimacy with Alexander bishop of Jeru- 
 salem, who seems to have been a holy 
 man. This last suffered imprisonment 
 for the faith ; and in that situation he wrote 
 a letter to the Church of Antioch, which 
 was conveyed by Clemens. Something 
 of the spirit of Christianity appears in 
 the fragment of this letter. " Alexander, 
 a servant of God, and a prisoner of Jesus 
 Christ, to the blessed Church at Antioch, 
 in the Lord, greeting. Our Lord has made 
 my bonds, in this time of my imprison- 
 ment, light and easy to me; while I un- 
 Iderstood that Asclepiades, a person ad- 
 
Cest. III.] 
 
 CLEMENS ALEXANDRINUS. 
 
 147 
 
 mirably qualified by his eminency in the 
 faith, was, by divine providence, become 
 bishop of your holy Church of Antioch. 
 
 were permitted," says he, " to purchase 
 eternal salvation, what would you not 
 give for if? And now you may obtain it 
 
 These letters, brethren, I have sent to youj byj^ith and love 5— there^j^s nothing; raji 
 by Clemens the blessed Presbyter, a man ^' ^""" " "" """""■""• ' • "^it 
 
 of approved integrity, whom ye both do 
 know already and shall still farther know : 
 He hath been here with us according to the 
 good will of God, and hath much establish- 
 ed and augmented the Church of Christ." 
 From Jerusalem Clemens went to An- 
 tioch, and afterwards returned to his 
 charge at Alexandria. — The time of his 
 death is uncertain. 
 
 The mystic philosophy, to which he 
 ■was so much addicted, would naturally 
 darken his views of some of the most pre- 
 cious truths of the Gospel. In particular, 
 the doctrine of justification by faith in Je- 
 sus Christ will always suflTer from a con- 
 nexion of this kind : Human philosophical 
 doctrines admit no righteousness but what 
 is a man's own. — There is, notwitstand- 
 ing, good proof of the solid piety of this 
 learned man. Little is known of his life ; 
 but his religious taste and spirit may be 
 collected from his writings. 
 
 His Exhortations* to the Gentiles is a 
 discourse written to convert the Pagans 
 from their religion and persuade them to 
 embrace that of Jesus Christ. In the be- 
 ginning of it he shows what a difference 
 there is between the design of Jesus Christ, 
 and that of Orpheus, and of those ancient 
 musicians who were lUe authors of idola^ 
 try. " These captivated men by the sweet 
 ness of their music with a view of rendering 
 them miserable slaves to idols; and of 
 making them like the very beasts, the 
 stocks, the stones, which they adored ;— 
 whereas Jesus Christ, who, from all eter 
 nity, was the Word of God, always had a 
 compassionate tenderness for men, and at 
 last took their nature upon him, to free them 
 from the slavery of Demons, to open the 
 eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf, 
 to guide their paths in the way of righte- 
 ousness, to deliver them from death and 
 hell, and to bestow on them everlasting 
 life, and to put them into a capacity of 
 living a heavenly life here upon earth ; 
 and, lastly, God made himself man to 
 teach man to be like unto God." He 
 shows them, that eternal salvation cannot 
 otherwise be expected, and that eternal 
 torments cannot otherwise be avoided, 
 than by believing in Jesus Christ, and by 
 living conformably to his laws. " If you 
 
 * Du Pia Clement. 
 
 hinder you from acquiring it; — neither 
 poverty, nor misery, nor old age, nor any 
 
 state of life. Believe, therefore, in one 
 God, who is God and man, and receive 
 eternal salvation for a recompense. — Seek 
 God, and ye shall live for ever." 
 
 The candid Christian sees that the 
 fundamentals of the Gospel are actually 
 here, though not laid down in the clearest 
 and happiest manner. *ln his Pedagogue 
 he describes the word incarnate as the 
 instructor of men ; and says " that he per- 
 forms his functions by forgiving our sins 
 as he is God, and by instructing us as he 
 is man, with great sweetness and love : — 
 He equally instructs all sorts, because, 
 in one sense, all are children: yet we 
 must not look on Christian doctrines as 
 childish and contemptible : on the con- 
 trary, the quality of children, which we 
 receive in baptismf — or regeneration, — 
 renders us perfect in the knowledge of 
 divine things, by delivering us from sins 
 through grace, and by enlightening us 
 with the illumination of faith ; so that we 
 are at the same time both children and 
 men ; and the milk with which we are 
 nourished, being both the word and will 
 of God, is very solid and substantial nour- 
 ishment." These appear to be some of 
 his best ideas of Christianity. 
 
 In his Stromata he speaks with his 
 usual partiality in favour of philosophy, 
 and shows the effect which 
 his regard for it had on his Stromata 
 • J u • iU t 01 Clem- 
 
 own mind, by saying that g^g_ 
 
 faith is God's gift, but so as 
 to depend on our own free-will. His ac- 
 count of the perfect Christian, whom he 
 calls Gnosticus, is sullied by stoical 
 rhapsodies. :|: — " He is never angry, and 
 nothing affects him ; because he always 
 loves God : He looks upon that time as 
 lost which he is obliged to spend in re- 
 ceiving nourishment: He is employed in 
 continual and mental prayer. He is mild, 
 affable, patient, but at the same time so 
 
 * Du Pin. 
 
 f The outward sign and the inward spiritual 
 grace, on account of their usual connexion in 
 the primitive church, are used as synonymous 
 by a number of primitive writers, which has, 
 unhappily, given occasion to one of the worst 
 abuses, by those who place all grace in form 
 and ceremony only. 
 
 t Fleury, B. 4. 
 
148 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 rigid as not to be tempted : He gives 
 way neither to pleasure nor to pain." 
 
 But enough of these views: Pseudo- 
 religionists have since his time dealt 
 largely in such reveries, so inconsistent 
 with that humbling sense of imbecility, 
 and that sincere conflict against the sin 
 of our nature, which is peculiarly Chris- 
 tian. In truth — if his knowledge of Chris- 
 tian doctrine was really defective, the 
 dei'ect lay in his view of original sin. 
 Of this HIS philosophical sect knew noth- 
 ing aright; and it must be owned he 
 speaks of it in a very confused, if not in 
 a contradictory manner. On the whole, — 
 such is the baneful effect of mixing things 
 which will not incorporate, — human in- 
 ventions with Christian truths, — that this 
 writer, learned, laborious, and ingenious 
 as he was, may seem to be far exceeded 
 by many obscure and illiterate persons 
 at this day, in true Scriptural knowledge 
 and in the experience of divine things. — 
 That he was, in the main, a truly pious 
 person, neither makes this account less 
 credible, nor the danger less of admitting 
 the pestilent spirit of human self-suffi- 
 ciency to dictate in the Christian religion. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE STATE OF THE CHTIRCH DURING 
 THE REIGNS OF SEVJiRUS AND PARA- 
 CALLA. 
 
 It seemed proper to prefix to the gene- 
 ral history of the third century, the lives 
 of the four persons, which we have re- 
 viewed ; partly because they were studious 
 men not very much connected with the 
 public state of Christianity; and partly 
 because the knowledge of their views 
 and taste in religion may prepare the 
 reader to expect that unhappy mixture of 
 philosophical self-righteousness and su- 
 perstition, which much clouded and de- 
 praved the pure light of the Gospel in this 
 century. 
 
 Severus, though in his younger days 
 a bitter persecutor of Christians at Ly- 
 ons, was yet, through the influence of the 
 kindness which he had re- 
 The 5ih ceived from Proculus, favour- 
 Persecu- ^^^j disposed toward the 
 tion 01 the /-,,■'.• ^ ,. ■ i , ^ 
 
 Christians. Christians for a considerable 
 Bv Seve- time. It was not till about 
 pug the tenth year of his reign, 
 
 A. D. 202. which falls in with the year 
 two hundred and two, that 
 
 his native ferocity of temper brake out 
 afresh, and kindled a very severe perse- 
 cution against the Christians. He was 
 just returned from the East victorious; 
 and the pride of prosperity induced him 
 to forbid the propagation of the Gospel. 
 Christians still thought it right to obey 
 God rather than man. Severus persisted ; 
 and exercised the usual cruelties. The 
 persecution raged every where ; but par- 
 ticularly at Alexandria. From various 
 parts of Egypt the Christians were 
 brought thither to suffer; and they ex- 
 pired in torments. Leonidas, father of 
 the famous Origen, was beheaded ; so 
 easy a death however was esteemed a 
 favour. His son was then very young ; 
 but the account, which is given of him 
 by Eusebius,* deserves our notice. 
 
 Lastus was at that time governor of 
 Alexandria and of the rest of Egypt; and 
 Demetrius had been recently elected bish- 
 op of the Christians in that Account of 
 city. Great numbers now Oi-i°-en. 
 suffering martyrdom, young 
 Origen panted for the honour and need- 
 lessly exposed himself to danger. His 
 mother checked the imprudent zeal at 
 first by earnest entreaties ; but perceiv- 
 ing that he still wes bent on suffering 
 with his father, who at that time was 
 closely confined, she very properly exer- 
 cised her motherly authority by confining 
 him to the house, and by hiding from 
 him all his apparel. Tho vehement spirit 
 of Origen prompted him, when he could 
 do nothing else, to write a letter to his 
 father, in which he thus exhorted him, 
 "Father, faint not, and don't be concern- 
 ed on our account." He had been care- 
 fully trained in the study of the Scrip- 
 tures under the inspection of his pious 
 father, who, together with the study of 
 the liberal arts, had particularly superin- 
 tended this most important part of edu- 
 cation. Before he introduced his son to 
 any material exercises in profane learn- 
 ing, he instructed him in the Scriptures, 
 and gave him daily a certain task out of 
 them to repeat. The penetrating genius 
 of Origen led him, in the course of his 
 employment, to investigate the sense of 
 Scripture, and to ask his father questions 
 beyond his ability to solve. The father 
 checked his curiosity, reminded him of 
 his imbecility, and admonished him to 
 be content with the plain grammatical 
 sense of Scripture, which obviously offered 
 
 * Euseb. B. vi. C. 1. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 UNDER SEVERUS, ETC. 
 
 149 
 
 itself; — but inwardly rejoiced, it seems, 
 that God had given him such a son. And 
 it would not have been amiss, if he had 
 rejoiced with trembling; — perhaps he 
 did so ; and Origen's early loss of such 
 a father, who probably, was more simple 
 in Christian faith and piety than he him- 
 self ever was, might be an extreme dis- 
 advantage to him. Youths of great and 
 uncommon parts, accompanied, as is gene- 
 rally the case, with much ambition and 
 boundless curiosity, have often been 
 the instruments of Satan in perverting 
 divine truth : and it is not so much at- 
 tended to as it ought to be by many truly 
 pious and humble souls, that the superior 
 eminence, in parts and good sense, of 
 young persons whom they love and re- 
 spect, is by no means a prognostic of the 
 like superiority in real spiritual know- 
 ledge and the discernment of divine things. 
 Men of genius, if they meet with encour- 
 agement, will be sure to distinguish 
 themselves in whatever line of life they 
 move. But men of genius and even of 
 very remarkable endowments, though 
 sincere in Christianity, may, not only in 
 the practice, but even in the perception 
 of Gospel-truths, be far outstripped by 
 others who are naturally much their in- 
 feriors; because the latter are by no 
 means so exposed to the crafts of Satan, 
 are not so liable in their judgments to be 
 warped from Christian simplicity, are 
 more apt to look for understanding from 
 above, and are less disposed to lean to 
 an arm of flesh. 
 
 We seem to discover, in the very be- 
 ginning of Origen, the foundation of that 
 presumptuous spirit which led him after- 
 wards to philosophize so dangerously in 
 the Christian religion, and never to con- 
 tent himself with plain truth, but to hunt 
 after something singular and extraordina- 
 ry ; — though it must be acknowledged 
 his sincere desire of serving God appear- 
 ed from early life ; nor does it ever seem 
 to have forsaken him, so that he may be 
 considered as having been a child of God 
 from early years. 
 
 His father dying a martyr, he was left, 
 with his mother and other six children, 
 an orphan aged seventeen years. His 
 father's substance was confiscated by the 
 emperor, and the family reduced to great 
 distress. But Providence gave him a 
 friend in a rich and godly matron, who 
 yet supported in her house a certain per- 
 son of Antioch, that was noted for here- 
 sy. We cannot at this distance of time 
 n2 
 
 assign her motives ; but Origen, though 
 obliged to be in the company of the here- 
 tic, could not be prevailed on to join in 
 prayer with him. He now vigorously 
 applied himself to the improvement of 
 his understanding; and having no more 
 work at school, — it seems, because he 
 soon acquired all the learning his master 
 could give him, — and finding that the 
 business of catechising was deserted at 
 Alexandria because of the persecution, 
 he undertook the work himself; and se- 
 veral Gentiles came to hear him and be- 
 came his disciples. He was now in the 
 eighteenth year of his age; and in the 
 heat of the persecution he distinguished 
 himself by his attachment to the martyrs, 
 not only to those of his acquaintance, but 
 in general to all who suffered for Chris- 
 tianity. He visited such of them as were 
 fettered in deep dungeons and close im- 
 prisonment ; and was present with them 
 even after their condemnation, and bold- 
 ly attended them to the place of execu- 
 tion : he openly embraced and saluted 
 them ; and was once in imminent danger 
 of being stoned to death on this account. 
 Indeed he was repeatedly in peril of his 
 life ; for the persecution daily prevailed ; 
 and he could no longer pass safely through 
 the streets of Alexandria. He often 
 changed his lodgings, but was every 
 where pursued ; and, humanly speaking, 
 it seemed impossible for him to escape. 
 His instructions, however, and his zeal, 
 produced great effects ; multitudes crowd- 
 ed to hear him ; and were by his labours 
 incited to attend to Christianity. 
 
 The charge of the school was now, by 
 Demetrius the bishop, committed to him 
 alone ; and he converted it wholly into a 
 school of religious information : He main- 
 tained himself by the sale of the profane 
 books which he had been wont to study. 
 Thus he lived many years, an amazing 
 monument, at once both of industry and 
 of self-denial. Not only the day, but 
 the greater part of the night, was by him 
 devoted to religious study; and he prac- 
 tised, with literal conscientiousness, our 
 Lord's rules, of not having two coats, nor 
 two pairs of shoes, and of not providing 
 for futurity. He was inured to cold, 
 nakedness, and poverty : He offended 
 many by his unwillingness to receive 
 their gratuities : He abstained from wine ; 
 and, in general, lived so abstemiously as 
 to endanger his life. Many persons imi- 
 tated his excessive austerities : and were, 
 at that time, honoured with the name of 
 
150 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 philosophers ; and some of them patient- 
 ly suffered martyrdom. 
 
 I state facts as I find them. — A strong 
 spirit of self-righteousness, meeting with 
 a secret ambition, too subtile to be per- 
 ceived by him who is the dupe of it, and 
 supported by a natural fortitude of mind, 
 and by the active exertion of great ta- 
 lents, hath enabled many in external 
 things to seem superior in piety to men 
 of real humanity and self-diffidence, who 
 penetrating more happily into the genius 
 of the Gospel, by the exercise of faith in 
 the Son of God, and that genuine charity 
 which is its fruit, are led into a course of 
 conduct less dazzling indeed, but much 
 more agrreeable to the Gosnel. One can- 
 not form a high idea of the solid judg- 
 ment of these Alexandrian converts. — 
 Were there none of the elder and more 
 experienced Christians in that city, who 
 were capable, with meekness of wisdom, 
 of correcting the exuberances of this zeal- 
 ous youth, and of showing him that, by 
 such a refusal of the comforts of life, he 
 affected a superiority to Paul himself, 
 who gratefully received the alms of the 
 Philippians 1 Excesses of this sort must 
 have been attended with great defects in 
 inward vital godliness : The reader is 
 again referred to the second chapter of 
 the epistle to the Colossians, for a com- 
 ment on the conduct of Origen. How 
 much better had it been for him to have 
 continued a scholar for some time longer ; 
 and not to have feasted the pride of the 
 human heart by appointing him a teach- 
 er ~ 
 to 
 in Christian knowledge and piety 
 
 One of his scholars, called Plutarch, 
 was led to martyrdom. Origen accom- 
 panied him to the place of 
 execution. The odium of the 
 scholar's sufferinsfs reflected 
 on the master ; and it was not without a 
 peculiar providence that he escaped the 
 vengeance of the citizens. After him 
 Serenus sufiered by fire : the third mar- 
 tyr was Heraclides; the fourth Heron. 
 The former had not yet been baptized, 
 being only what was called a Catechu- 
 men : the latter had been lately baptized ; 
 but both were beheaded. A second Se- 
 renus of the same school, having sustain- 
 ed great torments and much pain, was 
 beheaded. A woman also, called Rais, 
 as yet a Catechumen, suffered death. 
 Potamiaena, a young woman remarkable 
 for beauty, purity of mind, and firmness 
 
 ! — But the lively flow of genius seems 
 have been mistaken for great growth 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom. 
 
 in the faith of Christ, suffered very dread- 
 ful torments : She was scourged very 
 severely by the order of Aquila the judge, 
 who threatened to deliver her to be abus- 
 ed by the basest characters. But she 
 remained firm in the faith : was led to 
 the fire, and burned together with her 
 mother Marcella. The heart of Basilides, 
 a soldier, who presided at her execution, 
 was softened. He pitied her, treated 
 her courteously, and protected her, so 
 far as he durst, from the insolence of the 
 mob. She acknowledged his kindness, 
 thanked him, and promised that after her 
 departure she would entreat the Lord for 
 him. Scalding pitch was poured on her 
 whole body, which she sustained in much 
 patience. Sometime after, Basilides, be- 
 ing required by his fellow-soldiers to 
 swear profanely on a certain occasion, he 
 refused, and confessed himself a Chris- 
 tian. They disbelieved him at first; but 
 finding him serious, they carried him be- 
 fore the judge, who remanded him to pri- 
 son. The Christians visited him; and 
 upon being questioned as to the cause of 
 his sudden change, he declared that Po- 
 tamieena, three days after her martyrdom, 
 had appeared to him by night, and in- 
 formed him that she had performed her 
 promise; and that he should shortly die. 
 After this he suffered martyrdom. 
 
 The reader will think this an extraor- 
 dinary story : It is tinged with supersti- 
 tion, no doubt; but who can venture, 
 without meriting the imputation of temer- 
 ity, to reject it altogether as a fiction 1 
 Eusebius lived at no great distance from 
 the time of Origen : He had made accu- 
 rate inquiries after him and his followers 
 in Alexandria; and he observes that the 
 fame of Potamiasna was in his own time 
 very great in that province. Her martyr- 
 dom and that of the soldier seem suffi- 
 ciently authentic. Her promise to pray 
 for him after her departure only shows 
 the gradual prevalence of fanatical phi- 
 losophy, will-worship, and the like; and 
 if the reader be not prepared by a sufli- 
 cient degree of candour to admit the truth 
 of authentic narratives and the reality of 
 converting grace, because pitiably stain- 
 ed, in many instances, with such super- 
 stition, he will find little satisfaction in 
 the evidences of Christian piety for many 
 ages. But we are slaves to habit. In 
 our own time we make great allowances 
 in Christians for the love of the world : 
 we are not so easily disposed to make al- 
 lowances for superstitions. Yet many 
 
Cent, hi.] 
 
 UNDER SEVERUS, ETC. 
 
 151 
 
 wrong sentiments and views may be 
 found where the heart is devoted, in faith 
 and love, to God and his Christ. It will 
 still be objected, that God would not 
 sanctify superstitions of this sort, by 
 causincr supernaturally the deceased spi- 
 rit of a martyr to appear to Basilides. — 
 I answer, — the supposition of a dream 
 removes all the difficulty; and the more 
 easily, Avhen we recollect that the man's 
 mind could not fail to have been previ- 
 ously under a strong impression of the 
 person of the sufferer, of her late martyr- 
 dom, and of the circumstances which at- 
 tended it. 
 
 A peculiar resolution made and put in- 
 to execution about this time by Origen, 
 illustrates his character in the strongest 
 manner. Though disposed beyond most 
 men to allegorize the Scriptures, in one 
 passage he followed their literal sense 
 too closely. "There are some who have 
 made" themselves eunuchs for the king- 
 dom of heaven's sake."* — We need not 
 be at a loss for his motives. He was 
 much conversant among women as a 
 catechiser and an expounder of the Scrip- 
 tures; — and, no doubt, he was desirous 
 of removing occasions for the slanders of 
 infidels, as well as temptations from him- 
 self. — However he took all possible pains 
 to conceal the fact. 
 
 One cannot but be astonished in notic- 
 ing how strong the self-righteous maxims 
 and views were grown in the Church; — 
 yet still, — piety of principle, combined 
 with fervour of zeal, must be revered by 
 every one, who is not lost to all sense of 
 goodness. — The extraordinary step taken 
 by Origen, above alluded to, could not 
 remain a secret. Demetrius, his bishop, 
 at first encouraged and commended him : 
 afterward, f through the power of env}'^, 
 on account of his growing popularity, he 
 published the fact abroad with a view to 
 asperse him. However, the bishops of 
 Caesarea and Jerusalem protected and 
 supported him, and ordained him a pres- 
 byter in the church. Day and night he 
 continued still to labour at Alexandria. 
 But it is time to turn from Alexandria to 
 other parts of the Roman empire ; and to 
 see what effects were produced by this 
 same persecution of Severus. 
 
 Alexander, a bishop in Cappadocia, 
 confessed the faith of Christ, and sustain- 
 ed a variety of sufferings ; and yet by 
 the providence of God was at length de- 
 
 • Matthew xix. 12. 
 
 t Euseb. B. vi. C. 7. 
 
 livered : — and he travelled afterwards to 
 Jerusalem. There he was joyfully re- 
 ceived by Narcissus the very aged bish- 
 op of that see, a man of extraordinary 
 piety, who associated Alexander with 
 him in the labours of Christian instruc- 
 tion. Some epistles of the latter were 
 extant in Eusebius's time, who gives us 
 a short fragment of one of them, suffi- 
 ciently authenticating the fact, — that those 
 two holy men were joint pastors of Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 Narcissus greets j'^ou, who governed 
 this bishopric before me ; and now being 
 an hundred and sixteen years old, pray- 
 eth with me, and that very seriously, for 
 the state of the church, and beseeches 
 you to be of one mind with me." 
 
 If the ancient martyrologies had been 
 preserved uncorrupted, they would, doubt- 
 less, afford us useful materials, and illus- 
 trate much the spirit and genius of real 
 Christianity in its primitive professors. 
 Butfrauds, interpolations, and impostures, 
 are endless : The papal and monastic su- 
 perstitions, in after-ages, induced their 
 supporters to corrupt these martyrologies, 
 and indeed the writings of the fathers in 
 general. The difficulty of procuring ma- 
 terials for a well-connected credible his- 
 tory of real Christians, is hence increased 
 exceedingly. What I cannot believe, I 
 shall not take the trouble to transcribe ; 
 what I can, where the matter appears 
 worthy of memory, shall be exhibited. 
 This is the case of the martyrs of Scil- 
 lita, a city of Africa, in the province of 
 Carthage. The narration is simple, credi- 
 ble throughout, and worthy of the purest 
 ages of the Gospel. — The facts belong to 
 the times of Severus. 
 
 " Twelve persons were brought before 
 Saturninus the proconsul at Carthage, the 
 chief of whom were Speratus, Narzal, 
 and Cittin; and three women, Donata, 
 Secunda, and Vestina. When they came 
 before him, he said to them all, ' You 
 may expect the emperor our master's par- 
 don, if you return to your senses, and ob- 
 serve the ceremonies of our gods.' To 
 which Speratus replied, ' We have never 
 been guilty of any thing that is evil, nor 
 been partakers of injustice: We have 
 even prayed for those who persecute us 
 unjustly; in which we obey our emperor, 
 who prescribed to us this rule of beha- 
 viour.' Saturninus answered, ' We have 
 also a religion that is simple : We swear 
 by the genius of the emperors, and we 
 offer up vows for their health, which you 
 
152 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 ought also to do.' Speratus answered, 'If 
 you will hear me patiently, I will declare 
 unto you the mystery of Christian sim- 
 plicity.' The proconsul said, ' Shall I 
 hear you speak ill of our ceremonies 1 
 Rather swear, all of you, by the genius of 
 the emperors our masters, that you may 
 enjoy the pleasures of life.' Speratus 
 answered, ' I know not the genius of the 
 emperors. I serve God, who is in hea- 
 ven, whom no man hath seen, nor can see. 
 I have never been guilty of any crime 
 punishable by the public laws : if I buy 
 any thing, I pay the duties to the collec- 
 tors : I acknowledge my God and Saviour 
 to be the Supreme Governor of all nations : 
 I have made no complaints against any 
 person ; and therefore they ought to make 
 none against me.' The proconsul, turn- 
 ing to the rest, said, ' Do not ye imitate 
 the folly of this mad wretch; but rather 
 fear our prince and obey his commands.' 
 Cittin answered, 'We fear only the Lord 
 our God, who is in heaven.' The pro- 
 consul then said, — ' Let them be carried 
 to prison, and put in fetters till to-mor- 
 row.' 
 
 " The next day the proconsul, seated on 
 his tribunal, caused them to be brought 
 before them, and said to the women, — 
 ' Honour our prince, and do sacrifice to 
 the gods.' Donata replied, ' We honour 
 Caesar as Csesar, but to God we offer 
 prayer and worship.' Vestina said, 'I 
 also am a Christian.' Secunda said, ' I 
 also believe in my God, and will continue 
 steadfast to him ; and, in regard to your 
 gods, we will not serve and adore them.' 
 The proconsul ordered them to be sepa- 
 rated ; then, having called for the men, 
 he said to Speratus, ' Perseverest thou in 
 being a Christian V Speratus answered, 
 ' Yes, I do persevere : — Let all give ear, 
 I am a Christian ;' which being heard by 
 the rest, they said, ' We also are Chris- 
 tians.' The proconsul said, ' You will 
 neither consider your danger, nor receive 
 mercy.' They replied, ' Do what you 
 please, we shall die joyfully for the sake 
 of Jesus Christ.' The proconsul asked, 
 ' What books are those which you read 
 and revere ]' Speratus replied, ' The 
 four Gospels of our Lord and Saviour .Te- 
 sus Christ; the Epistles of the Apostle 
 St. Paul, and all the Scripture that is in- 
 spired of God.' The proconsul said, 'I 
 will give you three days to reflect and to 
 come to yourselves.' Upon which Spera- 
 tus answered, ' I am a Christian, and such 
 are all those who are with me : and we 
 
 will never quit the faith of our Lord Je- 
 sus. Do, therefore, what you think fit.' 
 
 " The proconsul, seeing their resolution, 
 pronounced sentence against them, — that 
 they should die by the hands of the exe- 
 cutioner, in these terms : — ' Speratus and 
 the rest, having acknowledged themselves 
 to be Christians, and having refused to 
 pay due honour to the emperor, I com- 
 mand their heads to be cut off.' This 
 sentence having been read, Speratus and 
 his fellow-sufferers said, ' We give thanks 
 to God, who honoureth us this day with 
 being received as martyrs in heaven, for 
 confessing his name.' They were carried 
 to the place of punishment, where they 
 fell on their knees all together, and hav- 
 ing again given thanks to Jesus Christ, 
 they were beheaded."* 
 
 f At Carthage itself four young Cate- 
 chumens were seized, Revocatus and Fe- 
 licitas, — slaves to the same master, — with 
 Saturninus and Secundulus; and also 
 Vivia Perpetua, a lady of quality. She 
 had a father, a mother, and two brothers, 
 of whom one was a catechumen ; she was 
 about twenty-two years of age ; was mar- 
 ried, and was then pregnant ; and more- 
 over, she had a young child at her breast. 
 To these five, by an excess of zeal too 
 common at that time, Satur, voluntarily, 
 joined himself. While they were in the 
 hands of the persecutors, the father of 
 Perpetua, himself a Pagan, but full of 
 affection to his favourite offspring, impor- 
 tuned her to fall from the faith. His in- 
 treaties were vain. Her pious constancy 
 appeared to him an absurd obstinacy, and 
 enraged him so much as to induce him to 
 give her very rough treatment. For a 
 few days while these catechumens were 
 under guard, but not confined in the pri- 
 son, they found means to be baptised ; and 
 Perpetua's prayers were directed particu- 
 larly for patience under bodily pains. 
 They were then put into a dark prison. 
 To the rest, who had been more accus- 
 tomed to hardships, this change of scene 
 had not any thing in it very terrible. To 
 her, who had experienced nothing but the 
 delicacies of genteel life, it was peculiar- 
 ly formidable and distressing : Her con- 
 cern for her infant was extreme. — Ter- 
 tius and Pomponius, two deacons of the 
 Church, obtained by money, that the pri- 
 soners might go out of the dark dungeon, 
 and for some hours refresh themselves in 
 a more commodious place, where Perpe- 
 
 * Henry, B. 5, p, 77. f Acta sincera, p. 86. 
 
Cent, ni.] 
 
 UNDER SEVERUS, ETC. 
 
 153 
 
 tua gave the breast to her infant, and then 
 recommended him carefully to her mother. 
 For some time her mind was oppressed 
 with concern for the misery she had 
 brought on her family ; though it was for 
 the sake of a good conscience; but she 
 grew more composed, and her prison be- 
 came a palace. 
 
 Her father, sometime after, came to the 
 prison overwhelmed with grief; which, 
 in all probability, was augmented by the 
 reflections he had made on his own rough 
 and angry behaviour to her at their last 
 interview. " Have pity, my daughter," 
 says he, " on my gray hairs ; have pity 
 on your father, if I was ever worthy of 
 that name : if I myself have brought you 
 up to this age ; if I have preferred you to 
 all your brethren, make me not a reproach 
 to mankind : respect your father and your 
 aunt" — these, it seems, were joined in 
 the interests of paganism, while the mo- 
 ther appears to have been a Christian, 
 otherwise his silence concerning her seems 
 scarcely to be accounted for ; — " have 
 compassion on your son, who cannot sur- 
 vive you: lay aside your obstinacy, lest you 
 destroy us all : for if you perish we must 
 all of us shut our mouths in disgrace." 
 The old gentleman, with much tenderness, 
 kissed her hands, threw himself at her 
 feet, weeping and calling her no longer 
 his daughter, but his mistress — the mis- 
 tress of his fate ! He was the only per- 
 son of the family who did not rejoice at 
 her martyrdom. Perpetua, though in- 
 wardly torn with filial affection, could 
 offer him no other comfort than to desire 
 him to acquiesce in the Divine disposal. 
 
 The next day they were all brought 
 into the court, and examined in the pre- 
 sence of vast crowds. There the unhappy 
 old man appeared with his little grandson, 
 and taking Perpetua aside, conjured her 
 to have some pity on her child. The 
 procurator, Hilarian, joined in the suit, 
 but in vain. The old man then attempted 
 to draw his daughter from the scaffold. 
 Hilarian ordered him to be beaten ; and 
 a blow, which he received with a staff, 
 was felt by Perpetua very severely. 
 
 Hilarian condemned them to be ex- 
 posed to the wild beasts. They then re- 
 turned cheerfully to their prison. Per- 
 petua sent the deacon, Pomponius, to de- 
 mand her child of her father, which he 
 refused to return. The health of the 
 child, we are told, suffered not ; nor did 
 Perpetua feel any bodily inconvenience. 
 
 Secondulus died in prison. Felicitas 
 
 was eight months gone with child ; and 
 seeing the day of the public shows to be 
 near, she was much afflicted lest her exe- 
 cution should take j)lace before her deli- 
 very. Her companions joined in prayer 
 for her three days before the spectacles; 
 and she was, with great difficulty,delivered 
 of a child. One of the doorkeepers, who, 
 perhaps, expected to have found in her a 
 stoical insensibility, and heard her cries, 
 said, " Do you complain of this 1 what 
 will you do when you are exposed to the 
 beasts'?" Felicitas answered, with a sa- 
 gacity truly Christian, " It is I that suffer 
 now, but then there will be another with 
 me, that will suffer for me, because I 
 shall suffer for his sake." — Her new-born 
 dauo-hter was delivered to a Christian 
 woman, who nursed it as her own. 
 
 The tribune appears to have credited a 
 report, that the prisoners would free them- 
 selves by magical practices ; and in con- 
 sequence, to have treated them roughly. 
 " Why don't you," says Perpetua, "give 
 us some relief?" Will it not be for your 
 honour that w^e should appear well fed at 
 the spectacles'!" 
 
 This address of hers had the desired 
 effect: It procured a very agreeable alte- 
 ration in their treatment. On the day be- 
 fore the shows, they were supplied with 
 their last meal ; and the martyrs did their 
 utmost to convert it into an *£t^*T« : they 
 ate in public : their brethren and others 
 were allowed »to visit them : and the 
 keeper of the prison himself, by this 
 time, was converted to the faith: they 
 talked to the people, and warned them to 
 flee from the wrath to come : they pointed 
 out to them their own happy lot, and 
 smiled at the curiosity of those who ran 
 to see them. " Observe well our faces," 
 cries Satur, with much animation, " that 
 ye may know them at the day of judg- 
 ment." 
 
 The Spirit of God was much with them 
 on the day of trial: joy, rather than fear, 
 was painted on their looks. Perpetua, 
 cherished by Jesus Christ, went on with 
 a composed countenance and an easy 
 pace, holding down her eyes, lest the 
 spectators might draw wrong conclusions 
 from their vivacity. Some idolatrous gar- 
 ments were offered them by the Pagans : 
 " We sacrifice our lives," said they, " to 
 
 avoid 
 
 thinor of this kind." — The 
 
 every ^ 
 
 tribune desisted from his demand. 
 
 Perpetua sang, as already victorious: 
 
 * A love-feast. 
 
154 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 and Revocatus, Saturninus, and Satur, 
 endeavoured to affect the people with the 
 fear of the wrath to come. Being come 
 into Hilarian's presence, "Thou judgest 
 us," said they," "and God shall judge 
 thee." The mob was enraged, and in- 
 sisted on their being scourged before they 
 were exposed to the beasts. It was 
 done, and the martyrs rejoiced in being 
 conformed to their Saviour's suffer- 
 ings. 
 
 Perpetua and Felicitas were stripped, 
 and put into the nets, and exposed to a 
 wild cow. The spectators were shocked 
 at the sight : for the one was an accom- 
 plished beauty, and the other had been 
 recently delivered of a child. — The as- 
 sisting executioner drew them back and 
 covered them with loose garments. Per- 
 petua was first attacked ; and falling 
 backwards she put h&rself into a reclining 
 posture ; and seeing her habit torn by her 
 side, she retired to cover herself: she 
 then gathered up her hair, that she might 
 seem less disordered : she raised herself 
 up, and seeing Felicitas bruised, she gave 
 her her hand and lifted her up : then they 
 went toward the gate, where Perpetua 
 was received by a catechumen, called 
 Rusticus, who attended her : " I wonder," 
 said she, " when they will expose us to 
 the cow ;" — She had been, it seems, in- 
 sensible of what had passed, nor could 
 believe it till she saw on her body and 
 clothes the marks of her sufferings. She 
 caused her brother to be called, and ad- 
 dressing herself to him and Rusticus, she 
 said, "Continue firm in the faith; love 
 one another ; and be neither frightened 
 nor offended at our sufferings." 
 
 The people insisted on having the mar- 
 tyrs brought into the midst of the am- 
 phitheatre, that they might have the plea- 
 sure of seeing them die : some of them 
 rose up and went forward of their own 
 accord, after having given one another 
 the kiss of charity : others received the 
 last blow without speaking or stirring. 
 Perpetua fell into the hands of an unskil- 
 ful gladiator, who pierced her between 
 the ribs so as to give her much unneces- 
 sary pain. She cried out ; and then she 
 herself guided his trembling hand to her 
 throat : — and thus with the rest she slept 
 in Jesus. 
 
 Augustine, in his exposition of the 
 forty-seventh Psalm, takes notice of the 
 victorious strength of divine love pre- 
 vailing over all natural affections, and 
 produces this same Perpetua as an exam- 
 
 ple :* — " We know and read thus in the 
 sufferings of the blessed Perpetua." — 
 He mentions the isame story also in three 
 other places in his treatise of the Soul.f 
 But it is evident that he doubts whether 
 Perpetua herself wrote what is ascribed 
 to her. If so, we may well doubt ; and 
 more than doubt the truth of the visions 
 with which this excellent narrative has 
 been intermixed ; and with which I have 
 not thought it worth while to trouble the 
 reader. Yet the general history has every 
 mark of authenticity. — Augustine him- 
 self published three sermons on the an- 
 niversary of the martyrs. It is much to 
 be regretted that the finest monuments of 
 ecclesiastical antiquity have been thus 
 tarnished by mixtures of fraud or super- 
 stition. — ^The authority of Augustine has 
 enabled me to distinguish with some de- 
 gree of precision the truth from the false- 
 hood. My business does not call me to 
 recite the frauds; and it will be needless 
 to add further remarks: The pious reader 
 sees, with pleasure, that God was yet 
 present with his people. — Indeed the pow- 
 er of God appeared evidently displayed 
 during the course of this dreadful perse- 
 cution, by the sudden and amazing con- 
 versions of several persons who volunta- 
 rily suffered death for that doctrine which 
 they before detested. Of this we have 
 the very respectable testimony of Origen, 
 who, whatever other defects he be justly 
 charged with, is certainly allowed to be 
 of unquestionable veracity. :J: 
 
 Severus would naturally extend this 
 persecution to Gaul, the scene of his 
 former cruelties. In fact, it was now that 
 Irenceus suffered : and many more suffered 
 with him ; and Lyons was once more 
 dyed with the blood of the martyrs of 
 Jesus. Vivarius and Andro- 
 lus, who had been sent by Po- Y'vanus, 
 lycarp there to preach the Xoticus"^' 
 Gospel, were put to death. Hiartyred. 
 At Comana, in Pamphylia, 
 Zoticus the bishop, who had distinguished 
 himself by writing against the Monta- 
 nists, obtained the crown of martyrdom. 
 
 At this trying season it was that some 
 churches purchased their peace and quiet 
 by paying money, not only to the magis- 
 trates, but also to the informers and sol- 
 diers who were appointed to search them 
 out. The pastors of the churches ap- 
 
 * Tom. V. iii. 
 
 + L. 1. c. 10. L. 3. c. 9. L. 4. c. 18. Tom. vii. 
 
 i Contra Celsum. L. 1 . 
 
cekt. m.] 
 
 UNDER SEVERUS, ETC. 
 
 155 
 
 proved of this proceeding, because it was 
 only suffering the loss of their goods, and 
 
 f (referring that to the endangering of their 
 ives. However casuists may decide this 
 question, it is easily conceivable that the 
 practice might take place with many in 
 real uprightness of heart. 
 
 It is usual with God to moderate the 
 sufferings of his people, and not to suffer 
 them to be tried by persecution at once very 
 long and very violent. — In the 
 Severus year two hundred and eleven, 
 A^D 211 after a reign of eighteen years, 
 the tyrant Severus died : and 
 the Church found repose and tranquillity 
 under his son and successor Caracalla, 
 though a monster of wickedness. 
 
 Divine Providence had long before pre- 
 pared for the Christians this mitigation 
 of trial, in the circumstances of Caracal- 
 la's education. He had known Proculus 
 the Christian, who had recovered the 
 health of his father, and was maintained 
 in his palace to his death ; and he had 
 himself been nursed, when an infant, by 
 a Christian woman. Though this could 
 not win his heart to Jesus Christ, it gave 
 him an early predilection in favour of 
 Christians, insomuch that when he was 
 seven years old, observing one of his 
 playfellows to be beaten because he fol- 
 lowed the Christian religion,* he could 
 not for some time after behold with pa- 
 tience either his own father or the father 
 of the boy. Certainly few men have ever 
 exceeded him in the ferocious vices ; yet. 
 during the six years and two months 
 which he reigned, the Christians found 
 in him friendship and protection. In- 
 deed, for the space of thirty and eight 
 years, — from the death of Severus to the 
 reign of Decius, — if we except the short 
 turbulent interval of Maximinus, the 
 Church enjoyed a continued calm.| — 
 About the year two hundred 
 and ten, Origen came to Rome, 
 where Zephyrinus was bish- 
 op, desirous of visiting that 
 ancient Church, but soon re- 
 turned to Alexandria, and to his office of 
 catechising. He entrusted to Heraclas, 
 his associate in that employment, the in- 
 struction of the more ignorant, while he 
 himself took care of those who had made 
 a greater proficiency. His active spirit 
 
 Origen 
 comes to 
 Rome, 
 A. D. 210. 
 
 * Spartian's Caracalla. The Pagan author 
 says, " because he followed the Jewish reli- 
 gion ;" but, most probably, he means the 
 Christian. 
 
 f Sulpitius Severus, B.2. C. 42. 
 
 induced him to study the Hebrew lan- 
 guage ; and the first fruit of his labour 
 was the publication of the Hexapla. In 
 this great work he gave the Hebrew text 
 and the translations of the Septuagint, of 
 Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, — and 
 two others, which had long been obsolete, 
 and whose authors were unknown. Of 
 these interpreters, Symmachus was an 
 Ebionite ; that is, he held that Christ was 
 but a mere man;* and he inveighed 
 against the genuine gospel of St. Mat- 
 thew, for no other reason that I can see, 
 but on account of the clear testimony 
 which the beginning of it affords against 
 his heresy. — These works of Origen, in 
 addition to his constant diligence, bcth in 
 writing and in preaching, are monuments 
 at least of the most laudable industry. 
 The evangelical reader would wish, no 
 doubt, to see stronger signs of real Chris- 
 tian proficiency in experimental and prac- 
 tical religion ; but we must be content 
 with such matter as the ecclesiastical re- 
 cords afford us. 
 
 One Ambrose, addicted to the Valenti- 
 nian heresy, an extremely fanciful and 
 romantic scheme, not worthy of the read- 
 er's attention, found himself confuted by 
 Orio-en, and was brouofht over to the 
 Church. Many learned men also felt the 
 force of his argumentations. Heretics 
 and philosophers attended his lectures; 
 and he took, no doubt, a very excellent 
 method to procure regard to himself at 
 least; he instructed them in profane and 
 secular learning. He confuted the opin- 
 ions of the different sects by opposing 
 them to each other ; and he exposed the 
 various fallacies with so much acutencss 
 and sagacity, that he obtained among the 
 Gentiles the reputation of a great Philo- 
 sopher. He encouraged many persons 
 to study the liberal arts, assuring them, 
 that they would, by that means, be much 
 better furnished for the contemplation of 
 the Holy Scriptures : — He was entirely 
 of opinion, that secular and philosophical 
 institutes were very necessary and profit- 
 able to his own mind. — Does it escape 
 the reader, how much in the course of the 
 Christian annals, we are already depart- 
 ed, though by insensible degrees, from 
 Christian simplicity? Here is a man 
 looked up to with reverence, at least by 
 the Eastern Church, as a great lumina- 
 ry ; — a man, who, in his younger days, 
 was himself a scholar of the amphibious 
 
 * Euseb. B, 6. C. 16. 
 
156 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chip.V. 
 
 Ammonius ; who mixed together Chris- 
 tianity and pag-an philosophy; and who, 
 by reading his motley lectures drew over, 
 in form at least, many of the heathen phi- 
 losophers to embrace the religion of Je- 
 sus. These mention him often in their 
 books : some dedicate their works to him ; 
 and others respectfully deliver them to 
 him as their master. All this Eusebius 
 tells us with much apparent satisfaction. 
 To him the Gospel seems to have tri- 
 umphed overgentilism by these means. — 
 There is no doubt, but, in a certain sense, 
 Origen's success was great; but I much 
 fear that, in return, the pure Gospel suf- 
 fered greatly by an admixture of gentil- 
 ism. What can this extraordinary teacher 
 and author mean, by asserting the utility 
 and even the *necessity of philosophy for 
 himself as a Christian T Are not the 
 Scriptures able to make a man wise 
 
 UNTO SALVATION THROUGH FAITH WHICH 
 
 IS IN Christ Jesus, that the man of 
 God may be perfect, thoroughly fur- 
 nished TO every GOOD WORK? Suppose z 
 man of common sense, perfectly unac- 
 quainted with all the learned lore of Am- 
 monius, to study ONLY the sacred books, 
 with prayer, dependence on divine gui- 
 dance and illumination, and with self- 
 examination. Is it not conceivable that he 
 may acquire a competent, — nay, even an 
 eminent knowledge of the Scriptures 1 
 Certainly an acquaintance with classical 
 and philosophical learning may furnish 
 him with strong arguments to prove the 
 necessity and the excellency of divine 
 revelation ; and therefore they deserve se- 
 riously to be encouraged in the minds of 
 all who are to instruct others, — for their 
 improvement in taste, language, elo- 
 quence, and history; but if they are to 
 DICTATE in religion, — or are thought ca- 
 pable even of adding to the stock of the- 
 ological knowledge, — the Scriptures, — 
 with reverence be it spoken, — may seem 
 to have been defectively written. In 
 truth, we hear, among these learned con- 
 verts of Origen, nothing — of conviction 
 of sin — of conversion — of the influence of 
 the Holy Spirit — of the love of Christ. 
 They are pleased with their master : — 
 Superior parts and learning always com- 
 mand the esteem of mankind : — but, what 
 are all his labours which we have now 
 before us, but vain attempts to mix things 
 which the Holy Ghost has declared will 
 not incorporate? The mischief which 
 
 • Euseb. B. 6—17. 
 
 actually followed was to be expected : 
 Characters were confounded: and hence- 
 forward, among the learned, the distinc- 
 tion between Christian godliness and hu- 
 man philosophy is but faintly marked. — 
 If Origen had simply and plainly ex- 
 pounded to his learned auditors the pecu- 
 liar and vital truths of the Gospel, I can- 
 not but suspect that many of them would 
 have ceased to attend his instructions. 
 
 The famous Porphyry, — than whom 
 Christianity had never a more acrimoni- 
 ous enemy, — takes notice of Origen's 
 allegorical mode of interpreting Scripture, 
 observes that he was acquainted with him 
 when young, and bears testimony to his 
 rapid improvements under Ammonius. 
 He asserts, — what indeed Eusebius, who 
 must have known, contradicts, — that Am- 
 monius, though brought up a Christian, 
 turned afterwards a Gentile. He ac- 
 knowledges "that Origen continually pe- 
 rused Plato, Numenius, and the rest of 
 the Pythagoreans; that he was well 
 versed in Cheeremon the Stoic, and in 
 Cornutus; and, that from all these mas- 
 ters he borrowed the Grecian manner of 
 allegorical interpretation, and applied it 
 to the Jewish Scriptures." 
 
 We have seen, before, the wanton spi- 
 rit of allegory introduced by Ammonius : 
 and it is very probable that Origen then 
 first learnt to treat the Scriptures in the 
 same manner. He had the candour to 
 confess that he had been mistaken in his 
 literal interpretation of our Saviour's 
 words concerning eunuchs. He after- 
 wards fell into the contrary extreme, and 
 allegorized all the three clauses in the 
 Gospel of St. Matthew;* — and intro- 
 duced such a complicated scheme of fan- 
 ciful interpretation, as for many ages 
 after, — through the excessive respect paid 
 to this man, — much obscured the light of 
 Scripture. 
 
 There wanted not, however, some per- 
 sons who found fault with Origen for all 
 this attachment to pagan philosophy. Pro- 
 bably, simple, docile, ingenuous minds, 
 which desired to be fed with the " sin- 
 cere milk of the Word, that they 
 might grow thereby," found themselves 
 starved amidst all this heterogeneous, in- 
 consistent doctrine. He felt himself 
 called upon to vindicate his practice ; — 
 which he does, only by observing the use 
 of philosophy in confuting heretics ; and 
 by the example of Pantaenus, and of He- 
 
 * Chap. xix. 12. 
 
CZ.^T. III.] 
 
 STATE OF CHKISTIANITY. 
 
 157 
 
 raclas, an Alexandrian pastor, — his coad- 
 jutor, who formerly had worn the com- 
 mon dress, and afterwards took up the 
 philosopher's garb, and still studied ear- 
 nestly the writings of the heathen philo- 
 sophers. What does all this prove but the 
 destructive progress of this epidemical 
 disease? 
 
 The governor of Arabia sent to Deme- 
 trius, desiring the instruction of Origen ; 
 who did not hesitate to undertake the ne- 
 cessary journey for that purpose; and he 
 then returned back to Alexandria. 
 
 The elegant publication of 3Iinucius 
 Felix, — a work deserving even to be 
 ranked among the Latin classics for neat- 
 ness and purity of style, was an ornament 
 to the Latin Church. The arguments 
 contained in it against Paganism are well 
 pointed and well adapted to the state of 
 the world at that time : It is only to be 
 regretted that we see not more of the real 
 nature of Christianity in that celebrated 
 performance. 
 
 In the year two hundred 
 and seventeen, Macrinus suc- 
 ceeded Caracalla, who had 
 reigned a little more than six 
 years. 
 
 Macrinus 
 succeeds 
 Caracalla, 
 A. D. 217. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 STATE OF CHRISTIANITY DURING THE 
 REIGNS OF MACRINUS, HELIOGABA- 
 LUS, ALEXANDER, MAXIMINUS, PUPI- 
 ENUS, GORDIAN, AND PHILIP. 
 
 Macrinus reigned one year and two 
 months ; and was succeeded by Helioga- 
 
 balus ; whose follies and vices 
 Macrinus ^^e infamous ; but it does not 
 reigns one appear that the Church of 
 t^o'inHhs. ^0^ suffered on that account. 
 
 He seems not to have con- 
 ceived any particular prejudices against 
 Christians ; on the contrary, he expressed 
 a desire of removing their rites of wor- 
 ship to Rome. — It is not worth while to 
 
 attempt an explanation of the 
 Helioga- views of so senseless a prince, 
 balus sue- — jjg ^y^g gp^jjj a^ ^^Q agg of 
 
 h slam'l" eighteen, in the year two hun- 
 A. D. 222. dred and twenty-two, after he 
 had swayed the sceptre three 
 years and nine months. His cousin 
 Alexander succeeded him ; who was then 
 only in the sixteenth year of his age, but 
 was esteemed one of the best moral clia- 
 racters in profane history. His mother 
 Vol. I. O 
 
 Mammaea, is called by Eusebius,* a most 
 rrodly and religious woman. — I am at 
 a loss to vindicate the expression. — It 
 does not appear that she received the faith 
 of Christ: — however, — neither she nor 
 her son persecuted, they rather approved 
 and countenanced, the Christians. They 
 were persons of candour and probity them- 
 selves ; and they saw that, in morals at 
 least, the people of God concurred with 
 their own views. Their conduct was 
 laudable; but — mark the mischief of 
 blending philosophy with Christianity ! 
 How cheap is the term godly grown in 
 the eyes of Eusebius! 
 
 The providence of God not only se- 
 cured his Church from suffering, but pro- 
 cured it a favourable patron in this prin- 
 cess and her son. The emperor had a 
 domestic chapel, where, every morning, 
 he worshipped those deceased princes, 
 whose characters were most esteemed : 
 their statues were placed among those of 
 the gods : and into this company he in- 
 troduced Apollonius of Tyana, Jesus 
 Christ, Abraham, and Orpheus.| He 
 had a desire to erect even a temple to 
 Christ, and to receive him regularly into 
 the number of the gods. 
 
 There are on record other instances of 
 his candour towards the Christians. — 
 The right of possessing a certain piece 
 of ground was claimed by a tavern- 
 keeper : It had been co.aimon for a long 
 time,:J: and the Christians had occupied it 
 for a place of worship. — " It is fitter," 
 said Alexander, "that God should be 
 served there, in any manner whatever, 
 rather than that it should be used for a 
 tavern." He frequently used this Chris- 
 tian sentence, "Do as you would be 
 DONE BY." He obliged a crier to repeat 
 it when he punished any person; and 
 was so fond of it, that he caused it to be 
 written in his palace and in the public 
 buildings. When he was going to ap- 
 point governors of provinces or other 
 officers, he proposed their names in pub- 
 lic, giving the people notice, that if they 
 had any crime to accuse them of, they 
 should come forward and make it known. 
 " It would be a shame," says he, " not 
 to do that with respect to governors, 
 who are entrusted with men's properties 
 and lives, which is done by Jews and 
 Christians when they publish the names 
 
 * Enseb. L. 6. Fleury, B. v. iv. 
 
 f Lamprid. 
 
 I That is, without owner or possessor. 
 
158 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 of those whom they mean to ordain 
 Priests." And, indeed, by Origen's ac- 
 count,* the Christians were so very care- 
 ful in the choice of tlieir pastors, that the 
 civil magistrates were by no means to be 
 compared with them in probity and sound 
 morality. This prince had, it seems, too 
 much gravity and virtue for the times in 
 which he lived : — for some persons, in 
 derision, called him Archysynagogus.j 
 
 It seems to have been his plan to en- 
 courage every thing that carried the ap- 
 pearance of religion and virtue; and to 
 discountenance whatever was openly im- 
 moral and profane. — His historian:^: tells 
 us " that he favoured astrologers, and 
 permitted them to teach publicly; that 
 he himself was well skilled in the vain 
 science of the Aruspices, and was master 
 of that of the Augurs in a high degree." 
 In the year two hundred and twenty- 
 nine Alexander was obliged to go to the 
 East, and to reside at Anti- 
 och. His mother Mammaea 
 went with him, and having 
 heard of the fame of Origen, 
 and being very curious to hear 
 new things ; she sent him a guard, and 
 caused him to come to her. AH the ac- 
 count we have of this interview is, that 
 he continued there awhile, and published 
 many things to the glory of God, and con- 
 cerning the power of the heavenly doc- 
 
 Alexander 
 resides at 
 Antioch, 
 A. D. 229. 
 
 trine ; and, that he then returned to his 
 school at Alexandria. 
 
 What Origen taught this princess we 
 are not told: What he ought to have 
 taught her, the Acts of the Apostles 
 would have amply informed him — A plain 
 and artless declaration of the vanity and 
 wickedness of all the reiofnino- idolatries 
 and philosophical sects : and what is still 
 more — of the corruption, helplessness, 
 and misery of man, and a faithful infor- 
 mation concerning the only way of salva- 
 tion by Jesus Christ, the great duty of 
 believing on him, of confessing him, and 
 of admitting the sanctifying operations 
 of his Spirit, — these things a perfectly 
 sound preacher would have shown to 
 her; and his exhortations would have 
 been entirely founded on these doctrines ; 
 nor would he have felt the necessity of 
 aiding his message by the authority of 
 Plato or of any other philosopher. — His- 
 tory informs us of no remarkable effect 
 
 which attended the ministry of Origen 
 on this occasion. That he spake what 
 he believed, and what he thought most 
 wise and expedient, is not to be doubted ; 
 but we may be allowed to lament, that 
 his own state and views were too similar 
 to those of Mammasa and of her son, to 
 permit him to represent Christianity to 
 them in the clearest and most striking 
 manner. In truth, it is to be feared that 
 a number of Christians so called, at this 
 time, were much of the same religion 
 with Alexander himself. — He seems to 
 have learnt, in some measure, the doc- 
 trine of the unity of the Godhead; and by 
 the help of the eclectic philosophy to 
 have consolidated all religions into one 
 mass. — But the Scriptural method of 
 teaching things that accompany salvation 
 will not incorporate with this system of 
 doctrines. 
 
 The liberality of his friend Ambrose 
 enabled Origen to prosecute his Scriptu- 
 ral studies with vast rapidity. Ambrose 
 himself was a deacon of the Church ; 
 and, by his faithfulness under persecution, 
 he obtained the name of Confessor. 
 
 At this time Noctus of Smyrna propa- 
 gated the same heresy in the East, which 
 Praxeas had done in the West, — namely, 
 that there was no distinction among the 
 Divine Persons. The pastors of the 
 Church of Ephesus summoned him be- 
 fore them ; and demanded whether he 
 really maintained this opinion. At first 
 he denied it ; but afterwards, having 
 formed a party, he became more bold, and 
 publicly taught his heresy. Being again 
 
 Celsus, B. iii. and viii. 
 
 * A 
 + T 
 jf Lampridius 
 
 le chief ruler of the svnaa;os;ue. 
 
 interrogated by the pastors, he said, 
 " What harm have I done 1 1 glorify none 
 but one God ; I know none besides him 
 who hath been begotten, who suffered and 
 died," He evidently, in this way, con- 
 founded the persons of the Father and the 
 vSon together ; and being obstinate in his 
 views, he was ejected out of the Church 
 with all his disciples. — We have here an 
 additional proof of the jealousy of the 
 primitive Christians in support of the 
 fundamental articles of Christianity : 
 The connexion also indissolubly pre- 
 served between heretical depravity and 
 pride of heart appeared in this teacher. 
 — He called himself Moses, and his bro- 
 ther Aaron.* 
 
 Origen was now sent for to Athens to 
 assist the Churches, which were there 
 disturbed with several heresies. Thence 
 
 * Fleury, B. v. Epiphanius and Theodoret. 
 
Cest. III.] 
 
 STATE OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 159 
 
 Origen 
 ordained 
 
 he went to Palestine. At 
 Caesarea, Tlieoctistus the bi- 
 shop, and Alexander bishop 
 A*D '"30 '^^ Jerusalem, ordained him a 
 priest at the age of forty-five, 
 about the year two hundred and thirty. 
 Demetrius, his own bishop, was offended ; 
 and, at length, divulged what had hitherto 
 been kept very secret, — the indiscreet 
 self-mutilation before mentioned, which 
 took place in the youth of Origen. Alex- 
 ander defended himself in what he had 
 done, by the encomium which Deme- 
 trius had given of Origen in his letter. 
 The latter, on his return to Alexandria, 
 found his bishop quite incensed against 
 him ; for he procured even his ejectment 
 from the Church by a council of pastors, 
 on account of some errors that appeared 
 in his works. What judgment is to be 
 formed of these errors 1 shall have a fu- 
 ture occasion' to consider. Banished from 
 Egypt, this great man lived now in Pa- 
 lestine, with his friends Theoctistus and 
 Alexander, still followed by many disci- 
 ples, and particularly respected by Fir- 
 milian of Cappadocia, who looked upon 
 it as a happiness to enjoy his instructions. 
 Here also the famous Gregory Thauma- 
 turgus attended his theological lectures, 
 which, even in his exile, were delivered 
 in Ori gen's usual manner. 
 
 Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, died, 
 after having held that oihce forty-three 
 years. A long period ! — ^but our inform- 
 ation is too indistinct and scanty to enable 
 us to pronounce his real character. If 
 we were sure that he preserved a very 
 upright conscience toward God in things 
 of essential moment, something might be 
 advanced to justify his severe treatment 
 of Origen : but, as we are left on that 
 head to conjectures, it is, perhaps, better 
 to be silent. — Origen's assistant Hera- 
 clas succeeded him. 
 
 In the year two hundred and thirty-five, 
 
 Alexander was murdered, to- 
 
 The Era- gether with his mother ; and 
 
 peror Maxiniin the murderer ob- 
 
 Alexander twined the empire. His ma- 
 
 ir eie , jjgg ^Qrainst the house of Alex- 
 
 murde 
 
 A D. '235. a 
 
 ' .'". * ander disposed him to perse- 
 
 be^i'n^tlie ^^^^ ^^^ Christians; and he 
 6th Perse- gave orders to put to death 
 cation. the pastors of the Churches. 
 
 The persecution was not con- 
 fined to them : Others suffered at the 
 same time ; and, it seems by Firmilian's 
 letter to Cyprian of Carthage, that the 
 flame extended to Cappadocia. Ambrose, 
 
 the friend of Origen, and Protoctetus, 
 minister of Caesarea, sutfered much in 
 the coarse of it ; and to them Origen de- 
 dicated his Book of Martyrs. He him- 
 self was obliged to retire. But the ty- 
 rant's reign lasted only three years, in 
 which time it must be confessed that the 
 rest of the world had tasted of his fero- 
 city as much as the Christians had. — 
 His persecution of them was local ; but 
 his cruelty to mankind in general seemed 
 to have no limits. 
 
 Pupienus and Balbinus, the . 
 
 successors of Maximin, were ""V'i!"r^K- 
 
 1 • • .1 ^ I A ^A andBalbi- 
 
 slam m the year two hundred, ^^^^^ killed 
 
 and thirty-eight; Gordian a. U. 238.' 
 reigned for six years, and was 
 then supplanted by the usual military 
 turbulence, which made way for his mur- 
 derer, Philip the Arabian. 
 
 Origen, in a letter to his scholar Gre- 
 gory Thaumaturgus, exhorts him to ap- 
 ply himself chiefly to the Holy Scrip- 
 ture ; to read it very attentively ; not to 
 speak or judge of it lightly, but with un- 
 shaken faith and prayer, which, says he, 
 is absolutely necessary for the under- 
 standing of it. — This exhortation will be 
 noticed by the pious reader, doubtless, 
 with much satisfaction. It proves that 
 his philosophy had not obliterated his 
 Christianity. 
 
 A fresh attempt was now made to per- 
 vert the doctrine of the person of Christ.. 
 — Beryllus, bishop of Bostra in Arabia, 
 affirmed that our Saviour, before his in- 
 carnation, had no proper divinity, but only 
 his Father's divinity dwelling in himself. 
 Thus Eusebius states the matter. It is 
 not easy to form clear ideas of these sen- 
 timents : they seem, however, to annihi- 
 late the divine personality of the eternal 
 Word. The man, it seems, was not ob- 
 stinate ; he listened to sound scriptural 
 argument, and was therefore reclaimed 
 by^means of Origen. He even loved his 
 instructor ever after, and was sincerely 
 thankful to him ;— a circumstance, which 
 reflects an amiable light on the character 
 of Berylus.* 
 
 Philip began to reign in the year two 
 hundred and forty-four. Eu- pj^jj- 
 sebius tells us that he was a ^.^^.^Jg^ 
 Christian; and indeed tlrat a.U. 244. 
 he was so, by profession, 
 seems well attested oy the concurrent 
 voice of antiquity. He is said to have 
 
 * Hieronym. Eccle. Scrip. L. xx.— See Dr. 
 I Waterland on the Importance of the Trinity., 
 
160 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH, 
 
 He allows 
 idolatrous 
 games, 
 A.D.247. 
 
 submitted to certain ecclesiastical cen- 
 sures from a bishop ; but the report is 
 void of proper authenticity; — and most 
 probably, he ranked at his death only 
 as a Catechumen. There is, 
 however, no doubt, but in the 
 fourth year of his reign, and 
 in the year of Christ two hun- 
 dred and forty-seven, he al- 
 lowed and conducted the secular games, 
 which were full of idolatry : and this is 
 a fact, which clearly proves that he was 
 not disposed to give up any thing for the 
 sake of Christ: And, in general, there is 
 not the least ground to conclude from his- 
 tory that he was a cordial friend to the 
 Gospel. — Nevertheless the progress of 
 Christianity in the world at this time 
 must have been very great, which could 
 induce so worldly-minded a person as 
 Philip to countenance it without reserve 
 or ambiguity. — To this emperor and to 
 his wife Severa, Origen wrote an epistle, 
 which was extant in Eusebius's time. 
 
 It appears from one of the homilies of 
 Origen, that the long peace which the 
 Church, — with only the short interrup- 
 tion of Maximin's persecution, — had en- 
 joyed, was followed by a great degree of 
 lukewarmness and even of much religious 
 indecorum. Let the reader only notice 
 the difference between the scenes which 
 he here describes, and the conduct of the 
 Christians both in the first and second 
 century, and he will be affected with the 
 greatness of the declension. 
 
 "Several,"* says he, " come to Church 
 only on solemn festivals ; and then, not 
 so much for instruction as diversion : 
 Some go out again as soon as they have 
 heard the lecture, without conferring or 
 asking the pastors any questions : Others 
 stay not till the lecture is ended ; and 
 others hear not so much as a single word, 
 but entertain themselves in a corner of 
 the church." 
 
 By the blessing of Almighty God, no- 
 thing was so likely to conquer this care- 
 less spirit, as the faithful dispensation of 
 the peculiar truths of the Gospel in a 
 practical manner, so as to search the 
 heart. — But the ability as well as the 
 taste for doing this had much declined, 
 in the Eastern part of the Church espe- 
 cially. — Origen complains elsewhere of 
 the ambitious and haughty manners of 
 pastors, and of the improper steps which 
 some took to obtain preferments. 
 
 * Fleui-y. 
 
 Cyprian 
 made 
 bishop of 
 Carthage, 
 
 A. D. 248. 
 
 This great man was now once more 
 employed in Arabia in confuting another 
 error, namely, — of those who denied the 
 intermediate state of souls ; and this he 
 managed with his usual good success.* 
 
 Philip enjoyed the fruits of his crimes 
 five years, and was then slain and suc- 
 ceeded by Decius. — A little before his 
 death, in the year two hundred and forty- 
 eight, CvPRiAN was chosen 
 bishop of Carthage. — A star 
 of the first magnitude, — when 
 we consider the times in 
 which he lived. Let us re- 
 create ourselves with the con- 
 templation of it: We are fatigued with 
 hunting for Christian goodness; and we 
 have discovered but little: and that little 
 with much difficulty. — We shall find Cy- 
 prian to be a character, who partook in- 
 deed of the declensions which we have 
 noticed and lamented ; but who was still 
 far superior, I apprehend, in real simpli- 
 city and piety, to the Christians of the 
 East. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE CONVERSION OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 The life of this prelate was written by 
 Pontius his deacon. It is to be regretted, 
 that one who must have known him so 
 well, should have written in so incompe- 
 tent a manner. Very little distinct infor- 
 mation is to be gathered from him ; but 
 Cyprian's own letters are extant, and 
 from them I shall endeavour to exhibit 
 whatever is of the greatest moment. They 
 are, in truth, a valuable treasure of eccle- 
 siastical history : The spirit, taste, disci- 
 pline, and habits of the times, among 
 Christians, are strongly delineated, nor 
 have we in all the third century any ac- 
 count to be compared with them. He 
 was a professor of oratory in the city of 
 Carthage, and a man of wealth, quality, 
 and dignity. Cascilius, a Carthaginian 
 presbyter, had the felicity, under God, to 
 conduct him to the knowledge of Christ; 
 and in his gratitude, Cyprian afterwards 
 assumed the praenomon of Caecilius. His 
 conversion was about the year Qo„yep. 
 two hundred and forty-six ; gjo,, ^f 
 and two years before his ele- Cyprian, 
 vation to the see of Carthage, j^ d 245. 
 About thirteen years compre- 
 
 * Euseb. B. vi. 36. 
 
Cent. IH.] 
 
 CONVERSION OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 161 
 
 hend the whole scene of his Christian life. 
 — But God can do great things in a little 
 time ; or to speak more nervously with 
 the sacred writer, " one day is with the 
 
 LORD AS A THOUSAND YEARS." He did 
 
 not proceed by slow painful steps of ar- 
 gumentation, but seems to have been led 
 on with vast rapidity by the effectual 
 operation of the Divine Spirit : — and he 
 happily escaped, in a great measure at 
 least, the shoals and quicksands of talse 
 learning and self-conceit, which so much 
 tarnished the character of his eastern 
 brethren. Faith and love in native sim- 
 plicity appear to have been possessed by 
 him when an early convert. He saw 
 with pity the poor of the flock ; and he 
 knew no method so proper of employing 
 " the unrighteous mammon as in reliev- 
 ing their distress."* — He sold whole es- 
 tates for their benefit. 
 
 It was an excellent rule of the Apostle 
 concerning ordination, " Not a novice, 
 lest, being lifted up with pride, he fall 
 into the condemnation of the devil." 
 There appeared, however, in Cyprian a 
 spirit at once so simple, so zealous, and 
 so intelligent, that in about two years 
 after his conversion he was chosen pres- 
 byter, and then bishop of Carthage. 
 
 It was no feigned virtue that thus ad- 
 vanced him in the eyes of the people. 
 With Cyprian the love of Christ evident- 
 ly preponderated above all secular con- 
 siderations. In vain his wife opposed 
 his Christian spirit of liberality. The 
 widow, the orphan, and the poor, found 
 in him a sympathizing benefactor con- 
 tinually. The presbyter Ccecilius must 
 have beheld with much delight the grow- 
 ing virtues of his pupil : — When dying 
 he recommended to his care his own wife 
 and children. It was with no satisfaction 
 that Cyprian observed the designs of the 
 people to choose him for their bishop. 
 He retired , to avoid solicitation: His house 
 was besieged : His retreat was rendered 
 impossible. He yielded at length, and 
 with much reluctance accepted the pain- 
 ful PRE-EMINENCE : fof SO he soou found 
 it. — Five presbyters, however, were ene- 
 mies to his exaltation. His lenity, pa- 
 tience, and benevolence towards them 
 were remarked by every one. 
 
 The active spirit of Cyprian was, no 
 doubt, much employed before he was 
 made a bishop : Indeed Pontius tells us, 
 that this was actually the case ; but he 
 
 communicates no particulars. St. Austin 
 says, that his letter to Donatus was his 
 first work; and, therefore, the time of 
 writing it may safely be placed before 
 his arrival at episcopal dignity. Part of 
 this letter, as it will illustrate his con- 
 version, and show the spirit of a man 
 penetrated with divine love, and lately 
 recovered from the idolatry of the world, 
 well deserves to be translated. — " I find 
 your whole care and concern at present 
 is for conversion : you look at me ; and in 
 your affection, expect much from me :— 
 I fear I cannot answer your expectations. 
 Small fruits must be looked for from my 
 unworthiness ; — Yet, I will make the at- 
 tept, for the subject-matter is all on 
 my side. — Let plausible arts of ambition 
 be used in courts ; but when we speak of 
 the Lord God, plainness and sincerity, 
 not the powers of eloquence, should be 
 used. Hear, then, things not eloquent, 
 but important; not courtly, but rude and 
 simple ; — so, should the divine goodness 
 be celebrated always with artless truth. — 
 Hear, then, an account of something 
 which is felt before it is learnt ; and is 
 not collected by a long course of specu- 
 lation, but is imbibed by the soul through 
 the compendium of grace ripening her, as 
 it were, all at once. 
 
 " While I lay in darkness and the night 
 of paganism, and when I fluctuated un- 
 certain and dubious with wandering steps 
 in the sea of a tempestuous age, igno- 
 rant of my own life, and alienated from 
 light and truth, it appeared to me a harsh 
 and difficult thing, as my manners then 
 were, to obtain what divine grace had 
 promised, — namely, that a man should 
 be born again ; and that, being animated 
 to a new life by the salutary washing of 
 regeneration,* he should strip himself of 
 what he was before, and though the body 
 emained the same, he should, in his 
 mind, become altogether a new creature. 
 How can so great a change be possible, 
 said I, — that a man should suddenly and 
 at once put off what nature and habit 
 have confirmed in him. These evils are 
 deeply and closely fixed in us. How 
 shall he learn parsimony, who has been 
 accustomed to expensive and magnificent 
 feasts 1 And how shall he, who has been 
 accustomed to purple, gold, and costly 
 attire, condescend to the simplicity of a 
 plebeian habit? Can he who was delight- 
 
 * Pontius, Vit. Cyp. 
 02 
 
 * An instance we have here of the power- 
 ful eflects of regeneration attending baptism 
 in tliose days. 
 
162 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VII. 
 
 ed with the honours of ambition, live pri- 
 vate and obscure 1 Further, — the man has 
 been accustomed to crowds of clients, 
 and will think solitude the most dreadful 
 punishment. — He must still, thought I, 
 be infested by tenacious allurements : 
 Drunkenness, pride, anger, rapacity, cru- 
 elty, ambition, and lust, must still domi- 
 neer over him. 
 
 "These reflections engaged my mind 
 very often ; for they were peculiarly appli- 
 cable to my own case. — I was myself en- 
 tangled in many errors of my former life, 
 from which I did not think it possible to 
 be cleared : hence, I favoured my vices, 
 and, through despair of what was better, I 
 stuck close to them as part of my very 
 frame and constitution. But after the 
 filth of my former sins was washed away 
 in the laver of regeneration, and divine 
 light, from above, had infused itself into 
 my heart, now purified and cleansed ; after, 
 through the effusion of the Holy Spirit 
 from heaven, the new birth had made me 
 a new creature indeed, — immediately, and 
 in an amazing manner, dubious things 
 began to be cleared up; things once shut 
 were opened ; dark things shone forth ; 
 and what before seemed difficult and even 
 impossible, now appeared easy and prac- 
 ticable. I saw that, that which was 
 born after the flesh and had lived enslav- 
 ed by wickedness, was of the 'earth, 
 earthy ;' but that the new life now ani- 
 mated by the Holy Ghost, began to be 
 of God. You know and recollect, as 
 perfectly as I do, my conversion from a 
 deadly criminal state to a state of lively 
 virtue: You know what these opposite 
 states have done for me : — what they have 
 taken away ; and what they have confer- 
 red : and therefore, I need not proclaim 
 it: To boast of one's own merits is odi- 
 ous ; though that cannot be called an ex- 
 pression of boasting, but of gratitude, 
 which ascribes nothing to the virtue of 
 man, but professes all to proceed from 
 the gift of God : Thus deliverance from 
 sin is the consequence of sound faith : — 
 The preceding sinful state was owing 
 to human blindness. — Of God it is, — of 
 God, I say, even all that we can do : thence 
 we live; — thence we have strength; — 
 thence we conceive and assume vigour ; 
 even though, as yet, placed here below, 
 we have some clear foretaste of our fu- 
 ture felicity. Only, — let fear be the guar- 
 dian of innocence; that the Lord, who 
 kindly shone into our minds with an ef- 
 fusion of heavenly grace, may be detained 
 
 as our guest by the steady obedience of the 
 soul which delights in him, — lest pardon 
 received should beget a careless presump- 
 tion, and the old enemy break in afresh. 
 
 " But if you keep the road of innocence 
 and of righteousness, if you walk with 
 footsteps that do not slide ; — if, depend- 
 ing upon God with all your heart and 
 with all your might, you be only what 
 you have begun to be, you will then 
 find, that according to the proportion 
 of faith, so will your attainments and 
 enjoyments be. For no bound or mea- 
 sure can be assigned in the reception 
 of divine grace, as is the case of earthly 
 benefits. The Holy Spirit is poured forth 
 copiously ; is confined by no limits ; is 
 restrained by no barriers ; he flows per- 
 petually ; he bestows in rich abundance : 
 Let our heart only thirst and be open 
 to receive him : As much of capacious 
 faith as we bring, so much abounding 
 grace do we draw from him. Hence an 
 ability is given, with sober chastity, up- 
 rightness of mind, and purity of language, 
 to heal the sick, to extinguish the force 
 of poison, to cleanse the filth of distemper- 
 ed minds, to speak peace to the hostile ; to 
 give tranquillity to the violent, and gentle- 
 ness to the fierce ; to compel, by menaces, 
 unclean and wandering spirits to quit their 
 hold of men ; to scourge and control the 
 foe, and by torments to bring him to con- 
 fess what he is. — Thus, in what we have 
 already begun to be, our new spiritual 
 nature, which is entirely the gift of God, 
 triumphs in its freedom from the bondage 
 of sin and Satan ; though, till our corrup- 
 tible body and members be changed, the 
 prospect, as yet carnal, is obscured by 
 the clouds of worldly objects. What a 
 faculty, what an energy is this ! — that the 
 soul should not only be emancipated from 
 slavery, and be made free and pure ; but 
 also stronger and more efficient, so as 
 to become victorious and triumphant over 
 the powers of the enemy!" 
 
 The testimony here given to the ejec- 
 tion of evil spirits, as a common thing 
 among the Christians, even in the third cen- 
 tury, deserves to be noticed, as a proof 
 that miraculous influences had not ceased 
 in the Church. Minutius Felix speaks 
 to the same purpose, and I think with 
 more precision. " Being adjured by the 
 living God, they tremble and remain 
 wretched and reluctant in the bodies of 
 men : they either leap out immediately, 
 or vanish by degrees, as the faith of the 
 patient or the grace of the person admi- 
 
Ceitt. nr.] 
 
 CONVERSION OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 163 
 
 nistering relief may be strong or weak." 
 — Indeed the testimony of the Fathers in 
 these times is so general and concurrent, 
 that the fact itself cannot be denied with- 
 out universally impeaching their veracity. 
 It is not my province to dwell on this 
 point : The sanctifying graces of the 
 Spirit call for my particular attention ; 
 and these are described by Cyprian as by 
 one who had seen and tasted them. No 
 doubt, after his conversion, he experienced 
 in himself vital, energetic, and divine prin- 
 ciples, far beyond the reach of ordinary ra- 
 tional processes ; — and he appeals to his 
 friend Donatus if he had not also felt the 
 same. 
 
 We may safely, therefore, infer that 
 such things were not then infrequent 
 among Christians, though, certainly, the 
 EFFUSIONS of the Holy Ghost did not 
 so much abound as in the two former cen- 
 turies. — Indeed, what but the power of 
 God on the heart can account for a change 
 so sudden, so rapid, and yet so firm and 
 solid, as that of Cyprian 1 What can 
 be conceived more opposite than the last 
 thirteen years of his life compared with 
 the former part of if? — Will modern fas- 
 tidionsness call all this enthusiasm ? 
 
 In this narrative, the reader will notice, 
 that the essential doctrines of justification 
 and regeneration by divine grace were 
 not only believed but experienced by this 
 zealous African. — The difference between 
 mere human and divine teaching is ren- 
 dered striking by such cases. W'ith 
 no great furniture of learning, it was his 
 happiness to know little, if any thing, of 
 the then reigning philosophy. — We see a 
 man of business and of the world rising 
 at once a Phoenix in the Church ; and 
 though no extraordinary Theologian in 
 point of accurate knowledge, yet an useful 
 practical Divine, an accomplished Pastor, 
 flaming with the love of God and of souls, 
 and with unremitting activity spending 
 and being spent for Jesus Christ. — This 
 is the Lord's doing; and it should be re- 
 marked as HIS WORK. — We shall see that 
 Cjqjrian's own conversion prepared him 
 for actual service. Argument and dispute 
 prevailed among Christians in the East; 
 — brotherly love in the West. 
 
 He records a remarkable influence of 
 Divine Grace, which to him appeared to 
 have accompanied his baptism. Nor is 
 it unreasonable to suppose that this was 
 commonly the case at that time. The 
 inward and spiritual grace really attended 
 the outward and visible sisrn. And is 
 
 to be lamented, that the corruption and 
 perversion of after ages, availing itself 
 of the ambiguous language of the fathers 
 on this subject, — which, with them, waa 
 natural enough, — supposed a necessary 
 connexion to take place where there had 
 heen a frequent one. In Cyprian's time, 
 to call baptism itself the new birth was not 
 very dangerous : In our age it is poison 
 itself: Men are apt to content themselves 
 with the outward and visible sign ; and 
 it has long been the fashion to suppose, 
 all persons who have been baptised whea 
 they were infants, to be, of course, when 
 they are grown up, in a state of regenera- 
 tion by the Holy Spirit : and thus men 
 have learned to furnish themselves with 
 a convenient evasion of all that is written 
 in Scripture concerning the godly motions 
 of the third Person of the sacred Tri- 
 nity.* 
 
 Cyprian goes on, — "And that the marks 
 of divine goodness may appear the more 
 perspicuously by a discovery of the truth, 
 I would lay open to your view the real 
 state of the world ; — I would remove the 
 thick darkness which covers it, and de- 
 tect the hidden mischiefs and the evils 
 which it contains. — For a little time, fancy 
 yourself withdrawn to the top of a high 
 mountain ; — thence inspect the appear- 
 ance of things below you; look all around ; 
 — preserve yourself unfettered by worldly 
 connexions, — observe the fluctuating tem- 
 pests of the world ; — you will then pity 
 mankind ; you will understand and be 
 sensible of your own happiness ; — you 
 will be more thankful to God ; and, with 
 more joy, you will congratulate yourself 
 on j^our escape." 
 
 He then gives an affecting view of the 
 immensity of evils which the state of 
 mankind at that time exhibited, and gra- 
 phically delineates the miseries of public 
 and of private life ; after which he returns 
 to the description of the blessings of true 
 Christianity. 
 
 " The only placid and sound tranquilli- 
 ty," says he, " the only solid, firm, and 
 
 * It is true that the term regeneration may 
 be so defined as to imply no more tliaii the 
 mere ceremony of baptism. But tlie real clan- 
 ger is, lest by any contrivances in our defini- 
 tions, we eitber do away entirely, or at least 
 weaken, tbe necessity of the operations of the 
 Holy Spirit, so essential both in the first work 
 of conversion, and also in the carrying on of 
 that work ; or in tbe words of our Tenth Ar- 
 ticle, so essential in " preventing us that we 
 may have a good will, and working with us 
 when we have that good will." 
 
164 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VHL 
 
 perpetual security is, to be delivered from 
 the tempests of this restless scene, to be 
 stationed in the port of salvation ; to lift 
 np the eyes from earth to heaven, and to 
 be admitted into the favour of the Lord : 
 Such a man approaches, in his thoughts, 
 near to his God ; and justly g-lories, that 
 whatever others deem sublime and great 
 in human affairs, — is absolutely beneath 
 his notice. He, who is greater than the 
 world, can desire nothing, can want no- 
 thing from the world. Wliat an unshaken 
 protection ; what a truly divine shelter 
 fraught with eternal good, it must be, to 
 be loosed from the snares of an entangling 
 world, to be purged from earthly dregs, 
 and to be wafted into the light of immor- 
 tal day ! When we see what the insi- 
 dious rage of a destructive enemy was 
 plotting against us ; — certainly, we must 
 be the more compelled to love what we 
 shall be, because we have now learned 
 both to know and to condemn what we 
 were. Nor is there, for this end, any 
 need of price, of canvassing, or of manual 
 labour : This complete dignity or power 
 of man is not to be acquired by elaborate 
 eiibrts : The gift of God is gratuitous and 
 easy. As the sun shines freely, as the 
 fountain bubbles, as the rain bedews, so 
 the Celestial Spirit infuses himself. The 
 soul looks up to heaven and becomes 
 conscious of its Author : It then begins 
 actually to be what it believes itself to 
 be : It is higher than the firmament, and 
 sublimer than all earthly power. Only, — 
 do you, whom the heavenly warfare hath 
 marked for divine service, preserve im- 
 tainted and sober your Christian course 
 by the virtues of religion. Let prayer or 
 reading be your assiduous employment : 
 Sometimes speak with God : At other 
 times hear him speak to you : Let him 
 instruct you by his precepts ; let him re- 
 gulate you : Whom he hath made rich, 
 none shall make poor. There can be no 
 penury with him whose heart has once 
 been enriched with celestial bounty. 
 Roofs arched with gold, and houses inlaid 
 with marble, will be vile in your eyes, 
 when you know that your own minds ou ght 
 rather to be cultivated and adorned : That 
 this house is more valuable, which the 
 Lord has chosen to be his temple, in 
 which the Holy Ghost has begun to dwell. 
 Let us adorn this house with the paintings 
 of innocence, let us illuminate it with the 
 light of righteousness. This will never 
 fall into ruin through the decays of age : 
 Its ornaments shall never fade. What- 
 
 ever is not genuine is precarious, and af- 
 fords to the possessor no sure foundation. 
 This remains in its culture perpetually 
 vivid ; in honour, and in splendour, spot- 
 less and eternal : It can neither be abo- 
 lished nor extinguished. — Is it then ca- 
 pable of no alteration'? — Yes, — It will 
 receive a rich improvement at the resur- 
 rection of the body. 
 
 "Let us be careful how we spend our 
 time: let us rejoice; but let not an hour 
 of entertainment be inconsistent or uncon- 
 nected with divine grace. Let the sober 
 banquet resound with psalms; and as 
 your memory is good, and voice harmo- 
 nious, perform this office, — as I believe 
 you do. — It will be more than agreeable, 
 — it will be delightful, — to your dear 
 friends to hear of your spiritual and reli- 
 gious harmony." 
 
 In all this the intelligent reader sees 
 the picture of an active Christian, — pos- 
 sessed of a rich portion of that effusion of 
 the Holy Ghost which, from the Apos- 
 tles' days, still exhibited Christ Jesus, — 
 and fitted by experience to communicate 
 to others the real Gospel, and to be a 
 liappy instrument of guiding souls to that 
 rest which remains for the people of God. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE BEGINNINGS OF THE PERSECUTION 
 
 OF DECIUS. THE GOVERNMENT OF 
 
 CyPRlAN TILL HIS RETIREMENT. 
 
 How Cyprian conducted himself in his 
 bishopric, who is sufficient to relate? 
 says Pontius, in the fulness of his admi- 
 ration. Some PARTICULAR account, how- 
 ever, might have been expected from one 
 who had such large opportunity of infor- 
 mation. He does make some brief obser- 
 vations on his external appearance. " His 
 looks had the due mixture of gravity and 
 cheerfulness ; so that it was doubtful 
 whether he vvere more worthy of love or 
 of reverence. His dress also was cor- 
 respondent to his looks : He had renounc- 
 ed the secular pomp to which his rank in 
 life entitled him ; — yet he avoided affected 
 penury." — From a man of Cyprian's piety 
 and good sense united, such a conduct 
 might be expected. 
 
 While Cyprian was labouring to re- 
 cover the spirit of godliness among the 
 Africans, which long peace had corrupted, 
 Philip was slain, and sue- xhe 7th 
 ceeded by Decius. His en- Persecu- 
 
CEifT. in.] 
 
 UNDER DECIUS, ETC. 
 
 165 
 
 tionbyDe- mity to the former emperor 
 dus, conspired with his pagan pre- 
 
 A. D. 250. judices to bring on the most 
 dreadful persecution which 
 the Church had yet experienced. It was 
 evident that nothing less than the destruc- 
 tion of the Christian name was intended. 
 The chronology is here remarkably em- 
 barrassed ; nor is it an object of much 
 consequence to trouble either myself or 
 the reader with studious attempts to set- 
 tle it. Suffice it to say, that the eventful 
 period before us of Cyprian's 
 bishopric extends from the 
 year two hundred and forty- 
 eiffht to two hundred and six- 
 
 The ex- 
 tent of it, 
 A. D. 248 
 to 260. 
 
 ty, and that Decius's succes- 
 sion to the empire must have taken place 
 about the beginning of it. The persecu- 
 tion raged with astonishing fury, beyond 
 the example of former persecutions, both 
 in the East and West. The latter is the 
 scene before us at present. In a treatise 
 of Cyprian concerning the lapsed,* we 
 have an affecting account of the declen- 
 sion from the spirit of Christianity, which 
 had taken place before his conversion, and 
 which moved God to chastise his Church. 
 " If the cause of our miseries," says he, 
 " be investigated, the cure of the wound 
 may be found. The Lord would have his 
 family to be tried. And because long 
 peace had corrupted the discipline divine- 
 ly revealed to us, the heavenly chastise- 
 ment hath raised up our faith, which had 
 lain almost dormant : and when, by our 
 sins, we had deserved to suffer still more, 
 the merciful Lord so moderated all things, 
 that the whole scene rather deserves the 
 name of a trial than a persecution. Each 
 had been bent on improving his patrimo- 
 ny ; and had forgotten what believers had 
 done under the Apostles, and what they 
 ought always to do : — They were brood- 
 ing over the arts of amassing wealth : — 
 The pastors and the deacons each forgat 
 tlieir duty : Works of mercy were ne- 
 glected, and discipline was at the lowest 
 ebb. — Luxury and effeminacy prevailed : 
 Meretricious arts in dress were cultivated : 
 Fraud and deceit were practised among 
 brethren. — Christians could unite them- 
 selves in matrimony with unbelievers ; 
 could swear not only without reverence, 
 but even without veracity. With haughty 
 asperity they despised their ecclesiastical 
 superiors: They railed against one an- 
 other with outrageous acrimony, and con- 
 
 Section 4. 
 
 ducted quarrels with determined malice: 
 — Even many bishops, who ought to be 
 guides and patterns to the rest, neglect- 
 ing the peculiar duties of their stations, 
 gave themselves up to secular pursuits: 
 — They deserted their places of residence 
 and their flocks : They travelled through 
 distant provinces in quest of pleasure and 
 gain; gave no assistance to the needy 
 brethren; but were insatiable in their 
 thirst of money : — They possessed estates 
 by fraud, and multiplied usury. What 
 have we not deserved to suffer for such a 
 conduct* Even the Divine Word hath 
 foretold us what we might expect, 'if 
 
 HIS CHILDREN FORSAKE MY LAW, AND WALK 
 NOT IN MY JUDGMENTS, I WILL VISIT THEIR 
 OFFENCES WITH THE ROD, AND THEIR SIN 
 
 WITH SCOURGES.' Thcsc thiugs had been 
 denounced and foretold, but in vain : Our 
 sins had brought our affairs to that pass, 
 that because we had despised the Lord's 
 directions, we were obliged to undergo a 
 correction of our multiplied evils and a 
 trial of our faith by severe remedies." 
 
 That a deep declension from Christian 
 purity had taken place not only in the 
 East, where false philosophy aided its 
 progress, as we have seen, but also in the 
 West, where the operation of no peculiar 
 cause can be traced beyond the commoa 
 influence of prosperity on human depra- 
 vity, is now completely evident from this 
 account of Cyprian; and, — it deserves to 
 be remarked, that the first grand and gene- 
 ral declension, after the primary effu- 
 sion of the Divine Spirit, should be fixed 
 about the middle of this century. The 
 wisdom and goodness of God is also to 
 be observed in qualifying the bishop of 
 Carthage by a strong personal work oa 
 his own heart : and then, in raising him 
 to the See of Carthage, to superintend the 
 western part of his Church in a time of 
 trial like the present. The trial, no doubt, 
 was kindly intended by Providence to ope- 
 rate as a medicine for the revival of the 
 declining spirit of Christianity; but it 
 needed, nevertheless, all that fortitude, 
 zeal, and wisdom, with which Cyprian 
 was so eminently endowed. 
 
 In such a situation it was not to be ex- 
 pected that the people under the bishop's 
 care should, in general, stand their ground: 
 avarice had taken deep root among them; 
 and vast numbers lapsed into idolatry im- 
 mediately. Even before men were ac- 
 cused as Christians, " many ran to the 
 forum and sacrificed to the gods as they 
 were ordered; and the crowds of apos- 
 
166 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 tates were so great* that the magistrates 
 wished to delay numbers of them till the 
 next day, but they were importuned by 
 the wretched suppliants to be allowed 
 to prove themselves heathens that very 
 night." 
 
 At Rome, the persecution raged with 
 unremitting violence. There Fabian the 
 bishop suffered; and, for some time, it 
 became impracticable to elect a successor : 
 yet it does not appear that the metropolis 
 suffered more, in proportion, than some 
 other places, since we find that the flame 
 of persecution had driven several bishops 
 from distant provinces, and made them fly 
 for shelter to Rome.f Cyprian, however, 
 having been regularly informed by the 
 Roman clergy of the martyrdom of their 
 bishop, congratulated them on his glori- 
 ous exit,:j: and exulted on occasion of his 
 uprightness and integrity. He expresses 
 the pleasure he conceived in observing 
 that his edifying example had so much 
 penetrated their minds ; and owns the 
 energy which he himself felt to imitate 
 the pattern. 
 
 Moyses and Maximus, two Roman 
 presbyters, with other confessors, were 
 also seized and imprisoned. Attempts 
 were repeatedly made to persuade them 
 to relinquish the faith, but in vain. Cy- 
 prian found means to write to them also 
 a letter full of benevolence, and breathing 
 the strongest pathos. § He tells them 
 that his heart was with them continually, 
 — that he prayed for them in his public 
 ministry, — and in private. He comforts 
 them under the pressures of hunger and 
 thirst which they endured, and congratu- 
 lates them for living now not for this life 
 but for the next; and particularly, be- 
 cause their example would be a means of 
 confirming many who were in a wavering 
 state. — But Carthage soon became an un 
 safe scene to Cyprian himself. — By re 
 peated suffrages of the people at the thea- 
 tre he was demanded to be taken and 
 given to the lions ; and it behooved him 
 immediately either to retire into a place 
 of safety, or to expect the crown of mar- 
 tyrdom. 
 
 Cyprian's spirit in interpreting Scrip- 
 ture was more simple, and more accom- 
 modated to receive its plain and obvious 
 sense, than that of men who had learned 
 to refine and subtilize. He knew the li- 
 berty which his Divine Master had given 
 
 to his people — of fleeing when they were 
 persecuted in one city, to another; — and 
 he embraced it. Nay, he seems scarcely 
 to have thought it lawful to do otherwise. 
 — Even the last state of his martyrdom 
 evinces this. — His manner of enduring it, 
 when it, providentially, was brought on 
 him, 3ufl[iciently acquits him of all suspi- 
 cion of pusillanimity. — To unite such 
 seemingly opposite things as discretion 
 and fortitude, each in a very high degree, 
 is a sure characteristic of greatness in a 
 Christian : — It is grace in its highest ex- 
 ercise. — Pontius thinks it was not with- 
 out a particular divme direction that he 
 was moved to act in this manner for the 
 benefit of the Church. 
 
 Behold him at present, in some place 
 of retreat, under the protection of God, 
 and through the love of his people safe 
 for the space of two years from the arm 
 of a most barbarous persecution ; and let 
 us next see how he employed this inter- 
 val of retirement. 
 
 * Cypri. 
 I Ep. 4. 
 
 de lapsis. 
 
 fEp. 
 §Ep. 
 
 31. 
 16. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF CYPRIAN AND OF THE 
 WESTERN CHURCH DURING HIS RE- 
 TIREMENT OF TWO YEARS. 
 
 CypRiAN was never more active than in 
 his retreat. Nothing of moment occur- 
 red in ecclesiastical affairs either in Af- 
 rica or in Italy with which he was unac- 
 quainted ; and his counsels, under God, 
 were of the greatest influence in both 
 countries. I shall endeavour, from his 
 own letters, which were written in this 
 period, to abbreviate the account. 
 
 The presbyters of Carthage sent Cle- 
 raentius, a sub-deacon, to Rome, from 
 whom the Roman clergy learnt the place 
 of the retreat of the bishop. They, in re- 
 turn, express to the Africans their perfect 
 agreement in opinion concerning the pro- 
 priety of the concealment, because he 
 was an eminent character, and a life ex- 
 tremely valuable to the Church. They 
 represent the conflict as very important, 
 which God had now permitted for the trial 
 of his servants : They said, it was the 
 express purpose of God to manifest both 
 to angels and to men, that the conqueror 
 shall be crowned, and the conquered, tha* 
 is, the faithless apostate, be self-con- 
 demned. They express the deep sense 
 which they had both of their own situar- 
 tion and that of the clergy of Carthage, 
 whose duty it was to take care not to in- 
 
CsjTT. in.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 167 
 
 cur the censure passed on faithless shep- 
 herds in the prophet,* but rather to imi- 
 tate their Lord the good shepherd, who 
 laid down his life for the sheep, f and who 
 so earnestly and repeatedly charges Si- 
 mon Peter, as a proof of his love to his 
 Master, "to feed his sheep.":!: "We 
 would not wish, dear brethren," say they, 
 " to find you mere mercenaries, but good 
 shepherds, since you know it must be 
 highly sinful in you not to exhort the 
 brethren to stand immovable in the faith, 
 lest they be totally subverted by idolatry. 
 Nor do we only in words thus exhort 
 you ; but, as you may learn from many 
 who came from us to you, our actions, 
 with the help of God, accord with our 
 declarations : we make no scruple to 
 hazard our lives ; for we have before our 
 eyes the fear of God and of eternal punish- 
 ment, rather than the fear of men and of 
 a temporary calamity : we do not desert 
 the brethren ; we exhort them to stand in 
 the faith, and to be ready to follow their 
 Lord when called: We have also done 
 our utmost to recover those who had gone 
 up to sacrifice in order that they might 
 save their lives. Our Church stands firm 
 in the faith in general : Some, indeed, 
 overcome by terror, either because they 
 were persons in high life, or were moved 
 by the fear of man, have lapsed ; yet 
 these, though separated from us, we do 
 not give up as lost altogether, but we ex- 
 hort them to repent, if they may find mer- 
 cy with him who is able to save : we 
 would not, by abandoning them, render 
 their case hopeless and incurable. 
 
 " We wish you, brethren, to act in the 
 same manner,. as much as in you lies : — 
 Exhort the lapsed, if they should be 
 seized a second time, to confess their Sa- 
 viour. And we suggest to you to receive 
 again into commuuion any of these, if 
 
 in that which is least, will have ' autho- 
 rity over ten cities.'* May God, who 
 does all things for those who hope in 
 him, grant that we may all be found thus 
 diligently employed ! The brethren in 
 bonds, the clergy, and the whole Church 
 salute you : We all of us with earnest 
 solicitude watch and pray for all who call 
 on the name of the Lord. And we be- 
 seech you, in return, to be mindful of us 
 also in your prayers." 
 
 Several observations present themselves 
 on this occasion. 1. It appears, that, 
 both at Rome and Carthage, the reduced 
 mode of episcopacy was the form of ec- 
 clesiastical government which gradually 
 prevailed in the Christian world. It is 
 not to be supposed that the whole body 
 of Christians, either at Rome or at Car- 
 thage, was no more than what might be 
 contained in one assembly. — The infer- 
 ence is obvious. 
 
 2. The Roman Church appears, in the 
 beginning of Decius's persecution at least, 
 to have been in a much more thriving 
 state than that of Carthage, and their 
 clergy to have been models worthy of 
 imitation in all ages. 
 
 3. The administration of discipline 
 among the Christians, wisely tempered 
 by tenderness and strictness, is truly ad- 
 mirable. 
 
 4. The work of the Divine Spirit also 
 amongst them, infusing the largest cha- 
 rity, even to the laying down of their 
 lives for the brethren, is manifest beyond 
 contradiction. Now mark the spirit of a 
 primitive pastor, full of charity and meek- 
 ness, of zeal and prudence, in the follow- 
 ing letter of Cyprian to his clergy : — 
 
 " Being hitherto preserved by the fa- 
 vour of God, I salute you, dearest breth- 
 ren, and I rejoice to hear of your safety. 
 As present circumstances permit not my 
 
 they heartily desire it, and give proofs of | presence among you, I beg you by your 
 
 "" faith and by the ties of religion, to dis- 
 
 charge your duties, in conjunction with 
 mine also, that nothing be wanting either 
 on the head of discipline or of diligence. 
 I beg that nothing may be wanting to 
 supply the necessities of those, who are 
 imprisoned because of their glorious pro- 
 fession and avowal of God, or who labour 
 underthepressuresof indigence and pover- 
 ty, since the whole ecclesiastical fund is 
 in the hands of the clergy for this very 
 purpose, that a number may have it in their 
 power to relieve the wants of individuals. 
 
 sound repentance. And certainly officers 
 should be appointed to minister to the 
 widows, the sick, those in prison, and 
 those who are in a state of banishment. 
 A special care should be exercised over 
 the catechumens, to preserve them from 
 apostasy ; and those whose duty it is to 
 inter the dead, ought to consider the in- 
 terment of the martyrs as matter of indis- 
 pensable obligation. 
 
 " Sure we are, that those servants, who 
 shall be found to have been thus faithful 
 
 * Ezek. xxxiv. 
 i John xxi. 
 
 3,4. 
 
 f John X. 
 
 * Luke xix. 19. 
 
168 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH ; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 "I beg further, that you would use 
 every prudential and cautious method to 
 procure the peace of the Church; and if 
 the brethren, in their charity, wish to con- 
 fer with and to visit those pious suftering 
 converts, whom the divine goodness hath 
 thus far shone upon by such good begin- 
 nings, they should, however, do this cau- 
 tiously, not in crowds, nor in a multitude ; 
 lest any odium should hence arise, and 
 the liberty of admission be denied alto- 
 gether; and lest while, through greedi- 
 ness, we aim at too much, we lose all. 
 Consult therefore and provide, that this 
 may be done safely and with discretion ; 
 so that the presbyters, one by one, accom- 
 panied by the deacons in turn, may suc- 
 cessively minister to them, because the 
 change of persons visiting them is less lia- 
 ble to breed suspicion. For in all things we 
 ought to be meek and humble, as be- 
 comes the servants of God, to redeem the 
 time, to have a regard for peace, and to 
 provide for the people. Most dearly be- 
 loved and longed-for, I wish you all pros- 
 perity, and entreat you to remember us. 
 Salute all the brethren. Victor the deacon, 
 and those that are with us, salute you."* 
 The numerous defections which took 
 place must have penetrated deeply the 
 fervent and charitable spirit of Cyprian. 
 Not only very many of the laity, but part 
 of the clergy also had been seduced. " I 
 could have wished," says he,f " dearest 
 brethren, to have had it in my power to 
 salute your whole body sound and entire; 
 but as the melancholy tempest has, in ad 
 dition to the fall of so many of the people, 
 also affected part of the clergy, — sad ac- 
 cumulation of our sorrow I we pray the 
 Lord, that, by divine mercy, we may be 
 enabled to salute you at least, — whom we 
 have known hitherto to stand firm in faith 
 and Atirtue, — as sound and unshaken fol 
 lowers of Christ for the time to come.— 
 Though the cause loudly called on me to 
 hasten my return to you ; first, on account 
 of my own desire and regret for the loss 
 of your company, — a desire which burns 
 strongly within me ; — in the next place, 
 that we might, in full council, settle the va- 
 rious objects in the Church which require 
 attention ; yet, on the whole, to remain still 
 concealed seemed more advisable on ac- 
 count of other advantages which pertain 
 to the general safety, an account of which 
 our dear brother Tertullus will give you ; 
 who, agreeably to that care which he em- 
 
 ploys in divine works with so much zeal 
 was also the adviser of this council, that 
 I should act with caution and moderation, 
 and not rashly commit myself to the pub- 
 lic view in a place where I had so often 
 been sought and called for. 
 
 "Relying therefore on your afifection 
 and conscientiousness, of which I have 
 had good experience, I exhort and charge 
 you by these letters, that you, whose si- 
 tuation is less dangerous and invidious, 
 would supply my lack of service. Let 
 the poor be attended to as much as possi- 
 ble, — those I mean, who have stood the 
 test of persecution : suffer them not to 
 want necessaries ; lest indigfence do that 
 agamst them which persecution could 
 not. I know the charity of the brethren 
 has provided for very many of them :— 
 yet, — as I wrote to you before, even while 
 they were in prison, — if any persons do 
 want meat or clothing,* let their necessi- 
 ties be supplied." 
 
 Li the sequel of this epistle, he shows 
 a deep knowledge of the depravity of the 
 human heart, which is very apt to be 
 puffed up with vain-glory and self-con- 
 ceit, on the consciousness of having well 
 performed our part in any respect. I 
 cannot forbear transcribing the following 
 practical rules of humility. 
 
 " Let them know, — that they must be 
 instructed and taught by you ; — that the 
 doctrines of Scripture require subordina- 
 tion in the people to their pastors ; — that 
 they should cultivate an humble, modest, 
 and peaceable demeanour ; — and that 
 those who have been gloriously bold in 
 the avowal of their faith, should be 
 equally exemplary in all the branches of 
 Christian conduct. — The harder trial yet 
 remains :— The Lord saith, ' He that en- 
 dureth to the end, the same shall be 
 saved. 'f Let |^them imitate the Lord, 
 whose humility never shone more than at 
 the eve of his passion, when he washed 
 his disciples' feet. The Apostle Paul 
 too, after repeated sufferings, still conti- 
 nued mild and humble. His elevation to 
 the third heaven begat in him no arro- 
 gance ; neither, says he, ' did we eat any 
 man's bread for nought, but laboured and 
 travailed night and day, that we might 
 not be chargeable to any of you.'ij: 
 
 " All these duties do you instil into the 
 minds of the brethren : and, — because he, 
 
 Epis. 4. 
 
 t Epis. 5. 
 
 * It hence appears that a 
 had been released. 
 
 number of them 
 
 t Matthew x. 22. 
 
 :j: 2 Thess. iii. 8. 
 
CEST.m.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 169 
 
 who humbles himself, shall be exalted, 
 — now is the time more particularly that 
 they should tear the snares of the enemy 
 of souls, who loves to attack even the 
 strongest, and to revenge the disgrace 
 which he has already sustained from 
 them. The Lord grant that, in due sea- 
 son, I may be enabled to visit my people 
 again ; and to exliort them to useful pur- 
 pose. For I am grieved to hear that some 
 of them run about idly, foolishly, and in- 
 solently; or give themselves up to strife; 
 and even pollute, by fornication, those 
 members which had confessed Christ 
 and are not willing to be subject to the 
 deacons or presbyters, but seem to act as 
 if they intended, by the bad conduct of a 
 few nominal Christians, to bring disgrace 
 on the whole body. He is a true Chris- 
 tian indeed, on account of whom the 
 Church need not blush, but glory. 
 
 " To the point, concerning which cer- 
 tain presbyters wrote to me, I can answer 
 nothing alone; for, from the beginning of 
 my appointment to this See, I determin- 
 ed to do nothing without your consent and 
 the consent of the people. But when, by 
 the favour of God, I shall have returned 
 to you, — we will treat in common of all 
 things." 
 
 In the next letter* he dwells on the 
 same subject, namely, the ill conduct of 
 some of the confessors. The use of good 
 discipline in the Church of God ; the bene- 
 fits of orderly subjection in the members ; 
 the danger of pride and self-exaltation ; 
 and — the deceilfulness of the human heart, 
 are well staled, and in exceedingly strong 
 terms. 
 
 After having congratulated his people 
 on the steadiness of their confession, he 
 reminds them of the necessity of perse- 
 verance, since faith itself and the new 
 birth conduct us to life eternal, not mere- 
 ly as once received, but as preserved. 
 He reminds them, that the Lord regards 
 him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, 
 and that trembles at his words ; — and he 
 rejoices to find that the greatest part of 
 the confessors thus adorned the Gospel. f 
 But he had heard that some of them 
 were puffed up : To these he exhibits the 
 mild, charitable, and humble spirit of the 
 Lamb of God: "And dare," says he, 
 "any one, who now lives by him and in 
 
 HIM, to lift himself up with pride 1 — He 
 that is least among you, the same shall 
 be great. How execrable ought those 
 immoralities and indecencies to appear 
 among you, which we have heard of with 
 the deepest sorrow of heart!" — He then 
 repeats what he had before mentioned of 
 the lasciviousness of some. 
 
 " Contentions and strifes ought to have 
 no place among you, since the Lord has 
 left us his peace. I beseech you abstain 
 from reproaches and abuse ; — for he who 
 speaks what is peaceable, and good, and 
 just, according to the precepts of Christ, 
 daily imitates his Lord and Master. — 
 We renounced the world when we were 
 baptized; but now we truly and indeed 
 renounce the world, when, upon being 
 tried and proved by God, we scruple not 
 to give up our own wills to follow the 
 Lord ; and to stand and live in his faith 
 and fear. Let us strengthen one another 
 with mutual exhortations, and strive to 
 grow in the Lord ; — that when, in his 
 mercy, he shall give us that peace and 
 tranquillity which he has promised, we 
 may return to the Church as new men ; — 
 and that both our brethren and the gen- 
 tiles may receive us improved in holy 
 conduct; and may admire the excellency 
 of the morals and discipline of those very 
 Christians, who had astonished them by 
 their fortitude during the persecution." 
 
 The mind of Cyprian, full of the fear 
 of God, and reflecting, from a compari- 
 son of Christian precepts with the bad 
 practice of many, how exceedingly his 
 people had provoked the Lord before the 
 persecution, was vehementl)'' incited to 
 stir them up to repentance. — He address- 
 
 * Epis. fi. ad Rogatianum presbyterum el 
 cseteriis corifc'Ssores. 
 
 + A coiit'cssor means one who openly avow- 
 ed himself to be a convert to Christiauhy, &c. 
 See note, p. 174, infra. 
 
 Vol. L P 
 
 es them from his recess,* as follows : — 
 "Though I am sensible, dearest brethren, 
 that as we all live in the obedient fear 
 of God, you are instant in prayers, yet I 
 also admonish you that we ought to 
 breathe out our souls to God, not only in 
 words, but also in fasting, tears, and 
 every method of supplication. In truth, 
 we must understand and confess that the 
 apostasy which, in so large a degree, has 
 wasted our flock and still wastes it, is 
 the proper consequence of our sins." 
 
 He then goes on to speak of their prac- 
 tical corruptions, as he does in his trea- 
 tise concerning the lapsed. " And what 
 plagues, what stripes do we not deserve, 
 since even confessors, who ought to be 
 patterns to the rest, are quite disorderly ! 
 
 Epis. 
 
170 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 Hence, while the proud and indecent 
 boasting of their confession puffs up some, 
 torments have come upon us, and tor- 
 ments unremitted ; — tedious and most dis- 
 tressing ; and so protracted as to exclude 
 even the comfort of death itself! 
 
 " Let us pray with our whole heart for 
 mercy : and if the answer to our prayers 
 be slow because we have deeply offended ; 
 — let us knock; for to him that knocketh 
 it shall be opened, when prayers, groans, 
 and tears beat at the door." — He then 
 records some visions ;— which, as they 
 rather suit the dispensation of that age 
 in which miracles were by no means 
 wanting, I pass over. 
 
 "Our Master himself prayed for us; 
 because though himself no sinner, yet he 
 bore our sins. And if he laboured and 
 watched on account of us and of our sins, 
 how much more should we be urgent in 
 prayer 1 Brethren — let us first entreat our 
 Lord himself, and then through him we 
 may obtain favour with God the Father. 
 The Father himself corrects and takes 
 care of us, in the midst of all pressures, 
 provided we remain firm in the faith, and 
 stick close to his Christ; — as it is writ- 
 ten, ' Who shall separate us from the 
 love of Christ ■? Shall tribulation, or dis- 
 tress, or persecution, or famine, or naked- 
 ness, or peril, or sword 1' None of these 
 can separate believers : Nothing can 
 pluck away those, who adhere closely to 
 his body and blood. — Persecution is the 
 examination and trial of our heart. God 
 would have us to be sifted and tried ; nor 
 was ever his help wanting in trials, to 
 those who believe. Let our eyes be lift- 
 ed up to heaven, lest earth with its en- 
 ticements deceive us. If the Lord see 
 us humble and quiet, lovingly united, 
 and corrected by the present tribulation, 
 he will deliver us. Correction has come 
 first; pardon will follow: Let us only 
 continue to pray in steady faith ; and to 
 behave like men placed between the ruins 
 of the fallen and the remains of those who 
 are in fear, — between a multitude of the 
 sick, and the few who have escaped a 
 devouring pestilence." 
 
 Thus the persecution at Carthage ap- 
 pears to have been very dreadful ; but 
 mostly so on account of the number of 
 apostates : The Christian faith, patience, 
 and magnanimity of Cyprian and of a 
 small remnant were in full exercise. 
 
 The persecutors endeavoured to lessen 
 the number of Christians by banishing 
 from Carthage all those who confessed 
 
 Christ : but this not answering their pur- 
 pose, they proceeded to cruel torments. 
 Cyprian, hearing that some had expired 
 under their sufferings, and that others 
 were still in prison yet alive, wrote to 
 these last a letter of encouragement and 
 consolation. Their limbs had been sore- 
 ly mangled and torn, so that they appear- 
 ed like one continued wound ; yet they 
 remained firm in the faith and love of 
 Jesus. One of them, Mappalicus, amidst 
 his torments, said to the proconsul, "To- 
 morrow you shall see a contest for a 
 prize." — He alluded to the crown of mar- 
 tyrdom; and, what he uttered in faith, 
 the Lord fulfilled : — He lost his life in 
 the conflict on the next day.* 
 
 So eagerly and so firmly was the mind 
 of Cyprian fixed on heavenly things ; and 
 so completely lifted up above the world, 
 that he ardently exulted and triumphed 
 amidst those scenes of horror. He de- 
 scribes the martyrs and confessors as 
 wiping away the tears of the Church, 
 while she was bewailing the ruins of her 
 sons. He represents even Christ him- 
 self as looking down with complacency; 
 fighting and conquering in his servants ; 
 and giving strength to believers in pro- 
 portion to their faith: — "He was present 
 in the contest," says he ; " He encour- 
 aged, corroborated, animated his war- 
 riors. And he, who once conquered 
 death for us, always conquers in us." 
 Toward the close of his epistle, he con- 
 soles, with suitable arguments, those who 
 had not yet been crowned with martyr- 
 dom, but were prepared for it in spirit. 
 
 The joy of Cyprian, on account of the 
 faithfulness of the martyrs, was, how- 
 ever, considerably damped by the disor- 
 derly conduct, which began to take place 
 in his absence. Those, who had suffer- 
 ed tortures for Christ, and were on the 
 point of martyrdom, and to whom it was 
 usual to make application for the presen- 
 tation of petitions, wrote to him and re- 
 quested, that the consideration of the 
 cases of lapsed Christians might be de- 
 ferred till the persecution was stopped, 
 and the bishop was restored to his Church. 
 In the mean time, several of these lapsed 
 brethren offered themselves to certain 
 presbyters of Carthage to be received 
 again into communion; and they were 
 actually re-admitted to the Lord's Sup- 
 per without any just evidence of their re- 
 pentance. — The bishop dissembled not 
 
 * Epis. 8. 
 
CxxT. ni.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 171 
 
 his pleasure on this occasion : He con- 
 fessed, he had long borne with these dis- 
 orders for the sake of peace, till he 
 thought it his duty to bear with them no 
 longer : — He said, " that it was quite un- 
 precedented to transact these things with- 
 out the consent of the bishop:* — and 
 that, even in lesser offences, a regular 
 time of penitence was exacted of the 
 members ; — a certain course of discipline 
 took place, — they made open confession 
 of their sins, and were re-admitted to 
 communion by the imposition of hands 
 of the bishop and his clergy." — He di- 
 rects that the irregular practice might be 
 stopped, till, on his return, every thing 
 should be settled with propriety. 
 
 Some of the martyrs themselves, it ap- 
 pears,! acted very inconsiderately in this 
 business, and gave to lapsed persons re- 
 commendatory papers, conceived in ge- 
 neral terms. Cyprian wishes them to 
 express the names of the persons, and to 
 give no such recommendations to any but 
 those, of whose sincere repentance they 
 had some good proof; and even in that 
 case to refer the ultimate cognizance of 
 such matters to the bishop. 
 
 Every thing has two handles. Cypri- 
 znX has been represented as stretching the 
 episcopal power beyond its due bounds. 
 I see no evidence that he exceeded the 
 powers of his predecessors. A pious care 
 for the good of souls, — not any ambition 
 for the extension of liis own authority, 
 seems to influence his mind in these af- 
 fairs;; but of this, the learned reader must 
 judge for himself, who will take the pains 
 to examine his epistles with attention. 
 Let any man peruse the following letter; 
 and consult his own heart as he goes 
 along, whether it be the language of a 
 tender father of the Church, or of an im- 
 perious lord. 
 
 CYPRIAN TO THE BRETHREN OF THE 
 LAITV, GREETING. 
 
 " I know from my own feelings, dear- 
 est Brethren, that you must grieve and 
 bitterly bewail over the ruins of our peo- 
 ple, as I sincerely join with you in sad 
 grief and lamentation for every one of 
 them : I experience the truth of what the 
 blessed Apostle said, ' Who is weak, and 
 I am not weak 1 Who is offended, and 
 
 * A further confirmation of the antiquit}- of 
 a limited episcopacy in the Church of Christ, 
 t Epis. 10. 
 ^ Mosheim — Ecclesiastial History. 
 
 I burn not]' And again, ' If one member 
 suffer, all the members suffer with it.' I 
 sympathize and condole with our breth- 
 ren, who have lapsed through the violence 
 of persecution : It is true, their wounds 
 give me the most acute pain : they abso- 
 lutely break my heart : but, divine grace 
 can heal them. — Still I think we should 
 not be in a hurry ; nor do any thing in- 
 cautiously and precipitately ; lest, wliile 
 we rashly re-admit them into communion, 
 the divine displeasure be more grievously 
 incurred. The blessed martyrs have writ- 
 ten to us, 'begging that their petitions in 
 favour of the lapsed may be examined, 
 when the Lord shall vouchsafe peace to 
 us, and we shall be able to return to the 
 Church.' — Certainly then every case 
 shall be examined in your own presence, 
 and with the concurrence of your own 
 judgments, — But I hear that some presby- 
 ters, — neither mindful of the precepts of 
 the Gospel, — nor considering what the 
 martyrs have written to us, — and also in 
 contempt of the episcopal authority, have 
 already begun to communicate with the 
 lapsed, and to administer the Lord's Sup- 
 per to them, in defiance of that legitimate 
 order by which alone re-admissions are 
 ever to be regulated. For, if in lesser 
 faults this discipline should be observed, 
 much more ought it in evils, like these, 
 which radically affect the Christian pro- 
 fession itself. Our presbyters and dea- 
 cons are bound to admonish the people in 
 this matter, that they may cherish the 
 sheep intrusted to them, and instruct them 
 in the way of imploring mercy by the di- 
 vine rules. — I have too good an opinion 
 of the peaceable and humble disposition 
 of our people to believe that they would 
 have ventured to lake such a step, had 
 they not been seduced by the adulatory 
 arts of some of the clergy. 
 
 " Do you, then, take care of each of 
 them ; and, by your judgment and mode- 
 ration, according to the sacred precepts, 
 moderate the spirits of the lapsed : let 
 none pluck off fruit, as yet unripe, with 
 improvident precipitation ; let none com- 
 mit a vessel again to the deep, shattered 
 already and leaky, till it be carefully 
 re-fitted : let none put on his tattered gar- 
 ment, till he see it thoroughly repaired. 
 — I beseech them also to attend to this 
 advice, and to expect our return ; — that 
 when we shall come to you, — by the mer- 
 cy of God, — we may, with the concur- 
 rence of other bishops, examine the let- 
 ters and the petitions of the martyrs, in 
 
172 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 the presence of the confessors, according 
 to the will of the Lord." 
 
 It is hence observable, that persons, 
 whose religion had more of form than 
 sincerity, and whose consciences were 
 not altogether seared, acted in the same 
 manner then as such do now ; — that is, 
 they were more hasty to sfain the good 
 will of men than of their Maker. They 
 were ambitious of the favour of the mar- 
 tyrs of those times, who were unquestion- 
 ably sound and pious Christians ; and 
 we shall see soon still stronger proof, 
 that even men of eminent godliness are 
 sometimes too apt to repay, with conces- 
 sions of a dangerous nature, the profes- 
 sions of respect made to them by ambigu- 
 ous characters. The Lord's Supper was 
 then, as it is now, made by some an en- 
 gine of self-righteous formality. And it 
 is in cases of this nature that wholesome 
 Church-discipline is very precious. The 
 danger of false healing justly appeared 
 great to Cyprian, nor can any thing be 
 conceived more proper than the delay 
 which he directed. Yet as the time was 
 protracted to a more distant period than 
 he expected, and as he was afraid that 
 the sickly season of the hot weather might 
 carry off some of the lapsed, he directs, 
 in a subsequent letter,* " that any of the 
 lapsed penitents whose lives might he in 
 danger, should, by such Church officers 
 as were authorized, be re-admitted into 
 the Church." And he intreats his clergy 
 to cherish the rest of the fallen Christians 
 with care and tenderness. — He observes 
 that the grace of the Lord would not for- 
 sake the humble. 
 
 His exhortations to his clergy were not 
 without effect. They fell in with hi:S views, 
 and solicited tho people to patience, mo- 
 desty and real repentance. — They consult- 
 ed him how they should act in certain criti- 
 cal cases : He referred them to his former 
 letters ; and repeated his ideas of the pro- 
 per season of settling, in general, the con- 
 cerns of the lapsed ; at the same time he 
 urged the indecency of some persons in 
 expecting a re-admission into the Church 
 before the return of those who were in 
 exile, and were stripped of all their goods 
 for the sake of the Gospel. "But, if 
 they are in such excessive hurry," said 
 the bishop, " it is in their own power to 
 obtain even more than they desire. The 
 battle is not yet over ; the conflict is daily 
 carrying on. If they cordially repent, and 
 
 the fire of divine faith burns in their 
 breasts, he who cannot brook a delay, 
 may, if he please, be crowned with mar- 
 tyrdom." 
 
 The African prelate was ever studious 
 of preserving an intimate connexion with 
 the Roman Church, where still the perse- 
 cution raged and prevented the election of 
 a successor to Fabian. 
 
 The next epistle is employed in giving 
 them an account of his proceedings. 
 
 The bold neglect of discipline in Car- 
 thage proved a source of vexation to his 
 mind in addition to his other trials, and 
 called forth all the patience, tenderness, 
 and fortitude of which he was possessed. — 
 Lucian a confessor of Christ, sincere and 
 fervent in faith, but injudicious, and too 
 little acquainted with Christian precepts, 
 undertook, in the name of the collective 
 bod}'^ of the confessors, to re-admit into 
 communion all the lapsed who had ap- 
 plied to them ;* and he wrote a very con- 
 cise letter to Cyprian, in which he desires 
 him to inform the rest of the bishops of 
 what they had done, and expresses a wish 
 that he may acquiesce in the views of the 
 martyrs. — It cannot be denied, — that, on 
 the one hand, a superstitious veneration 
 for the character of a martyr and a confes- 
 sor had grown up among these Africans ; 
 — and that, on the other, — those, who had 
 suffered for Christj in persecution, were 
 apt to be elated with spiritual pride, and 
 to assume an authority which by no means 
 belonged to them ; — so dangerous a thing 
 is it to be unacquainted with Satan's de- 
 vices, — and so prone in all ages are 
 even professors of true religion to walk 
 in the steps of Korah, Dathan, and Abi- 
 
 Cyprian sent the copy of this letter to 
 his clergy at Carthage ; and prefaced his 
 observations on it in the following point- 
 ed manner : " To this man will I look, 
 saith the Lord, even to him that is poor 
 
 AND of a contrite SPIRIT, AND THAT TREM- 
 
 BLETH AT MY WORD. This character be- 
 comes us all, particularly those who have 
 fallen, that they may appear before the 
 Lord humble and penitent indeed." He 
 then added, — " that the bishops, his 
 brethren, had agreed with him in opinion 
 to defer the consideration of the cases of 
 the lapsed to a council to be held by them 
 in general, after that it should have pleased 
 God to restore peace to his Church;" — 
 
 Epis. 12. 
 
 * Ejjis. 17. 
 
 4 Sec Numbers x\i. 
 
 f Ellis. 18. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 17a 
 
 and he urged them " to support these 
 views." He sent them, at the same 
 time, a copy of a correspondence between 
 Caldonius, an African bishop, and him- 
 self. 
 
 It is not known in what place Caldo- 
 nius lived ; but he, like Cyprian, was 
 very cautious in restoring the lapsed to 
 communion. Some, however, of his 
 Church, having- apostatized by sacrificing 
 to the pagan gods, were called to a se- 
 cond trial ; when they recovered their 
 ground ; and, in consequence, were driven 
 into banishment and stripped of their pro- 
 perty. Caldonius expressed his opinion 
 that SUCH should be re-admitted. Felix, 
 a presbyter, his wife Victoria, and one 
 Lucian, thus lost their possessions, which 
 were forfeited to the Imperial treasury. 
 A woman, also, named Bona, who was 
 dragged by her pagan husband to sacri- 
 fice, was, while they held her hands, 
 compelled to a seeming compliance, but 
 she fully cleared her integrity by saying, 
 " I did it not, — ye have done it." She 
 also was banished. Caldonius having 
 stated the facts and given his own opi- 
 nion, asks the advice of Cyprian, who ac- 
 quiesces in his judgment ; and adds, that 
 he wished all the lapsed, who then caused 
 him so much affliction, were disposed to 
 retrieve their Christian character by these 
 methods, rather than to increase their 
 faults by pride and insolence.* 
 
 A confessor, named Celerinus, who 
 lived in some part of Africa — most pro- 
 bably in banishment — was much grieved 
 on account of the apostasy of his two sis- 
 ters, Numeria and Candina. He wept 
 night and day in sackcloth and ashes on 
 their account; and hearing of Lucian still 
 being in prison and reserved for martyr- 
 dom at Carthage, he wrote to him to in- 
 treat that either he himself or any of his 
 suffering brethren, — particularly, whoso- 
 ever should first be called to martyrdom, 
 — would restore them to the Church. He 
 begs the same favour for Etcusa also ; 
 who, though she had not sacrificed, had 
 given money to be excused from the act.j 
 He assures Lucian of the sincerity of 
 their repentance; and says, it was evi- 
 denced by their kindness and assiduity in 
 attending on the suffering brethren. He, 
 manifestly, attributes too much to the 
 character of martyrs, in affirming, that 
 " because they were friends and wit- 
 nesses of Christ, they had therefore a 
 
 Epis. 18, 19. 
 
 p2 
 
 t Epis. 20. 
 
 power of indulging all requests of this 
 sort." This letter and the answer of Lu- 
 cian contain a mixture of good and evil : 
 they exhibit true grace tarnished with 
 pitiable ignorance and superstition. Both 
 Celerinus and Lucian were, doubtless, 
 good men ; — but we are more disposed to 
 make candid allowances for the defects of 
 our own age than for those of preceding 
 times. 
 
 The conduct of Lucian affords a memo- 
 rable and lamentable instance of the 
 weakness of human nature even in a re- 
 generate spirit. His answer to Celerinus* 
 displays the most consummate fortitude, 
 — and this, — as far as appears — grounded, 
 in the main, on the true faith and love of 
 Christ. The existence of a deplorable 
 and subtile spirit of pride, in some de- 
 gree, is, perhaps, not to be denied; but 
 this holy man was certainly not aware of 
 the alloy. — He describes himself and his 
 companions as shut up and pressed to- 
 gether excessively close in two small 
 cells, and also greatly suffering from hun- 
 ger, thirst, and intolerable heat. He 
 mentions a number of them as already 
 killed in prison ; and adds that, in a few 
 days, he himself must expire. " For five 
 days," says he, " we have received very 
 little bread; and the water is apportion- 
 ed to us by measure." — Such were the 
 sufferings of this persecution. — Lucian 
 speaks of all this in a cool, and most un- 
 affected manner; — like one, whose mind 
 was lifted up above the world and its ut- 
 most malice, and patiently expected a 
 blessed immortality. As to the petition 
 of Celerinus in favour of his sisters, he 
 informs him that Paul the martyr, who 
 had lately suffered, had visited him while 
 
 YET IN THE BODY, and had said, — "Lu- 
 cian, I say to thee before Christ, that if 
 any person after my decease beg of you to 
 be restored to the Church, do you, in my 
 name, grant his request." Lucian ex- 
 tends this generosity to the greatest 
 height ; and refers him to the general let- 
 ter, which he had already written in be- 
 half of the lapsed. Yet he owns, they 
 ought to explain their cause before the bi- 
 shop, and make a confession. It is very 
 plain, however, that he attributes, in this 
 matter, a sort of superior dignity to Paul, 
 to himself, and to the other martyrs : and, 
 no doubt, the vain-glory of martyrdom 
 was much augmented by the excessive 
 regard which now began to be shown to 
 
 * Epis. 21. 
 
174 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 sufferers. — ^These and similar facts con- 
 strain the reluctant historian to acknow- 
 ledge, that the corruptions of superstition, 
 in giving immoderate honour to saints and 
 martyrs, which afterwards, through Sa- 
 tan's artifice and delusion, grew to the 
 enormous pitch of idolatrjr itself, had al- 
 ready entered the Church, and contami- 
 nated the simplicity and the purity of 
 Christian faith and dependence. Yet this 
 concession, — it must be remembered, — 
 implies no suspicion of hypocrisy either 
 in the martyrs or in their admirers. This 
 same Lucian was a man of true, of sub- 
 stantial piety. — He wept and lamented 
 exceedingly on account of the lapsed wo- 
 men ; and had the fear of God constantly 
 before his eyes. Probably, he was not 
 very judicious : his letter is confused and 
 perplexed beyond measure ; nor is it now 
 easy to say, how far the obscurity is to 
 be ascribed to the want of a clear under- 
 standing, or to his very distressed cir- 
 cumstances, or to the corruption of the 
 text. 
 
 It is evident that a spirit extremely dan- 
 gerous to the cause of piety, humility, 
 and wholesome discipline, was spreading 
 fast in the African Church. Celerinus 
 himself, who had been a confessor,* owns 
 that the cause of his sister had been heard 
 by the clergy of her Church, — at that 
 time, it seems, destitute of a bishop ; — 
 who had deferred the settlement of it till 
 the appointment of the chief pastor ; — 
 but the precipitation of men would brook 
 no delay. 
 
 The eyes of all prudent and more dis- 
 cerning persons in the Church were fixed 
 on the bishop of Carthage in this emer- 
 gency. The danger of the loss of the 
 Gospel itself, by substituting a depen- 
 dence on saints instead of Christ Jesus, 
 forcibly struck his mind. His connexion 
 with the Roman clergy, and the superior 
 regard to discipline which there prevailed, 
 was of some service on the occasion ; and, 
 in his correspondence with them,f he 
 compares the immoderate assuming con- 
 duct of Lucian, with the modesty of the 
 martyrs Mappalicus and Saturninus, who 
 had abstained from such practices : The 
 former had written only in behalf of his 
 
 * By a confessor, in the language of those 
 times, we are always to understand a person 
 who has publicly professed or confessed him- 
 self to be a Christian, when called upon by llie 
 heathens to sacrifice to their gods, or other- 
 wise to worship them. 
 
 t Epis. 22. 
 
 own mother and sister; and the latter, 
 who had been tortured and imprisoned, 
 had yet sent out no letters whatever of 
 this kind. Lucian, he complains, every 
 where furnished the lapsed with letters 
 testimonal for their reception into the 
 Church, written with his own hand in 
 the name of Paul while alive, continued 
 to furnish them after his death, and de- 
 clared that that martyr had directed him 
 to do so ; — though he should have known, 
 says Cyprian, that he ought to obey the 
 Lord rather than his fellow-servant. 
 
 A young person, named Aurelius, who 
 had suffered torments, was seized with 
 the same vanity, but was unable to write ; 
 and Lucian wrote many papers in his 
 name. 
 
 Cyprian complains of the odium thus 
 incurred by the bishops. In some cities, 
 he takes notice how the multitude had 
 forced the bishops tore-admit the lapsed; 
 but he blames those rulers of the Church 
 for wantof faith and Christian constancy. 
 In his own diocese he had occasion for 
 all his fortitude. Some, who were for- 
 merly turbulent, were now much more so, 
 and insisted on being speedily re-admit- 
 ted. He observes that baptism is per- 
 formed in the name of the Father, Son, 
 and Holy Ghost; and that remission of 
 past sins is tlien received ; and then he 
 complains that the name of Paul, in ef- 
 fect, is inserted in the place of the Trinity. 
 He applies, on this occasion, St. Paul's 
 well-known holy execration denounced in 
 the beginning of the Epistle to the Gala- 
 tians. He owns his obligation to Rome 
 for the letters of their clergy, which were 
 well calculated to withstand these abuses. 
 He wrote a congratulatory letter* to 
 the confessors Moyses and Maxiraus, 
 whose faith and zeal, united with mo- 
 desty and with the strictest attention to 
 discipline, he had formerly much com- 
 mended ; and he now thanks them for the 
 epistolary advice, which they had given 
 to the African confessors. In their an- 
 swerf they appear transported with holy 
 joy, and elevated with the heavenly pros- 
 pects before them. They quote the New 
 Testament Scriptures relative:}: to these 
 things ; and expresses such strength of 
 faitir, hope, and charity, as demonstrates 
 the real power of divine grace to have 
 been possessed by them in a very emi- 
 
 * Epis. 24. 
 ^ Matt. V. 10, 
 18. Horn. viii. 
 
 11. 
 
 35. 
 
 t Epis. 25. 
 Luke vi. 23. Matt. 
 
CziTT. ni.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 175 
 
 nent manner. Their love of the divine 
 ■word and of just discipline appears no 
 less great than their zeal and ardonr for 
 martyrdom. They observe how deeply 
 and how widely spread the evil of defec- 
 tion had been ; and they conclude with 
 very just observations on the right me- 
 thod of treating the lapsed, in perfect 
 agreement with Cyprian. Greatness of 
 mind, a high sense of the importance of 
 order, a heavenly warmth of temper, and 
 an accuracy of judgment, are equally and 
 abundantly evident in this epistle : — Such 
 endowments existing in just proportion 
 prove that the work of the Holy Spirit 
 was very sound in these excellent men. 
 
 Cyprian now wrote to the lapsed them- 
 selves; and rebuked the precipitation of 
 some, and exposed the injustice of their 
 claims, since they acted as if they took to 
 themselves the whole title of the Church : 
 he commended the modesty of others, 
 who refused to take advantage of the in- 
 discreet recommendation of the martyrs, 
 and who wrote to him in the language of 
 penitents ; — whence it appears that the 
 folly of the lapsed was by no means uni- 
 versal.* 
 
 Gaius Diddensis, one of the presbyters 
 of Cyprian, undertook, along with his 
 deacon, against the sense of the rest of 
 the clergj', to communicate with the 
 lapsed. Repeated admonitions availed 
 not to a reformation. As the bishop was 
 sensible that the common people, for 
 whose salvation he was solicitous, were 
 deceived by these things, he commends 
 his clergy for refusing communion with 
 so obstinate and irregular a presbyter and 
 deacon. — He againf intimates his inten- 
 tion of judging all things in full council 
 upon his return ; and intreats them to co- 
 operate, in the mean time, with his views 
 in the maintenance of discipline. In 
 writing again to the Roman clergy, he de- 
 clares his determination of acting as God 
 had directed his ministers in the Gospel, 
 if the contumacious were not reformed by 
 his and by their admonitions.:!: 
 
 The Roman clergy condole affection- 
 ately with Cyprian; — "Our sorrow," 
 say they, "is doubled, because you have 
 no rest from these pressing difficulties of 
 the persecution ; and because ihe immo 
 derate petulance of the lapsed has pro 
 ceeded to the height of arrogance. But, 
 though these things have grievously af- 
 flicted our spirits ; yet your firmness and 
 
 evangelical strictness of discipline have 
 moderated the load of vexation : You 
 have both restrained the wickedness of 
 certain persons ; and also, by exhorting 
 them to repentatice, have shown them 
 the wholesome way to salvation. — We 
 are astonished that they should proceed 
 to such lengths, in a time so mournful, 
 so unseasonable as the present; — that 
 they should not so much as ask for re- 
 communion with the Church; but claim 
 it as a right; — and even affirm that they 
 are already forgiven in heaven. Never 
 cease, brother, — in your love of souls, — 
 to moderate and restrain these violent spi- 
 rits ; and to offer the medicine of truth to 
 the erroneous, though the inclination of 
 the sick be often opposite to the prudent 
 industry of the physician. These wounds 
 of the lapsed are fresh, and produce con- 
 siderable tumours; but we feel assured, 
 that, in process of time, their heat and 
 violence will subside ; — and the patients 
 themselves will then be thankful for that 
 delay, which was absolutely necessary 
 for a wholesome cure, provided there be 
 none to arm them with weapons against 
 themselves, and, by perverse instruc- 
 tions, to demand for them the deadly poi- 
 son of an over hasty restoration : for we 
 cannot think that they would all* have 
 dared to have claimed their admission so 
 petulantly, without the encouragement of 
 some persons of ecclesiastical influence. 
 We know the faith, the good order, the 
 humility of the Carthaginian Church; — 
 whence we have been surprised in notic- 
 ing certain harsh reflections made against 
 you in a certain epistle, when we have 
 formerly had repeated proof of your mu- 
 tual charily." 
 
 They proceed to give the most whole- 
 some advice to the lapsed ; and in truth, 
 the whole conduct of the Roman clergy, 
 at this season, reflects the highest honour 
 on their wisdom and their affection ; and 
 affords the most pleasing proofs of the 
 good state of that church at that time. 
 The same can by no means be said of 
 Cyprian's : — they were, — as we have 
 seen, — a declining people before his ap- 
 pointment to the See; and the scourge of 
 persecution produced vast numbers of 
 apostates. — In those days of discipline, 
 the lapsed, by their eagerness for re-ad- 
 mission, showed the same dispositions of 
 
 • Epis. 26. t Epis. 27. + Epis. 28. 
 
 * They must have uiulei-stsod tliat by much 
 the major part at least of the lapsed were 
 guilty of this evil. 
 
176 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 selfishness and of pride, which, in our 
 times, are evinced by persons wishing to 
 hear nothing but comfort preached to them, 
 — but finding fault with ministers who 
 dare not speak false peace ; — and by un- 
 soundly healing themselves. We are 
 perfectly lax in point of discipline : — 
 Who regards its menaces against the dis- 
 orderly? — With the first Christians this 
 was an awful concern. — The same de- 
 pravity of nature seems now to work on 
 corrupt minds in another way ; but so as 
 still to exercise the patience and fortitude 
 of godly ministers, who, by persevering 
 in their duty, and not giving way to the 
 unreasonable humours of their people in 
 things of importance, will find, in the 
 end, a wholesome issue even with many 
 of their most unpromising and froward 
 hearers. 
 
 An African, named Privatus, who had 
 left his country and travelled to Rome, 
 solicited to be there received as a Chris- 
 tian. Cyprian had mentioned him to the 
 Roman clergy, and pointed out his real 
 and dangerous character. In the close of 
 tills admirable letter* they inform him 
 tliat, before they had received his caution- 
 ary letters, they had detected the impos- 
 tor. At the same time they lay down a 
 golden maxim, " that we all ought to 
 watch for the body of the whole Church, 
 diffused through various provinces." — It 
 was this unity and uniformity of the 
 Christian Church, which hitherto had 
 preserved it, under God, from the infec- 
 tion of heresies. None of these were yet 
 able to mix themselves with the " body 
 of Christ :"f and the Church, — instead 
 of being broken into small handfuls of 
 distinct sets of persons, all glorying in 
 having something peculiarly excellent, 
 and prone to despise their neighbours, — 
 as yet knew no other name than that of 
 CHRISTIAN : numbers and diversity of 
 place alone prevented their assembling 
 all together ; for they were one people. 
 In Italy and Africa the union at this time 
 appears very salubrious: and the vigorous 
 spirit and sound understanding of Cy- 
 prian was enabled to apply the solid 
 graces of the Roman Church as medicinal 
 for the reformation of his own disordered 
 flock. 
 
 The Roman clergy, in a second letter,:): 
 take notice of St. Paul's eulogium of 
 
 * Epis. 29. 
 •j- Coloss. i. 
 the Church. 
 :f Epis. 80. 
 
 24. His body's sake, which is 
 
 their Church in the beginning of his epis- 
 tle ; — " that their faith was spoken of 
 through the whole world," and they ex- 
 press their desire of treading in the steps 
 of their Christian predecessors. They 
 mention the cases of Libellatici,* which 
 were two-fold ; 1st, Of those who deli- 
 vered in written testimonials to heathen 
 magistrates, in which they abjured the 
 Gospel ; and who, at the same time, by 
 paying money, obtained the privilege of 
 not sacrificing to the gods. — 2dly, Of 
 those who procured friends to do these 
 same things for them. Both kinds, these 
 last, as well as those who had actually 
 sacrificed, were censured by the Roman 
 clergy as lapsed persons. They mention 
 likewise the letters sent by the Roman 
 confessors into Africa to the same pur- 
 port, and express their joy on account of 
 the consistency of their conduct in mat- 
 ters of discipline, with their suflTerings 
 for the faith. They declare their agree- 
 ment in opinion with Cyprian, — to defer 
 the settlement of these affairs till some 
 general measure could be planned for this 
 purpose, after peace should be restored. 
 " Behold," say they, " almost the whole 
 world is laid waste : — Fragments of the 
 fallen lie in every place ; — With one 
 and the same counsel, with unanimous 
 prayers and tears, let us, — who seem hi- 
 therto to have escaped the ruins of this 
 visitation, as well as those, who have not 
 stood entirely faithful during the persecu- 
 tion, intreat the Divine Majesty, and beg 
 peace in the name of the whole Church : 
 let us cherish, guard, and arm one an- 
 other with mutual prayers : let us suppli- 
 cate for the lapsed, that they may be rais- 
 ed : let us pray for those who stand, that 
 they may not be tempted to their ruin ; let 
 us pray also, that those, who have fallen, 
 may become sensible of the greatness of 
 the crime, and may have the wisdom not to 
 wish for a crude and momentary medicine, 
 and that they may not disturb the yet 
 fluctuating state of the Church, — lest they 
 should appear to aggravate our distresses 
 by exciting internally seditious and in- 
 flammatory commotions. Let them knock 
 at the doors, but not break them. Let 
 
 * So called from libellus — which here means 
 a concise written document, sigiieil by the per- 
 son whom it concerned, and containing an ac- 
 count of his religion: In many cases, it was 
 only signed by some creditable and well-known 
 friends. — An evasive contrivance — for thepur- 
 f^pose of quieting insincere consciences, not yet 
 quite hardened ! 
 
CBirr. m.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 177 
 
 them g-o to the threshold of the Churcli. 
 but, not leap over it. Let thein watch at 
 the gates of the heavenly camp, but with 
 that modesty which becomes those who 
 remember they have been deserters. Let 
 them arm themselves indeed with the 
 weapons of humility, and resume that 
 shield of faith which they dropped through 
 the fear of death ; but so that they may 
 be armed against the devil, — not against 
 that very Church, which laments over 
 their fall." 
 
 The want of a bishop at Rome w^as an 
 additional reason for delay. They speak 
 of certain bishops w^ho lived in their 
 neighbourhood, and also of others, who, 
 through the flame of persecution, had fled 
 to them from distant provinces, — who all 
 concurred in the same views. 
 
 There was a very young man, named 
 Aurelius, whom Cyprian speaks of as 
 greatly excelling in the graces of Chris- 
 tianity. He had twice undergone the 
 rage of persecution for the sake of Christ: 
 Banishment was his first punishment, 
 and torture the second. The bishop had 
 ordained this youth a reader in the Church 
 of Carthage; and he apologizes on ac- 
 count of the peculiar circumstances of 
 the case of the times, for his not having 
 previously consulted his presbyters and 
 deacons. He beseeches them to pray, 
 that both their bishop and good Aurelius 
 may be restored to the exercise of their 
 respective functions. — I cannot but hence 
 observe, how exact and orderly the ideas 
 of ordination were in those times. — It is 
 not to the advantage of godliness among 
 us, that persons can now be introduced 
 to very high offices in the ministry with- 
 trial, ceremony, or 
 
 out much previous 
 ditficulty.* 
 
 Celerinus was also ordained a reader 
 by the same authority.-)- However weak 
 in judgment he may appear from the 
 transactions between him and Lucian al- 
 ready stated, the man suifered with great 
 zeal for the sake of Christ. The very be- 
 ginning of the persecution found him a 
 ready combatant. For nineteen days he 
 had remained in prison fettered and starv- 
 ed; but he persevered, and escaped at 
 length without martyrdom. His grand- 
 father and two of his uncles had suflTcred 
 for Christ, and their anniversaries were 
 celebrated by the Church. 
 
 It seems, that Cyprian thought proper 
 to reward with honourable establishments 
 
 in the Church those who had suffered 
 with the greatest faithfulness in the per- 
 secution, which was now drawing to a 
 close. Numidicus was advanced to the 
 office of presbyter. He had attended* 
 a great number of martyrs who were 
 murdered partly with stones and partly 
 by fire. His wife, sticking close by his 
 side, was burnt to death with the rest : 
 He himself, half burnt, buried with stones, 
 and left for dead, was found afterwards 
 by his daughter; and, through her care, 
 he recovered. Probably, this last case 
 was the eff"ect of the tumultuary rage of 
 a persecuting populace : The ferocity of 
 many in those times did not permit them 
 to wait for legal orders. — Who can tell 
 the number of Christian sufferers, which 
 this mode of oppression must have added 
 to the list of martyrs 1 
 
 Amidst all these cares, the charity and 
 diligence of Cyprian towards his flock 
 vver-e unremitted. The reader who loves 
 the annals of genuine and active godli- 
 ness, will not be wearied in seeing still 
 fresh proofs of it in extracts o^two letters 
 to his clergy. f 
 
 " Dear brethren, I salute you : By the 
 grace of God, I am still safe ; and I wish 
 to come soon to you ; — that our mu- 
 tual desire, and that of all the brethren, 
 may be gratified. Whenever, on the set- 
 tlement of your affairs, you shall write 
 to me that I ought to come, or, if the 
 Lord should condescend to make it plain 
 to me before, then I will come to you; for 
 where can I have more happiness and 
 joy, than there, where God appointed me 
 both first to become a believer, and also 
 to grow in faith] I beseech you, take 
 diligent care of the widows, of the sick, 
 and of all the poor; and supply also 
 strangers, if any be indigent, with what 
 is needful for them, out of my proper 
 portion, which I left with Rogatian the 
 presbyter. And lest that should, by this 
 time, be all spent, I have sent by Nari- 
 cus the Acolyth,:j: another sum of money 
 to the same presbyter, that you may the 
 more readily and largely supply the dis- 
 tressed. 
 
 "Though you have been frequently 
 admonished by my letters to show all 
 care for those, who have gloriously 
 confessed the Lord, and are in prison, 
 yet I must repeatedly intreat your atten- 
 
 Epis. 33. 
 
 t Epis. 34. 
 
 * Epis. 35. t Epis. 36, 37. _ 
 
 I All inteiior officer of ihe Church, signify- 
 insj an atteudant. 
 
178 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 tion to the same thing. I wish circum- 
 stances would permit my presence among 
 you : With the greatest pleasure and 
 readiness would I discharge these solemn 
 duties of love and affection towards our 
 brethren. But — Do you represent me. — 
 A decent care for the interment, not only 
 of those who died in torture, but also of 
 such as died under the pressures of con- 
 finement, is necessary. For, whoever 
 hath submitted himself to torture and to 
 death, under the eye of God, hath already 
 suffered all that God would have him to 
 suffer. — Mark also the days in which they 
 depart this life, that we may celebrate 
 tlieir commemoration among the memo- 
 rials of the martyrs ; — though our most 
 faithful and devoted friend Tertullus, — 
 who agreeably to his usual exactness and 
 care, attends to their obsequies, — hath 
 written, still writes to me, and signifies 
 tJie days in which the blessed martyrs 
 are transmitted to immortality. — Their 
 memorials are here celebrated, and I hope 
 shortly, under Divine Providence, to be 
 a])le to celebrate them with you. Let 
 not your care and diligence be wanting 
 for the poor, who have stood firm in the 
 faith, and have fought with us in the 
 Christian warfare. Our affectionate care 
 and attention to them are the more requi- 
 site, because neither their poverty nor 
 persecution have driven them from the 
 love of Christ." 
 
 Every one knows into what idolatry 
 these commemorations of martyrs after- 
 wards degenerated. — But I observe few 
 or no signs of it in the days of Cyprian. 
 
 In addition to other evils, the provi- 
 dence of God now thought fit to exercise 
 the mind of Cy^irian with one of the most 
 distressing calamities which can happen 
 to a lover of peace and charity, — the rise 
 of a schism. 
 
 There* existed in the Church of Car- 
 tilage a person of a very exceptionable 
 character, named Felicissimus, who had 
 long been a secret enemy of 
 
 j^yg artifices and blandishments 
 
 which seditious persons make 
 use of in all ages, this man had enticed 
 some of the flock to himself; and he held 
 communion with them on a certain moun- 
 tain. Among these and in their neigh- 
 bourhood, there arrived several discreet 
 brethren, who were authorized by Cy- 
 prian to discharge the debts of poor Chris- 
 
 * Epis. 38. 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 tians; and to furnish them with small 
 sums of money to begin business again ; 
 and also to make a report of their ages, 
 conditions, and qualities, that he might 
 select such of them for ecclesiastical offi- 
 ces, as should be judged properly quali- 
 fied. Felicissimus opposed and thwarted 
 both these designs. Several of the poor, 
 who came first to be relieved, were threat- 
 ened by him with imperious severity, 
 because they refused to communicate on 
 the mountain. This man growing more 
 insolent, and taking advantage of Cy- 
 prian's absence, whose return he speedily 
 expected, because the persecution had 
 nearly ceased at Carthage, raised an op- 
 position against the bishop in form, — 
 found means to unite a considerable party 
 to himself, — and threatened all those per- 
 sons, who did not choose to partake in 
 the sedition. — Among other crimes, this 
 sower of discord had been guilty of adul- 
 tery ; and he now saw no method of pre- 
 venting an infamous excommunication, 
 but that of setting up himself as a leader. 
 — His second in this odious business was 
 named Augendus, who did his utmust to 
 promote the same views. — Cyprian, by 
 letter, expressed his vehement sorrow on 
 account of these evils, promised to take 
 full cognizance of them on his return, 
 and in the mean time he wrote to his 
 clergy to suspend from communion Fe- 
 licissimus and his abettors. — His clergy 
 wrote to him in answer, that they had 
 suspended the chiefs of the faction ac- 
 cordingly.* 
 
 In the meantime there were not v/ant- 
 ing upright and zealous ministers, who 
 instructed the people at Carthage. — 
 Among these were distinguished Britius 
 the presbyter, also Rogatian and Numi- 
 dicus, confessors ; and some deacons of 
 real godliness. These warned their flocks 
 of the evils of schism, and endeavoured 
 to preserve peace and unity, and to re- 
 cover the lapsed by wholesome methods. 
 
 In addition to their labours, Cyprian 
 now wrote to the people themselves. f 
 "For," says he, "the malice and perfidy 
 of some presbyters hath effected, that I 
 should not be able to come to you before 
 Easter.ij: But the source of the faction 
 of Felicissimus is now discovered, and 
 we are acquainted with the foundation 
 on which it stands. His followers en- 
 
 * Epis. 39. t Epis. 40. 
 
 :t: In what -way they hindered his arriving 
 sooner will appear afterwards. 
 
Cbst, III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 179 
 
 courage certain confessors, that they 
 should not harmonize with their bishop, 
 nor observe ecclesiastical discipline faith- 
 fully and modestly. And as if it were 
 too little for them to have corrupted the 
 minds of confessors, and to have armed 
 them against their pastor, and to have 
 stained the glory of their confession, they 
 turned themselves to poison the spirits of 
 the lapsed, to keep them from the great 
 duty of constant prayer, and to invite them 
 to an unsound and dangerous re-admission. 
 ButI beseech you, brethren, watch against 
 the snares of the devil : Be on your guard 
 and ' work out your own salvation :' this 
 is a second and a different sort of perse- 
 cution and temptation. The five sedi- 
 tious presbyters may be justly compared 
 to the five pagan rulers, who lately, in 
 conjunction with the magistrates, pub- 
 lished some plausible arguments with a 
 view of subverting souls. The same 
 method is now tried, for the ruin of your 
 souls, by the five presbyters with Feli- 
 cissimus at their head : They teach you, 
 that you need not petition ; — that he who 
 hath denied Christ, may cease to suppli- 
 cate the same Christ whom he hath de- 
 nied ; — that repentance is not necessary ; 
 and in short, that every thing should be 
 conducted in a novel manner, and contra- 
 ry to the rules of the Gospel. 
 
 " My banishment of two years, and my 
 mournful separation from your presence ; 
 my constant grief and perpetual lamenta- 
 tion ; and my tears flowing day and night, 
 because the pastor whom you chose with 
 so much love and zeal could not salute 
 nor embrace you, — all this, it seems, was 
 not a sufficient accumulation of sorrow. 
 — To my distressed and exhausted spirit 
 a still greater evil must be added, — that 
 in so great a solicitude I cannot, with 
 propriety, come over to you. The threats 
 and snares of the perfidious oblige me to 
 use caution : lest, on my arrival, the tu- 
 mults should increase ; and lest I myself, 
 the bishop, who ought to provide in all 
 things for peace and tranquillity, should 
 seem to have afforded matter for sedition, 
 and again to exasperate the miseries of 
 the persecution. Most dear brethren, I 
 beseech you do not give rash credit to the 
 pernicious representations of those who 
 put darkness for light : They speak, but 
 not from the word of the Lord : They, 
 who are themselves separated from tlie 
 Church, promise to restore the lapsed. 
 
 "There is one God, one Christ, one 
 Church. Depart, I pray you, far from 
 
 these men, and avoid their discourse, as 
 a plague and pestilence. They hinder 
 your prayers and tears, by affording you 
 false consolations. Acquiesce, I beseech 
 you, in my counsel : I pray daily for you, 
 and desire you to be restored to the Church 
 by the grace of the Lord. — Join your 
 prayers and tears with mine. But, if 
 any person shall despise repentance, and 
 betake himself to Felicissimus and to his 
 faction, let him know that his re-admis- 
 sion into the Church will be impractica- 
 ble."_ 
 
 It is not possible, by a few extracts, to 
 give a perfect idea of the glowing charity, 
 which reigned in Cyprian's breast on this 
 occasion. Whoever has attended to the 
 imbecility of human nature, ever prone to 
 consult ease, to humour selfish feelings, 
 and to admit flattery, will see the difficult 
 trials of patience, which faithful pastors, 
 in all ages, have endured from the insidi- 
 ous arts of those who would heal the 
 wounds of people falsely. — Uncharitable 
 — and, imperious — are the usual epithets 
 with which they are aspersed on account 
 of their faithfulness. — But " Wisdom is 
 justified of her children." 
 
 But there was also another character, 
 who was a primary agent in these disa- 
 greeable scenes, — Novatus, a 
 presbyter of Carthage, a man '-n^racter 
 extremely scandalous and im- "^g °^^" 
 moral.* His domestic crimes 
 had been so notorious as to render him not 
 only no longer fit to be a minister, but 
 even unworthy to be received into lay- 
 communion. The examination of his con- 
 duct was about to lake place, when the 
 breaking out of the persecution by Decius 
 prevented it. He it was, who supported 
 and cherished the views of Felicissimus 
 and of the rest ; and he appears, by his 
 address and capacity, to have been ex- 
 tremely well qualified to produce much 
 mischief in the Church. He could do it 
 no service; because he was absolutely 
 devoid both of honesty and conscience.— 
 Felicissimus himself, though at first the 
 ostensible leader of the congregation on 
 the mountain, gave way afterwards to one 
 of the five presbyters, named Fortunatus, 
 who was constituted bishop in opposi- 
 tion to Cyprian. Most of the five had 
 been already branded with infamy for im- 
 moralities. Yet so deep is the corrup- 
 tion of human nature — that such charac- 
 ters usually find advocates, even where 
 
 • Epis. 49. 
 
180 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 the light of the Gospel shines, and where 
 there exist pastors of eminent sanctity. 
 The fact is, pastors of this last descrip- 
 tion cause numerous enemies to them- 
 selves by irritating- the corruptions of 
 wicked men, which they constantly do by 
 refusing to speak peace where there is no 
 peace. — Itis no slightproof of the strength 
 of these evils, that even a persecution the 
 most dreadful yet recorded in the annals 
 of the Church, did not perfectly unite pro- 
 fessors of Christianity in love. The pious 
 reader will, hence, infer the necessity, 
 which called for so severe a scourge to 
 the Church ; and will also remark the ad- 
 vantages thence accruing to the really 
 faithful, either by happily removing them 
 to rest out of a world of sin and vanity, 
 or by promoting their sanctification, if 
 their pilgrimage were prolonged. 
 
 Novatus, either unwilling to face the 
 bishop of Carthage, or desirous to extend 
 tire mischiefs of schism, passed the sea 
 
 and came to Rome. There he 
 Account of connected himself with a 
 
 priest, named Novatian, a 
 
 Novatian. 
 
 friend of the confessor Moyses, who has 
 been already mentioned, and whose sui- 
 ferings at Rome were of a tedious nature. 
 Novatus had the address and manage- 
 ment to effect the separation of Novatian 
 from the Church. — Moyses renounced all 
 intercourse with his former friend and ac- 
 quaintance on account of this conduct; 
 and soon after died in prison, where he 
 had been confined nearly a year. Doubt- 
 less, he entered into eternal glory at 
 length, having left the evidence of mo- 
 desty and peaceableness, in addition to 
 his other more splendid virtues, as testi- 
 monies of his love to the Lord .Tesus. 
 
 Novatus found the religious ideas of his 
 new associate and partner ranged in ex- 
 treme opposition to his own. Novatian had 
 been a Stoic before he was a Christian ; 
 and he still retained the rigour of the sect 
 to such a degree, that he disapproved of 
 receiving those into the Church who once 
 had lapsed, though they gave the sincer- 
 est marks of repentance. Full of these 
 unwarranted severities, he exclaimed 
 against the wise and well-tempered leni- 
 ty of the Roman clergy in receiving peni- 
 tents. Many of the clergy of Rome, Avho 
 were still in prison for the faith; — and 
 among these Maximus and others, to 
 whom Cyprian had formerly written, — 
 were seduced by this apparent zeal for 
 Church-discipline; and they joined No- 
 vatian. His African tutor, with astonish- 
 
 ing inconsistency, after having stirred up 
 a general indignation in his own country 
 and against his own bishop on account of 
 severity to the lapsed, now supported a 
 party who complained of too much lenity 
 at Rome. It is hard to say which of the 
 two extremes is the worse: — Novatus 
 defended both within the compass of two 
 years ; — and with equal pertinacity. 
 
 The Roman clergy thought it high time 
 to stem the t.orrent. They had, for six- 
 teen months,* with singular piety and 
 fortitude governed the Church during one 
 of its most stormy seasons. Schism was 
 now added to persecution : The necessity 
 of choosing a bishop grew more and more 
 urgent; yet a bishop of Rome must, of 
 course, be in the most imminent danger 
 of martyrdom ; — for Decius threatened all 
 bishops with great haughtiness and aspe- 
 rity. Sixteen of them happened to be 
 then at Rome, and these ordained Corne- 
 lius as the successor'of Fabian. He was 
 very unwilling to accept the office; but 
 the people, who were present, approved of 
 his ordination; and no step was to be ne- 
 glected, which might be useful in with- 
 standing the growing schism.— 'The life 
 of Cornelius appears to have been worthy 
 of the Gospel : Novatian, however, not 
 only vented many calumnies against him, 
 but also contrived, in a very irregular 
 manner,| to be elected bishop in opposi- 
 tion. 
 
 Thus was formed the first body of 
 Christians, who, in modern language, 
 may be called dissenters ; that is, men, 
 who separate from the gene- 
 ral-Church, not on grounds of 
 
 DOCTRINE, but of DISCIPLINE. 
 
 The Novatianists held no opi- 
 nions contrary to the faith of the Gospel. 
 It is certain from some writings of Nova- 
 tian extant,:!^ that their leader was sound 
 in the doctrine of the Trinity. But the 
 confessors, whom his pretensions to su- 
 perior§ purity had seduced, returned af- 
 terwards to the communion of Cornelius, 
 and mourned over their own credulity. 
 In a letter of Cornelius to Fabius, bishop 
 of Antioch, a few circumstances are occa- 
 sionally mentioned, from which an idea of 
 the state of the Church of Rome, at that 
 
 The first 
 Dissen- 
 ters. 
 
 * Fleury, B. 6. 
 
 j- See in Euseb. B. 6. Cornelius's letter con- 
 ceiiiing; Novatian, whom Eusebius, by mis- 
 take, confounds with Novatus. 
 
 :): See Waterland's Importance of the Tri- 
 nit}'. 
 
 § Epis. 48 and 49. 
 
\ 
 
 CE3fT. III.] 
 
 HISTORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 181 
 
 time may be collected.* There were 
 under the bishop forty-six priests, seven 
 deacons, seven sub-deacons, forty-two 
 acolyths, fifty-two exorcists, readers, and 
 porters, and upwards of fifteen hundred 
 widows, and infirm or disabled persons. 
 —"The number of the laity was," says 
 he, "innumerable." — I don't know so 
 authentic a memorial of the number of the 
 Christians in those times. 
 
 In this letter he charges Novatian, — 
 perhaps without sufficient warrant,— with 
 having denied himself to be a priest du- 
 ring the heat of the persecution, and with 
 obliging his separatists, when he admi- 
 nistered to them the Lord's Supper, to 
 swear to adhere to himself. — The party, 
 however, at Rome daily lost ground : Ni- 
 costratus the deacon was among the very 
 few persons of note there, who, after being 
 seduced by the arts of Novatian, did not re- 
 turn into communion and peace with Cor- 
 nelius. — Conscious of scandalous crimes, f 
 this schismatic fled from Rome into Af- 
 rica ; — whither Novatus himself also re- 
 turned ; and there the Novatians found 
 many adherents,* and are said to have 
 elected for themselves, as a sort of coun- 
 ter-bishop, a presbyter, named Maximus, 
 who had been lately sent as deputy from 
 Rome, by Novatian, to inforni Cyprian 
 of the new election:j: in opposition to that 
 of Cornelius. — This same deputy, Cypri- 
 an had rejected from communion. 
 
 It would not have been worth while to 
 have detailed these events so distinctly, 
 but for the purpose of marking the symp- 
 toms of declension in the Church, — the 
 unity of which was now broken for the 
 first time : for it ought not to be concluded 
 that all the Novatians were men void of 
 the faith and love of Jesus. The artifices 
 of Satan also, in pushing forward oppo- 
 site extremes, are worthy of notice : The 
 skilful tempter tries both the lax and the 
 severe method of discipline. The former 
 he finds more suitable to the state of 
 Christianity in our times ; but it could 
 gain no solid footing in the third century. 
 The Novatian schism stood at last on the 
 ground of excessive severity ; — a certain 
 proof of the strictness of the ecclesiasti- 
 cal government then fashionable among 
 Christians, and, of course, of great purity 
 of life and doctrine having been prevalent 
 amonsT them : To refuse the rc-admission 
 
 * About the middle of the third century, 
 f The Novatians called themselves Cathari, 
 pure people. 
 
 I The election of Novatian. 
 Vol. I. Q 
 
 of penitents was a dangerous instance of 
 Pharisaical pride : but, in justice to No- 
 vatian, it ought to be mentioaad, that he 
 advised the exhorting of thejd^sed to re- 
 pentance, though he thou^t that they 
 should then be left to the judgment of 
 God. On the same plan he also con- 
 demned second marriages ; — Extreme au- 
 sterity and superstition were growing evils 
 in this century ; and they were cherished 
 by false philosophy. 
 
 At length, Cyprian ventured out of his 
 retreat and returned to Carthage. In 
 what manner he there conducted him- 
 self, shall be the subject of the next chap- 
 ter. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Cyprian's settlement of his church 
 after his return, and the his- 
 tory of the western church till 
 the persecution under callus. 
 
 The prudence of Cyprian had been so 
 remarkable during the whole of the per- 
 secution of Decius, that we may fairly 
 conclude he had ceased to apprehend atiy 
 personal danger when he appeared agaia 
 in public at Carthage. In fact, it was 
 not the cessation of malice, but the dis- 
 traction of public affairs, which put an 
 end to this persecution. Decius, on ac- 
 count of the incursion of the Gotlis, was 
 obliged to leave Rome ; and God gave a 
 respite to his servants, while men of the 
 world were wholly taken up with resist- 
 ing or mourning under their secular ca- 
 lamities. — After Easter a council was 
 held at Carthage, and the eyes of Chris- 
 tians were turned toward it : The Church 
 was in a very confused state ; and some 
 settlement of it was expected under the 
 auspices of Cyprian and the other bishops 
 of Africa. At first, a short delay was oc- 
 casioned on account of doubts which 
 arose respecting the validity of the elec- 
 tion of Cornelius.* But an exact infor- 
 mation of the circumstances laid open the 
 truth : The regularity of his appointment, 
 and the violation of order in the schis- 
 matical ordination of Novatian, by some 
 persons who were in a state of intoxica- 
 tion, appeared so clearly, that no room 
 for hesitation was left: Novatian was re- 
 jected in the African synod ; — Felicissif 
 mus, with his five presbyters, was con- 
 demned ; and Cornelius was owned as 
 
 See Cornelius's letter ia Euseb. 
 
182 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 legitimate bishop of Rome. — And now 
 the case of the lapsed, which had given 
 so much disquietude, and which Cyprian 
 had so often promised to settle in full 
 council, was finally determined ; — and 
 with men, who feared God, it was no 
 hard thing to adjust a due medium. — A 
 proper temperature was used betAA'een the 
 precipitation of the lapsed and the stoical 
 severity of Novatian. Hence, tried peni- 
 tents were restored, and the case of dubi- 
 ous characters was deferred ; and yet 
 every method of Christian charity was 
 used to bring about and facilitate their 
 epentance and re-admission. 
 
 Fortunatus preserved still a schismati- 
 cal assembly. But both this bishop and 
 his flock shrunk soon into insignificance. 
 The Christian authority of Cyprian was 
 restored. The Novatian party alone re- 
 mained a long- time after, in Africa and 
 elsewhere, numerous enough to continue 
 a distinct body of professing Christians. 
 The very little satisfactory light, which 
 Christian annals afford concerning these 
 Dissenters, shall be given in its place. 
 And, as I am convinced that the Almighty 
 has not limited his creatures to any par- 
 ticular and strictly defined modes of 
 Church' government, I cannot be under 
 much temptation to partiality. — The laws 
 of historical truth have obliged me to 
 state facts which prove their secession to 
 have been unjustifiable ; but that circum 
 stance does not render it impossible that 
 the Spirit of God might be with some of 
 this people during their continuance as a 
 distinct body of Christians. 
 
 Thus did it please God to make use of 
 the vigour and perseverance of Cyprian 
 in recovering the Church of Carthage 
 from a state of most deplorable declension. 
 First, she had lost her purity and piety 
 to a very alarming degree ; then, she was 
 torn with persecution, and sifted by the 
 storm so much that the greatest part of 
 her professors apostatized : and, lastly, 
 she was convulsed by schisms, through 
 men's unwillingness to submit to the 
 rules of God's own word in wholesome 
 discipline and sincere repentance. On 
 Cyprian's return, however, a new train 
 of regulation was established by the coun 
 oil of Carthage ; and unity was restored 
 in a great measure : The accounts of the 
 succeeding transactions are imperfect ; 
 but there is great reason to believe that 
 the Church of God was much recovered 
 in these parts. 
 Decius lost his life in battle in the 
 
 year two hundred and fifty-one, after hav- 
 ing: reisrned thirty months. — A prince — 
 
 Deciu3 
 slain, 
 A. D 
 
 neither deficient in abilities 
 nor in moral virtues, but dis- 
 tinguished, during this whole ^_ jy. 251. 
 period, by the most cruel per- 
 secution of the Church of God ; he ap- 
 pears to have been bent on its ruin ; but 
 was stopped in his career by an over- 
 ruling Providence. 
 
 The Church was now allowed peace 
 for a little time under Gallus, the succes- 
 sor of Decius. 
 
 There remain a few circumstances to be 
 observed, which attended this persecution 
 in the West, before we proceed to relate 
 its effects in the Eastern Church. 
 
 Cyprian, zealous for the tmity of the 
 Church, informed Cornelius,* that cer- 
 tain persons came to Carthage from No- 
 vatian, who insisted on being heard as 
 to some charges which they had to pro- 
 duce against Cornelius : — But, — that as 
 sufficient and ample testimony had already 
 been given in favour of Cornelius, — as a 
 prudent delay had also been made, — and 
 as the sense of the Church of Rome had 
 been authentically exhibited, any further 
 audience of the Novatians had been re- 
 fused. — ^These, he observes, strove then 
 to make a party in Africa ; and for this 
 purpose solicited different towns and pri- 
 vate houses. The council of Carthago 
 informed them that they ought to desist 
 from their obstinacy, and not to relinquish 
 their mother Church; but to own, that a 
 bishop being once constituted and ap- 
 proved by the testimony and judgment of 
 his colleagues and of the people, another 
 could not be lawfully set up in his room : 
 and that therefore, if they intended to act 
 peaceably and faithfully, — if they pre- 
 tended to be the assertors of the Gospel 
 of Christ, — they ought to return to the 
 Church. 
 
 Though the ideas contained in this 
 epistle may appear very repugnant to the 
 habits of thinking contracted by many 
 professors of godliness in our days, I see 
 not, I own, on what principles they can 
 be controverted. There is a medium be- 
 tween the despotism of idolatrous Rome 
 and the extreme licentiousness of modern 
 ecclesiastical polity. — Are not peace and 
 unity precious things! — and ought not 
 they to be preserved in the Church if pos- 
 sible ■? — Then why should not the decided 
 sense of the majority prevail, where that 
 
 Epis. 41. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 HISRORY OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 183 
 
 mode of evantrelically settling a Church 
 has been usual, and where it is not con- 
 trary to the established laws of the coun- 
 try, — and lastly, where pastors sound in 
 faith and decorous in manners have been 
 appointed 1 — Can it be right for a small 
 number of individuals to dissent — and 
 that, on no better ground, than their own 
 fancy and humour'?* This is not keep- 
 ing the unity of the Spirit in the bond of 
 peace. — Such, however, was the first ori- 
 gin of the Novatian schism. 
 
 Persons, who have been accustomed to 
 approve the unrestrained and unscriptural 
 manner of conducting religious commu- 
 nities, which now so unhappily prevails ; 
 who feel no pity for the Church of Christ, 
 nor care how much her members be torn 
 one from another, and who make no more 
 difficulty of changing their pastors than 
 their workmen ; will not enter into the 
 beauty of Cyprian's charitable concern 
 for the unity of the Church. It is evi- 
 dent, union at Rome was as much on his 
 heart as union at Carthage, because he 
 considered Christ's body as one. He ex- 
 plains! to Cornelius why he was not im- 
 mediately acknowledged as bishop, and 
 how he was honourably received on full 
 information. He speaks of the Roman 
 schism with horror; he represents the 
 
 • The author would by no means be under- 
 stood Iiere to encroach on the right of private 
 judgment ; but be laments sincerely tliat the 
 evii of separation should have been considered 
 by the Novatians as a trilling matter ; and he, 
 further, laments, that a spirit of the same kind 
 should appear to jjrevail strongly in our own 
 days. — " l)oes, then, right and wrong, — will 
 any one say, — depend upon numbers ? Have 
 not the FEW as undoubted a right to their own 
 opinions as the many ?" — Such questions are 
 often asked, — and with an air of triumph. — 
 But, after all, whoever denied this right of 
 opinion ; this right to think ? — It is the right 
 of ACTING according to this right of opinion 
 that is contested. Let a man, for e.xample, in 
 his private judgment, prefer for his pastor or 
 his bishop some person different from him who 
 has been elected by the majority; — Let him 
 publicly show this preference at tiie time of 
 giving his suffrage ; — but let him remember 
 to acquiesce peaceably in the appointment of 
 the persor\ elected ; and not endeavour to di- 
 vide the Church of Christ by placing a rejected 
 candidate or some other favourite at the head 
 of a faction in opposition to the election of, — 
 perhaps, — a truly godly a\id religious man. 
 
 But in all this the author supi)Oses either 
 the Lex scripta or the Lex non scripta of liie 
 country to authorize ecclesiastical appoint- 
 ments by election. 
 
 + Epis. 42. 
 
 Christian schismatics, as refusing the 
 bosom and the embrace of their mother, 
 and as setting up an adulterous head out 
 of the Church. I attempt not to vindi- 
 cate expressions which go to the length 
 of a total condemnation of the persons of 
 schismatics : Schism is not so deadly an 
 evil as heresy ; nor must we undertake 
 to judge the HEARTS of others. But when 
 all this is allowed, — Does not the zeal of 
 Cyprian call for similar candour! — ^The 
 mischief, which had just begun to show 
 itself in Rome and Carthage, was then 
 NEW in the Christian world. Before the 
 time of this able and active prelate, no 
 instance had happened of any separations 
 made from the Church, except in the 
 case of damnable heresies : Slight and 
 tolerable inconveniences had not yet been 
 thought sufficient reasons to justify such 
 violent measures ; — and, it must be owned, 
 if really good men in all ages had pos- 
 sessed the same conscientious dread of 
 the sin of Schism, it would have fared 
 much better with vital Christianity; and, 
 further, those separations which must of 
 necessity be made, when false worship 
 and false doctrine are prevalent, would 
 have been treated with more respect in 
 the world. 
 
 Encouraged with the success of his 
 pacific labours at home, Cyprian endea- 
 voured to heal the breaches of the Ro- 
 man Christians. He was sensible that 
 the example of the confessors, whom No- 
 vatian's appearance of superior piety in 
 discipline had seduced, had occasioned a 
 great defection. He wrote respectfully 
 to his former correspondents, and assured 
 them that the deepest sadness had pos- 
 sessed his breast on their account : he re- 
 minds them of the honour of their faith- 
 ful suffi^ringfs : he intreats them to return 
 to the Church ; and points out the incon- 
 sistency of their glorious confession of 
 Christ with their present irregularity. 
 But so exactly attentive was Cyprian to 
 order, that he first sent the letter to Cor- 
 nelius, and ordered it to be read to him, 
 and submitted to his consideration before 
 he would suffer it to be sent to the con- 
 fessors.* With the same cautious cha- 
 rity he explains again to Cornelius some 
 things which had given umbrage to that 
 prelate with respect to the delay of the 
 acknowledgment of his ordination. | — 
 These transactions appear to me to belong 
 to my plan ; and to be singularly instruc- 
 
 Epls. 43, 44. 
 
 t Epis. 45. 
 
184 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 tive.— The conduct of this African bishop 
 is calculated to admonish Christian mi- 
 nisters in all ages to enlarge their views 
 so as to comprehend the whole Church 
 of Christ ; and never to feel assured that 
 they grow in true zeal and true charit)% 
 as long as they do not feel the evils of 
 division, and do not labour to preserve 
 peace and unity. 
 
 The progress of Christian grace will 
 always be much seen in the just manage- 
 ment of matters of this kind. 
 
 There is the strongest reason to believe 
 that the authority of Cyprian had a great 
 effect on the minds of Maximus and the 
 other seduced confessors, whose undoubt- 
 ed piety gave the chief support to Nova- 
 tian's party. But another circumstance 
 happened about the same time, which 
 contributed to open their eyes effectually. 
 The excessive eagerness of the schisma- 
 tics at Rome defeated their own end. 
 "With the view of increasing the Schism, 
 they were so fraudulent as to send out 
 frequent letters in the names of these con- 
 fessors, almost throughout all the Church- 
 es. Maximus and the rest became ac- 
 quainted with the fact, and were exceed- 
 ingly surprised : they owned they knew 
 not a syllable of the contents of these 
 letters : and they heartily desired a re- 
 union with the Church. The whole body 
 of the Roman Christians, — and probably, 
 at that time no purer Church existed, — 
 sympathized with these confessors both 
 in their seduction and in their recovery. 
 Tears of joy and thanksgiving to God 
 burst forth in the assembly. " We con- 
 fess," says Maximus and the rest with 
 ingenuous frankness, " our mistake. — We 
 own Cornelius the bishop of the most 
 holy general* Church, chosen by Al 
 mighty God and by Christ our Lord ; we 
 suffered an imposture : We were circum- 
 vented by treachery and a captious plau- 
 sibility of speech : and though we seem 
 to have had some communication with a 
 schismatic and a heretic, f yet our mind 
 was sincerely with the Church ; for we 
 knew that there is one God, one Christ, 
 one Lord, whom we have confessed ; one 
 Holy Ghost; and that one bishop ought 
 
 * I choose to translate Cornelius's Calho- 
 licse in Epis. 46, which gives an account of this 
 transaction, genehal rather tlian catholic, 
 to distinguish the Church of Christ at large 
 from particular separatists. 
 
 + They confound here two terms that ought 
 to be kept distinct. Novatian was a schisma- 
 tic, but not a heretic. 
 
 to be in the general Church." " Should 
 we not," says Cornelius, " be moved with 
 their profession; — and, by restoring them 
 to the Church, give them the opportunity 
 of acting according to that belief which 
 they liave dared to profess before all the 
 world ] We have restored Maximus the 
 presbyter to his office : — the rest we have 
 also received with the zealous consent of 
 the people." 
 
 Cyprian, with his usual animation,* 
 congratulated Cornelius on the event; 
 and describes the happy effect which the 
 example of the confessors had on the 
 minds of the people. — And, I cannot biit 
 think that, in modern times, much evil 
 might have been prevented in the Church 
 of Christ, — if many excellent men, who 
 have suffered their minds to be harassed 
 by needless and frivolous scruples, had 
 possessed more tenderness of conscience 
 in regard to the question of schism and 
 separation. — " No one can now be de- 
 ceived," says Cyprian, " by the loqua- 
 city of a frantic schismatic, since it ap- 
 pears that good and glorious soldiers of 
 Christ could not long be detained out of 
 the Church by perfidy and fallacy." 
 
 The Novatians being baffled at Rome, 
 Novatus and Nicostratus went over to 
 Africa. We have already taken notice 
 of their seditious attempts in those parts. 
 Cornelius, f by letter, warned Cyprian of 
 the probable approach of the schisma- 
 tics ; and certainly, there is a disagreea- 
 ble harshness of language in this account 
 of his enemies as well as in the fragment 
 of his Epistle preserved by Eusebius. 
 
 Of Novatus himself, the bishop of 
 Carthage, who must have thoroughly 
 known him, asserts expressly and cir- 
 cumstantially that he was guilty of hor- 
 rible crimes, which, in truth, it is neither 
 pleasant to particularize, nor does the 
 plan of this history call for such a detail. 
 —The honest charity of Cyprian requires 
 that this testimony should be admitted. :|: 
 This bishop was as remarkable for mode- 
 ration as for zeal. He speaks with much 
 sensibility of persons seduced by the arts 
 of the foul impostor; and observes — 
 " Those only will perish, who are wilful 
 in their evils. The rest," says he, " the 
 mercy of God the Father will unite with 
 us, and the grace of our Lord Christ, and 
 our patience." I wish this benevolent 
 spirit had had opportunities of knowing 
 Novatian as perfectly as he knew Nova- 
 
 Epis. 47 
 
 t Epis. 48. + Epis. 49. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 CYPRIAN, 
 
 185 
 
 tus. But a Roman, who does not appear 
 ever to have come into Africa at all, could 
 only he made known to him hy report. — 
 I shall find a convenient place by and by, 
 in which it may be proper to make such 
 further remarks upon him as the scanty 
 and imperfect materials will supply. — 
 Let the candid reader, however, always 
 bear in mind, that, though Novatus was, 
 doubtless, a very wicked man, though no 
 ground for the separation appears in his- 
 tory, and though there is not the least 
 reason to believe that the Spirit of God 
 had left the general Church to abide with 
 the dissentients, yet the personal charac- 
 ter of several of the supporters of the 
 schism might still be excellent. 
 
 In answer to a friendly letter of the Ro- 
 man confessors,* Cyprian, after congratu- 
 lating them on their re-union with the 
 Church, and expressing his sincere sor- 
 row for the former defection, delivers his 
 sentiments on the duty of Christians in 
 this point. The flattering idea, which 
 had seduced these good men, was a no- 
 tion of constituting a Church here on 
 earth exactly pure and perfect. — The man, 
 who sustained so much ill-will on ac- 
 count of discipline, may be heard with 
 patience on this subject. — Yet he was far 
 from supposing that fallible mortals 
 should be able, in all cases, to decide 
 positively who were true Christians and 
 who not, and to rectify all abuses, and to 
 cleanse the Church of all its tares. The 
 middle state between impracticable efforts 
 of severity and licentious neglect was Cy- 
 prian's judgment: He thought it neces- 
 sary that the lapsed should show good 
 marks of penitence : and he held it highly 
 culpable to separate from the visible 
 Church, for the want of that exact purity 
 in the members which the present state of 
 things does not admit. But let us hear 
 the bishop himself: The subject is not, 
 indeed, of the first importance, bat it de 
 serves, on account of its practical influ- 
 ence, to be deeply considered by all 
 friends of vital godliness. 
 
 " Though there appear to be tares in the 
 Church, our faith and love ought not to 
 be impeded by seeing them, so that we 
 should desert our post. — Our business is 
 to labour, that we ourselves may stand a 
 scnitiny, that when the wheat shall be 
 gathered into the harvest, we may receive 
 reward according to our labour. The 
 Apostle speaks of vessels not only of gold 
 
 and silver, but also of wood and of earth, 
 and some to honour and some to dishon- 
 
 Epis. 50, 51. 
 q2 
 
 our. 
 
 " Be it our care that we be found ves- 
 sels of gold or silver : but we are not to 
 break in pieces the vessels of earth : this 
 belongs to the Lord alone, who has a rod 
 of iron. — The servant cannot be greater 
 than his master: nor must any man claim 
 to himself what the Father attrilnites to 
 the Son alone: — No man should think 
 himself capable ofthoroughly purging the ' 
 floor, or of separating all the wheat from 
 the tares by human judgment. To think 
 so is proud obstmacy and sacrilegious 
 presumption, which a depraved madness 
 assumes to itself; and Avhile some lay 
 claim to a dominion of this kind beyond 
 the limits of justice and equity, they are 
 lost to the Church ; and, while they inso- 
 lently extol themselves, they become 
 blinded by their passions, so as to lose 
 the light of truth. With these views, we 
 have aimed at a proper medium ; we have 
 contemplated the balance of the Lord ; we 
 have thirsted exceedingly that we might 
 be directed both by the holiness and the 
 mercy of God the Father; and, after a 
 long and careful deliberation, we have 
 settled a just mediocrity. —I refer you to 
 my own books on the subject, which I 
 lately read here; and which, from mo- 
 tives of brotherly love, I have sent over 
 to you to read. In them there is wanting- 
 neither a due censure of the lapsed, nor 
 medicine to heal the penitent. — I have 
 expressed also my thoughts on the unity 
 of the Church to the best of my feeble 
 judgment."* 
 
 There was a bishop of some note, 
 named Antonius, Avho seemed disposed 
 to embrace the Novatian schism. To 
 him Cyprian in a long letter explains with 
 much force and clearness the whole of 
 his ideas on the subject. A short abridge- 
 ment of it may merit perusal, because of 
 the charity and good sense which run 
 through it.)" 
 
 He clears himself from the charge of 
 inconsistency, by showing, in both cases, 
 the views on which he acted under very 
 different circumstances, formerly with 
 strictness, now with lenity ; — he informs 
 him what had been determined both at 
 Rome and Carthage concerning the la])sed; 
 — he enlarges on the virtues of Cornelius, 
 who had ventured his life in a time of se- 
 
 * He means his Treatises on the Lapsed, 
 and on the Unity of the Church. 
 t Epis. 52. 
 
186 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CIirRCH: 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 \cro trial under Dccius; — he ilotomls him 
 against the unjust aspersions of the IS'o- 
 vatians, and demonstrates, that verj' dif- 
 ferent rules and metliods should he used, 
 Rccordinoto the eircunistances of olTend- 
 ers; and that Novatian's stoicism, hy 
 which all sins are equal, was ahsolutely 
 repuornant to the fjenius of Christianity. 
 He supports his ideas of mercy liy strik- 
 ing and apposite passages of Scripture. 
 For instance; "The whole need not a 
 physician, hut the sick." What sort of 
 a physician is he, who says, " 1 cure only 
 the sound ?" — "Nor ought we to think 
 all those whom we see wounded hy a de- 
 gree of apostasy, during the deadly per- 
 secution, to he absolutely dead; hut ra- 
 ther to lie half dead only, and to be capa- 
 ble of being recovered by sound faith and 
 penitence, so as yet to display in future 
 the true characters of confessors and mar- 
 tyrs." 
 
 He shows that the censures of the 
 Church ought not to anticipate the judg- 
 ment of the Lord. His quotations of 
 Scripture, in behalf of receiving penitents 
 again into the Church may well be spared: 
 — The Novatian unchariiableness will, in 
 our days, scarcely find a defender. 
 
 He "heauiifuUy insists on the propriety 
 and wholesomcness of mercy, gentleness, 
 and charity, and exposes the unreason- 
 ableness of the present dissent from this 
 circumstance — that formerlji in Africa, 
 some bishops excluded adulterers from a 
 return into the Church, — but they did not 
 form a schism on that account. And yet 
 au adulterer appears to him to deserve a 
 greater degree of severity than a man who 
 lapses through fear of torment. — He ex- 
 poses the absurdity of the Novatians in 
 exhorting men to repent, while they rob 
 them of all those comforts and hopes 
 which should encourage repentance. It 
 is observable, that he alleges nothing par- 
 ticular against the personal character of 
 Novatian : — but he blames Schism with 
 an excess of severity not to be defended. 
 From another circumstance we are led 
 to remark the strictness of discipline which 
 then prevailed in the purest Ciuirches. — 
 Several persons, who stood firm lor a 
 time in persecution, and afterwards fell 
 through extremity of torment, were kept 
 three years in a state of exclusion from 
 the Church ; and yet they lived all that 
 
 time with every mark of true repentance. 
 — Cyprian being consulted,* decided that 
 they ought to be re-admitted to commu- 
 
 nion. 
 
 The appearance of a new persecution 
 from (rallus now threatening tiie Church, 
 Cyprian, with the African synod, wrote 
 to Cornelius on the subject of hastening 
 the reception of penitents, that they might 
 be armed for the approaching storm. f 
 
 In the mean time Kelicissimus finding, 
 after his condemnation, no security to his 
 reputation in Africa, crossed the sea to 
 Home, raised a party against Cornelius, 
 and by menaces, threw him into great 
 fear. Cj'prian's spirit seems more dis- 
 turbed on this occasion than I have seen 
 n-ason to observe in any of his epistles. 
 He supports the dignity of the episcopal 
 character in a style of great magnificence ; 
 but it is evident, that continued ill treat- 
 ment from seditious characters had led 
 him into some degree of impatience : The 
 language he uses concerning the autho- 
 rity of bishops, would sound strange to 
 our ears, thoujili it bj- no means contains 
 any definite ideas contrary to the Scrip- 
 tures. The whole epistle is calculated to 
 rouse the dejected spirit of Cornelius; 
 and shows much of the hero — less of the 
 Christian. He confesses — that he speaks 
 grieved and irritated, by a series of un- 
 merited ill usage. He takes notice that 
 at the very time of writing this, he was 
 again demanded by the people to be ex- 
 posed to the lions. He speaks of the or- 
 dination of Fortunatus and also of Maxi- 
 mus, by the schismatics, in a contemptu- 
 ous manner. — It is very evident, that, on 
 the whole, he triumphed in Carthage 
 among his own people. His great virtues 
 and unquestionable sincerity secured him 
 their affections ; l)'it they seem not to 
 have been sufficiently patient and discreet 
 in the re-admission of ollenders : He com- 
 plains that, in some cases, they were vio- 
 lent and resentfiil ; — and in otliers, preci- 
 pitately easy and f\ivourable. The elo- 
 quence, and even the genuine charity of 
 this great man, appears throughout this 
 fifty-fifth epistle; — but it is deficient in 
 the meekness and the moderation, which 
 shine in his other performances. 
 
 • Epis. 53. 
 
 t Epis. 54. 
 
CiiST. UL] 
 
 PERSECUTION OF DECIUS. 
 
 187 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE EFFECTS OF THE PERSECUTION OF 
 DECIUS IX THE EASTERN CHURCH. 
 
 Thk Eastern and Western Churches 
 were, in those times, divided from each 
 other by the (ireelv and Roman lanjriiajre, 
 tliou<(h cemented by the common bond — 
 of the Itoman government, and much more 
 — of the common Salvation. It will often 
 be found convenient to consider their his- 
 torj' distinctly. The ((enlile Church of 
 Jerusalem still maintained its respecta- 
 bility under Alexander its bishop, wiio 
 has been mentioned above. He was airain 
 called on to confess Christ before the tri- 
 bunal of the president at Cscsarea; and, 
 in this second trial of his faith, having 
 acquitted himself with his usual fidelity, 
 he was cast into prison: His venerable 
 locks procured him neither pity nor re- 
 spect: and he finally breathed out liis 
 soul under confinement.* 
 
 At Antioch, I5abylas after his confes- 
 sion dying in bonds, Fabius was chosen 
 his successor. In this persecution the 
 renowned Origen was called to suffer ex- 
 tremely. Bonds, tonnents, a dungeon, 
 the pressure of an iron chair, the disten- 
 sion of his feet for many days, the threats 
 of burning, and other evils were inflicted 
 by his enemies, all which he manfully en- 
 dured : and his life was still preserved ; 
 for the judge was solicitously careful that 
 his tortures should not kill him. " What 
 words he uttered on these occasions, and 
 how useful to those who need consolation, 
 many of bis epistles," says Eusebius, 
 " declare with no less truth than accura- 
 cy!" — If the words here alluded to were 
 now extant, more light, I apprehend, 
 might be thrown on the internal charac- 
 ter of Origen, in respect to experimental 
 godliness, than by all his works which 
 remain. 
 
 Account of 
 ])ioiiysius, 
 bishop of 
 Alexan- 
 dria. 
 
 Origen 
 dies, aged 
 
 70. 
 
 These show the scholar, the 
 philosopher, and the critic : 
 — Those would have display- 
 ed the Christian. This great 
 man died in his seventieth 
 year, about the same time as the emperor 
 Decius. 
 
 Uy and by I shall find occasion to in- 
 sert an estimate of his character. 
 
 Dionysius was at this time bishop of 
 Alexandria, — a person of great and de- 
 served renown in the Church. We are 
 
 • Euseb. li. 6. flora C. 39 to the end. 
 
 obliged to Eusebius for a few 
 fragments of his writings, 
 some of which being histori- 
 cal, must be here inserted. In 
 an ejjistle to Cerrnanus he 
 writes thus: — "Sal)inus, the 
 Roman governor, sent an officer to seek 
 me, during the persecution of Decius, and 
 I remained four days at home, expecting 
 Ills coming: he made the most accurate 
 search in the roads, the rivers, and the 
 fields, where he suspected I might be hid. 
 A confusion seems to have seized liim, 
 that he could not find my house; for he 
 had no idea that a man, in my circum- 
 stances, should stay at home. At length, 
 after four days, God ordered me to re- 
 move;* and, having opened me a way 
 contrary to all expectation, I and my ser- 
 vants and many of the brethren went to- 
 gether. The event showed that the whole 
 was the work of Divine Providence. — 
 About sun-set, I was seized, together 
 with my whole company, by the sol- 
 diers, and was led to Taposiris. l]iit my 
 friend Timotheus, by the providence of 
 Cod, was not presenti, nor was he seized. 
 He came afterwards to my house, and 
 found it forsaken and guarded ; and he 
 then learned that we were taken captive. 
 How wonderful was the dispensation! 
 but it shall be related precisely as it hap- 
 pened. A countrj-man met Timotheus as 
 he was flying in confusion, and asked the 
 cause of his hurry : he told him the truth : 
 the peasant heard the story and went 
 away to a nuptial feast, at which it was 
 the custom to watch all night. He in- 
 formed the guests of what he had heard. 
 At once, they all rose up, as by a signal, 
 and ran quickly to us, and shouted : our 
 soldiers, struck with a panic, fled; and 
 the invaders found us laid down on un- 
 fiirnished beds. I first thought they must 
 have been a company of robbers. They 
 ordered me to rise and go out quickly ; at 
 length I understood their real designs; 
 and I cried out, and entreated them ear- 
 nestly to depart, and to let us alone. But 
 if they really meant any kindness to us, I 
 requested them to strike off my head, and 
 so to deliver me from my persecutors. 
 They compelled me to rise by doAvnright 
 violence; and I then threw myself on the 
 ground. They seized my hands and feet, 
 pulled me out by force ; and placed me 
 on an ass, and conducted me from the 
 place." 
 
 • H}- a vision or some oilier Divine icanires- 
 tation, I suppose. 
 
188 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 In so remarkable a manner was this 
 useful life preserved to the Church. We 
 shall see it was not in vain. 
 
 In an epistle to Fabius bishop of Anti- 
 och, he gives the following account of 
 the persecution at Alexandria, which had 
 preceded the Decian persecution by a 
 whole year, and which must have hap- 
 pened therefore under Philip, the most 
 open friend of Christians. "A certain 
 augur and poet took pains to stir up the 
 malice of the gentiles against us, and to 
 inflame them with zeal for the support of 
 their own superstitions. Stimulated by 
 him, they gave free course to their licen- 
 tiousness, and deemed the murder of 
 Christians to be the most perfect piety 
 and the purest worship of demons. They 
 first seized an old man, named Metras, 
 and ordered him to blaspheme : he refus- 
 ed; and they beat him with clubs, and 
 pricked his face and eyes with sharp 
 reeds : they dragged him to the suburbs, 
 and they th^re stoned him. Then they 
 hurried one Quinta, a faithful woman, to 
 the idol-temple, and insisted on her wor- 
 shipping of the gods. — Quinta showed 
 the strongest marks of abominating that 
 practice. They then tied her by the feet ; 
 dragged her over the rough pavement 
 through all the city; dashed her against 
 mill stones, and whipped her ; and lastly 
 they led her back to the place where they 
 had first seized her; and there they dis- 
 patched her. — After this, with one accord 
 they all rushed on the houses of the god- 
 ly: every one ran to the house of his 
 neighbour, spoiled and plundered it; and 
 purloined the most valuable goods, and 
 threw away those things which were 
 vile and refuse, and burnt them in the 
 roads ; and thus was exhibited the ap- 
 pearance of a captive and spoiled city. 
 The brethren fled and withdrew them- 
 selves, and received with joy the spoiling 
 of their goods, as those did to whom 
 Paul beareth witness ; and I do not know, 
 that any person, who fell into their hands, 
 — except one, — denied the Lord. Among 
 others, they seized an aged virgin, called 
 Apollonia, and dashed out all her teeth ; 
 and having kindled a fire before tlie city, 
 tliey threatened to burn her alive, unless 
 she would consent to blaspheme. This 
 admirable woman begged for a little in- 
 termission ; and she then quickly leaped 
 into the fire, and was consumed. They 
 laid violent hands on Serapion in his own 
 house : they tortured him and broke all 
 his limbs; and, lastly, threw him head 
 
 long from an upper room. No road, pub- 
 lic or private, was passable to us, by 
 night or by day : the people crying out 
 always and every where, that unless we 
 would speak blasphemy, we should be 
 thrown into the flames; — and these evils 
 continued a long time. A sedition then 
 succeeded, and a civil war, which avert- 
 ed their fury from us, and turned it against 
 one another; and again we breathed a 
 little during the mitigation of their rage. 
 Immediately the change of government 
 was announced : The persecuting Decius 
 succeeded Philip our protector, and we 
 were threatened with destruction : The 
 edict, which our Lord foretold would be 
 so dreadful as to seduce, if it were possi- 
 ble, even the elect,* appeared against us. 
 — All were astonished; many Christians 
 of quality discovered themselves imme- 
 diately through fear ; others, who held 
 public offices, were constrained by their 
 office to appear ; and others were brought 
 forward and betrayed by their gentile 
 relations. Each person was cited by 
 name. They then approached the un- 
 holy altars ; some pale and trembling, 
 not as if they were going to sacrifice, but 
 to be themselves the victims; so that 
 they were derided by the multitude who 
 stood around; and it was visible to all 
 that they were very much frightened both 
 at the prospect of death and at the crime 
 of sacrificing: but some ran more readily 
 to the altar, and affirmed boldly, that they 
 never had been Christians. Of such our 
 Lord affirmed most truly, that they should 
 be saved with great dilHculty.| Of the 
 rest some followed the various examples 
 above mentioned ; and others fled : — Some 
 persisted in the faith ; and suffered bonds 
 and imprisonment for many days ; but, 
 at last, before they were led to the tribu- 
 nal, they abjured their religion; — others 
 held out longer, and endured torments. — 
 But the firm and stable pillars of the 
 Lord, being strengthened by him, and 
 having received vigour and courage pro- 
 portionate and correspondent to the live- 
 ly faith which was in them, became ad- 
 mirable martyrs of his kingdom. — The 
 first of these was Julian, a gouty person 
 who could neither stand nor walk; he 
 was brought forth with two others who 
 carried him; one of whom immediately 
 denied Christ. The other, called Cro- 
 
 * It is evident tliat this apijlication of our 
 Lord's words is a mistake. 
 
 f I suppose he means because they were 
 rich. 
 
Ceitt. III.] 
 
 PERSECUTION OF DECIUS. 
 
 189 
 
 nion the Benevolent, and old Julian him- 
 self, having confessed the Lord, were led 
 through the whole city, — very large as 
 ye know it is, — sitting on camels : they 
 were then scourged, and were at last 
 burnt in a very hot fire in the view of 
 surrounding multitudes. A soldier, named 
 Besas, stood by them and defended them 
 from insults ; which so incensed the mob, 
 that the man lost his head for having 
 thus behaved boldly in the service of his 
 God. — An African by birth, called Me- 
 car,* and truly meriting the appellation, 
 having resisted much importunity, was 
 burnt alive. After these, Epimachus and 
 Alexander, who had long sustained im- 
 prisonment and undergone a thousand 
 tortures, were burnt to death ; and along 
 with these four women. Ammonarion, 
 a holy virgin, was grievously tormented 
 by the judge for having declared before- 
 hand that she would not repeat the blas- 
 phemy which he ordered : she continued 
 faithful, and was led away to execution. 
 The venerable ancient Mercuria — and Di- 
 onysia, a mother, indeed, of many chil- 
 dren, but a mother who did not love her 
 children more than the Lord — and another 
 Ammonarion, — these, together with many 
 others, were slain by the sword without 
 being first exposed to torments : — for the 
 president was ashamed of torturing them 
 to no purpose, and of being baffled by 
 women ; — which had been remarkably 
 the case in his attempt to overcome the 
 former Ammonarion, who had undergone 
 what might have been esteemed sufficient 
 torture for them all. — Heron, Ater, and 
 Isidore, Egyptians, and with them a boy 
 of fifteen, called Dioscorus, were brought 
 before the tribunal : the boy resisted both 
 the blandishments and the tortures which 
 were applied to him : the rest, after cruel 
 torments, were burnt. The boy having 
 answered in the wisest manner to all 
 questions, and excited the admiration of 
 the judge, was dismissed by him from 
 motives of compassion, with an intima- 
 tion of hope that he might afterwards re- 
 pent. — And now the excellent Dioscorus 
 is with us, reserved to a greater and 
 longer conflict. Nemesian was first ac- 
 cused as a partner of robbers; but he 
 cleared himself of this charge before the 
 Centurion : — An information — that he was 
 a Christian, was then brought against 
 him, and he came bound before the presi- 
 dent, who most unjustly scourged him 
 
 * Happy or blessed. 
 
 with twice the severity used in the case 
 of malefactors, and then burnt him among 
 robbers. — Thus was he honoured in re- 
 sembling Christ in suffering. 
 
 " And now some of the military guard. 
 Amnion, Zeno, Ptolemy, and Ingenuus, 
 and with tliem old Theophilus, stood be- 
 fore the tribunal ; when a certain person 
 being interrogated whether he was a 
 Christian, and appearing disposed to de- 
 ny the imputation, they made such lively 
 signs of aversion as to strike the behold- 
 ers ; but before they could be seized, they 
 ran voluntarily to the tribunal and owned 
 themselves Christians, — so that the go- 
 vernor and his assessors were astonished. 
 — God triumphed gloriously in these; 
 and gave them evidently the ascendant 
 over the judges; and they went to exe- 
 cution with all the marks of exultation. 
 
 " Many others through the towns and 
 villages were torn to pieces by the gen- 
 tiles. Iscyrion was an agent to a certain 
 magistrate ; yet he refused to sacrifice : 
 This man, after repeated indignities, was 
 killed by a large stake driven through 
 his intestines.— ^But why need I mention 
 the multitude of those who wandered in 
 deserts and mountains, and were at last 
 destroyed by famine, and thirst, and cold, 
 and diseases, and robbers, and wild 
 beasts'? Those, who survived, are wit- 
 nesses of their faithfulness and victory. 
 Suffice it to relate one fact: There was a 
 verjr aged person named Chseremon, bish- 
 op of the city of Nilus. He, together 
 with his Avife, fled into an Arabian moun- 
 tain; and they did not return ; nor could 
 the brethren, after much searching, dis- 
 cover them alive or dead ; and many per- 
 sons about the same Arabian mountain 
 were led captive by the Barbarian Sara- 
 cens, some of whom were afterwards re- 
 deemed for money with difficulty ; others 
 could never regain their liberty." Di- 
 onysius adds something concerning the 
 benevolence of the martyrs towards the 
 lapsed, and contrasts it with the inexora- 
 ble severity of Novatian. 
 
 Two things are evident from this nar- 
 rative, 1st, That the persecution found 
 the Eastern Christians as poorly provided 
 against the storm as the Western. Long 
 peace and prosperity had corrupted both; 
 and men, in the former part of this cen- 
 tury, had forgotten that a Christian life 
 was that of a stranger and pilgrim. The 
 Decian persecution, under God, was at 
 once a scourge and an antidote. 2d, Yet 
 1 there still existed a competent number of 
 
190 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XL 
 
 The story 
 of Sera- 
 pion. 
 
 those who should prove the truth of Chris- 
 tianity, and the power of Divine Grace ac- 
 companying- it. — The true Church is not 
 destroyed, but flourishes and triumphs 
 amidst both inward and outward evils. 
 
 Eusebius relates a story, from Diony- 
 sius's letters to Fabius, which he says 
 was full of wonder : — " There was a faith- 
 ful aged person, named Sera- 
 pion, who had lived blameless 
 a long time, but fell, in the 
 time of trial, through fear of 
 death or of bodily pain. He had fre- 
 quently solicited to be restored to the 
 Church, but in vain, — ^because he had 
 sacrificed. He was seized with a dis- 
 temper and continued speechless and 
 senseless for three days successively; 
 but recovering a little on the fourth, he 
 called to his grandson, ' And how long,' 
 says he, 'do you detain me? I beseech 
 you hasten and quickly dismiss me. De- 
 sire one of the presbyters to visit me ;' 
 and after this he was again speechless. 
 The boy ran for the presbyter ; it was 
 night ; the presbyter was sick, and could 
 not come. But he had given directions 
 to receive dying- penitents, — particularly 
 if they should have supplicated for it, — 
 that they might leave the world in good 
 hope. He gave a little of the P]ucharist 
 to the boy; and bid him dip it in water, 
 and put it into the old man's mouth : The 
 child hastened to follow the directions ; 
 and found Serapion a little recruited, — 
 who said, ' You are come, son ; — do 
 quickly what you are ordered, and dis- 
 miss me.' The old man had no sooner 
 received the morsel, than he gave up the 
 ghost. — Was he not evidently reserved, 
 until he was absolved ; and was not his sin 
 remitted, and the man acknowledged by 
 Christ as a faithful servant on account of 
 many good works." Thus far Dionysius. 
 I remark here, 1st, That the connexion 
 between the sacrament and the grace con- 
 veyed by it, being usually thus expressed 
 as if it were necessary and indissoluble, 
 both in baptism and the Lord's Supper, 
 gave occasion to the increase of much su- 
 perstition in the Church. I am disposed 
 to believe, and certainly to hope, that 
 both Dionysius and Serapion knew that 
 the sign was nothing without the inward 
 grace. Yet perhaps they are not to be 
 acquitted of superstition on account of 
 the inordinate stress which they laid on 
 external things. — The reader must ob- 
 serve that this evil continues to grow 
 during the third century. 
 
 2d, — That, along with this superstition, 
 the power of the leaders of the Church, 
 would naturally increase beyond the due 
 l)ounds. That it it did so afterwards sur- 
 prisingly is well known ; — but I judge 
 the evil to have begun already both in 
 the East and in the West. 
 
 3d, — That there was at that time, 
 among persons of real piety, a general 
 propensity to extend discipline too far. 
 Serapion ought, doubtless, to have been 
 sooner received into the Church. The 
 Lord seems to have favoured him with 
 a token of his loving-kindness, by fulfill- 
 ing his desires of being re-admitted into 
 the Church before he left the world. — 
 But how much more decent and proper 
 would it have been for him to have been 
 received while in health. Satan always 
 pushes men to extremes. Church disci- 
 pline was held then too high ; with us it 
 is reduced to the lowest state. Without 
 communion with a visible Church estab- 
 lishment in form, however impracticable it 
 might be, it was scarcely thought possi- 
 ble for a man to be saved : Slany per- 
 sons, at that time, would have had no 
 hope of Serapion's salvation, if the pow- 
 er of his disease had prevented the recep- 
 tion of the Eucharist. The clouds of 
 miserable superstition increased, till by 
 the light of the Reformation they were 
 dispelled. On the contrary, in our age, 
 the Lord's Supper itself is treated with 
 levity by thousands who call themselves 
 Christians ; and communion with a set- 
 tled ministry and Church is esteemed as 
 a thing of trifling consequence by num- 
 bers who profess the doctrines of vital 
 godliness. 
 
 Dionysius wrote several other tracts, 
 which are mentioned by Eusebius : — 
 Among the rest he wrote to Cornelius, 
 bishop of Rome, in answer to his letter 
 against Novatian ;* and informed him — 
 that he had been invited by Helenus of 
 Tarsus in Cicilia, and by the rest of the 
 bishops of his neighbourhood, by Firmi- 
 lian of Cappadocia and Theoctistes of 
 Palestine, to meet them in a synod at 
 Antioch, where some attempts were made 
 to strengthen the Novatian party. — But 
 all these Churches united to condemn the 
 schism, and, with this view, Dionysius 
 wrote to the Roman confessors both be- 
 fore and after they had returned to the 
 Church. On the whole, the East and 
 
 * Eusebius certainly calls him Novatus by 
 mistake. 
 
Cbnt. hi.] 
 
 PERSECUTION OF DECroS, 
 
 191 
 
 West united in condemning- the new dis- 
 senters ; whose head having professed 
 that some brethren had compelled him 
 to the separation, Dionysius wrote to No- 
 vatian himself to this effect : " If you 
 were led unwillingly, as you say, you 
 will prove it by returning willingly ; for 
 a man ought to suffer any thing- rather 
 than to rend the Church of God. Even 
 martyrdom on this account would be no 
 less glorious than on any other ; — even 
 more so — For in common martyrdom a 
 man is a witness for one soul : — here for 
 the whole Church. And now, if you 
 would compel or persuade the brethren 
 to unanimity, your good conduct would 
 be more laudable than your defection was 
 culpable. The latter will be forgotten, 
 the former will be celebrated through the 
 Christian world. But if you find it im 
 practicable to draw over others, save your 
 own soul at least ; I wish you to be 
 strong in the Lord, and studious of peace." 
 Such was the zeal of the Christian lead- 
 ers at that time for the preservation of 
 UNITY. If there had been a defection 
 from Christian purity of doctrine in the 
 general Church, or if the Heads of it, for 
 the most part, had been vicious men in 
 principle or practice, one might have sus- 
 pected that the Lord had forsaken these, 
 and that his Spirit had rested chiefly with 
 the new separatists. But that godliness 
 in a considerable degree prevailed still in 
 the Church at large is very evident. Cypri- 
 an, Dionysius, Cornelius, Firrnilian, were 
 holy men : Martyrs, in abundance from 
 their flocks, suffered for Christ's sake : 
 A number of Church officers suffered in 
 a very edifying manner : — The lapsed 
 were restored among them by the most 
 Christian methods of mildness and just 
 discipline ; — and this with success in a 
 variety of cases. — Dionysius concurred 
 with Cyprian in his views on the subject ; 
 and, though the flame of Christian piety 
 was considerably lowered since the days 
 of Ignatius, I see not a shadow of proof 
 that there was any just reason for dissent 
 or any superior degree of spirituality with 
 the Novatians. — If, for example, there 
 had been many persons among them of 
 half the piety of Cyprian, I think it pro- 
 bable that history would not have been 
 silent respecting them. 
 
 It is my duty"to trace the work of the 
 Divine Spirit wherever I can find it. 
 Traces of this Spirit, with the Novatians 
 in general, in these times, I cannot dis- 
 cern; and yet, it is improbable, that they 
 
 should have been a people altogether for- 
 saken of God. Wherever the real truth, 
 as it is in Jesus, is professed, there some 
 measure of his Spirit most probably exists. 
 Novatian himself is constantly reprehend- 
 ed both by Cyprian and by Dionysius : 
 Yet, I observe, they cast no imputations 
 on his moral character : His schism alone 
 is the object of their reprehension : Cor- 
 nelius, indeed, carries the matter still 
 farther, as we have seen ; but I am not 
 disposed to credit all he says : His tem- 
 per was heated by personal competition. 
 
 Before we proceed to other instances 
 of the Decian persecution, it may be pro- 
 per to conclude the affair of Novatian : 
 Let us collect what evidence we can ; and 
 endeavour to form a just estimate of his 
 character : — If our observations appear 
 unsatisfactory ; — let it be imputed to the 
 scantiness of the materials. 
 
 Novatian was originally a Stoic ; and 
 seems to have contracted all the seve- 
 rity which marked that sect of philoso- 
 phers. He was born a Phrygian, and 
 came to Rome, where he em- 
 braced Christianity. He ap- 
 plied for the office of presby- 
 ter ; but, as he had neglected 
 
 Character 
 of Nova- 
 tian. 
 
 certain ecclesiastical forms after recovery 
 from a sickness, he was objected to by 
 the clergy and the people. The bishop, — 
 probably Fabian the predecessor of Cor- 
 nelius, — desired that the rules might be 
 dispensed with in his case. This was 
 granted ; and it is a testimony, surely, 
 rather in favour of his abilities and con- 
 duct than otherwise, particularly, as the 
 circumstance stands recorded by the pen 
 of his rival Cornelius.* That he excelled 
 in genius, learning, and eloquence, is 
 certain : and hence, it is not probable, 
 that he was a man of debauched or of 
 loose morals. The evils of his schism 
 were unquestionably great ; but no vice 
 seems affixed to his character ; nor does 
 any just suspicion lie against the purity 
 of his intentions. One| of the letters of 
 the Roman clergy to Cyprian, written by 
 Novatian himself, is still extant: It is 
 worthy of a Roman presbyter and of a 
 zealous Christian ; — and, at that time, 
 the writer coincided in opinion with the 
 African prelate. E usebius, in his Chroni- 
 con, ranks him among the confessors : 
 and it is certain, that while he continued 
 presbyter his fame was not only without 
 a blot, but very fair in the Church. 
 
 * See bis letter in Eusebius. f Pam. 31. 
 
192 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XL 
 
 Perhaps it had been happy for him if 
 --he had never consented to become a bi- 
 shop. The preference given to Corne- 
 lius in the election of a bishop, was, pro- 
 bably enough, the grand cause of the 
 schism : From being actuated by a tem- 
 perate degree of severity, he became in- 
 tolerably inexorable in his ideas of disci- 
 pline : It is not for man to say how far 
 temper, stoicism, prejudice, and principle 
 might all unite in this business: — We 
 must now behold him bishop of the No- 
 vatians, and industriously spreading the 
 schism through the Christian world. The 
 repeated condemnation of it in synods 
 hindered not its growth ; and as purity of 
 principle and inflexible severity of disci- 
 pline, were their favourite objects, it is 
 not to be apprehended that Novatian 
 could have supported himself in the opin- 
 ion of his followers without some degree 
 of exemplary conduct. He is allowed to 
 have preserved in soundness the Chris- 
 tian Faith : There is actually extant a 
 treatise by him on the Trinity ; — and 
 that, one of the most regular and most ac- 
 curate which is to be found among the 
 ancients. It is astonishing that any 
 man should ascribe the ideas of the Trini- 
 tarians mainly to the Nicene Fathers. 
 We have repeatedly seen proofs of the 
 doctrine being held distinctly in all its 
 parts from the Apostles' days. This trea- 
 tise by Novatian may be added to the 
 list: — I know not how to abridge it bet- 
 ter than by referring the ^reader to the 
 Athanasian creed. The Trinity in Unity, 
 and the Godhead and Manhood of Christ 
 in one person, are not more plainly to be 
 found in that creed, than in the composi- 
 tion of this contemporary of Cyprian. 
 
 I wish that a more experimental view, 
 — a more practical use — of Christian doc- 
 trines, were to be seen in it. But all pro- 
 fessors of Christianity, — Churchmen or 
 dissenters — seem, at that time, to have 
 much relaxed in this respect. The favour 
 and simplicity of the life of faith in Jesus 
 was not so well known: yet,— particu- 
 larly under the article of the Holy Ghost, 
 — he speaks very distinctly of " him as 
 the author of regeneration, the pledge of 
 the promised inheritance, and, as it were, 
 the hand-writing of eternal salvation, — 
 who makes us the temple of God and his 
 house, — who intercedes for us with 
 'groanings which cannot be uttered,' — 
 who acts as our advocate and defender, 
 — who dwells in our bodies, and sancti- 
 fies them for immortality. He it is, who 
 
 fights against the flesh, — hence the flesh 
 fights against the Spirit:" — and he pro- 
 ceeds to speak in the best manner of his 
 holy and blessed operations in the minds 
 of the faithful.* 
 
 He wrote also a sensible little tract 
 against the bondage of Jewish meats; 
 in which he explains the nature of Chris- 
 tian liberty, according to the views of St. 
 Paul, with just directions for the mainte- 
 nance of temperance nnd decorum. 
 
 The letter to Cyprian before mentioned 
 closes his works. He lived to the time 
 of Valerian, under whom Cyprian suffer- 
 ed. In that persecution also fell Nova- 
 tian by martyrdom, as appears from the 
 authentic testimony of Socrates. f His 
 rival Cornelius died a little time before 
 them, in exile for the faith. — It will be a 
 grateful refreshment to the reader to pause 
 for a moment; and to contemplate these 
 three men meeting in a better world, 
 clothed with the garments of Jesus, and 
 in him knownng their mutual relation, 
 which prejudice hindered in this mortal 
 scene of strife, infirmity, and imperfec- 
 tion. Neither the separation of Novatian, 
 nor the severity with which the two regu- 
 lar bishops condemned him, can be justi- 
 fied. — There seems, however, sufficient 
 evidence of the Christian character of the 
 separatist ; — The general tenor of his life ; 
 — and above all, his death, show to whom 
 he belonged.:): 
 
 The reader will pardon this digression ; 
 — if that be indeed a digression, — which 
 shows that the Spirit of God was not li- 
 mited to one denomination of Christians ; 
 and which paves the way for a liberal 
 and candid construction of characters. In 
 the future scenes of this history, while 
 we trace the kingdom of God through a 
 multiplicity of names and divisions of 
 men, it will highly behoove us to cultivate 
 an unprejudiced temper. 
 
 To proceed with the Decian persecu- 
 tion. — The management of this seems to 
 have been the whole employment of the 
 magistrates. Swords, wild beasts, pits, 
 red-hot chairs, wheels for stretching hu- 
 man bodies, and talons of iron to tear 
 them ; — these were at this time the instru- 
 ments of Pagan vengeance. Malice and 
 covetousness in informing against Chris- 
 tians were eagerly and powerfully set on 
 work during this whole short, but horri- 
 ble reign : And the genius of men was 
 
 * Nov. Trin. p. 114. t L- IV. C. 28. 
 
 I Greg. Nyss. vita Thaum. p. 1000.— See 
 Fleury, B. 6—25. 
 
Cext. III.] 
 
 PERSECUTION OF DECIUS. 
 
 193 
 
 never known to have had more of employ- 
 ment in aiding the savageness of the 
 heart. Life was prolonged in torture, in 
 order that impatience in suffering might 
 effect at length, what surprise and terror 
 could not. 
 
 Mark two examples of Satanic artifice. 
 A martyr having endured the rack and 
 burning plates, the judge ordered him lo 
 be rubbed all over with honey, and then 
 to be exposed in the sun, which was very 
 hot, lying on his back with his hands tied 
 behiad him, that lie might be stung by 
 insects. — Another person, young and iu 
 the flower of his age, was, by the order 
 of the same judge, carried iuto a pleasant 
 garden among iiowers, near a pleasing ri- 
 vulet surrounded with trees : here they 
 laid him on a feather bed, bound him with 
 silken cords, and left him alone. After- 
 ward, a very handsome lewd woman was 
 introduced to him; who began to em- 
 brace him and to court him with all ima- 
 ginable impudence. The martyr spit iu 
 her face ; and at length bit oil' his own 
 tongue; as the most effectual method in 
 his power of resisting the assaults of sen- 
 suality. In the most shocking and dis- 
 gusting trials, Christianity, however, ap- 
 peared what it is, — true holiness ; while 
 its persecutors showed that thej'^ were at 
 enmity with every virtuous principle of 
 internal benevolence, and of external de- 
 corum.* 
 
 Alexander, bishop of Comana, suffered 
 martyrdom by fire. At Smyrna, Eude- 
 mon the bishop apostatized, and several 
 unhappily followed his exam- 
 ple. But the glory of this 
 Church, once so celebrated by 
 the voice of infallibility,! was 
 not totally lost. The exam- 
 ple of Pionius, one of the 
 was salutary to all the 
 Churches. — The account of his martyr- 
 dom is, in substance, confirmed by Euse- 
 bius: — Nor, in general, is there any thing 
 in it improbable, or unworthy of the 
 Christian spirit.:j: — In expectation of be- 
 ing seized, he put a chain about his own 
 neck, and caused Sabina and Asclepiades 
 to do the same, — to show their readiness 
 to suffer. Polemon, keeper of the idol- 
 temple, came to them with the magis- 
 trates : "Don't you know," says he, 
 " that the emperor has ordered you to sa- 
 crifice'?" "We are not ignorant of the 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom of 
 Alexan- 
 der,bishop 
 of Coma- 
 na. 
 
 presbyters, 
 
 * Jerom vita Paul. 
 
 * Euseb. B. 4. C. 15.' 
 Vol. I. 
 
 t Rev. ii. 8, 9,&c. 
 -Fleury, B. 6—30. 
 R 
 
 commandments," says Pionius, " but 
 they are those commandments which di- 
 rect us to worship God." " Come to the 
 market-place," says Polemon, " and see 
 the truth of what I have said." " We 
 obey the true God," said Sabina and As- 
 clepiades. 
 
 When the martyrs were in the midst 
 of the mvillitude in the market-place, " It 
 would be wiser in you," says Polemon, 
 " to submit and avoid the torture." Pio- 
 nius began to speak ; " Citizens of Smyr- 
 na, who please yourselves with the beau- 
 ty of your walls and city, and value your- 
 selves on account of your poet Homer ; 
 and ye Jews, if there be any among you, 
 hear me speak a few words : We find that 
 Smyrna has been esteemed the finest city 
 in the world, and was reckoned the chief 
 of those which contended for the honour 
 of Homer's birth. I am informed that 
 you deride those who come of their own 
 accord to sacrifice, or who do not refuse 
 when urged to it. But surely your ad- 
 mired Homer should teach you never to 
 rejoice at the death of any man."* " And 
 ye Jews ought to obey Moses, who tells 
 you, ' Thou shalt not see thy brother's 
 ass or his ox fall down by the way, and 
 hide thyself from them : thou shalt surely 
 help him to lift them up again.'f And 
 Solomon says, ' Rejoice not when thine 
 enemy falleth.' — For my part I would ra- 
 ther die, or undergo any sufferings, than 
 contradict my conscience in religious con- 
 cerns. ij: Whence then proceed those 
 btirsts of laughter and cruel scofts of the 
 Jews, pointed not only against those who 
 have sacrificed, but against us 1 They 
 insult us with a malicious pleasure to 
 see our long peace interrupted. — Though 
 we were their enemies still we are men. 
 — But what harm have we done them ? 
 What have we made them to suffer ? 
 Whom have we spoken against 1 Whom 
 have we persecuted with unjust and un- 
 relenting hatred 1 Whom have we com- 
 pelled to worship idols ? Have they no 
 compassion for the unfortunate 1 Are they 
 themselves less culpable than the poor 
 wretches, who, through the fear of 'men 
 or of tortures, have been induced to re- 
 nounce their religion?" He then address- 
 ed the Jews on the grounds of their own 
 
 * Odyss. xxii. v. 412. f Deut. xxii. 4. 
 
 I Pionius adapts liimself to his audience, 
 and convicts them of guilt even by tlieir own 
 principles, a thing not hard to be done in all 
 cases, — except in those of trueChristians, who 
 never fail to show their faith by their works. 
 
194 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 Scriptures, and solemnly placed before 
 the Pagans the day of judgment. 
 
 The sermon bore some resemblance to 
 Stephen's* in like circumstairces : It 
 tended to beget conviction of sin, and to 
 lead men to feel their need of the Divine 
 Saviour, accord mg to the justest vievirs 
 and in the soundest taste of the Gospel. 
 He spake long, and was very attentively 
 heard ; and there is reason to hope that 
 his exertions were not in vain. The peo- 
 ple who surrounded him said with Pole- 
 mon, " Believe us, Pionius, your probity 
 and wisdom make us deem you worthy to 
 live ; — and life is pleasant." — Thus pow- 
 erfully did conscience and humanity ope- 
 rate in their hearts. " I own," says the 
 martyr, " life is pleasant, but I mean that 
 eternal life which I aspire after : I do not 
 
 are so learned seek death in this resolute 
 manner ?" 
 
 When carried to prison, they found 
 there a presbyter named Lemnus, — a 
 woman named Macedonia, — and another 
 called Eutychiana, a Montanist. 
 
 These all employed themselves in 
 praising God, and showed every mark of 
 patience and cheerfulness. Many Pagans 
 visited Pionius, and attempted to persuade 
 him to renounce his religion : — His an- 
 swers struck them with admiration. Some 
 persons, who, by compulsion, had sacri- 
 ficed, visited them and shed many tears. 
 " I now suffer afresh," says Pionius ; 
 " and methinks I am torn in pieces when 
 I see the pearls of the Church trod under 
 foot by swine, and the stars of heaven 
 cast to the earth by the tail of the dragon.* 
 
 with a contemptuous spirit reject the good — But our sins have been the cause 
 
 things of this life ; but I prefer something 
 which is infinitely better: — I thank you 
 for your expressions of kindness : I can- 
 not, however, but suspect some stratagem 
 in it." 
 
 The people continued intreating him : 
 and he still discoursed to them of a future 
 state. — ^The well-known sincerity and un- 
 questionable virtues of the man seem to 
 have filled the Smyrneans with venera- 
 tion, and his enemies began to fear an up- 
 roar in his favour. " It is impossible to 
 persuade you then," said Polemon. " I 
 would to God I could," said Pionius, 
 "persuade you to be a Christian !" 
 
 Sabina, by the advice of Pionius, who 
 was her brother, had changed her name, 
 for fear of falling into the hands of her 
 pagan mistress, who, in order to compel 
 her to renounce Christianity, had for- 
 merly put her in irons, and banished her 
 to the mountains, where the brethren se- 
 cretly supported her with nourishment 
 She now called herself Theodota. " What 
 God dost thou adore]" says Polemon 
 " God Almighty," she answered, "who 
 made all things ; — of which we are assur- 
 ed by his Word Jesus Christ." "And 
 what dost THOU adore ]" speaking to As- 
 clepiades. " Jesus Christ," says he. 
 " What, is there another God ?" says Po- 
 lemon. " No," says he, " this is the 
 same whom we come here to confess." — 
 He, who worships the Trinity in Unity, 
 will find no difl^iculty in reconciling these 
 two confessions. Let him, who does not 
 so worship, attempt it. One person pity- 
 ing Pionius, said, " Why do you that 
 
 * Acts of the Apostles, Chap. vii. 
 
 The Jews, whose character of bigotry 
 had not been lessened by all their mise- 
 ries, and whose hatred to Christ conti- 
 nued from age to age with astonishing 
 uniformity, invited some of the lapsed 
 Christians to their synagogue. The gene- 
 rous spirit of Pionius was moved to ex- 
 press itself vehemently against the Jews. 
 Among other things he said, " They pre- 
 tend that Jesus Christ died like other 
 men by constraint. Was that man a 
 common felon, whose disciples have cast 
 out devils for so many years'? Could that 
 man be forced to die, for whose sake his 
 disciples, and so many others, have volun- 
 tarily suffered the severest punishment'?" 
 — Having spoken a long time to them, he 
 requested thera to depart out of the prison. 
 
 Though the miraculous dispensations 
 tendant on Christianity form no part of the 
 plan of this History, I cannot but observe 
 on this occasion, how strongly their conti- 
 nuance in the third century is here attested. 
 Pionius affirms that devils were ejected 
 by Christians in the name of Christ ; and 
 he does this in the face of enemies, who 
 would have been glad of the shadow of 
 an argument to justify their bitterness, 
 resentment, and perfidy. 
 
 The captain of the horse came to the 
 prison, and ordered Pionius to go to the 
 idol-temple. "Your bishop Eudemon 
 hath already sacrificed," said he. The 
 martyr, knowing that nothing of this sort 
 could be done legally till the arrival of 
 the proconsul, refused. The captain put 
 a cord about his neck, and dragged him 
 along with Sabina and others. They cried, 
 
 * Rev. xii. 4. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 FERSECUTION OF DECIUS. 
 
 193 
 
 " We are Christians," and fell to the 
 ground, that they might not enter the 
 idol-temple. Pionius, after much resist- 
 ance, was forced into it and placed on the 
 ground before the altar; and there stood 
 the unhappy Eudemon, after having sac- 
 rificed. 
 
 Lepidus, a judge, asked; "What God 
 do you adore]" " Him," says Pionius, 
 " that made heaven and earth." " You 
 mean him that was crucified"?" "I mean 
 him whom God the Father sent for the 
 salvation of men." The judges then 
 whispered to one another, and said, — 
 " We must compel them to say what we 
 wish." — Pionius heard them, and cried, 
 " Blush, ye adorers of false gods : have 
 some respect to justice, and obey your 
 own laws: they enjoin you not to do vio- 
 lence to us; but merely to put us to 
 death." 
 
 Then Ruflanus said, " Forbear, Pionius, 
 this thirst after vain-glory." "Is this 
 your eloquence ]" answered the martyr : 
 " Is this what you have read in your 
 books ] Was not Socrates thus treated 
 by the Athenians'? According to your 
 judgment and advice he sought after 
 vain-glory, because he applied himself 
 to wisdom and virtue." — Ruffinus was 
 struck dumb. — The case was apposite in 
 a degree : Socrates, undoubtedly, suffer- 
 ed persecution on account of his zeal for 
 moral virtue. 
 
 A certain person placed a crown on 
 Pionius's head, which he tore in pieces 
 before the altar: The Pagans finding 
 their persuasions ineffectual, remanded 
 them to prison. 
 
 A few days after this, the proconsul 
 Quintilian returned to Smyrna, and ex- 
 amined Pionius. He, then, tried both 
 tortures and persuasions in vain ; and at 
 length, enraged at his obstinacy, he sen- 
 tenced him to be burnt alive. 
 Martyr- rpj^g martyr went cheerfully to 
 Pionius. *'^^ place oi execution, and 
 thanked God, who had pre- 
 served his body pure from idolatry. After 
 he was stretched and nailed to the wood, 
 the executioner said to him, "Change 
 your mind, and the nails shall be taken 
 out." "I have felt them," answered 
 Pionius: He then remained thoughtful 
 for a time; afterward he said, " I hasten, 
 O Lord, that I may the sooner be a par- 
 taker of the resurrection." Metrodorus, 
 a Marcionite, was nailed to a plank of 
 wood in a similar manner: They were 
 then both placed upright; and a great 
 
 quantity of fuel was heaped around them. 
 — Pionius, with his eyes shut, remained 
 motionless, absorbed in prayer while the 
 fire was consuming him. At length he 
 opened his eyes, and looking cheerfully on 
 the fire, said, "Amen;" — his last words 
 were, " Lord, receive my soul." — Of the 
 particular manner in which his compa- 
 nions suffered death we have no account. 
 
 In this narrative we see the spirit of 
 heavenly love triumphing over all world- 
 ly and selfish considerations. Does not 
 the zeal of Pionius deserve to be com- 
 memorated as long as the world endures 1 
 The man appears to have forgotten his 
 sufferings : He is. wholly taken up in vin- 
 dicating the divine truth to the last. — 
 Who can doubt of his having been a faith- 
 ful preacher of the Gospel ] He is intent 
 on the blessed work amidst his bitterest 
 pains. — Glorious exemplification of true 
 religion in its simplicity ! 
 
 If there be any thing particular in the 
 treatment he underwent, it consists in the 
 repeated endeavours which were made 
 to preserve his life. — The man was much 
 respected, though the Christian was ab- 
 horred. Integrity and uprightness, when 
 eminent, and supported by wisdom and 
 learning, fail not to overawe, to captivate, 
 and to soften mankind. The voice of 
 natural conscience pleads ; but cannot 
 overcome the enmity of the human heart 
 against God. 
 
 There are many good reasons which 
 may be assigned why sound learning 
 ought to be cultivated by Christians, and 
 especially by all who mean to be pastors 
 of Christ's flock. The case of Pionius 
 clearly intimates this. Knowledge never 
 fails to ensure respect. It does this a 
 thousand times more effectually with 
 mankind than birth or wealth, or rank, 
 or power. — It is evident that Pionius was 
 a man of learning, and that his persecu- 
 tors esteemed him on that account, and 
 took pains to detach him from Christian- 
 ity. — We may conceive how useful this 
 accomplishment had been in the course 
 of his ministry. 
 
 A Montanist and a Marcionite are the 
 fellow-sufferers of this martyr : The lat- 
 ter is consumed with him in the flames. 
 Doubtless, from all the information of 
 
 antiquity, both these heresies appear in 
 an odious light. But there might be ex- 
 ceptions, and who so likely to be among 
 those exceptions, as those " " 
 
 ed 1 We 
 
 godliness 
 
 who suffer- 
 must not confine the truth of 
 to any particular denomina- 
 
196 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 tion. Providence, by mixing persons of 
 very opposite parties in the same scene 
 of persecution, demonstrates that the pure 
 faith and love of Jesus may operate in 
 those who cannot own each other as 
 brethren: I know not whetlier Pionius 
 and Metrodorus did so on earth : I trust 
 they do so in heaven. 
 
 In Asia a merchant named Maximus, 
 was brought before Optimus the procon- 
 sul, who inquired after his condition] "I 
 was born free," said he, "but I am the 
 servant of Jesus Christ." "Of what pro- 
 fession are you ]" " I live by commerce." 
 " Are you a Christian 1" " Though a sin- 
 ner, yet I am a Christian." While the 
 usual process of persuasions and of tor- 
 tures was going forward ; — he exclaimed, 
 — "These are not torments which we 
 suffer for the name of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ: They are wholesome unctions." 
 — Such was the effect of the Holy Ghost 
 shedding the love of God in Christ 
 abroad in the human heart ! — He was or- 
 dered to be stoned to death.* 
 
 All this time the persecution raged in 
 Egypt with unremitting fury. In the 
 lower Thebias there was a young man 
 named Paul, to whom, at fifteen years of 
 age, his parents left a great estate. He 
 was a person of much learning, of a mild 
 temper, and full of the love of God. He 
 had a married sister, with whom he lived. 
 Her husband was base enoutjh to design 
 an information against him, in order to 
 obtain his estate. Paul, having notice 
 of this, retired to the desert mountains, 
 where he waited till the persecution ceased. 
 Habit, at length, made soli- 
 Paul the ^^(jg agreeable to him. He 
 
 xirst rift*" 
 
 jjjjf found a pleasant retreat, and 
 
 lived there during fourscore 
 and ten years. At the time of his retire- 
 ment he was twenty-three, and he died 
 at the age of a hundred and 
 thirteen.| This is the first 
 distinct account of a hermit 
 in the Christian Church. — No doubt 
 ought to be made of the genuine piety of 
 Paul. — Those, who, in our days, con- 
 demn ALL Monks with indiscriminating 
 contempt, seem to make no allowance for 
 the prodigious change of times and cir- 
 cumstances. Reflect seriously on the 
 sort of society to which Christians were 
 exposed in the reign of Decius : Was 
 there a day, — an hour, in which they 
 could enjoy its comforts, or secure its 
 
 Lived to 
 be 113. 
 
 ' Fleury, B. 6—40. 
 
 t Ibid. B. 6—48. 
 
 benefits'? Where could Christian eyes or 
 ears direct their attention, — and not meet 
 with objects exceedingly disgusting? If 
 Paul preferred solitude in such a season, 
 we need not be more surprised than we 
 are at the conduct of Elijah the prophet. 
 — But, why did he not, with the return 
 of peace, return also to the discharge of 
 social duties'? — The habit was contract- 
 ed ; and the love of extremes is the in- 
 firmity of human nature. — Besides, a 
 heart breathing the purest love to God 
 might naturally enough be led to think 
 the perfection of godliness best attaina- 
 ble in solitude. — The increasing spirit of 
 superstition soon produced a number of 
 imitations of Paul : and the most lament- 
 able effect was that those, who possessed 
 only external religion, placed their right- 
 eousness and their confidence in monastic 
 austerities ; — and thus, from the depraved 
 imitations of well-meant beginnings, one 
 of the strongest supports of false religion 
 gradually strengthened itself in the Chris- 
 tian world. 
 
 Here we close the account of the De- 
 cian persecution. Its author is admired 
 by Pagan writers. Wliat has been said 
 of Trajan and Antoninus is applicable to 
 him. He was a moralist ; and he w^as a 
 cruel persecutor. — It cannot be denied, 
 that for thirty months the Prince of Dark- 
 ness had full opportunity to gratify his 
 malice and his fury. But the Lord meant 
 to chasten and to purify his Church, — not 
 to destroy it. The whole scene is me- 
 morable on several accounts. — It was not 
 a local or intermitting, but a universal 
 and constant persecution : and, therefore, 
 it must have transmitted great numbers 
 to the regions where sin and pain shall 
 be no more. — The peace of thirty years 
 had corrupted the whole Christian atmo- 
 sphere : The lightning of the Decian rage 
 refined and cleared it. No doubt, the ef- 
 fects were salutary to the Church. Ex- 
 ternal Christianity might indeed have 
 still spread, if no such scourge had been 
 used ; but the internal spirit of the Gos- 
 pel, would, probably, have been extin- 
 guished. The survivors had an opportu- 
 nity of learning, in the faithfulness of the 
 martyrs what that spirit is ; and men 
 were again taught, that he alone, who 
 strengthens Christians in their sufferings, 
 can effectuatly convert the heart to true 
 Christianity. — The storm, however, prov- 
 ed fatal to many individuals who aposta- 
 tized ; and Christianity was, in that way, 
 cleared of many false friends. We have 
 
Cbwt. III.] 
 
 UNDER GALLUS. 
 
 197 
 
 also noticed two collateral evils. — Both 
 the formation of schisms and of super- 
 stitious solitudes had their date from the 
 Decian persecution. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE CHURCH DURING 
 THE REIGN OF GALLUS. 
 
 The successor of Decius allowed the 
 Church of Christ a little tranquillity. 
 During that space the two small treatises 
 of Cyprian concerning' the 
 Gallus Lapsed and concerningp Unity, 
 
 succeeds j i,..i c 
 
 Decius were, doubtless, oi some ser- 
 
 about "^ice in recovering the lapsed 
 
 A D 251 ^'^ ^ state of penitence, and in 
 disposing the minds of men 
 to preserve the unity of the Church. In 
 the former of these treatises, indeed, it 
 must be confessed he carries his censure 
 of the Novatians too far. The sin and 
 the danger of rending the body of Christ 
 might have been stated in the strongest 
 terms, without pronouncing the evil to 
 be absolutely damnable : This was car- 
 rying the matter beyond all bounds of 
 moderation. But the same candour which 
 should incline one to apprehend that No- 
 vatian was influenced by good intentions, 
 in his too rigid scheme, pleads also for 
 the motives of Cyprian's zeal in the 
 maintenance of unity. — He seems to have 
 considered the mischief as most exceed- 
 ingly destructive ; and he can find no 
 terms sufficiently strong to express his 
 detestation of it. 
 
 But Gallus soon began to disturb the 
 peace of the Christians, though not with 
 the incessant fury of his predecessor. — 
 A Roman presbyter, named 
 Gallus Hyppolitus, had been seduced 
 
 the 7th " '"^^ Novatianism; but his 
 Persecu- mind had not been perverted 
 tion. from the faith and love of Je- 
 
 sus. He was now called on 
 to suffer martyrdom, which he did with 
 courage and fidelity. Either curiosity or 
 a desire of instructive information induced 
 some persons to ask him in the last scene 
 of his sufferings, whether he still persist- 
 ed in the communion of Novatian? He 
 declared in the most explicit terms, that 
 he now saw the affair in a new light, — 
 that he repented of having encouraged the 
 schism, — and that he died in the commu- 
 nion of the general Church. — Such a tes- 
 r2 
 
 Banish- 
 ment of 
 Cornelius. 
 
 timony must have weakened the influence 
 of the schism.* 
 
 In this persecution of Gallus it was 
 that Cornelius confessed the faith of 
 Christ, and was banished, by the empe- 
 ror, to Civita Vecchia ; which 
 gave occasion to a congratu- 
 latory letter from Cyprian. In 
 one part of it he reflects on the 
 Novatians with his usual vehemence : — 
 The rest breathes a fervent spirit of piety 
 and charity, and throws a strong light on 
 two historical facts ; — namely, — that the 
 persecution of Gallus was severe ; — and, 
 that the Roman Christians bore it with 
 becoming and exemplary fortitude. 
 
 " We have been made acquainted, dear- 
 est brother, with the glorious testimonies 
 of your faith and virtue ; and we have re- 
 ceived the honour of your confession with 
 such exultation, that, in the praises of 
 your excellent conduct, we reckon our- 
 selves partners and companions. For, as 
 we have but one Church, united hearts, 
 and indivisible concord, what pastor re- 
 joices not in the honours of his fellow- 
 pastors as his own ] Or what brother- 
 hood does not every where exult in the 
 joy of brothers ] We cannot express how 
 great was our joy and gladness when we 
 heard of your prosperous fortitude; — that 
 at Rome you were the leader of the con- 
 fession, and, moreover, that the confession 
 of the leader strengthened, in the breth- 
 ren, their disposition to confess ; — that 
 while you led the way to glory, you in- 
 cited many to be companions of your 
 glory ; so that we are at a loss which 
 most to celebrate, — your active and steady 
 faith, or the inseparable love of the breth- 
 ren. The virtue of the bishop in leading 
 the way was publicly admired ; while the 
 union of the brethren in following him 
 was proved beyond contradiction: There 
 was but one mind and one voice among 
 you all. The Apostle foresaw, in spirit, 
 this faith and firmness of the whole Ro- 
 man Church, which have shown so illus- 
 triously ; and, in praising the primitive 
 fathers, he stirs up their future sons to 
 an imitation of their courage and patience. 
 Your unanimity and perseverance are 
 great, and an instructive example to the 
 brethren. Ye have taught largely the 
 important lesson of fearing God, of firm- 
 ly adhering to Christ, of uniting pastors 
 with the people, brethren with brethren in 
 one common danger ; ye have proved, — 
 
 *Fleury,B.7. X. 
 
198 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 that a concord thus formed is invincible ; 
 — that the God of peace hears and an- 
 swers the joint prayers of the peace- 
 makers. — With terrible violence the ad- 
 versary rushed to attack the soldiers of 
 Christ; but was bravely repulsed. 
 
 " He had hoped to supplant the servants 
 of God, by finding them, like raw soldiers, 
 unprepared : He had hoped to circumvent 
 a few individuals ; but he found them 
 united for resistance; and he learnt, — 
 that the soldiers of Jesus remain on the 
 •watch sober and armed for the battle ; 
 that they cannot be conquered ; — that 
 they may die ; but that they are invinci- 
 ble because they fear not death ; — that 
 they resist not aggressors, since it is not 
 lawful for them, though innocent, to kill 
 the guilty :* and lastly — that they readily 
 give up their life and shed their blood, in 
 order that they may the more quickly de- 
 part from an evil world in which wicked- 
 ness and cruelty rage with so much fierce- 
 ness. What a glorious spectacle under 
 the immediate eyes of God ! What a joy 
 in the sight of Christ and of his Church, 
 that — not a single soldier, but the whole 
 army together, endured the warfare I 
 Every individual, who heard of this pro- 
 ceeding, has joined in it: How many 
 lapsed are restored by this glorious con- 
 fession ! For now they have stood firm ; 
 and, by the very grief of their penitence, 
 are made more magnanimous : Their 
 former fall may now be justly considered 
 as the effect of sudden tremor ; but they 
 have returned to their true character : they 
 have collected real faith and strength from 
 the fear of God, and have panted for mar- 
 tyrdom. 
 
 " As much as possible we earnestly 
 exhort our people not to cease to be pre- 
 pared for the approaching contest, by 
 watching, fasting, and prayers. These 
 are our celestial arms ; these are our for- 
 tresses and weapons. Let us remember 
 one another in our supplications : Let us 
 be unanimous and united ; and let us re- 
 lieve our pressures and distresses by mu- 
 tual charity : And whosoever of us shall 
 first be called hence, let our mutual love 
 in Christ continue ; and let us never cease 
 to pray to our merciful Father for all our 
 brethren and our sisters." 
 
 Thus ardent was the spirit of Cyprian 
 in the expectation of martyrdom ! And 
 
 * A plain proof of ihe passiveness of Chris- 
 tians, still continued from the Apostolic age, 
 under the most unjust treatment. 
 
 SO little account did he make of temporal 
 things ! And, in this natural and easy 
 manner, did he esteem the dreadful scenes 
 of persecution as matter of joy. 
 
 He himself was preserved, for the use 
 of the Church, beyond the life of Gallus, 
 as well as of Decius. — Cornelius died in 
 exile: His faithfulness in suifering for 
 Christ evinces all along whose servant 
 he was ; — otherwise, history affords little 
 evidence respecting his character. — The 
 little specimen which we have of his 
 writings, will induce no one to think high- 
 ly of his genius or capacity. 
 
 It is no wonder that Cyprian, who had 
 seen and known such dreadful devasta- 
 tions under Decius, finding, after a very 
 short interval, the persecution renewed 
 by Gallus, should be tempted to imagine 
 the approach of Antichrist, — the end of 
 the world, — and the day of judgment to be 
 at hand. Sagacious and holy men are 
 never more apt to be deceived than when 
 they attempt to look into futurity. God 
 hath made the present so much the ex- 
 clusive object of our duty, that he will 
 scarcely suffer even his best and wisest 
 servants to gain reputation for skill and 
 foresight by any conjectures concerning 
 the times and the seasons, which he hath 
 reserved in his own power. The perse- 
 cution of Gallus proved, however, a light 
 one compared with that of Decius. Un- 
 der very formidable apprehensions of it, 
 Cyprian wrote an animating letter to the 
 people of Thibaris.* The mistaken idea 
 I have mentioned, probably, added spirit 
 to the epistle; nevertheless the reasoning 
 is solid; and his arguments, and the 
 scriptures which he quotes, deserve at- 
 tention in all ages. — A few extracts may 
 gratify the reader. 
 
 " I had intended, most dear brethren, 
 and wished, — if circumstances had per- 
 miited, agreeably to the desire you have 
 frequently expressed, — myself to have 
 come among you; and, to the best of my 
 poor endeavours, to have strengthened 
 the brotherhood with exhortations. But 
 ursfent affairs detain me at Carthage ; I 
 cannot make excursions into a country 
 so distant as yours ; nor be long absent 
 from my people. Let these letters, then, 
 speak for me. 
 
 "You ought to be well assured, that 
 the day of affliction is at hand; and, that 
 the end of the world, and time of Anti- 
 christ, is near : W^e should all stand pre- 
 
 * Epis. 56. 
 
Cext. III.] 
 
 UNDER GALLUS. 
 
 199 
 
 pared for the battle, and think only of 
 the glory of eternal life and of the crown 
 of Christian confession. Nor ought we 
 to flatter ourselves that the imminent per- 
 secution will resemble the last : — a hea- 
 vier and more ferocious conflict hangs 
 over us, for which the soldiers of Christ 
 ought to prepare themselves with sound 
 faith and vigorous fortitude ; and consider 
 that they daily drink the cup of the blood 
 of Christ,* for this reason, — that they 
 themselves may be able to shed their 
 blood for HIM. — To follow what Christ 
 hath taught and done is to be willing to 
 be found with Christ. As John the 
 the Apostle says ; ' He that saith he 
 abideth in Christ, ought himself also to 
 walk even as he walked.' Thus also 
 the blessed Apostle Paul exhorts and 
 teaches, saying, ' We are the sons of God, 
 and if sons, then heirs of God and joint 
 heirs with Christ, if we suffer with him, 
 that we may also be glorified together.' 
 Let no man desire any thing now which 
 belongs to a perishing world ; but let him 
 follow Christ, who lives for ever, and 
 who makes his servants to live, if indeed 
 they be settled in the faith of his name. 
 For the time is come, most dear brethren, 
 which our Lord long ago foretold, saying, 
 'The hour is coming, when whosoever 
 killeth you will think he doeth God ser- 
 vice.' " In his usual manner he quotes 
 those Scriptures which relate to persecu- 
 tion : and, doubtless, the force and beauty 
 of them would then be felt and admired, 
 more than they are by us, who, it is to be 
 feared, are apt to speculate upon them at 
 our ease with too much indifference. 
 
 Observe how justly he arms their minds 
 against the discouragement which the 
 circumstances of approaching persecu- 
 tion are apt to induce. "Let no one, 
 when he sees our people scattered through 
 fear of persecution, be disturbed, because 
 he sees not the brethren collected, nor 
 the bishops employed among them. We, 
 whose principles allow us to suflfer death, 
 but not to inflict it, cannot possibly, in 
 such a season, be all in one place. — 
 Wherever, therefore, in those days, by 
 the necessity of the time, any one shall 
 be separated, in body, not in spirit, from 
 the rest of the flock, — let not such a one 
 be moved at the horror of the flight, nor 
 be terrified by the solitude of the desert, 
 
 * The daily reception of the Lord's Supper 
 appears to have been the practice of the Afri- 
 caa Church at that time. 
 
 while he retreats and lies hid. No man 
 is alone, who hath Christ for his compan- 
 ion : No man is without God, who, in his 
 own soul, preserves the temple of God 
 undefiled. The Christian may indeed be 
 assailed by robbers or by wild beasts 
 among the mountains and deserts ; he 
 may be afflicted by famine, by cold, and 
 by thirst, he may lose his life in a tem- 
 pest at sea, — but the Saviour himself 
 watches his faithful soldier fighting in all 
 these various ways ; and is ready to be- 
 stow the reward which he has promised 
 to give in the resurrection." 
 
 He then produces precedents of Scrip- 
 ture-saints, who suflTered for God in the 
 most ancient times, and adds, " How 
 shameful must it be for a Christian to be 
 unwilling to suffer, when the Master suffer- 
 ed first ; to be unwilling to suffer for our 
 own sins, when he, who had no personal 
 sin, suffered for us.* The Son of God 
 suffered, that he might make us the sons of 
 God : — and, shall not the sons of men be 
 willing to suffer, that they may continue 
 to be esteemed the children of God? 
 
 "Antichrist is come, but Christ is also 
 at hand. — The enemy rages and is fierce, 
 but the Lord is our defender: and he will 
 avenge our sufferings and our wounds." 
 — He again makes apposite Scripture quo- 
 tations. — That from the Apocalypse is 
 remarkable, "If any man worship the 
 beast and his image," &c. Rev. xiv. 9. 
 
 " O what a glorious day," continues 
 Cyprian, "will come, when the Lord 
 shall begin to recount his people, and to 
 adjudge their rewards; — to send the guil- 
 ty into hell ; — to condemn our persecutors 
 to the perpetual fire of penal flame ; — and 
 to bestow on us the reward of faith and 
 of devotedness to him. What glory! 
 what joy! to be admitted to see God; — 
 to be honoured; to partake of the joy of 
 eternal light and salvation with Christ 
 the Lord your God; to salute Abraham, 
 Isaac, and Jacob, and all the Patriarchs, 
 and Prophets, Apostles, and Martyrs; to 
 joy with the righteous, the friends of 
 God, in the pleasures of immortality ! — 
 When that revelation shall come, when 
 the beauty of God shall shine upon us, 
 we shall be as happy as the deserters and 
 
 * I have translated this literall)'. The dif- 
 ference between suflering for our own sins, 
 and suffering for us, is striking; the first is 
 corrective, the second is by imijutation. Cy- 
 prian believed the atonement of Christ, and 
 therefore varied his phraseology, to prevent 
 mistakes. 
 
200 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 rebellious will be miserable in inextin- 
 guishable fire." 
 
 Such are the views of the next life 
 which this good bishop sets before Chris- 
 tians. The palm of heavenly-mindedness 
 belonged to these persecuted saints : and 
 I wish, with all our theological improve- 
 ments, we may attain to a measure of 
 this zeal amidst the various good things 
 of this life, which as Christians, we at 
 present enjoy. 
 
 Lucius was chosen bishop of Rome in 
 the place of Cornelius; but was imme- 
 diately driven into exile by the authority 
 of Gallus. Cyprian congratu- 
 Lucius lated him both on his promo- 
 
 Bishop of *^°" ^^^ °" ^'^ sufferings. 
 Rome His exile must have been of 
 
 A D 252 short duration. He was per- 
 mitted to return to Rome in 
 the year two hundred and fifty-two ; and 
 a second congratulatory letter was writ- 
 ten to him by Cyprian.* He suffered 
 death soon after; and was succeeded by 
 Stephen. — ^The episcopal seat at Rome 
 was then, it should seem, the next door 
 to martyrdom. 
 
 It was not owing to any diminution of 
 his usual zeal and activity, that the Afri- 
 can prelate was still preserved alive, 
 while three of his contemporaries at Rome, 
 Fabian, Cornelius, and Lucian, died a 
 violent death or in exile. About this 
 time he dared to write . an epistle to a 
 noted persecutor of those times, named 
 Demetrianus : and, with great freedom 
 and dignity, he exposed the unreasona- 
 bleness of the Pagans in charging the 
 miseries of the times upon the Christians. 
 There will be no necessity to give any 
 detail of his reasonings on the subject: — 
 Paganism has at this day no defenders. 
 — The latter part of the epistle, which 
 is exhortatory and doctrinal, shall be af- 
 terwards considered, when we come to 
 make an estimate of Cyprian's theological 
 works. 
 
 The short reign of Gallus was distin- 
 guished by so large an assemblage of hu- 
 man miseries, as to give a plausible 
 colour to Cyprian's mistake of the near 
 P ,-\ approach of the end of the 
 
 in^Afi^icr world. A dreadful pestilence 
 A D '^5"' t)roke out in Africa, which 
 ■ "'''" daily carried off numberless 
 persons ; and frequently swept away 
 whole houses. The Pagans were alarm- 
 ed beyond measure : Through fear, they 
 
 * Epis. 58. 
 
 neglected the burial of the dead, and vio- 
 lated the duties of humanity. The bodies 
 of many lay in the streets of Carthage, 
 and in vain seemed to ask the pity of 
 passengers.* — It was on this occasion, — 
 that the Lord stirred up the spirit of 
 Christians to show the practical superior- 
 ity of their religion; and, that Cyprian, 
 in particular, exhibited one of the most 
 brilliant proofs of his real character. He 
 gathered together his people, and expa- 
 tiated on the subject of mercy. He point- 
 ed out to them, — that if they did no more 
 than others, — no more than the heathen 
 and the publican did in showing mercy 
 to their own, there would be nothing so 
 Very admirable in their conduct; — that 
 Christians ought to overcome evil with 
 good, and, like their heavenly Father, to 
 love their enemies, since he makes his 
 sun to rise on the evil and the good, and 
 sends rain on the just and the unjust. 
 Why does not he, who professes himself 
 a son of God, imitate the example of his 
 Father "? We ought to answer to our birth, 
 and those, who appear to be born again 
 of God should not degenerate, but should 
 be solicitous to evidence the genuineness 
 of their relation to God by the imitation of 
 his goodness. Much more than this, Pon- 
 tius tells us, was said by him. But Pontius 
 is always very scanty in his informations. 
 
 The eloquent voice of Cyprian, on this 
 occasion, as on others, roused the alac- 
 rity of his people. The Christians ranked 
 themselves into classes for the purpose of 
 relieving the public distress. The rich 
 contributed largely : The poor gave what 
 they could ; namely, their labour, with 
 extreme hazard of their lives : — The Pa- 
 gans saw with astonishment the effects of 
 the love of God in Christ; and had a salu- 
 tary opportunity of contrasting these ef- 
 fects with their own selfishness and inhu- 
 manity. 
 
 The dreadful calamity of the Plague 
 gave to Cyprian an opportunity of im- 
 pressing on the minds of his people, what, 
 in truth, had been the ruling object of his 
 own life since his conversion, namely — 
 a warm and active regard for the bless- 
 ings of immortality, joined with a holy 
 indifference for things below. He pub- 
 lished on this occasion his short treatise 
 on Mortality. He, who wrote it, must 
 have felt what all have need to feel, — 
 how little a thing life is, — how valuable 
 the prospect of heavenly bliss! The 
 
 • Vit. Pont. 
 
Cewt. III.] 
 
 UNDER GALLUS. 
 
 201 
 
 whole of this little tract is very precious ; 
 but the reader must be content with a few 
 extracts. 
 
 "The kingdom of God, my dearest 
 brethren, shows itself to be just at hand. 
 The reward of life, the joy of eternal 
 salvation, perpetual gladness, and para- 
 dise lost, — all these things come into our 
 possession now that the world passes 
 away : Heavenly and eternal glories suc- 
 ceed earthly, fading trifles. What room 
 is there for anxiety, solicitude, or sadness, 
 unless faith and hope are wanting ] If, 
 indeed, a man be unwilling to go to 
 Christ, or does not believe that he is go- 
 ing to reign with him, such a one has 
 good reason to fear death: For, ' the just 
 live by faith.' — Are ye then just; Do 
 ye live by faith ; Do ye really believe in 
 the promise of God ] — If so, — why do ye 
 not feel secure of the faithfulness of 
 Christ; why do ye not embrace his call, 
 and bless yourselves that ye shall soon 
 be with him, and be no more exposed to 
 Satan!" 
 
 He than makes an apposite use of the 
 ease of good old Simeon, and adds, 
 
 "Our stable peace, our sound tran- 
 quillity, our perpetual security is in the 
 world to come : — In this world we wage 
 a daily war with our spiritual enemies ; 
 ■we have no rest : If one sin be subdued, 
 another is up in arms : — We are continu- 
 ally exposed to temptations; but the di- 
 vine laws forbid us to yield to them. — 
 Surely, amidst such constant pressures, 
 we ought to be joyful in the prospect of 
 hastening to Christ by a speedy depar- 
 ture. How does our Lord himself instruct 
 us on this very head ] Ye shall weep and 
 lament, but the world shall rejoice; and 
 ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow 
 shall be turned into joy. — Who does not 
 wish to be free from sorrow ] Who would 
 not run to take possession of joy T Since 
 then to see Christ is joy, and since our 
 joy cannot be full till we do see him, — 
 what blindness, what infatuation is it, to 
 love the penal pressures and tears of the 
 world, and not to be desirous of quickly 
 partaking of that joy which shall never 
 pass away ! 
 
 " The cause of this, dear brethren, is 
 UNBELIEF : We none of us believe really 
 and solidly those things to be true which 
 the God of truth promises, — whose word 
 is eternally firm to those that put their 
 trust in him. If a man of a grave and 
 respectable character promises you any 
 thing, you do not doubt his performance, 
 
 because you know him to be faithful. 
 Now God himself speaks with you ; and 
 dare you waver in uncertainty 1 He pro- 
 mises you immortality when ye shall 
 depart out of this world ; and will ye 
 still doubtl — This is not to know God: 
 This is to offend, with the sin of unbelief, 
 Christ the Lord and Master of believers : 
 — ' To me to live is Christ, and to die is 
 gain,' said the blessed Apostle, — who 
 computed it to be gain indeed, — no longer 
 to be detained in the snares of the world, 
 — no longer to be obnoxious to sin and 
 the flesh, — to be exempt from excruciating 
 pressures, — to be freed from the poison- 
 ous jaws of Satan, — and lastly, to go to 
 the joys of eternal salvation upon the call 
 of Christ." 
 
 Some of Cyprian's people happened to 
 be staggered in their minds, because they 
 found that Christians were liable to be 
 afflicted with the plague as others : Upon 
 which, the bishop explained to them — 
 that IN SPIRIT the children of God are in- 
 deed separated from the rest of mankind ; 
 but that, in all other respects, they are 
 obnoxious to the common evils of human 
 life. In his usual manner he supports 
 his precepts by Scripture examples ; and 
 speaks eloquently and solidly of the be- 
 nefits of afflictions, and of the opportunity 
 of showing what spirit they are of. " Let 
 that man fear to die," says he, "who has 
 the second death to undergo ; who is not 
 born of water and the Spirit; who is not 
 a partaker of the cross and passion of 
 Christ; and whom eternal flame will 
 torment with perpetual punishment. To 
 such a one life is indeed a desirable ob- 
 ject, because it delays his condemnation : 
 — but what have good men to dread from 
 death] — They are called by it to an 
 eternal refreshment. — There is, however, 
 great use in a season of uncommon mor- 
 tality: It rouses the idle; compels de- 
 serters to return; and produces faith in 
 the Gentiles : It dismisses and sends to 
 rest many old and faithful servants of 
 God ; and it raises fresh and numerous 
 armies for future battles. 
 
 "We should consider and think again 
 and again, that we have renounced the 
 world and live here as strangers. What 
 stranger loves not to return to his own 
 country'? Let us rejoice in the day 
 which summons us to our home. — There, 
 a great number of dear friends await us : 
 What raptures of mutual joy to see and 
 embrace one another !" , 
 
 The active as well as the passive graces 
 
202 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 of Cyprian were kept in perpetual exer- 
 cise by various calamities, which hap- 
 pened at no great distance of time from 
 each other. The madness of men has 
 ever been generating the horrors and mi- 
 series of war, and there have never been 
 wanting poets and historians to celebrate 
 the praises of those who have most ex- 
 ceeded others in shedding human blood. — 
 It belongs to narrations purely Christian 
 to record, with a modest, yet firm appro- 
 bation, the actions of holy men, whom 
 the world despises, but whom the grace 
 of God leads to the exercise of real love 
 to God and men. — Mark another instance 
 of Cyprian's truly Christian benevolence. 
 Numidia, the country adjoining to Car- 
 thage, had been blessed with the light 
 of the Gospel, and a number of Churches 
 were planted in it. By an irruption of 
 the barbarous nations, who neither owned 
 the Roman sway, nor had the least ac- 
 quaintance with Christianity, many Nu- 
 midian converts were carried into cap- 
 tivity. Eight bishops, Januarius, Max- 
 imus, Proculus, Victor, Modianus, Ne- 
 mesian, Nampulus, and Honoratus, wrote 
 the mournful account to the prelate at 
 Carthage. What he felt and did on the 
 occasion his own answer will best ex- 
 plain. The love of Christ and the in- 
 fluence of his Holy Spirit will appear to 
 have been not small in the African Church 
 from this and from the foregoing case ; 
 nor will the calamities of the times and 
 the scourge of persecution seem to have 
 been sent to them in vain.* 
 
 " With much heart-felt sorrow and tears 
 we read your letters, dearest brethren, 
 which ye wrote to us in the solicitude of 
 your love concerning the captivity of our 
 brethren and sisters. For who would 
 not grieve in such cases'? or who would 
 not reckon the grief of his brother his 
 own 1 since the Apostle Paul says, ' If 
 one member suffer, all the members suffer 
 with it; and if one member rejoice, all 
 the other members rejoice with it;' and 
 elsewhere, ' Who is weak, and I am not 
 weak *?' Therefore now the captivity of 
 our brethren is to be reckoned our cap- 
 tivity ; and the grief of those who are 
 in danger is to be reckoned as our own 
 grief, since we are all one body : — Not 
 only our affections, but the religion of 
 Jesus itself ought to incite us to redeem 
 the brethren : For, since the Apostle says, 
 in another place, ' Know ye not that ye 
 
 » Epis. 60. Para. 
 
 are the temple of God, and that the Spirit 
 of God dwelleth in you]' It follows, 
 that even if our love did not induce us to 
 help the brethren, yet, in such circum- 
 stances, we ought to consider, that they 
 which are taken captive, are the temples 
 of God, and that we ought not, by a long 
 delay and neglect, to suffer the temples 
 of God to remain in captivity, but to la- 
 bour with all our might, and quickly to 
 show our obsequiousness to Christ our 
 Judge, OUR Lord, and our God. For 
 whereas Paul the Apostle says, ' As 
 many of you as have been baptized into 
 Christ, have been baptized into his death ;' 
 Christ is to be viewed as existing in our 
 captive brethren ; and he, who dwells and 
 abides in us, must, by a sum of money, 
 be redeemed from captivity, and snatched 
 from the hands of the barbarians; — he, 
 who by his cross and blood,* redeemed 
 us from death, and snatched us from the 
 jaws of Satan. — In fact, he suffers these 
 things to happen, in order that our faith 
 may be tried, and that it may be seen 
 whether we be willing to do for another 
 what every one would wish to be done 
 for himself, were he a prisoner among 
 the barbarians. For who, if he be a fa- 
 ther, does not now feel as if his sons 
 were in a state of captivity ] Who, — if 
 a husband, — is not affected as if his own 
 wife were in that calamitous situation ? 
 This must be the case, if we have but the 
 common sympathy of men. — Then how 
 great ought our mutual sorrow and vexa- 
 tion to be on account of the danger of the 
 viro-ins who are there held in bondage ! 
 Not only their slavery, but the loss of 
 their chastity is to be deplored ; the bonds 
 of barbarians are not so much to be dread- 
 ed as the lewdness of men, lest the mem- 
 bers of Christ dedicated to him, and 
 devotedf for ever to the honour of conti- 
 nency, should be defiled and insulted by 
 libidinous savages. 
 
 " Our brethren, ever ready to work the 
 work of God, but now much more quick- 
 ened by great sorrow and anxiety to for- 
 ward so salutary a concern, have freely and 
 
 * Redemption by the blood of Jesus, union 
 and fellowship with liim maintained in the soul 
 by faith, and the returns of love answerable to 
 his loving kindness, these are the principles of 
 Christian benevolence. 
 
 f Voluntary celibacy, I apprehend, was in 
 growing repute in the Church at that time. 
 St. Paul's advice in the 7lh of first Cor. had 
 then many followers, but monastic vows had 
 yet no existence. 
 
Cext. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 largely contributed to the relief of the dis- 
 tressed captives. For, whereas the Lord 
 says in the Gospel, ' I was sick, and ye vis- 
 ited me ;' with how much stronger appro- 
 bation would he say, ' I was a captive, and 
 ye redeemed me !' And when again he 
 says, ' I was in prison, and ye came to 
 me ;' how much more is it in the same 
 spirit to say, — I was in the prison of cap- 
 tivity and lay shut up and bound among 
 barbarians, and ye freed me from the dun- 
 geon of slavery: Ye shall receive your 
 reward of the Lord in the day of judg- 
 ment. 
 
 "Truly we thank you very much that 
 ye wished us to be partakers of your soli- 
 citude, and of a work so good and necessa- 
 ry ; — that ye have offered us fertile fields 
 in which we might deposite the seeds of 
 our hope with an expectation of an ex- 
 uberant harvest. We have sent a hun- 
 dred thousand sesterces, — the collection 
 of our clergy and laity* of the Church of 
 Carthage, which you will dispense forth- 
 with according to your diligence. Hearti- 
 ly do we wish that no such thing may 
 happen again, and that the Lord may pro- 
 tect our brethren from such calamities. 
 But if, to try our faith and love, such af- 
 flictions should again befal you, hesitate 
 not to acquaint us ; and be assured of the 
 hearty concurrence of our Church with 
 you both in prayer and in cheerful contri- 
 butions. 
 
 " That you may remember in your 
 prayers, our brethren, who have cheer- 
 fully contributed, — I have subjoined the 
 names of each ; — I have added also the 
 names of our colleagues in the ministry, 
 who were present and contributed, in their 
 own names and in that of the people ; and, 
 besides my own proper quantity, I have 
 set down and sent their respective sums. 
 We wish you, brethren, always prospe- 
 rity." 
 
 About this time, Cyprian wrote to an 
 African bishop, named Caecilius, for the 
 purpose of correcting a practice in the 
 administration of the Lord's Supper, 
 which had crept into some Churches, — 
 of using water instead of wine. — With 
 arguments drawn from the Scriptures, he 
 insists on the necessity of wine in the ov- 
 dinance, as a proper emblem of the blood 
 of Christ. 
 
 The appointment of Stephen to the bish- 
 opric of Rome was soon followed by the 
 
 death of Callus; who was 
 slain, in the year two hundred 
 and fifty-three, after a wretch- 
 ed reign of eighteen months. 
 
 203 
 
 Death of 
 Gallus, 
 A. D. 253. 
 
 * About 7811. 5s. sterling. — See Notes to 
 Epis. 62. Oxfoid Edit. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE PACIFIC PART OF VALERIAn's 
 REIGN. 
 
 Under Gallus the peace of the Church 
 of Christ seems to have been very short 
 and precarious. But his successor Va- 
 lerian, for upwards of three years, proved 
 their friend and protector. His house 
 was full of Christians, and he appears to 
 have had a strong predilection in their fa- 
 vour. 
 
 The Lord exercises his people in vari- 
 ous ways. There are virtues adapted to 
 a state of prosperity as well as of adver- 
 sity. — The wisdom and love of God, in 
 directing the late terrible persecutions, 
 have been plainly made manifest by the 
 excellent fruits. — Let us now attend to 
 the transactions of Christians during this 
 interval of refreshment. 
 
 The affairs of Cyprian detain us long, 
 because his eloquent pen continues to at- 
 tract us ; and because we would not lose 
 a faithful and an able guide, till we are 
 compelled to leave him. — Probably, there 
 were many before his time, whose Chris- 
 tian actions would have equally deserved 
 to be commemorated : But the materials of 
 information fail us : The fine composi- 
 tions of this bishop are still, however, a 
 capital source of historical instruction. 
 
 During the tranquillity under the em- 
 peror Valerian, a council was held in 
 Africa by sixty-six bishops, with Cypri- 
 an at their head. The object of this as- 
 sembly was, doubtless, the regulation of 
 various matters relating to the Church of 
 Christ. — These bishops had, unquestiona- 
 bly, each of them, a small diocess ; and 
 with the assistance of their clergy, they 
 superintended their respective jurisdic- 
 tion according to the primitive mode of 
 Church-government. The face of Africa, 
 which is now covered with Mahometan, 
 idolatrous, and piratical wickedness, af- 
 forded in those days a very pleasing spec- 
 tacle ; for we have good reason to be- 
 lieve that a real and salutary regard was 
 paid to the various flocks by their eccle- 
 siastical shepherds. But, we have no 
 particular accounts of the proceedings of 
 this council beyond what is contained in 
 
204 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 a letter of Cyprian, to which I shall pre- 
 sently advert. He mentions two points, 
 which engaged their attention; — but, it 
 is very likely, that matters of greater im- 
 portance than either of those points were 
 then reviewed : — The synod was worthy 
 of the name of Christian : many of the 
 bishops then present had faithfully main- 
 tained the cause of Christ during scenes 
 of trial the most severe that can be ima- 
 gined ; and I know no ground for suspect- 
 ing the clergy of those times to have 
 been influenced by schemes of political 
 ambition for increasing their wealth or 
 power. 
 
 A presbyter, named Victor, had been 
 re-admitted into the Church without hav- 
 ing undergone the legitimate time of trial 
 in a state of penance, and also without the 
 concurrence and consent of the people. 
 His bishop, Therapius, had done this ar- 
 bitrarily and contrary to the institutes of 
 the former council for settling such mat- 
 ters. Cyprian, in the name of the coun- 
 cil, contents himself with reprimanding 
 Therapius ; but yet confirms what he had 
 done, and warns him to take care of of- 
 fending in future. 
 
 This is one of the points. And, we 
 see hence that a strict and godly disci- 
 pline, on the whole, now prevailed in the 
 Church ; and that the wisest and most 
 successful methods of recovering the 
 lapsed were used. The authority of bish- 
 ops was firm, but not despotic : and the 
 share of the people, in matters of ec- 
 clesiastical correction and regulation, ap- 
 pears worthy of notice. 
 
 The other point he thus explains in the 
 same letter addressed to Fidus : "As to 
 the care of infants, of whom you said 
 that they ought not to be baptized within 
 the second or third day after their birth, 
 and that the ancient law of circumcision 
 should be so far adhered to that they 
 ought not to be baptized till the eighth 
 day ; we were all of a very different opin- 
 ion. We all judged that the mercy and 
 grace of God should be denied to none. 
 For, if the Lord says in his Gospel, 'the 
 Son of man is not come to destroy men's 
 lives, but to save them,' how ought we 
 to do our utmost, as far as in us lies, that 
 no soul be lost! Spiritual circumcision 
 should not be impeded by carnal circum- 
 cision. If, even to the foulest offenders 
 when they afterwards believe, remission 
 of sins is granted, and none is prohibited 
 from baptism and grace ; how much more 
 should an infant be admitted ; — who, just 
 
 born, hath not sinned in any respect, ex- 
 cept, that being carnally produced accord- 
 ing to Adam, he hath, in his first birth, 
 contracted the contagion of the ancient 
 deadly nature ; — and who obtains the re- 
 mission of sins with the less difficulty, 
 because not his own actual guilt, but that 
 of another, is to be remitted. 
 
 " Our sentence therefore, dearest bro- 
 ther, in the council was, that none, by 
 us, should be prohibited from baptism 
 and the grace of God, who is merciful 
 and kind to all." 
 
 I purpose carefully to avoid disputes 
 on subjects of small moment. Yet to 
 omit a word here on a point, which hath 
 produced volumes of strife, might seem 
 almost a studied affectation : On such 
 occasions I shall briefly and pacifically 
 state my own views, as they appear de- 
 ducible from evidence. 
 
 Instead of disputing whether the right 
 of infant-baptism is to be derived from 
 Scripture alone, and whether tradition 
 deserves, any attention at all, I would 
 simply observe, — that the Scripture itself 
 seems to speak for an infant 
 baptism ;*— and further, that pefence of 
 
 tradition, in matters of cus- 
 
 tism. 
 
 tom and discipline, is of real 
 weight, as appears from the confession 
 of every one ; for every one is glad to 
 support his cause by it, if he can : — and 
 in the present case, — to those who say 
 that the custom of baptizing children was 
 not derived from the apostolical ages, 
 the traditional argument may fairly run 
 in language nearly Scriptural, " if any 
 man seem to be contentious, we have no 
 such custom, neither the Churches of 
 God:"! — and we never had any such 
 custom as that of confining baptism to 
 abults. 
 
 Here is an assembly of sixty-six pas- 
 tors, men of approved fidelity and gravity, 
 who have stood the fiery trial of some of 
 the severest persecutions ever known, 
 and who have testified their love to the 
 Lord Jesus Christ, in a more striking 
 manner than any Antipado-baptists have 
 had an opportunity of doing in our days ; 
 and, if we ma)' judge of their religious 
 views by those of Cyprian, — and they 
 are all in perfect harmony with him, — 
 they are not wanting in any fundamental 
 of godliness. No man in any age more 
 reverenced the Scriptures, and made more 
 copious use of them on all occasions, 
 
 * 1 Cor. vii. 14. 
 
 t 1 Cor. xi. 16. 
 
Gext. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 205 
 
 than he did; and, — it must be confessed, 
 — in the very best manner. For he uses 
 them continually, for practice, not for 
 osTENTATIO^; for USE, not for the sake of 
 VICTORY in argument. — Before this holy 
 assembly a question is brought, — not 
 whether infants should be baptized at all, 
 — none contradicted this, — but, whether 
 it is right to baptize them immediately, 
 or on the eighth day] Without a single 
 negative, they all determined to baptize 
 them immediately. This transaction pass- 
 . _ ed in the year two hundred 
 
 A. u. ^53. ^jjj fifty-three. Let the rea- 
 der consider: If infant-baptism had been 
 an innovation, it must have been now of 
 a considerable standing: The disputes 
 concerning Easter, and other very uninter- 
 esting points, show that such an innova- 
 tion must have formed a remarkable asra 
 in the Church. The number of heresies 
 and divisions had been very great. Among 
 them all such a deviation from apostoli- 
 cal practice as this, 3iust have been re- 
 marked. To me it appears impossible 
 to account for this state of things, but on 
 the footing that it had ever been allowed ; 
 and, therefore, that the custom was that 
 of the first Churches. Though, then, I 
 should wave the argument d.awn from 
 that sentence of St. Paul, "Else were 
 your children unclean, but now they are 
 holy;" — and yet it is not easy to explain 
 its meaning by any thing else than infant- 
 baptism, — I am under a necessity of con- 
 cluding, that the antagonists of infant- 
 baptism are mistaken. Yet I see not 
 why they may not serve God in sincerity, 
 as well as those who are differently 
 minded. The greatest evil lies in the 
 want of charity : and in that contentious 
 eagerness, with which singularit}'-, in lit- 
 tle things, is apt to be attended. Trul}^ 
 good men have not always been free from 
 this ; — perhaps few persons, on the whole, 
 cultivated larger and more generous views 
 than our African prelate ; — yet, in one 
 instance, we shall presently see, he was 
 seduced into a bigotry of spirit not un- 
 
 like to that which I here disapprove, and 
 greatly lament. 
 
 I could have wished that Christian 
 people had never been vexed with a con- 
 troversy so frivolous as this about bap- 
 tism : but having, once for all, given my 
 views and the reasons of them, I turn 
 from the subject, and observe further, — 
 that there is, in the extract of the letter 
 before us, a strong and clear testimony of 
 the faith of the ancient Church concern- 
 
 VOL. I. S 
 
 ing the doctrine of original sin. One 
 may safely be allowed to reason, on that 
 head, in the same way as in the case just 
 now considered; but the fulness of Scrip- 
 ture concerning so momentous a point 
 precludes the necessity of traditional ar- 
 guments. A lover of divine truth will, 
 however, not be displeased to find — that, 
 without contradiction, Christians in the 
 middle of the third century did believe, 
 that men were born in sin and under the 
 wrath of God through Adam's transo-res- 
 sion, and, by their connexion with him 
 as a federal head, were involved in all 
 the consequences of his offence. Such 
 were the sentiments of the ancient Chris- 
 tians in general ; — of the very best Chris- 
 tians, — who possessed the spirit of Christ 
 in the most powerful degree. — The just 
 consequences, which belong to this fact, 
 are seldom attended to by persons who 
 are wise in their own conceit. — " Let us 
 attend," say they, " to right reason, — 
 to modern improvements in the interpre- 
 tation of Scripture, and let us reject 
 without ceremony the obsolete absurdi- 
 ties of ancient ignorance ;" — The real 
 practical meaning of which is this : We 
 will torture and twist, in every possible 
 direction, the most perspicuous passages 
 of holy writ, rather than we will acknow- 
 ledge them to contain doctrines which 
 we dislike. — To submit at once to the 
 testimony of the Divine W"ord is, in itself, 
 the most reasonable thing in the world; 
 but when men will not abide by that ; — 
 when they will substitute schemes of 
 their own fancy and invention, — in the 
 place of actual revelation, — and still pro- 
 fess themselves to be under the guidance 
 of the Scriptures, it may then be very ex- 
 pedient to oppose and confute their un- 
 warrantable constructions and criticisms 
 by the unanimous judgment of the primi- 
 tive Church, who had the best opportuni- 
 ty of knowing the truth. — There is no 
 unprejudiced mind, which will not feel 
 the force of this argument. 
 
 The following private case, — which 
 must have happened in a time of peace, 
 — and therefore may properly be referred 
 to this period, deserves, on account of the 
 light which it throws on primitive Chris- 
 tian manners, to be distinctly recorded. 
 
 " Cyprian to Eucratius his brother. 
 Health. Your love and esteem have in- 
 duced you, dearest brother, to consult 
 me as to what I think of the case of a 
 Player among you, who still continues to 
 instruct others in that infamous and mi- 
 
206 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 serable art, which he himself hath learnt. 
 You ask whether he should be allowed 
 the continuance of Christian communion] 
 I think it very inconsistent with the ma- 
 jesty of God, and the rules of his Gospel, 
 that the modesty and honour of the Church 
 should be defiled by so base and infa- 
 mous a contagion. In the law* men are 
 prohibited to wear female attire, and are 
 pronounced abominable ; how much more 
 criminal must it be, not only to put on 
 "Woman's garments, but also to express 
 lascivious, obscene, and effeminate ges- 
 tures in a way of instructing others ! — 
 By these means boys will not be improv- 
 ed in any thing that is good, but abso- 
 lutely ruined in their morals. 
 
 " And let no man excuse himself, as 
 having left the theatre, while yet he un- 
 dertakes to qualify others for the work. 
 You cannot say that the man has ceased 
 from his business, when he provides 
 substitutes in his own place, and furnishes 
 the playhouse with a number of perform- 
 ers instead of one ; and teaches them, 
 contrary to the divine ordinances, to con- 
 found, in their apparel, the proper and 
 decent distinctions of the sexes; and so 
 gratifies Satan by the defilement of the 
 divine workmanship. — If the man makes 
 poverty his excuse, his necessities may 
 be relieved in the same manner as those 
 of others, who are maintained by the 
 alms of the Church, ])rovided he be con- 
 tent with frugal and simple food, and do 
 not fancy that we are to hire him, by a 
 salary, to cease from sin ; since it is not 
 OUR interest, but his own, that is con- 
 cerned in this aflfair. But, — ^let his gains 
 by the service of the playhouse be ever 
 so large, — "What sort of gain is that, 
 which tears men from a participation in 
 the banquet of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, 
 and leads them from their miserable and 
 ruinous feasting in this world to the pu- 
 nishments of eternal famine and thirst 1 
 Therefore,--ifpossible,— recover him from 
 this depravity and infamy to the way of 
 innocence and to the hope of life, that he 
 may be content with a parsimonious, but 
 salutary maintenance from the Church. 
 And, if your Church be insufficient to 
 maintain its own poor,f he may transfer 
 himself to us; — and he shall here receive 
 what is necessary for food and raiment : — 
 He must, however, no longer teach his 
 
 * Deut. xxii. 5. 
 
 f Eucratius was the liishop of the place 
 called ThensBj lying in the military road to 
 Carthage. 
 
 pernicious lessons; hut himself endea- 
 vour to learn something from the Church 
 that may be useful to his salvation. 
 Dearest son, I wish you constant pros- 
 perity."* 
 
 The decision of Cyprian is, doubtless, 
 that which piety and good sense wovild 
 unite to dictate in the case. — A player 
 was ever an infamous character at Rome; 
 and was looked on as incapable of filling 
 any of the offices of state. The Romans, 
 at the same time that they showed, in this 
 point, the soundness of their political, 
 evinced the depravity of their moral, 
 sense : For there were still maintained 
 by them, at the public expense and for the 
 public amusement, a company of men, 
 who, — they knew, — must of necessity be 
 dissolute and danoferous members of so- 
 ciety. If this was the judgment of sober 
 Pagans, we need not wonder that the 
 purity of Christianity would not even 
 suffer such characters to be admitted into 
 the bosom of the Church at all. To say, 
 that there are noble sentiments to be found 
 in some dramas, answers not the purpose 
 of those, who would vindicate the enter- 
 tainments of the stage. The support of 
 them requires a system in its own nature 
 corrupt ; — a system, which inust gratify 
 the voluptuous and the libidinous, or it 
 can have no durable existence. Hence, 
 in every age, complaints have been made 
 of the licentiousness of the stage ; and the 
 necessity of keeping it under proper re- 
 straints and regulations has been admit- 
 ted by its greatest admirers. But it is, I 
 think, a great mistake to suppose that the 
 stage may remain a favourite amusement, 
 and, at the same time, be so regulated as 
 not to offend the modest eyes and ears of 
 a humble Christian. The gravest advo- 
 cates for the theatre expect pleasure from 
 it rather than instruction: If, therefore, 
 you believe that human nature is corrupt 
 and impure, only ask yourself what sort 
 of dramatic exhibitions and conversations 
 will be most likely to meet with the ap- 
 plause of the people; — and you will soon 
 be led to conclude, that the playhouse is 
 and must be a school of impurity. 
 
 The first Christians felt the force of this 
 obvious argument, and they rejected the 
 stage entirely. — A Christian, renouncing 
 the pomps and vanity of this wicked 
 world, and yet frequenting the playhouse, 
 was with them a solecism. — The effusion 
 of the Holy Spirit, which, during three 
 
 £p. 61. Pam. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 207 
 
 centuries, we are now reviewinor, never 
 admitted these amusements at all. — The 
 profession of the dramatic art, and the 
 profession of Christianity, were held to be 
 absolutely inconsistent with each other. 
 
 It is one of the main designs of this 
 History to show, practically, what true 
 Christians were, both in principles and in 
 manners: and, in this view, the case 
 before us is exceeding-ly instructive.— 
 What would Cyprian have said had he 
 seen large assemblies of Christians, so 
 called, devoted to these impurities, and 
 supporting them with all their might, and 
 deriving from them the highest delight] 
 — " Such persons must, certainly, be 
 strangers to the joy of the Holy Ghost; 
 and fcannot but wonder why they choose 
 to retain the name of Christians." — Then, 
 if he had examined their stage entertain- 
 ments, and compared them with those 
 that were in vogue in his own day, — 
 Would he not have seen the same confu- 
 sion of sexes, — the same encouragement 
 of unchaste desires, and the same sen- 
 suality, with the same contemptuous ridi- 
 cule of Christianity 1 — If, indeed, in his 
 time the Gospel was ever burlesqued on 
 a stage, as it has frequently been in ours. 
 — In some points of lesser consequence, 
 the ancient drama might differ from the 
 modern ; but, on the whole, the spirit and 
 tendency was the same; and, doubtless, 
 this excellent bishop would have been 
 astonished to be told, that in a country 
 which called itself Christian, actors and 
 actresses and managers of playhouses 
 amassed large sums of money ; — that 
 many exemplary clergymen could scarcely 
 
 Behold now the strenuous assertor of 
 
 the right of faithful bishops openly expo- 
 sing the pretensions of unworthy ones, 
 and instructing the people to guard them- 
 selves against such delusions 1 What ef- 
 fect his' epistle had, does not appear: 
 The weight of his character, and the 
 vigour oflhe discipline then happily pre- 
 valent in Africa, make it probable that it 
 had the desired success. 
 
 Rogatian, an African bishop, com- 
 plained to Cyprian and his colleagues as- 
 sembled in a Synod, of the insolent and 
 injurious behaviour of a deacon. Cyprian 
 observes, that he might have done him- 
 self justice without taking this step. — 
 He applies the case of Korah, Dathan, 
 and Abiram to this of the haughty dea- 
 con, and takes notice very properly of the 
 humble and unassuming carriage of our 
 Lord toward the impious dignitaries of 
 the Jewish Church. " He taught us," 
 says he, "by his own behaviour towards 
 false pastors, how true ones ought to be 
 fully and regularly honoured." 
 
 The following passage is, perhaps, the 
 most striking proof of any in Cyprian's 
 writings, that the ideas of episcopacy 
 were too lofty, even in that a^e, and that 
 they had insensibly grown with the gra- 
 dual increase of superstition. — Let it be 
 remarked as a character of the spirit of 
 those times; and as an instance of the 
 effect of that spirit on a mind the most 
 pure and humble. 
 
 " Deacons ought to remember that the 
 Lord chose Apostles, that is, bishops and 
 rulers; but that the Apostles, after his 
 ascent into heaven, chose to themselves 
 
 find subsistence; and, that theologians of deacons, as the ministers of their govern 
 
 great erudition enlisted in the service of 
 the stage, and obtained applause by writ- 
 ing comments on dramatic poets. 
 
 There was a bishop of Assure, named 
 Fortunatus, who had lapsed in the time of 
 persecution, and who, without any marks 
 of repentance, still assumed to himself the 
 episcopal character, and insisted on his 
 being received as such by the clergy and 
 people. This case produced an epistle 
 of Cyprian to the Church,* in which he 
 as strenuously opposes the ambitious 
 claims of the bishop as, in similar circum- 
 stances, he had formerly done those of 
 the laity; and he repeats the advice 
 which he had before given to the lapsed, 
 and cautions the people against the recep- 
 tion of him in his former rank and station. 
 
 Epis, 6. 
 
 ment and of the Church. Now if we 
 dare do any thing against God who makes 
 bishops, then may deacons dare to act 
 against us by whom they are appointed." 
 Even the least offensive part of this 
 comparison is very unseemly: Bishops 
 are, by no means, to be considered in the 
 same light as Apostles, — His next obser- 
 vation is, however, strictly just : " These 
 are the beginnings of heresies, and the 
 attempts of ill-disposed schismatics to 
 please themselves, and to despise with 
 haughtiness their superiors." He pro- 
 ceeds to advise the bishop how to act 
 concerning a turbulent deacon ; and he 
 does this with that happy mixture of firm- 
 ness and charity, of which, by a pecu- 
 liarly intuitive discernment, he seldom 
 failed to show himself a master.* 
 
 » Epis. 66. 
 
208 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XIIT- 
 
 Geminius Victor, by his will, appointed 
 Faustinus, a presbyter, a guardian. In 
 an African synod, Cyprian and his col- 
 leagues wrote to the Church of Furnaj* a 
 protest against the practice. — The clergy 
 were then looked on as men wholly de- 
 voted to divine things : secular cares 
 were taken out of their hands as much as 
 possible. — Let this fact, also, be noted as 
 one of the happy effects of the work of 
 the Holy Ghost on the Church. 
 
 Novatianism had spread into Gaul ; 
 and Marcian, bishop of the Church of 
 Arelate, united himself to the schism. 
 Faustinus, bishop of Lyons, and several 
 other French bishops, wrote to Stephen 
 of Rome on this subject. Faustinus 
 wrote, also, concerning the same matter, 
 to Cyprian of Carthage ; who, in a letter 
 to Stephen, supported the cause of the 
 general Church against the schismatics. 
 — These facts are mentioned, for the pur- 
 pose of showing how the Gospel, which 
 had so gloriously begun at Lyons in the 
 second century, must now have spread iu 
 France to a great degree. — Contentions 
 and schisms usually have no place, till 
 after Christianity has tiken deep root. 
 
 The same observation may be made re- 
 specting the progress of Christianity in 
 Spain ; where, by the inscriptions of 
 Cyriac of Ancona, it appears that the light 
 of truth had entered in Nero's time. 
 Two Spanish bishops, Basilides and Mar- 
 tial, had deservedly lost their pastoral 
 offices in the Church, on account of their 
 unfaithfulness in the persecution. Cy- 
 prian and his colleagues in council wrote 
 to confirm their deposition: He shows 
 that the people, no less than the clergy, 
 were bound to abstain from communion 
 with such characters; and he supports 
 his argument by the directions of Moses 
 to the children of Israel, "Depart, I pray 
 you, from the tents of these wicked 
 men. He recommendsf — that ordinations 
 should be performed in the sight of all 
 the people, that they might all have an 
 opportunity to approve or to condemn the 
 characters of the persons ordained. He 
 takes notice — that, in Africa, the neigh- 
 bouring bishops used to meet in the place 
 where the new bishop was to be ordained ; 
 and, that there he was chosen in the pre- 
 sence of the people themselves, who knew 
 fully the life and conversation of every 
 candidate. He observes — that Sabinus, 
 who had been substituted in the room of 
 
 Epis. 67. 
 
 t Epis. 68. 
 
 Basilides, bad been ordained in this fair 
 and equitable manner: and he censures 
 Basilides for going to Rome, and for gain- 
 ing by deceit, the consent of Stephen to 
 his being re-instated in his former dignity. 
 Cyprian thinks — that his guilt was much 
 aggravated by his conduct; and in regard 
 to Martial, who, it seems, had defiled 
 himself with Pagan abominations, he in- 
 sists, — that his deposition ought to re- 
 main confirmed. 
 
 While these things show the unhappy 
 spirit of human depravity bearing down 
 the most wholesome fences of discipline, 
 they evince, that there existed persons at 
 that time in the Christian world, who ex- 
 erted themselves, — and that not without 
 success, — to preserve the purity of the 
 Church. And, if ever it should please 
 God to affect, with due care and zeal, thf^ 
 hearts of those, who possess the power 
 to reform our own ecclesiastical defects 
 and abuses, better guides and precedents 
 than these, — next to the Scriptures, — will 
 scarcely be found. 
 
 In the year two hundred and fifty-four, 
 Pupian, a Christian of distinc- 
 tion in Carthage, by letter ac- Pupian's 
 cased Cyprian of rulingf the '^^ ^^'^' 
 Church with imperious sway ; p,.ian 
 and of ejecting members from a. D.'254. 
 it with great insolence and 
 haughtiness. The African prelate had 
 presided now during six years, and had 
 signalized himself, equally in persecution 
 and in peace, as the friend of piety, order, 
 and discipline, and had exerted himself, 
 in the use of every temporal and spiritual 
 faculty, solely for the good of the falling 
 and distempered Church : he saw, by this 
 time, the great success of his labours ; 
 and, it now behooved him to pay the tax, 
 which eminent virtue ever does pay to 
 slander and to envy. — A tax, no doubt, 
 exceedingly irksome and distressing; — 
 nevertheless, necessary to prevent the 
 risings of pride, and to preserve the most 
 eminent Christian humble before his God. 
 Pupian believed, or affected to believe 
 very unjust rumours, which were circu- 
 lated against his pastor; and said, that 
 the scruple of conscience, with which he 
 was seized, prevented him from owning 
 the authority of Cyprian. He himself 
 had suffered during the persecution, and 
 had been faithful ; but, like Lucian, whom 
 he probably resembled both in virtues 
 and weaknesses, he was disgusted at the 
 backwardness of Cyprian in receiving 
 the lapsed. This malcontent heavily com- 
 
Ceitt. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 209 
 
 plained of his severity, while the Nova- 
 tian party had separated from their bishop 
 on account of his lenity. The best and 
 wisest characters have ever been most 
 exposed to such inconsistent charges. It 
 does not appear that Pupian was able to 
 raise a second sect of dissenters on oppo- 
 site grounds to those of the first : and we 
 may hope that he reflected on his error, 
 and returned into a state of reconciliation 
 with his bishop. A few extracts from 
 Cyprian's answer — for we have not Pu- 
 pian's letter — may throw still stronger 
 light on the temper and principles of Cy- 
 prian, and aflford us some salutary reflec- 
 tions. 
 
 To the charge of Pupian — that he was 
 not possessed of humility, he answers 
 thus : " Which of us is most deficient in 
 humility 1 — I, who daily serve the breth- 
 ren ; and who, with kindness and plea- 
 sure, receive every one who comes to the 
 Church ; or you, who constitute yourself 
 the bishop of the bishop, and judge of the 
 judge appointed by God for a certain 
 time'? The Lord, in the Gospel, when 
 it was said to him, ' Answerest thou the 
 high priest so ]' still preserving the re- 
 spect due to the sacerdotal character, said 
 nothing against the high priest, but only 
 cleared his own innocence : and St. Paul, 
 though he might have been justified in 
 using strongf lanofuagre aofainst those who 
 had crucified the Lord, yet answers, ' I 
 wist not, brethren, that he was the High 
 Priest; for it is written, Thou shalt not 
 speak evil of the ruler of thy people.' 
 
 "Unless, indeed, you will say — that 
 before the persecution, when you were in 
 communion with me, I was your pastor ; 
 but that after the persecution I ceased to 
 be so. — I suppose, then, the persecution 
 exalted you to the high honour of a wit- 
 ness for Christ ; and, at the same time, 
 depressed me from my office by a heavy 
 proscription ; — yet, — the very edict which 
 proscribed me, acknowledged my rank as 
 a bishop :* Thus, even those, who be- 
 lieved not God who appoints the bishop, 
 credited the devil who proscribed him, 
 
 " I speak not these things in a way of 
 boasting, but with grief; since you set 
 yourself up as a judge of God and his 
 Christ, who says to the Apostles, — and, 
 of consequence, to all the bishops, the 
 successors of the Apostles, — ' He that 
 
 * The edict ran thus—" Whoever sliall hold 
 or possess any pait of the goods of Ciecilius 
 Cj^prian, bishop of llie Christians," &c. 
 S2 
 
 heareth you, heareth me ; and he that re- 
 jecteth you, rejecteth me.' — Hence here- 
 sies and schism arise and must arise, 
 whenever persons presumptuously de- 
 spise the authority of the bishop, who 
 
 alone is the president of the Church 
 
 What arrogance is this, — to call pastors 
 to vouR cognizance ; and unless they 
 be acquitted at your bar, — behold — 
 the brethren must be pronounced to have 
 been without a bishop for the last six 
 years ! 
 
 "You say your scruples must be solved; 
 — but, Why did not those martyrs, who, 
 full of the Holy Ghost,— suffered for God 
 and his Christ ; — Why did not many of 
 my colleagues, and many of the people, 
 who have been illustrious for their suf- 
 ferings, indulge similar scruples 1 Must 
 all — as you arfirm — who have communi- 
 cated with me, be considered as polluted, 
 and as having lost the hope of eternal 
 life 1 — Pupian alone is upright, — invio- 
 lable, — holy, — chaste : he must not mix 
 with us : he must dwell solitary in para- 
 dise !! " 
 
 He then exhorts him to return to the 
 bosom of the Church : but at the same 
 time he informs him, that, in the matter 
 of his re-admission, he shall be guided 
 by intimations and admonitions from the 
 Lord, communicated to him possibly by 
 visions and dreams. — This is a languao-e 
 not unusual in Cyprian: but we know 
 too little of the mode of dispensation 
 which the Church, at that time, was un- 
 der, to judge accurately concerning it; — 
 certainly the age of miracles had not then 
 ceased ; and, certainly, instruction by 
 dreams was very much the method used 
 by God in Scripture ; — To reject, there- 
 fore, wholly the positive declarations of 
 a man of Cyprian's wisdom and veracity, 
 would be inexcusable temerity. — He, re- 
 peatedly, speaks of the Lord's directions 
 revealed to him in the manner above 
 mentioned. 
 
 If some expressions in the letter be al- 
 lowed to favour of episcopal haughtiness, 
 which was then growing in the Church, 
 the main tenor of it, nevertheless, con- 
 tains nothing but what Pupian ought to 
 have attended to most seriously. A readi- 
 ness to believe stories, which tend to ca-' 
 lumniate the worthiest pastors, is a snare 
 which Satan has too successfully laid for 
 the members of the Church in all ages ; 
 and, doubtless, much greater circumspec- 
 
 Epis. 69. 
 
210 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 Contro- 
 vei-sy re- 
 specting 
 rc-bapti- 
 zation. 
 
 tion is required on this head, than many 
 are disposed to pay. The brotherly fel- 
 lowship of Churches depends, in a great 
 measure, on their endeavours to preserve 
 the unity of the Spirit in the bond of 
 peace. 
 
 Cyprian concludes in this nervous man- 
 ner: "I have vi^rilten these things with 
 a pure conscience, and in the firm reliance 
 on my God. — You have my letters ; I 
 have yours ; both will be recited in the 
 day of judgment before the tribunal of 
 Christ."* 
 
 A controversy now arose among Chris- 
 tians, while the pacific spirit of Valerian 
 continued to protect them, 
 which reflects no honour on 
 any of the parties concerned 
 in it. The question was, 
 whether persons returning 
 from heresies into the Church 
 ought to be re-baptised 1 The active 
 spirit of Cyprian was employed, partly 
 by a council in Africa, and partly by hit 
 letters, in maintaining that the baptism 
 of heretics was null and void ; and that 
 even Novatian baptism ought to be looked 
 upon in the same light. Stephen, bishop 
 of Rome, maintained, that, if persons had 
 been baptized in the name of the Father, 
 the Son, and the Holy Ghost, imposition 
 of hands would then be sufficient for their 
 reception into the Church : The point 
 was left undecided, because no party had 
 power to compel others ; most Christians, 
 however, have long since agreed with 
 Stephen; and, indeed, it is the voice of 
 good sense as well as of the Church of 
 England, — that the efficacy of a Sacra- 
 ment, rightly administered, depends not 
 on the character of him that ministers it. 
 But the respect which Cyprian, not un- 
 deservedly, had acquired by his labours, 
 his sufferings, and his abilities, procured 
 him a much greater degree of strength 
 than either the importance of his cause or 
 the weight of his arguments merited. 
 Even Firmilian of Cappadocia, in a long 
 letter, supported his side of the question. 
 — This bishop, occasionally, reverts to 
 the case of a woman, who, about twenty- 
 two years before the date of his letter, 
 had professed herself a prophetess, and 
 for a long time had deceived the brethren 
 with her ecstatic raptures, till one of the 
 exorcists confuted her pretensions. It 
 may be worth while just to have mention- 
 ed this fact, as it shows that delusions 
 
 * Epis. 69. 
 
 have ever been raised by Satan to disgrace 
 the work of God. It appears by the same 
 letter,* — that Stephen behaved with much 
 violence and asperity in the contest; — 
 that he did not even admit to a conference 
 the brethren who came to him from dis- 
 tant parts, if they happened to be of Cy- 
 prian's opinion ; — but that he denied them 
 the common rights of hospitality. — In the 
 course of this controversy Cyprian de- 
 cided, and certainly with much proprie- 
 ty, — that those, f whose weak state of 
 health did not permit them to be washed 
 in water, were yet sufficiently baptized 
 by being sprinkled : — He observes, that 
 the virtue of baptism ought not to be es- 
 timated, in a carnal manner, by the quan- 
 tity of external apparatus. 
 
 How weak, alas, is man! — A peace of 
 three )'ears has set the members of the 
 Church in a flame among themselves, — 
 and for a matter of trifling import! — And 
 one of the best and wisest men of his day, 
 by zeal for unity, and by caution against 
 innovations, is betra3'ed into the support 
 of an indefensible point of mere ceremony, 
 which tends to the encouragement of su- 
 perstition and the weakening of brotherly 
 love ! — How soon do we forget that " the 
 kingdom of God is not meat and drink, 
 but righteousness, and joy in the Holy 
 Ghost!"— With what difficulty is the 
 real love of Jesus and its fruits preserved 
 among professors of Christianity! All 
 this proves in the strongest manner, — how 
 mighty and gracious the Lord is in still 
 preserving a Church in the earth; — how 
 dark and corrupt is man;— how active 
 and subtile is Satan; how precious is 
 that blood which cleanses from all sin; — 
 and how true is that book which contains 
 these salutary doctrines and faithfully 
 describes the misery of man! — How 
 safely may we rely on the way of salva- 
 tion which it teaches ; and how pleasing 
 is the prospect which it exhibits of the 
 Church in heaven I 
 
 The reader would justly think the time 
 ill-employed in unravelling the niceties 
 of this trifling controversy. — Besides, our 
 attention is called to more important mat- 
 ter:— God prepares a scourge for his fro- 
 ward children : Persecution lowers again 
 with renewed strength; and Christians 
 are called on — to forget their idle internal 
 squabbles,— to humble themselves before 
 HiiM, — and to prepare for fresh scenes of 
 horror aud desolation. 
 
 Epis. 75. 
 
 t Epis. 76. 
 
Ckiit. III.] 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 211 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE LAST ACTS AND MARTYRDOM OF 
 CYPRIAN. 
 
 8th Per- 
 secution, 
 A. D. 257 
 
 The change in the disposition of Va- 
 lerian towards the Christians, which took 
 place about the year of our Lord two 
 hundred and fifty-seven, is 
 one of the most memorable 
 instances of the instability of 
 human characters. In kind- 
 ness to them he had surpassed all his 
 predecessors. Even from Philip they 
 had not experienced so much courtesy 
 and friendship. His palace had, usually, 
 been full of the followers of Jesus, and 
 was looked on as a sanctuary. But now, 
 after he had reigned three years, he w'as 
 induced by his favourite, Macrianus, to 
 commence a deadly persecution. This 
 man dealt largely in magical enchant- 
 ments and abominable sacrifices ; he 
 slaughtered children, and tore out the in- 
 testines of new-born babes.* The per- 
 secution of Christians was a cruel em- 
 ployment, worthy of a mind so fascinated 
 with diabolical wickedness and folly; 
 and he found in Valerian but too prompt 
 a disciple. This fresh attack on the ser- 
 vants of Christ began in the year two 
 hundred and fifty-seven, and continued 
 during the remainder of the reign of this 
 emperor ; — namely, three years and a half. 
 Stephen of Rome appears to have died a 
 natural death about the beginning of it: 
 For, there is no evidence of his martyr- 
 dom ; and, therefore, we want the proofs 
 which might, in that case, have been af- 
 forded, whether his turbulent and aspir- 
 ing spirit was really combined with gen- 
 uine Christian affections. — He was suc- 
 ceeded by Sixtus. 
 
 Cyprian, who had escaped two perse- 
 cutions, was now made the victim of the 
 third, — though by slow degrees, and 
 with circumstances of comparative lenity. 
 Every thing relating to him is so interest- 
 ing, that it may not be amiss to prosecute 
 his story, in a connected manner, to his 
 death; and to reserve the narrative of 
 other objects of this persecution till after- 
 wards. 
 
 He was seized by the servants of Pa- 
 ternus the proconsul of Carthage, and 
 brought into his council-chamber. " The 
 
 sacred emperors, Valerian and Gallie- 
 nus," says Paternus, " have done me the 
 honour to direct letters to me, in which 
 they have decreed, that all men ought to 
 adore the gods whom the Romans adore : 
 and on pain of being slain with the sword 
 if they refuse. I have heard that yoo 
 despise the worship of the gods ; — whence 
 I advise you to consult for yourself and 
 to honour them." " I am a Christian," 
 replied the prelate, " and know no god 
 but the one true God, who created heaven 
 and earth, the sea, and all things in them. 
 This God we Christians serve: To him 
 we pray night and day for all men, and 
 even for the emperors." " You will die 
 the death of a malefactor, if you persevere 
 in this disposition of mind."* "That is 
 a good disposition which fears God," 
 answered Cyprian, " and therefore it must 
 not be changed." " It is the will, then, 
 of the princes, that, for the present, you 
 should be banished." " He is no exile," 
 replied the bishop, " who has God in his 
 heart, for the earth is the Lord's and the 
 fulness thereof." Paternus said, " Be- 
 fore you go, tell me, — where are your 
 presbyters : They are said to be in this 
 city?" — With much presence of mind, 
 Cyprian reminded him of the edicts made 
 by the best Roman princes against the 
 practice of informers : " They ought not, 
 therefore, to be discovered by me ; and 
 you yourself do not approve of men, who 
 offer themselves voluntarily to you." " I 
 will make you discover them by tor- 
 ments." " By me," the intrepid bishop 
 rejoined, " they shall not be discovered." 
 " Our princes have ordered that Chris- 
 tians should hold no conventicles ; and 
 whoever breaks this rule shall be put to 
 death." " Do what you are ordered," 
 Cyprian calmly replied. 
 
 Paternus, however, was not disposed 
 to hurt Cyprian. Most probably he re- 
 spected the character of the man, who, 
 by this time, must have been highly es- 
 teemed in Africa on account of a shining 
 series of good works. After having made 
 soine ineffectual attempts to work on his 
 fears, he sent him into banishment to 
 Curubis, a little town fifty miles from 
 Carthage, situate by the sea, over against 
 Sicily. ° The place w-as healthy, the air 
 good, and, by his own desire, he had pri- 
 vate lodgings. The citizens of Curubis, 
 during- the eleven months which he lived 
 
 • Dionysius of Alex. — Euseb. B. 7. C. 
 
 10. 
 
 * The passion of Cyprian in Fam. Edit. — 
 Fleury's Hist. B. 7. 
 
212 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH : 
 
 [Chap. XIV. 
 
 among them, treated him with great kind- 
 ness ; and he was repeatedly visited by 
 the Christians.— In this short interval 
 Paternus died. 
 
 While the exiled prelate remained by 
 the sea-side, serving his divine Master in 
 holy meditations and useful actions to the 
 best of his power and opportunity, he was 
 informed that the persecutors had seized 
 nine bishops, with several priests and 
 deacons, and a great number of the faith- 
 ful, even virgins and children ; and, after 
 beating them with slicks, had sent them 
 to work in the copper mines among the 
 mountains. Every one of these bishops 
 had been present at the last council of 
 Carthage; their names were Nemesian, 
 Felix, Lucius, a second Felix, Litteus, 
 Polus, Victor, Jader, and Dativus. I can- 
 not account for the milder treatment 
 which Cyprian received from the Roman 
 governors in any other way than by sup- 
 posing, that an extraordinary and rever- 
 ential respect was paid to his superior 
 quality, labours, and virtues. 13e that as 
 it may. Providence certainly favoured him 
 in a peculiar manner. But his sympa- 
 thizing spirit could not but be with his 
 brethren : — His sentiments and his feel- 
 ings are strongly expressed in a letter to 
 Nemesian and the rest. 
 
 " Your glory requires, blessed and be- 
 loved brethren, that I ought to come and 
 embrace yon, were it not that the confes- 
 sion of the same name has confined me 
 also to this place : but if it be forbidden 
 me to come to you in body, I am ]neseiU 
 with you in spirit and affection ; and I 
 endeavour to express my very soul to you 
 in letters.— How do I exult in your hon- 
 ours, and reckon myself a partner with 
 yovi,— though not in suffering,— yet in the 
 fellowship of love!— How can 1 hold my 
 peace, when I hear such glorious things 
 of dearest brethren! How hath the Di- 
 vine dispensations honoured you ! Part 
 of you have already finished the course 
 of martyrdom, and are now receiving 
 crowns of righteousness from the Lord ; 
 and the rest, as yet in prisons, or in 
 mines and bonds, exhibit, in the tedious- 
 ness of their afflictions, still great exam- 
 ples of patience and perseverance, which 
 will arm and strengthen the brethren, at 
 the same time that these long-continued 
 torments will advance the sufferers to a 
 higher proficiency in Christian glory, and 
 ensure to them a proportional reward in 
 heaven. 
 
 "In truth,— that the Lord has thus 
 
 honoured you, affords me no surprise 
 when I reflect on your blameless lives 
 and faithfulness; your firm adherence to 
 the divine ordinance; your integrity, con- 
 cord, humility, diligence; mercy in che- 
 rishing the poor; constancy in defence of 
 the truth ; and strictness of Christian dis- 
 cipline : — And, that nothing might be 
 wanting in you as patterns of good works, 
 even now, by confession with the mouth 
 and by suffering with the body, you stir 
 up the minds of the brethren to divine 
 martyrdom, and distinguish yourselves as 
 leaders of eminent goodness; nor do I 
 doubt, but that the flock will imitate their 
 pastors and presidents, and be crowned, 
 in like manner, by our common Lord. — 
 That you have been grievously beaten 
 with clubs, and have been initiated, by 
 that punishment, in Christian confession, 
 is a thing not to be lamented. The body 
 of a Christian trembles not on account of 
 clubs : All his hope is in wood.* The 
 servant of Christ acknowledges the em- 
 blem of his salvation : Redeemed by a 
 cross of wood to eternal life, by this wood 
 he is advanced to his crown. O happy 
 ieet ! shackled indeed at present with fet- 
 ters; ye will quickly finish a glorious 
 journey to Christ!— Let malice and cru- 
 elty bind you as they please, ye will soon 
 pass from earth and its sorrows to the 
 kingdom of heaven.— In the mines ye 
 have not abed on which the body may be 
 refreshed ; — nevertheless, Christ is your 
 rest and consolation: Your limbs are fa- 
 tigued with labour and lie on the ground : 
 but so to lie down, when you have Christ 
 with you, is no punishment. — Filth and 
 dirt defile your limbs, and ye have no 
 baths at hand ; but, remember, ye are in- 
 wardly washed from all uncleanness. — 
 Your allowance of bread is but scanty ; 
 be it so,— man doth not live by bread 
 alone, but by the word of God. Ye have 
 no proper clothes to defend you from the 
 cold ; —but he, who has put on Christ, is 
 clothed abundantly." 
 
 He afterwards comforts them, by suita- 
 ble arguments, under the loss of means 
 of grace and of public worship; and 
 
 * I observe once for all, — tliat the want of a 
 just classical taste like that of the Augustan 
 a"-e, and the excess of false rhetorical onia- 
 ii?enls, appear every where in Cyprian's writ- 
 inn-s. This was not the dtlect of ihe man, but 
 oHhe times: and the meanness of the pun in 
 this place will be forgiven by all, who relish 
 (he preciousuess of the doctrine connected 
 with it. 
 
Cekt. III.] 
 
 MARTYRDOM OF CYPRIAN. 
 
 213 
 
 speaks of the Lord as rewarding the pa- 
 tience and fortitude of his saints, which 
 virtues are indeed his own work in their 
 hearts. "For it is of him that we con- 
 quer; it is not ye that speak, but the Spi- 
 rit of your Father which speaketh in 
 you." — He shows, hence, the great sin 
 of unbelief — in not trusting him who pro- 
 mises his aid to those who confess him, 
 and in not fearing him who threatens 
 eternal punishment to those who deny 
 him. In conclusion, he begs their earn- 
 est prayers, — that he and they may be 
 freed from the snares and the darkness of 
 the world; and that those, who, in the 
 bond of love and peace, had stood to- 
 gether against the injuries of heretics 
 and the pressures of the heathen, might 
 together rejoice in the celestial man- 
 sions.* 
 
 Nemesian and the other bishops re- 
 turned him an answer full of affection 
 and gratitude, from three different places 
 in which they were confined ; and they 
 acknowledge the pecuniary assistance 
 which he had sent them. 
 
 Cyprian wrote also to Rogatian the 
 younger, and to other confessors who 
 were in prison, — most probably at Car- 
 thage : — He animates them in his usual 
 manner, "to despise present afflictions 
 through the hope of future joys ;" and he 
 speaks with much pleasure of some wo- 
 men and boys who were partners of their 
 sufferings. He recommends to them the 
 example of the elder Rogatian, and of the 
 ever peaceable and sober Felicissimus,| 
 who had consummated their martyrdom 
 already. 
 
 In the year two hundred and fifty-seven, 
 Cyprian was permitted to return from ex- 
 ile; and he lived in a garden near Car- 
 thage, which was now pro- 
 Cyprian videntially restored to him, 
 returns though he had sold it at his 
 
 A D 257 """^^ conversion. His liberal 
 spirit would have inclined 
 him once more to sell it for the relief of 
 the needy, if he had not feared lest he 
 should excite the envy of the persecutors. 
 Here he regulated the affairs of the 
 Church and distributed to the poor what 
 he had left. He sent messengers to 
 Rome for the purpose of clearing up cer- 
 tain indistinct information which had 
 
 * Epis. 78, 79, 80. 
 
 f He thus distinguishes this humble, patient 
 martyr, tVoin the factious character of the 
 same name. Epis. 81. 
 
 been received concerning the persecution 
 having broken out afresh ; and he imme- 
 diately communicated to the brethren* 
 the following facts, namely — That Va- 
 lerian had given orders that bishops, 
 presbyters, and deacons should be put to 
 death without delay ; — that senators, no- 
 bleinen, and knights should be degraded 
 and deprived of their property; and, that 
 if they still persisted in being Christians, 
 they should lose their lives; — that wo- 
 men of quality should be deprived of their 
 property and banished ; — and that all 
 Ceesar's freedmen, who should have con- 
 fessed, should be stripped of their goods, 
 be chained, and sent to work on his es- 
 tates. These were Valerian's directions 
 to the senate; and he sent letters, to the 
 same effect, to the governors of pro- 
 vinces : " These letters," said Cyprian, 
 " we daily expect to arrive. We stand, 
 however, in the firmness of faith, in pa- 
 tient expectation of suffering, and in 
 humble hope of obtaining, from the Lord's 
 help and kindness, the crown of eternal 
 life." He mentions also the daily fero- 
 city with which, — he understood, — the 
 persecution was carried on at Rome in all 
 its horrors: and, he gives a particular in- 
 stance of it, in the martyrdom of Xystus, 
 the bishop.— He begs that the intelli- 
 gence may be circulated through Africa ; 
 " That we may all think of death ; but 
 not more of death than of immortality; 
 and, that, in the fulness of faith, we may, 
 rather with joy than fear, expect the ap- 
 proaching events." 
 
 Galerius Maximus had succeeded Pa- 
 ternus in the proconsulate, and Cyprian 
 was daily expected to be sent for. In 
 this awful crisis a number of senators and 
 others, considerable for their offices or 
 their quality, came to him. Ancient 
 friendship melted the minds of some of 
 them towards him ; and they offered to 
 conceal him in country-places; but his 
 soul was now thirsting for martyrdom. 
 The uncertainty of tedious banishment 
 could not be agreeable to one, who had 
 had so much experience of that kind; 
 and, Valerian's law being expressly le- 
 velled at men of his character, there 
 seemed little probability left of his being 
 long concealed. Further, I believe the 
 gen^erous temper of this prelate would 
 have been hurt, if the safety of his former 
 Pagan friends had been endangered on 
 his account. He might, therefore, hesi- 
 
 Epis. 82. 
 
214 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH : 
 
 [Chap. XIV. 
 
 tate to accept their offers, though, accord- 
 ing- to the steady maxims of his consci- 
 entious prudence, he would, by no means, 
 do anything to accelerate his own death. 
 Pontius his deacon tells us, — that in op- 
 position to the intemperate zeal of those 
 who were for giving themselves up to 
 martyrdom, Cyprian had always on this 
 head conscientious fears, lest he should 
 displease God by throwing away his life. 
 In fact, he continued still at Carthage, 
 exhorting the faithful, and wishing, that 
 when he should suifer martyrdom, death 
 might find him thus employed in the ser- 
 vice of his God. Being informed, how- 
 ever, that the proconsul, then at Utica, 
 had sent soldiers for him, he was induced 
 to comply, for a season, with the advice 
 of his friends, by retiring to some place 
 of concealment, that he might not suffer 
 at Utica, but, — that if he was called to 
 martyrdom, — he miglit finish his life 
 among his own people at Carthage : So 
 he states the matter in the last of his let- 
 ters to the clergy and the people. " Here 
 in this concealment, I wait for the return 
 of the proconsul to Carthage, ready to 
 appear before him, and to say what shall 
 be given me at the hour. t)o you, dear 
 brethren,— Do you, agreeably to the in- 
 structions you have always received from 
 me, continue still and quiet: Let none of 
 you excite any tumult on account of the 
 brethren, or offer himself voluntarily to 
 the Gentiles. — He, who is seized and de- 
 livered up, ought to speak: The Lord, 
 who dwells in us, will speak at that 
 hour: Confession rather than profession 
 is our duty." 
 
 The proconsul returned to Carthage, 
 and Cyprian returned to his garden. 
 There he was seized by two officers, 
 who had been sent with soldiers for that 
 purpose. They obliged him to sit be- 
 tween themselves in a chariot; and they 
 conveyed him to a place named Sextus, 
 six miles from Carthage, by the sea-side. 
 The proconsul lodged there on account of 
 indisposition; and he gave orders that 
 Cyprian should be carried back to the 
 house of the chief officer, about the dis- 
 tance of a stadium* from the prretorium; 
 and — that the consideration of the busi- 
 ness should be deferred till the next day. 
 — The news spread through Carthage: 
 The celebrity of the bishop, on account 
 ofhis good works, drew prodigious crowds 
 to the scene; not only of Christians, but 
 
 A hundred and twenty-five paces. 
 
 of infidels, who revered eminent virtue in 
 distress. 
 
 The chief officer guarded him, — ^but, in 
 a courteous manner ; so that he was per- 
 mitted to have his friends about him as 
 usual. The Christians passed the night 
 in the street before his lodo-incrs; and the 
 benevolence of Cyprian moved him to 
 direct a particular attention to be paid to 
 the young women who were among the 
 multitude. 
 
 The next day the proconsul sent for 
 Cyprian, who walked to' the prsetori- 
 um attended by a vast concourse of peo- 
 ple. The proconsul not yet appearing, 
 he was ordered to wait for him in a pri- 
 vate place. He sat down, and being in 
 a great perspiration, a soldier, who had 
 been a Christian, offered him fresh clothes: 
 "Shall we," says Cyprian, "seek a re- 
 medy for that which inay last no longer 
 than to-day ]" The arrival of the pro- 
 consul was announced, and this venera- 
 ble servant of Christ was brought before 
 him into the judgment-hall. — " Are you 
 Thascius Cyprian]" "lam." "Are you 
 HE whom the Christians call their bish- 
 op ]" "lam." "Our princes have or- 
 dered you to worship the gods." "That 
 I will not do." "You would judge bet- 
 ter to consult your safety, and not lo de- 
 spise the gods." " My safety and my 
 strength is Christ the Lord, whom I de- 
 sire to serve for ever." " I pity your 
 case," says the proconsul, "and could 
 wish to consult for you." "I have no 
 desire," says the prelate, "that things 
 should be otherwise with me, than that I 
 may adore my God, and hasten to him 
 with all the ardour of my soul; — for the 
 afflictions of this present time are not 
 worthy to be compared with the glory 
 which shall be revealed in us." The 
 proconsul grew red with anger; and im- 
 mediately pronounced sentence of death 
 in the following terms : — " You have 
 lived sacrilegiously a long time ; you 
 have formed a society of impious con- 
 spirators; you have shown yourself an 
 enemy to the gods and their religion, and 
 have not hearkened to the equitable coun- 
 sels of our princes ; you have ever been 
 a father and a ringleader of the impious 
 sect. — You shall therefore be an example 
 to the rest, — that, by the shedding of your 
 blood, they may learn their duty. Let 
 Thascins Cyprian, who refuses to sacri- 
 fice to the gods, be put to death by the 
 sword." " God be praised !" said the 
 martyr; and while they were leading 
 
Ceitt. hi.] 
 
 CYPRIAN AND ORIGEN. 
 
 215 
 
 Execution 
 of Cyprian 
 
 A.D. 258. 
 
 him away, a multitude of the people fol- 
 lowed and cried, "• Let us die with our 
 holy bishop." 
 
 A troop of soldiers attended the martyr ; 
 and the officers marched on each side of 
 him. They led him into a plain sur- 
 rounded with trees, and many 
 climbed up to the top of them, 
 to see him at a distance. Cy- 
 prian took off his mantle, and 
 fell on his knees and worshipped his 
 God : — then he put off his inner garment 
 and remained in his shirt. — The execu- 
 tioner being come, Cyprian ordered twen- 
 ty-five golden denarii to be given to him: 
 he himself bound the napkin over his 
 own eyes ; and a presbyter and a dea- 
 con tied his hands, and the Christians 
 placed before him napkins and handker- 
 chiefs to receive his blood. — His head 
 was then severed from his body by the 
 sword.* 
 
 His biographer Pontius represents him- 
 self as wishing to have died with him : 
 and, as divided between the joy of his 
 victorious martyrdom, and sorrow that 
 himself was left behind. 
 
 Thus, — after an eventful and instruc- 
 tive period of about twelve years since 
 his conversion, — after a variety of toils 
 and exercises among friends, and open 
 foes and nominal Christians, by a. death 
 more gentle than commonly fell to the 
 lot of martyrs, rested at length in Jesus 
 the truly magnanimous and benevolent 
 spirit of Cyprian of Carthage. — An ex- 
 traordinary personage, surely ! And one 
 whose character calls for the most dis- 
 tinct review and illustration in our power. 
 — An attempt of this sort we would make 
 in the next chapter, however imperfect, 
 or inadequate it may prove. — Let writers, 
 whose views are secular, celebrate their 
 heroes, their statesmen, and their philoso- 
 phers ; but let us, — even though a Chris- 
 tian's taste be derided, — at least take ad- 
 vantage of the rare felicity of the present 
 times of civil liberty, and endeavour, in 
 employing the press, to do some justice 
 to the virtues of men, who, while they 
 lived, " set their affections on things 
 above," and who, after death, according 
 to modern sentiments of worth and excel- 
 lence, — are almost, assigned to contempt- 
 uous oblivion And, may their me- 
 morial be blessed forever! ! 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 CYPRIAN COMPARED WITH ORIGEN. 
 
 The east and the west beheld at the 
 same time these two men, in talents, ac- 
 tivity, and attainments much superior to 
 the rest of the Christian world. The 
 Roman seems, beyond contradiction, to 
 have much excelled the Grecian in those 
 things in which true Christian virtue 
 consists ; yet as the latter, by the fruits 
 of his life, — though they were miserably 
 tarnished and clouded by a depraved phi- 
 losophy,— still claims a just place amon,g 
 saints, it may answer some valuable pur- 
 pose, not impertinent to the design of 
 this History, to compare, in several par- 
 ticulars, the respective endowments, de- 
 fects, and excellences of these extraordi- 
 nary men. 
 
 1. There may have been as pious and 
 holy men as Cyprian, in the interval of 
 time between the Apostles and him, but 
 we have no opportunity of knowing any 
 other Christian so well. The distinct 
 particularity of the accounts concerning 
 him makes his character remarkably de- 
 serving of our attention. The dealings 
 of God with a sinner, at his first conver- 
 sion, often give a strong tincture to the 
 whole future life. Cyprian was intend- 
 ed for very great and important services 
 in the Church; and, those — of an active 
 nature, and attended with an almost un- 
 interrupted series of sufferings; — such as 
 no man could perform to the glory of 
 God, but one, who knew assuredly the 
 ground on which he stood, by a strong 
 work of the Divine Spirit on his soul. 
 His experience in conversion he himself 
 describes in his letter to Donatus. — His 
 reception of Christianity was not the ef- 
 fect of mere reasoning or speculation. It 
 was not carried on in a scholastic or phi- 
 losophical manner, but may truly be said 
 to have been " in the demonstration of 
 the Spirit and of power." He felt the 
 doctrines of the Gospel, — namely, the 
 
 of God ; forofiveness of sins 
 
 by 
 
 the 
 
 grace 
 
 Jesus Christ; and Ihe inflixence of 
 Holy Ghost, — powerful, exuberant, and 
 victorious. His soul was brought into 
 the love of God, and that of the purest 
 kind, tempered ever with humility and 
 godly fear : and it is evident — that he al- 
 ways saw the work to be of God, and 
 - Acts of his Martyrdom. Passion of Cy- beheld nothing in himself as wise, holy, 
 
 prianin Pam. Puntius's Life of Cyprian, aatl | and glormus ;^ and that a, spmt of thank- 
 
 Fleury's History. 
 
 I fulness for redeeming love, of simple de- 
 
216 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV.. 
 
 pendence on the divine promises, and of 
 steady charity to God and man, was the 
 result. His race was of no long duration ; 
 only about twelve years ; and by far the 
 greater part of the time he was bishop of 
 Carthage. He lived a Christian life; 
 and no part of it was exempt from much 
 labour or much affliction. He seems 
 never to have known what it was to set- 
 tle into a lukewarm state. The fire 
 which was first kindled in him, burnt se- 
 rene and steady to the end of his days. — 
 I am aware that Mosheim charges him 
 with an ambitious, domineering spirit, 
 that invaded the rights of the lower cler- 
 gy and people.* But I take the liberty 
 of assuring the cautious reader, that this 
 excellent and very judicious secular 
 historian, is not to be trusted in his ac- 
 counts of men of real holiness. From 
 the most attentive review which I have 
 been able to make of the character of the 
 African prelate, by a repeated perusal of 
 the existing evidence, especially his epis- 
 tles, I cannot see any thing on which to 
 ground such a censure. He did nothing, 
 in general, without the clergy and peo- 
 ple. He was ever sedulous in promoting 
 the good of the whole. The episcopal 
 authority was, in his time, at no very 
 blameable height in the Church : never- 
 theless, through the gradual growth of 
 superstition, it was, naturally, advancing 
 to an excess of dignity; and it is not to 
 be denied that some few expressions sa- 
 vouring of haughtiness and asperity are 
 to be found in the writings of Cyprian. — 
 But these few expressions were evident- 
 ly the effect of particular provocation ; — 
 nor is there the least evidence that am- 
 bition was his vice. Candour would 
 rather say, he was, in general, influenced 
 by a very fervent zeal, supported in its 
 exertions by a temper remarkably active 
 and sanguine. But whoever looks into 
 the original records with an expectation 
 of finding any thing selfish, proud or 
 domineering in his general conduct, will 
 be disappointed; and, on the contrary, 
 will be struck with the steady tenor of 
 gentleness, charity, and humility. In 
 fine, if he had not been a Christian, one 
 might have held him forth to the world 
 as a GREAT man;— if it be the part of a 
 great man to unite, in a large and capaci- 
 ous mind, many virtues, and each of them 
 in a high degree of perfection; — virtues 
 too, which are opposite in their nature, 
 
 * Eccles. History, Century III. Chap. 2. 
 
 and which rarely meet in firm consistence 
 in the same subject; — for example, vig- 
 our and mildness, magnanimity and mer- 
 cy, fortitude and prudence, warmth of 
 temper and accuracy of judgment, and, 
 above all, — zeal and discretion. 
 
 In Origen's conversion we see nothing 
 remarkable. He received Christianity in 
 a way of education, rather than by quick, 
 lively, and decisive operations of the Holy 
 Spirit. It is not usual with God to make 
 use of SUCH persons for extraordinary ser- 
 vices, like those for which Cyprian, in 
 the prime of life, appears to have been 
 selected from the world. Origen's views 
 of the peculiar truths of Christianity were, 
 — to say no more, too faint and general; 
 — nor ever sufficiently distinguished 
 from moral and philosophical religion. 
 He bore persecution, when young, with 
 much zeal and honesty; but he lived 
 many years in peace and prosperity. 
 Much respected and sought after by phi- 
 losophers, highly esteemed and honoured 
 by courts and by the great, he lived a 
 scholastic rather than an active life in the 
 Church ; always fully employed indeed, 
 but more like a man of letters than a min- 
 ister of the Gospel ; ever bent on pro- 
 motingr truth and holiness so far as he 
 knew them ; but always leaving one's 
 mind dissatisfied on account of the defec- 
 tiveness of his views. His last scenes 
 are the most satisfactory and the most 
 decisively Christian. He suffered per- 
 secution with the patience and honesty 
 of a martyr; and proved indeed whose 
 disciple he was on the whole. Mosheim 
 charges him with dishonesty in his argu- 
 ments against Celsus; and says, that 
 any one that has penetration and judg- 
 ment may discern it.* It would have 
 been more to the purpose to have pointed 
 out the instances of dishonest argumen- 
 tation, which he alludes to. My exami- 
 nation of the tract in question induces me 
 to dissent from this learned historian ; 
 and further, I am convinced that great 
 uprightness of mind was a ruling feature 
 in Origen's character. — But it is not the 
 practice of modern writers to be candid 
 in their judgment of the ancient Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 After this general review of these two 
 men, and, after it has been admitted that 
 integrity and fairness of mind were pos- 
 sessed by both in a very great degree, it 
 
 * Mosheim's Eccl. History, Century HI. 
 Chap. 3. 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 CYPRIAN AND ORIGEN. 
 
 217 
 
 may be natural to ask — In what consisted 
 the superior excellence of Cyprian ] — 
 The general answer to such an inquiry is 
 — The manner of their first conversion 
 has appeared to have been strikingly dif- 
 ferent in the two cases; and still more 
 so — The work of God upon their hearts 
 afterwards. — But besides this, — 
 
 2. Cyprian was possessed of a simpli- 
 city of TASTE to which Origen seems 
 ever to have been a stranger. By sim- 
 plicity oftaste I mean here a genuine and 
 unadulterated relish for the doctrine and 
 spirit of the Christian religion, just as it 
 stands in its real nature. It is possible 
 for a person very eminent in this gift, — 
 which is purely divine and spiritual,— to 
 be, in no way, remarkable for his know- 
 ledge of evangelical truth : In respect of 
 knowledge he may not much exceed 
 another who is far his inferior in the for- 
 mer grace of the Spirit: The light and 
 means of information are very dillerent in 
 different ages of the Church ; and it is 
 evident that the third century suffered a 
 decline in illumination. But where a 
 man is deficient in knowledge, yet if his 
 simplicity of Christian taste be very 
 great, he will be silent on those subjects 
 which he does not understand, or at least 
 he will be extremely cautious in opposing 
 any part of divine truth. This was Cy- 
 prian's case. He appears not, for in- 
 stance, to have understood the doctrine 
 of the election of grace. Since Justin's 
 days the knowledge of that article of faith 
 was departing from the Church. — But. 
 he opposed it not. — Origen, less humble 
 and less submissive to divine instruction 
 and feeling more resources in his reason 
 ing powers, dares to oppose it by a con 
 trary statement.* 
 
 In Cyprian this simplicity appears in 
 a supreme degree. He never trifles with 
 Scripture, or sets up his reason against it. 
 Unencumbered with the apparatus of 
 Grecian philosophy, and possessed of 
 what is much better, — plain good sense, 
 he takes, always, the words of Scripture 
 in their obvious, and most natural mean- 
 ing ; and thinks he has sufficiently proved 
 his point, when he has supported it by 
 an apposite quotation. His humble spirit 
 bows to the divine word : and hence, 
 faith, patience, charity, heavenly-mind- 
 edness, have full dominion in his soul ; 
 and hence also, his sentiments have i 
 strength, a purity, a perspicuity, pecu- 
 
 liarly the property of those whose reli- 
 gious taste is altogether scriptural. Here 
 it is that Cyprian and Origen are diame- 
 trically opposite to each other. The lat- 
 ter is full of endless allegorical interpre- 
 tations, and of platonic notions concern- 
 ing the soul of the world, the transmigra- 
 tioii of spirits, free-will, and the pre-ex- 
 istence of souls. The first and simple 
 sense of Scripture he too often ventures 
 to reject entirely.* David's sin in the 
 affair of Uriah he cannot admit. It seems, 
 he had not such strong and palpable 
 proof of his own innate depravity, as to 
 suppose it possible for so good a man to 
 fall so foully. He has recourse, there- 
 fore, to a hidden and abstruse sense. His 
 numberless comments on Scripture con- 
 stitute a system of fanciful allegory, 
 which pervades the whole of the sacred 
 oracles : The just and plain sense is much 
 neglected; and the whole is covered 
 with thick clouds of mysticism and chi- 
 merical philosophy. He labours, it is 
 true, to support the faith, which was once 
 delivered to the saints ; but, like his pla- 
 tonic master, Ammonius, he introduces 
 
 large quantities of figurative trash, which 
 wifl not incorporate with Christian doc- 
 trine. — Thus, by accommodating his in- 
 terpretations to the then reigning literary 
 taste, he gained to himself, indeed, a 
 celebrity of character among the heathen, 
 even among the great and noble, but 
 threw all things into inextricable ambi- 
 guity. — His quickness of parts and his 
 superior ingenuity served only to entan- 
 gle him more effectually, and to enable 
 him to move in the chaos of his own for- 
 mation with an ease and rapidity that ren- 
 dered him unconscious of the difficulties 
 in which he had involved himself. 
 
 One remarkable consequence of this 
 difference of character was, that while 
 Origen, among the Pagans, succeeded in 
 gaining the favour of the great, and was 
 heard by them with patience, Cyprian 
 could not be endured in his preaching or 
 writings, — except by real Christians. — 
 Another consequence is this, — It is no 
 easy thing to vindicate the soundness of 
 the former in Christian principles :— The 
 latter challenges the severest scrutiny. — 
 He is christian throughout. 
 
 Such is the difference between a man 
 of simplicity and a man of philosophy 
 and religion ; and the mind, on this oc- 
 casion, is led to compare the effect of a 
 
 -Vol. I. 
 
 Philocalia xxi. 
 T 
 
 Philoc. Chap. 1. page 20. 
 
218 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV- 
 
 philosophical and of a philological spirit. 
 Origen had the former, Cyprian the lat- 
 ter. Eloquence was his distinguishing 
 accomplishment; and he possessed all 
 the powers of it in a very high degree, 
 according to the taste of the age, — which 
 was far from being the best. And here, 
 I would hnmbly submit to the considera- 
 tion of the pious and well-disposed, — 
 whether the knowledge of grammar, his- 
 tory, criticism, and of oratory, theoretical 
 and practical, properly regulated by com- 
 mon sense and in subordination to divine 
 grace, be not much less dangerous, and, 
 in their way, more useful endowments 
 for a minister of Christ, than deep re- 
 searches into philosophy of any kind 1 — 
 Far, very far, from meaning to insinuate 
 that the studies of metaphysics and of 
 natural philosophy should be entirely ex- 
 cluded from the education of persons, 
 who mean to be pastors, — I would be 
 understood to suggest, — that a less pro- 
 portion of THESE, and a greater proportion 
 of THOSE than what agrees with the pre- 
 sent fashionable taste, might be more 
 advantageous to the Church. The rea- 
 soning powers might find in the for- 
 mer an useful exercise and improvement, 
 without the same danger of presump- 
 tion which so strongly adheres to the lat- 
 ter.* 
 
 3. Having compared the lives and the 
 tempers of these men, let us now view the 
 PRINCIPLES of each. Of Cyprian, after 
 the many quotations already given from 
 his writings little need be added. Never- 
 theless, as it has lain more in our way to 
 consider him as addressing Christians 
 than pagans or infidels, I shall select a 
 letter of his to Demetrian, a persecutor of 
 Christians in Africa, in which his manner 
 of preaching to men altogether profane 
 and unconverted is observable. 
 
 He denounces to them the plain threat- 
 enings of eternal punishment. " There 
 remains hereafterf an eternal prison, con- 
 stant flame, and perpetual punishment. 
 There the groans of suppliants will not 
 he heard, because here they disregarded 
 the terror of God's indignation," He 
 bids them solemnly look into themselves, 
 and appeals to the conscience as affording 
 
 * These sentiments are certainly favoured 
 by the conijiarison of Cyprian and Origen. — 
 It is true, lliis is only a single instance of such 
 comparison : — l)ut, I believe, it will be very 
 difficult to find examples of a contrary ten- 
 dency, t Pam. ad Demetrian. 
 
 full proof of guilt before God. And he 
 aggravates the charge of condemnation, 
 because, amidst the miseries of the times, 
 men did not repent. After exposing the 
 folly of idolatry, and exhibiting, in lively 
 colours, the all-important scenes of the 
 last judgment, he concludes with this 
 Christian exhortation, which is intro- 
 duced in the true taste and order of things, 
 after he had first denounced the terrors of 
 the law. " Provide then for your secu- 
 rity and life, while you may. We oflfer 
 you the most salutary counsel ; and be- 
 cause we are forbidden to hate you or to 
 requite evil, we exhort you, while there 
 is time, to please God and to emerge from 
 the profound night of superstition into the 
 fair light of true religion. We envy not 
 your advantages, nor do we hide the di- 
 vine benefits. We return good will for 
 your hatred ; and, for the torments and 
 punishments, which are inflicted upon us, 
 we show you the paths of salvation. — 
 Believe, and live ; and do ye, who perse- 
 cute us for a time, rejoice with us for ever. 
 When you depart hence, there will be no 
 room for repentance : no method of being 
 reconciled to God : here, eternal life is 
 either lost or secured ; here, by the wor- 
 ship of God and the fruit of faith, ])rovi- 
 siou is made for eternal salvation : and let 
 no man be retarded, either by his sins or 
 by his years, from coming to obtain it. 
 No repentance is too late, while a man 
 remains in this world. 
 
 " An access lies open to the grace of 
 God ; and, to those, who seek and under- 
 stand the truth, the access is easy. Even, 
 in the very exit of life, pray for remission 
 of sins, and implore the only living and 
 true God with confession and faith : Par- 
 don is granted to him who confesses his 
 sin ; and saving grace from the divine 
 goodness is conferred on the believer ; 
 and, thus may a man pass from death to 
 immortality in his very last moments. 
 By subduing death through the trophy of 
 his cross, by redeeming the believer with 
 the price of his blood, by reconciling man 
 to God the Father, and by quickening the 
 dead with celestial regeneration, Christ 
 imparts to us these great mercies. Him, 
 if it be possible, let us all follow ; — let 
 us be baptized in his name. He opens 
 to us the way of life ; he brings us back 
 to paradise. He leads us to the heavenly 
 kingdom : and we shall always live with 
 him. By him made sons of God, we 
 shall rejoice with him for ever : Redeem- 
 ed by his blood, we shall be Christians 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 CYPRIAN AND ORIGEN. 
 
 219 
 
 with Christ in glory : we shall be the 
 blessed of God the Father; and shall 
 give him thanks to all eternity. — Tlie 
 man, who was obnoxious to death, and 
 has been made a sure j)artaker of immor- 
 tality, cannot but be tilled with joy and 
 gratitude for evermore." 
 
 With sucli an affectionate spirit, and 
 with such clearness of doctrine did Cy- 
 prian preach justification, by faith onlv, 
 to the unconverted. It must not be denied, 
 — that, in his address to men, who had 
 already " tasted that the Lord is graci- 
 ous," there is not the same evangelical 
 purity. In his treatise on Good Works, 
 he says very excellent things on the duty 
 of alms-frivintj: but he sometimes uses 
 language that might easily be construed 
 into the language of merit ; and as he 
 had not learnt to distinguish the Apocry- 
 pha from the Old Testament, he supports 
 his ideas with quotations from Tobit and 
 Ecclesiasticus. We have had, — what 
 he had not, — an experience of the evil 
 tendency of any expressions, which, 
 in the smallest degree, countenance the 
 supposition of the efficacy of Imman 
 WORKS in washing away the pollution of 
 sin, whether contracted before or after 
 baptism. We know too, from the de- 
 pendence on the divine grace and on the 
 Spirit's illumination, which Cyprian and 
 many other fathers of the same stamp 
 habitually exeicised, — besides the tes- 
 timony of their holy lives, — that the same 
 expressions mean not with them what 
 they do in the mouths of moderns, who 
 too often appear to be full of self-righte- 
 ousness and of contempt both of the grace 
 of Christ and of the work of the Holy 
 Ghost. We are sure, that the former 
 mean no opposition to the free gift of 
 God, because they are humble : whereas, 
 it is but too evident that the latter do, — 
 because they are proud, and scorn the 
 whole work of the Spirit of God in the 
 formation of the new creature. It had 
 been well, however, if holy men had 
 never given a handle to the profane to 
 adulterate the doctrines of the Gospel. 
 But I have before observed, that Cyprian's 
 views of grace were not equally clear 
 with those of the first Christians: Yet, 
 in every fundamental principle, he speaks 
 as the Oracles of God ; and in his ad- 
 dresses to Pagans, Christians, or Jews, 
 he is alway? fervent and zealous. His 
 tract on Patience, as a practical perform- 
 ance, and that on the Lord's Prayer, as a 
 doctrinal one, deserve the highest praise. 
 
 In general, his works are excellent in 
 their kind, and he must have a poor taste 
 indeed in godliness who will not find the 
 perusal of them refreshing to his soul. 
 Nevertheless, Cyprian shines much more 
 in practical than in speculative divinity. 
 The shortness of his Christian life and 
 the pressure of his employments will 
 easily account for this. 
 
 I wish it were as easy to clear the doc- 
 trinal character of Origen from reproach. 
 The ancients themselves were much di- 
 vided in their views of his opinion con- 
 cerning the Son of God. It is certain 
 that the Arians of the fourth century 
 seemed to receive some countenance from 
 him ; and men who had so very little as- 
 sistance from precedents, were glad to 
 catch at the shadow of an argument drawn 
 from his illustrious name. — But what, if 
 his Arianism were indeed full and con- 
 fessed on all hands, — What would such 
 a fact avail as an argument, — I say, not 
 an-ainst the Scriptures, — but against the 
 joint consent of the whole Church for 
 three hundred years ? Even the very op- 
 position made against his character by 
 many, shows how zealous the Church 
 had ever been in the defence of the doc- 
 trine of the Trinity. — Here is open a wide 
 field of controversy ; but little profit is to 
 be expected from traversing it. — The 
 writings of Origen against Celsus, in 
 which he ably defends Christianity 
 against philosophy and paganism, and 
 the Philocalia of the same author, furnish 
 sufficiently decisive passages against 
 Arian tenets, — if they were not embar- 
 rassed by others of a more doubtful cast. 
 
 It is probable, however, that one who 
 thought so rapidly, wrote so much, and 
 had his eyes so steadily fixed on his phi- 
 losophy, must have dropped many things, 
 which he would not have seriously main- 
 tained if he had ever carefully reviewed 
 them. That he never meant to hold any 
 thing different from the orthodox creed, 
 may be inferred from the pains which he 
 took against heretics, as well as from his 
 general character. Some, therefore, of 
 his indefensible sentences ought to be 
 considered as containing queries and con- 
 jectures rather than settled opinions. 
 Athanasius must be allowed to have been 
 a judge of this matter; and he believed 
 him to be sound, and quoted his writings 
 to prove our Lord's co-eternity and co- 
 essentiality with the Father. And he, 
 likewise, observes — that what things Ori- 
 gen wrote by way of controversy and dis- 
 
220 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 putation are not to be looked on as his 
 own sentiments.* 
 
 After all, the best defence of this great 
 man consists in the general holiness of 
 his life, and in his patient suffering for 
 the faith of Christ in old age : And I re- 
 joice that, amidst all the trash with which 
 his writings abound, we have yet this 
 unquestionable testimony — that he kept 
 the commandments of God, and had the 
 faith of Jesus. The loss of his volumin- 
 ous commentaries, and of his other nu- 
 merous works, is, perhaps, not much to be 
 regretted. There are two sentencesf in 
 them which merit particular attention. 
 He thus speaks on the words, Rom. iii. 
 " we conclude, that a man is justified by 
 
 faith," &C. THE JUSTIFICATION OF FAITH 
 ONLY IS sufficient; so THAT IF ANY PER- 
 SON ONLY BELIEVE, HE MAY BE JUSTIFIED, 
 THOUGH NO GOOD WORK HATH BEEN FUL- 
 FILLED BY him;" — and again, on the case 
 of the penitent thief, "he was justified 
 by faith without the works of the law ; 
 because, concerning these, the Lord did 
 not inquire what he had done before ; 
 neither did he stay to ask what work he 
 was purposing to perform after he had 
 believed ; — but, the man being justified 
 by his confession only, Jesus, who was 
 going to paradise, toolc him as a compa- 
 nion, and carried him there." 
 
 Thus, the precious doctrine of justifi- 
 cation, though much sullied and covered 
 with rubbish, was yet alive, in the third 
 century, even in the faith of the most du- 
 bious characters among the Anti-Nicene 
 fathers. This it was that kept Origen, 
 with all " his hay and stubble,":)^ firm on 
 Christian foundations, and distinguished 
 him radically from an adversary of Christ. 
 
 4. If we compare the public life of 
 these two men, the Grecian shines in a 
 scholastic, the Roman in a pastoral capa- 
 city. Origen appears as an author, and 
 moves in a sphere calculated for the learn- 
 ed. Cyprian is a preacher, and, like the 
 Apostles, addresses equally all sorts of 
 men. The latter, on account of the pride 
 of corrupt nature, was most likely to be 
 regarded by the poor : He valued not re- 
 finement of composition : His aim was to 
 reach the heart and the conscience, and 
 to reduce every religious consideration to 
 real practice. Origen, however, was use- 
 fully employed in untying knotty specu- 
 
 * Cave's Life of Origen. 
 •}• See Bisliop Bevei-idge on the Articles of 
 tlie Church of England. 
 + I Cor. iii. 12. 
 
 lations, in refuting heresies, and in recom- 
 mending Christianity, or something like 
 Christianity, to the learned world. No 
 doubt, his labours would be of some ad- 
 vantage amidst the mischief which the 
 accommodating scheme produced ; but 
 the pastoral exhortations of Cyprian, as 
 they Avould not be received at all by pre- 
 judiced philosophers, so, where they were 
 received,lefteffects ofunadulterated piety, 
 through the divine influence that attended 
 them. As a Christian bishop, scarcely 
 any age has seen his superior in activity, 
 disinterestedness, and steady attention to 
 discipline. He was equally remote from 
 the extremes of negligent remissness, 
 and impracticable severity : and he pos- 
 sessed a charity and a patience unwearied, 
 and ever consistent. He may safely be 
 recommended as a model to all pastors, 
 and particularly to those of rank ^nd dig- 
 nity throughout Christendom. Whoever 
 feels a desire to serve God in the most ar- 
 duous and the most important of all pro- 
 fessions, may profitably, — next after the 
 study of the sacred oracles, give days and 
 nights to Cyprian's writings. — All his 
 geuine compositions, — if you except his 
 correspondence and controversy with vSte- 
 phen of Rome, — deserve a diligent peru- 
 sal ; yet no man must be expected to 
 relish them thoroughly, unless he himself 
 has experienced the new birth unto right- 
 eousness. A truly regenerated person 
 will not only relish them, but also will 
 not fail to be affected with a generous 
 glow of the purest godliness, upon read- 
 ing them with care and attention. — The 
 frequency of such bishops in Europe is 
 devoutly to be wished ! What avail good 
 sense, taste, learning, without Christian 
 simplicity — and a heart above the world, 
 its flatteries or its frowns ! — Contemplate 
 — study the character of the prelate of 
 Carthage, and you will learn what Chris- 
 tian bishops once were, and what they 
 still ought to be. 
 
 5. But thechiefpointof view in which 
 the contrast between these two persons is 
 most striking, is in the consequences and 
 fruits of their labours and their writings. 
 Before Cyprian's time, Africa appears to 
 have been in no very flourishing state 
 with respect to Christianity. Within 
 twelve years he was the instrument of 
 most material service in recovering many 
 apostates, in reforming discipline, and in 
 reviving the essence of godliness. His 
 example was most powerful and effectual 
 among them for ages. The honours paid 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 221 
 
 to his memory demonstrate this : More- 
 over, it is certain, that his diocese, once 
 the scene of Punic greatness, continued, 
 long after, one of the most precious gar- 
 dens of Christianity, as I shall have 
 abundant occasion to show in the course 
 of this History, — if I should be permitted 
 to continue it. — But the mischiefs of Ori- 
 gen's taste and spirit in religion were in- 
 expressible. — Talents and learning are 
 coveted by mankind ; he, however, who 
 possesses much of them, has the more 
 abundant need to learn humility and di- 
 vine caution. For, if he do not evidently 
 benefit mankind by them, he is in danger 
 of doing much mischief. No man, not 
 altogether unsound and hypocritical, ever 
 injured the Church of Christ more than 
 Origen did. From the fanciful mode of 
 allegory, introduced by him and uncon- 
 trolled by Scriptural rule and order, arose 
 a vitiated method of commenting on the 
 sacred pages ; which has been succeeded 
 by the contrary extreme — namely, a con- 
 tempt of types and figures altogether ; 
 and, in a similar way, his fanciful ideas 
 of LETTER and SPIRIT tended to remove 
 from men's minds all just conceptions of 
 genuine spiritualit}'. — A thick mist for 
 ages pervaded the Christian world, sup- 
 ported and strengthened by his absurd 
 allegorical manner of interpretation. The 
 learned alone were considered as guides 
 implicitly to be followed ; and the vulgar, 
 — when the literal sense was hissed off the 
 stage, — had nothing to do but to follow 
 their authority wherever it might conduct 
 them. — It was not till the days of Luther 
 and iMelancthon, that this evil was fairly 
 and successfully opposed. 
 
 If I have carried the parallel to a greater 
 length than the just laws of history allow, 
 the importance of the case is my apology. 
 Let the whole be attentivelj'' weighed by 
 the serious reader, in connexion with two 
 passages of St. Paul : the first of which 
 is, — " I am jealous over you with a godly 
 jealousy, lest your minds be corru]Ued 
 from the simplicity that is in Christ ;" — 
 and the second — " Hath not God made 
 foolish the wisdom of this world V 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 ».». 
 
 OTHER PARTICULARS OF VALERIAN S 
 PERSECUTION. 
 
 It has been already mentioned, that Cy- 
 
 priein heard of the death of Sixtus, bishop of 
 
 t2 
 
 Rome, a little before his own martyrdom. 
 In pursuance of the cruel orders of Valeri- 
 an, for carrying on the persecution, that 
 prelate had been seized with some of his 
 clergy. While they were carrying him to 
 execution, Laurentius, his chief deacon, 
 followed him weeping,and said, "Whither 
 goest thou. Father, without thy son ]" 
 Sixtus said, " You shall follow me in 
 three days." We may suppose him to 
 have been possessed with the spirit of 
 prophecj;- in saying this, because we are 
 certain that miraculous gifts were as yet 
 by no means extinct in the Church : But, 
 perhaps, the declaration was not out of 
 the reach of common sagacity from the 
 circumstances of affairs. 
 
 After Sixtus's death,* the Prefect of 
 Rome, moved by an idle report of the im- 
 mense riches of the Roman Church, sent 
 for Laurentius, and ordered him to deliver 
 them up. Laurentius replied, " Give me 
 a little time to set every thing in order, 
 and to take an account of each particular." 
 The Prefect granted him three days time. 
 In that space Laurentius collected all the 
 Poor who were supported by the Roman 
 Church, and going to the Prefect, said, 
 " Come, behold the riches of our God; 
 you shall see a large court full of golden 
 vessels." The Prefect followed him, but 
 seeing all the poor people, he turned to 
 Laurentius with looks full of anger. 
 " What are you displeased atl" said the 
 martyr ? — " The gold, you so eagerly de- 
 sire, is but a vile metal taken out of the 
 earth, and serves as an incitement to all 
 sorts of crimes : the true gold is that 
 Light whose disciples these poor men are. 
 The misery of their bodies is an advan- 
 tage to their souls : Sin is the real disease 
 of mankind : The great ones of the earth 
 are the truly poor and contemptible. 
 These are the treasures which I promised 
 you ; to which I will add precious stones. 
 — Behold these virgins and widows ; they 
 are the Church's crown; make use of 
 these riches for the advantage of Rome, 
 of the emperor, and of yourself." 
 
 Doubtless, if the Prefect's mind had 
 been at all disposed to receive an instruc- 
 tive lesson, he would have met with one 
 here. The liberality of Christians in 
 maintaining a great number of objects, 
 and in looking for no recompence but 
 that which shall take place at the resur- 
 rection of the just, while they patientl)' 
 bore affliction, and humbly rested on an 
 
 * Aug. Vol. 9. p. 52.— See Fleury, B. 7. 
 
232 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XVI. 
 
 unseen Saviour, was perfectly agreeable 
 to the mind of him, who bids his disci- 
 ples, in a well-known parable, to relieve 
 those who cannot recompense them.* 
 How glorious was this scene ! at a time 
 when the rest of the world were tearing 
 one another in pieces, and when philoso- 
 phers made not the slightest attempts to 
 alleviate the miseries of their fellow- 
 creatures ! — But, as the persecutors would 
 not hear the doctrines explained, so nei- 
 ther would they see the precepts exempli- 
 fied with patience. " Do ye mock me?" 
 cries the Prefect ; " I know, ye value 
 yourselves for contemning death, and 
 therefore ye shall not die at once." Then 
 he caused Laurentius to be stripped, ex- 
 tended, and fastened to a gridiron, and, 
 in that manner, to be broiled to death by 
 a slow fire. When he had continued a 
 considerable time with one side to the fire, 
 he said to the Prefect, " Let me be turned, 
 I am sufficiently broiled on one side." 
 And when they had turned him, he looked 
 up to heaven and prayed for the conver- 
 sion of Rome; and then gave up the 
 ghost ! 
 
 I give this story at some length, be- 
 cause it has sufficient marks of credibili- 
 ty, and is supported by the evidence of 
 Augustine. — I am not disposed to follow 
 rieury in various other narratives. In 
 subjects of martyrology this author seems 
 directly opposite to our countryman Gib- 
 bon. Whatever judgment these histo- 
 rians possessed, remained, in this matter, 
 equally unexercised by both. Indiscrimi- 
 nate incredulity is as blind as indiscrimi- 
 nate belief. — I may not always succeed, 
 but I certainly endeavour to separate truth 
 from fiction, and neither to impose on my 
 readers nor myself. 
 
 At Ceesarea, in Cappadocia, a child, 
 named Cyril, sho\ved uncommon forti- 
 tude. He called on the name of Jesus 
 Christ continually, nor could threats or 
 blows prevent him from openly avowing 
 Christianity. — Several children of the 
 same ao"e persecuted him; and his own 
 father, with the applauses of many per- 
 sons for his zeal in the support of pagan- 
 ism, drove him out of his house. The 
 judge ordered him to be brought before 
 him, and said, " My child, I will pardon 
 your faults ; and your father shall receive 
 you again: It is in your power to enjoy 
 your father's estate, provided you are 
 wise, and take care of your own interest." 
 
 » Luke xiv. 12—15. 
 
 "I rejoice to bear your reproaches," re- 
 plied the child ; — " God will receive me : 
 I am not sorry that I am expelled out of 
 our house : I shall have a better mansion : 
 I fear not death, because it will introduce 
 me into a better life." Divine Grace 
 having enabled him to witness this good 
 confession, he was ordered to be bound 
 and led, as it were, to execution. The 
 judge had given secret orders to bring 
 him back again, hoping that the sight of 
 the fire might overcome his resolution. 
 Cyril remained inflexible. The humanity 
 of the judge induced him still to continue 
 his remonstrances. " Your fire and your 
 sword," says the young martyr, "are 
 insignificant. I go to a better house ; I 
 go to more excellent riches : Dispatch 
 me presently, that I may enjoy them." 
 The spectators wept through compassion. 
 " Ye should rather rejoice," says he, " in 
 conducting me to punishment. Ye know 
 not what a city I am going to inhabit, nor 
 what is my hope." Thus he went to his 
 death, and was the admiration of the 
 whole city. — Such an example illustrates 
 well that Scripture, — " Out of the mouths 
 of babes and sucklings thou hast ordained 
 strength." 
 
 There were at Antioch a presbyter and 
 a layman, the former named Sapricius, 
 the latter Nicephorus, who, through some 
 misunderstanding, after a remarkable inti- 
 macy, became so completely estranged, 
 that they would not even salute each 
 other in the street. Nicephorus after a 
 time relented, begged forgiveness of his 
 fault, and took repeated measures to pro- 
 cure reconciliation,— but in vain. He 
 even ran to the house of Sapricius, and 
 throwinghimself athisfeet, entreated his 
 forgiveness for the Lord's sake; — the 
 presbyter continued obstinate. 
 
 In this situation of things the persecu- 
 tion of Valerian reached them suddenly. 
 Sapricius was carried before the governor, 
 and ordered to sacrifice in obedience to 
 the edicts of the emperors. " We Chris- 
 tians," replied Sapricius, " acknowledge 
 for our King Jesus Christ, who is the 
 true God, and the Creator of heaven and 
 earth. — Perish idols, which can do nei- 
 ther good nor harm !" The Prefect tor- 
 mented him a long time, and then cona- 
 manded that he should be beheaded. Ni- 
 cephorus, hearing of this, runs up to hina, 
 as he is led to execution, and renews in 
 vain the same supplications. The execu- 
 tioners deride his humility as perfect folly. 
 But he perseveres, and attends Sapricius 
 
Cbkt. III.] 
 
 UNDER VALERIAN. 
 
 223 
 
 to the place of execution. There he says 
 further, It is written, " Ask, and it shall 
 be given you." — But, not even the men- 
 tion of the word of God itself, so suitable 
 to Sapricius's own circumstances, could 
 affect his obstinate and unforgiving tem- 
 per. 
 
 Sapricius, however, suddenly forsaken 
 of God, recants, and promises to sacrifice. 
 Nicephorus, amazed, exhorts him to the 
 g . .. contrary, but in vain. He, 
 
 recaiiis"* then, says to the execution- 
 ers, " I believe in the name 
 of the Lord Jesus Christ whom he hath 
 renounced." The officers return to give 
 an account to the governor, who ordered 
 Nicephorus to be beheaded.* 
 
 The account ends here : — but if Sapri- 
 cius lived to repent, as I hope he did, he 
 mig-ht learn what a danjjerous thinof it is 
 for a miserable mortal, whose sufficiency 
 and perseverance rest entirely on Divine 
 Grace, to despise, condemn, or exult over 
 his brother. The last became the first : 
 — and God showed his people wonder- 
 fully by this case, that he will support 
 them in their sufferings for his name ; but 
 that, at the same time, he would have 
 them to be humble, meek, and forgiving. 
 This is the first instance I have seen of a 
 man attempting to suffer for Christ on 
 PHILOSOPHICAL grouuds ; — and it failed : 
 Self-sufficiency and pure Christianity are, 
 in their nature, distinct and opposite : — 
 Let no man attempt to unite or mix to- 
 gether such heterogeneous and jarring 
 principles. 
 
 It appears that Christian fortitude is a 
 very different thing from the steady pride 
 of a philosopher, or the sullen patience of 
 an Indian; and, that it cannot even sub- 
 sist in the absence of Christian meekness 
 and charity. — Philosophers and savages 
 without the least supernatural help, have 
 frequently maintained a hardy and un- 
 conquerable spirit. But, the event of this 
 story may teach the infidel, — that he has 
 no reason to exult in such instances, — 
 that the spirit of suffering for Christ is, 
 in its kind, a quite different thing, — that 
 it is above mere human nature, — that it is 
 wrought in the heart by divine grace, — 
 and, that it cannot subsist if the Spirit of 
 God be provoked to leave the sufferer. 
 
 Dionysius of Alexandria, whom Divine 
 Providence had so remarkably preserved 
 in the Decian persecution, lived to suffer 
 much also in this — but not to death. Eu- 
 
 • Fleury, Book 7. Acta sincera, 253, 254. 
 
 sebius has preserved some extracts of his 
 writings, which not only prove this fact 
 beyond dispute, but also throw considera- 
 ble light on the effects of Valerian's per» 
 secution in Egypt.* 
 
 This bishop, with his presbyter Maxi- 
 mus, three deacons, and a Roman Chris- 
 tian, was brought before jEmilian the 
 Prefect, and was ordered to recant : At 
 the same time it was observed, that his 
 doing so might have a good effect on 
 others. — He answered, " We ought to 
 obey God rather than man ; I worship 
 God, who alone ought to be worshipped." 
 "Hear the clemency of the emperor," 
 says ^milian : "You are all pardoned, 
 provided you return to a natural duty : — 
 Adore the gods who guard the empire, 
 and forsake thosie things which are con- 
 trary to nature." Dionysius answered, 
 " All men do not worship the same gods, 
 but men worship variously according to 
 their sentiments. But we worship the 
 One God, the maker of all things, who 
 gave the empire to the most clement em- 
 perors Valerian and Gallienus ; and to 
 him we pour out incessant prayers for 
 their prosperous administration." " What 
 can be the meaning," says ^milian, 
 " why ye may not still adore that God of 
 your's, — on supposition that he is a god 
 — in conjunction with our gods ]" Diony- 
 sius answered, — " We worship no other 
 God." 
 
 From this remarkable question of the 
 Prefect, it is evident, that men might 
 have been tolerated in the worship of Je- 
 sus, if they had allowed idolaters also to 
 be right in the main, by associating idols 
 with the true God. The firmness of Chris- 
 tians, in this respect, provoked their ene- 
 mies. The dislike, at this day, of the 
 pure Gospel of Christ, arises from a simi- 
 lar cause : Men are condemned as bigots, 
 because they cannot allow the world at 
 large to be right in the eyes of God. 
 
 iEmilius banished them all to a village 
 near the desert, called Cephro. And 
 thither Dionysius, though sickly, was 
 constrained to depart immediately. " And 
 truly," says Dionysius, " we are not ab- 
 sent from the church : for I still gather 
 such as are in the city as if I were pre- 
 sent : — absent indeed in body, but present 
 in spirit. And there continued with us, 
 in Cephro, a great congregation, partly of 
 the brethren which followed us from Alex- 
 andria, and partly of them which came 
 
 Book 7. Chap. x. 
 
224 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XVI. 
 
 from Egypt. And there God opened a 
 door to me to speak his word. Yet, at 
 the beginning, we suffered persecution 
 and were stoned : hut at length, not a 
 few of the Pagans forsook their idols and 
 were converted. For, here, we had an 
 opportunity to preach the word of God to 
 a people who had never heard it before. 
 And God, that brought us among them, 
 removed us to another place, after our mi- 
 nistry was there completed. As soon as 
 I heard that ^milian had ordered us to 
 depart fromCephro, I undertook my jour- 
 ney cheerfully, though I did not know 
 whitlier we were to go ; but, upon being 
 informed that Colluthio was the place, I 
 felt much distress; because it was re- 
 ported to be a situation destitute of all the 
 comforts of society, exposed to the tumults 
 of travellers, and infested by thieves. 
 My companions well remember the effect 
 this had on my mind. I proclaim my own 
 shame : At first I grieved immoderately. 
 It was a consolation, however, that it was 
 nigh to a city. I was in hopes from the 
 nearness of the city, that we might enjoy 
 the company of dear brethren; and that 
 particular assemblies for divine worship 
 might be established in the suburbs, 
 which indeed came to pass." 
 
 Amidst this scantiness of information 
 
 Caius, and Peter, were separated from 
 the other brethren, and were confined in 
 a dreary part of Libya, distant three days 
 journey from Paraetonium." — Afterwards 
 he says, "There hid themselves in the 
 city some good men who visited the 
 brethren secretly : Among these, Maxi- 
 mus, Dioscorus, Demetrius, and Lucius, 
 were ministers. Two others of greater 
 note, Faustinus and Aquila, now wander, 
 I know not where, in Egypt. All the 
 deacons died of diseases, except Faus- 
 tinus, Eusebius, and Chceremon. God in- 
 structed Eusebius and strengthened him, 
 from the beginning, to minister diligent- 
 ly to the confessors in prison, and to bury 
 the bodies of the holy martyrs : — which, 
 however, he could not do without great 
 danger. The president, to this day, 
 ceases not his cruelty, killing some in- 
 stant, and tearing in pieces others by 
 torments, or consuming them by bonds 
 and imprisonments : He forbids any per- 
 sons to come nigh them ; and inquires 
 daily whether his orders be obeyed — 
 Yet our God still refreshes the afflicted 
 with consolation and with the attendance 
 of the brethren." 
 
 Tiiis Eusebius, — here honourably men- 
 tioned, — was sometime after bishop of 
 Laodicea in Syria; and Maxiinus the 
 
 conveyed in no great perspicuity or beau- presbyter was successor to Dionysius in 
 
 ty of style, it appears, however, that the 
 Lord was with Dionysius, and caused 
 his sufferings to tend to the furtherance 
 of the Gospel. — His confession of his 
 own heaviness of mind does honour to 
 his ingenuousness: and the strength of 
 Christ was made perfect in his weakness. 
 
 In another epistle, he gives a brief ac- 
 count of the afflictions of others. — It de- 
 serves to be transcribed as a monument 
 of the greatness and the violence of Va- 
 lerian's persecution. 
 
 " It may seem superfluous to recite the 
 names of our people : for they were many, 
 and to me unknown. Take this however 
 for certain : There were men and women, 
 young men and old men, virgins and old 
 women, soldiers and vulgar persons, of 
 all sorts and ages. Some, after stripes 
 and fire, were crowned victors : some, im- 
 mediately by the sword, and others, after 
 a short but severe torture, became accep- 
 table sacrifices to the Lord. You all 
 heard how I, and Caius, and Faustus, 
 and Peter, and Paul, when we were led 
 bound by the centurion and his soldiers, 
 were seized by certain men of Mareota, 
 and drawn away by violence. I, and 
 
 was reserved to 
 — a^ain to suffer- 
 
 Alexandria. Faustus 
 the days of Dioclesian- 
 even to blood. 
 
 At Ceesarea in Palestine, Prisons, Mal- 
 cus, and Alexander, were devoured by 
 wild beasts. These persons led an ob- 
 scure life in the country; but hearing of 
 the multitude of executions, they blamed 
 themselves for their sloth; they came to 
 Caesarea; went to the judge, and obtain- 
 ed the object of iheir ambition. — Our di- 
 vine Master, both by precept and exam- 
 ple, condemns such forward zeal ; — which 
 however, in these instances, we trust, 
 was not without a real love of his name. 
 — We have seen abundantly how much 
 like a true disciple of Christ, Cyprian of 
 Carthage conducted himself in these re- 
 spects. — In this same city, there like- 
 wise suffered a woman, who was said to 
 be inclined to the heresy of Marcion ; but, 
 probably, there was not much ground for 
 the report. 
 
 After three years employed in persecu- 
 tion. Valerian was taken prisoner by Sa- 
 por king of Persia, who detained him the 
 rest of his life, and made use of his neck 
 when he mounted his horse ; and at length 
 
Cext. III.] 
 
 REIGN OF GALLIENUS. 
 
 225 
 
 commanded him to be flayed 
 "^?uo'*" and salted. This event be- 
 ^eathby longs rather to secular than 
 Sapor, Church-history: But as it is 
 
 A D 260 perfectly well attested, and as 
 
 no one that I know of, except 
 Mr. Gibbon, ever affected to disbelieve the 
 fact, it cannot but strike the mind of any 
 one who fears God. — Valerian had known 
 and respected the Christians : His perse- 
 cution must have been a sin against the 
 light; and it is common with Divine 
 Providence to punish such daring offen- 
 ces in a very exemplary manner. 
 
 After Valerian's captivity the Church 
 was restored to rest. About the year 
 two hundred and sixty-two, Gallienus, 
 his son and successor, proved a sincere 
 friend to the Christians, though, in other 
 
 respects, no reputable empe- 
 Gallienus ^^^^ g g^jjc^g ^e stopped 
 
 the Chris- persecution; and he had 
 
 tians the condescension to give the 
 
 A n oco bishops his letters of licence 
 
 A. U. 262. ■ , . , , 
 
 to return to their pastoral 
 
 charges. One of these letters, as pre- 
 served by Eusebius, runs thus; — "The 
 emperor Caesar Gallienus, to Dionysius 
 the bishop of Alexandria, and to Pinna 
 and Demetrius, with the rest of the bish- 
 ops. The benefit of our favour we com- 
 mand to be published through the world : 
 and I have, therefore, ordered every one 
 to withdraw from such places as were 
 devoted to religious uses ; so that you 
 may make use of the authority of my 
 edict against any molestation ; for I have, 
 sometime since, granted you my protec- 
 tion : — wherefore, Cyrenius the gover- 
 nor of the province will observe the re- 
 script which I have sent." He directed 
 also another edict to certain bishops, by 
 which he restored to them the places in 
 which they buried their dead. 
 
 Were it needful at this day to refute 
 the rash calumnies of Tacitus and of 
 others against the Christians, one might 
 appeal to these two edicts of Gallienus. 
 It is impossible that either of them could 
 have taken place, if it had not been unde- 
 niable, that the Christians, even to the 
 time beyond the middle of the third cen- 
 tury, were men of probity and worthy of 
 the protection of government. As it is 
 impossible to avoid this conclusion, the 
 deepest stain rests on the characters of 
 Trajan, Decius, and Valerian, men high- 
 ly respected in secular history, for treat- 
 ing their subjects of the best characters 
 with savage ferocity. — But God, who 
 
 has the hearts of all men in his hand, 
 provided for his servants a protector in 
 Gallienus, after an unexampled course of 
 heavy persecution during the three last 
 reigns. — Gallienus himself seems to have 
 been more like a modern than an ancient 
 sovereign ; — a man of taste, indolence, 
 and philosophy ; — disposed to cherish 
 every thing that looked like knowledge 
 and liberty of thinking;— by no means so 
 kind and generous in his constant prac- 
 tice as his profession might seem to 
 promise ; — the slave of his passions, and 
 led away by every sudden feeling that 
 seized his imagination. The Christians 
 appear to have been considered by him as 
 a sect of new philosophers ; and as he 
 judged it improper to persecute philoso- 
 phe'rs of any sort, they found a complete 
 toleration under a prince, whose con- 
 science seems to have been influenced by 
 no religious attachment whatever. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 FROM THE REIGX OF GALLIENUS TO 
 THE END OF THE CENTURY. 
 
 The general history of the Church of 
 Christ, for the remaining forty years of 
 this century, affords no great quantity of 
 materials. After having collected them 
 into this chapter in order, it may be pro- 
 per to reserve, to a distinct consideration, 
 the lives of some particular persons, and 
 other miscellaneous matters, which be- 
 long not to the thread of the narrative._ 
 
 We now behold a new scene : — Chris- 
 tians legally tolerated under a pagan go- 
 vernment for forty years ! — The example 
 of Gallienus was followed by the suc- 
 cessive emperors to the end of the centu- 
 ry : — It was violated only in one instance ; 
 — the effect of which was presently dis- 
 sipated by the hand of Providence. — This 
 new scene did not prove favourable to 
 the growth of grace and holiness. In no 
 period since the Apostles was there ever 
 so great a general decay as in this ; — not 
 even in particular instances, can we dis- 
 cover, during this interval, much of live- 
 ly Christianity. 
 
 Those, however, are not well informed 
 in the nature of the religion of Jesus, 
 who suppose, that, literally, there was 
 no persecution all this time : — True Chris- 
 tians are never without some share of it ; 
 nor is it in the power of the best and the 
 mildest governments to protect men of 
 godliness from the malice of the world in 
 
226 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XVH. 
 
 all cases. We saw an example of this 
 when Commodus was emperor: — Ob- 
 serve another under the government of 
 Gallienus.~At Csesarea in Palestine, 
 there was a soldier — of bravery, — of no- 
 ble family, — and of great opulence ; who, 
 upon a vacancy, was called to the office 
 of centurion. His name was Marinus. 
 — But, another soldier came before the 
 tribunal, and urged — that, by the laws, 
 Marinus was incapacitated, because he 
 was a Christian, and did not sacrifice to 
 the emperors ; — and that he himself, as 
 next in rank, ought to be preferred. — 
 Achffius the governor asked Marinus what 
 was his religion] — upon which he con- 
 fessed himself a Christian. The gover- 
 nor gave him the space of three hours for 
 deliberation. — Immediately Theotecnes, 
 bishop of Ca;sarea, called Marinus from 
 the tribunal, — took him by the hand, — 
 led him to the Church, — showed him the 
 sword that hung by his side, and a New 
 Testament which he pulled out of his 
 pocket ; — and he then bid him choose 
 which of the two he liked best. — Marinus 
 stretched out his hand, and took up the 
 Holy Scriptures. — " Hold fast, tlien," 
 said Theotecnes ; " Cleave to God : and 
 BiM whom you have chosen, you shall 
 enjoy : you shall be strengthened by him, 
 and shall depart in peace." — After the 
 expiration of the three hours, upon the 
 crier's summons, he appeared at the bar, 
 manfully confessed the faith of Christ, 
 heard the sentence of condemnation, and 
 was beheaded. 
 
 Without more acquaintance with the 
 particular* institutes of Roman law on 
 this subject, it is not easy to reconcile 
 this proceeding with the edict of Gallie- 
 nus. — Perhaps the act of Achceus was il- 
 legal, — or, perhaps, some particular mili- 
 tary law might be in force against the 
 martyr. The fact, however, rests on the 
 best authority ; and the profession of 
 arms appears to have had still among 
 them, since the days of Cornelius, those 
 who loved Jesus Christ.' 
 
 The greatest luminary in the Church 
 at this time was Dionysius of Alexandria. 
 His works are lost : A few extracts of 
 them, preserved by Eusebius, have al- 
 The Sa- ready been given ; — and some 
 bellian few more may be here intro- 
 
 Heresy duced — He speaks of the Sa- 
 
 appears. bellian heresy, which had 
 now made its appearance, — as follows : — 
 
 Euseb. Book 7, Chap. 14. 
 
 " As* many brethren have sent their 
 books and disputations in writing to me, 
 concerning the impious doctrine lately 
 propagated at Pentapolis in Ptolemais, 
 which contains many blasphemies against 
 the Almighty God and Father of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, and also much infi- 
 delity respecting his only-begotten Son, 
 
 the FIRST BEGOTTEN OF EVERY CREATURE, 
 
 and THE Word incarnate ; and, lastly, 
 much senseless ignorance relative to the 
 Holy Ghost; — some of them I have 
 transcribed, and sent the copies to you." 
 
 This is the first account in existence of 
 the origin of Sabellianism ; — a plausible 
 corruption, no doubt, — perhaps the most 
 so of all those which oppose the mystery 
 of the Trinity. But, like all the rest, it 
 fails for want of Scripture-evidence, and 
 shows itself to be only a weak attempt to 
 lower and submit to human reason that, 
 which was never meant to be amenable 
 to its tribunal. The careful distinctions 
 of Dionysius, in recounting the persons 
 of the Trinity, were very proper in speak- 
 ing of a heresy which confounds the per- 
 sons, and leaves them nothing of those 
 distinct characters, on which the nature 
 of the doctrines of the Gospel so much 
 depends. 
 
 This bishop also delivers his senti- 
 ments in the controversy concerning the 
 re-baptizing of heretics : He is against 
 that practice ; and, at the same time, he 
 condemns with great severity the Nova- 
 tian schism ; — because, says he, " it 
 charges the most loving and merciful 
 God with unmercifulness."f Yet, on 
 the subject of baptism, he confesses him- 
 self to have been, for some time at least, 
 stago-ered in opinion by a remarkable 
 caseT — " When the brethren were gather- 
 ed together, and when there was present 
 one who had been, before my time, an 
 ancient minister of the clergy, a certain 
 person, allowed to be sound in the faith, 
 — upon seeing our form and manner of 
 baptism, and hearing the interrogatories 
 and responses, came to me weeping and 
 wailing, falling prostrate at my feet, and 
 protesting — that the baptism which he 
 had received was heretical, — could not 
 be the true baptism, — and, that it had no 
 agreement with that which was in use 
 among us, but, on the contrary, was full 
 of impiety and blasphemy. He owned, 
 that the distress of his conscience was 
 extreme, — that he durst not presume to 
 
 Book 7, Chap. 5. f Book 7, Chap. 7. 
 
Ce^t. III.] 
 
 EEIGN OF GALLIENUS. 
 
 227 
 
 lift up his eyes to God, because he had 
 been baptized with profane words and 
 rites. He begf^ed therefore to be re-bap- 
 tized ; with which request I durst not 
 comply ; but I told him that frequent 
 communion, many times administered, 
 would suffice. This man had heard 
 thanksgiving sounded in the church, and 
 had sung to it, 'Amen;'j he had been 
 present at the Lord's table ; had stretched 
 forth his hand to receive the holy food ; 
 had actually communicated; and, indeed 
 for a long time, had been partaker of the 
 body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 — therefore, I durst not re-baptize him, 
 but bade him be of good cheer and of a 
 sure faith, and boldly ap])roach to the 
 communion of saints. — Notwithstanding 
 all this, the man mourns continually ; 
 and his horror keeps him from the Lord's 
 table ; and he scarcely, with much in- 
 treaty, can join in the prayers of the 
 Church." 
 
 We have no farther account of this mat- 
 ter; but surely there is no good reason 
 to believe that the God of Grace would, 
 in due time, relieve such a character. 
 
 The detestation of heresy, and the 
 marked distinction of true Christianity 
 were, in some circumstances, carried to 
 an extreme, during this century; disci- 
 pline, however, was not neglected in the 
 Church; but, as I have already observed, 
 was carried sometimes to excess, — even 
 to superstition. — Sextan's temptations are 
 ever ready to drive to despair truly peni- 
 tent and contrite spirits. This story, as 
 it respects all the parties concerned, 
 breathes throughout a spirit the very op- 
 posite to the licentious boldness of our 
 own times, and marks the peculiar cha- 
 racter of the piety of the age of Diony- 
 sius ; — which was sincere, but mixed 
 with superstition.* 
 
 The celebration of the feast of Easter 
 and of other holy days, forms the subject 
 of another of Dionysius's epistles. 
 
 Dionysius, now returned from exile to 
 Alexandria, found it involved in the hor- 
 rors of a civil war. On the feast of Eas- 
 ter, as if he was still in banishment, he 
 wrote to his people, who were in another 
 part of the city, with which he could 
 have no personal intercourse. In a letter 
 to Hierax, an Egyptian bishop at some 
 distance, he says, " It is not to be won- 
 dered at, that it is difficult for me to con- 
 verse by epistles with those at a distance, 
 
 Euseb. Book 7, Chap. 8. — See Greek. 
 
 when I find myself here precluded from 
 having any intercourse with my most in- 
 timate friends and tenderest connexions. 
 — Even with them I have no intercourse 
 but by writing, though they are citizens 
 of the same Church ; and I find it very 
 difficult to procure a safe conveyance of 
 any letters which I would send to them. 
 A man may more easily travel from the 
 east to the west than from Alexandria to 
 Alexandria. The middle road of this 
 city is more impassable than that vast 
 wilderness which the Israelites wan- 
 dered through in two generations." — He 
 goes on to describe the miseries of war 
 and bloodshed, of plagues and diseases, 
 which, at that time, desolated Alexan- 
 dria; — and he complains that the people 
 still repented not of their sins. 
 
 To the brethren he says, " Now every 
 thing is full of lamentation; — every one 
 does nothing but mourn and howl through 
 the city, because of the multitude of 
 corpses and the daily deaths. — Many of 
 our brethren, through their great love and 
 brotherly affection, spared not themselves, 
 i)ut clave one to another, and attended 
 upon the sick most diligently; and, in 
 doing so, they brought the sorrows of 
 others upon themselves ; they caught the 
 infection, and lost their own lives. In 
 this manner the best of our brethren de- 
 parted this life ; — of whom some were 
 presbyters, and some deacons, — highly 
 reverenced by the common people." He 
 then goes on to observe with what affec- 
 tionate care the Christians attended the 
 funerals of their friends, while the Pagans, 
 in the same city, through fear of receiv- 
 ing the contagion, deserted and neglected 
 theirs. Undoubtedly he describes here 
 a strong picture of the benevolence of 
 Christians, and of the selfishness of other 
 men. — It belongs to true Christianity to 
 produce such fruits, though, in some re- 
 spects, they might be carried farther than 
 real Christian prudence would vindicate. 
 — But every lover of Jesus is refreshed 
 to find the certain marks of his Spirit 
 and HIS presence among his people. 
 
 An Egyptian bishop, named Nepos, 
 taught that the Millemiium was to come 
 AFTER the resurrection ; and described 
 the happiness of saints as much consist- 
 ing in corporeal enjoyments. Dionysius 
 thought the notion dangerous; — yet, his 
 candour inclined him to entertain a good 
 opinionof Nepos on the whole. He com- 
 mends his faith, his diligence, his skill 
 in the Holy Scriptures ; and, particularly, 
 
228 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap.XVH. 
 
 his agreeable psalmody, with which many 
 of his brethren were delighted : But, as 
 he thought his opinions not safe, he op- 
 posed them. When he was at Arsenoita, 
 he spent three days with the brethren who 
 had been infected with the notions of 
 Nepos, and explained the subject. He 
 speaks with much commendation of the 
 candour and docility of the people, par- 
 ticularly of Coracion their leader, who 
 owned himself brought over to the senti- 
 ments of Dionysius. — The authority of 
 Dionysius seems to have quashed the 
 opinions of Nepos in the bud. — The con- 
 sequence of an injudicious and unscrip- 
 tural view of the Millennium, thus re- 
 jected and refuted by a bishop of candour, 
 judgment and authority, was, — that the 
 doctrine itself, for ages, continued both 
 much out of sight, and out of repute. — 
 The learned reader need not be told, with 
 how much clearer light it has been re- 
 vived and confirmed in our days. 
 
 Dionysius finding how much use had 
 been made of the Revelation of St. John 
 in supporting the doctrine of the Millen- 
 nium, gives his thoughts on that sublime 
 and wonderful book : With much modes- 
 ty he confesses, that though he rever- 
 enced its contents, he did not understand 
 their scope. 
 
 The subtilty and the restless spirit of 
 those, who corrupt the doctrine of the 
 Trinity, have ever had this advantage, — 
 that while they, without fear or scruple, 
 can say what they please, its defenders 
 are reduced to the necessity either of leav- 
 ing the field to them entirely, or of expos- 
 ing themselves to the specious charge of 
 maintainino; some human invention, or 
 even heresy, — contrary to that which they 
 are opposing. This last was the case of 
 Dionysius in his attack on Sabellianism. 
 The scantiness of our ideas, and the ex- 
 treme difficulty of clothing, with proper 
 expressions, those very inadequate ones 
 which we have on a subject so profound, 
 naturally lay us open to such imputation, 
 from which, however, faithful zeal will 
 never be disposed to shrink on a proper 
 occasion ; — I mean, the faithful zeal of 
 those, who see through the designs of 
 heretics, and who prefer truth, tlaough 
 veiled in an unavoidable mystery, to spe- 
 cious error disguised in an affected garb 
 of simplicity. — Sabellius had taken pains 
 to confound the persons of the Father and 
 the Son. Dionysius showed, by an un- 
 equivocal testimony, that the Father was 
 not the same as the Son, nor the Son the 
 
 same as the Father. — Dionysius, bishop 
 of Rome, being informed of these things, 
 assembled a council, in which certain ex- 
 pressions attributed to his namesake of 
 Alexandria were disapproved ; and he 
 wrote to him with a view of furnishing 
 an opportunity for explanation. 
 
 The bishop of Alexandria with great 
 clearness, candour, and moderation, ex- 
 plained himself at large in a work which 
 he entitled a Refutation and Apology.* In 
 the small remains of this work, it appears 
 that he held the consubstantiability of the 
 Son with the Father : He describes the 
 Trinity in Unity, and steers equally clear 
 of the rock of Sabellianism, which con- 
 founds the persons, and that of Arianism, 
 which divides the substance. His testi- 
 mony, therefore, may be added to the 
 uniform judgment of the primitive fathers 
 on this subject. 
 
 " The Father," says he, " cannot be 
 separated from the Son, as he is the Fa- 
 ther ; for THAT NAME, at the same time, 
 establishes the relation. Neither can 
 the Son be separated from the Father ; for 
 the word Father implies the union : more- 
 over, the Spirit is united with the Father 
 and the Son, because it cannot exist se- 
 parate either from him who sends it, or 
 from HIM who brings it. Thus we under- 
 stand the indivisible Unity without any 
 diminution." This account was satis- 
 factory to the whole Church ; and was 
 allowed to contain the sense of Chris- 
 tians on the doctrine. 
 
 In the year twojiundred and sixty-four, 
 the heresy of Paul of Samosata began to 
 excite the general attention of Christians; 
 and, about the same time, a p^^^^j ^j- 
 degeneracy both in principle Samosata, 
 and practice, hitherto very un- . j^ oqa 
 common within the pale of ' ' " 
 Christianity, attracted the particular no- 
 tice of all who wished well to the souls 
 of men. Paul was the bishop of Antioch. 
 It gives one no very high idea of the state 
 of ecclesiastical discipline in that renown- 
 ed Church, that such a man should ever 
 have been placed at its head : — But it is 
 no new thing for even sincere Christians 
 to be dazzled with the parts and eloquence 
 of corrupt men. The ideas of this man 
 seem to have been perfectly secular. 
 Zenobia of Palmyra, who, at that time, 
 styled herself Queen of the East, and 
 reigned over a large part of the empire 
 which had been torn from the indolent 
 
 * Anth de Sent.— See Fleury, L. iv. Book 7. 
 
CsiTT. in.] 
 
 REIGN OF GALLIENUS. 
 
 229 
 
 hands of Gallienus, desired his instruc- 
 tions in Christianity.* It does not ap- 
 pear that her motives had anything in 
 them beyond philosophical curiosity 
 
 years, Claudius succeeded ; and, after a 
 rein"n of two years, in which he continued 
 the protector of Christians, Aurelian be- 
 came emperor. Under him a second 
 
 The master and the scholar were 
 
 well council was convened concerning Paul of 
 
 suited to each other; and Paul taucrht 
 her his own conceptions of Jesus Christ, 
 — namely, that he was, by nature, a com- 
 mon man like others. The irregularities 
 of Paul's life, and the heterodoxy of his 
 doctrines could no longer be endured. 
 There is, in fact, more necessary connex- 
 ion between principle and practice than 
 the world is ready to believe ; for pure 
 practical holiness can only be the effect 
 of Christian truth. — The bishops met at 
 Antioch, to consider his case: Among 
 these, were, particularly, Firmilian of 
 Caesarea in Cappadocia, Gregoryf Thau- 
 maturgus, and Athenodorus, who were 
 brethren and bishops in Pontus ; and 
 Theotecnes of Caesarea in Palestine. A 
 number of ministers and deacons besides 
 met together on the occasion. In several 
 sessions the case of Paul was argued. 
 Firmilian seems to have presided. — Paul 
 was induced to recant; and with such 
 appearances of sincerity that Firmilian and 
 tlie council believed him. The matter 
 slept, therefore, for the present, and Paul 
 continued in his bishopric. 
 
 It was in the same year two hundred 
 and sixty-four, the eleventh of Gallienus, 
 •p. , r that Dionysius of Alexandria 
 Dionvsius. f^ied, after having held the 
 A n' T-l' '*'*^° seventeen years. He had 
 been invited to the council ; 
 but pleaded in excuse his great age and 
 infirmities : he, however, sent a letter to 
 the council, containing his advice, and 
 addressed the Church of Antioch, with- 
 out taking any notice of her bishop. This 
 was the last service of this great and 
 good man to the Church of Christ, after 
 having gone through a variety of hard- 
 ships, and distinguished himself by his 
 steady piety in the cause of religion. His 
 having been a pupil of Origen in his 
 younger years was no great advantage to 
 his theological knowledge : It is to be 
 regretted that our materials concerning 
 him are so defective ; but the few frag- 
 ments which remain, afford the strongest 
 marks of unquestionable good sense and 
 moderation, as well as of genuine piety. 
 
 Gallienus having reigned about fifteen 
 
 Firmiliaa 
 dies, 
 
 A. U. 269. 
 
 * Athan. torn. 11. p. 857. — Fleury, Euseb. 
 vii. Chap. 0, kc. 
 t See his Life in the next Chap. 
 Vol. I. U 
 
 Saraosata. He dissembled egregiously; 
 nevertheless, the intolerable corruption 
 both of his doctrine and of his morals, 
 was proved in a satisfactory manner ; in- 
 somuch that the servants of Christ felt 
 themselves called upon to show openly, 
 that all regard to the person and precepts 
 of their divine Master was not lost in 
 the Christian world.* — Seventy bishops 
 appeared at the synod, among whom 
 Theotecnes of Caesarea in Palestine 
 was still one of the principal. They 
 waited some time for the arrival of Fir- 
 milian of Cappadocia, who had been 
 invited, and was on his way, notwith- 
 standing his great age; but 
 he died at Tarsus in the year 
 two hundred and sixty-nine. 
 He had been one of the great- 
 est luminaries of the day, and so had Gre- 
 gory Thaumaturgus of Pontus, who also 
 died in the interval between the first and 
 second council. The loss of these great 
 men was, no doubt, the more severely 
 felt on this occasion, because it was not 
 in the power of ever)"^ one, who really be- 
 lieved and loved the truth as it is in Jesus, 
 to confute and expose, in a proper manner, 
 the artifices of Paul. 
 
 Whoever has seen the pains taken at 
 this day, by many persons of Paul's per- 
 suasion, to cover their ideas unde*; a 
 cloud of ambiguous expressions, and to 
 represent themselves, when attacked, as 
 meaning the same thing with real Chris- 
 tians, while, at other times, they take all 
 possible pains, and in the most open way, 
 to undermine the fundamental doctrines 
 of the Gospel, will not be surprised that 
 Paul, — artful, eloquent, and deceitful as 
 he was, — should be able to give a spe- 
 cious colour to his ideas. But, there was 
 in the council a presbyter, named Mal- 
 chion, who added to the soundness of 
 Christian faith great skill in the art of 
 reasoning : He had been, a long time, 
 governor^of the school of humanity at An- 
 tioch: and his talents and experience 
 were of great service in this business: — 
 He so pressed the ambiguous, equivo- 
 cating Paul, that he compelled him to 
 declare himself and to disclose his most 
 secret meanings. There needed no more 
 
 * Athan. de Sjn. Euseb. 28, &c. 
 
230 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XVH. 
 
 Paul of 
 
 Samosata 
 deposed, 
 
 A. D. 269 
 
 or 270. 
 
 to condemn him. All the bishops agreed 
 to his deposition and exclusion from the 
 Christian Church. — Malchion's disputa- 
 tion against Paul was preserved in writing 
 to the time of Eusebius. 
 
 No fact in Church history is more cer- 
 tain than the deposition and exclusion of 
 Paul ; — and the inference is, thence, de- 
 monstratively clear, — that So- 
 cinianism in the year two hun- 
 dred and sixty-nine, was not 
 suffered to exist within the 
 pale of the Christian Church. 
 — I use that term, because it 
 is now well understood; and because it 
 fairly expresses the ideas of Paul. In 
 truth; — no injury was done to the man: 
 He had certainly no more right to Chris- 
 tian preferment than a traitor has to hold 
 an office of trust under a legal govern- 
 ment; and to oblige him to speak out 
 what he really held, was no more than 
 what justice required : Truth and open- 
 ness are essential to the character of all 
 teachers : He who is void of them, de- 
 serves to be without scholars or hearers. 
 At the same time I cannot but further 
 conclude — that the doctrine, usually call- 
 ed Trinitarian, was universal in the 
 Church in those times : — Dionysius, Fir- 
 milian, Gregory, Theotecnes, seventy 
 
 " For the purpose of healing this deadly 
 and poisonous mischief, we have called 
 many bishops from far, as Dionysius of 
 Alexandria, and Firmilian of Csesarea in 
 Cappadocia, — menblessed in the Lord ; — 
 the former of whom, writing hither to 
 Antioch, vouchsafed not so much as once 
 to salute the author of the heresy; for he 
 wrote not specifically to him, but to the 
 whole congregation; — the copy of which 
 we have annexed. Firmilian came twice 
 to Antioch, and condemned this novel 
 doctrine. — He wished to have come the 
 third time, for the same purpose; but he 
 only reached Tarsus; and, while we were 
 assembling, sending for him, and expect- 
 ing his coming, he departed this life. — 
 This man* was formerly indigont: He 
 derived no property from his parents, nor 
 acquired any either by a trade or a pro- 
 fession ; yet he is grown exceedingly rich 
 by sacrilegious practices and by extor- 
 tions. — He deceived the brethren and im- 
 posed on their easiness: He entangled 
 them in law suits : pretended to assist the 
 injured ; took bribes on all sides, and thus 
 turned godliness into gain. — Vain, and 
 fond of secular dignity, he preferred the 
 name of Judge to that of Bishop: He 
 erected for himself a tribunal and lofty 
 throne, after the manner of civil magis- 
 
 bishops, the whole Christian world, were trates, and not like a disciple of Christ. — 
 
 unanimous on this head ; — and this una- 
 nimity may satisfactorily be traced up to 
 the Apostles. 
 
 Paul being deposed, and a new bishop 
 being chosen in his room, an epistle was 
 dictated by the council and sent to Dio- 
 nysius of Rome and to Maximus of Alex- 
 andria, and also dispersed through the 
 Roman world, in which they explained 
 their own labours in this matter, — the 
 perverse duplicity of Paul, — and the ob- 
 jections against him. — The chief part of 
 this will deserve to be transcribed — from 
 Eusebius — as the most authentic account 
 of the whole transaction.* 
 
 " To Dionysius and Maximus, and all 
 our fellow bishops, elders, and deacons 
 throughout the world, and to the whole 
 universal Church,^ Helenus, Hymeufeus, 
 Theophilus, Theotecnes, &c., with all the 
 other bishops who with us inhabit and 
 preside over the neighbouring cities and 
 provinces ; — together with the presbyters 
 and deacons and holy Churches of God, — 
 to the beloved brethren in the Lord, send 
 greeting : — 
 
 * Book 7. chap. 29. 
 
 He was accustomed to walk through the 
 streets, with a numerous guard, in great 
 state, receiving letters and dictating an- 
 swers ; insomuch that great scandal has 
 accrued to the faith through his pride and 
 haughtiness. In church assemblies he 
 used theatrical artifices, to amaze, sur- 
 prise, and procure applause from weak 
 people :— such as, striking his thigh with 
 his hand, and stamping with his feet. — 
 Then, if there were any, who did not ap- 
 plaud him, nor shake their handkerchiefs, 
 nor make loud acclamations as is usual 
 in the theatre, — nor leap up and down as 
 his partizans do, — but behaved with de- 
 cent and reverent attention as becomes 
 the house of God, he reproved— and even 
 reviled such persons. — He openly in- 
 veighed against the deceased expositors 
 of .Scripture in the most impudent and 
 scornful terms; and magnified himself 
 exactly in the manner of sophists and 
 impostors. He suppressed the psalms 
 made in honour of Jesus Christ, and 
 called them modern compositions ; — and 
 
 he directed others to be 
 
 in 
 
 the 
 
 * Paul of Samosata. 
 
CEinp. in.] 
 
 REIGN OF GALLIENUS. 
 
 231 
 
 Church in his own commendation, — 
 which very much shocked the hearers : — 
 He also encouraged similar practices, as 
 far as it was in his power, among the 
 neighbouring bishops. — He refused to ac- 
 knowledge the Son of God to have coine 
 down from heaven; and affirmed positive- 
 ly that he was of the eari i. — These are 
 not mere assertions, but si all be proved 
 by the "public records of the Synod. — 
 Moreover, this same man kept women m 
 his house under the pretence of their be- 
 ing poor : His priests and deacons did the 
 same; but he tolerated and concealed this 
 and many other of their crimes, in order 
 that they might remain in a state of de- 
 pendence; and that, standing in fear on 
 their own account, they might not dare 
 to bring accusations against him for his 
 Wicked actions. He also frequently gave 
 them money ; — and in that way, he en- 
 gaged covetous and worldly dispositions 
 very strongly in his interest. — We are 
 persuaded, brethren, that a bishop and 
 all his clergj'' are bound to give the peo- 
 ple an example of all good works ; and 
 we are not ignorant, that many, by the 
 dangerous and evil custom of introducing 
 single and unprotected women into their 
 houses, have fallen into sin; — and how 
 man)', also, are subject to suspicion and 
 slander on the same account. If, there- 
 fore, it should be admitted, that he hath 
 committed no actual crime, yet the very 
 suspicion arising from such a conduct 
 ought to be guarded against, for fear of 
 giving offence or setting a bad example 
 to any. For how can he reprove another, 
 or admonish another — not to converse 
 frequent!}' and privately with a woman, — 
 and to take heed, as it is written, lest he 
 fall, — HE who, though he has sent away 
 one, still keeps two women in his house; 
 — both of them handsome and in the 
 flower of their age : Besides, wherever 
 he goes, he carries them about with him; 
 and at the same time indulges himself in 
 high living and luxuries. — On account of 
 these things all sighed in secret indigna- 
 tion, but trembled at his power, and did 
 not dare to accuse him. 
 
 " Doubtless he would deserve severe 
 censures, even if he were our dearest 
 friend, and perfectly orthodox in his sen- 
 timents ; — but as he has renounced Chris- 
 tian mysteries, — We have felt ourselves 
 under the necessity of expelling from the 
 Church this contumacious adversary of 
 God ; we have, accordingly, placed in his 
 room Donjnus— .a person adorned with all 
 
 the gifts required in a bishop : He is the 
 son of Demetrian, of blessed memory — 
 the predecessor of Paul." 
 
 It is fashionable, at present, to despise 
 all religious councils whatever: and pro- 
 bably, this contempt does not arise from 
 an EXTRAORDINARY regard to religion it- 
 self. For, on all subjects, which are es- 
 teemed of moment and of general concern, 
 common sense hath ever dictated to man- 
 kind the propriety and advantage of hold- 
 ing councils, by which the wisdom of 
 THE MANY might be collected, concen- 
 trated and directed to beneficial purposes. 
 Let the reader reflect, how much this has 
 ever been the case in regard to politics, 
 agriculture, commerce, and the fine arts. 
 — Against religious councils, however 
 moulded, or however conducted, the tor- 
 rent of the present times, unquestionably, 
 runs violent: And the mind of a historian 
 is strongly tempted to give way to this 
 torrent ; for by so doing, he much more 
 easily acquires a reputation for good 
 sense and discernment, than by any ex- 
 ercises of learning, industry, or reflection, 
 if these should lead him to oppose opi- 
 nions, which happen to be prevalent. 
 But it is, also, to be remembered, that a 
 temporary reputation which neither con- 
 sists with truth, nor with the deliberate 
 judgment of the writer, is of very little 
 value ; — and with this sentiment in view, 
 I venture to affirm, that religious coun- 
 cils ought not to be universally despised 
 and rejected, because some of them have 
 been useless or hurtful. — The council at 
 Jerusalem* was intrinsically of more va- 
 lue than all the wealth and power of the 
 Roman empire : It was by a council, also, 
 that Cyprian was enabled to serve^ the 
 Church substantially, though in one' in- 
 stance he failed : And, again, the council, 
 which dictated the letter concerning Paul 
 of Samosata, will deserve the thanks of 
 the Church of Christ to the end of the 
 world. Circumstanced as Paul was, — 
 superior in artifice, eloquence, and capa- 
 city; — supported in civil power, and un- 
 controlled in his own tiiocese, nothing 
 seemed so likely to weaken his influence 
 and encourage the true disciples of Christ 
 as the concurrent testimony of the Chris- 
 tian world assembled against him. And 
 though it may be difficult for the insin- 
 cere mildness of polite scepticism to re- 
 lish the blunt tone of the council, there 
 seem to me, in their proceedings, evident 
 
 See the Acts of the Apostles, 
 
232 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XYTi. 
 
 marks of the fear of God, of Christian 
 gravity, and of conscientious regard to 
 truth. No doubt, the reports of Paul's 
 actual lewdness must have been very 
 common in Antioch ; — but, for want of 
 specific proof, — the hardest thing in the 
 world to be obtained in such cases, — they 
 check the smallest disposition to exag- 
 gerate: they assert no more than what 
 they positively knew; and thus they con- 
 vince posterity that they w'ere, in no way, 
 under the dominion of intemperate pas- 
 sion or resentment. This is the first in- 
 stance of a Christian bishop having been 
 proved so shamefully secular; — and that, 
 on the most authentic evidence ; — a griev- 
 ous fact I — The mind is however con- 
 siderably relieved by observing, that 
 there existed at the same time a becom- 
 ing zeal for truth and holiness. 
 
 Dionysius of Rome died, also, in the 
 year 270. His successor Felix wrote an 
 epistle to Maximus of Alexandria, in 
 which, — probably on account 
 D.onysius ^f p^^pg heresy,— he speaks 
 or Kome ,, ,, -..t , ■',■ ^, ' ^ 
 
 jjjgg thus : — " VV e believe that our 
 
 A. D. 270. Saviour Jesus Christ was 
 born of the Virgin Mary: we 
 believe that he himself is the eternal God 
 and the Word, and not a mere man, 
 whom God took into himself, in such a 
 manner, as that the man should be dis- 
 tinct from him : For the Son of God is 
 perfect God; and was also made perfect 
 man, by being incarnate of the Virgin."* 
 By the favour of Zenobia, Paul for the 
 space of two or three years supported iiim- 
 self in the possession of the mother- 
 church of Antioch, and of the episcopal 
 house, and, of course, of so much of the 
 revenues as depended not on voluntary 
 contributions of the people. A party he, 
 doubtless, had among the people; but the 
 horror, which Socinianism tlien excited 
 liirough the Christian world, as well as 
 the flagitiousness of his life, render it im- 
 possible that he should have had, in gene- 
 ral, the hearts of the Christians of Anti- 
 och. Zenobia. was conquered by the em- 
 peror Aurelian, and then a change took 
 place : The Christians complained ; and 
 Aurelian, considering Rome and Italy as, 
 in all things, a guide to the rest of the 
 world, ordered, — that the controversy 
 should be decided according to the senti- 
 ments of the bishops. Oi' course Paul 
 was fully and effectually expelled ; and 
 •we hear no more of him in history. 
 
 * Cone. Eph. — See Fleury, Book 8, chap. 4. 
 
 Aurelian, hitherto, had been the friend 
 
 of Christians : but pagan superstition 
 
 and its abettors drove him at . i- 
 1 ,, • ^ ,, Aurelian 
 
 length into measures ot per- beoins a 
 
 secution. The Christians were nfh Per- 
 
 in full expectation of sangui- secution, 
 
 nary treatment, when his A. D. 272. 
 
 death prevented his designs, Aurelian 
 
 in the year two hundred and k'Hed, 
 
 seventy-five. ■^- ^- ^'''" 
 
 Tacitus, the successor of Aurelian, after 
 a short reign, left the empire to Probus; 
 in whose second year, and in the year of 
 our Lord two hundred and se- „ „_ 
 venty-seven, appeared the ' ' * 
 monstrous heresy of Manes, of which the 
 fundamental principle was the admission 
 of two first causes independent of each 
 other, for the purpose of explaining the 
 origin, of evil. But I write not the history 
 of heresies: That has been peribrmed 
 with sufficient accuracy by many, while 
 we have very scanty information of the 
 progress of true religion. — This heresy 
 continued long to infest the Church; and 
 necessity will oblige me hereafter, if this 
 work be continued, to take notice of it 
 more distinctly. 
 
 After Probus, Carus and his two sons, 
 Dioclesian beo-an to reio-n in the year two 
 hundred and eighty-four. For the space 
 of eighteen years this emperor was ex- 
 tremely indulgent to theChris- 
 tians. His wife Prisca and °'i"*;[f '^'^ 
 his daughter Valeria were ^'i)' 234 
 Christians, in some sense, se- 
 cretly. The eunuchs of his palace and 
 his most important olhcers were also 
 Christians; and their wives and families 
 opely professed the Gospel. Christians 
 held honourable offices in various parts of 
 the empire ; innumerable crowds attended 
 Christian worship : the old buildings 
 could no longer receive them ; and in all 
 cities, wide and large edifices were 
 erected.* 
 
 If Christ's kingdom had been of this 
 world ; and, if its strength and beauty 
 were to be measured by secular pros- 
 perity, we should here fix the ajra of its 
 greatness. But, on the contrary, the rera 
 of its actual declension must be dated in 
 the pacific part of Dioclesian's reign. 
 During this whole century the work of 
 God, in purity and power, had been tend- 
 ing to decay: The connexion with philo- 
 sophers was one of the principal causes : 
 Outward peace and secular advantages 
 
 * Euseb. Book 8. Chap. 1. 
 
Ckjtt. nr.] 
 
 REIGN OF GALLIENUS. 
 
 233 
 
 completed the corruption :• Ecclesiastical 
 discipline, which had been too strict, was 
 now relaxed exceedingly : bishops and 
 people were in a state of malice : End- 
 less quarrels were fomented among con- 
 tending parties ; and ambition and covet- 
 ousness had, in general, gained the as- 
 cendency in the Christian Church. Some 
 there, doubtless, wee, who mourned in 
 secret, and strove in vain to stop the 
 abounding torrent of the evil. The truth 
 of this account seems much confirmed by 
 the extreme dearth of real Christian ex- 
 cellencies after the death of Dionysius. 
 For the space of thirty years, no one 
 seems to have arisen like Cyprian, Firmi- 
 lian, Gregory, or Dionysius : — No bishop 
 or pastor, eminent for piety, zeal, and la- 
 bour. — Eusebius, indeed, mentions the 
 names and characters of several bishops ; 
 but he extols only their.learning and phi- 
 losophy, or their moral qualities. He 
 speaks with all the ardour of affection 
 concerninsf a minister in Caesarea of Pa- 
 lestine, named Pamphilus, — but, in this 
 case also, the best thing he asserts of 
 him is, " that he suffered much persecu- 
 tion and was martyred at last." — This 
 event must have happened in the time of 
 the persecution by Dioclesian, which be- 
 gins just after the limits prescribed to this 
 volume. — Notwithstanding this decline 
 both of zeal and of principle ; — notwith- 
 standing this scarcity of evangelical graces 
 and fruits, still Christian worship was 
 constantly attended ; and the number of 
 nominal converts was increasing; — but 
 the faith of Christ itself appeared now an 
 ordinary business ; and here terminated, 
 or nearly so, as far as appears, that great 
 first Effusion of the Spirit of God, which 
 began at the day of Pentecost. Human 
 depravity effected throughout a general 
 decay of godliness ; and one generation 
 of men elapsed with very slender proofs 
 of the spiritual presence of Christ with 
 his Church. 
 
 The observation of Eusebius, who 
 honestly confesses this declension, is ju- 
 dicious : " The heavy hand of God's 
 judgments began softly, by little and lit- 
 tle, to visit us after his wonted manner: 
 The persecution, which was raised against 
 us, took place first among the Christians 
 who were in military service ; but, we 
 were not at all moved with his hand, nor 
 took any pains to return to God : We 
 heaped sin upon sin, judging, like care- 
 less Epicureans, that God cared not for 
 our sins, nor would ever visit us on ac- 
 u2 
 
 count of them. And our pretended shep- 
 herds, laying aside the rule of godliness, 
 practised among themselves contention 
 and division." — He goes on to observe, — 
 that the " dreadful persecution of Diocle- 
 sian was then inflicted on the Church, as 
 a just punishment and as the most proper 
 chastisement for their iniquities." 
 
 Toward the end of the century, while 
 Dioclesian was practising the supersti- 
 tious rites of divination, he became per- 
 suaded that the ill success of his attempts 
 to pry into futurity, were owing to the 
 presence of a Christian servant, who had 
 made, on his forehead, the sign of the 
 cross : and he immediately, in great an- 
 ger, ordered not only those who were 
 present, but all in his palace, to sacrifice 
 to the gods, or, in case of refusal, to be 
 scourged with whips.* He commanded 
 also the officers of his armies to constrain 
 all the soldiers to do the same, or to dis- 
 charge the disobedient from the service. 
 Eusebius alludes to this in the foregoing 
 passage. — Christian truth, however, had 
 not so universally decayed, but that many 
 chose rather to resign their commissions, 
 than to do violence to their consciences. 
 — Very few were put to death on this ac- 
 count. — The story of iMarcellus is remark- 
 able. "(• Mr. Gibbon has undertaken to 
 justify his execution, by representing him 
 as punished purely for desertion and mi- 
 litary disobedience. But, it is no unusual 
 thing- for this historian to suppress or to 
 disguise facts, when the credit of religion 
 is concerned : and I might have added 
 this instance to the list of his perversions, 
 which I formerly submitted to the judg- 
 ment of the public. :j: The truth is, the 
 death of Marcellus was the effect of a 
 PARTIAL PERSECUTION : Ncw military 
 rules, subversive of Christianity, were 
 introduced : Christian soldiers were or- 
 dered to sacrifice to the gods ; and they 
 could not do this without renouncing 
 their religion : — Otherwise, it was, in 
 those times, not uncommon for tlie follow- 
 ers of .lesus to serve in the armies. 
 
 It was in the year two hundred and 
 ninety-eight, at Tangier in Mauritania, 
 while every one was employed in feasting 
 and sacrifices, that Marcellus the centu- 
 rion took off his belt, threw ]\ia,.gel- 
 down his vine-branch and his jug called 
 arms, and added, " I will not St. Mar- 
 
 * Lactantius, de morte persecut. 
 
 f Acta siiicera, Fleury, Book 8. Chap. 27. 
 
 ^ See Milner's Gibbon. 
 
234 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XVHL 
 
 celliis, be- fight any longer iindor the 
 headed, banner of your emperor, or 
 A. D. 298. serve your gods of wood and 
 stone. If the condition of a soldier be 
 such that he is obliged to sacrifice to gods 
 and emjierors, I abandon the vine-branch 
 and the belt, and quit the service." " We 
 plainly see the cause," says Fleury, "that 
 forced the Christians to desert : — They 
 ■were compelled to partake of idolatrous 
 worship." The centurion was ordered to 
 be beheaded: And Cassianus, the regis- 
 ter, whose business it was to take down 
 the sentence, cried out aloud that he was 
 shocked at its injustice, Marcellus smiled 
 for joy, foreseeing that Cassi-anus would 
 be his fellow-martyr : In fact, he was 
 actually martyred about a month after. 
 
 When I first read Mr. Gibbon's account 
 of this transaction, I concluded that Mar- 
 cellus had suffered on mere principles of 
 modern Quakerism. — Quite unnecessary 
 are any further remarks, on a suliject, 
 which is not in the smallest degree ob- 
 scure or uncertain. 
 
 These preliminaries to the persecution, 
 with which the next century opens, did 
 not, it seems, duly affect the minds of 
 Christians in general ; nor was the spirit 
 of prayer stirred up among them; a cer- 
 tain sign of long and obstinate decay in 
 godliness ! There must have been, in 
 secret, a lamentable departure from the 
 lively faith of the Gospel. Origenism, 
 and the learning and philosophy connect- 
 ed with it, were extremely fashionable ; 
 And we conjecture, that the sermons of 
 Christian pastors had more, in general 
 of a merely moral and philosophical cast, 
 than of any thing purely evangelical. In 
 truth, justification by faith, — hearty con 
 viction of sin, — and the Spirit's influen- 
 ces, are scarcely mentioned in all this 
 season. Moral duties, I doubt not, were 
 inculcated, — but professors of Christian! 
 ty continued immoral and scandalous in 
 their lives. The state of the Church of 
 England from the time of Charles II 
 down to the middle of the last reign, — 
 full of party faction and animosities, 
 and love of the world, yet in its public mi- 
 nistrations adorned with learning, and 
 abounding in external morality, — seems 
 very much to resemble that of the Chris- 
 tian Church in manners and in piety, from 
 the death of Dionysius to the end of the 
 century. — In one instance there was a 
 great difference : Superstition was much 
 stronger in the ancient Church ; hut as it 
 was enlisted in the service of self-right- 
 
 eousness, and as the faith of Christ and 
 the love of God was, in a great measure, 
 buried under it, such a diversity does not 
 affect the general likeness. 
 
 God, who had exercised long patience, 
 declared at length in tire course of his 
 providence, " Because I have purged 
 thee, and thou wast not purged, thou 
 shalt not be ]nirged from thy filthiness 
 any more, till I have caused my fury to 
 
 REST UPON THEE.* 
 
 But this scene, which introduces quite 
 a new face on the Church, and was quick- 
 ly followed by several surprising revolu- 
 tions, belongs to the next century. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 SOME ACCOUNT OF GREGORY THAUMA- 
 TURGIIS, TIIEOGNOSTUS, AND DIONY- 
 SIUS OF ROME. 
 
 These three persons are all, whom I 
 can find belonging to the third century, 
 to whom, according to my plan, suffici- 
 ent justice has not been done already. 
 Of the two last, indeed, I have little to 
 say. Of the first more is recorded. Eu- 
 sebiusj" has given a short account of him ; 
 and his life is written at length, by Gre- 
 gory of Nyssen. Cave and Fleury have 
 collected the most material things con- 
 cerning him ; but the former is more to 
 be depended on. — I wish to 'furnish the 
 reader witli every information that may 
 appear valuable concerning this great 
 man : I wish to separate truth from fiction. 
 Considerable allowance, no doubt, must 
 be made for the growth of superstitious 
 credulity : — I dare not, however, reject all 
 that part of Gregory's narrative, in which 
 miraculous powers are ascribed to Thau- 
 maturgus. — His very name:j: admonishes 
 the historian to be cautious in this mat- 
 ter : and though no great stress, perhaps, 
 ought to he laid on such a circumstance 
 alone, it behooves us to remember that the 
 same idea is supported by the concurrent 
 testimony of antiquity. 
 
 He was born at Neocfesarea, the me- 
 tropolis of Cappadocia. His father, zeal- 
 ous for paganism, took care to educate 
 him in idolatry, and in the learning of the 
 Gentile world. — He died when his son 
 was only fourteen years of age. — The 
 mother of Thaumaturgus took care, how- 
 ever, to complete his education and that 
 
 * F.zek. xxiv. 13. f Book 6. Chap. 29. 
 ^ Wonderworker. 
 
Cest. III.] 
 
 THAUMATURGUS, ETC. 
 
 235 
 
 of his brother Athenodorus, who was af- 
 terwards a Christian bishop, as well as 
 himself. — He travelled to Alexandria to 
 learn the Platonic philosophy, where he 
 was equally remarkable for strictness of 
 life and for close attention to his studies. 
 The renowned Origen, at that time, gave 
 lectures in religion and philosophy, at 
 Csesarea in Palestine. Thaumaturgus, 
 his brother Athenodorus, and Firmilian, 
 a Cappadocian gentleman, with whom 
 he had contracted an intimate friendship, 
 put themselves under his tuition. This 
 same Firmilian is the Cappadocian bish- 
 op, whom we have, repeatedly, had occa- 
 sion to mention. The two brothers con- 
 tinued five years with Origen, and v/ere 
 persuaded by him to study the holy Scrip- 
 tures ; and no doubt is to be made, but 
 that the most assiduous pains were exert- 
 ed by that zealous teacher to ground them 
 in the belief of Christianity — On his de- 
 parture he delivered an eloquent speech 
 in praise of Origen, before a numerous 
 auditory : — a testimony at once of his 
 gratitude and of his powers of rhetoric. 
 
 There is still extant a letter written by 
 Origen to Gregory Thaumaturgus,* in 
 which he exhorts him to apply his know- 
 ledge to the promotion of Christianity 
 The best thing in it is, that he advises 
 him to pray fervently and seriously for the 
 illumination of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Being now returned to Neoca^sarea, he 
 gave himself much to prayer and retire- 
 ment; and, doubtless, was, in secret, 
 prepared and disciplined for the important 
 ■work to which he was soon after called. 
 Neoc3Bsarea was a large and populous 
 city, — full of idolatry, — the very seat of 
 Satan ; so that Christianity could scarce- 
 ly gain any entrance into it. Phcsdimus, 
 bishop of Amasea, a neighbouring city, 
 was grieved to see its profaneness ; and 
 hoping much from the piety and capacity 
 of young Gregory, he took pains to en- 
 gage him there in the work of the minis- 
 try. Gregory, from pure modesty, en- 
 deavoured to elude his designs ; but 
 was at length prevailed on to accept the 
 charge. 
 
 The scene was arduous. He had a 
 Church to found, before he could govern 
 it. There were not above seventeen pro- 
 fessors of Christianity in the place. His 
 name-sake of Nyssen seems to have been 
 imposed on by the superstitious spirit 
 then too prevalent, when he tells us that 
 
 Gregory Thaumaturgus received, in a 
 vision, a creed from John the Evangelist 
 and the Virgin Mary. But, as he assures 
 us, that the original, written with his own 
 hand, was preserved in the Church of 
 NeocEesarea in his time; and, — as this 
 is a matter of fact of which any person 
 
 might judge ; — as the creed itself contains 
 nothing but what is very agreeable to the 
 language of the fathers of the third cen- 
 tury ; — and, as we have already seen the 
 exact and steady pains with which they 
 guarded the doctrine of the Trinity against 
 heresies, — I do not hesitate to conclude 
 that he either actually composed the creed 
 in question, or received it as his own ; — 
 at the same time the intelligent reader, 
 when he has considered its contents, and 
 the consequences deducible from them, 
 need not be in the least surprised at' the 
 industry* with which, in our times, its 
 credit has been impeached. The whole 
 creed is as follows, and merits our at- 
 tention the more, — because the orthodoxy 
 of Gregory has been unreasonably sus- 
 pected against the express testimony of 
 Eusebius, — who, we have seen above, — 
 represents him as one of the opposers of 
 Paul of Samosata, at the first council. 
 
 "There is one God. — The Father of 
 the living Word, of the subsisting wis- 
 dom and power, and of him, who is 
 his eternal express Image : The perfect 
 Father of Him that is perfect : The Fa- 
 ther of the only-begotten Son. There is 
 One Lord, the only Son of the only Fa- 
 ther ; God of God ; the Character and 
 Image of the Godhead ; the energetic 
 Word ; the comprehensive Wisdom by 
 which all things were made; and the 
 Power that gave Being to all creation : 
 The true Son of the true Father : The In- 
 visible of the Invisible : The Incorrupti- 
 ble of the Incorruptible : The Immortal 
 of the Immortal : The Eternal of the 
 Eternal. There is one Holy Ghost, hav- 
 ing his subsistence of God; who was 
 manifested through the Son to men: 
 The perfect Image of the perfect Son : 
 The Life, and the Source of Life : The 
 Holy Fountain : Sanctity, and the Author 
 of Sanctification ; by whom is made mani- 
 fest God the Father, who is above all and 
 in all, and God tlio Son, who is through 
 all. A perfect Trinity, which, neither in 
 Glory, Eternity, or Dominion, is sepa- 
 rated or divided." 
 
 Notwithstanding the prejudices, which 
 
 * Origen Philocal. C. 13. 
 
 * See Lardner's Credibility. 
 
236 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [CHAP.XVm. 
 
 his idolatrous countrymen must have had 
 against him, he was received by Muso- 
 nius, a person of consequence in the city; 
 and, in a very little time, his preaching- 
 was so successful that he was attended 
 by a numerous congregation. The situa- 
 tion of Gregory, so like that of the primi- 
 tive Christian preachers, in the midst of 
 idolatry, renders it exceedingly probable 
 that he was, as they were, favoured with 
 miraculous gifts : for these the Lord be- 
 stowed in abundance, where the name of 
 Jesus had as yet gained no admission; 
 and it is certain that miracles had not 
 then ceased in the Church. 
 
 Gregory Nyssen himself lived within 
 less than a hundred years after Gregory 
 Thaumaturgus ; and both he and his 
 brother, — the famous Basil, — speak of 
 his miracles without the least doubt. 
 Their aged grandmother, Macrina, who 
 taught them in their youth, had, in her 
 younger years, been a hearer of Gregory. 
 Basil particularly observes, that she told 
 them the very words which she had heard 
 from him ; and assures us that the Gen- 
 tiles, on account of the miracles which 
 he performed, used to call him a second 
 Moses. The existence of his miraculous 
 powers, with reasonable persons, seems 
 then unquestionable. It is only to be re- 
 gretted that the few particular instances 
 which have come down to us are not the 
 best chosen : — but, that he cured the sick, 
 —healed the diseased, — and expelled 
 devils ; and, — that thus God wrought by 
 him for the good of souls, and paved the 
 way for the propagation of the Gospel, — 
 as it is, in itself, very credible, so has it 
 the testimony of men worthy to be be- 
 lieved. 
 
 Gregory continued successfully em- 
 ployed at Neocaesarea till the persecution 
 of Decius. Swords and axes, fire, wild 
 beasts, stakes, and engines for distending 
 the limbs, iron chairs made red-hot, frames 
 of timber set up straight, in which the 
 bodies of the tortured were racked with 
 nails that tore off the flesh ; these, and a 
 variety of other inventions, were used. — 
 But the Decian persecution, in general, 
 was before described. — Pontus and Cap- 
 padocia seem to have had their full share. 
 Near relatives, in the most unnatural 
 manner, betrayed one another : the woods 
 W€re full of vagabonds : the towns were 
 empty : the public prisons were found 
 too small ; and the private houses, de- 
 prived of their Christian inhabitants, be- 
 came gaols for the reception of prisoners. 
 
 In this terrible situation of things, 
 Gregory considered, that his new con- 
 verts could scarcely be strong enough to 
 stand their ground and be faithful : He, 
 therefore, advised them to flee ; and he 
 encouraged them to that step by his ex- 
 ample. Many of his people endured much 
 affliction, but God restored them at length 
 to peace: Their bishop returned again, 
 and refreshed and exhilarated their minds 
 with his pastoral labours. 
 
 In the reign of Gallienus, the Chris- 
 tians suffered extremely from the ravages 
 of barbarous nations, which gave occa- 
 sion to Gregory's Canonical Epistle, still 
 extant, — in which, rules of a wholesome, 
 penitential, and disciplinarian nature are 
 delivered. 
 
 The last service which is recorded of 
 him, is the part which lie took in the first 
 council concerning Paul of Samosata. He 
 died not long after. A little before his 
 death he made a strict inquiry, whether 
 there were any persons in the city and 
 neighbourhood still strangers to Chris- 
 tianity : And being told there were about 
 seventeen in all, he sighed; and, lifting 
 up his eyes to heaven, appealed to God, 
 how much it troubled him that any of his 
 fellow-townsmen should still remain un- 
 acquainted with salvation : At the same 
 time he ex])ressed great thankfulness — 
 that, whereas at first, he had found only 
 seventeen Christians, he should now only 
 leave that same number of idolaters. — 
 Having prayed for the conversion of in- 
 fidels and for the edification of the faith- 
 ful, he peaceably gave up his soul to the 
 Almighty. 
 
 He was an evangelical man, says Ba- 
 sil, in his whole life : In his devotion he 
 showed the greatest reverence : Yea and 
 NAY — were the usual measures of his 
 communication. — How desirable is it 
 that those who profess to love Jesus, 
 should uniformly practise the same ! He 
 never allowed himself to call his brother 
 fool: No anger or bitterness proceeded 
 out of his mouth: Slander and calumny, 
 as directly opposite to Christianity, he 
 peculiarly hated and avoided. Lies and 
 falsehood, envy and pride, he abhorred. 
 He was zealous against all corruptions; 
 and Sabellianism, which long after, in 
 Basil's time, reared up its head, was si- 
 lenced by the remembrance of what he 
 had taught and left among them. — So 
 Basil tells us. 
 
 On the whole, the reader will with me 
 regret, that antiquity has left us such 
 
Ce5t. in.] 
 
 THAUMATURGUS, ETC. 
 
 237 
 
 scanty memorials of a man so much ho- 
 noured of God, so eminently holy, and 
 so little inferior, in utility among man- 
 kind, to any, with which the Church of 
 Christ was blessed, from the Apostles' 
 days to his own times. For it is not to 
 be conceived, that so great and almost 
 universal a change in the religious pro- 
 fession of the citizens of Neoceesarea 
 could have taken place without a marvel- 
 lous EFFUSION of tiie Holy Spirit in that 
 place. And how instru(^tive and editying 
 would the narrative be, if we were dis- 
 tinctly informed of its rise and progress ! 
 Certainly, — the essentials of the Gospel 
 must have been preached in much clear- 
 ness and purity. In no particular instance 
 was the Divine influence ever more appa- 
 rent since the apostolic age. 
 
 It is not easy to fix with precision, the 
 time when Theognostus of Alexandria 
 lived; though it is certain that he is later 
 than Origen; and, that he must belong to 
 the third century. He platonizes, alter 
 the manner of Origen, in some parts of 
 his writings ; yet, he is cited by Athana- 
 sius as a witness of the Son's consub- 
 stantiality with the Father. " For, as 
 the Sun is not diminished," says he, 
 " though it produces rays continually, so 
 likewise the Father is not diminished in 
 befettinjj the Son, who is his imao-e." It 
 IS certain that this is Trinitarian lan- 
 guage ; and, though neither Theognostus 
 nor Gregory, nor some others of the an- 
 cient fathers, spake always of the Per- 
 sons of the blessed Trinity, with so much 
 exactness as afterwards was done, it 
 "would be an extreme want of candour to 
 rank tlicm with Arians, Sabellians, or the 
 like, when there is the clearest proof that 
 the foundation of their doctrine was really 
 Trinitarian. Before this important article 
 of faith had been contradicted, men did 
 not perceive the necessity of being con- 
 stantly on their guard respecting it : but 
 when the heresies were formed, they felt 
 themselves, urgently, called upon to ex- 
 press themselves with the most diligent 
 precision. The want of attending to this 
 just distinction has nursed several unrea- 
 sonable cavils in the minds of those who 
 eagerly catch at every straw to support 
 heretical notions. — Nothing is known of 
 the life of Theognostus. — The proofs of 
 his eloquence and capacity are clear and 
 strong.* 
 
 The injustice of the late attempts made 
 
 to invalidate the evidences of the an- 
 tiquity and of the uninterrupted preserva- 
 tion of the doctrine of the Trinity within 
 the three first centuries, requires me to 
 mention one instance more, which, added 
 to the many already mentioned, will, I 
 think, authorize me to draw this conclu- 
 sion, — that during the first three hundred 
 years after Christ, though the doctrine of 
 the Trinity in Unity was variously op- 
 posed, yet the whole Christian Church 
 constantly united in preserving and main- 
 taining it, even from the Apostles' days, 
 as the proper sphere, within which all 
 the truth, and holiness, and consolation 
 of genuine Christianity lie ; and, one may 
 defy its boldest enemies to produce a sin- 
 gle instance of any real progress in Chris- 
 tian piety, made in any place, where this 
 doctrine was excluded. 
 
 We have before observed, that Dio- 
 nysius of Alexandria, through his zeal 
 against the sentiments of Sabellius, be- 
 came suspected of Arianism; and, that 
 he fully exculpated himself. A Roman 
 synod had been convened on that account ; 
 and Dionysius of Rome,* in the name of 
 the Synod, wrote a letter, in which he 
 proves, that the Word was not created, 
 but begotten of the Father from all eter- 
 nity; and distinctly explains the mystery 
 of the Trinity. Such extreme nicety of 
 caution in steering clear of two rocks like 
 those of Sabellianism and Arianism, be- 
 tween which, it must be confessed, the 
 passage is narrow and straight, demon- 
 strates, — that the true doctrine of the 
 Trinity in Unity, which, with so much 
 clearness, as to the existence of the thing 
 itself, though, necessarily, with perfect 
 obscurity as to the manner of the exist- 
 ence, discovers itself every where in the 
 Scriptures, was even then understood 
 with precision, and ^naintained with firm- 
 ness throuohout the Church of Christ. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE FURTHER ZXTENSIOX OF THE GOS- 
 PEL IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The power of real Christianity is al- 
 ways the strongest and the clearest in its 
 beginnings or in its revivals. — Exactly 
 contrary to the process in secular arts 
 and sciences, the improvements of follow- 
 ing ages, unless thoy be favoured with 
 
 • Du Pin, 3d Century. 
 
 * Du Pin, 3d Cent. 
 
238 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XX. 
 
 Extension 
 of the 
 Gospel, 
 
 A. D. 250. 
 
 fresh effusions of the Holy Spirit, are, in 
 reality, so many depravations of what 
 •was excellent in its infancy. For these 
 reasons, the object of this chapter would 
 fall exactly within the design of the au- 
 thor of this History; and it would be a 
 great satisfaction to his mind, to be able 
 to explain, at large, the extension of the 
 Gospel in the third century. — But we 
 must be content with such materials as 
 we have; and let the reader supply, from 
 his own meditations, as much as he can, 
 whatever he may think defective in the 
 following scanty account. • 
 
 In the reign of Decius, and in the 
 midst of his persecution, about the year 
 two hundred and fifty, the Gospel, which 
 had hitherto been chiefly con- 
 fined to the neighbourhood of 
 Lyons and Vienne, was con- 
 siderably extended in France 
 Saturninus was the first bish' 
 op of Toulouse, and at the sametime se 
 veral other Churches were founded; — as 
 at Tours, Aries, Narbonne, and Paris. 
 The bishops of Toulouse and Paris after- 
 wards suffered for the faith of Christ; but 
 they left Churches, in all probal)ility, 
 very flourishing in piety.* And France, 
 in general, was blessed wnth the light of 
 salvation. 
 
 Germany was also, in the course of 
 this century, favoured with the same 
 blessing, especially those parts of it which 
 are in the neighbourhood of France. Co- 
 logne, Treves, and Metz, particularly, 
 were evangel ized.f 
 
 Of the British Isles little is recorded; 
 and that little is obscure and uncertain : 
 It is rather from the natural course of 
 things and from analogy, than from any 
 positive unexceptionable testimony, that 
 we are induced to conclude that the Di- 
 vine Light must have penetrated into our 
 country. 
 
 During the miserable confusions of this 
 century, some teachers from Asia went to 
 preach the Gospel among the Goths who 
 were settled in Thrace. Their holy lives 
 and miraculous powers were much re- 
 spected by these barbarians ; and, many 
 of them, from a state perfectly savage, 
 were brought into the light and comfort 
 of Christianity.:}: 
 
 The wisdom and goodness of God so 
 
 • Book I. Greg. Tours, France, C. 30. 
 Fleury, 13, B. 6, 
 
 t See Mosh. 3d Century, 
 i Sozomen, B. 13. 11. 
 
 ordered events, that the temporal miseries, 
 which afflicted mankind in the reign of 
 Gallienus, were made subservient to the 
 eternal interests of his cruel, blind, and 
 infatuated creatures. The barbarians, 
 who ravaged Asia, carried away with 
 them into captivity several bishops, who 
 healed diseases, expelled evil spirits in 
 the name of Christ, and preached Chris- 
 tianity. — They were heard, in some 
 places, with respect and attention; and 
 became the instruments of the conver- 
 sion of numbers.* That is all that I can 
 collect of the extension of the Gospel 
 amonof the barbarian ravagers. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 A SHORT VIEW OF THE EXTERNAL, STATE 
 OF THE CHURCH IN THE THIRD CEN- 
 TURY. 
 
 It is the duty of Christians to shine as 
 lights in the world, in the midst of a 
 
 CROOKED AND PERVERSE NATION. That this 
 
 was actually the case, even in the third 
 century, — though much less so than in 
 the two former, and toward the latter end 
 of it with a very rapid diminution of the 
 glorious brightness of the Gospel, — the 
 course of the foregoing narrative has, I 
 trust, made apparent. 
 
 Those, with whom the real condition 
 of the rest of mankind in those times, is 
 familiar, will see this in the strongest 
 light. For three centuries, luxury, attend- 
 ed by every abominable vice that can be 
 conceived, had been increasing in the 
 Roman empire. There want not lament- 
 able proofs that the severe satires of Ju- 
 venal were but too well founded. All 
 
 FLESH HAD CORRUPTED THEIR WAY. With 
 
 the loss of civil liberty, even the old Ro- 
 man virtues, of public spirit and magna- 
 nimity,— though no better, as Augustine 
 says, than splendid sins in their nature, — 
 had vanished. Civil broils and distrac- 
 tions continually prevailed for the great- 
 est part of this period, and increased the 
 quantity of vice and misery. The best 
 time was, doubtless, during the reigns of 
 Trajan, Adrian, and the Antonines : But, 
 even under those princes, the standard of 
 virtue was extremely low. The most 
 scandalous and unnatural vices were 
 practised without remorse. Men of rank 
 either lived atheistically, or were sunk 
 
 * Sozomen, B. 2. C. 3. 
 
Cbwt. III.] 
 
 IN THE THIRD CENTURY. 
 
 239 
 
 in the deepest superstition. The vulgar 
 were perfectly ignorant : The rich domi- 
 neered over the poor, and wallowed in 
 immense opulence; while the provinces 
 groaned under their tyranny : Philoso- 
 phers, with incessant loquacity, amused 
 their scholars with harangues concerning 
 virtue, — but they neither practised it 
 themselves, nor understood its real na- 
 ture : By far the largest part of mankind, 
 — namely, the slaves and the poor, were 
 in remediless indigence: No methods 
 whatever were devised for their conve- 
 nience or relief: In the mean time, the 
 pleasurable amusements of men — as the 
 stage and the amphitheatre, — were full 
 of obscenity, savageness, and cruelty. 
 
 This was the Roman world. We know 
 much less of the rest of the globe : which, 
 however, in ferocious wickedness and ig- 
 norance, was sunk much deeper than the 
 nations that bowed under the yoke of the 
 Caesars. 
 
 Behold ! — In the midst of all this chaos, 
 this corruption, and this ignorance, arose 
 out of Judea a light of doctrine and of 
 practice singularly distinct from any thing 
 that was then in existence! — A number 
 of persons, — chiefly of low life, — the dis- 
 ciples of Jesus of Nazareth, live as men 
 ought to do, — with a proper contempt of 
 this vain life, — with the sincerest and 
 most steady ambition for another : They 
 prove themselves to be true philosophers, 
 if real love of wisdom be allowed to con- 
 sist in the justest views and worship of 
 their Maker, and in actual acquaintance 
 with his character, — in real moderation of 
 their passions and desires, — and in un- 
 feio"ned benevolence to all mankind, even 
 to their enemies. 
 
 No sound rules of philosophizing will 
 direct us to conclude all this to have been 
 of MAX. — The WORK was of God: and 
 this effusion of his Holy Spirit lasted for 
 three centuries, debased indeed toward 
 the end of that period, but not entirely ex- 
 tinguished. 
 
 It was necessary, that this people, — 
 diverse from all others, — the followers of 
 the same Jesus of Nazareth, — should 
 have amonof themselves some external or- 
 der, — or, in other words, some ecclesias- 
 tical government. — An endless maze of 
 controversy presents itself here ; nor 
 does there appear to be any certain di- 
 vine rule on this subject. Men may serve 
 God acceptably under very different 
 modes of Church-government; and, in 
 point of fact, these modes were different 
 
 in different places during the primitive 
 ages of Christianity. This variety, how- 
 ever, does not appear to have been either 
 so great, or so extreme, as to have ex- 
 cluded all general principles in the reo-u- 
 lation of the external Church : History 
 enables us to discover, — at least the rude 
 outlines of a usual — of a prevailing 
 PRACTICE, — which materially differed from 
 most, if not from all the ecclesiastical 
 forms of government, which now exist in 
 the Christian world. 
 
 The Apostles, who were the first teach- 
 ers, and, who planted the first Churches, 
 ordained successors, — as fai as appears, 
 — without any consultation of the res- 
 pective flocks over which they were about 
 to preside. But, ai? it was neither rea- 
 sonable nor probable thac any set of per- 
 sons after them should be regarded as 
 their equals, this method of appointing 
 ecclesiastical rulers did not continue ; — 
 and, undoubtedly, the election of bishops 
 devolved on the people.* Their appear- 
 ance to vote on these occasions, their 
 constraining of persons sometimes to ac- 
 cept the oflice against their will, and the 
 determination of Pope Leo, long after, 
 against forcing a bishop on a people 
 against their consent, demonstrate this. 
 The characters of men to be elected to 
 this office vrere very strictly examined. 
 Public notice was given, that any one 
 might inform against them, if they were 
 vicious and immoral. The decision on 
 their moral conduct was left to the peo- 
 ple; — that on their doctrine belonged 
 chiefly to the bishops who ordained them. 
 For the power of ordination belonged 
 properly to bishops alone, though pres- 
 bj^ters — a second order of men, who ap- 
 pear to me all along distinct from them, 
 — concurred with them and with the body 
 of the people. The same power of elect- 
 inof was, in some deoree and in some in- 
 stances, exercised by the people in the 
 appointment of these very presbyters; 
 but the case is by no means so uniformly 
 clear : and, in filling up the lower of- 
 fices of the Church the bishop acted still 
 more according to his discretion. 
 
 The use of deacons, the third order in 
 the Church, is well known. These three 
 orders obtained very early in the primi- 
 tive Churches. The epistles of Igna- 
 tius, — I build on those parts only that are 
 undoubtedly genuine, — demonstrate this : 
 
 * Biiigliam, Book 4. Cliap. 11. Antiquities. 
 — Du Pill, end of third Century. 
 
240 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Ghaf. XIV. 
 
 and, in general, the distinction of these 
 offices was admitted through the Chris- 
 tian world. 
 
 Yet, if a Christian people were grown 
 very heretical, the bishops thought them- 
 selves bound in duty to provide for the 
 instruction of the smaller number, who, 
 in their judgment, loved the truth as it is 
 in Jesus; and for this peculiar service 
 they were accustomed both to elect and 
 consecrate a bishop. Likewise in send- 
 ing missionaries to the barbarous nations, 
 it would be absurd to suppose that they 
 waited for the choice of the people. — 
 They deputed and ordained whom they 
 approved of for that end. 
 
 Besides those, which have been men- 
 tioned, there appear, in the third century, 
 a number of lower officers, as doorkeep- 
 ers, sub-deacons, acolyths or attendants, 
 who, by degrees, had grown up in the 
 Christian Church. A much more candid 
 and true account of them may be given, 
 than what has been imposed on us, with 
 sufficient malignity. It could not be to 
 administer to the pride and sloth of the 
 higher clergy, that such offices were in- 
 stituted. Christians increased in num- 
 ber, and more labourers were required: 
 Besides, as thry had not then any semi- 
 naries of learning, the serving of the 
 Church in these lower offices was made 
 an introductory step to the higher ones. 
 And this was their most important use.* 
 The authority of the bishop was by no 
 means unlimited; — but it was very great. 
 Nothing could be done in the Church 
 without his consent. The extent of his 
 diocese was called Uu^omtA. Some of 
 these DIOCESES had a greater, others a less 
 number of Churches which belonged to 
 them. The diocese of Rome, before the 
 end of the third century, had above forty 
 Churches, — as Optatus observes; — and 
 this agrees very well with the account 
 before stated, namely, — that under Cor- 
 nelius the bishop, there were forty-six 
 priests. f — Cornelius, according to the 
 usual practice in those times, must, him- 
 self, have ministered— particularly at the 
 chief or mother-church : and the priests 
 of course, must have taken care of the 
 other Churches. But, distinct parishes, 
 with presbyters allotted to them, were not 
 yet known in cities.:):— It appears that the 
 
 * Bing. Books. Chap. 1. — Calv. Institutes, 
 Book the last. 
 
 f See Chap. IX. of this volume— towards 
 the end. 
 
 i Bing. Book 9. Chap. 8. 
 
 bishop sent them successively to minister 
 according to his discretion. The neigh- 
 bouring villages, however, which were 
 annexed to bishoprics, could not be sup- 
 plied in that manner : And they had, — 
 even then, — stated parish priests, — who 
 acted under the authority of the bishop. 
 
 That bishops were not merely congre- 
 gational pastors, seems evident from the 
 nature of things, as well as from the con- 
 current testimony of all antiquity. There 
 were seven bishops who belonged to the 
 sev-en churches of Asia, called Angels in 
 the Book of the Revelaiion. It is absurd 
 to suppose that the great Church of Ephe- 
 sus, in the decline of St. John's life, 
 should be only a single congregation ; 
 and, most probably, the same is true of 
 all the rest. Supposing the Christian 
 brethren to consist of only five hundred 
 men ; these, with their families and ser- 
 vants, and occasional hearers, would make 
 an assembly large enough for any human 
 voice. But, it is more probable that the 
 number of Christians at Ephesus amount- 
 ed to many thousands. This was the 
 case at Jerusalem :* And, in Chrysos- 
 tom's time, the Church of Antioch con- 
 sisted of a hundred thousand. Perhaps 
 it might comprise half that number in the 
 latter end of the third century. — Never- 
 theless, it is still certain, that dioceses 
 were then much smaller than in after 
 times : and the vast extension of them 
 proved very inconvenient to the cause of 
 godliness. Archbishop Cranmer wished 
 to correct this evil in our national Church : 
 and HE wanted neither zeal nor judgment. 
 But that and many other good things 
 slept with the English Reformers. 
 
 The choice of bishops, and — in part at 
 least — of presbyters, by the people, is a 
 custom which seems to have grown na- 
 turally out of the circumstances of the 
 Church at that time. The first bishops 
 and presbyters were appointed by the 
 Apostles themselves;! nor could I ever 
 discover the least vestige in Scripture of 
 their appointment by the people. There 
 was not a sufficient judgment in any of 
 them for this trust ; the world being, at 
 that time. Pagan or Jewish, or at least, 
 infant in Christianity. Apostolical wis- 
 dom and authority, under God, supplied 
 the want in the next succession of bish- 
 ops. As the judgment of the people ma- 
 tured, and, especially, as the grace of God 
 was powerful among them, they were 
 
 *Actsxxi. 20. 
 
 t Acta xiv. 23. 
 
Cent, in.] 
 
 IN THE THIRD CENTURY. 
 
 241 
 
 rendered better qualified to be the electors 
 of their ecclesiastical governors. Pre- 
 cedents, not Scriptural indeed, but of very 
 high antiquity, were set ; and the prac- 
 tice continued during at least the three 
 first centuries. On the other hand I do 
 not find that the people had any power in 
 deposing a bishop : The cognizance of 
 the crimes of bishops was left to a coun- 
 cil or synod of neighbouring bishops and 
 presbyters; and in that, as well as all 
 material affairs which concerned the 
 Church in general, the authority of such 
 councils was held very great, from early 
 times ; nor does it appear that the Chris- 
 tian laity had any direction in them. — 
 The wetl-authenticated case of Paul of 
 Samosata is very instructive here. 
 
 In furnishing this rough sketch of jtri- 
 mitive ecclesiastical government, I would 
 be understood, neither to provoke nor to 
 invite any controversy on this contentious 
 subject. I have given my own senti- 
 ments, — but, at the same time, I confess 
 that I feel no surprise that controversies 
 should have been started in a matter, 
 where something may be said — for epis- 
 copac}'^, — for presbytery, — and for inde- 
 pendency. To me it seems an unhappy 
 prejudice, to look on any one of the forms 
 as of Divine right, or of Scriptural au- 
 thority. — Circumstances will make dif- 
 ferent modes more proper, in one place, 
 and at one time, than at another. — And, 
 whoever rests in this conclusion, will be 
 in no danger of bigotry, — but, on the 
 contrary, will see much reason for moder- 
 ation and latitudinarian indifference in 
 judging of various methods, which have 
 been proposed or made use of for the ex- 
 ternal regulation of the Church. — Let 
 zeal be employed by all sincere Christians 
 in what is really divine and scriptural ; — 
 in what is internal, and truly essential to 
 the immortal interests of mankind. — The 
 arguments for the three forms of Church 
 government, as supported by experience, 
 may be briefly stated thus : — In no one 
 instance does the independent plan ap- 
 pear to have a solid foundation either in 
 Scripture or antiquity ; yet, the inter- 
 ference of the people, and the share of 
 authority exercised by them, — though 
 never on the plan of independent congre- 
 gations, — gives some plausible colour to 
 INDEPENDENCY. The presbytcrian sys- 
 tem seems to be scriptural and primitive, 
 so far as the institution of the clergy is 
 concerned, but defective for want of a 
 bishop. The episcopal form, no doubt, 
 Vol. I. X 
 
 obtained in all the primitive Churches 
 without exception ; but — what effectually 
 checks the pride of those who are fond of 
 the pomp of hierarchy, — it must be con- 
 fessed, that ANCIENT episcopacy had no 
 secular mixtures and appendages : and, 
 further, the pastoral character of bishops, 
 together with the smallness of their dio- 
 ceses, always adapted to pastoral inspec- 
 tion, made them more similar to the 
 presbyterian hierarchy. — When facts are 
 actually balanced in this way, or nearly 
 so, though violent party or prejudice may 
 lead men to view even historical evidence 
 in opposite lights ; nevertheless, men of 
 cool and sedate judgment will not differ 
 much in their opinions. 
 
 The discipline of the primitive Church, 
 was very strict; it even degenerated, as 
 has been observed, into excessive severity. 
 A clergyman once deposed for flagitious- 
 ness, was never restored to his order. 
 This MIGHT be right. — Another custom, 
 which prevailed at length, cannot be vin- 
 dicated. A person once ejected for his 
 vices from the Church might be restored ;* 
 — on a relapse, being again ejected, he 
 could never be favoured with Church- 
 communion, — though by no means sup- 
 posed to be necessarily excluded from the 
 mercy of God in Christ. — Their jealous 
 care against heresies has been abundantly 
 shown; and their zeal against vicious- 
 ness of practice was equal to this. Sup- 
 pose it be allowed, that this zeal was 
 carried to too great a length ; and, even, 
 that it was mixed with superstition ; yet, 
 — in comparison of the licentiousness of 
 our times, — how beautiful does it appear ! 
 — and how demonstrative of the power 
 and reality of godliness among them ! 
 
 Christian assemblies were then fre- 
 quented with great constancy, and the 
 Eucharist was generally administered 
 whenever they met for public worship. 
 But still gTeater proofs of their superior 
 regard to God and to every thing that is 
 really good, remain yet to be mentioned. 
 
 Their liberality to the indigent was 
 wonderful : there was nothing like it at 
 that time in the world. The Jews were 
 a very selfish, hard-hearted people : the 
 Gentiles lived in luxury and splendour, 
 if they could ; — but, care for the poor 
 seems to have made no part of their ju- 
 risprudence, nor to have been at all a 
 fashionable virtue. I never could learn 
 that philosophers, though they harangued 
 
 * Du Pin. 
 
242 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XX. 
 
 incessantly concerning virtue, either much 
 recommended, or practised any kindness 
 to the bulk of mankind, — that is, the 
 slaves and the vulgar. Indeed their pre- 
 cepts are particularly directed to the 
 higher ranks, and they seem to forget that 
 the lower orders belonged to the human 
 species. A hospital, an almshouse, or 
 any similar provision for the poor, was 
 unknown in the pagan and philosophic 
 world. But, when the religion of him, 
 who is no respecter of persons, began to 
 gain ground, the barbarous spirit of aris- 
 tocracy lost its dominion among Chris- 
 tians, though it still prevailed in the 
 manners of the rest of mankind. Chris- 
 tians felt themselves all sinners: all, 
 in the sight of God, on a level. — Thus 
 the Christian master, though bound to 
 preserve a due subordination of ranks, and 
 whatever is wholesome in government, 
 considered his slave as his equal in the 
 sight of God, and as redeemed by the 
 same atoning blood of his Saviour. The 
 pride of birth, station, and quality, was 
 crushed : The obedient disciple of Christ, 
 followed the example of his compassion- 
 ate Lord, and made it his business to re- 
 lieve the miserable. — We have seen above 
 a thousand and fifty widows and impo- 
 tent persons maintained by the liberality 
 of the Roman Church under Cornelius; 
 we have seen also the active charity of 
 the archdeacon Laurentius, in finding out 
 and assisting miserable objects, punished 
 with a fiery death : The very spirit and 
 taste of Christians, with the frugality and 
 simplicity of their lives and manners, en- 
 abled them abundantly to help the neces- 
 sitous ; while the rest of the world per- 
 secuted them, and while philosophers 
 themselves, dependent on the great, and 
 despising the poor, vainly babbled against 
 them. 
 
 "0 God of all grace, whose tender 
 mercies are over all thy works, — this 
 must be thy religion, — which humbled 
 and sweetened the hearts of men, which 
 taught them practically to regard all men 
 as brethren, and to delight in doing good 
 to all without distinction of persons !" — 
 The pagans themselves admired this bro- 
 therly love. 
 
 But the most singularly striking cha- 
 racteristic of this people has not yet been 
 noticed. — Though they had a regular po- 
 lity, guarded by great strictness of disci- 
 pline, distinguished into a number of com- 
 munities, each administered by a bishop, 
 presbyters, and deacons; and concen- 
 
 trated by general councils held from time 
 to time ; they neither had, nor strove to 
 obtain the least secular support of any 
 kind. They lay exposed to the rage of 
 the whole world around them, incited by 
 its natural enmity against God and by 
 the love of sin ; and exasperated on find- 
 ing itself condemned by these upstarts as 
 deservedly obnoxious to the Divine dis- 
 pleasure. The whole Roman world com- 
 prehended thousands of discordant sects 
 and parties, — which all tolerated one an- 
 other, because all agreed to treat sin with 
 lenity, and to allow one another's religion 
 to be right. It was impossible for Chris- 
 tians to do this : Hence the spirit of per- 
 secution was excited ; and, whoever at 
 this day lives in the same sincere hosti- 
 lity against all sin, and in the exercise 
 of the same charity, patience, and hea- 
 venly-mindedness as they did, will unde- 
 signedly, yet assuredly, excite, in a suni- 
 lar manner, the displeasure of the rest of 
 mankind. — Now, it is very easy to un- 
 derstand, how precarious, on this account, 
 their situation in society must have been ! 
 — They had not the least legal or secular 
 aid against persecution. Obliged, like 
 the rest of the subjects of the Roman em- 
 pire, to contribute to the general defence, 
 and to serve in the Roman armies, when 
 called on, they had no civil privileges : 
 — If an emperor chose to persecute them, 
 they were perfectly defenceless ; they had 
 no political resource against oppression. 
 What could be the reason of this] Shall 
 we say, " their circumstances, during the 
 first three hundred years, were too low, 
 and their means too weak, to encourage 
 them to attempt resistance or innovation 
 of any kind!" — This has been said — in- 
 considerately, it should seem — by those 
 who are not willing to allow that their 
 passiveness under injuries proceeded from 
 principle. Let us suppose, therefore, for 
 a moment, that they had thought it right 
 to resist the powers that be, and that 
 those who resist do not receive to 
 themselves damnation, but merit the 
 tribute of applause for supporting the 
 natural rights of man ; then, as no people 
 on earth were ever more unjustly treated, 
 they would naturally feel their injuries as 
 other men do ; and admitting them to have 
 been too weak and inconsiderable, in the 
 first century, to have resisted with effect; 
 — surely, in the second, and much more in 
 the tliird, thousands and tens of thou- 
 sands must have been capable of shaking 
 the very foundations of the empire. — So 
 
Cest. III.] 
 
 IN THE THIRD CENTURY. 
 
 243 
 
 fer from being without means, they seem 
 to have had much greater than many who 
 have disturbed the repose of kingdoms. 
 
 Here is, " impkrium in imperio," — a 
 regular well united phalanx of men, inur- 
 ed to frugal habits and to a variety of 
 hardships ; not a mere mob of levellers, 
 but men taught to obey their religious 
 governors, and submitting to great strict- 
 ness of discipline. Among their gover- 
 nors, if history had not informed us so, 
 we are sure there must have been some 
 men of genius, fortitude, and capacity, 
 who already had exercised their talents 
 in the art of government, and who possess- 
 ed that eloquence which can inflame the 
 passions, especially of the lower sort. 
 Cyprian of Carthage is undoubtedly one 
 of these. The same courage, capacity, 
 discretion and activity, which made him 
 an oracle over half the Roman empire 
 among the Christians, would, — if it had 
 been exerted in a military line, — have 
 been formidable to the throne of the Cee- 
 sars. Their brethren in the Roman armies 
 could have taught them military discip- 
 line : The riches, which a number of 
 them possessed, might have purchased 
 arms and military stores : Those captive 
 bishops, who gained au birong an ascen- 
 dant over the ignorant and barbarous na- 
 tions, might have easily etfected alliances 
 between them and others of the Chris- 
 tian name. 
 
 Let the reader mark the inference to 
 t)e drawn from these considerations. — 
 We pretend not to say, who would have 
 prevailed in the end of such a contest, be- 
 cause nothing is more uncertain than the 
 issue of arms : but supposing the Chris- 
 tians to have thought resistance lawful, 
 we maintain that, amidst the distractions 
 of the Roman empire from within and 
 from witliout, they had both temptations 
 and probabilities sufficiently strong to 
 have induced them to excite seditions and 
 rebellions against their persecutors and 
 oppressors. — In knowledge and civiliza- 
 tion they were not inferior to those among 
 whom they lived : It cannot be denied 
 that they were very unjustly treated, and 
 that they possessed the probable mean 
 of redressing themselves by force: and 
 further, — we are now arguing on the sup 
 position that they thought it lawful to use 
 those means, — I affirm then, that which- 
 ever way we turn, we must be present- 
 ed with the same conclusion,^-namely, 
 that, under such circumstances, resistance 
 woqld infallibly have taken place;— 
 
 whereas, on the contrary, it appears — not - 
 from a few scattered passages, but from the 
 whole tenour of the writings of the Chris- 
 tians — and, what is still more, from their 
 uniform practice, without any exception, 
 that they thought it unchristian to seek 
 this mode of relief. Patience, and prayer, 
 and charity, were their only arms : Nor 
 is it possible to find a single instance of 
 a Christian intermeddling with the poli- 
 tics of HIS time. 
 
 Must we not then conclude — ^That they 
 understood the rules laid down in the 
 thirteenth chapter to the Romans, and 
 other parts of the New Testament of like 
 import, in their plain and literal sense? — 
 That they thought it wrong to revenge 
 injuries, public as well as private, and re- 
 ferred themselves wholly to Him who 
 hath said, "Vengeance is mine!" — I be- 
 lieve we have no other alternative : This 
 was the sum of Christian politics ; and 
 in this way of understanding the Gospel- 
 rules of submission and of suffering, — it 
 is not hard to conceive, what an advan- 
 tage such a spirit of patience and of ab- 
 straction from secular politics proved to 
 them, in making them feel themselves 
 strangers and pilgrims on earth, in caus- 
 ing them to long for the heavenly state, 
 in deadening their affections to the world, 
 and in exercising them in faith and cha- 
 rity: And, whenever real Christians, in 
 our times, shall more fully emancipate 
 themselves from the ambitious notions, 
 with which the present habits and preju- 
 dices of men infect them, and through 
 Divine Grace, shall catch this same spirit 
 of the primitive Believers, they will then 
 see a beauty in the New Testament prin- 
 ciples on this subject, of which they have 
 now little idea. — The love of the world 
 will then cease to entangle them so 
 strongly; and primitive apostolic faith 
 and practice will again visit the earth in 
 its genuine simplicity. 
 
 The monastic spirit, I have already ob- 
 served, had begun to appear during the 
 Decian persecution. About the year two 
 hundred and seventy lived 
 Anthony the Egyptian, the 
 first founder of these commu- 
 nities. Athanasius has writ- 
 ten his Life; and, I doubt not, 
 but many moderns may j udge the employ- 
 ment to be a proof of weakness of mind. 
 Posterity will, probably, requite them by 
 being equally rash and uncan^id in pass- 
 ing a similar censure on present charac- 
 ters. — In truth, Athanasius was a man of 
 
 Anthony 
 the Egyp- 
 tian, 
 
 A. D. 270. 
 
244 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XXL 
 
 solid sense and great capacity ; but these 
 endowments are not always a defence 
 against fashionable errors; and unhappi- 
 ly, the Monkish superstition was, in his 
 time, growing up into high admiration. — 
 It is much to be wished, "that men ad- 
 verted more closely to the " sins which 
 easily beset themselves " in their own 
 days ; for then, they would be less quick- 
 sighted in discovering the absurdities of 
 former ages, and also less disposed to 
 form ostentatious and pharisaical compar- 
 isons between what they term modern 
 excellencies and ancient defects. — An- 
 thony, it seems, perverting a few texts 
 of Scripture, took upon himself to live in 
 solitude. His austerities were excessive, 
 and the most ridiculous stories are told of 
 his contests with the devil : They merit 
 not the least attention : I observe in them, 
 however, a dangerous spirit of self-right- 
 eous pride and vain-glory, by which this 
 same Anthony was encouraged in his 
 progress, and which W4II lead a man very 
 far' in external shows of holiness, while 
 there is little of the reality. It is proba- 
 ble that his life, as it is recorded by Atha- 
 nasius, might, as superstition grew more 
 and more reputable, appear admirable in 
 the eyes of many persons, who were 
 much better men than this celebrated 
 monk himself. 
 
 We shall, for the present, leave An- 
 thony propagating the monastic disposi- 
 tion, and extending its influence not only 
 into the next century, but for many ages 
 after, and conclude this view of the state 
 of the third century, with expressing our 
 regret— "that the faith and love of the 
 Gospel received, toward the close of it, a 
 dreadful blow from the encouragement of 
 this unchristian practice." 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 TESTIMONIES TO THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 
 FROM ITS ENEMIES. 
 
 The fastidious indifference at least, if 
 not the virulent enmity, shown to the 
 Gospel by the great men of Greece and 
 Rome, during the three first centuries, 
 leaves one little reason to expect much 
 account of Christians through the chan- 
 nel of THEIR writings. Nor is the case 
 materially different in our own days. — A 
 few cursory, sarcastic, and ill-informed 
 reflections are all that, in writers of po- 
 lite estimation, can be found, concerning 
 
 more modern revivals and propagation of 
 evangelical truth and godliness. Some- 
 thing, however, which may throw light 
 on the state of religion in the second and 
 third centuries, is to be gleaned from the 
 hostile contemporary writers, and, per- 
 haps, Celsus will be more to our purpose 
 than all the other authors together; par- 
 ticularly, if we attend to the extracts from 
 his writings preserved by Origen. — My 
 views in presenting the reader with the 
 following few quotations from heathen 
 authors, is, not merely to establish the 
 general credibility of the Gospel, but 
 rather, to illustrate the character of real 
 Christians, and to point out some of the 
 effects of the work of the Holy Spirit 
 upon their minds. 
 
 In the former part of the second century 
 flourished the Stoic Philosopher Epicte- 
 tus.* — Arrian has published his dis- 
 courses. In one passage he occasionally 
 speaks of " the Galilceans, as indifferent 
 to sufferings, — from madness or from 
 habit." 
 
 These Galileans are obviously Chris- 
 tians. — Through the operation of what 
 cause they were indifferent to sufferings, 
 Ave shall be willing to learn from those 
 who blotter understnuJ the subject. In- 
 deed they took joyfully the spoiling of 
 their goods, because they were convinced 
 that tliey had in heaven a better and an 
 enduring substance. Christian faith and 
 hope afford motives truly deserving a bet- 
 ter name than madness or habit. But the 
 fact is attested by this prejudiced philoso- 
 pher, — namely, that Christians were then 
 exposed to singular sufferings, and that 
 they bore them with a composure and se- 
 renity so astonishing, that philosophers 
 knew not how to account for their pa- 
 tience They did not understand, that 
 
 ihey were strengthened with might, by 
 the glorious power of their God, to all 
 patience and long-suffering with joyful- 
 ness. 
 
 In the same century, Apuleius, a lu- 
 dicrous author, in his Metamorphosis, 
 speaks of a baker, a good sort of man, 
 troubled with a bad wife, — who was pos- 
 sessed of every vice ; — perverse, a drunk- 
 ard, lewd, — a follower of vain observ- 
 ances, — and a woman, who pretended 
 that the Deity was only one. 
 
 * When Uomitian ban'shed the Philoso- 
 phers from Rome, about the year 94, Epicte- 
 tus retired to Nicopolis, and died there about 
 the J- ear 161. 
 
Cbst. III.] 
 
 TESTIMONIES, ETC. 
 
 245 
 
 * The autheiUicity of St. Matt. 2il ehap. 
 which has been unreasonably deDieil, is sup- 
 ported by tiiis passage. 
 x2 
 
 I conjecture that Apuleius would have 
 taken no notice of her other crimes, if 
 she had not been guilty of this last. Mark 
 the revolution in sentiment, which Chris- 
 tianity has made in the world. Through- 
 out Europe the character of any man's 
 understanding would, at present, be much 
 impeached, who should seriously assert 
 a plurality of Gods. — In the second cen- 
 tury, the belief of the Divine Unity is, by 
 a polite author classed with an assem- 
 blage of vices. — What have ye been do- 
 ing, philosophers, that ye never could rid 
 mankind of that polytheism, which every 
 philosopher now despises] — Open the 
 eyes of your understandings, and learn 
 that God has effected this mighty change 
 by the Gospel. — This woman was, doubt- 
 less, a Christian by profession; but we 
 cannot now tell, whether she merited the 
 reproaches with which her memory is 
 loaded ; nor can we say, in what sense 
 her husband, who was plainly a pagan, 
 deserved the appellation of a good sort of 
 man ; — but we know that the world, with- 
 out much scruple, denominates its fol- 
 lowers to be good sort of men ; — and we 
 also know who said, — " If ye were of the 
 world, the world would love its own." 
 
 The extracts from Celsus, — who wrote 
 in the latter end of the second century, — 
 preserved in Origen's work against him, 
 are very valuable in the light which I 
 have stated. I shall select a few pas- 
 sages, partly from the collections of 
 others, and partly from such as I have 
 noticed myself. — The reader must be 
 prepared to hear bitter things. A more 
 spiteful calumniator hardly ever existed ; 
 but he may serve a purpose which he 
 never intended: — When' the following 
 extracts have been seriously considered, 
 the just inferences to be drawn from 
 them, concerning the nature of the Gos- 
 pel, and the characters of its professors, 
 cannot fail to present themselves to the 
 mind of every candid inquirer after truth. 
 
 " When they say, — Do not examine, 
 and the like, in their usual manner, sure- 
 ly, it is incumbent on them to teach what 
 those things are which they assert, and 
 whence they are derived." 
 
 _" They say, — Wisdom in life is a bad 
 thing, but folly is good." 
 
 " Christ was privately educated, and 
 served for hire in Egypt :* he got acquaint- 
 
 ed with miraculous arts there; he re- 
 turned; and, relying on his power of 
 working miracles, declared himself God." 
 
 " The Apostles were infamous men, 
 publicans, and abandoned mariners." 
 
 " Why should you, when an infant, be 
 carried into Egypt, lest you should be 
 murdered] God should not fear being 
 put to death." 
 
 " Ye say that God was sent to sinners ; 
 but why not to those who were free from 
 sin; What harm is it, not to have 
 sinned 1" 
 
 " Ye encourage sinners, because ye 
 are not able to persuade any really good 
 men ; therefore ye open the doors to the 
 most wicked and abandoned." 
 
 " Some of thera say, do not examine, 
 but BELIEVE, and thy faith shall save 
 thee." 
 
 With a sneer he makes the Christians 
 say, — "These are our institutions: Let 
 not any man of learning come here, nor 
 any wise man, nor any man of prudence ; 
 for these things are reckoned evil by us. 
 But whoever is unlearned, ignorant, and 
 silly, let him come without fear." — 
 " Thus, they own that they can gain only 
 the foolish, the vulgar, the stupid slaves, 
 women and children. — They, who con- 
 versed with him when alive, and heard 
 his voice, and followed him as their mas- 
 ter, when they saw him under punish- 
 ment and dying, were so far from dying 
 with him or for him, or from being in- 
 duced to despise sufferings, that they de- 
 nied that they were his disciples: — but 
 now YE die with him." 
 
 " He had no reason to fear any mortal 
 now, after he had died, and, as ye say, 
 was a God ; — therefore, he should have 
 shown himself to all, and particularly, to 
 him that condemned him. 
 
 " He persuaded only twelve abandoned 
 sailors and publicans, and did not per- 
 suade even all these." 
 
 " At first, when they were but few, 
 they agreed; But when they became a 
 multitude they were rent again and again ; 
 and each will have their own factions ; 
 for they had factious spirits from the be- 
 ginnino-." 
 
 " They are now so split into different 
 sects, that they have only the name left 
 them in common." 
 
 " All wise men are excluded from the 
 doctrine of their faith: They call to it 
 only fools and men of a servile spirit." 
 
 He frequently upbraids Christians for 
 reckoning him, who had a mortal body, 
 
246 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chaf. XXI, 
 
 to be God ; and looking on themselves as 
 pious on that account. 
 
 " The preachers of their Divine Word 
 only attempt to persuade fools, — mean 
 and senseless persons, — slaves, — women 
 and children. — What harm can there be 
 in learning-, or, — in appearing a man of 
 knowledge 1 — What obstacle can this be 
 to the knowledge of God I" 
 
 *' We see these itinerants showing rea- 
 dily their tricks to the vulgar, but not 
 approaching the assemblies of wise men; 
 not daring to show themselves there : but 
 where they see boys, — a crowd of slaves, 
 — and ignorant men, — there they thrust 
 in themselves and puff off their doctrine." 
 
 " You may see weavers, tailors, and 
 fullers, illiterate and rustic men, in their 
 houses, — but not daring to utter a word 
 before persons of age, experience, and 
 respectability : it is, when they get hold 
 of boys, and of silly women, privately, 
 that they recount their wonderful stories ; 
 it is then that they teach their young dis- 
 ciples that they must not mind their 
 fathers or their tutors, but obey them : 
 Their fathers and guardians, they tell 
 them, are quite ignorant and in the dark, 
 but themselves alone have the true wis- 
 dom. And if the children take this ad- 
 vice, they pronounce them happy; and 
 direct them to leave their fathers and tu- 
 tors, and to go, with the women and their 
 play-fellows, into the chambers of the fe- 
 males, or into a tailor's or fuller's shop, 
 that they may learn perfection." 
 
 " In other mysteries, the cryer used to 
 say, Whoever has clean hands, and a good 
 
 ife, let him come 
 hear whom they call, 
 a fool, an infant, 
 a lost wretch, — the kingdom of God will 
 receive him.' — An unjust man, if he 
 humble himself for his crimes, God will 
 receive him; but a just man, who has 
 proceeded in a course of virtue from the 
 beginning, if he look up to him, he will 
 not be received." 
 
 He compares a Christian teacher to a 
 quack, who promises to heal the sick, on 
 condition that they keep from intelligent 
 practitioners, lest his ignorance be de- 
 tected. 
 
 " Ye will hear them, — though differing 
 so widely from one another, and abusing 
 one another so foully, — making that boast 
 — the world is crucified to me, and I to 
 the world."* 
 
 conscience, and a good 
 in. But let us 
 'Whoever is a sinner- 
 
 Gal. 
 
 VI. 
 
 " The same things are better said by 
 the Greeks, and without the imperious 
 denunciation of God, or the Son of 
 God." 
 
 "If one sort introduce one doctrine, 
 another another, and all join in saying, 
 ' Believe, if ye would be saved, or de- 
 part;' what are they to do, who desire 
 really to be saved 1 Are they to deter- 
 mine by the throw of a die ? Where are 
 they to turn themselves, or whom to be- 
 lieve ?" 
 
 " Do ye not see, that any man that 
 will, may carry you away and crucify 
 you and your demon : — Tlie Son of God 
 gives you no help." 
 
 But enoug-h of Celsus. — He would not 
 deserve a moment's attention, if it were 
 not for the light which he throws on the 
 history of the Christians of his own times, 
 — that is, — of the second century. 
 
 It appears evident that there was then a 
 singular sort of persons, suliject to all 
 manner of ill treatment from the rest of the 
 world ; and who might be hunted down 
 at pleasure by violence or by calumny. 
 — Celsus insults them on account of their 
 defenceless condition. If they had re- 
 sisted evil with evil, his malignity would 
 have induced him to reproach them on 
 account of their turbulence and seditious- 
 ness. Undoubtedly then, they were a 
 meek, quiet, peaceable, inoifensive peo- 
 ple. It appears also, — that they ■ wor- 
 shipped a person named Jesus, who had 
 been crucified at Jerusalem, and, — that 
 they worshipped him as God ; and Celsus 
 derides their folly in so doing : In his 
 view of things, that the same person 
 should be both God and man, was the 
 greatest inconsistency. Their doctrine 
 concerning Christ appears to him foolish 
 beyond measure ; fit only for the under- 
 standing of fools, and beneath the regard 
 of wise men. Even from his loose and 
 sarcastic views of it one may conclude, 
 that they laid great stress on faith : — 
 and that the exercise of it was considered 
 as connected with salvation ; but that 
 this exercise, in its whole nature, was 
 contrary to all that is esteemed wise and 
 great in the -world. It was also a great 
 stumbling-block to Celsus, — that men the 
 most wicked and abandoned might be 
 saved by faith in Jesus, and, — that men's 
 confidence in moral virtues was a bar to 
 their salvation. Nor does it appear that 
 the number of converts among the learned 
 or the great was considerable : — The low- 
 er ranks of men were best disposed to 
 
Cewt. hi.] 
 
 TESTIMONIES, ETC, 
 
 247 
 
 receive it ; and the bulk of Christian pro- 
 fessors consisted of these. 
 
 From these premises, with a careful 
 study of the sacred volume, any man, 
 possessed of a humble spirit, may see 
 
 WHAT THE RELIGION AVAS, which CclsUS 
 
 so vehemently reprobates. It could not 
 be the doctrine of common morality. He 
 owHS, indeed, they taught this, though 
 he says that the philosophers taught it 
 better. One may appeal to any person 
 almost at this day, whether Christian 
 morals be not immensely superior to any 
 thing that is to be learnt from Plato, Tul- 
 ly, or Seneca. It has been the fashion 
 to extol the moral part of Scripture, — I 
 fear, with an insidious eye to the doc- 
 trinal. What this last was in Celsus's 
 days, he himself, in a measure, tells us ; 
 Namely, "Christ crucified, the living 
 and true God, the only Saviour of sinful 
 men ; — the necessity of renouncing our 
 own wisdom and righteousness; — salva- 
 tion through faith alone ; — dependence on 
 our supposed goodness, ruinous and fa- 
 tal." — It is certain, that mere moral truths, 
 if they had formed the main part of the 
 Christian scheme, would not so much 
 have provoked the enmity of Celsus. 
 
 In other words, — the peculiar doctrines 
 of the Gospel, man's fallen state, justifi- 
 cation by Jesus Christ alone, divine il- 
 lumination and influence, these, which 
 excite the ill-will of man in his natural 
 state now as much as they did then ;-^ 
 THESE were plainly the doctrines which 
 occasioned such misrepresentation and 
 abuse as that, which we have seen. 
 
 If the serious reader would take the 
 trouble to examine a variety of controver- 
 sial writings published against the re- 
 vival of godliness in our own times, he 
 could not fail to be struck with a remark- 
 able conformity of taste and sentiment 
 between Celsus and many who call them- 
 selves Christian pastors. Circumstances 
 vary : The dresses of religious profession 
 alter according to the course of things in 
 this world ; and hence, the undiscerning 
 will be liable to form a wrong estimate. 
 But, in reality, there is no " new thing 
 under the sun." — That which, in our 
 times, has been derided as enthusiasm, 
 was treated in the manner we have just de- 
 scribed, by Celsus and others, in the third 
 century ; and he, who pleases, may now 
 see in England the same sort of persons, 
 living by the faith of the Son of God, and 
 held in contempt by persons of the same 
 stamp as Celsus.— It has frequently been 
 
 Lucian 
 died at the 
 age of 90, 
 
 A. D. 180, 
 circiter. 
 
 well observed, that this adversary of .Te- 
 sus Christ gives a good testimony to the 
 miracles and facts of the Gospel ; — and I 
 add, with much satisfaction, that he is 
 also an excellent witness to the work of 
 the Spirit of God in his day, by showing 
 us what sort of doctrine was preached and 
 professed by Christians at that time. 
 
 Lucian of Samosata was a contempo- 
 rary of Celsus. He has already been 
 mentioned, as throwing considerable light 
 on the history of Christians, 
 in the story of Peregrinus. 
 The delusion into which this 
 hypocritical professor was suf- 
 fered to fall, after his aposta- 
 sy, deserves to be noticed as 
 a warning to those, who use the name of 
 Jesus for a cloak to sinister pursuits. 
 
 He publicly burnt himself in the sight 
 of all Greece, soon after the Olympic 
 games were over.* He did it to gain 
 himself a name, and " he had his reward." 
 — Heathen authors speak honourably of 
 him. The lustre of his philosophic life, 
 and his ostentatious suicide, expiated, in 
 the eyes of men of this world, the guilt 
 and infamy of his juvenile profession of 
 the Gospel. — A statue was erected to him 
 at Parium in Mysia, which was supposed 
 to be oracular. 
 
 That which in a Christian view is the 
 depth of iniquity, may seem, to misguided 
 and vain philosophers, the perfection of 
 virtue. " The Lord seeth not as man 
 seeth." 
 
 Lucian tells us also of a person, named 
 Alexander, who deluded mankind by 
 oracular falsehoods. Some Epicureans 
 detected and exposed his fallacies, which 
 made him declare that Pontus was full of 
 Atheists and Christians, who had the as- 
 surance to raise slanderous stories against 
 him : And he excited the people to drive 
 them away with stones. He instituted 
 mysterious rites, like those of Athens ; 
 and, on the first day of the solemnity, 
 proclamation was made, — as at Athens, — 
 to the following effect: " If any Epicu- 
 rean, Christian, or Atheist, be come 
 hither as a spy upon these mysteries, let 
 him depart with all speed ; but I promise 
 a happy initiation to those who [believe 
 in God." Then they thrust the people 
 away, — he going before and sa)'ing, 
 "Away with the Christians!" then the 
 multitude cried out again, " Away with 
 the Epicureans !" 
 
 Lardner's Collect, chap. six. 
 
248 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XXI. 
 
 We see here again that there is nothing 
 "new under the sun." A fervent or 
 artful supporter of old Pagan supersti- 
 tions finds himself opposed by two sorts 
 of people, the most opposite to one an- 
 other, which can possibly exist, — Epicu- 
 rean sceptics or men of no religious prin- 
 ciple, — and Christian believers. So at 
 this day, — Christians and Sceptics will 
 unite in discountenancing Papal supersti- 
 tions ; — but with how different a spirit I — 
 The one with compassion and gravity, — 
 the other with carelessness and levity : — 
 and, with how different a design ! — The 
 former to establish the true worship of 
 God, — the latter to spread universal infi- 
 delity. 
 
 The Greek author, Lucian, was himself 
 an Epicurean, — abounding in wit and 
 profaneness. His Dialogues are fall of 
 sarcastic insinuations against the fashion- 
 able idolatry. — He was not aware, that 
 he was co-operating with Christians in 
 subverting the abominations, which had 
 subsisted for so many ages. His writings 
 were, doubtless, of use in this respect: 
 And, who can foresee how serviceable, 
 under God, the present fashionable spirit 
 of depreciating and lowering Popery may 
 be to the future sfeneral establishment of 
 Christianity, — though nothing be farther 
 from the thoughts or wishes of our pre- 
 sent political sceptics and infidels. 
 
 There is a dialogue, called Philopatris, 
 ascribed to Lucian, but probably written 
 by some other person somewhat later. 
 No doubt, it is of high antiquity. It ridi- 
 cules the doctrine of the Trinity, " One 
 THREE, THREE ONE. The most high God; 
 Son of the Father ; the Spirit proceeding 
 from the Father." Such are the expres- 
 sions in the dialogue. The author speaks 
 also of " a beggarly, sorrowful company 
 of people." jfle insinuates their disaffec- 
 tion to government; — that they wished 
 for bad news, and delighted in public ca- 
 lamities ; — and that some of them fasted 
 ten whole days without eating, and spent 
 whole nights in singing hymns. — Who 
 does not see in all this the misrepresen- 
 tation of an enemy, describing men of 
 holy lives and mortified affections, who 
 worshipped the Father, the Son, and the 
 Holy Ghost; and who, in their desires 
 and temper, were elevated above the 
 world. 
 
 Aristides the Sophist, another contem- 
 porary of Celsus, speaks with indignation 
 against certain persons of his day, whom, 
 he observes, in manners to be not unlike the 
 
 Galen died 
 at the age 
 
 impious people in Palestine ; for they ac- 
 knowledged not the gods : they differ 
 from the Greeks and all good men, are 
 dexterous in subverting houses and dis- 
 turbing families : they contribute nothing 
 to public festivals, but dwell in comers, 
 and are wonderfully " wise in their own 
 conceits."* 
 
 Thus, when men were out of humour 
 with any persons, they compared them to 
 Christians, who, in this way, were made 
 the " off-scouring of all things". — By such 
 evidences as these, however, their singu- 
 lar abstinence from all reigning vices and 
 follies, their steady adherence to the wor- 
 ship of the living God, and the strength 
 of the divine operations on their minds, 
 are proved beyond contradiction. 
 
 Much about the same time, Galen, the 
 famous physician, gave testimony to the 
 firmness and perseverance of 
 Christians. "It is easier," 
 says he, " to convince the dis- of jq 
 ciples of Moses and Christ • jj' jg„ 
 than physicians and philo- 
 sophers who are addicted to particular 
 sects." Thus it appears that tlieir forti- 
 tude or their obstinacy was at that time 
 PROVERBIAL : and moreover, that they 
 were a people then well known in the 
 world. 
 
 Plotinus was, in this century, one of 
 the most celebrated disciples of the new 
 Platonic school, the genius of which, as 
 formed by Ammonius, has been before 
 described. He had studied under Ammo- 
 nius himself: and, by the strength of his 
 parts,themultiplicity of his literary acqui- 
 sitions, and the gravity of his manners, 
 he attained a very high reputation in the 
 world. He imitated Socrates in his pre- 
 tensions to a communion with a demon ; 
 and was, by his disciples, looked on as 
 somethino- celestial. Persons of the grreat- 
 est quality revered him : The emperor 
 Gallienus was once on the point of giving 
 him a ruined city in Campania, in which 
 he might settle a Platonic republic. — The 
 man seems, to his dying day, to have sup- 
 ported his philosophical reveries. — When 
 he was actually dying, he said, " I am 
 endeavouring to rejoin that, which is di- 
 vine in us, to the divine part of the uni- 
 verse."! Undoubtedly he alluded to the 
 NOTION of " God being the soul of the 
 universe," — that Pantheistic compound 
 of pride and atheistic absurdity, which 
 was the proper creed of most of the an- 
 
 Lardner's Collect, ch. xx. f Fleury. 
 
Ckwt. III.] 
 
 TESTIMONIES, ETC. 
 
 249 
 
 cient Philosophers, and was even more 
 impious than all the fables of vulgar Pa- 
 ganism.* 
 
 The oracle of Apollo, we are told, after 
 his death, informed his admirers that his 
 soul was in the Elysian fields with Plato 
 and Pythagoras, — Such were the artifices 
 by which .Satan and his human followers 
 endeavoured to raise up rivals to the Chris- 
 tians. In a work professedly illustrating 
 the operations of the Spirit of God, it 
 seemed proper to take notice of the con- 
 trasts, or rather of tlie counterfeits by 
 which the spirit of falsehood endeavoured 
 to support the declining cause of idolatry. 
 -—Its vulgar and gross scenes were, in 
 part, abandoned, and a more refined habit 
 was given to it by philosophy, which 
 pretended to wisdom and virtue in a high 
 degree. But human philosophy could 
 not produce holiness, because humility 
 and the faith of Jesus were not there : 
 Pride was its predominant feature ; and 
 while thousands found, even in this life, 
 the salutary benefits of Christianity, vain 
 philosophers prated concerning virtue, but 
 effected nothing either for the honour of 
 God, or the good of mankind. 
 
 One of the most studious and laborious 
 disciples of Plotinus was Amelius. It 
 is evident from a passagef of Eusebins, 
 that he made attempts to 
 unite something of Christiani- 
 ty with Platonism, just as we 
 have seen Origen, — who was 
 of the same school, — mix 
 something of the latter with the former, 
 to the great prejudice of the Gospel. 
 "This was the Word," says he, "by 
 whom, he being himself eternal, all things 
 that exist were made ; — the same whom 
 the barbarian afl[irms to be with God. and 
 to be God : the Word by whom all things 
 were made, and in whom every thing 
 that was made has its life and being 
 .who, descending into body and putting 
 on flesh, took tlie form of man; though 
 he even then gave proof of the majesty of 
 his nature ; nay, and after his dissolution 
 he was deified ao-ain, and is God, the 
 same he was before he descended into 
 body, and flesh, and man." 
 
 This may be called no mean testimony 
 to the Gospel of St. John, — for he is. 
 
 Plotinus 
 died at the 
 age of 66, 
 
 A. D. 270. 
 
 * See this point ably discussed in AVarbur- 
 ton's Legation of Moses, Book III. Sect. 4. 
 [Vol. iii. 8vo. edit. 1811.] 
 
 + Euseb. Pr. Ev. — See Lardner's Collec- 
 tions, chap, xxxiii. 
 
 doubtless, the barbarian here mentioned : 
 — The ideas of Christianity, it seems, in 
 some loose ambiguous manner, were ad- 
 mitted by these philosophers, and incor- 
 porated into their system ; and so, in 
 modern times, Swedenburgh, Rousseau, 
 or Bolingbroke, have not been unwilling 
 to ennoble their compositions with sub- 
 lime sentiments taken from the sacred 
 writings, but confusedly understood ; 
 while yet, they stood aloof from the so- 
 ciety of Christians, affected to think them 
 little better than barbarians, and made 
 not, in their own case, the least approach 
 to the faith and love of Jesus. 
 
 Thus also Longinus, a scholar of the 
 same school, and well acquainted with 
 Plotinus, in his treatise on the Sublime, 
 produces a fine quotation from the first 
 chapter of Genesis, and calls Moses a 
 man of no mean genius.* Likewise, a 
 fragment of this same writer, v/hich has 
 been preserved ; — and of which I see no 
 reason to doubt the authenticity, — speaks 
 of Paul of Tarsus, as one of the greatest 
 of orators ; and also, as the first supporter 
 of a doctrine by no means proved to be 
 true. 
 
 This passage is exactly in the style of 
 Longinus, — rather nervous than elegant. 
 It is found in a manuscript of the Gospels 
 of very good authority ; and no sufficient 
 reason has been given for suspecting its 
 genuineness. — The internal evidence is 
 all against such a suspicion. The sup- 
 posed author was a most judicious critic, 
 — if ever there was a person in the world, 
 who deserved that character; — and there- 
 fore he was very capable, by the excel- 
 lency of bis taste, of seeing and relishing 
 the EE.A.UTIES of St. Paul's compositions : 
 He possessed a very candid temper, — 
 which would dispose him to acknowledge 
 them ; and he was perfectly indifferent 
 in regard to religion, — which accounts 
 for his overlooking what ought principally 
 to have fixed his attention. For these 
 reasons, I reject the gratuitous and im- 
 probable assertion, which has been made, 
 — that this clause concerning St. Paul 
 was forged by some Christian. f 
 
 We see, hence, how well Christians 
 were known in the third century ; — and 
 what respect their doctrine, even then ob- 
 tained in the world from those, who, as 
 far as their own personal interests might 
 
 t Longinus is said to have been put to death 
 by Aurelian, a. d. 273. 
 
250 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XXI, 
 
 Porphyry 
 died at the 
 age of 
 about 71, 
 at the end 
 of Diocle- 
 sian's 
 reign. 
 
 be afFected, were either averse to embrace 
 the Gospel, or at least quite careless con- 
 cerning it. 
 
 Porphyry is the last unwilling witness 
 for Christians whom I shall mention 
 within the third century. There is a 
 work, indeed, bearing his 
 name, entitled the Philoso- 
 phy of Oracles, in which 
 there are very strong testi- 
 monies in favour of the Gos- 
 pel : but, as it appears to 
 have been written in the time 
 of Constautine, or after the 
 civil establishment of Christianity, the 
 consideration of it properly belongs to 
 the history of the next century. 
 
 _ This man was born at Tyre in Phoe- 
 nicia,— was a scholar of Plotinus, and,— 
 like the rest of that school,— maintained 
 a gravity of manners, and entered vigor- 
 ously into Platonic refinements In a'cri- 
 
 mony against Christians he far exceeded 
 them all. He took much pains to over- 
 turn the Gospel ; and it must be confess- 
 ed his learning and acuteness were con- 
 siderable. The very few fragments ex- 
 tant of his works afford us no great op- 
 portunity to judge of the extent of his ca- 
 pacity, or of the depth of his judgment : 
 but, from the serious pains taken by the 
 ancient Christians to confute him, we 
 may conclude that his abilities were of a 
 far higher order than those of Celsus. 
 
 In a passage, preserved by Eusebius,* 
 he censures the famous Origen for leav- 
 ing Gentilism and embracing the barba- 
 rian temerity,— that is, the Gospel. That 
 he states the fact erroneously is certain : 
 for Origen was brought up under Chris- 
 tian parents ; but I had almost said, that 
 that great man merited such a reproach 
 on account of the extravagant respect, 
 vphich he paid to the enemies of Chris- 
 tianity. Porphyry allows liim to have 
 been a great proficient in philosophy ; and 
 says, that he was very conversant with 
 Plato, Longinus, and the works of the 
 Pythagoreans and Stoics;— and, that he 
 learnt from these the allegorical method 
 of explaining the Greek mysteries, and 
 by forced interpretations, inconsistent in 
 themselves, andunsuitable to those writ- 
 ings, applied it to the Jewish Scriptures. 
 Fas est et ab hoste doceri. — The fan- 
 ciful mode of Origen in interpreting Scrip- 
 ture is here justly condemned by Por- 
 phyry : or, which is the same thing,— the 
 
 Ammonian scheme is allowed by him to 
 be unsuitable to those writings. Origen 
 did much mischief by making such at- 
 tempts: Let the word of God stand sim- 
 ple and alone; and let philosophers be 
 left to their own inventions : — The enmity 
 of Porphyry was not abated by the com- 
 plaisance of philosophizing Christians; 
 nor did their concessions make any con- 
 verts to evangelical truth. 
 
 His captious reasonings against the 
 book of Daniel show him to be a bitter, 
 but ineffectual adversary to Christianity: 
 The consideration of these, however, fall 
 not within our design. — The same may 
 be said of various cavils which he made 
 to many passages in the Gospel: — We 
 have seen a sufficient specimen of the 
 same spirit in Celsus. 
 
 Ingenuity and malevolence, when 
 united, seldom fail in forming plausible 
 objections, wherever opportunities offer. 
 The censure which St. Paul, in the Epis- 
 tle to the Galatians, has left upon St. 
 Peter, engaged the attention of Porphyry, 
 and induced him, from an occasional dif- 
 ference between the Apostles, to form an* 
 argument against the whole of their re- 
 ligion. I have, already, in the former 
 part of this volume, stated my deliberate 
 judgment on this subject; — and, I may 
 here add, — that the very clear testimony 
 which St. Peter, toward the conclusion 
 of his second epistle, gives to the in- 
 spired character of St. Paul, at the same 
 time that it demonstrates the harmony of 
 the Apostles, remains one of the fairest 
 monuments of St. Peter's humility and 
 candour. — On examination, then, it ap- 
 pears, that these attacks of enemies are, 
 in fact, so many evidences of the virtues 
 and graces of the Christians. Surely 
 truth, and wisdom, and goodness may 
 well be presumed to be with those, whom 
 their adversaries assault with such frivo- 
 lous objections. 
 
 On account of an epidemical disorder 
 raging in a certain city, Porphyry ob- 
 serves, " Men wonder now that distem- 
 pers have seized the city so many years : 
 they forget that ^Esculapius and the other 
 gods no longer dwell ainong them : for, 
 since Jesus was honoured, no one has 
 received any public benefit froraf the 
 gods." 
 
 What a testimony is this to the great 
 progress of Christianity in his day ! Ma- 
 
 * Euseb. Book 6, chap. 18. 
 
 * Lardner's Collections, chap, xxxvii. 
 t Eusebius. 
 
Cest. m.] 
 
 PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS. 
 
 251 
 
 levolence confesses, at the very time that 
 it impiously and absurdly complains. 
 
 " Matrons and women," says Porphyry, 
 "compose their senate, and rule in the 
 churches ; and the priestly order is dis- 
 posed of according to their good plea- 
 
 sure 
 
 "* 
 
 all that the world delights in, is no less 
 manifest than the malignity of our de- 
 praved nature in hating and opposing it. 
 
 The falsity of all this is notorious ; but 
 the testimony here given, by the mouth 
 of an enemy, to the piety of the female 
 Christians, is perfectly agreeable to the 
 accounts of the New Testament, and to 
 the history of all revivals of godliness in 
 every age ; — in none of which women 
 had the government ; but, in all a great 
 personal concern by their pious exertions 
 " There is neither male nor female, but 
 
 YE ARE ALL ONE IN ChRIST JeSUS." 
 
 " If Christ be the way of salvation, the 
 truth, and the life; and if they only, who 
 believe in him, shall be saved, what be- 
 came of the men who lived before his 
 comingl"! 
 
 The reader has often heard similar ob- 
 jections made in our days. The Chris- 
 tians preached then the same doctrine of 
 salvation — only by Christ, which is 
 now stigmatized as uncharitable. 
 
 " A person asked Apollo how to make 
 his wife relinquish Christianity^ It is 
 easier perhaps, replied the oracle, to 
 write on water, or to fly into the air, than 
 to reclaim her. Leave her, in her folly, 
 to hymn in a faint mournful voice the 
 dead God, who publicly suffered death 
 from judges of singular wisdom.":^: 
 
 This story, told by Porphyry, is a me- 
 morable testimony of the constancy of 
 Christians. — It also hence appears, that 
 they were accustomed to worship Jesus 
 as God ; and, that they were not ashamed 
 of this, notwithstanding the ignominy of 
 his cross. The attestation, however, here 
 given of the wisdom of Caiphas and of 
 Pontius Pilate, will not so readily be ad' 
 mitted. 
 
 The enemies of vital godliness, in our 
 days, may see from the various cavils 
 and misrepresentations contained in these 
 extracts, that their ancient brethren in in- 
 fidelity have been beforehand with them 
 in all their most material objections. The 
 doctrine, the spirit, and the conduct of 
 real Christians, appears from these evi- 
 dences : And the work of the Spirit of 
 God on the hearts of men, in attaching 
 them to Jesus, and in divorcing them from 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 CONNEXION BETWEEN THE DOCTRINE 
 AND PRACTICE OF PRIMITIVE CHRIS- 
 TIANS. 
 
 I AM sensible, that many parts of the 
 foregoing history may appear to several 
 persons defective in point of candour. — 
 " Why such solicitude to prove men Tri- 
 nitarians in opinion'? — Why so strict an 
 eye kept, all along, on the doctrines com- 
 monly called Evangelical by enthusiasts 
 and sectaries'? — Of what importance are 
 opinions, if men's practice be right'? — 
 Why is not all the stress of commenda- 
 tion laid on holiness of life, on integrity, 
 and on charity'?" 
 
 This language is specious, but is 
 chargeable with the following erroneous 
 notion : — It supposes that there is no real 
 connexion between doctrine and practice. 
 Now, a sound Christian cannot admit, — 
 however fashionable the sentiment may 
 be, — that all sorts of religious opinions 
 are equally influential, or equally ineffec- 
 tive in the production of virtuous conduct. 
 The Scripture connects sanctification with 
 belief of the truth.* Our Lord himself 
 prays that his disciples may be " sancti- 
 fied through the truth :"t " The blood of 
 Christ purges the conscience from dead 
 works to serve the living God :":{: and a 
 right faith in Jesus " overcomes the 
 world." — St. John challenges men to 
 prove that they can overcome the world 
 by any other way :§ and, in the chapter 
 now alluded to, he is very particular in 
 describing what that faith is. In fine, 
 Christ " gave himself for us, that he 
 might redeem us from all iniquity, and 
 purify to himself a peculiar people, 
 zealous of good works. "|| — If then this 
 zeal for good works be the effect of 
 HIS redemption, — how is it possible that 
 a person, who disbelieves the important 
 doctrines essentially concerned in that 
 redemption, should have any true zeal 
 for good works. By the supposition, the 
 man never uses, but has an aversion to, 
 the means, which God has expressly ap- 
 
 * Eusebius. f Ibid. 
 
 ^ Bullet's History. 
 
 * John xvii. 19. 
 i lleb. i.e. 14. 
 11 Titus ii. 14. 
 
 f 2Tliess. ii. 13. 
 § 1 John V. 5. 
 
252 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XXH. 
 
 pointed and made necessary for the at- 
 tainment of this end. — Let this concise 
 argument be well considered. 
 
 The peculiar doctrines of the Gospel 
 are, — Original sin, — Justification by the 
 grace of Jesus Christ, — His Godhead 
 and atonement, — the Divinity and the 
 efficacious influences of the Holy Ghost. 
 We appeal to the Scriptures for the proof 
 of this assertion. If it cannot be proved 
 THENCE, it is not to be proved at all. 
 The tradition of the Church, if it were 
 more uniform than it is, can never suffi- 
 ciently demonstrate it. But still, an au- 
 thentic history of the character of the 
 first Christians, is very instructive, — and 
 as such, merits our most serious atten- 
 tion. We have found that the doctrines 
 just stated, were, in the primitive times, 
 constantly held by men allowed to be the 
 most wise and upright. Surely, so re- 
 markable a fact might well induce those, 
 who, in our times, oppose these doctrines 
 with all their power, — to hesitate a lit- 
 tle, — to entertain doubts whether their 
 own sentiments be right ; and lastly — no 
 longer to call their adversaries zealots 
 in SPECULATIVE religion. — One would 
 think, that when the Scripture itself af- 
 firms the existence of a connexion be- 
 tween faith and practice, and Avhen the 
 history of Christian antiquity exemplifies 
 that connexion, neither the articles of be- 
 lief themselves ought to be coldly deno- 
 minated SPECULATIVE, nor the zeal used 
 in supporting them be reproached with 
 the contemptuous name of enthusiasm. — 
 Such reflections as these, it is hoped, 
 may remove from the mind of the reader 
 any unfavourable idea of the historian's 
 disposition in regard to candour. — True 
 candour consists, — not in endeavouring 
 to render an adversary contemptible by 
 using the hard terms, enthusiast, fanatic, 
 bigot, and such like ; but in fairly bring- 
 ing forward and digesting evidence, and 
 in drawing warrantable inferences from 
 it. 
 
 Two things have been shown to have 
 uniformly taken place during the three 
 first centuries ; — first, that there existed, 
 all along, a number of persons bearing 
 the Christian name, whose lives proved 
 them to be the " excellent of the earth." 
 And secondly, that, as far as appears, the 
 character of genuine virtue belonged ex- 
 clusively to men who espoused the pecu- 
 liar doctrines of the Gospel. From the 
 Apostles down to Ignatius, Polycarp, and 
 Irenajus ; and, from them, to the age of 
 
 Origen, both these assertions are demon- 
 strable by the clearest evidence. 
 
 Origen alone, of all persons of supe- 
 rior reputation in the Church, has been 
 suspected as deficient in point of ortho- 
 doxy. If the suspicion were swelled 
 into a certain proof, the discredit, which 
 his philosophic mixtures have brought on 
 his character, and the censures, which so 
 many wise and good men have so freely 
 passed on him, as unsound in the faith, 
 would rather prove our assertion of the 
 uniformity of Christian belief in these 
 articles than the contrary. But, that Ori- 
 gen, on the whole, believed these doc- 
 trines, is sufficiently proved by express 
 passages of his works : — and his well- 
 known curious and adventurous spirit of 
 inquiry in subjects on which he never 
 meant to be positive, will account for his 
 ambiguities. 
 
 I cannot allow Dionysius of Alexan- 
 dria, merely because he was once sus- 
 pected to be heretical, to be an exception 
 to my position. His well-known expla- 
 nation of himself sufficiently confutes the 
 surmise. The age of Cyprian is full of 
 the most luminous proofs. Even the 
 treatise of Novatian on the Trinity is it- 
 self a strong argument on the same side 
 of the question. An elaborate, copious, 
 and distinct treatise on such a subject 
 written by an innovator, — and the first 
 DISSENTER, — against whom I have freely 
 owned the best men of those times were 
 much too censorious, — would doubtless 
 have been branded with peculiar infamy 
 in the Church, if it had contained any 
 sentiments contrary to the apostolic faith. 
 Its deviation from truth would have been 
 marked with peculiar asperity. But it is 
 universally allowed, that the Novatians 
 held the same doctrines as the general 
 Church, and differed only in point of dis- 
 cipline. What greater proof can be de- 
 sired than such an uniformity? 
 
 Perhaps the cause of Paul of Samo- 
 sata may illustrate the subject still more 
 forcibly. — A bishop was, by the concur- 
 rent voice of the whole Christian Church, 
 degraded and expelled, because he op- 
 posed these doctrines. — The excellent 
 lives of men of orthodox views are evi- 
 dent in these times of true goodness. I 
 cannot find any proofs of such excellence 
 in other persons who called themselves 
 Christians. I acknowledge the scanti- 
 ness of historical materials : I make al- 
 lowance for the prejudices of writers; 
 and, I do not forget, that the compositions 
 
Cent. III.] 
 
 PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS. 
 
 253 
 
 of none, but of the orthodox of those 
 times, have come down to us. But, after 
 all, it seems inipossil)le to reject the re- 
 peated testimony of such a man as Ire- 
 naeus ; to the wickedness of the heretics. 
 — The immoral character of Paul of Sa- 
 Inosata is well known ; and men of real 
 holiness and virtue can scarcely be en- 
 tirely hid in any age in which they exist. 
 
 We have been told indeed great things 
 of the Ebionites; and they have been set 
 up as the true standard of primitive or- 
 thodoxy. But it seems scarcely possible 
 for any man of learning, who has a dispo- 
 sition to examine things fairly and can- 
 didly, to lay weight on such a wild and 
 groundless opinion. — Who is this Ebion ] 
 — " Who is this uncircumcised Philis- 
 tine, that he should defy the armies of 
 the living God V — Let it be admitted that 
 he and his party believed and thought of 
 St. Paul and of Christian doctrines, and 
 of Christ himself, exactly as some per- 
 sons do, who at this day call themselves 
 RATIONAL Christians. — Will it thence 
 follow that the holy Scriptures will be 
 best interpreted by consulting the opi- 
 nions of an obscure person, of whom all 
 we know is contained in only a few lines, 
 and whose very existence is but faintly 
 proved ; and whose sect also, though it 
 had certainly an early, if any, existence, 
 was condemned in the Christian churches, 
 and even by Origen himself, as heretical?* 
 
 It must be admitted that the Ebionites, 
 in not receiving St. Paul's Epistles, as 
 Origen tells us, acted consistently. 
 Their sentiments, and those of St. Paul, 
 are in direct opposition to each other. — 
 But, what are we to think of men who 
 rejected thirteen epistles of the New Tes- 
 tament, of whose divine authority there 
 never was any doubt among real Chris- 
 tians 1 
 
 And, though the Epistle to the He- 
 brews has abundant proofs of Divine in- 
 spiration, yet, if one were to allow, for a 
 moment, that it was only the work of some 
 pious person of very high antiquity in the 
 Church, and held in very great estima- 
 tion, who, that soberly examines the ba- 
 lance of evidences, would hesitate to de- 
 cide that its authority greatly exceeded 
 any possible respect due to the opinions 
 of the Ebionites? Then, — in this regu- 
 lar argumentative composition we find 
 certain doctrines enlarged on very much. 
 
 and supported by the united voices of the 
 Old and New Testament, — which doc- 
 trines, by an obscure sect, of whom we, 
 literally, know next to nothing, are barely 
 denied.— A chain of close reasoning on 
 the one hand ; — mere positive assertions 
 on the other ! 
 
 In judging of historical evidence, no 
 rule can be better founded, than that the 
 concurrent testimony of the best writers 
 ought always to outweigh the single af- 
 firmation of any particular person. — It is 
 on this ground that the relation of Per- 
 sian affairs by Ctesias is looked on as 
 romantic. The account of the death of 
 Cyrus also, as slain by Tomyris, the Scy- 
 thian Queen, has no credit, because of the 
 superior credibility of Xenophon, and of 
 other historians. And he would be thought 
 a weak critic in history, who should in 
 our days assert, that 
 
 " Charlemagne, -with all his peerage, fell by 
 Foiitaiabia." 
 
 Milton, as a poet, may be allowed to 
 say this on the evidence of romances : 
 But sober history, which asserts in gene- 
 ral the contrary, must be believed. — On 
 such weak foundations seems to me to 
 stand the authority of the Ebionites in 
 matters of Christian doctrine. 
 
 Let not the reader forget, that the ob- 
 ject of this whole argument is to esta- 
 blish the indissoluble connexion, which 
 subsists between principle and practice. 
 — For this purpose it may be useful to 
 attend a little to the internal nature of 
 Christian principles. 
 
 If there be a favourite point in Scrip- 
 ture, it is the recommendation of humi- 
 lity. The truly humble, with all their im- 
 perfections, will be admitted into heaven ; 
 the proud, with all the virtue compatible 
 with pride, will be excluded. Those doc- 
 trines, therefore, which support humility 
 must be divine : those which nourish pride 
 must be "earthly, sensual, devilish."* 
 Now the evangelical doctrines, just men- 
 tioned, are all of the former sort. The more 
 they are relished and admired, the more do 
 they direct the mind to honour God, to 
 feel even infinite obligation to him, to en- 
 tertain the lowest ideas of ourselves, to 
 confound the pride of intellect, of riches, 
 of virtue, of every thing human. To 
 sing salvation to God and the Lamb, to 
 confess our desert of destruction, and to 
 ascribe our deliverance from it to the 
 
 * See Origen ad Celsum, Book 5, towards 
 the end. 
 
 Vol. I. Y 
 
 * James ili. 15. 
 
254 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH : 
 
 [Chap. XXH. 
 
 atoning blood of Jesus, — this is the em- 
 ployment of heaven. The tastes and 
 tempers adapted to such employment 
 must be formed here on earth by grace ; 
 and the whole work of the Spirit, which 
 we have seen exemplified in three centu- 
 ries, is to produce and support these dis- 
 positions : And, in the words and actions 
 of holy men, we have seen this effect. 
 They believed heartily the truth of doc- 
 trines the most humiliating-. They were 
 poor in spirit, and patient under the se- 
 verest treatment and the most cruel inju- 
 ries, because they were conscious of de- 
 serving much worse : they were contented 
 in the meanest circumstances, because 
 they felt the beauty of his condescension, 
 who though HE was rich became poor for 
 their sakes, and who has provided for 
 them sure and eternal riches. They were 
 serene and confident in God, because they 
 viewed him as their Father through the 
 grace of Christ ; they were full of cha- 
 rity, because they knew the love of God 
 in Christ: and, in honour they preferred 
 others to themselves, because they were 
 ever conscious of their own depravity : — 
 in fine, — they gladly endured reproach 
 for Christ's sake, because they knew his 
 kingdom was not of this world. 
 
 Now take from these men the peculiar 
 doctrines of the Gospel, and all the mo- 
 tives and springs within them of those 
 actions which are peculiarly christian, are 
 annihilated. — Mere morals, as taught by 
 sensible heathens, and whatever was b}- 
 them esteemed reputable in social life, 
 may remain ; but that, which is properly 
 of a pious and humble nature is no more. 
 
 For, whoever daily feels himself to be 
 helpless, corrupt, and unworthy ; the man, 
 whose hope of divine favour cannot ex- 
 ist for a moment, but under the belief of 
 the most stupendous grace ; the man, who 
 is compelled to pray by the sense of his 
 constant wants, and who experiences the 
 answer of prayer by repeated supernatu- 
 ral aids, such a one must be habituated 
 to the perpetual exercise of cultivating 
 humblinof reflections concerninn- himself, 
 and GRATEFUL feelings towards his Ma- 
 ker. It is easy to see what a foundation 
 is here laid of meekness, gentleness, 
 modesty, submission to the will of God, 
 and of genuine compassion for the most 
 wicked and most injurious, — the truly 
 humbled Christian always remembering 
 that he himself, by nature, is a child of 
 wrath, as well as others. — Nor is there 
 one among the numerous virtues, for 
 
 which the primitive Christians were so 
 much renowned, but it may be traced up 
 to these principles. 
 
 It has been said, indeed, that the sense 
 of gratitude to God may be as strong in the 
 minds of those who think better of hu- 
 man nature, in its present state, because 
 they must own they are indebted to God 
 for their natural powers and faculties. 
 But the very feelings of the same human 
 nature itselfcontradict the position. Some- 
 thing like gratitude and humility may be 
 produced, where men are every moment, 
 by experience, made sensible of their de- 
 pendent condition: not so, where they 
 only admit it in general theory, bpt are 
 not led, experimentally, to an habitual 
 sense of their real state. Do parents ex- 
 pect to find a more grateful and more 
 humble conduct in their children, by 
 making them completely independent at 
 once, or, by supplying them liberally in- 
 deed, but still in such a way as to keep 
 them continually sensible of their depen- 
 dence] 
 
 The influence of anti-evangelical doc- 
 trines on the practice is but too evident. 
 
 — Those, who espouse them, if pre- 
 served, by Providence, in the practice of 
 a decent moral conduct, are, among our- 
 selves at this day, the proudest of men. 
 Even when they attempt to be humble, 
 the power of pride breaks forth and bears 
 down all before it. They feel and dis- 
 cover great self-sufficiency : No subject 
 of religfion is too hard for their understand- 
 ings : and in all disputable questions, 
 they are sure to decide in that way which 
 most gratifies vain-glory and self-conceit. 
 The teachers of this stamp, however low 
 and limited in capacity and education, 
 are continually exercising the most un- 
 bounded, and often the most ridiculous 
 arrogance. They are apt to wonder that 
 the common people have no ears for 
 them : They do not consider that they 
 themselves have no voice for the people. 
 The views of God, of Christ, and of hu- 
 man nature, which they exhibit, suit not 
 the unsophisticated taste of the common 
 people, but rather accord with the pert 
 and vain notions of dabblers in theology 
 and metaphysics. In a word, they con- 
 tradict experience ; and it is not to be 
 wondered at, that those of their hearers, 
 who have any reasonable modesty, and 
 the least tincture of humility, cannot re- 
 lish their discourses, because the only 
 food which is adapted to the taste of a 
 miserable sinner is not ministered to them. 
 
Cewt. III.] 
 
 PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS. 
 
 255 
 
 Deserted by the populace, such ministers 
 as these usually betake themselves to the 
 higher classes : The favour of a few per- 
 sons of rank compensates to them the 
 want of regard from the multitude; and 
 if they cannot boast of numerous congre- 
 gations, they console themselves at least 
 with the thought, that theirs are genteel. 
 — Their own account of them is " that 
 they are both genteel and rational." 
 
 Politics, — the affairs of nations, — the 
 reformation of states ; these are to them 
 the grand scenes which agitate their pas- 
 sions. To instruct ministers of states 
 is their ambition : To bring souls to 
 Christ is left to those, whom they, con- 
 temptuously, denominate Enthusiasts. 
 Nor does the least true pathos appear in 
 in any of their writings and orations, ex- 
 cept in the support of civil liberty, — a 
 subject, most important and most valua- 
 ble, no doubt; but, with them, ever car- 
 ried to excess, and, even when treated in 
 its best manner, belonaingr rather to the 
 province of statesmen and of legislators 
 than to that of divines. — Whoever has 
 attended to the demeanour of these men, 
 cannot fail to have marked them, as evi- 
 dently haughty, over-bearing, impatient 
 of contradiction ; and, of all others, the 
 least fitted, in their tempers, to suffer for 
 the cross of Christ : They are, however, 
 exceedingly prone, — to represent them- 
 selves as actually persecuted ; — to en- 
 large on the iniquity of all restraining or 
 
 excluding laws in ecclesiastical concerns ; 
 — and, lastly, with much arrogance, to 
 boast of their sincerity and soundness in 
 matters of religion, — in an age, whea 
 every one knows that there is not the 
 least probability of their being compelled 
 to undergo any fiery trial that might be 
 the test of true Christian zeal, fortitude, 
 and patience. 
 
 Are THESE the Christians of the three 
 first centuries ■? — Or, were those, whom 
 Celsus scorned, such men as these ? — 
 The facts presented to the reader, in this 
 
 volume, forbid the conclusion For if 
 
 indeed they were men of this class, their 
 worldly and ambitious spirit might easi- 
 ly have found some of the many pretend- 
 ers to the Roman empire, with whom 
 they might have united. We should 
 have seen Christians active in politics, 
 bargaining with different competitors for 
 the empire, and insisting on some com- 
 munication of temporal powers and pri- 
 vileges to themselves. Men, so void of 
 heavenly ambition, would have displayed 
 that which is of the earth ; and if Ebion's 
 religious sentiments had been then as 
 prevalent as they are now, the humble, 
 meek, charitable, passive Christians 
 would not have adorned the historic 
 page; but, on the contrary, the predomi- 
 nant characters of the foregoing narrative, 
 must have much more resembled the tur- 
 bulent, aspiring, political sons of Arius 
 and Socinus in our own times. 
 
256 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY IV. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE PERSECUTION OF DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 The last century concluded with some 
 symptoms of a storm ready to burst on 
 the Church, which had long been in a 
 state of ease and prosperity, and was at 
 the same time deeply declined from the 
 purity and simplicity of the Gospel. Be- 
 sides the martyrdom of Marcellus in Afri- 
 ca,* an attempt had been made in a more 
 general, and yet in a covert manner, to 
 corrupt the army. It was put to the op- 
 tion of Christian officers, whether they 
 would offer sacrifice, and enjny their dig- 
 nit)'^, or refuse and be deprived. . Many 
 were desirous of retiring into private life, 
 to avoid the trial. Many however show- 
 ed a sincere regard to the kingdom of 
 Christ, and contentedly lost their prefer- 
 ment. Some few were put to death for a 
 terror to the rest. But the general perse- 
 cution, which afterwards destroyed such 
 numbers, was withheld for some time.f 
 In this prelude, which has been mention- 
 ed above, and of which we have only a 
 dark and imperfect account, something of 
 the political manoeuvres of Dioclesian 
 seems conspicuous. It is evident that 
 after he had so lonjr favoured the Chris- 
 tians, he had now contracted a prejudice 
 against them, though at first he made use 
 of artifice rather than violence. 
 
 This emperor had an associate called 
 Maximian, and they had under them two 
 Offisars, Galerius and Constantius. The 
 „ , . last-mentioned only of the four 
 
 and Coti- ^^^^ ^ person of probity and 
 stanlius. humanity. The other three 
 
 were tyrants, though the sa- 
 Tageness of Galerius was the most re- 
 markable. He met Dioclesian at Nico- 
 media, where he usually kept his court, 
 in the winter, in the nineteeth year of 
 A D 302 ^^^ reign, and in the year of 
 
 our Lord 302, and determin- 
 ed, if possible, to instigate him to mea- 
 sures against the Christians, still more 
 sanguinary and decisive. :^: This man 
 had a mother extremely bigoted to pa- 
 
 * See Ch. XVII. of preceding Century. 
 f Euseb. B. VIII. C. IV. 
 i LactaiUius de M. P. 
 
 ganism, who almost every day employed 
 herself in sacrifices. The Christians 
 about her refused to partake of the idola- 
 trous feasts, and gave themselves up to 
 fasting and prayer. Hence her mind was 
 incensed against the whole body, and she 
 stimulated her son, who was as supersti- 
 tious as herself, to seek their destruction. 
 — A whole winter Dioclesian and Gale- 
 rius were engaged in secret counsels. 
 The latter proposed a general persecu- 
 tion ; the former remonstrated against the 
 impolicy of such sanguinary measures, and 
 was for limiting the persecution to the 
 officers of the court and the soldiers. 
 Finding himself unable to stem the fury 
 of Galerius, he called a council of a few 
 judges and otHcers. Some gave it as 
 their opinion, that the Christians should 
 in general be put to death ; and others, in- 
 duced by fear or flattery, assented. Still 
 Dioclesian was averse, and through poli- 
 cy or superstition determined to consult 
 the oracle of Apollo at Miletus. Apollo 
 answered, as it might be expected, in a 
 manner friendly to the views of Galerius. 
 Staggered with repeated importunities, 
 the old emperor still hesitated, and could 
 not be persuaded to attempt the demoli- 
 tion of Christianity by bloodshed ; where- 
 as Galerius was desirous to burn alive 
 those who refused to sacrifice to the hea- 
 then gods. 
 
 The feast of the Terminalia was the 
 day appointed to commence the opera- 
 tions against the Christians. Early in 
 the morning, an officer with guards came 
 to the great church at Nicomedia, and 
 bursting open the doors, sought for the 
 image of God. So says my author; 
 though if this be not a mere flourish of 
 rhetoric, they must have been strangely 
 ignorant of the sentiments of the follow- 
 I ers of Jesus. The Scriptures which were 
 found were burnt; every thing was given 
 to plunder. While all things were in 
 this confusion, the two emperors, looking 
 at the scene from the palace, were long in 
 doubt whether they should order the edi- 
 fice to be burnt. The prudent opinion of 
 Dioclesian at length prevailed, who fear- 
 ed the effect of a conflagration on the 
 neio-hbourinff buildings. The Pretorian 
 soldiers were therefore sent with axes and 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 257 
 
 other iron tools, and in a few hours 
 levelled the whole building with the 
 ground. 
 
 The next day an Edict appeared, by 
 
 which men of the Christian religion, of 
 
 whatever rank or degree, 
 
 ."^^ ^ , were deprived of all honour 
 against the j j- -^ i * 
 
 Christians. ^"° dignity ; were exposed to 
 torture; and every one might 
 have justice against them ; whilst they 
 were debarred the benefit of the laws in 
 all cases without exception.* Thus was 
 the Christian world at once exposed to 
 all possible insults without redress. The 
 spirit of man naturally revolts against in- 
 justice so flagrant, and a Christian was 
 found hardy enough, under the transports 
 of indignation, to pull down and tear the 
 Edict. He was burned alive for his in- 
 discretion, and bore his sufferings with 
 admirable, and, it is to be hoped, with 
 Christian patience. 
 
 Sometime after, a part of the palace 
 was found to be on fire : the Christians 
 were charged with the fact ; and the 
 eunuchs of the house were accused. Dio- 
 clesian himself was present, and saw his 
 servants burnt in the flames. It is re- 
 markable, that the servants of Galerius 
 Avere not put to the torture : while he 
 himself took much pains to keep up the 
 indignation of the old emperor. After 
 fifteen days a second fire brake out, and 
 Galerius left the palace in a hurry, ex- 
 pressing his fear of being burnt alive. 
 Lactantius, without hesitation, charges 
 all this to the artifices of Galerius. 
 
 Dioclesian now thoroughly in earnest, 
 raged against all sorts of men who bore 
 the Christian name, and obliged amonar 
 
 The Per- 
 secution of 
 Dioclesiaa 
 began 
 
 A. D. 303, 
 
 in the 20lh 
 j'earofthis 
 Emperor ; 
 and is the 
 10th Per- 
 secution of 
 the Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 others his wife and dausfhter to sacrifice. 
 
 * In a passage, which seems to be mis- 
 placed by some mistake, Eusebius observes, 
 that in the 19lh year of Dioclesian, edicts 
 were every wliere suddenly published, bv 
 ■which it was ordered, that churches should be 
 levelled with the ground, the sacred books 
 consumed by fire, persons of dignity disgraced, 
 common people made slaves if they persisted 
 in Christianity. Not long after, says he, other 
 letters were published, by which it was enact- 
 ed, that all the bishops every wiiere should 
 first be cast into bonds, and afterwards be com- 
 pelled by every metiiod to sacrifice. These 
 measures of the court increasing gradually in 
 asperity and horror, show that it was not with- 
 out reluctance, that Dioclesian was induced to 
 consent to an universal carnage, thougii he 
 too well agreed with Galerius in forming a 
 system for the extinction of the Christian 
 name. 
 
 y2 
 
 Doubtless he suspected them 
 at least of a secret regard for 
 Christianity. Presbyters and 
 deacons were seized and con- 
 demned in a summary way to 
 death. Eunuchs of the great- 
 est power in the palace were 
 slain, and persons of every 
 age and sex were burnt. It 
 was tedious to destroy men 
 singly ; fires were made to 
 burn numbers together, and 
 men with mill-stones fastened 
 about their necks were thrown into the 
 sea. Judges were every where at work 
 in compelling men to sacrifice. The pri- 
 sons were full. Unheard-of tortures were 
 invented ; and, to prevent the possibility 
 of Christians obtaining justice, altars 
 were placed in courts, at which plaintiffs 
 were obliged to sacrifice, before their 
 cause could be heard. The other two 
 emperors were directed by letters to pro- 
 ceed in the same violent course. Max- 
 imian, who governed in Italy, obeyed 
 with savage alacrity. Constantius with 
 reluctance demolished the churches, while 
 he preserved the persons of Christians. 
 
 The persecution pervaded the whole 
 Roman world, except France, where the 
 the mild Constantius ruled; and from 
 east to west, to use the language of Lac- 
 tantius, three monsters of horrible ferocity 
 raged. 
 
 I am aware that a laborious attempt 
 has been made to depreciate the accounts 
 of this persecution. If I think it need- 
 less to relate distinctly all the suflferings 
 of Christians under it, I must not how- 
 ever be supposed to countenance such at- 
 tempts. The agreement of Lactantius 
 and Eusebius, both contemporary authors 
 of credit, is apparent. That such edicts 
 were published, that they were strictly 
 enforced, that a systematical and serious 
 design of extinguishing the Gospel was 
 formed, these things are certain. Even if 
 we had no particular martyrologies extant, 
 we might be assured, from circumstances, 
 that much blood must have been spilt, 
 and much misery endured, not only in a 
 regular and legal way, but also by tumul- 
 tuary violence, and by the malice of men 
 combined against a set of persons de- 
 prived universally of the protection of the 
 laws. There wanted not some instances 
 of humanity and generosity in Pagans to- 
 wards their Christian friends and rela- 
 tions. But whoever knows what the pas- 
 sions of men are capable of, when set 
 
258 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 afloat and suffered to act without check or 
 control, will not doubt that the sufferings 
 of Christians in this period must have 
 been far greater than can be related by 
 any historian. Thus did God at once 
 punish their sins, revive his work in their 
 hearts by sanctified affliction, evidence the 
 extreme depravity of mankind, and above 
 all, illustrate his own power and wisdom 
 in baffling the rage of Satan,* and in de- 
 fending and delivering his Church, when 
 every thing seemed combined for its de- 
 struction. Should any be inclined to pay 
 more regard to the testimon};^ of heathens 
 than of Christians, let them hear Libani- 
 us, the friend of Julian the apostate, who 
 thus speaks in his funeral oration on that 
 emperor. " They who adhered to a cor- 
 rupt religion (he means the Christian) 
 were in great terrors, and expected that 
 their eyes would be plucked out, that 
 their heads would be cut off, and that 
 rivers of their blood would flow from the 
 multitude of slaughters. They appre- 
 hended their new Master would invent 
 new kinds of torments, in comparison of 
 which, mutilation, sword, fire, drowning, 
 being buried alive, would appear but 
 slight pains. For the pieceding empe- 
 rors had employed against them all these 
 kinds of punishments." He goes on to 
 commend Julian for using milder methods. 
 Two pillars in Spain were also monu- 
 ments of the systematic cruelty of this 
 persecution, on one of which was this 
 inscription: " Dioclesian, Jovian, Max- 
 imian Herculeus, Casares Augusti, for 
 having extended the Roman empire in 
 the East and West, and for having ex- 
 tinguished the name of Christians, who 
 brought the Republic to ruin." On the 
 other this: "Dioclesian, &c. for having 
 adopted Galerius in the East, for having 
 every where abolished the superstition of 
 Christ, for having extended the worship 
 of the gods." And to name only one 
 
 * Let not the reader startle, because I as- 
 cribe the persecutions of the Church to Satanic 
 influence. The following Scriptures caieful- 
 ly compared together, seem abundantly to 
 ■warrant such a sentiment. John viii. 38 — 44. 
 1 Tliess. ii. 18. 1 Pet. v. 8, 9. 1 John iii. 8 
 — 13. Revel, throughout. To these the evan- 
 }jelical reader may easily add many more. 
 Moreover, as the description oft he influences 
 of the Holy Spirit form an essential part of 
 this History, it seems to fall in with my plan, 
 to bi'ing into view from time to time, the coun- 
 terpart of the said influences, which is un- 
 doubtedly the agency of Satan. 
 
 more evidence, the cruelty must have beeii 
 egregious, which could have induced the 
 persecutors to strike the medal of Diocle- 
 sian, which still remains, with this in- 
 scription, " The name of Christians being 
 extinguished."* 
 
 Supported by such authorities against 
 the unreasonableness of modern scepti- 
 cism, we may proceed in the detail of 
 facts. There were soine ministers of the 
 palace of the highest rank and nobility, 
 who were yet found to prefer the reproach 
 of Christ to all worldly grandeur. The 
 martyrdom of Peter, one of the emperor's 
 household, is very remarkable. He Avas 
 brought before the emperor in Nicomedia, 
 and was scourged with excessive sever- 
 ity. As he refused to sacrifice, though 
 his bones were made bare by the stripes, 
 a mixture of vinegar and salt was poured 
 on his limbs; and this being still to no 
 purpose, he was gradually burnt to death. 
 Dorotheas, Gorgonius, and many others, 
 who served in the palace, after a variety 
 of sufferings, were strangled. Anthimus, 
 the bishop of Nicomedia, was beheaded, 
 and with him a great multitude of mar- 
 tyrs suffered. IMen and women leaped on 
 the funeral piles with alacrity: With the 
 persecution the spirit of martyrdom was 
 revived in the church. In every place the 
 prisons were filled with bishops and 
 other Christian ministers, and no room 
 was reserved for felons. Martyrs were 
 put to death in every province. Africa 
 and Mauritania, Thebais, and Egypt 
 throughout, abounded with them. Five 
 persons of this last country Eusebius 
 speaks of, whom he had known in Pales- 
 tine and Phoenicia. He hiiuself saw them 
 suffering under the scourge, or exposed 
 to enraged wild beasts, and celebrates 
 their admirable patience. One of them, 
 scarcely twenty years of age, stood with- 
 out bonds, with his hands stretched out 
 in a praying posture, exposed to bears 
 and leopards, which were backward to 
 perform the bloody task assigned them. 
 A bull which had been stimulated by hot 
 iron applied to him, tossed with his horns 
 and tore his employers ; and it was with 
 some ditficulty that beasts were found to 
 execute the purposes of the persectition. 
 
 Egypt suffered extremely. Whole fa- 
 milies were put to various kinds of death; 
 some by fire, others by water, others by 
 
 * Nomine Christianorum deleto. See Bul- 
 let's Establishment, &c. Euseb. B. VIII. 
 
Cest. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 259 
 
 Persecu 
 tions in 
 Egypt. 
 
 decollation, after horrible tor- 
 tures. Some perished by fa- 
 mine, others by erucifixioii, 
 and of these, some in the fom- 
 mon manner, others were fastened with 
 their heads downward, and preserved 
 alive, that they mig-ht die by hunger. 
 But the torments in Thebais exceed all 
 description. Women tied by one foot, 
 ■were raised up on high, and exposed 
 naked, monuments at once of the inhu- 
 nianit)' and indecency of the persecution. 
 Others were torn by the distorted boughs 
 of trees ; and these scenes continued some 
 years. Sometimes ten, at other times 
 thirty, and sixty, and once a hundred 
 men and women with their little ones, in 
 one day, were murdered by various tor- 
 ments. 
 
 Our author himself, while in Egypt, 
 saw many executed* in one day, some 
 beheaded, others burnt; so that both the 
 executioners were quite fatigued, and 
 their weapons were blunted. The Chris- 
 tians suffered (he speaks what he saw 
 himself) with the greatest faith and pa- 
 tience. There was even the strongest 
 appearance of joy and triumph among 
 them, and to their last breath they em- 
 ployed themselves in psalms and thanks- 
 giving. Philoromus, a person of great 
 dignity at Alexandria, and a man of 
 wealth and eloquence, is recorded as one, 
 who died cheerfully for Christ at this 
 time. Phileas also, bishop of the Thmu- 
 titae, a man of eminence in his country, 
 suffered in Thebais. In vain did relations, 
 friends, magistrates, even the judge him- 
 self, exhort them to pity themselves, their 
 wives and children. They loved Christ 
 above all, and were beheaded. f 
 
 * Euseb. B. IX. C. yill. 
 
 t Phileas beiiig asked, How he was per- 
 suaded lliat Jesus Clifist was God.' n plied, 
 He made ihe blind to see, and tlie deaf to 
 hear, cleansed the ltpers,and raised the dead. 
 Being asked. Is a crucified person God ' lie 
 answered, He was ci-ucified tor our salvation. 
 Tlie Governor said, You are rich, and able to 
 maintain almost all the province, 1 spare vou, 
 and advise you to sacrifice. It seems the liber- 
 ality of Phileas was great toward the poor. 
 The Governor added, Thy poor wife looks on 
 thee. Phileas answered, Jesus Christ is the 
 Saviour of all our spirits, he bath called me to 
 the inheritance of his glory, ami lie may also 
 call her to it. A little before his execution, 
 !My dear children, said he, ye that seek God, 
 vatch over your hearts. .My dear cliildren, 
 stick fast to the iirecepts of Jesus Christ. — 
 Acta Siucera. Fleury. 
 
 Undoubtedly these scenes demonstrate 
 in the highest manner the strength of 
 "race, and the reality of that divine in- 
 rtuence wiiich attended Christians. And 
 when I see Mr. Cibbon, in his notes to- 
 ward the conclusion of his first volume, 
 quibbling and cavilling against the text 
 of Eusehius, though any reader of Plu- 
 tarch could have told him that the Greek 
 word /rsgiij-iMsv. signifies we saw, and 
 the still plainer word rrwiocsttusi leaves no 
 room for doubt, methinks I see Stephen 
 in the glory of his martyrdom, and the 
 Jews gnashing upon him with their teeth. 
 
 Phileas, some time before his own 
 martyrdom, being at Alexandria in pri- 
 son, wrote an epistle to the Thmutitae, 
 his own church, concerning 
 the sufferings of the Chris- Epistle of 
 
 lians there. A fragment of H'«m»'-'3'r 
 
 , . , ,, , . , ^ Phileas. 
 
 which, Eusebius has preserv- 
 ed to us, which may not only illustrate 
 the nature of the persecution, but also the 
 spirit and views of the writer and other 
 good men of that time. " The martyrs 
 fixing sincerely the eye of their mind on 
 the supreme God, and cheerfully em- 
 bracintr death for the sake of godliness, 
 held immoveably their calling, knowing 
 that our Lord Jesus Christ was made 
 man for us, that he might cut down all 
 sin, and might afford us the necessary 
 preparatives for an entrance into eternal 
 life." (He then quotes the well-known 
 passage concerning the proper Deity and 
 humiliation of Christ, in the second chap- 
 ter to the Philippians.) Coveting the 
 best gifts, the martyrs, who carried Christ 
 within, underwent all sorts of tortures 
 once and again. And while the guards 
 insulted them in word and deed, they 
 were preserved serene and unbroken in 
 spirit, because " perfect love casteth out 
 fear." But what eloquence can do jus- 
 tice to their fortitude ] Free leave was 
 given to any to injure them; some beat 
 them with clubs, others with rods; some 
 scouroed them with thongs of leather, 
 others v,-ith ropes. Some, having their 
 hands behind them, were hung about a 
 wooden engine, and every limb of their 
 bodies was distended by certain ma- 
 chines. The torturers rent their whole 
 bodies with iron nails, which were ap- 
 plied, not only to the sides, as in the 
 case of murderers, but also to their bel- 
 lies, their legs, and their cheeks ; others 
 were suspended by one hand to a portico, 
 and underwent the most severe distention 
 of all their joints; others were bound to 
 
260 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 pillars, face to face, their feet being 
 raised above ground, that their bonds be- 
 ing distended by the weight of their bo- 
 dies, might be the closer drawn together, 
 and this they endured almost a whole 
 day without intermission. — The Gover- 
 nor ordered them to be bound with the 
 greatest severity, and when they breathed 
 their last, to be dragged on the ground. 
 No care, said he, ought to be taken of 
 these Christians; let all treat them as 
 unworthy of the name of men. Some, af- 
 ter they had been scourged, lay in the 
 stocks, both their feet being stretched to 
 the fourth hole ; so that they were obliged 
 to lie with their faces upward, unable to 
 stand on account of the wounds caused 
 by the stripes. Some expired under their 
 tortures. Others having been recovered 
 by methods taken to heal them, and be- 
 ing reduced to the alternative of sacri- 
 ficing or dying, cheerfully preferred the 
 latter. For they knew what was written, 
 " Whosoever sacrificeth to other gods, 
 shall be destroyed," and "Thou shalt 
 have none other gods but me." 
 
 Such, says Eusebius, are the words of 
 a martyr, a true lover of wisdom and of 
 God, which, belbre the definitive sentence 
 of his execution, he sent to the brethren 
 of his own Church. 
 
 One city in Phrygia, being generally 
 Christian, was beseiged by armed men, 
 and set on fire. The men with tlieir 
 wives and children were burnt to death, 
 calling upon Christ, the God over all.* 
 All the inhabitants, magistrates and peo- 
 ple, nobles and plebeians, professing 
 Christianity, were ordered to sacrifice, 
 and for refusing suffered in this manner.| 
 One Adauctus, a Christian, of the 
 highest dignity, who held at that time an 
 office of great importance, was honoured 
 also with the crown of mar- 
 tyrdom. Some were slain by 
 axes, as in Arabia; some by 
 breaking the legs, as in Cap- 
 some suspended by the feet, 
 head downward, over a slow 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom of 
 Adauctus. 
 
 padocia ; 
 with the 
 
 fire, were suffocated, as in Mesopotamia; 
 
 * Gibbon observes, Ihat tliere Mas an im- 
 portant circumstance, wliich lias been noticed 
 by Ruftinus, the Latin translator of Eusebius ; 
 lliat the gates were opened to permit ibem to 
 depart, it" they jjleased. The remark is worthy 
 of his own malignity. Is it to be supposed, 
 that this ))ermission was unconditional r" Eu- 
 sebius tells us, that it was expected from them, 
 that they should sacrifice. 
 
 f Euseb. B. VIII. C. XI. 
 
 some were mutilated, and cut in pieces, 
 as at Alexandria. Some M'ere burnt to 
 death, in a very gradual manner, at An- 
 tioch. Some, to avoid falling into the 
 hands of their enemies, committed sui- 
 cide, by throwing themselves down from 
 the tops of houses : lamentable instances 
 of impatience! But the reader will re- 
 member, that the decline had been very 
 great from Christian purity: that so 
 many should suffer like Christians in so 
 dull a time, can scarcely be accounted 
 for, but on the idea of the Lord's reviv- 
 ing his work and ministering the Holy 
 Spirit amidst their afflictions. I cannot 
 commend the conduct of a lady of An- 
 tioch, or that of her two daughters, who, 
 to avoid the licentious brutality of the 
 soldiers, drowned themselves. Two other 
 virgins in the same city of Antioch, per- 
 sons of quality, and of great piety, died 
 in a much more Christian manner, being 
 thrown into the sea by the persecutors. 
 
 In Pontus, sharp reeds were thrust un- 
 der the nails into the fingers of some ; the 
 backs of others were scorched by melt- 
 ed lead ; some in their bowels and privy 
 parts suffered inexpressible torments ; the 
 judges exercising ingenious malice in the 
 daily invention of new punishments. 
 
 Wearied at length with murder, and 
 affecting to praise the clemency of the 
 emperors, who were desirous to save life, 
 they contented themselves with plucking 
 out eyes, and cutting off one of the legs. 
 The number of those who suffered in this 
 way was inexpressible ; and they were 
 afterwards condemned to work in the 
 mines. 
 
 Lucian, a holy and exemplary presby- 
 ter of Antioch, had the honour tq apolo- 
 gise for Christianity at Nicomedia, in the 
 presence of the emperor, and afterwards 
 to suffer. Tyrannio, bishop 
 of Tyre, was thrown into the Lucian 
 sea. Zenobius, a presbyter ]yj3j,t . 
 of Sidon, and an excellent ^^^^^' 
 physician, expired serene in a. D. 312. 
 tortures. Sylvanus, bishop 
 of Emesa, with some others, was expos- 
 ed to the wild beasts. Pelcus and Nilus, 
 Egyptian bishops, with others were burnt 
 to death. Peter, bishop of Alexandria, 
 suffered also together with Faustus, Dius, 
 and Ammonius, his presbyters. Other 
 Egyptian bishops are mentioned also by 
 Eusebius, who leaves the celebration of 
 the rest to those who saw their sufferings, 
 contenting himself with a more particular 
 account of those whom he knew, and of 
 
Cest. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 261 
 
 those facts of which he had ocular de- 
 monstration. 
 
 As infidel writers have taken pains to 
 depreciate the authenticity of these facts, 
 it seemed proper to give the reader a just 
 picture of them from Eusebius, and to 
 submit to his determination, whether 
 there be any internal evidences of false- 
 hood in his narrative. In addition to 
 what has been shown already from Lac- 
 tantius, and ancient memorials, it may 
 with justice be said, in favour of the cre- 
 dibility of the writer, whose character as 
 a historian of veracity is before us, that 
 he is large and circumstantial in scenes 
 of which he was a spectator ; succinct 
 and general, where he had no opportuni- 
 ty of knowing the circumstances. Of the 
 martyrs of Palestine, his own country, 
 he has given us a copious narrative, a 
 specimen of which must now be deliver- 
 ed, containing those whose martyrdom 
 fell within the period of Dioclesian's 
 reign. The rest must be considered here- 
 after. Procopius was the first of these 
 martyrs, who being brought before ihe 
 tribunal, and ordered to sacrifice to the 
 gods, declared that he knew only one 
 God, to whom he ought to sacrifice in the 
 manner which he has appointed. Being 
 then ordered to make libations to the four 
 emperors, he repeated a verse of Homer, 
 which by no means pleased the persecu- 
 tors, as implying a censure of the present 
 government.* Upon this, he was be- 
 headed immediately. Whether the em 
 pire was benefited by the appointment of 
 four emperors instead of one, is a ques 
 tion of politics, which it certainly became 
 not the martyr to enter upon, especially 
 on that occasion. And it is the only in- 
 stance of deviation into secular matters, 
 which I remember to have seen in primi- 
 tive Christians as yet. It might be only 
 a sally of imprudent vivacity, but even 
 so it was extremely ill-timed. Galerius, 
 in whose dominions l>e said this, would 
 probably hear of it ; and this fiercest of 
 all the persecutors, needed not the addi- 
 tion of such an incentive, to inflame his 
 wrath against the Christians. 
 
 After him, in the same city, Csesarea 
 of Palestine, very many bishops of the 
 neighbouring churches, suffered grievous 
 torments : others through fear recanted at 
 the first onset. The rest underwent a 
 variety of punishments. Yet some pains 
 
 * Own ctyxiav 
 
 -o\uxoijan)|, SIS xoipaKOj esT* m 
 
 were taken to save the reputation of the 
 gods, and to preserve the lives of Chris- 
 tians at the same time. 
 
 One was dismissed, as if he had sacri- 
 ficed, though he was dragged to the altar, 
 and a sacrifice was put into his hand by 
 violence. Another went away in silence, 
 some persons, with a humane falsehood, 
 testifying that he had complied. One 
 was thrown out as dead, after he had 
 been tortured, though yet alive. Another 
 protesting against what was exacted of 
 him, many beating him in the mouth, 
 with a view to compel him to silence, 
 was thrust out of the court. Alpheus 
 and Zacchaeus alone of all these bishops 
 of Palestina, suffered death at this time. 
 Tortured for twenty-tour hours, after hav- 
 ing undergone excessive severities before, 
 they manfully confessed one only God, 
 and one only Saviour Christ, and were at 
 last beheaded. 
 
 On the same day at Antioch, Romanus, 
 a deacon of the Church of Coesarea, was 
 martyred. Happening to enter Antioch 
 at the very time when the churches were 
 demolished, he saw many 
 men and women with their Martyr- 
 little ones, crowding to the it^ol^anus. 
 temples and sacrifices, most 
 probably Christian apostates.* The same 
 spirit which moved Mattalhias, the father 
 of the Maccabees, on a like occasion, was 
 felt by Romanus, but exerted in a manner 
 more agreeable to the Christian dispensa- 
 tion. He cried aloud and rebuked their 
 cowardice and perfidy. But being seiz- 
 ed immediately, and condemned to the 
 flames, and tastened to the stake, while 
 the executioners expected the definitive 
 order from the emperor then present, (Ga- 
 lerius most probably) he asked cheerful- 
 ly. Where is the fire for me? Caesar, 
 provoked at his boldness, ordered his 
 tongue to be cut out. He put out his tongue 
 with great readiness. After this punish- 
 ment he was thrown into prison, and suf- 
 fered there a considerable time. His feet 
 were exposed to an unnatural distention, 
 and in the end he was dismissed out of 
 life by strangling. This happened during 
 the first year of the persecution, while it 
 raged only against the governors of the 
 church. 
 
 In the second year, when the persecu- 
 tion grew hotter. Imperial letters were 
 
 * So a discourse of Eusebius on the Resur- 
 rection teaches us. See B. on the Martyrs of 
 Palestine, C. II. Valesius ia the notes. 
 
262 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 sent into Palestine, commanding all 
 men, without exception, to sacrifice. At 
 Gaza, Timotheus, after many suffering's, 
 was consumed by a slow fire ; Agapius 
 and Thecla were condemned to the wild 
 beasts. At this time, when many apos- 
 tatized to save their lives, there wanted 
 not also some instances of an excessive 
 forwardness. Six persons at Caesarea, 
 with their hands bound, ran to Urbanus 
 the Judge, and offered themselves for 
 martyrdom. They suffered in conjunc- 
 tion with two others, whose spirit and 
 circumstances in the manner of their de- 
 parture out of life, were more conforma- 
 ble to the rules of the Gospel. 
 
 Power being now communicated to the 
 governors of the different provinces to 
 punish the Christians freely, each exer- 
 cised it, as his particular temper dictated. 
 Some, for fear of displeasing, did even 
 more than they were ordered. Some felt 
 the impulse of their own enmity against 
 godliness; others indulged a natural sa- 
 vageness of disposition : there were who 
 saw, that to shed blood profusely, was 
 the high road to preferment. There were 
 those, (and Lactantius* look? on them as 
 of the worst sort), who determined to 
 torment, and not to kill. Such persons 
 studied those arts of torture, which might 
 keep life still in being amidst the keenest 
 sensations of pain. Eusebius tells us, 
 that he himself heard some of this sort 
 boasting, that their administration was 
 not polluted with blood, and that he saw 
 a Bithynian governor exultinor, as if he 
 had subdued a nation of Barbarians, be- 
 cause one person, after two years' resis- 
 tance, had yielded to the force of tor- 
 ments. Much pains were taken also with 
 the tortured, to recover them, that they 
 miffht be strengthened to endure new 
 punishments. A considerable part of 
 Roman jurisprudence was now employed 
 on this subject. The constitutions of the 
 law on this head had been published and 
 commented on by the famous lawyer Ul- 
 pian, and were considered as serious ob- 
 jects of study by civilians. 
 
 At no time since the beginninof of 
 Christianity, was so systematical and so 
 laboured an effort made to extinguish the 
 Gospel of Christ. Satan had great wrath, 
 as if he had foreseen that he should have 
 but short time ; and when we consider 
 how poorly provided the Church was for 
 this fiercest of all the invasions she had 
 
 •B. V. C. 11. 
 
 ever met with, we shall see cause to ad- 
 mire the grace of God, who yet furnished 
 out a noble army of martyrs in a time of so 
 great Evangelical declension ; and in the 
 end, more effectually than ever, baffled 
 the designs of Satan. 
 
 In addition to other methods of perse- 
 cution, the powers of genius and the arts 
 of eloquence were introduced. Cyprian 
 alone of the Latin writers was capable of 
 pleasing the taste of the learned among 
 the Pagans. A certain person of taste 
 among them w^as heard by Lactantius, to 
 call him Coprianus,* because he employ- 
 ed an elegant genius, adapted to better 
 things, in the support of old wives' fa- 
 bles. In so contemptible a light did the 
 Gospel appear to the learned of that day, 
 even when clothed in the dress of the elo- 
 quent Cyprian ! but how much more con- 
 temptible in the hands of the generality 
 of Christian teachers, who were destitute 
 of the powers of argument and of lan- 
 guas^e. 
 
 Encouraged by the favour of the empe- 
 rors, and the apparently ruined state of 
 Christendom, at the very time when the 
 persecution rasfed in Bithynia, two wri- 
 ters appeared who insulted the Christians. 
 One, whose name Lactantius does not 
 give us, was a philosopher, and like 
 many preachers of morality in all ages, 
 a defender of virtue, and a practitioner of 
 vice, a flatterer of the court, very rich, 
 and very corrupt, one who condemned 
 his own practice by his moral Avritings, 
 and who dealt largely in the praises of 
 the emperors, on account of their great 
 piety in supporting the religion of the 
 gods. Yet all men condemned his mean- 
 ness in choosing that time particularly to 
 write against Christians, nor did he ob- 
 tain the favour at court which he expected. 
 
 The other writer, Hierocles, was doubt- 
 less a man of parts and talents. He was 
 a virulent enemy of the Gospel, had great 
 influence in promoting the persecution; 
 and from being a judge in Nicomedia was 
 promoted to the government of Alexan- 
 dria. He attempted to compare the feign- 
 ed miracles of ApoUonius Tyanasus with 
 those of Jesus Christ. This man wrote 
 with an air of candour and humanity to 
 the Christians, while his actions against 
 them were fierce and bloody. 
 
 In France alone, and its neghbourhood, 
 the people of God found some shelter. 
 
 * Lactan. B. V. 1, 2. The allusion is to 
 
 X37$lx, duDg. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 263 
 
 Yet was the mild Constantius, to save 
 appearances with his superior Maximian, 
 induced to persecute, not only by destroy- 
 ingr the temples, as was mentioned, but 
 also by dismissinor those of his own 
 household who would not renounce Chris- 
 tianity. The Christians of his family 
 were tried by such means. But the 
 event was contrary to their expectations. 
 Constantius retained the faithful, and 
 dismissed the apostates, judging that 
 those who were unfaithful to their God 
 would also be disloyal to their prince. 
 
 At Cirta in Numidia, Paul, the bishop, 
 ordered a sub-deacon to deliver up the 
 treasures of the church to a Roman officer. 
 The Holy Scriptures and the moveables 
 of this society of Christians were surren- 
 dered by the perfidy or cowardice of those 
 who ought to have protected them. But 
 God reserved some, who were endowed 
 with courage and zeal, at the hazard of 
 their lives, to take care of the sacred 
 writing, and baffle the intention of the 
 persecutors, which doubtless was to de- 
 stroy all records of Christianity among 
 men. Felix of Tibiura, in Africa, being 
 asked to deliver up the Scriptures, an- 
 swered, I have them, but will not part 
 with them. He was condemned to be 
 beheaded. " I thank thee, O Lord," says 
 this honest martyr, " that I have lived 
 fift}'-six years, have kept my virginity, 
 have preserved the Gospel, and have 
 preached faith and truth. O my Lord 
 Jesus Christ, the God of heaven and 
 earth, I bow my head to be sacrificed to 
 thee, who livest to all etevnity." I judge 
 it not amiss to distinguish this man in 
 the narrative. The preservation of civil 
 liberty is valuable, and the names of men 
 who have suffered for it with integrity 
 are recorded with honour. But how much 
 below the name of Felix of Tibiura should 
 these be accounted ! He is one of those 
 heroes who have preserved to us the pre- 
 cious word of God itself. In Abitina, 
 in Africa, forty-nine manfully perished 
 through hunger and ill treatment. In Si- 
 cily,* Euplius a martyr being asked, 
 " \\ by do you keep the Scriptures, for- 
 bidden by the emperors ?" answered, "Be- 
 cause I am a Christian. Life eternal is 
 in them ; he that gives them up loses life 
 eternal." Let his name be remembered 
 with honour, together with that of Felix. 
 He suffered also in the same cause. Va- 
 rious martyrs suffered in Italy, For Max- 
 
 imian was to the full as much disposed 
 to persecute as Dioclesian. 
 
 In the year 304 or 305, a civil change 
 took place in the empire, which paved 
 the way for very important changes in 
 the Church, though the persecution con- 
 
 Dioclesian 
 
 Resigna- 
 tion of 
 Dioclesian 
 
 A. D. 
 
 304 or 305. 
 
 Martyr- 
 dom of 
 Apphian. 
 
 * Acta Siiicera. I'leury. 
 
 tinned still for some time, 
 resigned the empire, and Max- 
 imian followed his example, 
 though with no great cordial- 
 ity. They were succeeded by 
 Galerius in the East, (who 
 ruled in the room of Diocle- 
 sian, and put Maximin his nephew, in 
 his own place,) and in the West by Con- 
 stantius. 
 
 Maximin inherited the savageness and 
 the prejudices of his uncle; and in Pales- 
 tine and in the more eastern parts, over 
 which Galerius had ruled, he still con- 
 tinued the horrors of the persecution. Let 
 us now attend to the remaining part of 
 Eusebius's account of the martyrs of 
 Palestine, who suffered under the author- 
 ity of this tyrant at different times. 
 
 Apphian, a young person under twen- 
 ty, who had received a very polite educa- 
 tion at Berytus, and could not bear to live 
 with his father and relations 
 at PagK in Lycia, because of 
 their aversion to the Gospel, 
 left all his secular emoluments 
 and hopes for the love of Christ, and came 
 to Cffisarea; where he was so transport- 
 ed with zeal as to run up to Urbanus the 
 governor then making a libation, to seize 
 him by the right hand, to stop his religi- 
 ous employment, and exhort him to forsake 
 idolatry and turn to the true God. The 
 consequence was, what might be expect- 
 ed in the natural course of things. He 
 was arrested, ordered to sacrifice; and 
 after he had sustained most dreadful tor- 
 tures by fire and otherwise, which Eu- 
 sebius* describes with an exactness of 
 detail that needs not be repeated, he was 
 thrown into the sea. His imprudence 
 was great, and his zeal very irregular 
 and extravagant; but who will not ad- 
 mire the sincerity of that love of Christ, 
 which carried this ardent youth through 
 all hardships : who would not prefer 
 his disposition, Avith all his faults, to the 
 cowardice and love of the world, which 
 in our times prevent such numbers from 
 daring to show true regard for the divine 
 Saviour 1 
 
 This Apphian had a brother called 
 
 C. IV. 
 
264 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 .^desius, who had advanced farther in 
 the philosophical studies than himself, 
 and who likewise embraced the faith of 
 Christ. Prisons, bonds, and the drudgery 
 of the mines of Palestine, he endured 
 with great patience and fortitude ; at length 
 he came to Alexandria, and there saw the 
 judge raging with frantic fury against 
 Christians, treating the men with various 
 abuses, and giving up chaste virgins, 
 who had devoted themselves to a single 
 life, to pimps to be treated in the vilest 
 manner. Fired at the sight, he lost all 
 patience, rebuked the magistrate, and 
 struck him. Upon which he was ex- 
 posed to a variety of torture, and thrown 
 into the sea. He seems to have possess- 
 ed both the excellencies and the faults of 
 his brother. It is proper to add,* that 
 the inhuman magistrate was no other than 
 the philosophical Hierocles, whose affect- 
 ed humanity and candour we have cele- 
 brated above. A remark or two may be 
 proper in this place, before we proceed. 
 
 1. The persecution we are reviewing 
 found the Church in the lowest state of 
 Christian wisdom and piety. In addi- 
 tion to what I have saidf on the ungene- 
 rous remarks of Mr. Gibbon, concerning 
 the behaviour of ^Edesius, it should be 
 observed, that amidst the great dearth of 
 instruction in which he had learned Chris- 
 tianity, it is not to be wondered at that 
 he should know his duty so imperfectly. 
 I compare the piety of him and of Ap- 
 phian to that of .lephthah and of Samp- 
 son; sincere, but irregular and injudici- 
 ous. They lived under similar circum- 
 stances, in times of great ignorance. The 
 Spirit of God, when he creates a new 
 heart, and a new spirit, and furnishes a 
 man with dispositions for obedience, su- 
 persedes not the use of pastoral instruc- 
 tion. Where this is much wanted, even 
 divine love itself, though strong, is blind, 
 comparatively speaking, and will mistake 
 the rule of duty continually. It is in vain 
 that I look out in all this period for judi- 
 cious and discreet pastors, and for clear 
 evangelical views. No Cyprian or Dio- 
 nysius now appeared to check, to regu- 
 late, to control the spirits of Christians, 
 and to discipline them by Scripture rules. 
 The persecution found vast numbers per- 
 fidious and cowardly ; some chosen spi. 
 rits, humble and faithful to death, but of 
 these many, it is to be feared, poorly in. 
 
 * See Valesius's notes on Enseb. 
 t Milner's Itemarks on Gibbon. 
 
 formed of their duty both to God and 
 man, and mixing with the love of Christ 
 the intemperance and precipitation of 
 blind self-will. The best use to be made 
 of this observation, after teaching us to 
 be candid to the faults of these good men, 
 is tliis, that those who enjoy the advan- 
 tage of better instruction and of wise 
 pastors, should thankfully improve their 
 privileges, and not by the want of just 
 subordination deprive themselves of the 
 opportunity of exhibiting more regular 
 and edifying examples of holiness. That 
 knowledge was thus low among Chris- 
 tians, is evident from Eusebius, one of 
 the most learned of those times, who ex- 
 tols a conduct in these brethren, which 
 every Christian of common light and ca- 
 pacity now would condemn. 
 
 2. I see also the prevalence both of the 
 monastic and of the philosophic spirit. 
 Devotees were increasing in numbers 
 among serious persons ; and Origenism 
 had made philosophy more and more re- 
 putable. tJnder this influence, the two 
 brothers, whose story we have seen, im- 
 bibed too much of Platonism, knew too 
 little of Christianity, and though sincere 
 enough to become martyrs for Christ, at- 
 tained not the praise of Christian simpli- 
 city. The doctrines of Christ had ceased 
 to be explicitly unfolded ; and it was in 
 sufferings chiefly, endured with patient 
 faith and cheerful hope, that we can now 
 see, that Christ had yet a church in the 
 world. The bush was burning indeed in 
 a fire the most dreadful, yet it was not 
 consumed. 
 
 In the fourth year of the persecution 
 happened the martyrdom of Agapius at 
 Ca^sarea. Maximin Ca'sar was there 
 exhibiting spectacles in honour of his 
 birthday. The ferociousness 
 of pagans was doubtless much Martyr- 
 augmented by the usual bar- AnTp^us 
 barous sports ; and the native " 
 enmity of the mind against godliness met 
 not with so many checks of humanitjr, in 
 times of persecution, as it would in our 
 days of civilization. But it should be 
 remembered, that it was not philosophy, 
 but the Gospel, which improved, in this 
 as well as other respects, the morality of 
 the Roman empire. Agapius, who had 
 been thrice before brought on the stage, 
 and had thrice been respited by the com- 
 passion of the judge, was now brought 
 before the emperor, to fulfil, says Euse- 
 bius, that word of Christ, " ye shall be 
 brought before kings for my name's sake." 
 
Cext.IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 265 
 
 A slave who had murdered his master 
 was produced at the same time, and con- 
 demned to the wild beasts. The emperor, 
 with a view to distinguish his l)irthday 
 by an act of trenerosity, both pardoned 
 and o;ave freedom to the murderer. The 
 whole amphitheatre ran^ with acclama- 
 tions in praise of his clemency. But it 
 was perfectly to act in character for Max- 
 imin to punish the innocent and to spare 
 the fjuilty. He asked Agapius if he 
 would renounce Christianity, promising- 
 him liberty on that condition. The mar- 
 tyr expressed his cheerful readiness to 
 undergo any punishment, not for any 
 crime committed by him, but fur piety 
 toward the Lord of the universe. He was 
 condemned to be torn by a bear, and stili 
 breathing, was carried back to prison ; 
 where after he had lived a day, he was 
 sunk in the sea with weights laslcned to 
 his feet. The exclamation of the Jews, 
 in the history of our Saviour, '• Not this 
 man, but Barabbas," naturally occurs to 
 Eusebius on this occasion. 
 
 In the fifth year of the persecution, a 
 
 Tyrian virgin, Theodosia, not quite 
 
 eighteen years old, was put 
 
 Also or |.Q (jgatj^ fyj- owning and coun- 
 
 sia^° °' tenancing some Christian pri- 
 soners. The judge, Urbanus, 
 afterwards condemned them to the mines 
 of Palestine. Silvanus a presbyter, af- 
 terwards a bishop, with some others, was 
 doomed to the labour of the brass mines 
 the joints of their feet being first weaken- 
 ed by the application of hot iron. 
 
 Few persecutors exceeded Urbanus in 
 malice and activity. He doomed three 
 to fight with one another ; Auxentius, a 
 venerable old saint, he condemned to th 
 beasts. Some of them he condemned to 
 the mines, after he had made tliem 
 eunuchs. Others, after bitter torments, 
 he threw into prison again. 
 
 If any be still inclined to regard the 
 calculation of those, who represent the 
 number of the mart)'rs as small, let him 
 consider, that it was evidently very much 
 the policy of this, and most probably of 
 the former persecutions, to torment Chris 
 tians without destroying them. The em 
 perors did not wish to rob themselves of 
 such a number of subjects, but to subdue 
 them to their will. Yet in many instances 
 the human frame must have sunk under 
 these hardships; and the multitude of 
 Christian sufferers on this account, in 
 addition to the evils of poverty and flight, 
 must exceed all powers of calculation. 
 
 Vol. I. Z 
 
 Urbanus tortured, among others, the 
 famous Pamphilus, the friend of Euse- 
 bius ; but lived not to see his martyrdom. 
 Being himself convicted of crimes, Ur- 
 banus was capitally punished in Ceesarea, 
 the scene of his cruelties, and by the 
 same Maximin, of whose imperial sa- 
 vageness he had been the minister. 
 
 In the sixth year of the persecution, of 
 the great multitude of Christian sufferers 
 in Thebais, near a hundred were selected 
 to be sent to Palestine, and 
 were adiiido-ed bv Firmilian, Cruel per- 
 .1 r ri 1 i secutions. 
 
 the successor oi LJrbaaus, to 
 be lamed in the left foot, and to lose the 
 right eye, and in that state to be con- 
 demned to the mines. The three persons 
 also, who had been condemned to fight 
 with one another, for refusing to learn the 
 new business of a gladiator imposed on 
 them, were doomed by Maximin himself, 
 with some others, to the same punish; 
 ments as the persons transported from 
 Thebais. Some persons were apprehend- 
 ed at Gaza for meeting together to hear 
 the Scripture read, and were punished 
 with the loss of a limb, and an eye, or in 
 a still more cruel manner. Two women, 
 after sustaining horrible torments, were 
 put to death. The former being menaced 
 with the loss of chastity, burst out into 
 expressions of indignation against the 
 tyrant Maximin, for employing such 
 judges. The latter being dragged by 
 force to an altar, threw it down. What 
 was said before of ^desius and Apphian 
 may be applied to these. But there were 
 Christians of a higher class, better in- 
 formed in their duty, and more possessed 
 of the mind of Christ. A person, named 
 Paul, being sentenced to lose his head, 
 begged to be allowed a short space of 
 time. His request being granted, he 
 prayed with a loud voice for the whole 
 Christian world, that God would forgive 
 them, remove the present heavy scourge 
 of their iniquities, and restore them to 
 peace and liberty : he then prayed for the 
 Jews, that they might come to God and 
 find access to him through Christ. In 
 the next place, he prayed that the same 
 blessings might he vouchsafed to the Sa- 
 maritans. The Gentiles, who lived in 
 error and in ignorance of God, were the 
 next objects of his charitable petitions, 
 that they migiit be brought to know God 
 and to serve him : nor did he omit to 
 mention the crowd about him, the judge 
 who had sentenced him, the emperors 
 and the executioner, and in the hearing 
 
266 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 of all he prayed that their sins might not 
 be laid to their charge. The whole com- 
 pany was moved, and tears were shed. 
 The martyr composed himself to suffer, 
 and offering his neck to the sword, he 
 was beheaded: An admirable Christian 
 hero ! in whom divine love breathed in 
 conjunction with resignation and serenity. 
 The Lord's hand was not shortened : His 
 grace appeared in him in a manner wor- 
 thy of the Apostolic age. Soon after a 
 hundred and thirty Egyptian chieftains, 
 suffering the same mutilations Avhich 
 have been mentioned above, were sen- 
 tenced by Maximin to the mines of Pa- 
 lestine and Cilicia. 
 
 After the persecution had paused some 
 time, it was renewed with fresh violence 
 
 by the Edicts of Maximin.* 
 K(licts of rpj^g temples were repaired ; 
 
 men were compelled to sacri- 
 fice every where ; all things sold in the 
 markets were polluted with libations; 
 and persons were placed at the public 
 baths to force men to idolatrous compli- 
 ances. Three believers, Antoninus, Ze- 
 binus, and Germanus, threw themselves 
 into the hands of Firmilian, and were 
 capitally punished. Eusebius, in his 
 usual manner, commends their over- for- 
 ward zeal. With them a virgin called 
 Ennathus was dragged by violence to the 
 judge, whipped, and burned to death. 
 Their bodies were left exposed to the 
 beasts of prey, and particular care was 
 taken to prevent their interment. Some- 
 time after, certain Egyptians, coming to 
 minister to the confessors of their own 
 country, who had been condemned to the 
 mines in Cilicia, one of them was burn- 
 ed, two were beheaded, and several were 
 associated with the confessors in their 
 afflictions, mutilation, and the drudgery 
 of the mines. Peter the monk, having 
 in vain been solicited by the judge to 
 save his life, gave it up cheerfully for 
 the sake of Christ. With him suffered 
 Asclepius, bishop of the Marcionites, 
 being burned on the same funeral pile, 
 "animated with zeal," says my author, 
 "but not according to knowledge."! This 
 however might be more than Eusebius 
 knew. The heretical form, in which he 
 appeared, might be consistent willi the 
 pure love of Christ; in a history, which 
 undertakes impartially to celebrate the 
 people of God, it does not become us to 
 be blinded by the idea of a rigorous and 
 exclusive uniformity of denomination. 
 
 * C. IX. de Martyr. Pal. 
 
 fC.X. 
 
 Pamphilus the presbyter and friend of 
 Eusebius, is highly commended by him 
 for his contempt of secular grandeur, to 
 which he might have aspired ; 
 for his great liberality to the IZldl' 
 poor ; for that which may seem 
 more likely to cloud than to adorn his 
 Christian excellencies, his philosophic 
 life ; above all, for his knowledge of the 
 Holy Scriptures, in which his panegyrist 
 tiiinks he excelled all men of that time; 
 and for his benevolence to all who came 
 to him. An excellent Christian he un- 
 doubtedly was, though a moderate de- 
 o-ree of Evangelical knowledg-e in that 
 age would easily be esteemed prodigious. 
 Firmilian asking him when brought be- 
 fore him, what was his country, received 
 for answer, " Jerusalem." Not under- 
 standing what he meant by this, he tor- 
 tured him lor an explanation. Pamphilus 
 persisted that he had spoken truth. 
 " Where is this country of yours ■?" "It 
 belongs to those who alone worship the 
 true God." The judge, at once incensed 
 and perplexed, after various torments, or- 
 dered him to be beheaded. Twelve mar- 
 tyrs suffered with him. One of them, 
 Porphyrins, a servant of Pamphilus, beg- 
 ging the favour of interment for the de- 
 ceased, was ordered to be burned; and 
 was heard for the last time when the 
 flame began to reach him, calling upon 
 Jesus the Son of God as his helper. It is 
 remarkable, that Firmilian also himself, 
 after having trodden in the steps of Urba- 
 nus in shedding Christian blood, like 
 him also suffered capitally by the sen- 
 tence of the emperor. 
 
 Toward the end of the seventh year the 
 persecution relaxing in some degree, the 
 multitude of the confessors in the mines 
 of Palestine enjoyed some liberty, and 
 even erected some places of public wor- 
 ship. The president of the province com- 
 ing among them, envied them the small 
 cessation of their miseries, and wrote to 
 the emperor in their prejudice. After- 
 wards the master of the mines coming 
 thither, as if by an imperial rescript, di- 
 vided the sufferers into classes. Some he 
 ordered to dwell in Cyprus, others in Li- 
 banus ; the rest he dispersed and harassed 
 with various drudgeries in different parts 
 of Palestine. Four he singled out for the 
 examination of the military commander, 
 who burnt them to death. Silvanus, a 
 bishop of great piety, John, an Egyptian, 
 and thirty-seven others, were the same 
 day beheaded by the order of Maximin. 
 
Ce^t. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 267 
 
 Of John it is remarked, that thoutrh hlind, 
 he had been, like the rest, cauterized and 
 debilitated in one leg by a hot iron. The 
 strength of his memory was admired 
 among the Christians: he could at plea- 
 sure repeat from the Old or New Testa- 
 ment many passages in Christian assem- 
 blies. But the fact proves something 
 more than what Eusebius mentions, 
 namely, that he had made the best use 
 of his eyes while he was possessed of 
 them. 
 
 And here we close the account from 
 Eusebius, of the martyrs of Palestine. 
 For eight years the East, with little in- 
 termission, groaned under the most heavy 
 persecution. In the West, their suffer- 
 ings abated after two years. The politi- 
 cal changes of the empire account for the 
 difference. But, both in the East and the 
 West, Satan was permitted to exert his 
 malice in the keenest manner during this 
 last of the Pagan persecutions. And the 
 Divine power and wisdom, in still pre- 
 serving a real Church on earth, was 
 never more conspicuously displayed, 
 since the days of the Apostles. The 
 lime of an external triumph of the 
 Church, under Constantine, was at hand. 
 Those, who look at outward things alone, 
 may be tempted to think how much 
 more crlorious would the Church have 
 appeared at that time, without the pre- 
 vious desolations of Dioclesian's perse- 
 cution. But when it is considered how 
 much Christian doctrine had decayed, 
 and how low holy practice had fallen, 
 the necessity of so sharp a trial to purify 
 the Church, and fit her at all for a state 
 of prosperity, is evident. Otherwise, the 
 
 many precious children of God suffered 
 in much patience and charity. But those 
 who siifTered with very much of a differ- 
 ent spirit found no pastor to discounte- 
 nance their self-will and false zeal; a 
 sure sign that the true spirit of martyr- 
 dom was loss pure than it had formerly 
 been. Moreover, the prevalence of super- 
 stition on the one hand, and the decay of 
 ICvangelical knowledge on the other, are 
 equal fy apparent. Christ crucified, justi- 
 fication purely by fnith, and the effectual 
 influences of the Holy Ghost, together 
 with humbling views of man's total apos- 
 tasy and corruption, these were ideas at 
 least very faintly impressed at that day 
 on Christian minds. It is vain to expect 
 Christian faith to abound without Chris- 
 tian doctrine. Moral, and philosophical, 
 and monastical instructions, will not ef- 
 fect for men what is to be expected from 
 Evangelical doctrine. And if the faith of 
 Christ was so much declined, (and its 
 decayed state ought to be dated from 
 about the year 270), we need 
 not wonder that such scenes 
 as Eusebius hints at without 
 any circumstantial details, 
 took place in the Christian 
 world.* He observes, that 
 pastors of Churches were condemned to 
 take care of camels, and to feed the em- 
 peror's horses. Even he, who was far 
 from seeing in a due light the cause of 
 the declension of piety in their departure 
 from the faiih, was struck with the moral 
 effects, and could not but revere the Di- 
 
 Decay of 
 pure 
 
 Christian- 
 ity. 
 A. D. 270. 
 
 difference between Christians and 
 gans might probably have been 
 
 Pa 
 
 little 
 
 more than a name 
 
 I know it is common for authors to re- 
 present the great declension of Christian- 
 ity to have taken place only after its ex- 
 ternal establishment under Constantine. 
 But the evidence of history has compelled 
 me to dissent from this view of things. 
 In fact we have seen, ihat for a whole 
 generation previous to the persecution, 
 few marks of superior piety appeared. 
 Scarce a luminary of godliness existed ; 
 and it is not common in any age for a 
 great work of the Spirit of God to be ex- 
 hibited, but under the conduct of some 
 remarkable Saints, Pastors, and Reform- 
 ers. This whole period, as well as the 
 whole scene of the persecution, is very 
 barren of such characters. Not but that 
 
 vine justice, in giving unworthy minis- 
 ters a punishment adapted to their crimes. 
 He speaks also of the ambitious spirit of 
 many, in aspiring to the ofl[ices of the 
 Church, the ill-judged and unlawful or- 
 dinations, the quarrels among confessors 
 themselves, and the contentions excited 
 by young demagogues in the very relics 
 of the persecuted Church, and the multi- 
 plied evils v;hich their vices excited 
 among Christians. How sadly must the 
 Christian world have declined, which 
 co\ild thus conduct itself under the very 
 rod of Divine vengeance ] Yet let not the 
 infidel or profane world triumph. It was 
 not Christianity, but the departure from 
 it, which brought on these evils; and 
 even in this low state of the Church 
 there was much more moral virtue than 
 could be found any where else ; and the 
 charitable spirit of many in suffering, 
 
 * C. XII. Martyr, of Pal. 
 
268 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 showed that God had yet a Church upon 
 earth. The reader is however now pre- 
 pared to conceive aright of the state of 
 the Church, when Constantine took it 
 under his protection, and to judge how 
 far a national establishment was bene- 
 ficial or prejudicial to it in future. Of 
 this he could scarcely judge with any 
 propriety, unless well informed of its 
 previous spiritual condition. But before 
 we enter upon this, some facts, more or 
 less connected with the persecution, with 
 the civil state of the Empire, so far as it 
 may throw light on the history of the 
 Church, and with the manner how the 
 persccuiion closed, will call for our at- 
 tention. 
 
 Of all the martyrologies of this perse- 
 cution, none are more replete with horror 
 than those which describe the sufferings 
 .of Taracus, Probus, and An- 
 MHriyism jironipug at Tarsus in Cilicia. 
 
 Bnt 1 suppose b}"^ this time, 
 the reader has seen a sufficient specimen 
 of scenes which admit of no entertain- 
 ment, no colouring, no embellishment. 
 One of the best lessons to be h arnt from 
 them is, that here human nature is dis- 
 covered in the height of its enmity against 
 God : and any man may see of what ma- 
 lignity he is capable, if left at large to 
 his own dark designs. I looked over 
 the acts of these martyrdoms, which are 
 rather tedious;* I suppose Mr. Gibbon 
 also did the same, and his remark on 
 what he had read, is this, that there was 
 an asperity of behaviour in the martyrs, 
 which might irritate the magistrates. But 
 are words to be compared to deeds'? 
 What if torments so terrible, so unpro- 
 voked, inflicted on innocent and worthy 
 citizens, did extort a few passionate com- 
 plaints and indignant speeches? This 
 was ihe case I see with Andronicus, and 
 it is the only thing blameworthy which 
 appears on the face of the narrative : Is 
 this an apology, or even an extenuation 
 for such barbarous persecutions ] Taracus 
 firmly owned the truth. On being asked, 
 whetber he did not worship two gods, 
 because he worshipped Christ, he con- 
 fessed that "Christ was God, being the 
 Son of the living God ; he is the hope of 
 Christians; he saves us by his suffer- 
 ings." Probus, on being required to sa- 
 crifice to Jupiter, says, " What to him 
 who married his sister, that adulterer, 
 that unchaste person, as all the poets 
 
 ♦ See Fleui-y, B. IX. 
 
 testify ■?" In such testimonies as these, 
 truth was delivered without violation of 
 decorum. It was not so in the whole of 
 these scenes. Brit enmity knows not 
 what candour means ; and lest such bi- 
 gots to infidelity as Mr. Gibbon should 
 misconstrue what I have said of the great 
 decline of godliness in the Christians of 
 these times, it ought in justice to be 
 owned in their favour, that a persecution, 
 which intended their total destruction, 
 v/as carried on against a race of men, 
 who were even then, with all their faults, 
 the most loyal, peaceable, and worthy 
 citizens in the whole Empire. 
 
 But Providence was raising up a Pro- 
 tector for the Church. The emperor 
 Constantius lying at the point of death, 
 desired his partner in the East, Galerius, 
 to send him home his son Constantine. 
 The Eastern emperor, having delayed as 
 long as possible, sent him at last, and the 
 son arrived in Britain just in time to see 
 his father alive, who was interred at 
 Eboracum.* Constantine sue- 
 ceeding, gave the most per- [^°"^j|^"' 
 feet toleration to Christians, Q,.gJ^t sug. 
 through the whole extent of ceedsCon- 
 his dominions. Providence stantius, 
 was still with him in enlarg- ^ jy 306. 
 ing his kingdom, that, like 
 another Cyrus, he might give peace and 
 liberty to the Church. Rome and Italy 
 were for sometime under the power of 
 Maxentius, the son of Dioclesian's col- 
 league Maximian. This prince attempted 
 the chastity of a Roman matron, who by 
 suicide prevented his base designs. Had 
 she been a Pagan, as Lucretia, her impa- 
 tience under the hand of God was not to be 
 wondered at ; but she professed Chris- 
 tianity ; yet her action is highly praised 
 by Eusebius ; — fresh proof of the taste of 
 the times in religion. But Maxentius, 
 though a tyrant of the basest character, 
 never seems to have been, strictly speak- 
 ing, a persecutor of the Christians. Con- 
 stantine, however, at length coming from 
 France into Italy, subverted his kingdom, 
 and became sole master of the Western 
 world. It was in his expedition against 
 Maxentius that he is said to have seen 
 the miracle of the Cross, the considera- 
 tion of which will more properly excite 
 our attention when we come to consider 
 the religious character and proceedings 
 of this emperor. Maximian also, whose 
 daughter Constantine had married, after 
 
 * Now York. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 269 
 
 various attempts to recover the power 
 which, hy the influence ofDioclesian, he 
 had resigned, was put to death by his 
 son-in-law for attempting his destruc- 
 tion. 
 
 Galerius himself in the year 310 was 
 smitten with an incurable disease : all 
 . his lower parts were corrupt- 
 
 Sufferings gj . physicians and idols were 
 01 Gale- 1- 1 . • ■ • .^ 1 
 
 j,jyg applied to in vain: an intoler- 
 
 A D 310 ^^ stench overspread itself 
 over the palace of Sardis, 
 where he resided : he was devoured by 
 worms : and in a situation the mobt dread- 
 ful he continued a whole year. Softened 
 p ,. . J. at length by his sufferings, he 
 Galerius published, in the year 311, 
 A D 311 ^^ Edict, by which he took 
 off the persecution from the 
 Christians, allowed them to rebuild their 
 places of worship, and entreated them to 
 pray for his health. Thus did God him- 
 self subdue this haughty tyrant. Prisons 
 were opened, and among others Donatus, 
 the friend of Lactautius,* who had been 
 confined six years, recovered his liberty. 
 
 Galerius had exceeded all emperors in 
 hostility to Christ; but who can fix the 
 limit of human passions] His nephew 
 Maximin, who reigned in a subordi- 
 nate capacity in the East, was even su- 
 perior in the arts of persecution. Pagan- 
 ism was expiring, and it behooved the 
 prince of darkness to find or qualify an 
 agent, who should dispute every inch of 
 ground with persevering assiduity. 
 
 Maximin, equally unmoved by the ex- 
 ample of Constantine on the one hand, 
 and the extorted clemency of Galerius on 
 the other, suppressed the Edict of the lat- 
 ter, and contented himself with giving 
 verbal orders to stop the persecution. The 
 prajtorian prefect .Sabinus, however, de- 
 clared the will of the emperor in favour 
 of toleration, which had all the effect his 
 humanity wished. The prisoners were 
 released, the confessors were freed from 
 the mines, the highways were full of 
 Christians, singing psalms and hymns to 
 (iod, as they returned to their friends, 
 and Christendom at length wore a cheer- 
 ful aspect. Even Pagans were melted; 
 and man)' who had joined in the attempt 
 to extinguish the Christian name, began 
 to be convinced, that a religion which had 
 sustained such repeated and such formi- 
 dable attacks, was divine and invinci- 
 ble. 
 
 * De Mort. persecut. 
 Z2 
 
 But this calm lasted not six whole 
 months.* Galerius, a few days after his 
 edict, expired, his body being altogether 
 corrupted. Without entering into a minute 
 description of his sufferings, which are par- 
 ticularized by Eusebius and Lactantius, it 
 is perfectly right to observe, that he who 
 delighted so long to make men feel the 
 most exquisite misery, might say at last 
 with Adoni-bezek,")" " As I have done, so 
 God hath requited me." Maximin at- 
 tempted to succeed him in all his eastern 
 dominions; but was prevented by Licini- 
 us, whom Galerius had nominated Au- 
 gustus, who took possession of Asia Mi- 
 nor. But Syria and Egypt with their de- 
 pendencies remained still under Maximin. 
 Here he renewed the persecution with 
 much malevolence and artifice. Under 
 certain pretences, he forbade Christians 
 to assemble in their church-yards, and 
 then he privately procured petitions from 
 various cities, which desired that the 
 Christians might not be encouraged in 
 their precincts. This was a refined spe- 
 cies of policy, in which he was assisted 
 by Theotecnus, the governor of Antioch. 
 This man had hunted the Christians from 
 their places of confinement, and had caused 
 the deaths of many. He now set up an 
 oracle of Jupiter, and consecrated the idol 
 at Antioch with new ceremonies. Jupiter 
 gave out, that the Christians ought to be 
 banished from the city, and Maximin was 
 informed, that it was his duty, both on 
 motives of piety and policy, to persecute 
 the Christians. All the other magistrates 
 of tlie cities subject to Maximin, acted 
 the same part as Theotecnus, and peti- 
 tions were sent by the Paofan inhabitants 
 begging the expulsion of Christians. 
 
 Maximin, furnished with plausible pre- 
 tences for renewing the persecution, com- 
 menced it again. Through every city 
 and village, idolatrous priests were ap- 
 pointed, and over them high-priests of a 
 new institution, who applied themselves 
 with great diligence to the support of de- 
 clining paganism. They offered sacrifices 
 with great assiduity. Persons of quality 
 filled the highest offices of idolatry; and 
 pains were taken to prevent Christians 
 from building places of worship, or from 
 following their religion in public or pri- 
 vate ; and the former method of compel- 
 ling them to sacrifice was renewed. To 
 render his new priests more respectable. 
 
 ♦ Enseb. B. IX. C. II, &c. 
 
 t Judges i. 7, 
 
270 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 Maximin clothed them with white raan- 
 tlos, such as were worn by the ministers 
 of the palace. Incited by the example of 
 the tyrant, all the Pagans in his domi- 
 nions exerted themselves to contrive the 
 ruin of Christians ; and human ingenuity 
 was put to the stretch, to invent calum- 
 nies in support of the kingdom of dark- 
 ness. 
 
 When falsehood and slanders are paid 
 for by governments, they will not want 
 employers. 
 
 Certain fictitious acts of Pilate and our 
 Saviour, full of blasphemy, were, by Maxi- 
 min's approbation, circulated through his 
 dominions, with orders to facilitate the 
 publication of them in all places, and to 
 direct schoolmasters to deliver them to 
 youth, that they might commit them to 
 memory. A certain officer at Damascus 
 also engaged some infamous women to 
 confess, that they had been Christians, 
 and privy to the lascivious practices 
 which were committed on the Lord's day 
 in their assemblies. These and other 
 slanders were registered, copied, and sent 
 to the emperor, as the authenticated con- 
 fession of these women, and he circulated 
 them through his dominions. The officer 
 who invented this calumny, destroj'cd 
 himself sometime after by his own hand. 
 But a specious pretence was now given for 
 augmenting the persecution. Maximin, 
 affecting still the praise of clemency, gave 
 orders to the prefects not to take away 
 the lives of Christians, but to punish 
 them with loss of eyes, and various am- 
 putations. The other abominations of 
 this tyrant, dreadful and uncommon af 
 they were, come not within our province 
 His lubovirs against Christianity only be- 
 long to our subject. Nor did he strictly 
 abstain from shedding blood at this sea- 
 son, though one would think the expe- 
 rience of so many years should have 
 taught him, as well as the other tyrants, 
 that the '• blood of the martyrs was the 
 seed of the church." 
 
 There appears, however, a plan of po- 
 lite refinement in this renewed persecu- 
 tion, beyond anything which had yet 
 been practised. Maximin did not now 
 as he had done formerly un- 
 der Galerius, slay indiscrimi- 
 nately, or put to death num- 
 bers with exquisite torture. 
 A few bishops and persons of Christian 
 renown were deprived of life, the rest 
 ■were harassed by every other kind of suf- 
 fering short of death, and no arts were 
 
 left unemployed to root Christianity out 
 of the mind, and educate the next gene- 
 ration in a confirmed aversion to it. The 
 decrees of cities against Christians, and 
 besides these, the copies of imperial 
 edicts engraved in brazen tables, were 
 nailed up and seen in every town. No- 
 thinp- like this had been done before. The 
 
 Cruelties 
 of Max- 
 imii). 
 
 persecution, in this its last stage, had 
 arrived at the perfection of di-abolical in- 
 genuity. Children in their schools daily 
 sounded Jesus and Pilate, and other 
 things, invented to asperse the Gospel. 
 
 A rescript of the emperor's, nailed to 
 a post at Tyre, manifests with what plea- 
 sure and joy he had received the petition 
 of that city against the Christians. It 
 venerates Jupiter and the rest of the gods, 
 as the authors of all good ; appeals to the 
 experience of the inhabitants liow happily 
 their affairs had proceeded since the wor- 
 ship of the ancients had been restored, 
 how they were now blest with good har- 
 vests, had no plagues, earthquakes and 
 tempests, and enjoyed peace through the 
 empire, and how opposite to all this the 
 case had been, while Christendom pre- 
 vailed. He desires that such as persisted 
 still in their error should be banished from 
 Tyre, according to the prayer of the pe- 
 tition. This rescript was a specimen of 
 the rest, and it cannot be denied, that 
 either Maximin, or some persons about 
 him, were men of capacity, industry, 
 and activity, though surely a worse cause 
 Vv-as never found for the exertion of these 
 talents. 
 
 Never were Christian minds so clouded 
 and dispirited. Thus low did God suffer 
 his Church to fall, to try its faith, and to 
 purify it in the furnace. Art was more 
 poisonous than rage, and the deceptions 
 seemed calculated to impose (if it were 
 possible) even on the elect. Very re- 
 markable, however, was the Divine tes- 
 timony to his Church ; at this tinie, man's 
 extremity was the opportunity in which 
 the truth and goodness of God appeared 
 most conspicuous. There were doubtless 
 many true Christians at that time wrest- 
 ling with their God, to appear for his 
 Clmrch, and ke did so, in this manner. 
 Wliile the messengers were on the road 
 with rescripts similar to that at Tyre, a 
 drought commenced, famine unexpected 
 oppressed the dominions of Maximin ; 
 then followed a plague with inflamed 
 ulcers. The sores spread over the body, 
 l)ut chiefly affected the eyes and blinded 
 many. And the Armenians, the allies 
 
Cext. IV,] 
 
 DIOCLESIAN. 
 
 271 
 
 and neighbours of the Eastern empire, 
 entered into a war with Maximin ; the}' 
 were disposed to favour the Gospel, and 
 Maximin, by extending his persecution 
 to them, drew on their hostility. Thus 
 were the boasts of Maximin confounded. 
 The plague and famine raged in the most 
 dreadful manner, and multitudes lay un- 
 buried. The Christians, whose piety and 
 fear of God were stirred up on this occa- 
 sion, were the only persons who employ- 
 ed themselves in doing good, every day 
 busying themselves in taking care of the 
 sick, and burying the dead, whereas 
 numbers of Pagans were neglected by 
 their own friends ; they gathered together 
 also multitudes of the famished poor, and 
 distributed bread to all ; thus imitating 
 their heavenly Father, who sendeth rain 
 on the just and the unjust. Christians still 
 appeared to be superior to all others ; and 
 the Church was known still to exist, by 
 fruits peculiarly her own, to the praise of 
 her God and Saviour. 
 
 Toward the end of the year 312, died 
 the emperor Dioclesian, who had reigned 
 prosperously for twenty j'ears ; in the lat- 
 
 T-, , c ter part of which time he corn- 
 Death of J .1 .■ 1 
 Dioclesian iri^ncpd the persecution, and 
 . T^ ^-^ abdicatinor the throne not lono- 
 A. D. 312. jv u 7- J 
 
 alter, he lived seven years a 
 
 private life : happy, had he done so on 
 motives of piety. But the mischiefs 
 which his authority introduced continued 
 under tyrants more ferocious than him- 
 self; and he lived not onl}^ to see these 
 mischiefs, without power to check them, 
 had he been so disposed, but also, what 
 probably more afflicted his mind, to find 
 his daughter Valeria, the widow of Ga- 
 lerius, and her mother, his own wife 
 Prisca, treated with great injustice by his 
 successors, and to solicit their release in 
 vain. Worn out with grief and vexation, 
 he ended his days at length, a monument 
 of the instability of all human greatness. 
 He lived not to see the catastrophe of liis 
 wife and daughter, who, after a long 
 course of sufferings, were put to death 
 by Licinius. It is foreign to the design 
 of this history to particularize their story, 
 which, after all, is very mysterious. Why 
 they should be so much persecuted, first 
 by Maximin and then by Licinius, we 
 know not, A conjecture may he made, 
 but it must be considered only as a con- 
 jecture. The two princesses had doubt- 
 less favoured the Gospel in the days of 
 their grandeur, and had defiled themselves 
 with sacrifices to appease Dioclesian. 
 
 Might they not afterwards suffer for the 
 sake of the Gospel itself, though their 
 persecutors might not choose to represent 
 them as suffering on account of Christi- 
 anity'? If so, the princesses sustained 
 the cross with more fidelity than formerly. 
 Maximin was surely capable of all this 
 inhumanity, and that Licinius also was 
 so, though for some time a friend of 
 Christians, will appear hereafter. 
 
 In the year 313, there was a war be- 
 tween Licinius and Maximin, who con- 
 tended each for the complete sovereignty 
 of the East. Before the de- * rj <-,<> 
 cisive battle, Maximin vowed * ' • "^ ■'• 
 to Jupiter, that if he obtained the victory, 
 Ije would abolish the Christian name. 
 Licinius, in a dream,* was directed to 
 supplicate, with all his army, the supreme 
 God, in a solemn manner. He gave di- 
 rections to his soldiers to do so, and they 
 prayed in the field of battle, using the 
 very words which he had received in his 
 dream. In all this the reader will see 
 nothing suspicious, nothing but what is 
 in its own nature very credible, when he 
 considers that the contest between Jeho- 
 vah and Jupiter was now at its height, 
 and drawing to a crisis. Victory decided 
 in favour of Licinius. Maximin, in con- 
 sequence of this,f published a cautious 
 decree, in which he forbad the molestation 
 of Christians, but did not allow them the 
 liberty of public worship. Warned by 
 former experience of his enmity, the 
 Christians in his dominions dared not to 
 assemble themselves together. Whilst 
 the rest of the Christian world, under 
 the auspices of Constantine 
 and Licinius, who published |"[J "^^8^^ 
 a complete toleration of Chris- cation 
 tianity, together with that 
 of all other religions, enjoyed peace and 
 tranquillity. 
 
 It was the will' of God to lay his hand 
 still more heavily on the tyrant. Struck 
 with rage at his disappointments, in the 
 sad reverse of his affairs he 
 slew many priests and pro- Jv"'* . . 
 pnets ot his gods, by whose 
 enchantments he had been seduced with 
 false hopes of universal empire in the 
 East ; and finding most probably that he 
 gained no friends among Christians by 
 his late edict, he published another in 
 their favour as full and complete as that 
 of Constantine and Licinius, So amaz- 
 ingly were affairs now changed, that con- 
 tending emnerors courted the favour of 
 
 * Lact. de .M. P. f Euseb. B. X. C. IX. 
 
272 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 the poor persecuted Christians. After 
 this he was struck with a sudden plague 
 over his whole body, pined away with 
 hunger, fell down from his bed, his flesh 
 being so wasted away by a secret fire, 
 that it consumed and dropped off from his 
 bones ; his eyes started out of their sock- 
 ets ; and in his distress he began to see 
 God passing judgment on him.* Frantic 
 in his agonies, he cried out, " It was not 
 1, but others who did it." At length, by 
 the increasing force of torment, he owned 
 his guilt, and every now and then im- 
 plored Christ, that he would compassion- 
 ate his misery. He confessed himself 
 vanquished, and gave up the ghost, j 
 
 Thus closed the most memorable of all. 
 the attacks of Satan on the Christian 
 Church. Since that time he has never 
 been able to persecute Christians, as such, 
 within the limits of Roman civilization in 
 Europe. I thought the account of the 
 most violent attempt to eradicate the 
 Gospel, ever known, deserved to be dis- 
 tinctly related. If some things happened 
 more approaching to the nature of mira- 
 cles, than ordinary history knows, the 
 greatness of the contest shows at once 
 the propriety of such signal divine inter- 
 positions, and renders them more credi- 
 ble. The present age affects a scepticism 
 more daring than any preceding one; but 
 in every age before this, all pious and 
 considerate persons have agreed that the 
 arm of God was lifted up in a wonderful 
 manner, at once to chastise and to purify 
 his Church, and also to demonstrate the 
 truth of Christian religion to the proudest 
 and the fiercest of his enemies, till they 
 were obliged to confess that the Gospel 
 was divine, and must stand in the earth 
 invincible ; that the most High ruleth, 
 and that he will have a Church in the 
 world, which will glorify him, in spite 
 of earth and hell united, and that this 
 Church contains in it all that deserves 
 the name of true wisdom and true virtue. 
 
 * Lactaiitius tells us, tliat the immedifite 
 cause of his death was poison, wliich he (iianii 
 in his fury. But I tiiiiik Kusehius's account 
 more probable, because Lactantius allows tliat 
 he lived four days under torture. 
 
 + It is remarkable, that all ihe associates of 
 Maximin in his crimes, partook also of his 
 punishments. Among these Culcian, tlie 
 bloody governor of Theliais,and Tlieotecnus, 
 are distinguished. His enchanters were, by 
 torments under the auliiority of Licinius, com- 
 pelled to lay open the frauds of tlieir employ- 
 ers, and he and they, willi all the children 
 and relations of the tyrant, were destroyed. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A VIEW OF THE STATE OF THE CHRIS- 
 TIAN RELIGION, ON ITS ESTABLISH- 
 MENT UNDER CONSTANTINE. 
 
 This emperor from early life had some 
 predilection in favour of Christianity. 
 His father Constantius, like Agrippa, had 
 been almost persuaded to be a Christian, 
 and probably the same fear of man and 
 the same love of the world operated as a 
 check upon both. This, however,* we 
 are informed concerning him, that he con- 
 demned the polytheism of the times, and 
 worshipped one God, the maker of all 
 things, that he had multitudes of Chris- 
 tians in his palace, and among these, 
 ministers of the Gospel, who openly pray- 
 ed for the emperor. The knowledge of 
 these things, joined to the remarkable 
 contrast between the moral character of 
 his father, and that of the other emperors, 
 must have made some impression in fa- 
 vour of the phristian religion on the in- 
 telligent spirit of Constantine, though 
 more pungent views of internal depravity 
 and guilt be needful to induce the mind 
 to enter fully into the spirit of the Gospel. 
 But even a worldly mind may feel the 
 need of divine assistance, when dubious 
 under the prospect of important secular 
 events: And Constantine marching from 
 France into Italy against Maxentius, on 
 an expedition, which was like either to 
 exalt or to ruin liirn, was oppressed with 
 anxiety. Some god he thought needful 
 to protect him. The God of the Chris- 
 tians he was most inclined to respect; 
 but he wanted some satisfactory proof of 
 his real existence and power ; and he 
 neither understood the means of acquiring 
 this, nor could he be content with the 
 atheistical indifference, in which so many 
 generals and heroes since his time have 
 acquiesced. He prayed, he implored with 
 much vehemence and importunity ; and 
 God left him not unanswered. While 
 he was marching with his forces, in 
 the afternoon, the trophy of the Cross 
 appeared very luminous in the heavens, 
 higher than the sun, with this inscrip- 
 tion, " Conquer by this."f He and 
 his soldiers were astonished at the 
 sight. But he continued pondering on 
 the event till night. And Christ appear- 
 ed to him when asleep, with the same 
 sign of the cross, and directed him to 
 
 * Euseb. Life of Constantine, XVII. 
 
Cekt. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTINE. 
 
 273 
 
 make use of the symbol as his military 
 ensign. Constantine obeyed, and the 
 cross was henceforward displayed in his 
 armies.* 
 
 Constantine, who hitherto was totally 
 unacquainted with Christian doctrine, 
 asked the pastors who this God was, or 
 what was the meaning of the sign. They 
 told him, that it was God, the only-be- 
 gotten Son of the only true God,f that 
 the sign was the trophy of the victory, 
 which he, when on earth, had gained over 
 death. At the same time they explained 
 to him the causes of his coming, and the 
 doctrine of his incarnation. From that 
 time Constantine firmly believed the truth 
 of Christianity. He would have acted 
 irrationally, if he had not; and it were 
 an inexcusable want of candour to ascribe 
 to motives merely political a course of 
 conduct in favour of Christianity, in 
 which he persevered to his death ; and 
 which he began at a time when the 
 triumph of the Christian cause and the 
 success of his arms as connected with it 
 were extremely dubious. He began after 
 this to read the Scriptures, and zealously 
 patronized the pastors of the Church all 
 his days. Whether he really loved the 
 Gospel, and felt its influence on his own 
 heart, is a doubtful question ; but that he 
 believed it to be divinely true, is certain. 
 
 • I give the narrative of Eusebius as concise- 
 ly as possible. It is proper to add, that lie tells 
 us that he had ttie story of the miraculous ap- 
 pearance in the heavens from the emperor iiim- 
 self a long' lime after, and that confirmed by 
 an oath. He, who is determined not to believe 
 Christianity to be divine, will doubtless disbe- 
 lieve this miracle, from the same spirit which 
 has induced him to harden his heart against 
 rauch more striking evidence. With such a 
 one I would not converse on the subject. Rut 
 to those who admit the divine origin of Chris- 
 tianity, if any such doubt the truth of the mi- 
 raole, I would say, that it seems to me more 
 reasonable to admit a divliie interposition in a 
 case like this, especially considering the im- 
 portant consequences, than to deny the vera- 
 city of Eusebius or of Constantine. On the 
 former view God acts like himself, conde- 
 scending to hear praver, leading the mind by 
 temporal kindness to look to him for spiritual 
 blessings, and confirming the truth of his own 
 religion ; on the latter, two men not of the 
 very best, but surely by no means of the worst 
 character, are imreasonably suspected of de- 
 liberate perjury or falsehood. 
 
 f I suspect Eusebius expresses here his own 
 sense of the doctrine of the divinity of Christ, 
 which will be considered hereafter : his words 
 
 fire, '^'•'^ /**^ £*WXi CS^V J ii)i T« *v3i )tx* ffCVt; 
 
 if a consistent and long course of actions 
 be admitted as evidence. 
 
 It belongs to civil history to describe 
 the civil and military transactions of this 
 warlike and magnanimous prince. He 
 was* no sooner made master of Rome by 
 the destruction of Maxentius, than he 
 honoured the cross by putting a spear of 
 that form into the hand of the statue erect- 
 ed for him at Rome. He now built 
 churches, and showed great beneficence 
 to the poor.. He encouraged the meeting 
 of bishops in synods, he honoured them 
 with his presence, and employed himself 
 in continually aggrandizing the Church. 
 In the mean time his associate in the 
 East, Licinius, began to persecute it. 
 
 Notwithstanding the proofs which this 
 man had had of the divine interposition in 
 favour of the Gospel, during his contest 
 with Maximin, the force of old prejudices 
 imbibed under Galerius operated at length, 
 in conjunction with the native depravity 
 of the human heart, to induce him to re- 
 new the persecution. He prohibited Chris- 
 tian synods in his dominions, expelled 
 believers from his court, and forbade the 
 women to attend the public assemblies of 
 men, and ordered them to furnish them- 
 selves with separate teachers of their own 
 sex. He dismissed from his armies those 
 who refused to sacrifice, and forbade any 
 supplies to be afforded them in their 
 necessities. He proceeded still further. 
 He murdered bishops, and destroyed 
 churches. At Amasia, in Pontus, his cru- 
 elty was particularly distinguished. He 
 used enchantments, and once more Satan 
 made a feeble attempt to recover by his 
 means the ground he had lost. It was 
 not probable that Licinius should take 
 these steps without quarrelling with Con- 
 stantine, and a war soon commenced be- 
 tween the two princes. Licinius put the 
 truth or falsehood of the Gospel on the 
 event of war. It was an unwarranted ap- 
 peal, but God answered him „ 
 in his own way. He lost in ^^ ^ ^^5, 
 the issue both his empire and 
 his life. It is remarkable, that one of 
 Constantine's soldiers, who parted with 
 the banner of the cross in battle to save 
 his life, lost it, while he, who in his room 
 supported and upheld the banner, was 
 
 - Flis victory over the tyrant was providen- 
 tially striking ; and the credulity of Maxen- 
 tius, and the failure of the heathen oracles, 
 which encouraged him to proceed against 
 Conslanline, are no less remarkable. But this 
 is civil history. 
 
274 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 preserved. It were to be wished, that 
 there had been as much zeal at this time 
 to support the doctrines and realize the 
 power of the cross, as there was to honour 
 its formalities. But this was far from 
 being the case. 
 
 For neither in Constantine, nor in his 
 favourite bishops, nor in the general ap- 
 pearance of the church, can we see much 
 of the spirit of godliness. Pompous ap- 
 paratus, augmented superstitions and un- 
 meaning forms of piety, much show and 
 little substance appears. This is the im- 
 pression, which the account given by Eu- 
 sebius has left on my mind. As the mat- 
 ter of my history is very scanty here, I 
 shall endeavour to compress it into a 
 small compass, chiefly with a view to 
 catch the face of Christianity at this pe- 
 riod, and to pave the way for a more com- 
 plete understanding of the great contro- 
 versy, which must soon arrest our atten- 
 tion. 
 
 If we look at the. external appearance 
 of Christianity, nothing can be more 
 splendid. An emperor, full of zeal for 
 the propagation of the only divine religion, 
 by edicts restores to the Church every 
 thing of which it had been deprived, in- 
 demnifies those who had suffered, honours 
 the pastors exceedingly, recommends to 
 governors of provinces to promote the 
 Gospel ; and though he will neither oblige 
 them nor any others to profess it, yet he 
 forbids them to make use of the sacrifices 
 commonly made by prefects ; he erects 
 churches exceedingly sumptuous and or 
 namental, with distinctions of the parts 
 corresponding in some measure to those 
 in Solomon's temple, discovers with 
 much zeal the Sepulchre of Christ at Je- 
 rusalem, real or pretended, and honours 
 it with a most expensive sacred edifice. 
 His mother Helena fills the whole Ro- 
 man world with her munificent acts in 
 support of religion ; and after erecting 
 churches, and travelling from place to 
 place to evidence her zeal, dies before her 
 son, aged eighty years. Nor is the Chris- 
 tian cause neglected even out of the bounds 
 of the Roman empire. Constantine zeal- 
 ously pleads, in a letter to Sapor king of 
 Persia, for the Christians of his domi- 
 nions : he destroys idol temples, prohibits 
 impious pagan rites, puts an end to the 
 savage fights of gladiators, stands up 
 with respectful silence to hear the sermon 
 of Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, the his- 
 torian ; furnishes him with the volumes 
 of the Scriptures for the use of the 
 
 churches, orders the observation of the 
 festivals of martyrs, has prayers and read- 
 ing of the Scripture at his court, dedicates 
 churches with great solemnity, makes 
 Christian orations himself, one of which 
 of a considerable length is preserved by 
 the historian his favourite bishop, directs 
 the sacred observation of the Lord's day, 
 to which he adds that of Friday also, the 
 day of Christ's crucifixion, and teaches 
 the soldiers of his army to pray by a short 
 form made for their use. 
 
 It may seem invidious to throw any 
 shade on this picture ; but though the 
 abolition of lewd, impious, and inliuman 
 customs must have been of great advan- 
 tage to society, and though the benefits 
 of Christianity, compared with paganism, 
 to the world, appear very strong by these 
 means; yet all this, if sound principle be 
 wanting, is but form and shadow. As it 
 was difficult to clear Origen of depreciat- 
 ing the divinity of Christ, so it is still 
 more difficult to exculpate Eusebius, 
 with whom he was a favourite author. 
 Not to anticipate what will more proper- 
 ly pass under examination hereafter, there 
 seems to have been both in Eusebius and 
 some of his friends, and probably in the 
 emperor himself, a disposition, of which 
 perhaps they were not conscious, to les- 
 sen the honours of the Son of God. In 
 his oration at the dedication of the church 
 at Tyre, he distinguishes between the 
 first and the second cause, and seems 
 very careful to give the supreme title ex- 
 clusively to the Father. His sermons 
 breathe little of Christianity, so far as I 
 have seen them. He largely assigns va- 
 rious causes for the coming of Christ into 
 the world, and though among these he 
 gives some place to the work of redemp- 
 tion and sacrifice for sin, he speaks of 
 them slightly, and as it were by the bye. 
 I have observed also, that, in one place 
 of his writings, he speaks in a very sub- 
 ordinate manner of the Holy Ghost, 
 though it must be confessed, he is so 
 rhetorical, and indistinct in his theologi- 
 cal discourses, that it is difficult to ex- 
 tract any determinate propositions from 
 his writings. 
 
 It was to be expected that great defec- 
 tiveness of doctrine would not fail to in- 
 fluence practice. External piety flour- 
 ished, monastic societies in particular 
 places were also growing; but faith, love, 
 heaveply-mindedness, appear very rare; 
 yet, among the poor and obscure Chris- 
 tians I hope there was far more godliness 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTINE. 
 
 275 
 
 than could be seen at courts, and amontr 
 bishops and persons of eminence. The 
 doctrine of real coaversion was very much 
 lost, or external baptism was placed in 
 its stead; and the true doctrine of justifi- 
 cation by faith, and the true practical use 
 of a crucified Saviour for troubled con- 
 sciences, were scarcely to be seen at this 
 time. There was much outward religion, 
 but this could not make men saints in 
 heart and life. The worst part of the 
 character of Constantine is, that as he 
 grew older, he grew more culpable, op- 
 pressive in his own family, oppressive 
 to the government, oppressive by east- 
 em superfluous magnificence; and the 
 facts to be displayed will show, how lit- 
 tle true humility and charity were now 
 known in the Christian world, while su- 
 perstition and self-righteousness were 
 making vigorous shoots, and the real Gos 
 pel of "Christ was hidden from men who 
 . professed it. 
 
 The schism of the Donatists, as its 
 history throws some light on the manners 
 of Christians, will deserve a few words 
 ■p. . , in this place. During the ces- 
 sation 01 the persecution in 
 the West, while it raged still in the East, 
 on the death of Mensurius bishop of Car- 
 thage, a council of neighbouring bishops 
 was called for the appointment of his suc- 
 cessor. The council was thinner than had 
 been usual, through the management of 
 Botrus and Celesius, two persons who 
 aspired to the office, whose ambition was 
 however disappointed, the election fall- 
 intr on Ccecilian the deacon. All that 
 was essential in the appointment of a 
 bishop was observed in this transaction ; 
 for Cfficilian had confessedly the suffrage 
 of the whole church. The two disap- 
 pointed persons protested against the elec- 
 tion, and were joined by Lucilla, a rich 
 lady, who for a long time before had 
 been too haughty to submit to discipline. 
 One Donatus of Casae nigras, who had 
 been a schismatic before this time, offer- 
 ed himself as the chief of the faction. 
 A number of bishops co-operated with 
 him, piqued that they had not been call- 
 ed to the ordination of Ca;cilian. Seven- 
 ty bishops, a number of whom had been 
 traditors,* met thus together at Carthage, 
 to depose Caecilian. 
 
 The reader will conceive in a strong 
 
 light, how corrupt the pastors of the Afri- 
 can church must have been at that time, 
 when such a number met to impose a 
 bisliop on the church of Carthage against 
 
 * A name of infamy given to those wlio to 
 save their lives in the persepution, had ileliver- 
 ed the Scriptures or goods of the thurch to 
 the persecuting powers. 
 
 the general sense of the Christians at 
 that place, and were at the same time un- 
 able to object any one crime, or support 
 the least material accusation against the 
 pastor, who had the hearts of the people. 
 Yet they persevered, and ordained one 
 Majorinus, a servant of the factious lady, 
 who, to support the ordination, gave large 
 sums of money, which the bishops divided 
 among themselves. 
 
 Such is the origin of the famous Dona- 
 tist schism, the second class of dissenters 
 who have appeared in the records of the 
 Church; but, as in their origin, so in 
 their manners and spirit all along, they 
 seem unworthy to be compared with the 
 first class, the Novatian, which still ex- 
 isted. With these a degree of real spi- 
 rituality existed ; whereas with the Dona- 
 tist, there does not appear to have been 
 any.* 
 
 It would be tedious to enter into a de- 
 tail of Constantine's proceedings in re- 
 gard to this sect. Undoubtedly he had a 
 great respect for whatever he conceived 
 to be Christian. With much candour 
 and patience he examined and re-examin- 
 ed the case of the Donatists ; and the 
 issue was constantly to their disgrace. 
 They stirred up magistrates to deprive 
 the Christian pastors of the benefit of the 
 imperial laws, by which they were ex- 
 empted from public offices, and endea- 
 voured to deprive them of their churches, 
 till the emperor was at last provoked to 
 confiscate the places of their assemblies. 
 Sylvanus, one of the Donatist bishops, 
 being convicted of having delivered up 
 the vessels of the church, and of being 
 simoniacall}'^ ordained a bishop, and of 
 hviving deprived the Christians of their 
 church, was sent into banishment, with 
 some others of the faction. Yet such 
 was the kindness of Constantine toward 
 the Christian name, that he recalled them 
 from their banishment, and granted re- 
 ligious toleration to the party, of which 
 lenity they continued to make an unwor- 
 thy use. 
 
 How corrupt is human nature ! The 
 Church has outward peace, and even 
 prosperity. Yet feuds, contentions, and 
 the most unworthy spirit of avarice and 
 ambition, appear very prevalent. So un- 
 
 * Fleury, B. IX. 
 
276 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 grateful were men for that admirable ad- 
 ministration of Providence, which as we 
 have seen now took place in their favour. 
 Another scourge seemed quickly necessa- 
 ry, a scourge generated from their own 
 vices indeed, though evidently of divine 
 appointment for the chastisement of the 
 Church. wSatan saw his time ; pure doc- 
 trinal truth was now too commonly mere 
 speculation. Men were ripe for a per- 
 version of doctrine. Lower or ambigu- 
 ous views of Christ were secretly rising 
 amidst the platonic studies of learned 
 men. Origen gave the first handle; Eu- 
 sebius the historian with cautious pru- 
 dence was fomenting the evil. And at 
 length a bold and open assault was made 
 against the Deity of the Son of God, and 
 persecution was stirred up against Chris- 
 tians by those who bore the Christian 
 name. The people of God were exercis- 
 ed, refined, and improved ; while the 
 Christian world at large was torn in 
 pieces with violence, intrigue, and scan- 
 dalous animosities, to the grief of all who 
 loved the Son of God, and walked in his 
 ways in godly simplicity. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE PROGRESS OF THE ARTAN CONTRO 
 VERSY, TILL THE DEATH OF CONSTAN- 
 TINE.* 
 
 Peter, bishop of Alexandria, had suf- 
 fered martyrdom under the Dioclesian 
 persecution. Numbers had recanted at 
 that time to save their lives, and among 
 the rest Meletius, an Egj^ptian bishop. 
 This man was of a schismatical and en- 
 terprising spirit, and having been deposed 
 by Peter before his martyrdom, he sepa- 
 rated himself, continued bishop on his 
 own plan, ordained others, and gave rise 
 to the third species of Dissenters : Til AT 
 is the proper name of the Meletian party; 
 for they are not charged with corruption 
 in their doctrine. Nor was this the only 
 person who disturbed the Church, and 
 exercised the patience of Peter. Arius of 
 Alexandria, in his beginnings, was a pro- 
 mising character, but on the appearance 
 of the Meletian party, he espoused their 
 cause. Some time after, he left it, and re- 
 conciled himself to Peter, and was by 
 him ordained deacon : but condemning 
 
 * Socrates, 1. 6. 
 
 the bishop's severity in rejecting the Me- 
 letian baptism, and exhibiting a restless 
 and factious spirit, he was again expelled 
 from the Church. After which Peter was 
 called to his rest by martyrdom. He was, 
 like Cyprian, too severe in rejecting the 
 baptism of schismatics and heretics, but 
 his zeal was doubtless from a desire of 
 preserving the uniformity of Christian 
 faith, and he did not live to see still 
 stronger proofs of that turbulent and con- 
 tentious spirit in his deacon, which has 
 rendered the name of Arius so famous in 
 history. 
 
 Achillas had succeeded to the bishop- 
 ric : and from him Arius, by submissions, 
 again obtained favour. Understanding 
 and capacity will command 
 
 respect, and these were un- „f . • ,„ 
 1 r 11 1 1 » • 01 Anus, 
 
 doubtedly possessed by Anus 
 
 in a great degree. He was by nature 
 formed to deceive. In his behaviour and 
 manner of life he was severe and grave; . 
 in his person tall and venerable; and in 
 his dress almost monastic. He was 
 agreeable and captivating in conversa- 
 tion, and well skilled in logic and all the 
 improvements of the human mind, then 
 fashionable in the world.* 
 
 Such was the famous Arius, who gave 
 name to one of the most powerful here- 
 sies which ever afflicted the Church of 
 Christ, and of whom Cicero's words, 
 with little variation, in his masterly cha- 
 racter of Catiline, I might be delivered ; 
 " had he not possessed some apparent 
 virtues, he would not have been able to 
 form so great a design, nor to have proved 
 so formidable an adversary." He, who 
 does much mischief in deceiving souls, 
 must at least have a fair appearance of 
 morals. Paul cf Samosata wanted this, 
 and he glittered only as the insect of a 
 day. 
 
 Achillas advanced Arius to the office 
 of presbyter, which in that church was 
 more important than in others, because 
 each presbyter had a distinct congrega- 
 tion of his own. and was not sent up and 
 down to different churches, at the discre- 
 tion of the bishop, as the general practice 
 had been in the primitive Church. This 
 practice, however, in time gave way to 
 the Alexandrian custom. Alexander, the 
 
 * Sozomen, B. 15. 
 
 t See Ills Oration pro Cselio. — Neque un- 
 quam ex illo tarn sceleratus impetus exlitisset, 
 nisi tot vitiorum tanta inimanitas quibusdam 
 facilitatis et patienliee radicibus niteretur. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTINE. 
 
 277 
 
 successor of Achillas, under Constantine, 
 treated Arius with respect, and appear- 
 ed very backward to censure hiin for 
 his dangerous speculations in religion. 
 The pride of reasoning seduced the pres- 
 byter to assert,* that there was a time 
 when the Son of God was not, that he 
 was capable of virtue or of vice, and that 
 he was a creature, and mutable as crea- 
 tures are. Whilst he was insinuating 
 these things, the easiness of Alexander 
 in tolerating such notions was found 
 fault with in the church. Necessity 
 roused him at length, however unwilling,. 
 to contend, and in disputing before Arius 
 and the rest of his clergy,f he affirmed 
 that there was an union in the Trinit3^ 
 Arius thinking that the bishop introduced 
 Sabellianism, eagerly maintained the ex- 
 treme which is opposite to that heresy, 
 and said, " if the Father begat the Son, 
 the begotten had a beginning of exist- 
 ence ; hence it was evident there was a 
 time when he was not." 
 
 I have given the narration from the 
 two historians rather with a view to con- 
 nect and reconcile them, than from a con- 
 viction that this dispute arose from Alex- 
 ander's zeal to withstand the growth of 
 Arianism. For it might have originated 
 from his orthodox zeal in general, before 
 Arius had yet distinctly broached his no- 
 tions. Be that as it maj% Arius evidently 
 split on the common rock of all heresies, 
 a desire of explaining by our reason the 
 modes of things which we are required to 
 believe on divine testimony alone. ^lany 
 of the clergy joined the disputatious pres- 
 byter, and it was no longer in Alexan- 
 der's power to prevent a solemn cog- 
 nizance of the cause. He was himself 
 cautious and slow in his proceedings;^ 
 while many persons of a grave cast, and 
 able and eloquent, like Arius, espoused 
 and fostered the infant heresy. Arius 
 preached diligently at his church, dif- 
 fused his opinions in all companies, and 
 gained over many of the common people ; 
 a number of women who had professed 
 virginity espoused his cause; and Alex- 
 ander saw the ancient doctrine of the 
 Church undermined continually. § Le- 
 nient measures and argumentative me- 
 thods having been tried in vain, he sum- 
 moned a synod of bishops, who met at 
 
 * Sozomen, B. I. c. 15. f Socrates, 1. 5. 
 t Sozomen, I. 5. 
 
 § TI.eod. B. I. c. 2. See Cave's Life of 
 Athanasius. 
 
 Vol. L 2 a 
 
 Alexandria, condemned Arius's doctrine, 
 and expelled him from the Church, with 
 nine of his adherents. 
 
 What Arius really held may be dis- 
 tinctl}^ stated from the concurrent testi- 
 mony of friends and enemies. Already 
 some secret and ambiguous . . 
 attempts had been made to ^.V,'""'/™ 
 lessen t.he idea oi the divinity 
 of the Son of God. While his eternity 
 was admitted by Etisebius the historian, 
 he yet was not willing to own him co- 
 equal with the Father. Arius w'ent greater 
 lengths : he said, That the Son proceeded 
 out of a state of non-existence; that he 
 was not before he was made; that he, 
 who is without beginning, has set his 
 Son as the beginning of things that are 
 made, and that God made one, whom he 
 called Word, Son, and Wisdom, by whom 
 he did create us. From these, and such 
 like expressions, it is evident what Arian- 
 ism properly is : for the epistle of Ariu3 
 himself,* preserved by Theodoret, repre- 
 sents his views in the same manner as 
 his adversaries have done, and proves 
 that no injustice was done to him in this 
 respect.-j- 
 
 * Thfod. B. I. c. 5. 
 
 f I sh:tll give the reader the epistle at 
 k-iigth, that lie may judge for liimseli, ihough 
 some parts of it are of no consequence with 
 respect to ilie controversy. I believe it is the 
 oidy fragment we have of his wi'itings, and it 
 IS therefore liie most authentic of all records, 
 to decide tlje question, what Arianism is. 
 
 The Epistle of ^in'us to Kusebhis, Bishop of 
 JYicomedia. 
 
 "To my most desirable lord, the faithful 
 man of God, the orthodox Eusebins, Arius per- 
 secuted by father Alexander unjustlv, for the 
 sake of truti], wliich conquers all tilings, of 
 which you are tlie defender; joy in the Lord! 
 -My father Ammonius coming to Nicomedia, 
 it appeared to me my duly to address you 
 by him, and at the same time to inform your 
 rooted charity and kind disposition, which you 
 have towards tlie brethren, for the sake of God 
 and his Christ, that the bishop harasses and 
 persecutes us greatly, and moves every ma- 
 chine against us, so as even to expel us from 
 the city as Atheists, because we agree not with 
 bim who pid)Iicly says, 'always God, always 
 the .Son : at the same time the Father, at the 
 same time the Son : the Son co-exists with 
 God without being begotten : he is always be- 
 gotten, yet unbegotteii : God does not [^recede 
 the Son in thought, not for a moment : always 
 God, always the Son : tiie Son exists from God 
 himself.' And when Eusebius your brother 
 in Cxsarea, andXheodotus, and Paulinus, and 
 
278 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHUKCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 It is an easy thing to say here, that si- 
 lence and charity would have been the 
 best means of preserving peace on all 
 sides : but then this mode of speaking 
 supposes that the controversy was frivo- 
 lous. No real Christian can think it un- 
 important, whether his Saviour be be- 
 lieved to be the Creator or a creature. 
 The soul is of too great consequence for 
 men to hazard its salvation on they know 
 not what. And it then appeared to all 
 humble and charitable Christians, that to 
 persist in blaspheming God, was at least 
 as practical an evil as to persist in drunk- 
 enness and theft. All these found them- 
 selves obliged to join with Alexander 
 against Arius. Silence was a vice in this 
 case ; though it can never be enough la- 
 mented how little care was taken of hu- 
 mility and charity, of both which the ex- 
 ercise is perfectly consistent with the sin- 
 cere zeal for the doctrine of the Trinity ; 
 but true religion itself was low ; the face 
 of the Church was " sullied and disho- 
 noured, yet still divine." And amidst the 
 numbers who, from fashion, prejudice, or 
 worse motives, joined with the Alexan- 
 drian bishop, we must look for those, 
 though they are hard to be found, who 
 feared God, and whose history alone is 
 the subject before us. The principles of 
 Arius exclude him and his followers, and 
 by the fullest light of antiquity their ac- 
 
 Athanasius,* and Gregory, and Aetius, and 
 all the bishops in the East, said, that God who 
 had no beginning, existed before the Son, they 
 were condemned, excejjt only Philogonius, 
 and Ellanicus, and Macarius, heretical un- 
 learned men, some of whom call the Son an 
 eructation, others a projection, others begot- 
 ten together with him. We cannot bear to 
 hear these impieties, though the heretics 
 should threaten us with ten thousand deaths. 
 But what we say and think, we have both 
 tau;,dit and do teach ; That the Son is not un- 
 begolten, noi- a part of the unbegotten, by any 
 means, nor of any suijject matter ; but that by 
 ■will and counsel he existed before the times 
 and the ages, full God, only begotten, not 
 mixed with any thing heterogeneous, and be- 
 fore he was begotten, or created, or defined, 
 or founded, he was not ; for he was not un- 
 begotten. We are persecuted because we say 
 
 THE SON HATH A BKGINNING ; but God is with- 
 out beginning. For this we are persecuted, 
 and because we say, that the Son is from non- 
 r.TcisTKXci;, and thus we said, because he is 
 not part of God, nor of any subject matter : 
 tor this we are persecuted ; the rest you know. 
 I pray that you may be strong in the Lord, — 
 remembering our afflictions." 
 
 * Not the famous Athanasius. 
 
 tions also exclude them from being num- 
 bered among the sound, faithful, intelli- 
 ofent followers of Jesus. 
 
 The Christian world now became the 
 scene of animosity and contention. The 
 orthodox and heretical did each their ut- 
 most to support their several pretensions : 
 practical religion was too much forgotten 
 by both sides ; and the former, from the 
 want, or at least from the very low state 
 of experimental religion, were deprived 
 of the very best method of supporting 
 the truth, by showing its necessary con- 
 nexion with the foundation of true piety 
 and virtue. The* Gentiles beheld the 
 contest and triumphed ; and on their thea- 
 tres they ridiculed the contentions of 
 Christians, to which their long and griev- 
 ous provocations of their God had justly 
 exposed them. Alexander repeatedly, in 
 letters and appeals, maintained his cause, 
 and so far as speculative argumentation 
 can do it, he proved his point from the 
 Scriptures ; while Arius strengthened 
 himself by forining alliances with various 
 bishops, and particularly with Eusebius 
 of Nicomedia,f who supported Arianism 
 with all his might. He had been trans- 
 lated from Berytus in Syria, and by living 
 in the metropolis (for there Constantine 
 resided much) he had an opportunity of 
 ingratiating himself with the emperor. 
 Near a hundred bishops in a second 
 synod at Alexandria condemned Arius, 
 who was now obliged to quit that place, 
 and try to gain supporters in other parts 
 of the empire. 
 
 In the year 324, Constantine being at 
 Nicomedia, and intending to make a far- 
 ther progress into the East, was prevent- 
 ed by the news of these contentions. So 
 important were Christian affairs now 
 grov/n, at a time when it is with difficul- 
 ty we can find any eminent spirit of ge- 
 nuine piety. The emperor sincerely strove 
 to make up the breach ; for his regard for 
 Christianity in general was doubtless 
 sincere ; but it is not in ecclesiastical 
 proceedings that we can discover any 
 trace of that penetration and discernment 
 for which in civil story he is so justly 
 renowned. He Avrote both to Alexander 
 and Arius, blamed both, expressed his 
 desire for their agreement, and explained 
 nothing. He sent the letter by Hosius 
 
 * I use the language of the times, in calling 
 the Pagan world Gentiles. 
 
 f He must not be confounded with Eusebius 
 of Csesarea, the historian. 
 
CONSTANTINE. 
 
 Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 bishop of Corduba, one whose faith and 
 piety had been distinguished in the late 
 persecutions. Hosius endeavoured to 
 make up the breach ; but it was impossi- 
 ble. The two parties were formed, and 
 were determined ; worldly motives were 
 too predominant in both to admitof an 
 easy compromise ; and it was not in the 
 power of those who loved both truth and 
 peace, to sacrifice the former to the latter, 
 consistently with a good conscience, how- 
 ever sincerely desirous they must have 
 been of promoting both. For the object 
 of contention was not a trifle, but a fun- 
 damental in religion. 
 
 Constantine now took the resolution of 
 summoning the aid of the whole Chris- 
 tian Church; and the Nicene Council 
 calls for our attention. 
 
 The bishops, collected from all parts 
 of the Christian world, met at Nice in 
 Bithynia: and their number, according 
 to the account of Athanasius, who was 
 present, amounted to three hundred and 
 eighteen. Of these, if we may believe 
 Philostorgius the Arian historian, twenty- 
 two espoused the cause of Arius ; others 
 make the minority still less. Be that as I 
 it may, since many presbyters were there 
 besides the bishops, it is not probable 
 that the whole number of persons assem- 
 bled in the council was less than six hun- 
 dred. 
 
 They met in the year 3-25, being trans- 
 ported to Nice in public con- 
 veyances at the emperor's ex- 
 pense, and maintained at his 
 cost, while they resided there, 
 the immediate business of the 
 
 279 
 
 Nicene 
 Council, 
 
 A. D, 325. 
 Before 
 
 synod was entered upon, their attention 
 was engaged by the attempts of some 
 Gentile philosophers, who appeared 
 among them ; some with a design to sa- 
 tisfy their curiosity concerning Christi- 
 anity itself, others wishing to involve the 
 Christians in a cloud of verbal subtilties, 
 and to enjoy the mutual contradictions of 
 the followers of Christ. One of them 
 distinguished himself above the rest by 
 the pomp and arrogancy of his preten- 
 sions, and derided the clergy as ignorant 
 and illiterate. On this occasion an old 
 Christian, who had suffered with magna- 
 nimous constancy, during the late perse- 
 cutions, though unacquainted with logical 
 forms, undertook to contend with the 
 philosopher. Those who were more 
 earnest to gratify curiosity than to inves- 
 tigate truth, endeavoured to raise a laugh 
 at the old man's expense; while serious I 
 
 spirits were distressed to see a contest 
 apparently so unequal. Respect for the 
 man, however, induced them to permit 
 him to engage ; and he immediately ad- 
 dressed the ''philosopher in these terms: 
 " Hear, philosopher, says he, in the name 
 of .Tesus Christ. There is one God, the 
 Maker of heaven and earth, and of all 
 things visible and invisible, who made 
 all these things by the power of his 
 Word, and confirmed tliem by the holi- 
 ness of his Spirit. This Word, whom 
 we call the Son of God, compassionating 
 the sons of men involved in error and 
 wickedness, chose to be born of a wo- 
 man, to converse with men, and to die 
 for them ; and he will come again as the 
 Judge of all things which men have done 
 in the body. That these things are so, 
 we believe in simplicity : do not then la- 
 bour in vain, investigating the manner in 
 which these things may or may not be, 
 and seeking to confute things which ought 
 to be received by faith ; but if thou be- 
 lievest, answer me, now that I ask thee." 
 Struck with this plain authoritative ad- 
 dress, the philosopher said, "I do be- 
 lieve;" with pleasure owned himself 
 vanquished, confessed that he embraced 
 the same sentiments with the old man, 
 and advised the other philosophers to do 
 the same, swearing that he was changed 
 by a divine influence, and moved by an 
 energy which he could not explain.* 
 
 Men will draw their conclusions from 
 this story, according to their different 
 tastes and views. A self-suihcient rea- 
 soner will despise the instruction it con- 
 tains ; but he who thinks with St. Paul, 
 will consider the whole story as no mean 
 comment on his words, that your " faith 
 should not stand in the wisdom of men, 
 but in the power of God;" nor will he 
 much regard the prudence of those who 
 labour to accommodate Christian ideas to 
 the spirit of unbelievers, by which they 
 only weaken themselves, and abate not 
 in the least the enmity of their opposers. 
 They will think it better to go forth in 
 simple dependence on God, trusting that 
 he will bless his own word with victo- 
 rious energy. Such know that even in 
 our own tunes, there want no instances 
 of conversions of a similar kind ; and 
 those who are still disposed to object, 
 should at least be told, that the story has 
 all the proper marks of historical credi- 
 bility, whatever inferences they may be 
 pleased to draw from it. 
 
 * Sozomen, B. I. c. 18. 
 
280 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 I fear we shall not find in the transac- 
 tions of the whole Nicene council so in- 
 structing a narrative. The emperor him- 
 self came to the synod, and exhorted 
 them to peace and unanimity. A number 
 of mutual accusations having been pre- 
 sented to him, he threw ihem all into the 
 fire, protesting that he had not read one 
 of them, and charged them to forbear, 
 and forgive one another. After this very 
 candid and generous procedure, he gave 
 them leave to enter directly on the busi- 
 ness of the synod. They canvassed the 
 doctrine of Arius, extracted his proposi- 
 tions out of his own writings, and argued 
 the subject with great vehemence ; Con- 
 stantine himself acting as moderator, and 
 endeavouring- to bring them to perfect 
 agreement. But it soon fippeared, that 
 witliout some explanatorj^ terms, deci- 
 sively pointing out what the Scriptures 
 had revealed, it was impossible to guard 
 against the subtilties of the Arians. Did 
 the Trinitarians assert that Christ was 
 God ? the Arians allowed it, but in the 
 same sense as holy men and angels are 
 styled gods in Scripture. Did they affirm 
 that he was truly God ? the others allow- 
 ed, that he was made so by God. Did 
 they affirm that the Son was naturally of 
 God ? it was granted ; for even we, said 
 they, are of God, of whom are all things. 
 Was it aflirmed, that the Son was the 
 power, wisdom, and image of the Fa- 
 ther? we admit it, replied the others, for 
 we also are said to be the image and glory 
 of God. Such is the account* Avhich 
 Athanasius gives of the disputations. He 
 was at that time deacon of the church of 
 Alexandria, and supported his bishop 
 with so much accuracy and strength of 
 argument, as to lay the foundation of that 
 fame, which he afterwards aci]uired by 
 his zeal in this controversy. What could 
 the Trinitarians do in this situation 1 to 
 leave the matter undecided, was to do 
 nothing ; to confine themselves merely to 
 Scripture terms, was to suffer the Arians 
 to explain the doctrine in their own way, 
 and to reply nothing. Undoubtedly they 
 had a right to comment according to their 
 own judgment, as well as the Arians; 
 and lliey did so in the following manner. 
 They collected together the passages of 
 Scripture, which represent the Divinity 
 of the Son of God, and observed that 
 taken together they amounted to a proof 
 of his being of the same substance with 
 
 See Cave's Life of Athanasius. 
 
 THE FATHER, ojuoao-io;. That crcatures 
 were indeed said to be of God, because, 
 not existing of themselves, ttiey had their 
 beginning from him ; but that the Son 
 was peculiarly of the Father, being of 
 his substance, as begotten of him. 
 
 It behooves every one who is desirous 
 of knowing simply the mind of God from 
 his own word, to determine for himself, 
 how far their interpretation of Scripture 
 was true. The Council however was, 
 by the majority before stated, convinced, 
 that this was a fair explanation, and that 
 the Arian use of the terms, God, true 
 God, and the like, was a mere deception, 
 because they aflixed to them ideas, which 
 the Scriptures would by no means admit. 
 So the most pious Christians have thought 
 in all ages since. But to censure the 
 council for introducing a new term, when 
 all that was meant by it was to express 
 their interpretation of the Scriptures, ap- 
 pears unreasonable to the last degree, 
 however fashionable. To say that they 
 ought to have confined themselves to the 
 very words of Scripture, when the Arians 
 had first introduced their own gloss, 
 seems much the same, as to say that 
 the Trinitarians had not the same right 
 with the Arians to express their own in- 
 terpretation of Scripture, and in their own 
 lanouaore. 
 
 The great patron of the Arians was 
 Eusebius of Nicomedia, who wrote a let- 
 ter to the council, in which he found fault 
 with the idea of the Son of God being un- 
 created. The whole Arian party present- 
 ed also their confession of faith. Both 
 that and the letter of Eusebius were con- 
 demned as heretical. The venerable Ho- 
 sius of Corduba was appointed to draw 
 up a creed, which is in the main the 
 same that is called the Nicene Creed to 
 this day. It soon received the sanction 
 of the Council, and of Constantine him- 
 self, who declared, that whoever refused 
 to comply with the decree, should be 
 banished. Eusebius of Ca;sarea, the his- 
 torian, expressed for some time his doubts 
 concerning the term consubstantial. He 
 observed, in a letter which he wrote on this 
 occasion to his church, that all the mis- 
 chief had arisen from the use of unscrip- 
 tural terms, and that he at last subscribed 
 to the term for the sake of peace. It would 
 undoubtedly be unjust to accuse this great 
 man of Arianism. Yet why was he so 
 much disposed to favour Arius, by writ- 
 ing to Alexander, as if he had been 
 wronged? why so disposed to join after- 
 
Cejtt. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTINE. 
 
 281 
 
 wadrs, as we shall see, against Athana- 
 sius? The truth is, he seems to have 
 held a middle notion, that the Son of 
 God was from eternity, but v/as not Je- 
 hovah; the very same notion, if I mistake 
 not, which was revived by the famous 
 Dr. Clark, explained in his Scripture doc- 
 trine of the Trinity, and I think very 
 solidly confuted by Dr. Waterland, in 
 his reply.* 
 
 From the opinion of Eusebius thus as- 
 certained, one may form an idea of Con- 
 stantine's creed, if indeed he had any 
 distinct one in his mind. Undoubtedly 
 Eusebius was his great favourite, and 
 moulded his imperial disciple as he pleas- 
 ed. But let his opinions have been what 
 they may, he seems not to have been 
 very zealous for any thing, except peace 
 and uniformity.' Never was a council 
 more free from political impediments. 
 The bishops undoubtedly spake their sen- 
 timents without reserve in general : And 
 Constantine was disposed to give his 
 sanction to any creed, to which the ma- 
 jority should agree. We have here then 
 the testimony of nearly the whole Chris- 
 tian worldf in favour of the doctrine of 
 the proper Deity of the Son of God, a 
 testimony free, unbiassed, and unrestrain- 
 ed. How can this be accounted for but 
 hence, that they followed the plain sense 
 of Scripture, and of the Church in pre- 
 ceding ages 1 As to the connexion be- 
 tween church and state, and the proprie- 
 ty of civil penalties in matters of religion, 
 I may find a more proper place to dwell 
 upon those subjects hereafter. 
 
 Arius was deposed, excommunicated, 
 and forbidden to enter Alexandria. The 
 minority at first refused to subscribe, but 
 being advised to yield at length by Con- 
 
 * That is what is commonly called high 
 Ariauisra, and secretly grows among us ; the 
 more so, because not distinctly understood, 
 and because it is consistent with some sort ot' 
 Trinitarian doctrine. It is doubtless the most 
 specious of all heresies. But two questions its 
 defenders seem incapable of answering: 1. 
 Why Christ is so often called Jehovah, the 
 self-existent God, in Scripture? 2. How they 
 can clear themselves of tiie charge of holding 
 more Gods than one ? 
 
 f Not a few of the Nicene fathers bore on 
 their bodies the marks of the Lord Jesus. 
 Paul, bishop of Neocsesarea at the banks of 
 J],uphrates,had been debilitated by the applica- 
 tion of hot iron to both his hands: others ap- 
 peared there deprived of their right eyes, 
 others deprived of their legs. A crowd of 
 raartjTS in truth were seen collected into one 
 body. — Theodoret, B. I. c. 7. 
 2a2 
 
 stantia their patroness, the a„:„„ 
 , . • , Anus 
 
 emperor s sister, they con- deposed. 
 
 sented. But by the insertion 
 of a single letter they reserved to them- 
 selves their own sense, subscribing, not 
 that the Son is the same, but only of like 
 essence with the Father.* Honesty is 
 however always respectable. Out of 
 twenty-two Arian bishops, two were found 
 who persisted in refusing; Secundus of 
 Ptolemais, and Theonas of Mannarica : 
 the former of whom bluntly rebuked the 
 courtly Eusebius of Nicomedia for his 
 dissimulation. Arius and his associates 
 were banished into lUyricum. 
 
 The INIeletian controversy was also set- 
 tled. Meletius was permitted to live in 
 his own city, with the title of bishop, but 
 without authority. His sect was indulg- 
 ed in some degree, and continued a long 
 time after in the church. The dispute 
 concerning Easter was likewise finally 
 adjusted in this council. 
 
 The canons appointed by this famous 
 council will deserve a remark or two, as 
 at least they may give us some idea of 
 the state and spirit of Christian religion 
 at that time. 
 
 One of them forbids clergymen to 
 make themselves eunuchs; which shows 
 that there n-ere then instances of the 
 same misguided zeal, which Origen in 
 early life had exhibited. Another for- 
 bids the ordination of new converts, and 
 supports itself by that well-known canon 
 of still higher authority ; " Not a Novice, 
 lest being lifted up wnth pride, he fall 
 into the condemnation of the devil." A 
 third provides for the chastity of the cler- 
 gy. The council were even proceeding 
 to restrain those of them who had wives 
 from cohabiting with them, after their 
 ordination; but were checked by Paph- 
 nutius, a bishop of Thebais, who 4iad 
 lost an eye during the late persecutions. 
 He had himself been brought up in a mo- 
 nastery from his childhood, and was re- 
 nowned for the purity of his manners. 
 He observed that it was sufficient for a man 
 once ordained to be prohibited to marry, 
 but that he ought not to be separated from 
 the wife whom he had married when a 
 layman. The authority of a person so 
 eminent in sanctity was decisive; and 
 this species of superstition, which had 
 
 *Notof<o8(ri=s,but ;//i.K-r>5,-. It is remarkable, 
 that this duplicity of theirs is recorded by 
 Philostorgius the Arian historian. — See Cave's 
 Life of Atiianasius. 
 
283 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 already made considerable advances, was 
 stopped for the present in its career. 
 Moreover some care was taken in this 
 council against the progress of covetous- 
 ness in the clergy, by the prohibition of 
 the practice of usury. Translations also 
 either of bishops, priests, or deacons, 
 from one city to another, were forbidden. 
 Eusebius of Nicomedia had been remov- 
 ed from Berytas, and the abuse began to 
 grow into a custom. In all these cases, 
 a desire of preserving purity of manners 
 in the Church, though not in all points 
 regulated with discretion, is observable. 
 The same remark may be extended to 
 another canon, which regulates the re- 
 ception of penitent apostates, by direct- 
 ing that they shall continue three years 
 among the auditors, and shall prostrate 
 themselves seven years. A distinction 
 also is made between those, who evinced 
 by good works the sincerity of repentance, 
 and those who appeared indiiferent, and 
 were merely formal in compliance with 
 the rules of the church. And greater 
 rigour of penance is prescribed to the 
 latter.* 
 
 These things show that the fear of God 
 was by no means extinct. Discipline, 
 which had been relaxed toward the close 
 of the last century, was revived, and the 
 predominant spirit of superstition carried 
 it, as formerly, into too great an extreme. 
 Our age, which has lost almost all dis- 
 cipline in church affairs, can scarcely ap- 
 preciate aright the merit of these rules, 
 on account of the strength of its preju- 
 dices against all restraints. 
 
 Liberty was allowed to the Novatians 
 also to return to the communion of the 
 general church, nor was it insisted on, 
 that they should be re-baptized, since 
 they held nothing contrary to the funda- 
 mentals of godliness. With respect to 
 the followers of Paul of vSamosata, called 
 Paulianists, some of whom still subsist- 
 ed, it was required, that if they were ad- 
 mitted again into the church, they should 
 be rebaptized, because they did not bap- 
 tize in the name of the Father, the Son, 
 and the Holy Ghost. So accurately did 
 ' they distinguish between a heretic and a 
 schismatic, between essentials and cir- 
 cmnstantials. Apostolic discernment and 
 piety, in no contemptible degree, ani- 
 mated the spirits of the Nicene fathers, 
 notwithstanding the decline of piety from 
 the primitive times. Constantine, zeal 
 
 ous for a pacific uniformity, had invited 
 Acesius, a Novatian bishop, to the coun- 
 cil, and asked him whether he assented 
 to the decrees concerning the faith, and 
 the observation of Easter. The council, 
 says he, has decreed nothing new con- 
 cerning these things. So I have always 
 understood the church has received, even 
 from the times of the Apostles. Why 
 then, says the emperor, do you separate 
 yourself from our communion'? Because, 
 replied Acesius, we think that to aposta- 
 tize is the " sin unto death," and that 
 those who are guilty of it ought never to 
 be restored to the communion of the 
 Church, though they are to be invited to 
 repentance, and to be left to God, who 
 alone has the power of forgiving sins. 
 Constantine, who saw that his views 
 were impracticably severe, said, " Set up 
 a ladder, Acesius, and climb up to heaven 
 by yourself." 
 
 Socrates* tells us, that he had this 
 from a very credible old person, who had 
 seen these things done in the council. 
 He means most probably the Novatian 
 dissenter; with whom he was intimately 
 acquainted. Candour and moderation ap- 
 pear very visible in Socrates as an histo- 
 rian, and render him as credible a writer 
 as any guide of those times. On this very 
 respectable evidence then it is manifest, 
 that a Novatian bishop, whose passions 
 could no way be heated by the internal 
 contentions of the general Church, be- 
 lieved the common doctrine of the Tri- 
 nity, and believed that it had always 
 been common. The narrowness of the 
 Novatian principle of dissent prevented 
 not the soundness of his faith and the ge- 
 neral integrity of his mind. Nqr is there 
 any blemish laid to the charge of this 
 people, except excessive severity. And it 
 ought to be acknowledged to the honour 
 of Constantine and the Nicene fathers, 
 that while they exercised severity in civil 
 matters towards heretical members of 
 their own church, they allowed and con- 
 tinued the religious toleration of the No- 
 vatians in its full extent. But we have 
 suiely in this case an additional proof of 
 the antiquity of the Nicene faith. We 
 see in what light the matter appeared to 
 a plain honest man, who had no concern 
 in the commotions of the times, who had 
 nothing to obtain or to lose for himself in 
 the contest, whose character appears un- 
 sullied, and who most probably was a 
 
 Fleury, B. XI. 16. 
 
 * B, I. c. 10. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 CONSTAXTINE. 
 
 283 
 
 pious person. He has no doubt respect- 
 ing the common creed of the church, and 
 though a separist, he affirms that she had 
 always held the proper Divinity of Jesus 
 Christ. I do not find that the second set 
 of dissenters, the Donatists, were called 
 into this council. They continued still 
 in a tolerable state, but never seem to 
 have had any effusion of the Divine 
 Spirit among them. The third sort, the 
 Melelians, seemed likely to be broken up 
 by the death of their founder ; but as he 
 named to himself a successor, they con- 
 tinued still in a state of separation, thoriO-h 
 a number of them returned to the church. 
 Three months after the dissolution of 
 the synod, Eusebius of Nicomedia and 
 Theognis of Nice were banished, by the 
 emperor's command, for attempting still 
 to support the Arian cause. 
 
 Alexander dying five months after his 
 return home, had desired that Athanasius 
 might be appointed his successor. Alex- 
 andria in general joined in the 
 A P ' ° same request, which the mo- 
 jg,.' desty of Athanasius resisted 
 
 a considerable time. His in- 
 tegrity and his abilities however pointed 
 him out as a proper successor to the zea- 
 lous Alexander. And he was 
 Athana- ^^ j^^^ ordained, with the 
 
 strongest testimonies of ge- 
 neral satisfaction. He was 
 not then above twenty-eight years of age, 
 and he held the see fortj'-six years, and 
 for that time with little intermission was 
 exposed to persecution on account of his 
 zeal against Arianism : and it must be 
 owned, that constancy and firmness in a 
 cause were never better tried than his 
 were, through the whole course of this 
 period. 
 
 After the death of Helena, Constantine 
 showed particular kindness to Constantia 
 his sister, who was nmch led by a pres- 
 byter secretly in the Arian interest. They 
 persuaded her that Arius and his friends 
 were unjustly condemned. She on her 
 death-bed prevailed by her intreaties on 
 Constantine to do justice to these men. 
 The emperor, who seemed as much a 
 child in religious discernment as he was 
 a man in political sagacity, suffered him- 
 self to be imposed on by the ambiguous 
 craft of Arius and his friend Euzoius, so 
 as to write in their favour to the 
 Churches.* Eusebius also, and The- 
 ognis, by owning the Nicene faith in 
 
 sius suc- 
 ceeds him 
 
 * Sozomen, B. II. c. 27. 
 
 words, were restored to their sees.* The 
 former wrote to Athanasius, desirino-him 
 to receive Arius, now returned from ba- 
 nishment, to communion; but in vain. 
 Athanasius had principle, and could not 
 sport with subscriptions and bonds, as 
 his adversaries did. The Nicene creed 
 had still all the sanction which church 
 and state could give it. It was not at 
 that time possible by all the artifices of 
 ingenious and unprincipled men to per- 
 suade the Christian world, that the Scrip- 
 ture held what it did not, or that their 
 fathers had all along thought as Arius 
 did. Even the chiefs of Arianism had 
 been now restored, not as Arians, but as 
 men well afiected to the doctrine of the 
 Trinity. And they attempted by subtilty 
 and artifice to establish at length what 
 was impossible to be done by fair argu- 
 ment. Determined to ruin Athanasius, if 
 possible, they united themselves closely 
 with the Meletians, and infected them 
 with their heresy. They. procured the de- 
 position of Eustathius of Antioch, an elo- 
 quent and learned professor, who was, on 
 unjust pretences, banished from his see : 
 This person, before his departure, ex- 
 horted his flock to be steadfast in the 
 truth, and his words were of great weight 
 with that flourishing church. He and se- 
 veral priests and deacons were banished. 
 The good man bore the will of God with 
 meekness and patience, and died in exile 
 at Philippi. Eusebius of Csesarea and 
 Eustathius had opposed each other in 
 matters of doctrine. The vacant see was 
 now offered to the former, who prudently 
 declined it. Asclepas of Gaza, and Eu- 
 tropius of Adrianople, were driven also 
 from their sees. And thus while the 
 truth was supported in form, its friends 
 by a variety of artifices were persecuted, 
 and its enemies triumphed. A case not 
 uncommon in our own times ! Men void 
 of principle had every secular advantage, 
 while those who feared God, chose rather 
 to suffer than to sin. 
 
 Among these Athanasius himself was 
 eminently distinguished. To relate the 
 various turns and changes of his life, by 
 no means suits the design of this history : 
 yet some account is necessary, that the 
 reader may see by facts, what sort of 
 fruit was produced by Trinitarian, and 
 what by Arian principles. 
 
 The repeated attempts of the adversa- 
 ries of Athanasius at length so far pre- 
 
 • Sozomen, B. II. c. 16. 
 
284 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 vailed in prejudicing the mind of the em- 
 peror, that he ordered a synod to be con- 
 vened at Tyre, not to examine the princi- 
 ples of the bishop, which even his adver- 
 saries had been obliged to admit, but to 
 institute an inquiry, whether various 
 . crimes, with which he was 
 
 Council of charged, had been really com- 
 jjj)' 335 mitted. In the year 335, the 
 synod met under the direc- 
 tion of Eusebius of Caesarea, and some 
 other bishops ; before whom the bishop 
 of Alexandria, attended by certain Egyp- 
 tian bishops, was obliged to appear. 
 Here Potamo, bishop of Heraclea, who 
 had been in prison with Eusebius during 
 the Dioclesian persecution, enraged to 
 see the latter on the bench, rudely ad- 
 dressed him thus : " Must you, Eusebius, 
 sit on the bench, while the innocent 
 Athanasius stands to be judged at your 
 bar? Who can bear such proceedings? 
 Were not you in prison with me in the 
 time of the persecution ? I lost an eye in 
 defence of the truth; you have no wound 
 to show, but are both alive and whole. 
 How got you out of prison, unless you 
 promised to sacrifice, or actually did so?" 
 Eusebius rose up and dissolved the meet- 
 ing for that time, reproving him for his 
 insolence. History throws no light on 
 the subject of Potamo's aspersions; nor 
 does he seem to have had any proof to 
 support them. Nevertheless Eusebius, 
 who himself so much supported the ca- 
 lumnies vented against Athanasius, had 
 of all men the least right to complain. 
 He suffered the same things which he in- 
 liicted on others ; and Satan, having deep- 
 ly embroiled the passions of men, conti- 
 nued thus to irritate and to inflame the 
 Christian world. 
 
 The heaviest crimes were charged upon 
 Athanasius, rebellion, oppression, rape 
 and murder. But every thing appeared 
 to be the result of malice. One case alone 
 shall be mentioned, by which 
 a judgment may be formed of 
 all the rest. He was said to 
 have murdered Arscnius, a 
 Meletian bishop ; for proof of which the 
 accusers produced a box, out of which 
 they took a dead man's hand, dried and 
 salted, which they affirmed to be the hand 
 of Arsenius, and that it was preserved by 
 Athanasius for magical purposes. The 
 Meletians charged Arsenius to conceal 
 himself till they had effected their pur- 
 pose. The party of Eusebius of Nico- 
 medm spread the report through the 
 
 The story 
 of Arse- 
 
 nius. 
 
 Christian world, that Arsenius had been 
 privately murdered by the bishop of Alex- 
 andria, and Constantine himself, over- 
 come by incessant importunities, was in- 
 duced to order an inquiry to be made.* 
 
 Athanasius had learned by his own ex- 
 perience, that any accusation against him- 
 self, however improbable, was likely to 
 find numerous and powerful 
 supports. But Providence 4'^^°*" 
 
 wonderfully confuted this at- f "^ *^-^' , 
 ,-' . , . , lumniated. 
 
 tempt. Arsenius, notwith- 
 standing the directions of the accusers to 
 keep close, had privately conveyed him- 
 self to Tyre, intending to be secreted 
 there during the whole time of the synod. 
 It happened, that some servants belong- 
 ing to Archelaus the governor, heard a 
 rumour whispered, that Arsenius was in 
 town. This they immediately told their 
 master, who found him out, apprehended 
 him, and gave notice to Athanasius. The 
 Meletian tool, unwilling to blast his em- 
 ployers, and feeling the awkwardness of 
 his situation, at first denied himself to be 
 Arsenius. Happily, Paul the bishop of 
 Tyre, who knew the man, deprived him 
 of that refuge. The day of trial being" 
 come, the prosecutors boasted that they 
 should give ocular demonstration to the 
 court, of the guilt of Athanasius, and 
 produced the dead hand. A shout of vic- 
 tory rung through the synod. Silence 
 being made, Athanasius asked the judges, 
 if any of them knew Arsenius ? Several 
 affirming that they did, Athanasius di- 
 rects the man to be brought into the 
 court, and asks, Is this the man whom I 
 murdered, and whose hand I cut off? 
 Athanasius turns back the man's cloak, 
 and shows one of his hands ; after a little 
 pause, he puts back the other side of the 
 cloak, and shows the other hand. " Gen- 
 tlemen, you see," said he, " that Arse- 
 nius has both his hands ; how the accu- 
 sers came by the third hand, let them 
 explain." Thus ended the plot to the 
 shame of the contrivers. 
 
 That any persons, who bear the name 
 of Christ, should deliberately be guilty 
 of such villany, is deeply to be regretted. 
 But let it be remembered, that the real 
 faith of Christ was opposed to those who 
 were concerned in this base act, and that 
 enmity to the doctrine of the Trinity pro- 
 duced it. The story itself deserves also 
 to be preserved as a memorable instance 
 of the interposition of Divine Providence. 
 
 Socrates, B. 1. c. 27. 
 
CZXT. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTIXE. 
 
 285 
 
 Notwithstanding the clearest proofs of 
 Athanasius's innocence, and that the 
 whole course of his life was extremely 
 opposite to such crimes as he was charg- 
 ed with, his enemies prevailed so far, 
 that commissioners were despatched into 
 Eg'ypt, to examine the matters of which 
 he was accused. Yet John, the Meletian 
 bishop, the chief contriver of the plot, 
 confessed his fault to Athanasius, and 
 beqfofed his forgiveness. And Arsenius 
 himself renounced his former connexions, 
 and desired to be received into commu- 
 nion with the Alexandrian prelate. 
 
 Eg-ypt, where Athanasius must have 
 been best known, was faithful to her pre- 
 late. Forty-seven bishops of that country 
 entered a protest against the injustice of 
 the council, but iu vain. The Arian 
 commissioners arrived at Alexandria, and 
 endeavoured to extort evidence against 
 him by drawn swords, whips, clubs, and 
 all engines of cruelty.* The Alexandrian 
 clerg)' desired to be admitted to give evi- 
 dence, but were refused. To the number 
 of fifteen presbyters and four deacons 
 they remonstrated, but to no purpose. 
 The Mara?otic clergy took the same steps, 
 but to no purpose. The delegates return- 
 ed with extorted evidence to Tyre, whence 
 Athanasius, who saw no justice was to 
 be had, had fled. They passed sentence, 
 and deposed him from his bishopric. 
 
 Yet there were those in the synod of 
 Tjrre, who were willing to do justice to 
 the much-injured prelate. Paphnutius, 
 who has been before mentioned, took 
 Maximus, bishop of Jerusalem, by the 
 hand ; " Let us be gone," said he, " it 
 becomes not those who have lost their 
 limbs for religion, to go along with such 
 pernicious company." But the majority 
 were very differently disposed. 
 
 Athanasius came to Constantinople, 
 and desired justice from the emperor, and 
 a fair trial. Constantine ordered the bi- 
 shops of the synod to appear before him. 
 and to give an account of what they had 
 done. The greatest part of them return- 
 ed home; but the genius of Eusebius of 
 Nicomedia was not exhausted, and as he 
 stuck at no fraud, and was ashamed of 
 no villany, he, with a few of the synod, 
 went to Constantinople, and waving the 
 old accusations, he brought a fresh one, 
 namely, that Athanasius had threatened 
 to stop the fleet that brought corn from 
 Alexandria to Constantinople. Constan- 
 
 Banish- 
 ment of 
 Athana- 
 sius. 
 
 * Epist. Synod. Alexan. Athan. 
 
 tine was credulous enough to be moved 
 by the report : the Arian arts prevailed at 
 court: those who used no arms 
 but truth and honesty, were 
 foiled for the present ; and 
 Athanasius was banished to 
 Treves in Gaul. 
 
 Arius, flushed with the success of his 
 party, returned to Alexandria, and 
 strengthened the hands of the heretics, 
 who had long languished for want of his 
 abilities. Tlie city being torn with in- 
 testine divisions, the emperor ordered the 
 heresiarch to come to Constantinople, and 
 there to give an account of his conduct. 
 That imperial city was now the chief seat 
 of the contention. But Providence had 
 given her a bishop not unequal to the 
 contest. This was Alexander of Con- 
 stantinople, a man of eminent piety and 
 integrity, whose character at least seems 
 to have approached as near to that of a 
 primitive Christian as did that of any 
 persons who distinguished themselves at 
 this period. Eusebius of Nicomedia 
 menaced him with deposition and exile, 
 unless he consented to receive Arius into 
 the church. On the one hand, the pre- 
 late knew too well the power of the 
 Arians by what they had done already ; 
 and the Trinitarians were so far outmatch- 
 ed by them in subtilty and artifice, that 
 though victorious in argument in the face 
 of the whole world, with the council of 
 Xice, and an orthodox emperor on their 
 side, they yet were persecuted and op- 
 pressed, and their enemies prevailed at 
 court. But on the other hand, it behooved 
 not a Christian bishop to consent to the 
 admission of an artful sectarian who could 
 agree in form to the Nicene faith, and yet 
 gradually insinuate his poisonous doc- 
 trines into the church. What were this 
 but in fact to allow the wolf to enter the 
 sheep-fold, and devour the flock? The 
 mind of Alexander was directed aright in 
 this conjuncture. He spent several days 
 and nights in prayer alone in his church; 
 the faithful followed his example, and 
 prayer was made by the Church without 
 ceasing, that God would interfere on this 
 occasion. Controversies and the arts of 
 logic were omitted ; and they, who be- 
 lieved that the Nicene faith was holy, 
 and of most interesting concern to the 
 souls of men, sincerely committed their 
 cause to God. 
 
 But Constantine himself was not to be 
 prevailed on to admit Arius into the 
 church, unless he could be convinced of 
 
286 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 his orthodoxy. He sent for him there- 
 fore to the palace, and asked him plainly, 
 whether he agreed to the Nicene decrees. 
 The heresiarch, without hesitation, sub- 
 scribed : the emperor ordered him to 
 swear : he assented to this also. I fol- 
 low the narrative of Socrates, one of the 
 most candid and moderate historians, who 
 tells us that he had heard, that Arius had 
 under his arm a written paper of his real 
 sentiments, and that he swore that he be- 
 lieved as he had written. Whether he used 
 this equivocation or not, is far from be- 
 ing clear. But Socrates, who is careful 
 to tell us that he heard this reported, as- 
 sures us that he did swear in addition to 
 his subscriptions, and that this he knew 
 from the emperor's epistles.* Constan- 
 tine, whose scruples were now overcome, 
 ordered Alexander to receive him into the 
 church the next day. The good bishop 
 had given himself to fasting and prayer, 
 and renewed his supplications that day 
 with great fervour in the church, prostrate 
 before the altar, and attended by Marcarius 
 only, who was a presbyter belonging to 
 Athanasius. He begged, that if Arius 
 was in the right, he himself might not 
 live to see the day of contest ; but if the 
 faith was true, which he professed, that 
 Arius, the author of all the evils, might 
 suffer the punishment of his impiety 
 The next day seemed to be a triumphant 
 one to the Arians : the heads of the party 
 paraded through the city with Arius in 
 the midst, and drew the attention of all 
 toward tliem. When they came nigh the 
 forum of Constantino, a sudden terror, 
 with a disorder of the intestines, seized 
 Arius. In his urgent necessity, he re- 
 quested to be directed to a place of pri- 
 Death of ^^^^ retirement. Agreeably to 
 Arius ^^® information he received, 
 
 A n '^V he hastened behind the forum; 
 and there he poured forth his 
 boM^els with a vast effusion of blood. 
 
 Such was the exit of the famous Arius. 
 The place of his death was memorable to 
 posterity, and was shown in the times of 
 Socrates. f The united testimony of an 
 
 • B. I. c. 8. 
 
 _ + Sozomoii tells us, that sometime after 
 rich Arian bought the place, changed its form, 
 and built there a house, that the event might 
 gradually sink into oblivion. It must not be 
 denied, however, that Arius also toolv pains 
 to propagate his sentiments by methods more 
 honourable than those of duplicity and fraud, 
 in which he was so eminently versed. His 
 historian Philostorgius, of whom some frag- 
 
 cient historians leaves no room to doubt of 
 the fact. The reflections to be made upon 
 it will vary, as men believe and are dis- 
 posed. That it is usual with God to hear 
 the prayers of his Church and to answer 
 them remarkably on extraordinary occa- 
 sions, will not be denied by those who 
 reverence the word of God, and who re- 
 member the case of Hezekiah in the Old 
 Testament,* and Peter in the New.f 
 That the danger of the Church from he- 
 resy was particularly great at this time, 
 will be equally admitted by all who be- 
 lieve that the Trinitarian doctrine includes 
 within it whatever is most precious and 
 interesting in the Gospel : that here on 
 one side an appeal was made to God in 
 his own appointed way, in faith, prayer, 
 patience, and sincerity ; while the other 
 side dealt in falsehood, artifice, ambition 
 and worldly policy, is evident from the 
 narrative. From these premises a man 
 who fears God will feel it his duty to be- 
 lieve that God interposed to comfort his 
 Church, and to confound its adversaries. 
 I see no method of avoiding this conclu- 
 sion. The translator of Mosheim seems 
 put to a great difficulty, when he declares 
 it extremely probable that he was poison- 
 ed by his enemies. A more absurd and 
 unwarranted imagination never entered 
 into the heart of man. And, surely, such 
 things ought not to have been said, with- 
 out some proof or probable circumstance. 
 Certain it is, that the fear of God rested 
 with the Trinitarians, though it was at 
 too low an ebb among all parties. Among 
 these, however, nothing like such wick- 
 edness appears : while the Arians evi- 
 dently seem to have been given up to the 
 greatest villanies and profligacy. Great 
 was the joy of the aged bishop, to find 
 that God had not forsaken his Church. 
 What effect the event had on Constan- 
 tino, appears not. He died 
 soon after, about the sixty- 
 fifth year of his age, having 
 first received baptism from 
 EusebiusofNicomedia. This 
 he had long delayed, and the 
 custom, from the imperial example would 
 naturally gather fresh strength. Super- 
 stitition had by this time taught men to 
 connect by a necessary union the forgive- 
 ness of sins with the administration of 
 
 Death of 
 the Empe- 
 ror Con- 
 stantine, 
 
 A. D. 337. 
 
 menfs remain, assures us, that he composed 
 songs for sailors, millers, and travellers, tend- 
 ing to support this heresy. 
 * Isaiah xxxvii. f Acts xii. 
 
Cekt. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTIUS. 
 
 287 
 
 the rite : and men who loved to continue 
 in sin protracted their baptism to a time 
 when they imagined it might be of the 
 greatest advantage to them. I have no- 
 thing more to say of Constantino's re- 
 ligious character, than that it appears to 
 have been much of the same sort as that 
 of his panegyrist Eusebiiis, whose pom- 
 pous life of this emperor gives no very 
 favourable idea of the writer's own views 
 of Christianity. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PROGRESS OF THE ARIAN CONTRO- 
 VERSY DFRIXG THE REIGN OF CON- 
 STANTIUS. 
 
 The subject before us is more specu- 
 lative and more secular than I could wish. 
 I shall condense it as much as possible 
 into a narrow compass, keeping more 
 particularly in view the one great end of 
 this history. 
 
 The great Constantino was succeeded by 
 three sons, Constantino, Constantius, and 
 Constans. The first ruled in Spain and 
 Gaul, the second in the East, the third 
 in Italy and Africa. The other relations 
 of the late emperor were put to death by 
 the soldiers. Two sons alone of Julius 
 his brother survived, Gallus and Julian. 
 These were spared, privately educated, 
 placed among the clergy, and appointed 
 readers in the church. The latter was 
 born at Constantinople, was only eight 
 years old at the time of his uncle's death, 
 and was reserved to be a scourge of de- 
 generate Christendom, and a memorable 
 instrument of Divine Providence. 
 
 Of Constanline the eldest we know" but 
 little ; and that little is laudable. He 
 sent back Athanasius to his church with 
 great respect, and declared, that his fa- 
 ther had intended to do the same, but was 
 prevented by death. After a banishment 
 of two years and four months, the bishop 
 returned from Treves to his diocese, 
 where he was received with general ac- 
 clamations. Asclepas of Gaza and Mar- 
 cellus of Ancyra, who had been deposed 
 by Arians, with others likewise, were re- 
 stored ; but Constantine himself was 
 slain by the troops of his brother Con- 
 stans. He was undoubtedly steady in 
 his adherence to the Nicene faith, but 
 our information concerning him is too 
 small to enable us to form any just esti- 
 mate of his character. 
 
 His nextbrother, Constantius, furnishes 
 but too many materials to illustrate his 
 disposition. One Eusebius, an eunuch, 
 his chamberlain, had great influence over 
 him ; and was himself the convert of the 
 Arian priest whom Constantiahad recom- 
 mended to her brother, and to whom also 
 the dying emperor had intrusted his will. 
 The empress herself, the wife of Con- 
 stantius, was infected with Arianism. By 
 degrees at least the emperor, a man of 
 weak understanding, corrupted with the 
 pride of power, and ill informed in any 
 thing that belonged to real Christianity, 
 was confirmed in the fashionable heresy. 
 There was then during this whole reign, 
 which reached from the year 337 to the 
 year 361, a controversy carried on between 
 the Church and the heretics by arms and 
 resources suited to the genius of the par- 
 ties ; those of the former were prayers, 
 treatises, and preaching; of the latter. 
 
 Death of 
 Eusebius 
 of Ciesa- 
 rea, 
 
 A. D. 340. 
 
 policy, intrigue, persecution, and the 
 friendship of the great. The most zeal- 
 ous supporters of anti-scriptural senti- 
 ments seem far more disposed to culti- 
 vate the favour of men of rank, than to 
 labour in the work of the ministry among 
 the bulk of mankind. 
 
 About the year 340 died the famous 
 Eusebius of Cssarea. He was the most 
 learned of all the Christians. After view- 
 ing him with some attention, 
 I can put no other interpreta- 
 tion on his speculations than 
 that which has been mention- 
 ed already.* He talks of a 
 necessity that there was in 
 God, to produce a middle power between 
 himself and the angels, to lessen the in- 
 finite disproportion Ijetween him and the 
 creature. Of the Holy Ghost he speaks 
 still more explicitly, and represents him 
 as one of the things made by the Son. Ne- 
 vertheless, one might be disposed to put 
 a favourable construction on various ex- 
 pressions of this great man, were it not 
 that his practice is a strong comment on 
 his opinions. He frequented the court, 
 he associated with Arius, he joined in the 
 condemnation of Athanasius. It really 
 gives pain to part on such terms with the 
 historian, to whom we are indebted for 
 the preservation of so many valuable mo- 
 numents of antiquity; but truth must be 
 spoken, and his case is one of the many, 
 which show that learning and philosophy, 
 
 * IV. 
 B.XII. 
 
 Demonstr, 
 :. 6. 
 
 EvaiiG'. I. c. 6. See Fleurvj 
 
288 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 of Con- 
 stantino- 
 ple. 
 
 unless duly subordinate to the revealed will 
 of God, are no friends to Christian simpli- 
 city : however, the loud noise which in 
 our times has been made concerning- the 
 doctrine of the Trinity being derived from 
 Platonism, should be silenced, when it is 
 known that it was by admiration of Plato 
 and Origen that Eusebius himself was 
 perverted. 
 
 About the same time died Alexander of 
 Constantinople, aged ninety-eight years, 
 who had been bishop twenty- 
 Death of three years. His clergy ask- 
 Alexander ^^ j^jj^ j^ j^jg dying moments, 
 
 whom he would recommend 
 as his successor. If you seek 
 a man of exemplary life, and 
 able to instruct you, says he, you have 
 Paul : if you desire a man of secular skill, 
 and one who knows how to maintain an 
 interest among the great, and to preserve 
 an appearance of religion, Macedonius is 
 preferable. The event showed in what 
 strength of discernment the aged prelate 
 was still preserved, and how careful to 
 his last breath he was of the propagation 
 of Evangelical purity. These two men 
 were just such as he described them, 
 Paul, though young, was at once pious 
 and discreet; Macedonius was far ad- 
 vanced in life, but yet was only a deacon. 
 The Arian party during the lifetime of the 
 venerable champion was unable to pre- 
 dominate in the metropolis. After his 
 death they endeavoured to prefer Mace- 
 donius; but the primitive ideas were too 
 prevalent as yet among the populace, 
 and Paul was elected. Constantius ar- 
 rivino- afterwards was provoked at the 
 election, encouraged an Arian council, di- 
 rected its resolves, and Eusebius of Ni- 
 comedia was translated to the metropolitan 
 see, which from this time continued under 
 Arian government for forty years. Thus 
 the ancient usages in choosing bishops 
 were altered, and a precedent was set, of 
 fixinor in the hands of princes the govern- 
 ment of the church in capital cities. A 
 council of a hundred bishops of Egypt, 
 with Athanasius at their head, protested 
 against these proceedings to the whole 
 Christian world. 
 
 A council was now convened at Anti- 
 och, supported by the presence of the 
 emperor and by the manoeuvres of Euse- 
 Council bins. Here they undertook to 
 Antioch. depose Athanasius, and or- 
 dain Gregory, a Cappadocian, 
 in his room; prevailing on Constantius 
 to direct Philagiius, the prefect of Egypt, 
 
 to support their proceedings with an arm- 
 ed force. For, the integrity and probity 
 of Athanasius had gained him so strong 
 an ascendant in Egypt, that while the 
 primitive modes of church government re- 
 mained, it would have been impossible 
 to expel him. Violence was found ne- 
 cessary to support iniquity, and an Arian 
 prince was obliged to tread in the steps 
 of his pagan predecessors, to support 
 what he called the Church. 
 
 His views were promoted with vigour. 
 Virgins and monks were cruelly treated 
 at Alexandria: Jews and Pagans were 
 encouraged to murder Christians.* Gre- 
 gory himself entered the church with the 
 governor and certain Pagans, and caused 
 a number of the friends of Athanasius to 
 be scourged and imprisoned. The perse- 
 cuted prelate himself, who wanted not 
 courage and capacity to resist, acted 
 however a much luore Christian part. 
 He fled from the storm, and 
 made his escape to Rome. g-^g^J's^." 
 This also happened about ^^.,^5 to 
 the year 342. It was a me- Rome, 
 morable season for the church j^ -q g^g. 
 of God, which now found her 
 livery to be that of persecution, even 
 when Pacrans had ceased to reign. Gre- 
 gory would not suffer the Alhanasians, 
 who in great numbers still refused to own 
 the Arian domination, even to pray in 
 their own houses. He visited Egypt in 
 company with Philagrius. The greatest 
 severities were inflicted on those bishops 
 who had been zealous for the Nicene 
 faith, though the decrees of the council 
 had never been reversed, and the Arians 
 as yet contented themselves with am- 
 biguous confessions and the omission of 
 the term consubstantial. Bishops were 
 scourged and put in irons. Potamo, 
 whom we have before celebrated, was 
 beaten on the neck, till he was thought 
 to have expired ; he recovered in a small 
 degree, but died some time after. His 
 crime, in the eyes of the Arians, was 
 doubtless an unvaried attachment to the 
 Nicene faith. 
 
 While Gregory dealt in violence, his 
 competitor used only the more Christian 
 arms of argument. He published an 
 epistle to the Christian world, f exhort- 
 ing all the bishops to unite on the occa- 
 sion. "The faith is now begun," says 
 he, "it came to us by the Lord from his 
 
 * Apolog. Athan. 2. Fleury, 13. II. 14. 
 t Aihau. VI. p. 943. 
 
Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTIUS. 
 
 289 
 
 disciples. Lest what has been preserved 
 in the churches until now perish in our 
 days, and we be called to an account for 
 ** our stewardship, exert yourselves, my 
 brethren, as stewards of the mysteries of 
 God, and as beholding 3'our rights taken 
 away^ by strangers." He goes on to in- 
 form them of the proceedings of the 
 Ariaus, observing that the like had not 
 happened in the church since the ascen- 
 sion of our Saviour. " If there were any 
 complaint against me, the people should 
 have besn assembled in the name of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ, with the spirit of or- 
 dination; all things should have been ex- 
 amined regularly, and in the presence of 
 the clergy and people; a stranger should 
 not have been intruded by force and the 
 authority of secular judges, upon a people 
 who neither require nor know him." He 
 begs the bishops "not to receive the let- 
 ters of Gregory, but to tear them, and 
 treat the bearers with disdain as ministers 
 of iniquity." It cannot be denied, that 
 his arguments were sound, and that his 
 cause was just. The Arians must bear 
 the infamy of being the first who secular- 
 ized the discipline of the church. But 
 in adding the close of the letter, I mean 
 the reader to remark the decline of the 
 spirit of the Gospel at this time. As on 
 the one hand it were very^ unfair to con- 
 found the Athanasians and the Arians as 
 on an equal footing in point of piety and 
 morality, when the superiority of the for- 
 mer is too evident to admit of a dispute ; 
 so on the other hand it is certain, that 
 the experimental use of the Divinity of 
 Christ, by no means employed an equal 
 degree of the zeal of its patrons with the 
 abstract doctrine itself. Hence Athana- 
 sius, though always firm and constantly 
 sincere, fails in meekness and charit}^ 
 
 This great man continued in exile at 
 Rome for eighteen months, under the 
 protection of Julius the bishop. Thither 
 fled many others whom the Arian tyran- 
 ny had expelled from their sees. Euse- 
 
 bius of Constantinople died 
 Death of soon after in the fulness of 
 EusLbms ^j^jjf prosperity, which his in- 
 ot Con- ■ ..' "i - • , J 
 
 stantiiio- ^^i^^y and oppression had pro- 
 ple_ cured him. Human depravity 
 
 under religious appearances 
 had in him attained a rare degree of ma- 
 turity. And the only lesson which his 
 life affords seems to be this, to warn the 
 clergy to beware of secular ambition, and 
 the spirit of the world, which so exceed- 
 ingly depraved this dignitary, that he at 
 Vol. I. 2 B 
 
 length became one of the most memora- 
 ble villains in history. A double elec- 
 tion followed his death, that of Paul and 
 that of Macedonius. Herraogenes, mas- 
 ter of tlie militia,* was order- . 
 ed by the emperor to banish Bamsh- 
 Paul. He did so; and Paul's p.^^^; 
 friends, exasperated by^ a se- 
 ries of persecutions, forgot the character 
 of Christians, and killed Her- Hermoo-e- 
 mogenes. These events took ,,^,5 killed. 
 place in or near the year 312. 
 Paul however was then banished the 
 city, and his holy character exempts him 
 from all suspicion of being concerned in 
 the outrage. 
 
 At Rome, Julius, in a council of the 
 western bishops, justified Athanasius and 
 his fellow sulferers. Among these was 
 Marcellus of Ancyra, whose zeal against 
 the Arians had provoked them to charge 
 him with Sabellianism. It is not the 
 desig-n of this history to enlarge on these 
 niceties. But it is easy to conceive how 
 such a charge might be drawn up with 
 specious appearances. Marcellus explain- 
 ed, and was cleared to the satisfaction of 
 the council ; but whether justly or not, 
 is not so evident. The progress of error 
 is easy, where the heart is not simply 
 stayed upon God. Athanasius himself 
 was afterwards far from being convinced 
 of his soundness in the faith. 
 
 Julius wrote a public letter on this oc- 
 casion, in which, after doing full justice fo 
 the sufferers, he concludes in a manner 
 not unworthy of a Christian bishop, not 
 threatenino-, but advising those of the 
 East not to do the like for the luture, 
 lest, says he, we be exposed to the laugh- 
 ter of Pagans, and above all to the wrath 
 of God, to whom we must all give an ac- 
 count at the d^y of judgment. 
 
 In the year 347, a council was held at 
 Sardica by the joint order of the two em- 
 perors, Constantius and Constans, the 
 latter being as steady in the Council at 
 support ot the JNicene laith Sardica, 
 as the former was in opposi- ^ ^^ 347 
 tion. Sardica was in Illyria, 
 the border of the dominions of the two 
 emperors. The intention was to unite, 
 but it actually separated the two parties 
 more than ever. Prayer and holy breath- 
 ings of soul, and judicious and affection- 
 ate preaching of practical religion, were 
 now at a low ebb. Peaceable spirits 
 were absorbed in superstition, turbulent 
 
 *Fleury, B. Xn.21. 
 
290 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 Ones in ecclesiastical contentions. The 
 life of faith was little known. They 
 treated the doctrine of the Trinity as a 
 mere speculation, and the result of their 
 disputes was, that each party retired as 
 they entered upon them. The Easterns 
 finding that it was likely to he a free coun- 
 cil, departed from it, leaving the West- 
 erns to settle matters as they pleased. 
 Hosius of Corduba, the venerable presi- 
 dent of Nice, presided here also, and the 
 Athanasian cause was decided in the fa- 
 vour of the Alexandrian prelate. They 
 made also some canons, in which they 
 condemned the translation of bishops. 
 The pious and zealous spirit of Hosius 
 was chiefly concerned in tliese things. 
 Remarkable are the words : " A perni- 
 cious custom must be rooted out. None 
 have been found to pass from a greater 
 bishopric to a less. Therefore they are 
 induced by avarice and ambition." So 
 reasoned and so ordained this council. 
 But where the religion of the Holy Ghost, 
 the religion of faith, hope, and charity, 
 exist not, the canons of councils forbid in 
 vain. There are several canons also 
 which enjoin the residence of bishops, 
 and which forbid their journeys to courts. 
 The time also of bishops remaining in 
 another diocese was fixed, in order to 
 prevent the surplanting of their brethren. 
 These things show the times : rules are 
 not made, except to prevent abuses, which 
 already exist. 
 
 The Easterns met at Philippopolis, in 
 Thrace, and excommunicated their breth- 
 ren of the West ; and for some time the 
 two parties remained distant in this man- 
 ner ; while in Asia and Egypt the friends 
 of the Nicene faith were treated witli 
 great cruelty. Into Europe, the subtil- 
 ties of this contention had not yet entered ; 
 men were there more simple, and follow- 
 ed the primitive faith in quietness and 
 peace.* 
 
 In Antioch the Arian bishop Stephen 
 Avas found, even by his own party, too 
 corrupt and profligate to be continued in 
 his dignity. Leontius,who succeeded him, 
 supported the Arian cause. Diodorus, an 
 ascetic, and Flavian, afterwards bishop 
 of Antioch, stirred up the faithful to a 
 zeal for religion, and passed whole nights 
 with them at the tombs of the martyrs. 
 Leontius finding them to have the affec- 
 tion of the people, wished them to do this 
 service in the church. And here I ap- 
 
 I'leury, C. 43. 
 
 prehend was a nursery of real godliness, 
 but the account is very imperfect. 
 
 In the year 349 died Gregory, the secu- 
 lar bishop of Alexandria, as he may be 
 justly called. Then it was that Constan- 
 tius,intimidatedby the threats ^ . , 
 of his brother Constans, wrote q^*^^ ° 
 repeatedly to Athanasius to i,ishop''of 
 return into the East, and to Alexan- 
 assure him of his favour and dria, 
 protection. The exiled pre- j^ j)_ 349^ 
 late could not easily credit a 
 man who had persecuted him so unrighte- 
 ously. At length he com- 
 plied, and after visiting Julius „f J"^"^/;; 
 at Rome, who sent a letter full Antioch. 
 of tenderness to the church of 
 Alexandria in favour of Athanasius, he 
 travelled to Xntioch, where Constantius 
 then was, by whom he was very graci- 
 ously received. The emperor requested 
 him to forget the past, and assured him 
 with oaths, that he would receive no ca- 
 lumnies against him for the future. While 
 Athanasius was at Antioch, he communi- 
 cated with the Eustathians, who under 
 the direction of Flavian held a conventi- 
 cle there. This same Flavian was the 
 first who composed the doxology, " Glory 
 be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
 Ghost ;" and in the singing of the Psalms, 
 not only those who frequented his meet- 
 ing made use of it, but in general all who 
 favoured the Nicene faith in the church 
 of Leontius did the same, in opposition 
 to the Arian doxology. Glory to the Fa- 
 ther, by the Son, in the Holy Ghost. So 
 earnest were the two parties against each 
 other. Leontius was a confirmed Arian, 
 but of a milder temper than the rest of 
 his party. He saw that it was by force 
 only that he was in possession of his 
 church ; numbers of people still professing 
 the Nicene faith. He dared not there- 
 fore oppose the Trinitarian hymns, and 
 laboured to preserve peace in his own 
 time; but touching his white hair, he 
 said on the occasion, " When this snow 
 shall melt, there will be much dirt," 
 hinting at the dissensions which he im- 
 agined would arise after his death. 
 
 Constantius observed to Athanasius, 
 that as he now put him into possession 
 of all his Egyptian churches, he ought to 
 leave one for the Arians. The Alexan- 
 drian prelate confessed it would be just, 
 on condition also that the same liberty 
 was allowed to the Eustathians at An- 
 tioch. The Arian party, however, sensi- 
 ble of the superior popularity of their op- 
 
Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 CONSTANTIUS. 
 
 291 
 
 posers, thought it most prudent to wave 
 the proposal.* 
 
 The return of Athanasius to Alexandria 
 was a triumph. Religious zeal and joy 
 
 appeared in the garb of the 
 Athanasi- ^ ^ ^ number devoting 
 to Alexaii- themselves to a monastic life, 
 dria. Acts of mercy and liberality 
 
 were also abundantly per- 
 formed. Every house seemed to be a 
 church set apart for prayer. Such are 
 the views which Athanasius himself gives 
 us of the effects of his restoration if a 
 number of his enemies retracted, and jus- 
 tified him in the most honourable manner, 
 and among these the recantation of Ursa- 
 tius and Yalens is remarkable. Asclepas 
 was also restored to Gaza, and Marcellus 
 to Ancyra, though the latter was not un- 
 molested. Tbe suspicion of his unsound- 
 ness was perhaps justly increased by the 
 less ambiguous sentiments of Photinus 
 bishop of vSirmium, who was supposed to 
 tread in his steps, and was in a council 
 at that place deposed ae a Sabellian by 
 universal consent. Germanius an Arian 
 was elected in his stead, and then, as 
 well as at this day, the Sabellians and 
 the Arians in opposing each other assault- 
 ed the truth, which lay between them : 
 the former removing all distinction be- 
 tween the Father and the Son, the latter 
 establishing a distinction which took 
 away the Trinity of the Godhead. Each 
 desired to remove the mystery from the 
 doctrine, and in the attempt corrupted it. 
 While those who were taught of God, 
 and were content with inadequate ideas, 
 sincerely worshipped the Trinity in Unity, 
 and mourned over the abominations of the 
 times. 
 
 A great change in civil affairs having 
 taken place by the death of Constans, and 
 the ruin of the usurper Magnentius, Con- 
 
 stantuis, now sole master of 
 a lartyr- ^j^g empire, revived the per- 
 
 •JOin of ^- A L .. .1, .Vr, 
 
 Paul of secution. About the year 351, 
 Constanli- P^'^l of Constantinople was 
 nople, sent into Mesopotamia, loaded 
 
 A. D. 351. with irons, and at length to 
 Cucusus on the confines of 
 Cappadocia. There, after suffering cruel 
 hardships, he was strangled. :j: Macedo- 
 nius by an armed force, attended with 
 much effusion of blood, took possession of 
 the see. Paul received the crown of 
 
 • Socrates, B. III. c. 20. 
 
 + Athan. ad Solit. See Fleury, B. XII. c. 52. 
 
 t Theodoret, B. XI. c. 5. 
 
 martyrdom, and the Arians seemed ambi- 
 tions to erpial the bloody fame of Galerias. 
 The weak mind of Constantius was 
 again prejudiced by absurd calumnies 
 against Athanasius, and a council at Mi- 
 lan was convened in the year 
 355, in the presence of the m^i!^^' * 
 emperor, who proposed to . j^ '„-- 
 them an Arian creed, which 
 he recommended by this argument, that 
 God bad declared in his favour by his 
 victories. Prosperity, it seems, had not 
 strengthened his reasoning powers, but, 
 unhappily had increased the depravity of 
 his heart. Here appeared the magnani- 
 mous constancy of Lucifer, bishop of Cag- 
 liari in Sardinia, and the pious self-denial 
 of Eusebius, bishop of Vercellae in Italy. 
 These prelates were animated with a sin- 
 cere spirit of piety on this occasion, and 
 answered that the Nicene faith had always 
 been the faith of the Church. " I ask not 
 your advice, says tbp emperor, and jou 
 shall not hinder me from following Arius, 
 if I think fit." The emperor's creed was 
 read in the Church ; but the people, more 
 sincere and more simple than the great, 
 and more willingly attached to the doc- 
 trines ofthe Trinity, because they read it in 
 their Bibles, rejected the faith of Constan- 
 tius, and it was not pressed any farther. 
 The condemnation of Athanasius was, 
 however, insisted on,and Dionysius bishop 
 of Milan, and the two others just mention- 
 ed,were mostunreasonably required to sub- 
 scribe to it. " Obey, or be banished," 
 was the imperious mandate. The bishops 
 lifted up their hands to heaven, and told 
 Constantino, that the empire was not his, 
 but God's, and reminded him of the day 
 of judgment. He drew his sword on them 
 in a rage, but contented himself with 
 ordering their banishment. Hilary the 
 deacon was stripped and scourged, and 
 ridiculed by Ursatius and Valens, who 
 had recanted sometime ago. Hilary 
 blessed God, and bore the indignity as a 
 Christian. The greatest part of the bish- 
 ops subscribed to the condemnation of 
 Athanasius : a few only testified that the 
 grace of God was still as powerful as 
 ever, in supporting his people, and ia 
 causing them to sutler gladly, rather thaa 
 to sin. Others, besides the three men- 
 tioned above, joined in the same measure, 
 particularly Maximus, bishop of Naples, 
 who was tortured in hopes of forcing his 
 submission, because of the weakness of 
 his body. In the end he was banished, 
 and died in exile. 
 
292 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 Eusebius of Vercellfe was sent into 
 Palestine, Lucifer into Syria, and Diony- 
 sius into Cappadocia, where lie died soon 
 after. Liberius of Rome was in an ad- 
 vanced age, when the storm which had 
 murmured at a distance, burst upon him : 
 He was carried before Constantius at Mi- 
 lan, where the eunuch P^usebius, the se- 
 cret and prevalent supporter of Arianism, 
 assisted the emperor in oppressing him. 
 Liberius said, "Though I were single, 
 the cause of the faith would not fail : 
 there was a time when three persons only 
 were found who resisted a regal ordi- 
 nance." Eusebius understanding his al- 
 lusion to Shadraoh, Meshach, and Abed- 
 iiego, answered, " Do you make the em- 
 peror a Nebuchadnezzar]" "No, said 
 the bishop of Rome, but you are not less 
 unreasonable than he, in desiring to con- 
 demn a man unheard." In the conclu- 
 sion Liberius was banished into Thrace. 
 But a character still more venerable than 
 his was yet unsubdued, and the Arians, 
 fiercely pursuing their victories, procood- 
 ed to the attack. Hosius, bishop of Cor- 
 duba in Spain, was now a hundred years 
 old. He was looked on as the first of 
 bishops, had been a confessor under the 
 Dioclesian persecution, had presided sixty 
 years in the Church, had guided the Ni- 
 cene council, had been a principle person 
 in the appointment of canons, and was 
 held in universal respect. Constantius 
 and the whole Christian party were sen- 
 sible of the importance of such a charac- 
 ter. Flattery and menaces were both em- 
 ployed to prevail on him to condemn 
 Aihanasius. A few lines of his answer 
 to an imperious letter of the emperor's 
 may give us some idea of his spirit :* " I 
 confessed the first time in the persecution 
 
 they have recanted and acknowledged 
 their calumny in writing? Remember 
 you are a mortal man ; be afraid of the 
 day of judgment. God hath given you 
 the empire, and hath committed the church 
 to our care. I write thus through my 
 concern for your eternal welfare ; but 
 with respect to your requisition, I cannot 
 agree with Arians, nor write against Atha- 
 nasius. You act for his enemies, but in 
 the da)"- of judgment you must defend 
 yourself alone." Constantius kept him 
 a year at Sirmium, without respect to his 
 age and infirmities. His orders addressed 
 to the bishops were to condemn Athana- 
 sius, and to communicate with the Arians 
 under pain of banishment. The judges 
 were directed to see to the execution of 
 these things, t^rsatius and Valens, whose 
 instability should have destroyed their 
 credit, assisted the persecution by infor- 
 mations : zealous heretics by force of 
 arms were intruded in the place of the 
 exiled : and Arianism seemed well niofh to 
 have avenged the cause of fallen idolatry. 
 The adventures of Athanasius himself 
 in his sufferings were extraordinary. He 
 was for some time preserved in the house 
 of a pious woman with great 
 care and fidelity. But we 
 must not enlarge on the va- 
 rious hardships to which he 
 Avas exposed : suffice it to 
 mention some of the particu- 
 lar circumstances. Syrianus, a secular 
 officer, came at night to his principal 
 church at Alexandria, when the people 
 were intent on their devotions. Numbers 
 were murdered, others insulted and beaten. 
 The intre]nd prelate sat still in his chair, 
 and directed the deacon to sing the 
 cxxxvitli Psalm, the people answering, 
 
 Athanasi- 
 us com- 
 pelled to 
 leave 
 Alexan- 
 dria. 
 
 under Maximian, your great-grandfather, according to the custom of alternate sing' 
 If you likewise desire to persecute me, I . tt. i 
 
 am ready still to suffer any thing rather 
 than betray the truth. It is not so mucii 
 a personal malice against Athanasius, as 
 the love of heresy which influences these 
 men. I myself invited them to come to 
 me, and declare at the council of Sardica 
 what they knew against him. They 
 dared not; they all refused. Athanasius 
 came afterwaids to your court at Antioch : 
 he desired his enemies might be sent for, 
 that they might make good their accusa- 
 tions. Why do you still hearken to them 
 "Who refused such fair proposals 1 How 
 can you endure Ursatius and Valens, after 
 
 Athan. ad Solit. 
 
 ing, " For his mercy endureth for ever." 
 Which being finished, he bade the people 
 return to their houses. As the soldiers 
 advanced toward him, his clergy and 
 people begged him to depart, which he 
 refused, thinking it his duty to stay till 
 they had all left the churcii. He was in 
 a manner forced out by the clergy and 
 monks, and conveyed safe from the 
 guards. An unavailing protest was 
 made by the people against these vio- 
 lences. 
 
 The Pagans took courage, and assisted 
 the heretics in the persecution, saying, 
 the Arians have embraced our relio-ion.* 
 
 Athan. ad Solit. 
 
Ceht. IV.] 
 
 CONST ANTIUS. 
 
 293 
 
 of Athana 
 si us. 
 
 f -^ bishop was found worthy 
 
 Caroado". to support these proceedings, 
 
 cia chosen George of Cappadocia, who 
 
 bytheAri- began his usurpation in the 
 
 ans to be year 356. Through his in- 
 
 bishop in fluence, supported by the se- 
 
 the place ^^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^ friends of the 
 
 Nicene faith were cruelly 
 beaten, and some died under 
 A. U. 356. ^j^gjj. gngjjjgh. A sub-deacon 
 
 having been severely scourged, was sent 
 to the mines, without being allowed time 
 to dress his wounds, and he died on the 
 road. Venerable, aged bishops were sent 
 into the deserts throughout Egypt, and 
 Arianism reigned and glutted itself in 
 blood. The episcopal office was sold 
 to unworthy men ; the profession of Arian- 
 ism being the only requisite for the of- 
 fice. The cruelties of George provoked 
 the Alexandrians to retaliation, but mili- 
 tary force prevailed ; and after this bishop 
 had been once expelled, he returned still 
 more terrible and more detested. 
 
 So deplorably misinformed was Con- 
 stantius, that in a letter to the people of 
 Alexandria, he represents this same 
 George as one who was very capable of 
 instructing others in heavenly things 
 Athanasius having obtained a sight of 
 this letter, was at length deterred from 
 his intended journey to the emperor, and 
 betook himself to the deserts, and visited 
 the monks, his most faithful adherents, 
 who refused to discover him to his perse- 
 cuting adversaries, and offered their 
 throats to the sword, being ready to die 
 for the Nicene faith. He filled up another 
 part of his time in writing his own apo- 
 logy to Constantius. There are in it 
 strong traces of that rapid eloquence and 
 clear reasoning, for which this father is 
 renowned. Integrity and fervour appear 
 throughout; but it were to be wished, 
 that less zeal on his own account, and 
 more on account of his Divine Master, 
 were visible in this as well as in his 
 other writings. In truth, the connexion 
 of the doctrine of the Trinity with the ho- 
 nour of Christ, and with lively faith in 
 his mediation, is so plain, that practical, 
 serious, humble religion, if it exist at all 
 in any scene of controversy, must be 
 found on that side. INIen, who degrade 
 the Divine Saviour into a creature, will 
 of course exalt themselves, and cannot 
 have that humility and faith which are 
 the essential ingredients of a holy life. I 
 gladly remind my readers, and myself, 
 that the value of the apostolical doctrines, 
 2b 2 
 
 so fiercely persecuted in the fourth cen- 
 tury, rests not on speculation, but on the 
 holy tendency of their nature. There is 
 sufficient proof of the existence of this 
 holy tendency and influence, both in re- 
 gard to Athanasius and other Trinitarians 
 of that time; and there is also more than 
 sufficient proof of the contrary tendency 
 of the doctrines supported by the Arians. 
 But it must be allowed that the evidence 
 of the former sort is scanty: Christian 
 godliness continued very low in all this 
 period : and good men in their writings 
 and reflections attended too little to the 
 connexion which subsists between doc- 
 trine and practice. 
 
 Eusebius of Vercellse, one of the most 
 honest and pious bishops of those times, 
 still suffered severely in Palestine in his 
 banishment. The persecution reached 
 even to Gaul, which had yet happily pre- 
 served the simplicity of apostolical con- 
 fession unmolested. In Constantinople, 
 Macedonius, by the terror of his persecu- 
 tions, drove those of the general church 
 and the Novatian dissenters, into a sym- 
 pathy for each other, which their mutual 
 prejudices had long prevented. Both sorts 
 suffered extremely, being obliged to com- 
 municate, with Arians, or to undergo a 
 variety of hardships. Agelius, the Nova- 
 tian bishop, fled. A priest and a monk 
 of theirs were tortured, and the latter died 
 by this usage. Novatianism still retained 
 a measure of the divine Spirit, and was 
 honoured with furnishing those who suf- 
 fered for Jesus. This* people had three 
 churches in Constantinople, one of which 
 was thrown down by the emperor's or- 
 ders. The Novatians carried away the 
 materials to the other side of the sea: the 
 women and children wrought diligently, 
 and thus it was rebuilt. In the next 
 reign, by the emperor's permission, they 
 carried back the materials, and rebuilt 
 their church at Constantinople, and called 
 it ANASTATiA.f An attempt was now 
 made to re-unite those of the general 
 church with the Novatians: the former 
 were the more ready, because they had 
 no place of worship at all ; but the narrow 
 bigotry, which had ever been the great 
 fault of Novatianism, prevented the union. 
 But we must now mention a remarkable 
 instance of human infirmity, which calls 
 at once for compassion and for caution. 
 Hosius had been a year confined at Sir- 
 
 • Sozomen, B. IV. c. 20. 
 + That is, " Risen again." 
 
394 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 miuni, his relations were persecuted, and 
 he suffered in his own person both 
 scourges and tortures. By thus afflict- 
 ing him, the Arian tyrant thought he 
 served the cause ; and by such inhuman 
 measures were the patrons of the heresy 
 stimulated to seek the destruction of 
 Godline^^s! Yet so infatuated was the 
 
 along 
 
 the vener 
 able llo- 
 sius. 
 
 spirit of Constantius, that he all 
 was liberally supporting the most expen- 
 sive forms and ornaments of Christian 
 worship, while he was labouring with all 
 his might to eradicate Christian doctrine. 
 Hosius, above a hundred years 
 Conduct of p1(3^ submitted at length to 
 subscribe an Arian creed, but 
 the condemnation of Athana- 
 sins he would not vindicate. 
 Permitted at length to return into Spain, 
 he lived, however, to retract, protesting 
 against the violence with which he had 
 been treated, and with his last breath ex- 
 horting all men to reject the heresy of 
 Arius; and thus we have s-jen to his end 
 the most venerable character of that age, 
 still in his heart true to his God. The 
 length of his days only exposed him to a 
 greater variety of suffering, and thouoh 
 Satan's malice was permitted to do him 
 much mischief, he yet was enabled to 
 die in peace, and to prove that the Lord 
 faileth not them that are his. 
 
 In the same year, 357, Liberius of 
 Rome, after two years exile, was not only 
 prevailed on to receive an Arian creed, 
 but even to reject Athanasius. 
 The subscription to the creed 
 was not so much an evidence 
 of insincerity, as was the con- 
 demnation of the Alexandrian 
 prelate, because the Arians, 
 fertile in expedients, made creeds upon 
 creeds, expressed in artful ambiguities, to 
 impose on the unwary. Liberius by these 
 unworthy means recovered his bishopric. 
 The see of Rome at that time had secular 
 charms sufficient to seduce a worldly 
 mind. Whether Liberius cordially re- 
 pented of his hypocrisy or not, we have 
 no evidence. The cruelty of the Arians 
 tried to the utmost the hearts of men in 
 those days, and now the proverb was ve- 
 rified, " All the world against Athana- 
 sius, and Athanasius against all the 
 world." 
 
 But the power of divine grace was dis- 
 played during this disastrous season in 
 preserving a remnant, and particularly in 
 strengthening the mind of that great man, 
 through a long course of afflictions. He 
 
 Liberius 
 of Rome 
 joins the 
 Ai'iaiis, 
 
 A. D. 357. 
 
 composed about this time a letter to the 
 monks, in which he confesses the ex- 
 treme difficulty of writing concerning the 
 divinity of the Son of God, though it be 
 easy to confute the heretics. He owns 
 his ignorance, and calls himself a mere 
 babbler, and beseeches the brethren to re- 
 ceive what he wrote, not as a perfect ex- 
 planation of the divinity of the Word, but 
 as a confutation of the enemies of that 
 doctrine. 
 
 Two councils were held, the one at 
 Rimini, the other at Seleucia, both with 
 a view to support Arianism. In the former 
 a number of good men were artfully se- 
 duced, by the snares of the Arians, to 
 agree to what they did not understand. 
 This sect, now victorious every where, 
 began to show itself disunited, and to se- 
 parate into two parties. But it is not 
 worth while to trouble the reader with 
 idle niceties, in which proud men in- 
 volved themselves, while all had for- 
 saken the simple faith of antiquity. In 
 these confusions, Macedonius 
 lost the see of Constantinople, 
 which was given to Eudoxius, 
 translated from Antioch, in 
 the year 360. Constantius 
 poorly endeavoured to atone 
 for the corruptions both of 
 principle and practice, with 
 which he filled the church, by offering 
 large vessels of gold and silver, carpets 
 for the altar of gold tissue, adorned with 
 precious stones, curtains of gold and di- 
 vers colours for the doors of the church, 
 and also liberal donatives to the clergy, 
 
 Eudoxius 
 is made 
 patriarcli 
 of Con- 
 stantino- 
 ple, 
 A. D. SCO. 
 
 the virgins, and the widows.* 
 
 In the meantime Christendom through- 
 out groaned under the weight of extorted 
 Arian subscriptions; and Macedonius, the 
 deposed bishop of Constantinople, formed 
 another sect of those who were enemies 
 to the divinity of the Holy Ghost. These, 
 by the advantage of sober manners, 
 spread themselves among the monaster- 
 ies, and increased the corruption which 
 then pervaded the Christian world. But 
 the vigilant spirit of Athanasius was 
 stirred up to oppose this heresy also. 
 "The Father cannot be Son, nor the Son 
 Father, (says he) and the Holy Ghost is 
 never called by the naine of Son, but is 
 called the Spirit of the Father and of the 
 Son. The holy Trinity is but one divine 
 nature, and one God, with which a crea- 
 
 Fleury, B. XIV. 33. 
 
Cejtt. IV.] 
 
 MONASTICISM, ETC. 
 
 295 
 
 ture cannot be joined. This is sufficient 
 for the faithful. Human knowledge goes 
 no farther: the cherubiras veil the rest 
 with their wings." 
 
 Tne see of Antioch being vacant, Me- 
 letius, bishop of Sebasta, a man of exem- 
 plary meekness and piety, was chosen. 
 The Arians supposed him to be of their 
 parly. Constantias ordered the new 
 bishop to preach before him on the con- 
 troversial subject of the Trinity : Meletius 
 delivered himself with Christian sincerity, 
 rebuked the rashness of men, who strove 
 to fathom the divine nature, and exhorted 
 his audience to adhere to tlie simplicity 
 of tiie faith. He had remained only a 
 month in Antioch, and had the honour to 
 be banished by the emperor, who filled 
 up the see with Euzoius, the old friend 
 of Arius. In consequence of this, the 
 friends of Meletius separated from the 
 Arians, and held their assemblies in the 
 ancient church, which had been the first 
 at Antioch. Besides ihe Arians, who 
 were in possession of the emperor's fa- 
 vour, there were two parties both sound 
 in the Nicene faith, the Eustathians, be- 
 fore spoken of, and the Meletians, who 
 testified in the strongest manner their re- 
 gard for their exiled pastor. In the year 
 361, however, Constantius 
 died of a fever, having re- 
 ceived baptism a little before 
 he expired, from Euzoius ; 
 for, after his father's example, he had de- 
 ferred it till this time.* His character 
 needs no detail : it appeared from his 
 case, that a weak man, armed with des- 
 potic power, was capable of doing incre 
 dible mischief in the Church of Christ. 
 
 Death of 
 
 Anthony 
 the IMonk, 
 
 A. D. 356. 
 
 Constanti- 
 us dies, 
 
 A. D. 361. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A VIEW OF MONASTICISM AND OTHER MIS- 
 CELLANEOUS CIRCUMSTANCES, FROM 
 THE ESTABLISHMENT OF CHRISTIANI- 
 TY UNDER CONST ANTINE, TO THE 
 DEATH OF CONSTANTIUS. 
 
 It seemed most convenient to preserve 
 the connexion of the Arian controversy 
 without interruption. If the evangelical 
 
 * A fact relateJ of him by Theotloret ena- 
 bles us to fix the religious character of tliis 
 prince. Wiien lie was p;oiiig to cany on war 
 with Magnenlius, he exhorted all his soldiers 
 to receive baptism, observing the danger ot 
 dying without that sacred rite, and ordering 
 those to return home who refused to submit to 
 
 reader has not gained much information 
 concerning the spirit of true religion, dur- 
 ing this violent contest, the times and 
 the materials must bear the blame. There 
 were probably, in that whole period, 
 many sincere souls, w^ho mourned in se- 
 cret over the abominations of the age; 
 but history, ever partial to the great, and 
 dazzled with the splendour of kings and 
 bishops, condescends not to notice them. 
 The people of God were in lower life, 
 and remain, therefore, unknown. We 
 left Athanasius in the desert, where he 
 employed the leisure, which the iniquity 
 of the persecution gave him, in visiting 
 the monks. He had been acquainted with 
 their most renowned leader 
 Anthony, but had not the sa- 
 tisfaction to meet with him 
 again, he dying in the begin- 
 ning of the year 356. Let us 
 leave Athanasius and the Arian contro- 
 versy awhile, and see what we can find 
 concerning the monks, and other particu- 
 lars of the dealings of God with his 
 Church in the mean time. 
 
 We are not to form an idea of ancient 
 monks from modern ones. It was a mis- 
 taken thing in holy men of old to retire 
 altogether from the world. But there is 
 every reason to believe the mistake ori- 
 ginated in piety. We often hear it said, 
 How ridiculous to think of pleasing God 
 by austerities and solitude ! Far be it 
 from me to vindicate the superstitions of 
 monks, and particularly the vows of celi- 
 bacy. But the error is very natural, has 
 been reprehended much too severely, and 
 the profaneness of men of the world is 
 abundantly more dangerous. The enor- 
 mous evils of Monasticism are to be as- 
 cribed to its degeneracy in after times, not 
 to its first institution. What could, for 
 instance, be better intentioned, than the 
 determination of Anthony to follow liter- 
 ally our Lord's rule, " Sell what thou 
 hast, and give to the poor"?" Say that 
 he was ignorant and superstitious; he 
 was both : but he persevered to the age 
 of a hundred and five years in volun- 
 tary poverty with admirable consisten- 
 cy. Surely it could be no slight cause 
 that could move a young person of opu- 
 lence to part with all, and live in the ab- 
 stemiousness of a solitary life with such 
 unshaken perseverance. Let us, from the 
 
 it. Not infidelity, but superstition, predomi- 
 nated in Ills mind. Yet how inconsistent, to 
 defer his own baptism so long ! 
 
296 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 memorials of his life, written by Athana- 
 sius, omitting the miracles which the 
 then fashionable credulity imposed on 
 men, endeavour to collect, as far as we 
 can, a just idea of his spirit. 
 
 Athanasius tells us that he had often 
 seen him, and had received information 
 concerning him from his servant. It was 
 a great disadvantage to Anthony's judg- 
 ment, that he was unwilling to be in- 
 structed in literature. There is a me- 
 dium in all things secular. We have 
 seen numbers corrupted by an excess of 
 literary attachments : we see here one 
 misled by the want of proper cultivation. 
 When a youth, he had heard read in the 
 church our Lord's words to the rich young 
 man, and his ignorance led him to sell 
 all, and give to the poor, and enter into 
 the monastic life. Monks, as yet, had 
 not learned to live in perfect deserts un- 
 connected with mankind, and hitherto 
 they lived at a small distance from their 
 own village. Anthony endeavoured to 
 form himself on the severest models, 
 and pushed the genius of solitude to ri- 
 gours before unknown. His fame increas- 
 ed ; he was looked on as a mirror of per- 
 fection, and the Egyptians were studious 
 to follow his example. His instructions 
 to those who listened to him are not, in 
 general, worth transcribing. The faith 
 of Christ is very obscure, at least in the 
 best of them; yet his sincerity is evident; 
 his love to divine things must have been 
 ardent; his conflicts and temptations, 
 which are confusedly written by Athana- 
 sius, demonstrated a mind too humble, 
 and knowing too much of himself, to 
 trust in his own righteousness. He preach- 
 ed well by his life, and temper, and spi- 
 rit, however he might fail in doctrinal 
 knowledge. 
 
 In the persecution by Dioclesian he 
 left his beloved solitude, and came to 
 Alexandria, strengthening the minds of 
 Christian sufferers, exposing himself to 
 danger for the love of the brethren, and 
 yet not guilty of the excess of delivering 
 up himself to martyrdom. In all this 
 there was what was better than the monk, 
 — the sincere and charitable Christian. 
 Nor did he observe to perfection the rules 
 of solitude. There were two sorts of 
 monks, the solitary, and those who lived 
 in societies. Anthony, though he had a 
 strong inclination to follow the first sort 
 altogether, sometimes joined the latter, 
 and even on some occasions appeared in 
 the world. 
 
 The Arian heresy gave him another op- 
 portunity of showing his zeal. He again 
 entered Alexandria and protested against 
 its impiety, which, he observed, was of 
 a piece with heathenism itself. " Be as- 
 sured," said he, "all nature is moved, 
 with indignation against those who reck- 
 on the Creator of all things to be a crea- 
 ture." And this is one circumstance, 
 which convinces me, that genuine godli- 
 ness, the offspring of Christian principles, 
 must have been with the primitive monks, 
 because they generally vindicated the 
 Nicene faith, and could not endure Arian- 
 ism. They must, many of them at least, 
 have felt the motions of the divine life, 
 which will not connect itself with any 
 principles that depreciate the dignity of 
 Jesus Christ. 
 
 In conversing with Pagan philosophers, 
 he observed, Uiat Christianity held the 
 mystery, not in the wisdom of Grecian 
 reasoning, but in the power of faith sup- 
 plied to them from God by Jesus Christ. 
 " Faith," says he, " springs from the af- 
 fection of the mind ; Logic from artificial 
 contrivance. Those who have the ener- 
 gy that is by faith, need not perhaps the 
 demonstration that comes by reasoning." 
 He very justly appealed to the glorious 
 fruits of Christianity in the world, and 
 exhorted the philosophers "to believe 
 and know that the Christian art is not 
 merely verbal, but of faith which work- 
 eth by love, with which ye being once 
 endowed, shall not need demonstrations 
 by arguments, but shall deem these words 
 of Anthony sufficient to lead you to the 
 faith of Christ." 
 
 The evangelical reader will see here 
 something better than mere monasticism.* 
 But he sullied all this by a foolish at- 
 tempt, to make mankind believe, that he 
 lived without food, while he ate in secret, 
 and by a vain parade of conversation con- 
 cerning temperance, which savoured more 
 of Pythagorean fanaticism than of Chris- 
 tian piety. In his extreme old age he 
 gave particular directions, that his body 
 should be interred, not preserved in a 
 house after the Egyptian manner of hon 
 ouring deceased saints and martyrs, and 
 charged his two attendants to let no man 
 know the place of his burial. "At the 
 resurrection of the dead I shall receive 
 
 * Possibly the attentive reader may observe, 
 without my mentioning it, that I have seen, on 
 a closer inspection, reason to tiiiiik better of 
 Anthony, than from liie siiort account of him 
 in p. 243, one migiit seem to conclude. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 MONASTICISM, ETC. 
 
 297 
 
 my body," says he, " from the Saviour in- 
 corruptible." He guarded his friends 
 against the Arian heresy, and bade them 
 not be disturbed, though the judicial pow- 
 er, an imaginary fading domination, should 
 be against them. "Do ye observe what 
 ye have received from the fathers, and 
 particularly the pious faith in our Lord 
 Jesus Christ, which ye have heard from 
 the Scriptures, and of which I have often 
 reminded you. Divide my clothes in 
 this manner : Give one of my sheep-skins 
 to the bishop Athanasius, together with 
 the garment which I received from him 
 when new, and now return him when old. 
 And give the other sheep-skin to Sera- 
 pion the bishop. The sackcloth keep for 
 yourselves," says he to his two attendants. 
 "Farewell, children, Anthony is going, 
 and is no more with you." He stretched 
 out his feet, and appearing pleased at the 
 sight of his friends coming to him, he 
 expired with evident marks of cheerful- 
 ness on his face. His last will was 
 punctually executed. Such was the death 
 of this father of monasticism : the account 
 is taken wholly from his Life by Athana- 
 sius, and is a monument of the genuine 
 piety and deep superstition both of the 
 monk and his biographer. Such was the 
 state of godliness in those times, existing 
 obscure "in hermitages; while abroad in 
 the world the Gospel was almost buried 
 in faction and ambition ; yet probably in 
 ordinary life it thrived the best in some 
 instances, though quite unknown. 
 
 By the assistance of Fleury, it would 
 be easy to enlarge the history of men of 
 this sort. There were others of great 
 monastic renown in the time of Anthony. 
 But their narratives, if true, are neither 
 entertaining nor instructive, and a great 
 part of them at least is stuffed with ex- 
 travagant fables. Let us turn to other 
 objects. At the time when the bishops 
 were travelling to the council of Nice, 
 Licinius, bishop of Casarea in Cappado- 
 cia, in his way thither, arrived at a small 
 town called Nazianzum in Cappadocia. 
 There he met with Gregory, afterwards 
 bishop of Nazianzum, who applied for bap- 
 tism. This man had led a life of great mo- 
 ral strictness, belonging to a particular 
 sect, who observed the Sabbath and a dis- 
 tinction of meats like the Jews. His wife 
 Nona was an exemplary Christian, and 
 was very instrumental in her husband's 
 conversion. There is reason to hope it 
 was a conversion from self-righteous 
 pride to the humble faith of Jesus. Lici- 
 
 nius instructed him : he received baptism, 
 and some years afterwards, was made 
 bishop of the place, and remained in that 
 office forty-five years, to an extreme old 
 age. Though advanced in years, when 
 he applied himself to Christian learning, 
 he accjuired a just discernment, preserved 
 his flock from the spreading infection of 
 Arianisrn, and mollified the manners of 
 the barbarous people. Possibly the me- 
 moirs of his pastoral labours, if we had 
 them, might be found more instructive 
 than most' of the subjects which engage 
 our attention in this period. Gregory's 
 episcopal character commenced about the 
 year 328. And this tribute seemed due 
 to his memory and to that of his wife, not 
 only on their own accounts, but also be- 
 cause they were the parents of the famous 
 Gregory of Nazianzum, who in an oration 
 celebrates their piety. 
 
 If we look to the situation of the an- 
 cient heretics, we find them in a dwind- 
 ling state. The followers of Marcion, 
 Valentinian, and the rest, still subsisted 
 indeed, and an edict of Constantine for- 
 bade their assembling together. Under 
 this act of Uniformity the Novatians were 
 condemned also. Thus the best of the 
 Dissenters were not permitted to worship 
 in their own way, while the Donatists, 
 the worst, were in a manner tolerated. 
 But in vain do we look either for wisdom 
 or equity in the ecclesiastical proceed- 
 ings of Constantine or any of his family 
 in general. Two only of the persecuted 
 sects, the INIeletians and the Donatists, 
 were not mentioned in the edict, as far as 
 one can judge, and, in consequence of 
 this omission, they subsisted,and weather- 
 ed the force of the decree. The old here- 
 sies were crushed, while the enthusiastic 
 Montanists maintained their hold in their 
 native Phrygia, and the Novatians re- 
 mained still numerous, retaining narrow 
 views of church discipline, and with these 
 a considerable strictness of manners, and 
 it is hoped, the good influence of the Di- 
 vine Spirit. But we want better materi- 
 als for the history of this people. 
 
 At the very time, when Athanasius was 
 persecuted at Tyre, and was thou ^ht un- 
 worthy to live at Alexandria, the bishops 
 were employed also in dediciting the 
 church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusa- 
 lem. Its magificence was a monument 
 of the ostentatious superstition of Con- 
 stantine. It is foreign to our design to 
 describe its expensive pomp. On this 
 occasion, Jerusalem, which from the time 
 
298 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 of Adrian had been called in ^lia,* re 
 covered its name, became the resort of 
 Christian pilgrims, was vainly represent- 
 edf by some as the new Jerusalem de- 
 scribed by the prophets, and was held in 
 great veneration by sermons, acts of li- 
 berality, and panegyrics on the emperor. 
 In these things the historian Eusebius 
 was signally distinguished. Here Arius 
 was received ; and thus that scripture 
 was fulfilled concerning the hypocrisy of 
 professors of religion in the Christian 
 times, "Your brethren, that hated you, 
 and cast you out for my name's sake, 
 said. Let the Lord be glorified. "ij; The 
 enmity against real godliness was var- 
 nished with a parade of external piety; 
 pomp supplied the room of sincerity, and 
 formality usurped the place of spiritual 
 understanding. 
 
 Not long before his death, Constantine 
 wrote to Anthony the monk, and begged 
 an answer. The reflection which he made 
 an the occasion showed at once his ig- 
 norance of secular affairs, and his know- 
 ledge of divine things. Bo not astonish- 
 ed, says he, if an emperor writes to us. 
 He is but a man : rather be astonished, 
 that God should write a book for man, 
 and deliver it to us by his own Son. He 
 answered the emperor, desiring him not 
 to esteem present things, to think of the 
 future judgment, to remember that Jesus 
 Christ is the true and eternal king ; to be 
 be merciful, to do justice, and particularly 
 to take care of the poor. 
 
 Under Constantius an attempt was 
 made to re-unite the Donatists to the gen- 
 eral church. The consequence was, that 
 a number were formally recovered to it. 
 The body of them remained, what they 
 always were, an unworthy people, and 
 they had among them a sort of wild li- 
 centious persons called Circumcelliones, 
 who were very violent and ferocious in 
 their conduct. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE EXTENSION OF THE GOSPEL, FROM 
 THE BEGINNING OF THE CENTURY, 
 TO THE DEATH OF CONSTANTIUS. 
 
 This should be the favourite object of 
 a Christian historian, and glad should I 
 be to answer the most sansruine wishes of 
 
 • ^lia Capitolina, because rebuilt by JElius 
 Adriaiius. 
 t Fleury, B. XI. 54. * Isaiah Ixvi. 5. 
 
 the evangelical reader. But the period 
 before us is far more fruitful in ecclesiasti- 
 cal contentions than remarkable for the 
 extension of Christianity itself; and even 
 the account which we have of the trophies 
 of the Redeemer's death and resurrection, 
 in the barbarous countries, is too mean 
 and defective, to satisfy the laudable 
 curiosity of those who love the progress 
 of vital religion. 
 
 About the beginning of the century, a 
 Tyrian philosopher, named Meropius, 
 possessed of the spirit of travelling, ex- 
 plored the interior parts of India.* He 
 took with him two boys, his relations, 
 who understood the Greek tongue. Ar- 
 riving at a certain harbour, the natives 
 murdered the whole company, except the 
 two boys, who were presented to the 
 king, and finding favour in his eyes, 
 were promoted in his court. Upon the 
 king's death, the queen dowager engaged 
 them to superintend the affairs of the 
 realm, and the education of the young" 
 prince. Their names were ^Edesius and 
 Frumentius. But the latter was prime 
 minister. f The man, however, had his 
 eyes fixed on higher objects than the po- 
 litics of the country. He met with some 
 Roman merchants, who traded there, and 
 asked them if they found any Christians 
 in the kingrdom. Having discovered some 
 by their means, he encouraged them to 
 associate for the purposes of religious 
 worship, and at length erected a church 
 for their use, and certain natives, instruct- 
 ed in the Gospel, were converted to the 
 faith. On the king's accession to the 
 admmistration, Frumentius desired leave 
 to return to his own country, which both 
 the king and his mother were very re- 
 luctant to allow. He left the country, 
 however, with ^desius. The latter re- 
 turned to his relations at Tyre, while Fru- 
 mentius, arriving at Alexandria, commu- 
 nicated his adventures to Athanasius the 
 
 • I follow the narrative of Socrates,B. I. c. 19. 
 But what he calls India, seems to have been 
 tiie kingdom of Abyssinia, which at this day 
 calls itself Christian, and glories in the evan- 
 gelical labours of its first bisliop Frumentius ; 
 ihough it appears, from the account of Bruce, 
 in his voyage to discover tiie source of tha 
 Nile, to have long remained in the deepest ig- 
 norance and vice. 
 
 t Bruce would call him the Ras. The 
 whole story carries a strong air of probabili- 
 ty, from the resemblance of the customs in this 
 Indian kingdom to tliose of Abyssinia; which 
 seems to confirm the conjecture, that the India 
 of Socrates was Abyssinia. 
 
Ckst. IV.] 
 
 EXTENSION OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 299 
 
 bishop, and informed him of the proba- 
 bility of evangelizing' the country, if mis- 
 sionaries were sent thither. On mature 
 consideration Athanasius told him, that 
 none was so fit for the office as himself. 
 He consecreated him, therefore, the first 
 bishop of the Indians ; and this active 
 missionary, returning to a country where 
 his integrity and capacity had already 
 been distinguished, preached the Gospel 
 with much success, and erected many 
 churches. Thus was the Gospel planted 
 in a barbarous kingdom, where the ex- 
 treme ignorance of the natives would much 
 facilitate its external progress at least, 
 under the episcopal labours of a man who 
 had educated their sovereign; then at 
 least, most probably, there were many 
 real conversions, and a time of copious 
 effusion of the Spirit of God.* And the 
 difficulty of access to this region, which 
 has since proved so prejudicial to the ad- 
 vancement of knowledge among its in- 
 habitants, was at that time a happy pre- 
 servative to the infant church. It was in 
 vain, that Constantius laboured to poison 
 it with his beloved Arianism. He gave 
 orders that Frumentius should be de- 
 posed, and that an Arian successor should 
 be appointed ; but the country was hap- 
 pily out of the reach of his imperial 
 bigotry. 
 
 The Iberians were a people bordering 
 on the Black Sea, who, in some military 
 excursion, took prisoner a pious Christian 
 woman, whose sanctity of manners en- 
 gaged the respect of these barbarians. 
 Socrates mentions several miracles which 
 God wrought by her means.| The credi- 
 bility of such divine interpositions much 
 depends on the importance of circum- 
 stances. " Nee Deus intersit, nisi dignus 
 vindice nodus," is a rule of Horace full of 
 good sense, and as applicable to theology 
 as to poetry. What so likely to affect the 
 minds of an ignorant people as miracles'? 
 The situation of things rendered it proba- 
 ble, that such divine interpositions might 
 take place; but I shall mention only 
 those, which may seem worthy of some 
 credit. A child of the kinof's was sent to 
 
 * Theabsolute despotism of the Abyssinian 
 princes, and the probability that tbe Sovereign 
 before us received Christianity, would account 
 for the establishment of the Gospel through 
 the M-hole country. And the inaccessible si- 
 tuation and profound ignorance of Abyssinia, 
 will account for the continuance of nominal 
 Christianity to this day. 
 
 t B. I. c. 20. 
 
 the women of the country to be cured, if 
 any of them knew a proper method of 
 treating it — a well-known ancient custom. 
 The case baffled the skill of them all, and 
 the child was committed to the captive 
 woman. " Christ," said she, " who heal- 
 ed many, will also heal this infant." She 
 prayed, and he recovered. In the same 
 manner the queen herself was healed of a 
 distemper some time after. " It is not my 
 work," said she, " but that of Christ the 
 Son of God, the maker of the world." 
 The king sent her presents in token of 
 his gratitude. But she sent them back, 
 assuring him, that " godliness was her 
 riches, and that she should look on it, as 
 the noblest present, if he would worship 
 the God whom she adored." The next 
 day the king was lost in hunting in a 
 thick mist, and implored in vain the aid 
 of his gods. In his distress, recollecting 
 the words of the woman, he prayed to the 
 God whom she worshipped. The mist 
 was instantly dispersed, and the king 
 found his way home. In consequence of 
 this event, and of future conferences with 
 the woman, both the king and queen em- 
 braced the Gospel, and exhorted their 
 subjects to receive it. An embassy was 
 sent to Constantine to desire that pastors 
 might be commissioned to instruct them. 
 The emperor gave the ambassadors a very 
 gracious reception. 
 
 It is proper to add here, on the autho- 
 rity of Philostorgius, that Constantius 
 sent ambassadors to the Sabeans of Ara- 
 bia Felix, demanding that the Roman na- 
 vigators and inhabitants might build 
 Christian churches, and that he furnished 
 them with money for the purpose. The- 
 ophilus, an Indian, who had long been 
 with Constantine in the capacity of a 
 hostage, was ordained bishop by Eus&- 
 bius of Nicomedia, and sent among the 
 Sabeans ; he erected churches, and spread 
 at least the name of Christianity to a cer- 
 tain degree. 
 
 The ecclesiastical accounts of Britain 
 are so fabulous, or at best so scanty, that 
 it is a pleasure to be able to relate any 
 thing that has the marks of historical au- 
 thenticity. At the council of Ariminum, 
 held on account of the Arian heresy, the 
 emperor Constantius gave orders to sup- 
 ply the expenses of the bishops out of the 
 public treasury. While the rest accepted 
 the imperial munificence, the bishops of 
 Gaul and Britain thought it unbecoming 
 the ecclesiastical character to receive se- 
 cular maintenance, and bore their own 
 
300 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 expenses. Only three from Britain were 
 so poor, that they were unable to main- 
 tain themselves. Their brethren offered 
 by a contribution to supply their wants; 
 but they chose rather to be obliiffed to the 
 emperor's bounty, than to burthen their 
 brethren. Gavidius, a French liishop, re- 
 proached them for this; but Severus, the 
 relater of the story, thinks it was a cir- 
 cumstance much redoundinor to their cre- 
 dit.* So I apprehend it will appear to the 
 reader, and we regret that where there 
 are such evident vestiges of primitive and 
 disinterested simplicity, Ave should know 
 so little of the lives and characters of 
 men quite remote from the scenes of ec- 
 clesiastical turbulence and ambition. Pro- 
 bably in our island the Gospel flourished 
 at this time in humble obscurity. 
 
 Christianity was spreading itself be- 
 yond the Roman empire. The nations 
 bordering on the Rhine, with the remotest 
 parts of France, were now Christian ; and 
 the Goths near the Danube, about sixty 
 jrears before, had been civilized at least, 
 by the Christian religion, through the 
 bishops whom they had carried captive 
 under Gallienus; and most probably the 
 Spirit of God was with their labours. 
 Armenia under its king Tiridates had 
 embraced Christianity, f and by means of 
 commerce had conveyed it into Persia, 
 where Christians began to be numerous. 
 
 But there they sustained a very griev- 
 ous persecution from king Sapor, in the 
 time of Constantino; a long account of 
 which we have in Sozomen.^ The rea- 
 der has seen many things of the same 
 kind in former persecutions; I shall only 
 observe therefore in general, that thou- 
 sands chose rather to suffer for the name 
 of Christ, than to pollute themselves with 
 the worship of the sun; that the Magi 
 and the Jews were peculiarly instrumen- 
 tal in this persecution ; and that the peo- 
 ple of God suffered here with so much 
 sincerity and fortitude, as to evince that 
 the Lord had many people belonging to 
 himself in Persia. 
 
 * Sulpit. Scv. B. II. c. 55. 
 
 -j- Armenia had probably long before lieen 
 in some measure evangelized. It was not, 
 however, till the conimeneement of ibis <en- 
 tui'v tliat Gregory, surnamed Tlie Knligbtener, 
 establistied ibe Gospel there, 'riirougb bis 
 means Tiridates and all his nobks were 
 brought over to the profession of Clu'istianity. 
 He was consecrated bisiiop of Armenia by 
 Leontius bishop of Cappadocia. Mosheim, 
 Cent. IV. 
 
 t B. II. c. <J, &c. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE DECLINE OF IDOLATRY IN THIS 
 CENTURY, TO THE DEATH OF CON- 
 STANTIUS. 
 
 It was the character of the ancient 
 Romans to be excessively superstitious. 
 While their arms prospered through Eu- 
 rope and Asia, they were vigilant and 
 punctual in all the offices of their religion, 
 and studious of adopting the gods of the 
 nations whom they conquered, as well as 
 their improvements in arts and sciences. 
 This religious spirit was the nurse at 
 least, if not the parent, of many social 
 virtues; industry, frugality, valour, and 
 patriotism, coalesced with superstition. 
 With the learning of Greece, at length, 
 her philosophical scepticisin and Epicu- 
 rean profaneness were incorporated into 
 the Roman commonwealth, and were at- 
 tended with their usual vices of luxury 
 and dissipation. The vulgar still be- 
 lieved, as senators and equestrians Avere 
 wont to do; the college of Augurs, the 
 whole apparatus of idolatry, remained in 
 all their pomp and formality ; and the 
 Sfreatest noblemen thou<jht themselves 
 dignified by the priesthood, while they 
 inwardly despised what they professed 
 with fictitious reverence. 
 
 Little did they think, when a few 
 fishermen and mechanics of Judea began 
 to preach Christ crucified, that the Chris- 
 tian religion was destined to overturn the 
 idolatrous establishment of ages. By cur 
 present familiarity with Christian usages, 
 and by the perfect, annihilation of Pagan 
 phenomena, we are not prepared to ad- 
 mire so much the work of God in the pro- 
 pagation of his own religion, as it de- 
 serves. Were the matter fully considered, 
 it would strike every mind with convic- 
 tion, that the hand of the Lord hath done 
 this. That zeal, which pliilosophy had 
 cooled, revived in the minds of polythe- 
 Ists, and produced persecution, as Chris- 
 tianity spread through the nations. A su- 
 perstitious teinper in many of the great 
 and the learned succeeded to the scepti- 
 cal turn of mind, and mere philosophers 
 themselves, through carnal enmity and 
 political selfishness, aided the intolerant 
 spirit with all their might. We have 
 seen how the Gospel still triumphed 
 without secular support, and have already 
 taken notice of one strong symptom of 
 the decline of Paganism toward the end 
 
Ckxt. IV.] 
 
 DECLINE OF IDOLATRY. 
 
 301 
 
 The Pla- 
 tonic 
 School of 
 Ammo- 
 nius. 
 
 of the second centurj-, namely, that a new 
 race of philosophers arose, who atternpt- 
 ed to form an alliance with Christianity. 
 These new Platonics all own- 
 ed Ammonius for their mas- 
 ter, who, as Ensebius tells 
 us, professed the Gospel to 
 the end of his life. So plainly 
 did Satan feel his inability to 
 crush the Gospel, that he was contented 
 now with labouring to adulterate and un- 
 dermine it. From this school proceeded 
 Porphyry,* born at Tyre, whose life is 
 written by Eunapius. He studied six 
 j'-ears at Rome under Plotinus, whose 
 Life he published, Socrates tells us,| 
 that in his early days he was a Christian; 
 but having been beaten by some Chris- 
 tians at CtBsarea, through disgust he re- 
 linquished the Gospel. Its hold on his 
 mind must have been extremely weak, 
 when he could be induced to leave it be- 
 cause of the unworthy conduct of some 
 nominal believers. But let Augustine's 
 reflection be heard on this occasion, who 
 thus addresses him: "If ever you had 
 truly and cordially loved divine wisdom, 
 you would have known Christ the power 
 of God, and the wisdom of God; nor 
 would you ever have revolted from his 
 most wholesome humility, through the 
 pride of vain knowledge." There remain 
 only some fragments of his fifteen books 
 against the Christians. He shows in 
 them the same malignant spirit which 
 Celsus did, but with superior abilities; 
 for his capacity and learning were both 
 very eminent. 
 
 In his old age he published a work on 
 the Philosophy of Oracles, which has 
 been denied to be his, because he speaks 
 in it very honourably of Christianity, and 
 utters sentiments which one would not 
 expect from a man Vv-ho had spent a long 
 life in virulent animosity against the fol- 
 lowers of Jesus. This enmity is often 
 as strong where it is covered, as when it 
 is open; and circumstances will dictate a 
 great variety in men's ways of showing or 
 concealing it. During the Dioclesian per- 
 secution, philosophers were not ashamed 
 to persecute. Hierocles has been mention- 
 ed, who as a magistrate tortured the 
 Christians, and rs a philosopher wrote 
 against them. If he lived to see Chris- 
 
 * See Laidner's Collection, under the arti- 
 cle rorpliyry. From him I have derived in- 
 i'orniation on this subject, tiioiigh obliged to 
 dissent entirely from his opinion. 
 
 + 13.111.0.23. 
 
 Vol. I. 2 
 
 tianity established under Constantine, it 
 is not improbable, provided he wrote at 
 all on the subject, that he wrote as Por- 
 phyry does in the work before us. World- 
 ly men are moved by good success to ad- 
 mire, by bad to contemn. Even their 
 opinions are superficially swayed by these 
 external things, and yet the latent frame 
 of their spirits remains the same. Por- 
 phyry lived, we are told, to an advanced 
 age ; and as his work, styled the Philoso- 
 phy of Oracles, points out the Gospel to 
 be then the prevalent religion, it was pro- 
 bably his last production; and Eunapius 
 owns he left sentiments in his last works 
 different from the former. Yet he never 
 seems with Ammonius to have professed 
 Christianity since his early apostasy. 
 But he confesses that the Barbarians 
 were much in the right, and the Greeks 
 in the wrong. He tells us of Apollo's 
 oracular answers concerning Christ, that 
 his soul after death was immortal, that 
 he was pious and holy, though ignorant 
 Christians do wrong to worship him. 
 Augustine thinks,* that these oracles 
 were invented on purpose to disparage 
 the Christians, by representing them as 
 being allied with Satan. The oracle, 
 wherher carried on by Satanic or human 
 fraud, or what seems nearest the truth, 
 by both, would doubtless have a tenden- 
 cy by this means to asperse Christianity. 
 At the same time to praise Christ and to 
 blame his followers, may be conceived to 
 be the natural language of an enemy of 
 God, lying under some restraint ; and it 
 has been the common conduct of infidels 
 in our days, who, had they lived in per- 
 secuting times, with Celsus would have 
 as freely expressed their contempt of 
 Christ as of his people. Christians are, 
 however, represented by Porphyry as cor- 
 rupt and erroneous, while their master is 
 honoured as divine. From this view of 
 Porphyry, one may learn something of 
 the policy of Satan and his embsaries 
 in the support of a dying cause. The de- 
 cay of Paganism is evident, and the arts 
 of philosophic infidelity were then what 
 they are now. Men who know the value 
 of divine truth should guard against these 
 devices, and not suffer themselves to be 
 seduced by an ambiguous and insiduous 
 candour. At the same time the progress 
 of error in proud men is strongly illus- 
 trated in the case of Porphyry. Men, 
 who have no real experience of the pow- 
 
 ■■ Civit. Dei. B. XIX. 
 
302 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VIH. 
 
 er of godliness, are easily induced to give 
 up its form : if they be men of parts and 
 learning, they are led from one delusion 
 to another, till they advance to the far- 
 thest limit of malevolence and enmity. 
 Checked they may be by circumstances, 
 and may talk respectfully of Christ to 
 the last ; but unless humbled and brought 
 to know themselves, they will live and 
 die the same. 
 
 The first measures of Constantine, af- 
 ter this success in Italy, were to place 
 Christianity on an equal footing with Pa- 
 ganism by the laws, while he gradually 
 patronized the Church more 
 Policy of ^^^ more. Among other im- 
 tine.^""" provements in the political 
 and judiciary state of the em- 
 pire, he abolished the barbarous punish- 
 ment of crucifixion. After he was be- 
 come sole master of the empire, he for- 
 bade the private exercise of divination, 
 the great bulwark of false religion, still 
 allowing the public use of it at the altars 
 and temples ; and sometime after he pro- 
 hibited the worst branches of sorcery and 
 magic* He took particular care to se- 
 cure the observation of the Lord's day, 
 and ordered it to be set apart for prayer 
 and holy exercises. He openly declared, 
 that he would not oblige men to be Chris- 
 tians, though he earnestly desired they 
 would become so; nor did he abolish the 
 rites of the temples. Finding, however, 
 the Pagans extremely obstinate in the 
 preservation of their superstitions, he 
 publicly exposed the mysteries which 
 had hitherto been kept secret, melted 
 down golden statues, and caused brazen 
 ones to be drawn by ropes through the 
 streets of Constantinople. And some of 
 the temples which had been scenes of 
 horrible wickedness he destroyed. 
 
 In Egypt, the famous cubit, with which 
 the priests were wont to measure the 
 height of the Nile, was kept in the tem- 
 ple of Serapis. This by Constantine'sl 
 order was removed to the church at Alex- 
 andria. The Pagans beheld the removal 
 with indignation, and ventured to predict, 
 that the Nile would no longer overflow 
 its banks. Divine Providence, however, 
 favoured the schemes of Constantine, 
 and the Nile the next year overflowed 
 the country in an uncommon degree. In 
 this gradual manner was Paganism over 
 turned ; sacrifices in a partial manner still 
 
 continued, but the entire destruction of 
 idolatry seemed to be at hand. The tem- 
 ples stood for the most part, though much 
 defaced and deprived of their former dig- 
 nity and importance. The sons of Con- 
 stantine trode in his steps, and gradually 
 proceeded in the demolition of Paganism. 
 Under them we find an express edict for 
 the abolition of sacrifices. 
 
 Magnentius, the usurper, while master 
 of Rome, allowed the Gentiles to cele- 
 brate their sacrifices in the night; but 
 Constantius immediately after his victory 
 took away this indulgence, and solemnly 
 prohibited magic in all its various forms. 
 He also took away the altar and image 
 of Victory which stood in the portico 
 of the Capitol. In truth, this emperor 
 was by no means wanting in zeal against 
 idolatry, though his unhappy controver- 
 sial spirit in defence of Arianism render- 
 ed him rather an enemy than a friend to 
 vital godliness. 
 
 Such was the state of Paganism at the 
 death of Constantius. Pagans were, 
 however, exceedingly numerous, and en- 
 joyed with silent pleasure the long and 
 shameful scenes of Arian controversy 
 in the church. Nor were they hopeless. 
 The eyes of the votaries of the gods were 
 all directed to his successor, the warlike, 
 the enterprising, the zealous Julian, a de- 
 termined foe of the Gospel. Great things 
 had been done for the church ; but its 
 rulers of the house of Constantine were 
 weak, and void of true piety. In the 
 warm imaginations of many zealous de- 
 votees, even Jupiter himself seemed like- 
 ly TO GROW TERRIBLE AGAIN, AND BE AGAIN 
 
 ADORED. Tliis last struggle of expiring 
 Paganism, marked as it is with signal 
 instances of Providence, will deserve par- 
 ticular attention. 
 
 * Cave's State of Paganism under the first 
 Christian Emperors. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Julian's attempts to restore idol- 
 atry. 
 A GREATKR zcalot for Paganism than 
 Julian is not to be found in the history of 
 mankind. Temper, talents, power, and 
 resentment, all conspired to cherish his 
 superstitious attachments. It may serve 
 to illustrate the providential care of God 
 over his church, and by way of contrast 
 it may heighten our ideas of that Gospel 
 simplicity, with which we have seen di- 
 vine truth to be supported and advanced, 
 
CE!fT. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 303 
 
 to behold the serpentine arts with which 
 the prince of darkness was permitted to 
 attempt the restoration of his kingdom 
 by the hand of .lulian. For I can by no 
 means subscribe to the character, which 
 Mosheim* gives us of the mediocrity of 
 his genius. Whoever duly attends to the 
 plan which he formed to subvert Chris- 
 tianity, will see the union of a solid judg- 
 ment with indefatigable assiduity. Nei- 
 ther address nor dexterity was wanted. 
 All that the wit and prudence of man 
 could do was attempted. He was highly 
 superstitious indeed, and addicted to ma- 
 gic beyond all bounds. Nor are these, 
 as Mosheim thinks, any tokens of natu- 
 ral meanness of spirit. Alexander the 
 
 read the New Testament with attentioq, 
 and prayed over it with seriousness, he 
 might have seen that the doctrines there 
 inculcated led to a conduct very opposite 
 to that which he beheld in the then lead- 
 ers of the Christian world, both civil and 
 ecclesiastical. A tenth part of the study, 
 which he employed on the profane clas- 
 sics, might have sufficed for this. But 
 like many infidels in all ages, he does not 
 seem to have paid any attention to the 
 Scriptures, nor even to have known what 
 their doctrines really are. From his youth 
 he practised dissimulation with consum- 
 mate artifice. One Maximus, a noted 
 philosopher and magician, confirmed him 
 in his ])agan views ; he secretly held cor- 
 
 Great was as magnanimous by nature as respondence with Libanius, the pagan 
 
 any of the sons of men ; yet was he as 
 superstitious as Julian himself. The de- 
 sire of weighing characters in modern 
 scales, is apt to betray men of learning 
 into a false judgment both of persons and 
 things. Let it then fairly be allowed, 
 what indeed his works and actions in 
 general, as well as his artful and judicious 
 opposition to the Gospel, evince, that 
 Julian was a man of very great parts and 
 endowments. He died about the same 
 age with Alexander; neither of them had 
 attained that maturity of judgment, which 
 full experience gives to the human mind. 
 And yet in them both the world beheld 
 uncommon exertions of genius and capa- 
 city. If Julian failed, let it be remem- 
 bered, that his arms were levelled against 
 Heaven; and it is of no service to Chris- 
 tianity, to depreciate the talents of its 
 enemies. 
 
 Constantius ought to have reflected, 
 that by cruelty and injustice in sacrificing 
 the relations of Julian, he excited his ha- 
 tred against Christianity. The case of 
 Julian deserves commiseration, though it 
 cannot admit of apology. What had he 
 seen excellent or comely in the eflfects of 
 the Gospel on his uncle or cousins'? What 
 a prospect did he behold in the face of the 
 Christian church, torn with factions, and 
 deformed by ambition ! The same vices 
 under which the heathen world groaned, 
 appeared but too visible at present among 
 Christians. These things, joined with 
 the resentment of family wrongs, deter- 
 mined him early in life in favour of the 
 old religion. He was made a public reader 
 in the church of Nicomedia, and affected 
 a zeal for Christianity during the greatest 
 part of the reign of Constantius. Had he 
 
 Julian suc- 
 ceeds CoD- 
 stantius, 
 A. D. 361. 
 
 * Mosli. Ecclesiast. Cent. iv. 
 
 sophist ; and openly attempted to erect a. 
 church; he studied all day, and sacri- 
 ficed at night. He offered up his prayers 
 in the church in public, and at midnight 
 rose to perform his devotions to Mercury. 
 His residence at Athens completed his 
 knowledge of the fashionable philosophy ; 
 in fine, no person was ever more admira- 
 bly qualified to act the part which he did, 
 when he succeeded Constantius. 
 
 This happened in the year 36L He 
 ordered the temples to be set open, those 
 that were decayed to be repaired, and 
 new ones to be built, where 
 there was a necessity. He 
 fined the persons who had 
 made use of the materials of 
 the temples which had been 
 demolished, and set apart the money, this 
 way collected, for the erection of new 
 ones. Altars were every where set up, 
 and the whole machinery of Paganism 
 was again brought into use. Altars and 
 fires, blood, perfumes, and priests at- 
 tending their sacrifices, were every where 
 visible'^ and the imperial palace itself had 
 its temple and furniture. The first thing 
 he did every morning was to sacrifice, and 
 by his presence and example he encour- 
 aged the practice among all his subjects. 
 Heathenism held up its head, and Chris- 
 tians were every where insulted. _ He re- 
 l)ealed the laws made against idolatry, 
 and confirmed its ancient honours and 
 privileges. But laws are the least part 
 of what it behooves princes to do, who 
 mean to encourage religion. Apian of 
 conduct, an earnestness of principle, and 
 a system of manners, are needful to sup- 
 port any religious tenets.* The Author, 
 
 * Cave's Slate ot" Paganism under Julian. 
 This writer has given so clear and masterly a 
 
304 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VHI. 
 
 mentioned below, has with great clear- 
 ness illustrated the methods of Julian. 
 Change the object, and let true relisrion 
 be promoted, instead of false, and Julian 
 will preach usefully to Christian princes, 
 and sharne the criminal indifference to all 
 piety, which clouds the crreatest part of 
 the political hemisphere of Europe. 
 
 I. Philosophical infidels, in our own 
 times, when they have found themselves 
 no longer able to support a perfect scep- 
 , ,. , ticism, have borrowed some 
 
 political Christian light, called it na- 
 measures. tural. 
 
 tural, and laboured by the 
 help of that to subvert Chris- 
 tianity itself. We have seen, in part, the 
 same procedure in the Amononian philo- 
 sophers. In Julian this scheme was re- 
 duced to a system ; and he issued out 
 precepts for the support of Heathenism, 
 which in his youth he had learned in the 
 Christian school, though he disavows his 
 obligations to his benefactors. The di- 
 vine excellence of the Gospel, and the 
 extreme malignity of human nature, do 
 each appear hence in a very conspicuous 
 light. To reform Pagranism itself was 
 his first object; to maintain it on the old 
 system of popular belief he saw was 
 irnyjossible. Christian licrht had now 
 rendered pagan darkness visible, its de- 
 formity disgustful, and its absurdity con- 
 temptible. With great importunity did 
 he exhoit magistrates to correct the vices 
 of men, and relieve their miseries, assur- 
 ing them that the gods would reward men 
 for their charitable acts ; that it is our 
 duty to do good to all, even to the worst 
 of rnen and our bitterest enemies ; and 
 that public religion should be supported 
 by a reverential adoration of the images 
 of the gods which were to be looked on as 
 symbols of the gods themselves. Priests, 
 he said, should so live, as to be copies of 
 what they preached by their own lives, 
 and dissolute ones should be expelled from 
 their offices. Not only wicked actions, 
 but obscene and indecent lannfuao-e should 
 be avoided by thern. Xo idle books and 
 •wanton plays, but divine philosophy, 
 should be the object of their serious study; 
 they should learn sacred hymns by heart, 
 should pray thrice or at least twice every 
 day; and when in their turn called on to 
 
 view, 111 eiglit partioilarg, of .Julian's attempts, 
 that I cannot <)f) belter than to tread in his 
 steps. I sl.all Mvail mvself, however, of other 
 helps, Mill r.iither to' illustrate the subject, 
 particularly Julian's own writin<'8. 
 
 attend the temple, they should never de- 
 part from it, but (five up themselves to 
 their office. At other times they should 
 not frequent the fcrum, nor approach the 
 houses of the great, unless with a view 
 of procuring relief for the indigent, or 
 discharging the duties of their office; 
 that in no case thej' should frequent the 
 theatres, nor ever be seen in the company 
 of a charioteer, player, or dancer. In 
 every city the most pious and virtuous 
 should be ordained, without any consi- 
 deration of their circumstances. The 
 godly training of their own families, and 
 their compassionate care for the indigent, 
 would be their best recommendation. 
 The impious Galileans, he observed, by 
 their sing-ular benevolence had strength- 
 ened their party, and Heathenism had 
 suffered by the want of att-jiiUon to these 
 thinsrs. 
 
 Such was the fire which the apostate 
 stole from heaven, and such his artifice 
 in managing it! The rules, however, de- 
 serve the attention of Christian pastors 
 in all ages, though it may seern wonder- 
 ful that the Roman high priest* should 
 not see the divinity of that religion 
 whence he had learned such excellent 
 things, the like to which are not in any 
 degree to be found in Plato or any other 
 of his favourite Greeks. He endeavour- 
 ed, in imitation of Christians, also to 
 erect schools for the education of youth. 
 Lectures of religion, stated times of pray- 
 ers, monasteries for devout persons, hos- 
 pitals and almshouses for the poor and 
 diseased, and for strangers ; these things 
 he particularly recommends in a letter to 
 Arsacius the chief priest of Galacia. He 
 tells him what it was that advanced the 
 impious religion of the Christians, their 
 kindness to strangers, their care in bury- 
 ing the dead, and tlieir aff'ected gravity. 
 He bids him warn the priests to avoid 
 play-houses and taverns, and sordid em- 
 ployments. Hospitals should be erected 
 in every city for the reception of all sorts 
 of indigent persons. The Galileans, he 
 observes, relieve both their own poor, 
 and ours. I 
 
 * All the Ciesars weie entitleil I'oiitit'ex 
 Maximiis. 
 
 + In the same spirit, sppakinj^of the duties 
 of a priest, he observes, " that the ^ods have 
 given us great hofies after death, anil on them 
 we may with confidence rely." He certainly 
 learnt this language from Christianity, which 
 he ungralefiilly labours to destroy. A species 
 of behaviour not uncommon with philosophic 
 infidels. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 305 
 
 It was not, however, in Julian's power 
 to infuse that spirit into his partisans, 
 which alone could produce such excellent 
 fruits. It is vain to think of destroy- 
 ing Christian principles, and at the same 
 time preserving Christian practice. But 
 here is an additional testimony to the vir- 
 tues of Christians from their most deter- 
 mined enemy, and as powerful an illus- 
 tration of the work of God in the first 
 ages of C hristianity. It must be confessed 
 at the same time, that the good sense and 
 penetration of the emperor are as con- 
 spicuous as his malice and impiety. 
 
 II. Ridicule was the next weapon 
 which the apostate made tise of against 
 Christianitv. It is a method of attack 
 which in all asfes has been but too suc- 
 cessful. Satire, as it is the easiest, so it 
 is the most pleasing mode of writing ; the 
 whole nature of man, prone to indulge 
 ideas of evil, favours the practice, and 
 when written by an emperor, who might, 
 if he had pleased, have used violence of 
 the most formidable kind, it seemed to be 
 the dictate of generosity. In writing 
 against Christianity, he trode in the steps 
 of Celsus and Porphyry, and by the few 
 fragments of his work which remain, ap- 
 pears to have imbibed their spirit. The 
 Son of Mary, or the Galilean, were the 
 titles which he gave to the blessed Jesus, 
 and he ordered Christians to be called 
 Galileans. 
 
 In his treatise of the Ceesars, he asper- 
 ses his uncle the great Constant! ne with 
 much severity, and represents the Gospel 
 as an asvlum for the vilest of mankind. 
 No doubt the enemies of God were de- 
 lighted in that age with such productions. 
 as thev have since been with similar ones 
 of Hume and Voltaire : and many are 
 slow to learn, that a serious frajne of 
 mind is absolutely necessary for the con- 
 templation of Christianity, and is as fa- 
 vourable for its reception, as a playful 
 spirit is for its exclusion from the mind 
 of man. 
 
 III. He was extremely politic in weak- 
 ening the power and interest of Chris- 
 tians. He made an act of sacrifice the 
 condition of preserving their places of 
 honour and authority, and thus he either 
 lessened their power or their reputation; 
 and while he caretully avoided a formal 
 persecution, he indirectly persecuted un- 
 der every plausible pretence he could in 
 vent. Whoever had distinguished him- 
 self, under the former reigns, in demolish- 
 ing the monuments of idolatry, felt his 
 
 2c2 
 
 heavy hand, and was even put to death 
 on frivolous accusations. The grants 
 made to some subjects from the revenues 
 of heatheu temples, furnished a decent 
 opportuiiitv of impoverishing the opulent 
 Christians, and this often with extreme 
 injustice. He seized the treasures of the 
 Arian church at Edessa which had as- 
 saulted the Valentinian heretics, taunting 
 them with the law of their religion, that 
 being made poor here they might be rich 
 hereafter. Injuries were now committed 
 with impunity against the Christians by 
 the governors of provinces, and when the 
 former complained, he had the baseness 
 to turn the knowledge of Christian pre- 
 cepts, which he had imbibed in his tender 
 years, into a cruel sarcasm : '* You know 
 what directions of passiveness under in- 
 juries your Clirist lias given you !"' To 
 this he added an affected encouragement 
 of heretics and sectaries, and thus artfully 
 embroiled the Christian world with fac- 
 tions b}' toleration of them all, without 
 real aflection for any. 
 
 IV. It was, however, a refinement of 
 policy far beyond the maxims of that age, 
 and a proof of the native sagacity and good 
 sense of Julian, that, young and impetu- 
 ous as he was, he could abstain from open 
 persecution himself, and yet connive at it 
 in others, who knew what was agreeable 
 to their master. He boasted of mildness 
 in this respect, and contrasted himself 
 with Galeriusand the rest of the persecu- 
 tors, observing, that they had augmented 
 rather than lessened the number of Chris- 
 tians. For give them only occasion, said 
 he, and they will crowd as fast to mar- 
 tyrdom as bees fly to their hives. Yet a 
 number suflered for the Gospel under his 
 reign, though not by tlie forms of avowed 
 persecution. 
 
 V. The bishops and inferior clergy 
 were beheld with an eye of rancour, at 
 once ingenious and determined. In truth, 
 they are in all ages the object of peculiar 
 malevolence to men who love darkness 
 rather than light. Persecuting emperors 
 and atheistical philosophers unite in this 
 respect. It is the glory of the Christian 
 religion, that it provides popular instruc- 
 tion for the bulk of mankind, where not 
 applause, but spiritual utility, — not os- 
 tentation, but holy and virtuous princi- 
 pies and practice. — are the objects of at- 
 tention. Persecutors desire, lliat no in- 
 struction be instilled into the minds of 
 the people, and philosophers, overlook- 
 ing tiie vulgar with proud disdain, confine 
 
306 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VHI. 
 
 their attention to a few learned men. If 
 the Gospel be indeed the litrht of heaven, 
 that alone leads men to holiness, which 
 fallen natnre abhors, one sees at once why 
 the public teachers of Christianity are ab- 
 horred by the proud and the mighty. Ju- 
 lian charged them with seditiousness ; had 
 he been a citizen of a free state, he would, 
 with equal falsehood and with equal ma- 
 lice, have charged them with supporting 
 tyranny. To deprive the church of the 
 inspection of its pastors, he seized their 
 incomes, abrogated their immunities, ex- 
 posed them to civil burdens and offices, and 
 occasionally expelled them by fraud or 
 yiolence. At Antioch the treasures of the 
 church were seized, the clergy obliged to 
 flee, and the churches shut up.* The 
 same was done at Cyzicus without any 
 shadow of sedition. At Bostra he threat- 
 ened Titus the bishop, that if any mutiny 
 happened, he should lay the blame on him 
 and his clergy ; and when the bishop as- 
 sured him, that though the inhabitants 
 were chiefly Christian, they lived peace- 
 ably and quietly under his government, 
 he wrote back to the city, charging him 
 with calumniating their character, and 
 exhorting them to expel him. In other 
 places he found pretences for imprisoning 
 and torturing the pastors. 
 
 VI. The vigilant malice of the apostate 
 surveyed every advantage, and seized it 
 witli consummate dexterity. Nor can the 
 enemies of the Gospel in any age find a 
 school more fruitful in the lessons of per- 
 secution than this before us. A man so 
 perfectly Grecian as this emperor, must 
 have hated or despised the Jews, and 
 Moses must have been as really an object 
 of his derision as St. Paul. But to ad- 
 
 * It is certain that tlie temple of Daphne 
 was burned in the niglit which terminated the 
 procession of tlie Christians, who had removed 
 the body of Bal)ylas, a martyr in tiie Decian 
 persecution, to Antiotli from Dapline, where 
 Julian would not suffer it to remain any long- 
 er. Julian, in his satire against the people of 
 Antioch, indirectly charged the Christians 
 with the fact, and was glad of the pretence 
 to justify his severities against them. That 
 he suspected them, Ammianus assures us, hut 
 gives no grounds to justify the suspicion. The 
 work entitled Misopognn, rallies the manners 
 of the Antiochians. Tiiose of tlie emperor 
 were austere, and void not only of pomp, hut 
 even of decent neatness. Theirs were full of 
 Asiatic luxury : In fact, Christian simplicity 
 had ranch decayed in this place, where Cin-is- 
 tians first had the name. Their numbers 
 were immense, but the power of godliness 
 was low. 
 
 vance and encourage the Jews in their 
 secular concerns, was one of the ol)- 
 vious means of depreciating Christianity. 
 Hence he spake of them with compas- 
 sion, becfged their prayers for his success 
 in the Persian wars, and pressed them to 
 rebuild their temple,* and restore their 
 worship. He himself promised to defray 
 the expense out of the exchequer, and 
 appointed an officer to superintend the 
 work. To strengthen the hands of such 
 determined enemies of Christianity, and 
 to invalidate the Christian prophecies 
 concerning the desolation of the Jews,| 
 were objects highly desirable indeed to the 
 mind of Julian. But the enterprize was 
 suddenly baffled, and the workmen were 
 obliged to desist. No historical fact since 
 the days of the Apostles seems better at- 
 tested. I shall state very briefly the fact 
 itself and its proofs, and then leave the 
 reader to judge, whether there was ever 
 any reason to doubt its credibility. 
 
 Ammianus Marcellinus, a writer of un- 
 questionable credibility, and at least no 
 friend of the Gospel, acquaints us with 
 the attempt, and informs us of its defeat. 
 " He projected to rebuild the magnificent 
 temple of Jerusalem. He committed the 
 conduct cf the affair to Alyjjius of An- 
 tioch ; who set himself to the vigorous 
 execution of his charge, and was assisted 
 by the governor of the province ; but hor- 
 rible halls of fire breaking out near the 
 foundations with repeated attacks, ren- 
 dered the place inaccessible to the scorch- 
 ed workmen from time to time, and the 
 element resolutely driving them to a dis- 
 tance, the enterprize was dropped. ":{: So- 
 crates observes, that during the progress 
 of thi^ affair the Jews menaced the Chris- 
 tians, and threatened to retort upon them 
 the evils which they had suffered from 
 
 * He sent for some of the chief men of tlieir 
 nation, and asked them why tliey did not sa- 
 crifice according to tlie law of Moses. They 
 told him that they were forbidden to sacrifice 
 except at Jerusalem. He thereupon promises 
 to rebuihl their temple; and we have still a 
 letter of his to the community of the Jews, 
 which ajjpears, on the authority of Sozomen, 
 to be geiinine. Philostorgius expressly tells 
 us, that Julian's design in the re-lniilding of Je- 
 rusalem was to oppose tiiepro[)hecies. Sozo- 
 men. — Lardner. 
 
 t See Matt, xxiii. 38, 39. To restore this 
 people, while yet they continued in their en- 
 mity to Christ, was an attempt worthy of an 
 infidel like Julian, and called for a miraculous 
 interposition as plainly as Pharaoh's pursuit of 
 the Israelites at the \im\ Sea. 
 :| Ammianus, B. XXllI. c. 1. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 307 
 
 the Romans. The Christian evidences 
 for the fact are Gregory Nazianzen, Am- 
 brose, and Chrj'sostom, who lived at the 
 same time. The three ecclesiastical his- 
 torians, Socrates, Sozomen, and Tiieodo- 
 ret, who lived in the next age, do all give 
 a testimony consistent one with another. 
 To these may be added, Plilostorgius the 
 Arian, and the testimony of Jewish rabbis. 
 — See Wnrl)urton's Julian, p. 98. 
 
 VII. The suppression of learning 
 among the Christians was another of the 
 objects of Julian's policy. He published 
 a law, that no professor of any art or 
 science should practise in anyplace witii- 
 out the approbation of the court of that 
 city, and the sanction of the emperor. 
 With a view to keep the church in ignor- 
 ance of the arts of reasoning and philo- 
 sophy, he forbad Christian schoolmasters 
 to teach Gentile learning, lest being fur- 
 nished, says he, with our armour, they 
 make war upon us with our own wea- 
 pons. Our learning is unnecessary to 
 Christians, who are trained up to an il- 
 literate rusticity, so that to believe is 
 sufficient for them ; and by this prohibi- 
 tion I only restore possessions to their 
 proper owners.* The scheme was highly 
 prudent, but it required a great length of 
 time to raise from it any considerable 
 effects. 
 
 VIII. Philosophy had ever been the 
 determined foe of the Gospel. It behoov- 
 ed the artful persecutor, himself a philo- 
 sopher, to encourage it as much as possi' 
 ble. He expressed his hearty wishes 
 that all the books of the wicked Galileans 
 
 * In the same strain, lie says " If tliey (tlit- 
 Christian professors) think these authors give 
 a false account ofllie most honourable tilings. 
 let them betake themselves to the eliurclies of 
 the Galileans, and expomid Matlliew and 
 Luke. Yet those of tlie [Christian' youtli wlio 
 please to go [to the Pagan schools' are not ex- 
 cluded." So prudently did he provide for the 
 progress of Hellenism, and for the downfall 
 of Christian knowledge. He charges the 
 Christians with the inconsistency of instruct- 
 ing pupils in classical learning, at the same 
 time that they opposed the lieallien mythology. 
 The account of La ]31eterie concerning tliis 
 matter is just, and his observation deserves to 
 be quoted. "To explain the classic autliors. 
 to commend them as models of language, of 
 eloquence and taste, to unveil their beauties. 
 &c., this is not proposing them as oracles of 
 religion and morality." Julian is pleased to 
 confound two things so dift'erent, and to erect, 
 under favour of this confusion, the puerile 
 sophistry, which prevails through his whole 
 edict. 
 
 were banished out of the world. But as 
 this was now impossible, he directed the 
 pliilosophers to bend all their powers 
 against them. Jamblicus, Libanius, Max- 
 imus, and others of the philosophic tribe, 
 were his intimate friends and counsellors, 
 and the empire was filled with invectives 
 against the Gospel. Its enemies were 
 liberally paid by iinperial munificence for 
 their labours, and Julian seemed desirous 
 to put it to the proof, whether indeed 
 " the foolishness of God was wiser thaa 
 men." 
 
 IX. He used ensnaring artifices to 
 draw unwary Christians into compliance 
 with pagran superstitions. He was wont 
 to place the images of the heathen gods 
 near his own statues, that those who 
 bowed to the latter might seem to adore 
 also the former. Those who seemed thus 
 to comply, he endeavoured to persuade 
 into greater compliances; those who re- 
 fused^ he charged with treason, and pro- 
 ceeded against them as delinquents. He 
 ordered the soldiers, when they received 
 their donative, to throw a piece of frank- 
 incense into the fire in honour of the gods. 
 Some few Christians who had been sur- 
 prised into the practice, returned to the 
 emperor, threw back their donatives, and 
 professed their readiness to die for their 
 religion. 
 
 The story of Theodoret, B. III. c. 17, 
 deserves to be told more particularly. 
 Julian caused an altar to be placed near 
 himself, with burning coals and incense 
 upon a table, and required every one to 
 throw some incense into the fire, before 
 he received his gold. Some, who were 
 aware of the danger, feigned sickness; 
 some through fear or avarice complied. 
 But the greater part were deceived. Some 
 of these last going afterwards to their 
 meals, called on the name of Jesus Christ, 
 according to their custom. One of their 
 companions said in a surprise : " What 
 is the meaning of this? you call on Christ, 
 after having renounced him." " How ?" 
 answered the other, astonished. " You 
 have thrown incense into the fire." They 
 instantly tore their hair, rose up from ta- 
 ble, and ran into the forum. " We de- 
 clare it, they cried, before all the world, 
 we are Christians; we declare it before 
 God, to whom we live, and for whom we 
 are ready to die. We have not betrayed 
 thee, Jesus our Saviour. If our hands 
 have offended, our hearts consented not. 
 The emperor has deceived us, we renounce 
 
 the impiety, and our blood shall answer 
 
308 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 for it." They then ran to the palace, and 
 throwing the gold at Julian's feet, " Sa- 
 crifice us, say they, to Jesus Christ, and 
 give your gold to those who will be glad 
 to receive it." In a rage he ordered them 
 to be led to execution. The warmth of 
 his temper had well-nigh prevailed over 
 his politic maxims ; he recovered himself, 
 however, in time sufficient to counter- 
 mand the order. He contented himself 
 with banishing them to the distant parts 
 of the empire, forbidding them to reside 
 in cities. Let the reader see here the 
 philosophizing heathen and the simple 
 Christian in contrast, and judge which 
 religion is human and which is divine. 
 
 On some occasions Julian would defile 
 the fountains with Gentile sacrifices, and 
 sprinkle the food brought to market with 
 hallowed water. Christians knew their 
 privilege from St. Paul's well-known de- 
 termination of the case, yet they groaned 
 under the indignity. Juventinus, and 
 Maximus, two officers of his guard, ex- 
 postulated with great warmth against 
 these proceedings, and so provoked his 
 resentment, that he punished them capi- 
 tally, though, with that caution which 
 never forsook him, he declared, that he 
 put them to death not as Christians, but 
 as undutifnl subjects. 
 
 Jupiter had in no age possessed so zea- 
 lous a devotee as this prince, who lived 
 at the close of his religious dominion 
 over mankind. The Decius's and the 
 Galerius's, compared with Julian, were 
 mere savages. It is certain, that no in- 
 genuity could have contrived measures 
 more dexterously. Disgrace, poverty, 
 contempt, a moderate degree of severity, 
 checked and disciplined by dissimulation, 
 and every method of undermining the 
 human spirit, were incessantly labouring 
 to subvert Christianity. One sees not 
 how the scheme could have failed, had 
 Providence permitted this prudent and 
 active genius to have proceeded many 
 years in this course : but what a worm is 
 man, when he sets himself to oppose his 
 Maker ! 
 
 CHAPTER IX, 
 
 THE CHURCH UNDER JULIAN. 
 
 After having taken a view of various 
 circumstances, all tending to illustrate 
 the state of Christendom, it is time to 
 return to the order of our history from the 
 death of Constantius. The people of 
 
 God, with light very faint, were in a low 
 state (torn within by the Arian controver- 
 sy) and scandalized by the madness of 
 the Donatists. The faithful sons and 
 pastors of the church were by no means 
 simple and intelligent in divine things, 
 and were menaced even with destruction 
 by a persecution conducted with as much 
 malice and vigour as any of the foregoing, 
 and with far greater dexterity. The Chris- 
 tian bishops, however, took advantage of 
 Julian's aflTected moderation to return to 
 their sees. Meletius came back to An- 
 tioch; Lucifer of Cagliari, and Eusebius 
 of Vercella;, returned to their churches ; 
 but Athanasius remained still in the de- 
 sert, because of the power of George at 
 Alexandria. Julian wrote a letter to 
 Photinus the heretic, and commended his 
 zeal against the divinity of Jesus Christ.* 
 He ordered Eusebius of Cyzicus, under 
 severe penalties, to rebuild the church of 
 the Novatians, which he had destroyed 
 in the time of Constantius ; a punishment 
 probably just, though like every thing 
 else done by Julian concerning the Chris- 
 tian religion, contrived by him with ma- 
 lignant intentions. He protected the 
 Donatists in Africa, and defended them 
 against the general church and against 
 one another. 
 
 The prohibition of human learning de- 
 creed by this emperor, induced ApoUi- 
 narius, the father and the son, to invent 
 something which might stand as a sub- 
 stitute for the loss. The father, a gram- 
 marian, wrote in heroics the sacred his- 
 tory, and imitated the Greek tragedians, 
 taking his subjects out of the Scripture. 
 The son, a philosopher, wrote in defence 
 of the Gospel in the form of dialogues, 
 like Plato. Little of these works has 
 come down to us ; the prohibition ceasing 
 with the death of Julian, Christian scho- 
 lars returned to their former studies, and 
 we cannot judge how far the writings of 
 the Apollinarii merited the rank of Clas- 
 sics. Ecebolius, a famous sophist at 
 Constantinople, yielded to the caresses 
 of Julian, and returned to paganism. 
 After the emperor's death he desired to 
 be received again into the church, and 
 prostrating himself at the door of the 
 church, said, " Tread me under foot like 
 salt that hath lost its savour." I know 
 no more of the man to enable me to form 
 a just estimate of his character. We 
 
 may be convinced, however, that a con- 
 
 Fleury, XV. 4. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 309 
 
 siderable number of true Christians were 
 yet in the church, amidst all its corrup- 
 tions, by this important fact, that the 
 jgreatest part of public teachers and pro- 
 fessors of Christianity chose to quit their 
 chairs, rather than to forsake their reli- 
 gion. Proeresius ought to be distinguish- 
 ed. Julian had studied under him at 
 Athens, and from a kindness to his mas- 
 ter, excepted him out of the general law. 
 Yet he refused to be thus singled out 
 from his brethren, and retired. Another 
 of them Avas Victorinus, an African, con- 
 verted from idolatry in his old age. The 
 manner of his conversion is finely told by 
 Augustine, and I shall have occasion to 
 give it to the reader hereafter. His rhe- 
 torical school was given up on occasion 
 of Julian's edict, and he wrote with zeal 
 in defence of divine truth, though his 
 abilities were inadequate to the work, 
 because he applied himself to the study 
 of Scripture too late in life. 
 
 Cffisarius, the brother of the famous 
 Gregory Nazianzen, continued to prac- 
 tise physic at court, as he had done in 
 the former reign. His brother wrote to 
 him, how grievous a thing it was to him- 
 self and to their aged father (the bishop 
 of Nazianzum in Cappadocia) that he 
 should continue in the court of an infidel, 
 seeking worldly greatness. "Our mo- 
 ther," says he, "could not endure the 
 account. Such the weakness of her sex, 
 and such the fervour of her piety, we are 
 obliged to conceal the truth from her." 
 Cassarius profited by these rebukes ; not 
 all the artifices of Julian could move him. 
 "I am a (Christian," says he, "and must 
 continue so." Cajsarius quitted the court, 
 and retired to his pious father, who was 
 as much delighted with his son's conduct, 
 as earthly-minded parents would have 
 been displeased. 
 
 Among the officers of the army was 
 Valentinian, afterwards emperor. He 
 commanded the guards who attended Ju- 
 lian. The emperor one day entered into 
 the temple of Fortune, and on each side 
 of the gate stood the door-keepers, who 
 sprinkled with sacred water those who 
 came in. A drop of this water falling on 
 Valentinian's mantle, he struck the officer 
 with his fist, expressed his resentment 
 at his being defiled with the impure water, 
 and tore that part of his mantle.* Julian, 
 incensed at his boldness, banished him 
 from his presence, not for his Christiani- 
 
 ty, as he pretended, but because he had 
 not kept his cohort in good order. Sen- 
 sible, however, of his merit, he still em- 
 ployed him in the army. There were 
 others who like Valentinian defended their 
 Christian profession not with meekness, 
 but wrath. They found, however, the 
 punishment of their folly from Julian, 
 whose partiality and prejudices in favour 
 of Paganism urged him to adopt measures, 
 which filled the whole empire with con- 
 fusion. 
 
 At Merum, a city of Phrygia, Ama- 
 chius the governor of the province order- 
 ed the temple to be opened, and the idols 
 to be cleansed. Three Christians, in- 
 flamed, says my author,* with Christian 
 zeal, could not bear the indignity. Burn- 
 ing, continues he, with an incredible love 
 of virtue, they rushed by night into the 
 temple, and broke all the images. The 
 governor, in his wrath, being about to- 
 chastise many innocent persons, the cul- 
 prits very generously offered themselves 
 to punishment. He gave them the alter- 
 native, to sacrifice, or to die. They pre- 
 ferred the latter, and suffered death with 
 excruciating tortures ; more admirable for 
 fortitude than meekness in their behaviour 
 during their dying scenes. 
 
 At Pessinus in Galatia, on the confines 
 of Phrygia, two young men suffered death 
 in the presence of Julian. I wish I could 
 say it was for professing the faith of 
 Christ. But one of them had overturned 
 an idol. The emperor put him to death 
 in a cruel manner, with his companion, 
 their mother and the bishop of the city. 
 
 At Ancyra, the capital of Galatia, there 
 was a priest named Basil, who in the 
 
 • Sozora. VI. c. 6. 
 
 * Socrates, B. III. c. 15. I fear there was 
 in this action more of jiride tlian zeal. Chris- 
 tians having tasted a little of tiie |)leasures of 
 sujjeriority over the Pagans in the two last 
 reigns, and being influenced in no high de- 
 gree by Christian principles in those times, 
 ilescended again into a state of disgrace and 
 inferiority with much reluctance. In tiie same 
 spirit, at Dorostora in Thrace, one ^Emilian 
 was cast into the fire by the soldiers for hav- 
 ing overtlirown certain altars. Tiiose only 
 who are in tlie vigorous exercise of spiritual 
 arms, can with clieerlul patience abstain from 
 such as are carnal, when they are under pro- 
 vocation. Yet true Christians might be in 
 a degree overcome by tiiis spirit, and suffer 
 with the love of Christ prevailing in the heart. 
 The intelligent i-eader will take notice, how- 
 ever, from the commendations bestowed on 
 such conduct by Socr-ates, how much the spirit 
 of Christianity had decliued since the days of 
 Cyprian. 
 
310 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 former reign had opposed Arianism, and] houses, and given to the Galileans by 
 
 now with equal sincerity resisted idok' 
 try. He went through the city, publicly 
 exhorting the people to avoid polluting 
 themselves with sacrifices. Once ob- 
 serving the Gentiles employed in their 
 religious rites, he sighed, and besought 
 God, that no Christian* might be guilty 
 of such enormity. The governor upon 
 this apprehended him, charging him with 
 sedition, and having tortured him, kept 
 him in prison. Julian himself coming 
 to Ancyra, sent for 13asil, who reproacli- 
 ed him with his apostasy. Julian said, 
 he had intended to dismiss him, but was 
 oblisred to treat him severely on account 
 of his impudence. And in the end this 
 priest suffered death in torture. Busiris 
 was a heretic of the sect of the Abste- 
 mious, and was tortured at the same 
 place. His constancy was amazing to 
 the beholders; but he outlived Julian, 
 recovered his liberty, and afterwards quit- 
 ting his heresy, returned to the general 
 church. 
 
 Ca?sarea, in Cappadocia, being almost 
 entirely Christian, having destroyed the 
 temple of Fortune since Julian's acces- 
 sion, merited his peculiar hatred ; and he 
 oppressed it with lieavy exactions. Ju- 
 lian arriving at Antioch, was mortified to 
 find how low the Pagan interest was fal- 
 len there. t The feast of Apollo was an- 
 nually celebrated at Daphne, and on that 
 occasion he expected to see the religious 
 magnificence of Antioch displayed before 
 himself as high priest. " What sacrifice," 
 said he to the priest, " is to be offered at 
 the festival]" "I have brought a goose 
 from home," replied he, "but the city has 
 prepared nothing." " You, all of you," 
 addressing himself to the senate,:^^ " suffer 
 every thing to be carried out of your 
 
 * Sozomen, B. V. c. 11. 
 
 •J- The indefatigable pains which the Apos- 
 tate took in support of Paganism is almost 
 incredible. On the festivals to Venus he 
 ■walked in procession with lewd women of the 
 worst character. So says Chrysostom. Yet 
 Lardner, who always mitigates the bad against 
 Julian, fancies that Julian scorned all debauch. 
 Moreover, he effects to doubt of the truth of 
 the representations of the follies and immoral- 
 ities of this emperor ; because they aie the 
 accounts of Christians; and because Greg. 
 Ni\zianzen is apt to overstate matters. Be it 
 so — but still it will not follow that the -whole is 
 false; and the judicious reader will rather be 
 disposed to conclude that Lardner liimselfis 
 greatly prejudiced in favour of Julian. — See 
 Amm. Marcellinus. 
 % Misopogon. 
 
 your wives, who support the poor with 
 your wealth, and give credit to their im- 
 piety." He uttered more to the same 
 purpose, but he could not communicate 
 ins zeal to the senate or people of Anti- 
 och. The rage for Hellenism had ceased 
 for ever, 
 
 Mark, the bishop of Arethusa, in Syria, 
 being ordered to pay the expense of re- 
 building an idolatrous temple, which he 
 had destroyed in the time of Constantius, 
 and refusing, from conscientious motives, 
 was tortured in an uncommon manner, 
 and bore his sufferings with such aston- 
 ishing patience, that the prefect said 
 to Julian, " Is it not a shame, sir, that 
 the Christians should be so much supe- 
 rior to us, and that an old man, over 
 whom victory itself would be inglorious, 
 should conquer us]" He was at length 
 dismissed ; and a number, who had per- 
 secuted him, attended afterwards to his 
 instructions. The bishop had saved the 
 life of Julian in the beginning of the 
 reign of Constantius, when all his family 
 was in danger! His character appears to 
 have been tliat of eminent piety and vir- 
 tue; as such he is extolled by Gregory 
 Nazianzen, though he had all along sup- 
 ported the Arian party: and considering 
 the entire separation of the Arian from 
 the general church, it is very improbable 
 that Gregory should speak of him so 
 highly as he does, had he not returned to 
 the church, and been in its communion 
 at that time.* It would be tedious to re- 
 cite all the accounts of those who suflfer- 
 ed from the insolent cruelty of Pagans, 
 under the politic connivance and partiali- 
 ty of Julian during his short reign. 
 
 In the year 362, George f of Alexan- 
 dria was murdered by the Pagans of that 
 city, to whom he had made ]y^u,.(]gj. of 
 himself obnoxious, by expos- George of 
 ing their senseless and ridi- Alexan- 
 culous rites. The providence dria, 
 of God was wonderfully dis- a.D.362. 
 played in causing this man, 
 who had distinguished himself as the 
 persecutor of his people, to perish by the 
 hands of idolaters at last. There were 
 not wanting, however, those who gave it 
 out, that he had been murdered by the 
 
 * Theodoret, B. III. c. 7. Fleury, B. XV" 
 
 + This is he whom monkisli ignorance nam 
 exalted into St. George, the Champion of Eng- 
 land, against all the rules of history, geogra- 
 phy and common sense. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 311 
 
 Athanasian party.* The letter of Julian 
 to the people of Alexandria, still extant, 
 abundantly confutes tliis calumny. He 
 blames none but those of his own religion 
 for it, and in his manner of blaming them, 
 he confesses that George desers^ed even 
 severer punishments, and declares that 
 he will inflict no higher penalty on them 
 than a repiimand, which he hopes they 
 will reverence, "because from their first 
 origin they were Greeks." Such the 
 partiality of Julian for Gentiles I 
 
 The reader will not have forgotten, 
 that Athanasius was all this time in con- 
 cealment. He had spent seven years, 
 partly in the deserts, and partly in the 
 house of a virgin at Alexandria. And the 
 steady affection which the people had for 
 him, and which no persecution of enemies 
 could conquer, had under God preserved 
 him from his enemies. This year, after 
 
 Athana- 
 sius re- 
 turns to his 
 bishopric. 
 
 the death of George, he ven^ 
 tured to return openly to his 
 bishopric. The Arians were 
 obliged to hold their meetings 
 in private houses, and the ge- 
 neral voice of the people every where 
 sincerely decided for Athanasius. During 
 the little time that he was allowed to ap- 
 pear in public, he acted as a Christian 
 bishop, treating his enemies with mild- 
 ness, and relieving the distressed without 
 respect of persons, restoring the custom 
 of preaching on the doctrine of the Tri- 
 nity, removing from the sanctuary those 
 who had made a traffic of holy things, 
 and gaining the hearts of the people. He 
 held a council at xYlexandria, composed 
 of those who had particularly sutTered 
 during the Arian persecution, among 
 whom Eu el)ius of Vercella; was particu- 
 larly distinguished. Here those, who, 
 contrary to their settled principles, had 
 been beguiled by Arian subtilties to sub- 
 scribe what they did not believe, with 
 tears owned how they had been imposed 
 on, and were received into the Church. 
 Here the doctrine of the Trinity was 
 again cleared of the ambiguities which 
 had clouded it, and the Xicene creed was 
 allowed to be the most accurate and ex- 
 act. Two schisms f unhappily rent the 
 church at this time. The first was at An- 
 tioch, where Euzoius the Arian had the 
 chief sway. The followers of Eustathius, 
 the late orthodox bishop, gave themselves 
 lip to Paulinus, a presbyter; while an- 
 
 other party looked on themselves as be- 
 lontring to Meletius, who had lately re- 
 turned from exile. Lucifer of Cagliari, in 
 his return through the East from banish- 
 ment in Egypt, stopped at Antioch, with 
 the best intentions, and endeavoured to 
 heal the divisions of the church. But by 
 ordaining Paulinus, he confirmed the 
 evils which he meant to cure. Meletius 
 had a church without the city, Paulinus 
 was allowed one within the city ; while 
 Euzoius, the most popular, possessed 
 himself of the rest of the churches, but 
 justice requires us to say, that he used 
 his victory with moderation; and respect- 
 ing the age, meekness, and piety of 
 Paulinus, he did not deprive him of his 
 little church in the city. A rare instance 
 of moderation in an Arian leader ! Luci- 
 fer himself was offended, that his fellow- 
 sufferer Eusebius would not approve of 
 his conduct at Antioch, and even broke 
 off communion with him. Finding his 
 obstinacy much blamed in the church, he 
 became a schismatic altogether, returned 
 to his own church at Cagliari in Sar- 
 dinia, where he died eight years after. 
 His followers were called Luciferiaas, 
 but they were few in number.* 
 
 * Socrates, R. Ilf. c. 3. 
 
 t Socrates, B. lU. c. 9. Fleury, B. XV. 29. 
 
 * No man ever exceeiled Lucifer in courage 
 and hardiness of spirit. When in exile tor the 
 Nicene faith, he published certain writings, in 
 whicli he accuses Constantius with the most 
 aslOMisliing boldness. It there were more of 
 the meekness of the Gospel in these writings, 
 it might be proper to quote some parts of them 
 for tl\e edification of the Christian reader ; but 
 there is evidently too much of the man, and 
 too little of the saint, in the whole method and 
 spirit of them. Not content with composing 
 these works, he sent a copy of them to the 
 emperor, who, surprised at his boldness, or- 
 dered hiai to he asked, " whether he had really 
 sent them." " Know," answered the intrepid 
 bishop, '• that I did send the book to the em- 
 peror, and after having again considered it, I 
 do not retract ; and when you have examined 
 the reasons for which I have written in this 
 manner, you will find that we have been 
 strengthened by God, so as to expect with 
 gladness the death which is preparing for us." 
 I wonder not that Athanasius highly com- 
 mends this njan ; he himself, though in a less 
 degree, partook of the same spirit. It is use- 
 ful to mark the declensions of the Christiaa 
 spirit among good men. The warit of a closer 
 attention to tiie vitals of experimental godli- 
 ness rendered even the best men in these days 
 too ferocious in their opposition to heretics. 
 Lucifer was consistent throughout ; the same 
 tem])er which appears to have actuated him in 
 his conduct towards Constantius, seduced him 
 into a blameable schism in his latter days ; yet 
 
312 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 It is the design of history to record 
 what may be useful to mankind. In this 
 view, even the faults of the wise and 
 good are serviceable. The unhappy spirit 
 of faction, in the decline of Christian 
 faith and love, sjdit the small remnant of 
 the faithful in Antioch into two parties, 
 which subsisted some time after the be- 
 ginning of the next century. Two per- 
 sons, both of undoubted piety, minister 
 there, and yet cannot heal the evil. A 
 third, who had distinguished himself for 
 zeal and piety above many of his age, en- 
 deavours to compose the breach, but 
 widens it. He himself soon after, through 
 the impatience of contradiction, makes 
 another party. There was a world of wis- 
 dom in St. John's charge to the Church 
 in his old age. " Little children, love 
 one another." The want of it is sure to 
 be succeeded by factions, surmises, and 
 endless divisions. The breach once made 
 is more easily widened than closed. While 
 the Gospel flourished in name through 
 Antioch, the vices of luxury prevailed 
 amidst the evils of heresy and schism. 
 The church there became the mark of re- 
 proach to the Apostate, in his satire 
 against their city. I turn with more plea- 
 sure to behold Eusebius of Vercello', who 
 came back to his western bishopric in 
 Italy, where he was received with extra- 
 ordinary joy. His labours, and those of 
 Hilary of Poitiers, were serviceable in 
 Italy, Gaul, and in general through Eu- 
 rope. There the Arian heresy was sup- 
 pressed, and peace and unity reigned. 
 False learning and philosophy had not so 
 corrupted the understanding. The Dona- 
 tists in Africa obtained leave of Julian to 
 recover their churches, and that frantic 
 and turbulent sect proceeded to exercise 
 military violence — an evil with which 
 they had always been infected. 
 
 Athanasius was not allowed to enjoy 
 long the sweets of liberty. The gentile 
 Alexandrians represented to the emperor, 
 that he corrupted the city and all Egypt, 
 and that if he continued there, not a Pa- 
 gan would be left. Julian's affected mo- 
 deration was tried to the utmost in this 
 case; and the open spirit of persecution, 
 which, contrary to his deliberate maxims, 
 he displayed on this occasion, does im- 
 mortal honour to the talents and integrity 
 of the Egyptian prelate. "I allowed 
 
 who can deny the sincerity of his love for the 
 trulh, and tlie integrity of his heart i" — See 
 page 291 of this volume. 
 
 those Galileans," says he, "who had 
 been banished, to return to their coun- 
 tries, not to their churches.* I order 
 Athanasius to leave the city on the re- 
 ceipt of my letter." The Christians 
 wrote to the emperor, and begged that he 
 might not be taken from them. Provoked 
 to see how deeply the love of Christianity 
 was fixed in them, and what progress the 
 bishop had made in a very little time, 
 Julian answered them,j that since Alex- 
 ander was their founder, and Serapis and 
 Isis their tutelary gods, it was surprising 
 that the corrupted part should dare to 
 call themselves the community. " I am 
 ashamed," says he, " that the gods should 
 suffer any of you Alexandrians to confess 
 himself a Galilean. You forget your an- 
 cient felicity, when Egj'pt conversed with 
 the gods, and you abounded with pros- 
 perity. Y^our Alexander was a servant of 
 the gods, whom Jupiter raised far above 
 any of these, or the Hebrews, who were 
 much better. The Ptolemies, who che- 
 rished your city as a daughter, advanced 
 it to its greatness not by preaching Jesus 
 Christ and the doctrine of the execrable 
 Galileans. If you resolve to follow these 
 impostors, agree among yourselves, and 
 desire not to retain Athanasius. Many of 
 his disciples are capable of pleasing you 
 by their impious discourses. But if your 
 affection for him is grounded on his skill 
 and shrewdness (for I hear the man is 
 crafty,) for this reason I expel him from 
 your city. That such an intriguer should 
 preside over the people, is dangerous ; 
 one who deserves not the name of man, a 
 low despicable creature,:}: who takes a 
 pride in hazarding his life, and is fit only 
 to cause disturbances in society." To 
 hasten the execution of his order, Julian 
 wrote to the governor of Egypt,§ that if 
 he did not expel Athanasius by a certain 
 time, a time which he limited, he would 
 fine his olhcers one hundred pounds of 
 gold. "I am deeply afflicted," says he, 
 " at the contempt of the gods, which is 
 shown by this man; it will be highly 
 ao-reeable to me if you drive the villain 
 out of Egypt, who under my government 
 
 * Jul. Epist. 26. A distinction certainly 
 unfounded, because coiitrai'v to tlie permission 
 gianted to all the rest of the bishops. 
 
 t Epist. 51. 
 
 i The original is /i-^Hi xvy,p, uk\' «v9piu5r«f!(rxo5 
 £uTs?.>.;, the malignant spirit of which it is not 
 easy to translate into English. 
 
 § Epist. 6. 
 
Cest. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 313 
 
 has had the insolence to baptize Grecian 
 women of quality." 
 
 The enmity of the carnal mind against 
 God has seldom been more displayed than 
 in these letters concerning Athanasius. 
 It breaks through all disguises, and trans- 
 messes all the bounds of prudence and 
 decorum. The affectation also of despis- 
 ing a man whom be feared, and whose 
 abilities dismayed him, is completely 
 evident. One sees in the weakness of 
 his arguments, how incapable even sen- 
 sible men are of saying anything that 
 has the least tendency to shake the mind 
 of a Christian. We must take every op- 
 portunity to show the progress of the 
 Gospel; and as, through the scantiness 
 of materials, a part of our evidence must 
 come from the mouth of enemies, it 
 should be observed, that there is in the 
 last letter a confession of the laborious 
 and useful life of Athanasius. He staid 
 not a year in his bishopric since his re- 
 turn ; yet in that time he confirmed the 
 faithful in the truth ; he demonstrated the 
 power of godliness by kindness, liberal- 
 ity and mercy, to enemies as well as 
 friends ; he extended the pale of the 
 
 Athana- 
 sius once 
 more lias 
 recourse 
 to fliarht. 
 
 church by the conversion of Pagans, some 
 of noble birth ; and he merited the indig- 
 nation, and alarmed the fears of the mo- 
 narch of the Roman world. Such is the 
 Grace of God operating by Christian 
 principles ! 
 
 Athanasius was therefore obliged once 
 more to seek safety by flight. All the 
 faithful gathered round him weeping. 
 " We must retire a little time, 
 friends, says he ; it is a cloud 
 that will soon fly over." He 
 took leave of them, recom- 
 mending his church to the 
 ablest of his friends, and go- 
 ing on board a vessel, he fled by the Nile 
 into the obscurer parts of Egypt. Still 
 his life was in imminent danger. The 
 persecutors followed, and were not far 
 from him, which induced Athanasius to 
 use something of that craftiness with 
 which Julian charged him.* He direct- 
 ed his companions to return to Alexan- 
 dria, and to meet his enemies. The 
 pursuers asked them earnestly, " Have 
 you seen Athanasius 1" — " He is near," 
 say they ; " make haste, and you will 
 soon overtake him." Thus deluded, they 
 went forward with speed in vain ; and the 
 
 bishop, who had secreted himself during 
 this scene, returned in private to Alexan- 
 dria, where he lay concealed till the en4 
 of the persecution. Thus did the malice 
 of Julian expose this great and good man, 
 to use the same sort of artifices, which 
 David did, when persecuted by king Saul, 
 who made the same remark as Julian 
 did, " It is told me that he dealeth very 
 subtilly;"* a conduct which probably 
 extorted from him afterwards that prayer, 
 " Remove from me the way of lying." 
 
 The active spirit of Julian was now 
 bent on the destruction of the Persian 
 monarchy; and the pains and expense 
 which he made use of in sacrifices and 
 auguries, may seem incredible. But his 
 ardent mind was one of the fittest instru- 
 ments of Satanic infatuation, and Divine 
 Providence was hastening his end. At 
 Antioch he was so provoked by the Psal- 
 mody of the Christians, particularly the 
 chorus which they used, " Confounded 
 be all they that worship graven images," 
 that he ordered his Praetorian prefect, 
 Sallust, to punish them. He, though a 
 Gentile, reluctantly obeyed, and seized 
 a number of Christians. One of them, 
 Theodorus, a youns man, was so long 
 
 and so variously tortured, that his life 
 was despaired of. But God preserved 
 him. Ruffinus, the Latin ecclesiastical 
 historian,! declares, that he saw him a 
 long time after, and asked him, whether 
 he felt any pain in his torments. He 
 owned not much; for a young man stood 
 by him, wiped off his sweat, and en- 
 couraged his spirit : so that upon the 
 whole he felt during his tortures more 
 pleasure than pain. A memorable in- 
 stance of the gracious care of God over 
 his servants ! Julian seems to have in- 
 creased in cruelty, as he came nearer his 
 end : He persecuted numbers at Antioch. 
 Gregory Nazianzen, in an oration, de- 
 scribes these facts rather in a rhetorical 
 than in an accurate manner, and speaks 
 also of his horrible incantations, and the 
 cruelties attendant on his superstition. 
 The description is probably exaggerated ; 
 but Gregory was both too intelligent and 
 too honest either to have been deceived 
 himself, or to have deceived others alto- 
 gether. Certain it is, that Julian toward 
 the Christian part of his subjects was a 
 tyrant; and one instance more shall close 
 the account of his severities. Publia, a 
 
 * Sozomen, B. V. 
 c. 14. 
 Vol. I. 
 
 c. 15 Socrates, B. III. 
 2D 
 
 * 1 Samuel xxiii. 22. 
 
 t Socrates, B. IH. c. 19. Ruff. B. I. e. 36, 
 
314 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 widow of great reputation, with a num 
 bar of virgins over whom she presided at 
 Antioch, sung and praised God, when 
 Julian was passing by. In particular, 
 they sung such parts of the Psalms as 
 expose the wickedness and folly of idola- 
 try. Julian ordered them to hold their 
 peace, till he had passed them. Publia, 
 with more zeal than charity, I fear, en- 
 couraged them, and caused them to sing 
 on another occasion as he passed, " Let 
 God arise, and let his enemies be scat- 
 tered."* Julian in a rage ordered her to 
 be brought before him, and to be buffeted 
 on each side of her face. The effects of 
 passion seem but too visible both in the 
 emperor and the woman : there is, how- 
 ever, this difference; the one had a zeal 
 for God, the other a contempt. 
 
 I studiously avoid secular history as 
 much as possible ; and having no busi- 
 ness with Julian's war against the Per- 
 sians,! I have only to take notice of the 
 circumstances of his death, and to make 
 a reflection or two on the conduct of Di- 
 vine Providence, on the character of the 
 man, and on the lessons of piety which 
 are obviously imprinted on his story, and 
 on the great deliverance vouchsafed to 
 the Church. He received a mortal wound 
 from a Persian lance in a skirmish. We 
 are told, that, conscious of his approach- 
 ing end, he filled his hand with the blood, 
 and castino- it into the air, said, " O Ga- 
 
 LILEAN, THOU HAST CONQUERED. :}: Some 
 
 think that by that action, he meant to re- 
 proach the sun, the idol of the Persians, 
 for his partiality to them, though he him- 
 self had been his devout worshipper. It 
 is highly probable, that a soul so active 
 and vehement as his, did express his in- 
 dignation in some remarkable way at that 
 juncture : neither of the accounts are im^ 
 probable, though both cannot be true 
 
 • Tfieodoi-et, B. III. c. 19. 
 
 t I shall introduce here a circumstance 
 which liHppeiied at Berea, whither Julian 
 went in his march from Antiocii. There he 
 found the son of an illustrious citizen, who 
 had been disinherited by his father for follow- 
 ing the religion of the emperor. Inviting 
 them to dinner, and placing himself between 
 them, he in vain endeavoured to unite them. 
 Finding the father inexorable, he promised 
 the son to be a father in his place. — His reli- 
 gious addresses to the people of this place 
 were little regarded by the senate of Berea, 
 which WHS almost entirely Ciiristian. So deep- 
 ly had this place received Christianity, and so 
 perseveringly preserved it since the days of 
 the Apostles. — Acts xvii. 
 
 i Theodoret, B. III. c. 25. 
 
 In his last moments in his tent he ex- 
 pressed a readiness to die, declaring that 
 he had learned from philosophy, how 
 much more excellent the soul was than 
 the body, and that death ought rather to 
 be the subject of joy than of affliction. 
 He boasted, that he had lived without 
 guilt, and that he reflected with pleasure 
 on the innocence of his private, and the 
 integrity of his public life. He reproved 
 the immoderate grief of the spectators, 
 and begged them not to disgrace by their 
 tears his death, as in a few moments he 
 should mix with heaven and the stars. 
 He entered into a metaphysical argument 
 with Maximus and Prisons, his favourite 
 philosophers, on the nature of the soul. 
 He died after a reign of one year and 
 eight months, in the thirty-second year 
 of his age. A man of good understand- 
 ing who taught children at Antioch, was 
 in company with Libanius, who asked 
 him what the carpenter's son was doing. 
 It was smartly replied, " the Maker of 
 the world, whom you jocosely call the 
 carpenter's son, is employed in making 
 
 a coffin." A few days after, ^^ ,, ,. 
 ... , A ^- I. r Death oi 
 
 tidings came to Antioch oi jyHan 
 
 Julian's death.* The story ' 
 
 is related also by authors 
 somewhat differently, but its substance 
 seems to be true : nor is there any occa- 
 sion to suppose the schoolmaster to have 
 been possessed of the spirit of prophecy. 
 The minds of Christians in general must 
 have been extremely agitated during this 
 whole scene of Julian's attempt against 
 the Persian empire : their ardent prayers 
 for the preservation of the church, with- 
 out the least personal ill will to their im- 
 perial persecutor, almost implied an ex- 
 pectation of his death in the answer to 
 their prayers ; and the extraordinary rash- 
 ness, with which his military expedition 
 was conducted, might lead mankind in 
 general to hope, or to fear, it would end 
 in his ruin. 
 
 The conduct of Divine Providence is 
 ever to be adored, in hastening the death 
 of so formidable an enemy to his people ; 
 whose schemes seemed only to require 
 length of time to effect the ruin of the 
 Church. But he was suffered to aim at 
 too many objects at once, the restoration 
 of idolatry, the ruin of Christianity, the 
 rebuilding of Jerusalem, and the conquest 
 of Persia. That he should have pursued 
 this last with such avidity, is an instance 
 
 • Theodoret. 
 
Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 JULIAN. 
 
 315 
 
 of the opposition of two parlies to ea:'h 
 other, both equally bent on the ruin of 
 the Church : a thing very common in 
 history, by which the Lord frequently 
 saves his people. How much more pru- 
 dent had it been in Julian to have ma^e 
 an alliance with the Persian monarch, 
 who would (rladiy have accepted it, and 
 to have united with him in the destruction 
 of Christians, against whom they both 
 were equally incensed. Thus does God 
 infatuate the councils of his enemies, and 
 lead them to quarrel with one another for 
 the good of his Church, rather than to 
 unite for its ruin ! 
 
 If philosophic pride had not entirely 
 hardened the heart and stupified the con- 
 science of the apostate, he could never 
 have boasted in his last moments of his 
 innocence and integrity. Besides num- 
 berless evils which a mind not quite 
 steeled against the checks of conscience 
 must have perceived, the guilt of ten 
 3'ears hypocrisy surely should have moved 
 him to remorse. If sincerity be not es- 
 sential to virtue upon every possible sys- 
 tem, it is hard to say what is. But from 
 the time of his initiation into the Platonic 
 mysteries at Ephesus, to his open avowal 
 of paganism, he dissembled in religion 
 altogether; he openly professed the Gos- 
 pel, and secretly worshipped idols. His 
 friend Libanius commends his hypocrisy. 
 Philosophers in general, who held that 
 every thing was God, and yet constantly 
 practised all the rites of vulgar polythe- 
 ism, dissembled continually. The mind 
 of Julian seems with astonishing incon- 
 sistency to have united, in sincere belief, 
 the refinements of philosophy with the 
 vulgar idolatry: but his hypocrisy with 
 respect to Christianity, so artfully per- 
 sisted in till the death of Constantius, is 
 one of the completest instances of deceit 
 I read of in history. That man must 
 either be extinct at death, or be happy by 
 a reunion with the Deity, was the belief 
 of the philosophers in general : and Ju- 
 lian, like them, avows it at his death, 
 and, like Cicero,* he had not the least 
 idea of punishment for sin in an after-life. 
 What is meant then by the praises so 
 profusely conferred in our age on philo- 
 sophic infidels'? Are hypocrisy, atheism, 
 the extinction of the feelings of natural 
 conscience, and a total exemption from 
 all that modest sense of imbecility which 
 is so becoming a frail creature like man. 
 
 • See his Senectute, toward the end. 
 
 are these virtues'? Shall we be told in 
 triumph, how nobly Hume the philoso- 
 pher died"? Is the very worst state of 
 mind to be gloried in as the best'? Is not 
 scepticism and indifference about a future 
 state, a mark of what the Scripture calls 
 a reprobate mind, however it may be com- 
 plimented by unbelievers with the appel- 
 lation of a philosophical spirit? How 
 much more amiable a prince would Julian 
 have been, if he had lived like Antonius 
 Pius, following the rules of plain and 
 common sense; and how large a part of 
 the defects and vices of his character was 
 owing to this same philosophy ! 
 
 Yet a tear of compassion is due to this 
 extraordinary man. He had seen a poor 
 sample of the Gospel in the lives and 
 manners of the family of Constantine, 
 and had suffered deep and cruel injuries 
 from them. Philosophers cautiously 
 watched him when very young, and in- 
 fused their poison with dexterity. Use- 
 ful lessons may be learned from history 
 by voung persons, who among ourselves 
 having been educated by Christians of 
 mere formal orthodoxy, are ever prone to 
 be seduced by heretical philosophers. 
 While those, who profess the Gospel, 
 are loudly called on to take care, that 
 they express their religious zeal b}' some- 
 thing more substantial than words and 
 forms. Young minds who are under the 
 influence of unfruitful professors, are se- 
 riously warned, by the apostasy of Julian, 
 to perform with diligence what he ne- 
 glected, namely. To search the Scriptures 
 for themselves with prayer. Had Julian 
 been as studious of the Greek Testament 
 as he was of Plato, and prayed as earnest- 
 ly to God through Christ as he did or 
 seemed to do to Jupiter and Apollo, he 
 might have escaped the snare of Satan. 
 But men confirm themselves in apostasy 
 and infidelity, by hearkenmg to every- 
 thing that tends to produce these evils, 
 and they avoid the force of divine truth 
 by contemptuous neglect and indiffer- 
 ence. 
 
 I wish the spirit of the Church could 
 be more an object of our commendation 
 during this whole scene than it is. No 
 doubt many prayed sincerely, and we 
 have seen abundant proofs of godly men 
 choosing to suffer rather than to sin. But 
 it is evident, that there was a great want 
 of primitive meekness and patience. Per- 
 secution under Julian was incurred too 
 frequently by Christians without cause. 
 Even just sentiments on this subject 
 
316 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 were lost by many. Sozomen, speaking 
 of a suspicion, that Julian was slain by a 
 Christian, admits that if it were so, none 
 could easily blame the action: and sup- 
 poses that Christians might do innocently 
 at least what heathen patriots have done 
 so laudably.* Such sentiments, com- 
 pared with the primitive spirit of the 
 Gospel, mark the degeneracy of the 
 times, at the same time that they afford 
 most lamentable advantages to the unbe- 
 liever. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE CHURCH UNDER JOVIAN. 
 
 This prince succeeded Julian in the 
 year 363, aged about 33 years. His reign 
 was terminated by sudden death, after lit- 
 tle more than seven months : 
 Jovian jjQj ^jjg ti^pj-e any thing pe- 
 
 reigns it- culiarlv shining or eminent in 
 tie more •' » , .. 
 
 than seven 
 
 his talents or character. Civil 
 months. history does not distinguish 
 A. D. 363. bim- In ecclesiastical history 
 
 he merits a particular atten- 
 tion ; for he is the first off the Roman 
 emperors who gave some clear evidences, 
 though not unequivocal, of real love to 
 the truth as it is in Jesus. It w^ere to be 
 wished that the accounts of this emperor 
 had been more explicit and large. Neither 
 his faith, however, nor his practice seein 
 to contradict^: what I have asserted ; and 
 Providence just showed him to the Ro- 
 man world, that he might restore the 
 sinking Church, and then removed him. 
 
 * Sozom. B.VI.c. 11. 
 
 + The first Constantine seems in doctrine to 
 have followed tiie Semi-Arianism of Eusebius, 
 or perliups more properly may be said to have 
 not understood the Gospel in any light ; and 
 the latter part of his life, it is allowed on all 
 hands, was very faulty. Of Constant! us, nothing 
 need be said. Of Philip, in the last centui'y, 
 we know much more evil, notwilhslanding his 
 Christian profession. I could wish the reader, 
 with me, to estimate the worth of characters 
 by their spirituality and holiness, not by talents 
 and exploits. If he does not, he will wonder 
 that I should make light of the great Constan- 
 tine in comparison of the obscure Jovian. 
 
 :t: I say seem to contradict; for I am aware 
 thatAmmianus charges him with gluttonous 
 and libidinous excesses. But this author was 
 not a Christian, and he expresses his hopes, 
 thathe might have corrected them, and owns 
 that he was very sincere in his religion. This 
 seems as much in .Tovian's favour as may be 
 expected from Aramianus. 
 
 In Julian's time he had given a noble 
 mark of Christian sincerity, by declaring 
 that he would rather quit the service 
 than his religion.* Yet Julian kept him 
 near his person, and employed him in his 
 fatal expedition; an unequivocal proof, 
 that his talents and capacity, though not 
 of the first rate, were by no means defec- 
 tive. In stature he was much above the 
 common size, and large in proportion, so 
 that it was dilficuit to find an imperial 
 habit that would suit him. The most 
 striking feature in his character seeiitis to 
 have been a consistent frankness, open- 
 ness, and integrity, such as I look for in 
 vain among mere philosophers and mere 
 heroes. Nor can it easily exist, except 
 in minds erected by divine grace above 
 the crooked pursuits of secular ambition. 
 Though the empire of the Roman world 
 was in his eye, he forgot not that he was 
 a Christian, and was solicitous to confess 
 his Saviour at a time when the cause of 
 Paganism must have predominated much 
 in Julian's army. " I am a Christian," 
 says he, " I cannot command idolaters, 
 and I see the wrath of the living God 
 ready to fall on an army of his enemies." 
 "Yon command Christians! exclaimed 
 those who heard him; the reign of super- 
 stition has been too short to efface from 
 our minds the instructions of the great 
 Constantine and of his son Constantius." 
 Jovian heard with pleasure, and assent- 
 ed ; and the Pagans in the army seem to 
 have been silent. j" 
 
 The army was in a situation of extreme 
 danger at the time of Julian's death ; far 
 advanced into an enemy's - country, and 
 without provisions. The rashness of his 
 predecessor had involved Jovian in these 
 
 * I follow the Abbe de la Bleterie in his Life 
 of this prince, which is beautifully written ; yet 
 I keep my eye on the ancient historians all 
 along. 
 
 t Theod. IV. 2. Socrat. III. 22. Both these 
 historians tell the same story, though the 
 former somewhat more fully. Ammiaiuis ob- 
 serves, indeed, that the victims and entrails 
 were inspected for Jovian : on which account 
 Mr. Gibbon exults over tlie destruction of The- 
 odoret's legend. But who does not see, that the 
 superstitious practice having been in high vogue 
 under Julian, it might be continued, for the 
 present at least, even witiiout Jovian's know- 
 ledge ? How does it appear that Theodoret's 
 narrative deserved to be called a legend, any 
 more than Ammianus's, or even Gibbon's ? 
 Resides, this object takes no notice at all of the 
 authority of Socrates, who in candour and ve- 
 racity is generally allowed to have been emi- 
 nent. 
 
Cewt. IV.] 
 
 JOVIAN. 
 
 317 
 
 difficulties, and compelled him to nego- 
 tiate with Sapor the Persian king; whose 
 craft imposed on the undesigning simpli- 
 city of the new emperor. By affected de- 
 lays, the old Persian monarch protracted 
 the^negotiation, till the increasing distress 
 of the Romans for want of provisions 
 enabled Sapor to dictate the terms en- 
 tirely. Ammianus thinks it would have 
 been a thousand times better to have 
 tried the chance of war, than to have ac- 
 cepted any of the conditions. But Jovian 
 was a Christian; he could not gain ad- 
 vantages by fraud and deceit in the course 
 of the negotiation; the preservation of the 
 lives of men was to him of more import- 
 ance than of the distant provinces which 
 he was obliged to cede to Sapor: and it 
 is remarkably providential, that the first 
 instance we have on record of an ignomini- 
 ous and disadvantageous treaty concluded 
 by the Romans, was under a monarch, 
 who it is hoped belonged sincerely to 
 Him whose kingdom is not of this world. 
 Heavy are the complaints which Roman 
 writers make of this dishonourable peace : 
 Gregory Nazianzen laments it, but throws 
 the blame on Julian : the pagan historian 
 Eutropius seems to justify Jovian by 
 calling it a treaty ignoble indeed, but ne- 
 cessary. 
 
 I seem to behold new maxims of go- 
 vernment appearing under the first fiiith- 
 ful emperor. The rule of the Psalmist,* 
 in controversy, was perhaps never more 
 punctually followed than by Jovian. — 
 ■ Though the inhabitants of Nisibis in Me- 
 sopotamia petitioned him, with the most 
 vehement importunity, to suffer them to 
 defend their fortress against the Persian 
 king, from their extreme unwillingness 
 to leave their native country, he answer- 
 ed. That he had expressly sworn to de- 
 liver up the city, and that he could not 
 elude an oath by vain subtilties. Crowns 
 of gold were usually offered by cities to 
 new princes. The people of Nisibis, 
 willing to remain under the Roman go- 
 vernment, very sedulously performed this 
 act of homage. Jovian refused the crown ; 
 but they at length in d manner compelled 
 him to accept it. Nothing, however, 
 could move him from his purpose. He 
 obliged the inhabitants to depart with 
 their effects, somewhat earlier than he 
 would have done, had he not been exas- 
 perated by their insults and importunities 
 
 Yet he seems to have done all that cir- 
 cumstances allowed. He ordered Araida, 
 whither most of them retired, and which 
 had been almost ruined by Sapor, to be 
 rebuilt for their use, and settled them 
 there. Not only Pagan, but some Chris- 
 tian authors, reproach Jovian for executing 
 the treaty with so much fidelity. I con- 
 fess he appears to me highly amiable in 
 those very things, for which he has been 
 so much censured. It was an act worthy 
 of a prince who served Jesus Christ, to 
 dread more the loss of truth and the wrath 
 of God, on account of perjury, than the 
 loss of territory. It is difficult for men 
 to divest themselves of the regard for 
 worldly honour and greatness. This il- 
 lusion gives Jovian a mean appearance in 
 the eyes of most writers.* Could such 
 a man be fit to govern an empire ? Let it 
 be remembered, however, that if Chris- 
 tian principles place a man under disad- 
 vantages in some worldly respects, they 
 compensate for these in others. The 
 same fear of God, which hindered Jovian 
 from breaking his word, would have kept 
 him from entering into a war of such 
 madness and folly, as he found himself 
 involved in at his accession. 
 
 These secular transactions would not 
 have engaged my* attention, were they 
 not connected with an illustration of the 
 religious principles and conduct of the 
 prince. When I can meet with an ex- 
 alted personage, who evidences a Chris- 
 tian spirit, I shall think his actions be- 
 long properly to this history. But to 
 proceed : at Carrhce in Mesopotamia, a 
 city wholly pagan, the messenger, Avho 
 brought the first news of Julian's death, 
 was near being stoned. Never was pa- 
 ganism more completely disappointed. 
 Her hopes in an instant vanished as a 
 dream, and the Church triumphed in 
 praising her God, who is ever faithful to 
 his promises. Real saints would doubt- 
 less show their thankfulness in a becoming 
 manner, and Gregory Nazianzen was par- 
 ticularly careful, in an oration which he 
 published on the occasion, to exhort 
 Christians to display their meekness, hu- 
 mility, and charity. But compassion for 
 a perishing enemy, and fear at the pros- 
 pect of prosperity were not exhibited as 
 they ought to have been. Antioch, in 
 
 • Psalm XV. 4. He that sweareth to his own 
 hurt, and changeth not. 
 
 2d2 
 
 * It is astonishing how tiie Abbe da la Ble- 
 terie could be induced to tliink, that Jovian 
 was not bound to execute his promise, and 
 should write a dissertation in support of his 
 opinion. 
 
318 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 particular, personally hostile to Julian, 
 and filled with Arianism, demonstrated 
 how much it had fallen from Christian 
 purity. Public entertainments, sacred 
 and profane festivals, filled this voluptu- 
 ous city. Dances and public shows were 
 seen in the churches ; and the theatres 
 resounded with insulting acclamations. 
 There the victory of the cross was pub- 
 lished, there Maximus was addressed, as 
 if present: "Fond Maximus I what has be- 
 come of they predictions 1 God and his 
 Christ have conquered." 
 
 Jovian led his army to Antioch, in 
 which he remained six weeks, and ap- 
 plied himself to the regulation of religion. 
 The conduct of his predecessor had in- 
 volved him in intricate difficulties, both 
 in ecclesiastical affairs and in civil. The 
 whole empire was torn with distractions, 
 and Julian's affected toleration had been 
 attended with the horrors of real persecu- 
 tion. Already on his death the temples 
 were every where shut;* the priests ab- 
 sconded; the philosophers had quitted 
 the cloak, and resumed their common 
 dress : to so great a despair were the Pa- 
 gans reduced. Within the church, the 
 Orthodox and the Arians were every 
 where at variance; Antioch itself was 
 split into three divisions. The Donatists 
 in Africa exercised a turbulence that re- 
 quired the interference of the magistrate. 
 The Novatians, faulty only in a narrow 
 bigotry and excess of discipline, had kept 
 up some good understanding with the 
 general Church, had joined her in the 
 defence of the faith against Arianism, 
 had endured persecution in common with 
 her, while Arianism triumphed ; and some 
 of them at Martinium in Paphlagonia had 
 cut in pieces several companies of sol- 
 diers who under Coastantius had been 
 sent to oblige them to embrace Arianism. 
 But during the reign of Julian, if we ex- 
 cept the mad excesses of the Donatists, 
 a kind of truce had prevailed among the 
 contending parties. Immediately on his 
 death their eyes were solicitously direct- 
 ed to his successor, to see what measures 
 he would pursue. Himself a sincere be- 
 liever of the primitive faith, he yet ab- 
 horred persecution. Convinced that con- 
 science could not be forced, and that a 
 voluntary religion only was acceptable to 
 God, he "made a law, by which he permit- 
 ted the Pagans to re-open their temples, 
 and exercise their religion. Yet he pe- 
 
 * Socrates. 
 
 remptorily forbad witchcraft and impos- 
 tures. He suffered the public sacrifices, 
 but put a stop to the overflowings of 
 magic and enchantments, with which 
 Julian had filled the empire ; in fine, he 
 granted the Pagans more than Constan- 
 tius had allowed, and placed them in the 
 same state in which they had been left 
 by the great Constantino. In this tolera- 
 
 tion there was an effective sincerity, to 
 which that of Julian had no just preten- 
 sions. In the former reign, the Christian 
 found himself only nominally free; in 
 the latter, the Pagan found himself really 
 so. Philosophers themselves were ad- 
 mitted to court ; though it could not be 
 expected, that they should become the 
 bosom friends of a Christian emperor. 
 Some of the courtiers insulted them ; 
 Jovian himself was too just and generous 
 to do it. Even Libanius and Maximus, 
 the pillars of Paganism and philosophy, 
 were spared ; we may thence judge how 
 mildly others were treated. At Constan- 
 tinople also, sacrifices were publicly of- 
 fered for the solemnity of the consulship 
 of Jovian. He even permitted Themis- 
 tius, an illustrious pagan magistrate, to 
 harangue before him on the propriety of 
 religious freedom, and the rights of con- 
 science, and to thank him for the liberty 
 which he gave to his subjects. His 
 speech on the occasion need not be given ; 
 the sentiments are now common and trite; 
 something right and something wrong, 
 as is usual at this day, appears on the 
 face of it. The rightof private judgment 
 and the iniquity of compulsion are justly 
 stated ; and, like all men who are void of 
 any true religious principle, he intimates 
 that all religions are equally true and 
 equally pleasing to God. But it seems 
 a pitiable thing, that none of the learned 
 and philosophical Pagans should have 
 found out this doctrine before ! if they 
 had, how much Christian blood would 
 have been spared! It would have re- 
 dounded more to their credit, if they had 
 made or propagated this discovery during 
 the Christian persecutions. To speak 
 of it now, when they were the inferior 
 party, looks more like selfishness than 
 liberality. Philosophers wrote against 
 Christians with much animosity, and 
 some of them joined actively in perse- 
 cuting: I recollect not one, before The- 
 mistius, who pleaded for toleration. 
 
 At the same lime Jovian declared 
 Christianity to be the established religion, 
 and replaced in the standard the figure of 
 
Ciirr. IV.] 
 
 JOVIAN. 
 
 319 
 
 the cross, which Julian had taken away. land your zeal for Jesus Christ o ir Sa- 
 
 He ordered the Christians to be restored 
 to their churches, recalled their exiles, 
 and reinstated them in all their privi- 
 leges. One Mag-nus, an officer of note, had 
 burned by his private authority the church 
 of Berytus in Phcsnicia. He was him- 
 self an unprincipled man, ardent in per- 
 secution. Jovian was very near behead- 
 ing him ; but contented himself with 
 obliging him to rebuild the church at his 
 own expense. 
 
 Thus did Jovian prove himself the de- 
 fender of Christianity as the established 
 relitrion, and of toleration at the same 
 
 viour, we take you, venerable bi ;hop, 
 under our protection. You deserve it, by 
 the courage which you have shown i ti the 
 most painful labours, and your conte npt 
 of persecutors and menacing words. — 
 Holding in your hand the helm of faith, 
 which is so dear to you, you cease not to 
 combat for the truth, nor to edify the 
 Christian people, who find in you the per- 
 fect model of all virtues. For these rea- 
 sons we recall you immediately, and we 
 order you to return, to teach the doctrine 
 of salvation. Return to the holy churches; 
 feed the people of God. Let the pastor 
 
 time. The ingenuity of man can proceed at the head of the flock offer up prayers 
 no farther in such a subject. The princi-l for our person ; for we are persuaded. 
 
 Athanasi- 
 us appears 
 openly at 
 Alexan- 
 dria. 
 
 pies of church government, which have 
 for 'a hundred years subsisted among 
 ourselves, were in their great outlines in- 
 troduced by Jovian into the empire : and 
 on the whole convey a just idea of the 
 integrity of his heart and the soundness 
 of his understanding.* 
 
 Athanasius had no sooner heard of the 
 death of Julian, than he suddenly appear- 
 ed again at Alexandria, to the agreeable 
 surprise of his people. A let- 
 ter from Jovian confirmed him 
 in his office, and it was con- 
 ceived in these terms : — " To 
 the most religious friend of 
 God, Athanasius. As we ad- 
 mire beyond expression the sanctity of 
 your life, in which shine forth the marks 
 of resemblance to the God of the universe,! 
 
 * This praise seems due to Jovian in general 
 for his conduct ; at the same time I am far from 
 pretending to determine precisely the line which 
 he ought to have pursued. Numbers speak 
 with great confidence on the subject of religious 
 establishments and toleration, who have never 
 weighed the difficulties with which it is in- 
 volved. A more proper place to investigate it 
 may occur, when we come to the reign of Theu- 
 dosius. 
 
 t Mr. Gibbon calls this impious and extrava- 
 gant flattery. Who but a person either exceed- 
 ingly prejudiced or ignorant would have ha- 
 zarded such an assertion ? I scruple not to 
 charge the learned critic with both. His 
 prejudice will not allow him to bear a short 
 interval of the prosperity of Athanasius with 
 patience, and his ignorance of the Scriptures has 
 led him here to express his prejudice with pecu- 
 liar absurdity. Every child in divinity knows, 
 that to say, a man resembles God, or bears his 
 image anii likeness, means no more, than "that 
 he is renewed in knowledge after the image of 
 Him that treated him," that he is what Adam 
 was before the fall, what every Christian is made 
 
 that God will diffuse on us and on our 
 fellow Christians his signal favours, if 
 you aflford the assistance of your prayers.' 
 Jovian wrote to him again, to ask in- 
 struction with respect to the Arian con- 
 troversy. Athanasius, entering into his 
 views, convened some bishops, and an- 
 swered him in the name of the synod, re- 
 commending to him the Nicene faith, and 
 defending it in his usual manner. Joviaa 
 directed him to come to Antioch, where 
 he was graciously received. Arian and 
 Candidus, two Arians, relations also of 
 the emperor, came to him at Antioch, 
 having conceived some hope of his fa- 
 vour. Euzoius also, the bishop of that 
 city, where Arianism was strong, and 
 some other Arians, laboured to ingratiate 
 themselves with the eunuchs of the pa- 
 lace, as their party had done in the reign 
 of Constantius. The Macedonians too, 
 the followers of the deposed bishop of 
 Constantinople, who had taught them to 
 deny the divinity of the Holy Ghost, so- 
 licited the emperor for predominancy in 
 the Church. "I hate disputes, replied 
 Jovian ; I love and honour men of peace, 
 and promoters of union." The Arians, 
 confounded with such a sentence, com- 
 municated with Meletius the orthodox 
 bishop of Antioch, and subscribed the 
 council of Nice. It is difficult to believe 
 their sincerity ; under any the most 
 moderate account that can be given of the 
 controversy, Arian duplicity must strike 
 every reader. At any rate Jovian was not 
 to blame; he plainly declared, that he 
 would constrain no man, and he said so 
 sincerely. But power, not mere tolera/- 
 tion, was their object. Jovian also strove 
 in vain to heal the division between the 
 
 by grace. What an imir.ensity of learning do j- jj of Meletius and Paulinus, which 
 
 some men at'ain, without knowing lue very ele- • ' 
 
 monta of the J\ew Testament? 
 
 has been mentioned above. 
 
320 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. X, 
 
 TTie Arians of Alexandria* attempted 
 to gain the episcopal see for a person 
 nrmed Lucius, a man void of all piety, 
 and made application for him to the empe- 
 ror, with Lucius himself at their head. 
 The friends of Athanasius sent deputies 
 also on their part, to oppose them. The 
 interference of Constantine, and still more 
 of Constantius, in the expulsion of bish- 
 ops in cities of great note in the empire, 
 had established an unhappy precedent, 
 which was followed too frequently. A 
 short extract of the conferences may throw 
 some light on the character of Jovian, and 
 on the state of relio-ion at that time. " We 
 beg your power, your majesty, your pie- 
 ty," say the Arians, " to give us audi- 
 ence." Who and whence are you 1 " Sir, 
 we are Christians." Whence, and of 
 what city ? " Of Alexandria." What 
 do you desire of me 1 " To give us a 
 bishop." I have ordered Athanasius to 
 return to his see. "Sir, this man has 
 been banished many years, for crimes of 
 which he is not cleared." A soldier of 
 the emperor's guard interposed : " Sir, 
 give yourself the trouble to examine who 
 these people are, the remains of the fac- 
 tion of George, the villain who desolated 
 Alexandria." At these words, Jovian 
 (who was on horseback when they met 
 him,) spurred his horse and left them. 
 The Arians were not so repulsed ; they 
 presented themselves to Jovian a second 
 time. "We have several heads of accu- 
 sation against Athanasius, which we are 
 able to prove. It is thirty years since he 
 was banished by Constantine and Con- 
 stantius of immortal memory." The ac- 
 cusations often, twenty, thirty years, re- 
 plied Jovian, are out of date. I know 
 why he was accused, and how he was 
 banished. A third time Jovian being iui- 
 portuned by the same petitioners, and the 
 deputies of the Athanasians speaking at 
 the same time, Jovian said, " When all 
 speak together, one cannot understand 
 who is in the ri^ht. Choose two persons 
 
 of that to God : We men hear words ; 
 God alone knows the heart." " The trea- 
 surer," said a lawyer, a cynic philoso- 
 pher, "has taken some houses from me 
 on account of Athanasius." Is Athana- 
 sius responsible for the actions of the trea- 
 surer 1 "I have a charge against Atha- 
 nasius," said another lawyer, named Pa- 
 talus, a Pagan. What business, said the 
 emperor, has a Pagan like thee to trouble 
 himself about Christians 1 Enraged at 
 the attempts of the Arians to corrupt the 
 eunuchs of his court, he made them to un- 
 dergo the torture, to discover the bottom 
 of the intrigue, and said he would treat 
 his first domestics in the same manner, 
 if they followed such mea- 
 sures. He sent Athanasius 
 to his diocese, where he lived 
 ten years longer, and directed 
 the affairs of the church. 
 
 The plainness and frank manners of 
 Jovian, mixed with firmness, are evident 
 in this account ; so is the inveterate ma- 
 lignity of the Arians; and every serious 
 reader will deplore the power which Sa- 
 tan gains over a people once tinged with 
 the spirit of religious party in opposition 
 to the truth as it is in Jesus, and will see 
 matter of caution not to depart from the 
 simplicity of the Gospel. 
 
 While Jovian was at Antioch, he was 
 much aspersed by the wits of that city. 
 His person, it was said, was formed at 
 
 Athanasi- 
 us recalled 
 to his dio- 
 cese. 
 
 on both sides ; I cannot answer both of 
 you." The Arians begged the emperor 
 to set over them any person except Atha- 
 nasius. "I have made inquiries," said 
 he; "he teaches sound doctrine." "It 
 is true he speaks well," answered the 
 Arians, "but means ill." The emperor 
 replied, "I need no further testimony; 
 if he means ill, he must give an account 
 
 * Opera Athanasii, V. 
 terie's Life of Jovian. 
 
 1. p. 782. See Ble- 
 
 the expense of his mind. The measure 
 of his stature is that of his folly. Calum- 
 nies were propagated against him, and 
 the spirit of satire was indulged with much 
 freedom. 
 
 But, notwithstanding these censures, the 
 acknowledgments of Pagans themselves 
 in favour of Jovian ; his talent of know- 
 ing men, and employing them accord- 
 ingly; his attention to find out persons of 
 merit; his care of Christian doctrine and 
 piety; his integrity and openness; and 
 above all, his strict conscientiousness, 
 like to which I find nothing in pagan he- 
 roes and patriots; announced, though not 
 the splendid genius, yet the man of sound 
 understanding, and promised to the world 
 a wise and pious government. It is im- 
 possible that Ammianus could have had 
 a mean opinion of him, since, when he 
 speaks of his faults, he owns that he 
 might have lived to correct them. He 
 seems to have been a character of the 
 solid, not the shining kind ; the wicked- 
 ness of the times, I fear, was unworthy 
 of him. He was soon removed, and so 
 
Czjrr. IV.] 
 
 VALENS. 
 
 321 
 
 very suddenly, that it was suspected, he 
 had not died a natural death ; though of 
 this no proof was given. The Christians 
 sincerely wept, the Pagans in general 
 spake well of him ; the Arians soon en- 
 deavoured to take advantage of his de- 
 cease, and the Church was once more in- 
 volved in persecution. 
 
 -! 
 
 CHAPTER XI, 
 
 THE CHURCH TJXDER VALENS. THE 
 
 DEATH, CHARACTER, AND WRITINGS 
 OF ATHANASIUS. 
 
 Jovian was succeeded by two bro- 
 thers, Valentinian and Valens ; the former 
 governed in the West, the latter in the 
 East. Valentinian followed the plan of 
 Jovian, in the affairs of the church. Va- 
 lens, a man of weak capacity himself, had 
 not been yet baptized, and seemed as lit- 
 tle qualified to judge of matters of religion 
 as of government. Valentinian, whom 
 fraternal affection induced to make him 
 his colleague in the empire, had been in 
 vain advised to choose another person. 
 The Arians, who, iinder Eudoxius bishop 
 of Constantinople, had ruled the capital in 
 all ecclesiastical affairs, ia the time of 
 Constantius, rejoiced to find Valens equal- 
 ly supple and ductile as that emperor. 
 Even the party of ]Macedonius, a sort of 
 Semi-Arians, who allowed the Son of 
 God to be like the Father, thougrh not of 
 
 churches were ordered to be shut up, as 
 well as their persons to be banished. For 
 the orthodox of the general church had 
 no places of worship from the days of 
 Constantius; and Jovian their friend had 
 not lived to come to his capital. One 
 Agelius, the Novatian bishop, was exiled, 
 a man of admirable sanctity and virtue, 
 and remarkable for his perfect contempt 
 of money. Yet was he restored not long 
 after, and he recovered the churches of his 
 communion. He owed this, under Pro- 
 vidence, to one Marcion, a man of learn- 
 ing and piety, a Novatian presbyter, who 
 tutored two daughters of the emperor. On 
 this account the Novatians were at length 
 tolerated ; while the general church suf- 
 fered the rigour of banishment, and was 
 silent by compulsion, and while the Arians 
 tyrannized over all the Christian world in 
 the East. Yet the Novatians were still 
 infested by the Arians, because they 
 cherished and loved in a tender manner 
 their brethren of the general church.* 
 
 We must once more see Athanasius at- 
 tacked by the enemies of Christian piety. 
 About the beginning of the £jigj ^f 
 year 367, Valens, at the so- Yaiens 
 
 the same substance, and who were like- 
 wise enemies to the Divinity of the Holy 
 Ghost, could not gain the favour of the 
 emperor, but were persecuted as well as 
 the orthodox; while Eudoxius with the 
 complete Arians, who would not allow 
 the similarity of the Son to the Father, 
 engrossed all the churches. The Semi- 
 Arians, induced by these circumstances, 
 entered into connexions with Liberius 
 bishop of Rome, and reunited themselves 
 with the orthodox churches of the West : 
 yet one can have no great idea of the sin- 
 cerity of this sect, as they would have 
 probably persisted in their heresy, if Va- 
 lens had favoured their notion ; many of 
 them, howevar, might be perverted by the 
 subtilties of disputation, and be more or- 
 thodox in their hearts than in their ex- 
 f>ressions. Valens* ordered all the fol- 
 owers of the Nicene faith to be expelled 
 from Constantinople. In this persecu- 
 tion were included the Novatians: their 
 
 *Soz.C.IX. 
 
 licitation of Eudoxius, order- , ^ ^g^ 
 ed the bishops who had been 
 deposed in the reign of Constantius, and 
 were afterwards restored, to be expelled 
 from their churches. By virtue of this 
 order, Tatian, governor of Alexandria, at- 
 tempted to drive Athanasius out of ihat 
 city. The prelate had the hearts of his 
 people. Long experience of his integ.ity 
 and virtue, respect for his talents, and 
 compassion for his sufferings had secured 
 him this the most reasonable and the most 
 glorious of all empires. The prefect was 
 so sensible of this, that for some time he 
 dared not proceed to execute his orders. 
 At length, he brake one night with aa 
 
 * H>-x-r^v y.xi tc-TSfyov. B. IV. 0. 9. Socrates. 
 This historian having himself a particular ac- 
 quaintance with the Novatians, we learn sorae- 
 tliing from him concerning this people. I wish 
 he liad given us more information. But their 
 fltarity and tenderness toward the general 
 church in its distress, while they themselves 
 were indulged with toleration, and their suffer- 
 ing some molestation from the reigning party, 
 because of their affection (or those who endured 
 persecution for righteousness' sake, reflects an 
 amiable histre on the character of these Dissen- 
 ters. And I wish the lesson it is calculated to 
 teach were attended to at this day. Let men who 
 love the faith of the Gospel, and are content to 
 suffer for it in the world, adorn it by brotherly 
 love, and leave political contentions and the arts 
 of ambition to the enemies of the Gospel. 
 
322 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 armed force into his church, where he 
 generally lodged, and sought for his per- 
 son in every place, but in vain, Athana- 
 sius, probably warned before- 
 Atlianasi- ^gnd of the danger, had re- 
 us flies tired, and remained for four 
 
 InTif hT months concealed in his fa- 
 anona the , . , , mu- 
 
 fourth iher's sepulchre. This was 
 
 time. the fourth time that he had 
 
 fled from Alexandria. Valens, 
 however, from the dread he seems to have 
 had of the people, ordered him to be 
 recalled; nor could Lucius, the Arian 
 bishop of Alexandria, prevail on him to 
 give Athanasius any more disturbance. 
 About this time Valens himself received 
 baptism from Eudoxius, who had such 
 an ascendant over the weak emperor, as 
 to induce him to swear, that he would 
 never depart from the Arian creed.* 
 
 A council was held at Laodicea in 
 Phrygia about this time. A few of its 
 canons shall be mentioned, as they will 
 throw some light on the spirit of religion. 
 One of them prohibits the ordination of 
 men lately baptized ; and so far agrees 
 with the sacred rule.f The choice of 
 those appointed to the priesthood was 
 not to be left to the people, but the bishops 
 were to be chosen by the metropolitans, 
 after a long probation of their faith and 
 morals. In this, an alteration was doubt- 
 less made from the customs which had ob- 
 tained before the time of Constantiue, and 
 the metropolitans now exercised the same 
 power which the Apostles had done, who 
 doubtless ordained pastors in all the 
 churches by their own authority. The 
 council orders:!^ clergymen not to lend 
 money upon usury, nor to visit taverns 
 and houses of entertainment, nor to as- 
 sist at the public shows exhibited at 
 marriages and festivals. A proof, I fear, 
 that their manners were grown more lax 
 and dissolute. The invocation of angels 
 is also solemnly forbidden : a proof that 
 this species of idolatry had already crept 
 into the church, and a condemnation of 
 the practice of the Romanists. Presby- 
 ters are forbidden also to practise magic 
 and enchantment: pity, that there should 
 be occasion to make such a canon ! On 
 the whole, this council, though it appears 
 seriously bent on the support of good 
 discipline and manners, evidences a great 
 and deep corruption to have taken place 
 in the church of Christ. 
 
 * Theod. IV. c 12. Fleury,B. 16. 8. 
 
 t 1 Tim. iii.6. i Fleury, B. XVI. c. 12. 
 
 Valens himself, being at Tomi, a city 
 of Scythia, near the mouth of the Danube, 
 ordered Brettannio the bishop to meet and 
 communicate with him and his Arian at- 
 tendants, who came to the bishop's church 
 for that purpose. Brettannio firmly re- 
 fused, professing his regard for the Ni- 
 cene faith, and leaving the emperor he 
 went to another church, and all his con- 
 gregation followed him. Valens with 
 his attendants being left alone, was so 
 enraged, that he ordered the bishop to be 
 banished, though political reasons in- 
 duced him soon after to permit his return. 
 The Scythians were indignant at the ba- 
 nishment of their bishop, a man renowned 
 among them* for piety and integrity, and 
 Valens dreaded their revolt. Of the con- 
 duct of Basil, and Gregory Nazianzen in 
 these times, it will be more proper to 
 speak in the course of their story, as they 
 are men, who deserve to be held out to 
 the more distinct attention of the reader. 
 Antioch was sorely shaken with the con- 
 flicts of this persecution. There Arian- 
 ism triumphed, both in numbers and in 
 power, though the influence of the two 
 orthodox bishops, Meletius and Paulinus, 
 under God, preserved a considerable rem- 
 nant. For wherever men of firm piety 
 ruled in the churches, they were enabled 
 to check the torrent. On the pg^d, ^f 
 death of Eudoxius in 370, the EuJoxius, 
 Arians chose Demophilus in ^ jj ^^^^ 
 his room, and Valens approved 
 of the election. The orthodox elected at 
 the same time Evagrius bishop of Con- 
 stantinople. Valens, incensed, banished 
 both him and the bishop who had dared 
 to ordain him. 
 
 On this occasion eighty ecclesiastics 
 were sent to the emperor at Nicomedia, 
 to complain of his conduct. Enraged at 
 their presumption, and yet afraid of a se- 
 dition, he gave private orders to Modes- 
 tus, his prelect, to murder them secretly. 
 The execution of this order deserves to 
 be known in all ages. The prefect pre- 
 tended that he would send them into ba- 
 nishment, with which they cheerfully ac- 
 quiesced. But he directed the mariners 
 to set the ship on fire as soon as they 
 were gone to sea. The mariners did so, 
 and going into a boat which followed 
 them, escaped. The burning vessel was 
 driven by a strong west wind into the 
 haven of Dacidizus, on the coast of Bithy- 
 nia, where it was consumed with the 
 
 • Soz. B. VI. 21. 
 
Ckwt. IV.] 
 
 VALENS. 
 
 323 
 
 ministers.* The intention of concealing' 
 what was done, was frustrated ; and the 
 wickedness and inhumanity of the mur- 
 der appeared more odious, by the mean- 
 ness with which it was contrived. 
 
 Cacsarius, the brother of Gregory Na- 
 zianzen, had been recalled to court by 
 Jovian, and Yalens made him questor of 
 Bithynia. His brother exhorted him to 
 disengage himself from the world, which 
 at length he did, and died soon after. 
 
 Athanasius had the courage to expel 
 from the church the governor of Libya, a 
 man wholly given up to cruelty and de- 
 bauchery: nor was the world then so 
 degenerated, as to despise altogether the 
 discipline of the church. A council held 
 at Antioch by the faithful, 
 A council consisting of a hundred and 
 och " *' forty-six bishops, pathetical- 
 ly bewailed the times : and 
 among other things, they observed, that 
 the infidels laughed at these evils, and 
 staggered the weak ; while true Chris- 
 tians avoiding the churches, as beingf now 
 nurseries of impiety, went into deserts, 
 and lifted up their hands to God with 
 sighs and tears. 
 
 Meletius, who was the chief of this 
 council, was banished the third time, and 
 sent into Armenia, his own country. The 
 other bishop, Paulinus, whose flock was 
 small, was spared. The Meletians, de- 
 prived of their churches, assembled at 
 the foot of a mountain near Antioch, and 
 heard the word of God. But from this 
 place also they were driven, and many of 
 them were thrown into the Orontes. 
 
 Maximus, the philosopher and friend 
 of Julian, was at length made a victim 
 to the jealousy of Valens, for some magi- 
 cal contrivances real or pretended. 
 
 At Edessa, the orthodox were wont to 
 meet in a field ; Valens ordered them to 
 be dispersed; but the resolution of a wo- 
 man who hastened thither as on purpose 
 to suffer martyrdom, staggered his mind, 
 and caused him to cease from the at- 
 tempt. 
 
 Another method was taken : the pas- 
 tors of Edessa were sent into banish- 
 ment; some of them were conducted to 
 Antinous,! where observing the greater 
 part of the inhabitants to be Pagans, they 
 employed themselves in taking pains for 
 their eternal salvation. Protogenes par- 
 ticularly taught the children to write and 
 
 Athana- 
 sius, 
 
 A. D. 373. 
 
 • Socrates, B. IV. c. 16.j 
 
 + A place, I suppose, in Thebais in Egypt. 
 
 to read the Psalms of David and suitable 
 passages of the New Testament ; and 
 though the account we have here is very 
 defective, there is reason to believe, that 
 the progress of the Gospel was increased 
 by these means.* 
 
 Athanasius died in the year 373, after 
 he had been bishop forty-six years ; and 
 being desired to nominate a successor, he 
 mentioned Peter, an aged 
 saint, and the faithful com- Death of 
 panion of his labours. Let 
 us pause a little, to view the 
 writings and character of this 
 great man. 
 
 A person so actively employed, and so 
 wholly taken up during the course of a 
 long life with a single controversy, is not 
 likely to leave behind him writings very 
 instructive to after ages. I 
 run through his works, and ^'* ^'■''•" 
 find nothing important in '"^^' 
 them, except what relates to the Arian 
 controversy. As a writer, he is nervous, 
 clear, argumentative, and every where 
 discovers the man of sense, except in 
 the Life of Anthony the monk, and other 
 monastic pieces; -the superstitions and 
 follies of which unhappy perversion of 
 piety received but too liberal a support 
 from his influence. But such were the 
 times ; and in public life, the abuses of 
 Christianity were so many, that I wonder 
 not that the most godly had the strongest 
 relish for monasticism, in an age when 
 the knowledge of the genius of the Gos- 
 pel was so much darkened. His two 
 treatises against the Gentiles bid the 
 fairest to show his general knowledge 
 and spirit in religion, because they are 
 exempt from the Arian controversy. In 
 them he discovers the source of idolatry 
 to be the corruption of the heart, in con- 
 sequence of the Fall. Men being fallen 
 from God, cannot erect their minds to 
 things spiritual, but sink down to things 
 earthly and sensual. He allows the evil 
 propensity of nature, and describes its 
 effects very justly; at the same time like 
 Justin, and other of the fathers whom we 
 have seen, he speaks of the free-will of 
 man, and of his power of resisting this 
 propensity, using the same Greek term. I 
 He speaks very solidly of the incarnation 
 of the Son of God, describes it as essen- 
 tial to the recovery of fallen man, and 
 speaks of the propriety of man's being 
 
 * Fleury, 32. B. V. 
 
 y AuTe^BO-ioy. 
 
324 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XL 
 
 taught by Him, who is the Wisdom of 
 the Father. Redemption by his cross he 
 speaks of in a manner perfectly scriptu- 
 ral ; but little is to be found in him of the 
 experience of these doctrines, and their 
 application to the heart and conscience; 
 nor does he dwell mucli on the virtues 
 and graces of the Holy Spirit. Opposi- 
 tion to Arianism absorbed his whole soul, 
 and he keeps it in constant view through- 
 out all his writings, or nearly so, except 
 in his two discourses to the Gentiles. 
 His address to Constantius is vehement 
 and persuasive ; but, though full of in- 
 tegrity, it is wanting in meekness. In 
 his apology for his flight, he amply vin- 
 dicates himself by scriptural and aposto- 
 lical authority. His book on the Psalms 
 explains very justly their excellencies. 
 He shows, that in them is found the 
 whole sum of duty, all the arguments of 
 prayer, all the doctrines of religion, pro- 
 phecies concerning Jesus Christ, and all 
 the histories of the Old Testament : he 
 observes, with great propriety, that the 
 believer may see in them the state and 
 frame of his own soul, what he himself 
 feels ; and let a man's state be what it 
 may, every one may find words adapted 
 to his condition, and a true relief for 
 every trouble. His treatise on the un- 
 pardonable sin is a monument of infirmi- 
 ty in a great and noble mind, and such 
 an infirmity as men of great sincerity are 
 more exposed to than others ; I mean that 
 of wresting every subject that we handle, 
 to promote the darling object of our own 
 minds. To defend the Trinity was his ; 
 I wonder not therefore, that Arianism with 
 him is represented as the " unpardonable 
 sin," and truly the conduct of the Arians 
 in his time would naturally give an edge 
 to his spirit. I have represented things 
 in as faithful a manner as I can from the 
 lights of antiquity which remain to us ; 
 and I must say, independently of all doc- 
 trinal sentiments, there appears no com- 
 parison between the two parties in their 
 moral conduct. Every thing 
 mean and sordid, cruel and 
 inhuman, ambitious and per- 
 fidious, is found on the side 
 of Arianism. The fruits of 
 genuine religion evidently ap- 
 pear on the other side, so far as I can 
 discover hitherto. However melancholy 
 may have been the scenes of human wick- 
 edness, which we have reviewed, and 
 however faint the marks of godliness in 
 any person, still " real virtue was seen 
 
 Compari- 
 son of 
 Trinita- 
 rians and 
 Arians. 
 
 the attendant of orthodox sentiments 
 alone." Is it to be wondered, that Atha- 
 nasius, who knew and felt all this, should 
 be betrayed into such an interpretation of 
 the unpardonable sin 1 
 
 In his defence of the Trinity, he guards 
 it on all sides with extreme exactness. 
 He is not solicitous to remove the mys- 
 tery ; he leaves the account as it always 
 should be left, inadequate and imperfect, 
 clear and exact only so far as the Scrip- 
 ture has explained it. He is not careful 
 to clear it of the objections, and to answer 
 the captious questions of the enemies of 
 the doctrine. But all sorts of opposition 
 to it find in him a just refutation. He 
 asserts every where the Trinity in Unity. 
 Among the rest, the heresy of Apollina- 
 rius, who denied to Jesus Christ a hu- 
 man soul, was by him effectually confut- 
 ed. But not to dwell longer on a subject 
 we have had so much occasion to consi- 
 der, I observe, that though the creed, 
 commonly called that of Athanasius, be 
 not his, yet it contains precisely his views 
 and sentiments.* 
 
 Athanasius shines, however, more in 
 his life than in his writings ; his conduct 
 every where appears consistent and up- 
 right, sharpened too much by long and 
 cruel opposition indeed, yet never govern- 
 ed by malice, always principled by the 
 fear of God in this whole controversy. I 
 doubt not but he was raised by a special 
 providence to defend the doctrine of the 
 Trinity; and while men of no religion 
 are blaming his asperity, let us admire 
 the strength of that grace, which kept 
 him so invincibly firm and calmly mag- 
 nanimous, and through his means pre- 
 served to us this precious part of Chris- 
 tian doctrine. The Lord has ever raised 
 up instruments of this strong and hardy 
 cast, to maintain his cause in the world ; 
 and let it be remembered, in regard to 
 this great and good man, that after all 
 the abuse thrown on his character respect- 
 ing persecution, there is very much of 
 persecution indeed, but persecution by 
 him always suffered, never inflicted on 
 others. 
 
 The choice of Peter, as his successor 
 at Alexandria, was confirmed by the 
 
 whole church; and the almost universal 
 respect which was paid to the virtues of 
 Athanasius, seemed to put his election 
 out of the reach of controversy. But im- 
 perial violence prevailed. By Euzoius 
 
 I* See Du Pin's view of his works. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 PETER. 
 
 325 
 
 of Antioch, Valens was stirred up to op- 
 pose Peter ; and Lucius, whom Jovian so 
 contemptuously rejected, was introduced 
 by the power of the sword. Then* was 
 seen the insolent cruelty of Magnus a 
 Pagan, whom the mercy of Jovian had 
 spared. Manj' Athanasians were mur- 
 dered, and many treated with great out- 
 rages ; while Arianisra, supported by the 
 civil powers, triumphed withoat control. 
 Nineteen priests and deacons, some very 
 old, were seized by Magnus. " Agree, 
 wretches," said the Pagan, " to the sen- 
 timents of the Arians. If your religion 
 be true, God will forgive you for yield- 
 ing to necessity." " Forbear to impor- 
 tune us," they replied, " we do not be- 
 lieve that God is sometimes Father, and 
 sometimes not. Our fathers at Nice con- 
 fessed, that the Son is consubstantial 
 with the Father." Whips and tortures, 
 the grief of the godly, and the insults of 
 Jews and apostates, altered not their de- 
 termination : they were banished to He- 
 liopolis in Phoenicia. Palladius a Pagan, 
 the governor of Egypt, sent many to pri- 
 son, who had presumed to weep ; and 
 after he had scourged them, sent twenty- 
 three of them, chiefly monks, to work in 
 the mines. Other scenes of savage cru- 
 elty are related; it is tedious and unplea- 
 sant to enlarge on them : but it is a plea- 
 sure to behold the fruits of Athanasius's 
 labours in the faithful suffering's of so 
 many of his followers. Euzoius, having 
 put Lucius and his Arians into the pos- 
 session of the churches, and left Alexan- 
 dria in tears, returned to Antioch. What 
 a bishop was this! But the Christian 
 reader will steadily observe with me, 
 that Christ had all along a real church, 
 and that the cross is her mark, but the 
 cross meekly endured : and were not Eu- 
 zoius's conduct connected with this truth, 
 his name would deserve no notice in this 
 history. 
 
 The monks of Egypt, whose piety 
 moved the common people, were courted 
 by the Arian party ; but they offered their 
 necks to the sword, rather than quit the 
 Nicene profession. A number of these 
 were banished, but were afterwards per- 
 mitted to return. f Peter himself, though 
 imprisoned, found means to escape, and 
 in Europe, where Arianism had no power, 
 he enjoyed a quiet exile. 
 
 The piety of Terentius, an officer of 
 Valens, deserves to be recorded. The 
 
 * Tlieod, 
 Vol. I. 
 
 IV. 22. 
 
 2E 
 
 f Soz. VI. 20. 
 
 emperor, pleased with his services, bade 
 him ask a favour. The man begged the 
 liberty of a place of worship for the or- 
 thodox. Valens in a rage tore his peti- 
 tion. Terentius gathering the fragments 
 of the petition, said, I have received a 
 gift from you, O, Emperor. Let the 
 Judge of all the earth judge between us.* 
 
 At the same time among the Goths, by 
 the cruelty of their king Athanaric, num- 
 bers of godly men were murdered for the 
 sake of their Redeemer. Eusebius of Sa- 
 mosata was expelled by the Arian tyranny 
 from his see. He took particular care to 
 preserve the life of the imperial messen- 
 ger before his departure, and when de- 
 sired with floods of tears by his flock not 
 to leave them to the mercy of the wolves, 
 he read to them that passage of the Apos- 
 tle, which commands obedience to the 
 powers that be.| Excellent servant of 
 Christ ! 
 
 Eusebius of Samasota is one of those 
 bishops of whom it were to be wished 
 we had a more distinct account. His 
 zeal had exposed him to this persecution. 
 In the disguise of a soldier he had travel- 
 led through various parts of the East, to 
 confirm the desolate churches, and to 
 supply them with pastors. When the 
 messenger of his banishment came to 
 him, " Conceal the occasion of your jour- 
 ney," says he, " or you will be thrown 
 into the river, and your death laid to my 
 charge." He himself retired with great 
 secrecy, yet was he followed by the peo- 
 ple. The testimony he gave of the primi- 
 tive duty of passiveness under injuries 
 was much needed in these times, when 
 men had too much forgotten to suffer 
 with meekness. He received from his 
 friends very little for his journey, though 
 their liberality would have supplied him 
 abundantly. He prayed, and instructed 
 the people, and then retired in peace. 
 
 It will be proper to finish here all that 
 I can find concerning Eusebius which is 
 material. In the time of Constantius he 
 had been intrusted with the care of a de- 
 cree of a council held at Antioch, which 
 the Arian party afterwards persuaded 
 Constantius to order him to deliver up. 
 He justly observed, that what had been 
 delivered by a synod, could only be re- 
 turned by the authority of the same sy- 
 nod. Even a menace, that he should 
 have his hand cut off, prevailed not with 
 him. Constantius admired his fortitude, 
 
 Cent. Magd. 
 
 t Rom. xiii. 
 
326 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 and desisted.* No wonder that the peo- 
 ple of Samosata, after his exile under 
 Valens, admiring a man so firm and sin- 
 cere, refused to attend the religious in- 
 structions of the successor who was 
 forced upon them ; who being a man of a 
 meek temper, took much pains to ingra- 
 tiate himself with them, but in vain. Eu- 
 nomius (that was his name) left them, 
 because he could not gain their favour. 
 The Arians put in his room one Lucius, 
 who acted with more violence, and en- 
 couraged the secular power to persecute. | 
 Eusebius however lived long enough to 
 recover his see of Samosata after the 
 death of Valens, and was at last killed 
 with a tile by a zealous Arian woman in 
 the town of Dolicha, whither he was 
 come to ordain an orthodox pastor, the 
 place being very hostile to the doctrine 
 of the Trinity. He died in a very chari- 
 table spirit, insisting with his friends, 
 that the woman should not be brought to 
 justice on his account, and obliged theni 
 to swear that they would gratify him in 
 this.:t^ 
 
 Some further views of the church under 
 Valens will appear in the lives 
 Death of Qf j3ggii ^^^ Gregory Nazi- 
 Valens, ^ anzen,whom I studiously pass 
 A. D. 378. ^ygj. j'gj. ^]^g present. Valens 
 perished in a battle with the Goths in 
 the year 378, after having reigned four- 
 teen years. 
 
 Valens, however, from whatever cause, 
 a little before his death, recalled the ex- 
 iled bishops. Lucius was driven from 
 Alexandria ; Peter recovered his see, and 
 Arianism lost its external dominion a lit- 
 tle before the death of its benefactor. 
 
 The Goths, who had settled on the 
 Roman side of the Danube, in the domi- 
 nions of Valens, were by the advice of 
 Eudoxius, the Arian bishop of Constan- 
 tinople, brought over to Arianism. Va- 
 lens proposed that they should agree with 
 him in doctrine ; but they declared, that 
 they never would recede from the doctrine 
 of their ancestors. Ulfila, the bishop of 
 the whole nation, of whom more here- 
 after, was induced, by the presents and 
 complaisance of Eudoxius, to attempt to 
 draw them over to the emperor's doc- 
 trine; and his argument, which I sup- 
 pose he had from Eudoxius, was, that it 
 was only a verbal dispute. Hence the 
 Gothic Christians continued to. assert, 
 
 that the Father was greater than the Son, 
 but would not allow the Son to be a crea- 
 ture. Nor yet did they wholly depart 
 from the faith of their ancestors. For 
 Urfila assured them, that there was no 
 difference of doctrine at all, but that the 
 rupture had arisen from a vain conten- 
 tion.* 
 
 J^ 
 
 67, 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE CHURCH UNDER VALENTINIAN-^ 
 AMBROSE APPOINTED BISHOP OF MI- 
 LAN. 
 
 Let us turn our eyes to a more cheer- 
 ful prospect in the West; in the East, 
 the only comfortable circumstance has 
 been, that God left not himself without 
 witness, but marked his real church by a 
 number of faithful sufferers. Valentin- 
 ian, the elder brother of Valens, made a 
 law in the beginning of his reign, that 
 no man should be compelled in religion. f 
 He restrained, however, this general li- 
 cence soon after, partly by seizing the 
 revenues of the heathen temples, which 
 the emperors annexed to their own patri- 
 mony, and partly by the prohibition of 
 divinations and enchantments. On a repre- 
 sentation of the governor of Greece, Achaia 
 was allowed still to practise her heathen- 
 ish follies. Other laws in favour of Chris- 
 tians followed. :|: One of the supposed 
 oracles of Greece had declared that Chris- 
 tianity should last only 365 years in the 
 world. This period was now expired, 
 and the event had falsified the prediction. 
 In other instances this emperor was very 
 indulgent to the Pagans, who might see 
 themselves, both in the East and West, 
 treated with far more lenity and favour 
 than the Church of Christ was in the 
 East during the whole reign of the two 
 brothers. Themistius, the Pagan philo- 
 sopher, was struck with the cruelty of 
 Valens ; and while he insinuated that per- 
 haps God was delighted with the diver- 
 sity of sentiments in the world concerur 
 ing him, he entreated the emperor not to 
 persecute any longer. This is one in- 
 stance of the illegitimate charity now so 
 
 * Theodoret. B. U. c. 32. fib. B. IV. C 15. 
 i lb. V. c. 4. 
 
 * Tlicodoret, end of B. IV. 
 
 f Though the laws of Valeiitinian run both 
 in his name and that of his bi-otlier, I speak of 
 them as his laws exclusively, because it may 
 fairly be presumed, that he was the principal 
 agent. 
 
 :j: See Cave's Introduction, Sect. IV. 
 
Ct.7.'t. IV.] 
 
 VALENTINIAN. 
 
 327 
 
 common in the world, whirh founds the 
 principles of moderation on scepticism, in- 
 stead of that divine love which is the 
 glory of the Christian religion. 
 
 Auxentius, the Arian bishop of Milan, 
 beincr opposed by Ensebius of Vercella?, 
 and by Hilary of Poictiers,* imposed on 
 Yalentinian by a dexterous use of those 
 ambiguities of speech, in which the Arians 
 all along- excelled. Nor is it to be won- 
 dered at, that Valentinian should be de- 
 ceived, since even to this day the patrons 
 of Arianism, by larg-ely dwelling on the 
 perfections of the Son of God, with a 
 cautious omission of the term consubstan- 
 tial, in a similar way frequently prevail 
 on many, who do not or will not under- 
 stand the true grounds of the controversy, 
 to suppose that the difference of opinion 
 is merely verbal, Hilary contended, that 
 if this were really the case, the Arians 
 could have no reason to avoid an explicit 
 acknowledgment of the whole truth. To 
 this it may justly be added, that their 
 constant support of those who were un- 
 doubted opposers of the divinity of Jesus, 
 and their constant enmity against its ex- 
 plicit defenders, evince the diiference to 
 be real, not imaginary ; and so it will be 
 felt by every one who feels the worth of 
 his soul, and is forced to see the differ- 
 ence between committing its salvation to 
 the Creator and the creature. With-equal 
 justice Hilary complained of the Arian 
 method of supporting their creed by mili- 
 tary and imperial power. But he com- 
 plained in vain; the duplicity of Auxen- 
 tius prevailed, and he was suffered to 
 continue at Milan in the practice of under- 
 mining the fiiith, without openly attacking 
 it; the constant method of heresy in all 
 ages. Whereas divine truth speaks di- 
 rectly and plainly, and must do so, what- 
 ever be the consequence. And in this 
 sincerity the church must continue to the 
 end, supported not by political 
 Liberius, gj-ts, but bv divine influence. 
 
 Rorai' "^ ^" ^'^^ y^^^ ^*'^' ^'*^^ Liberius 
 ^jgj ' of Rome. How far he really 
 
 A Ji «^^ recovered from his fall under 
 A. D. 366. ni * *• 
 
 Constantms, is not very ap- 
 parent. He was succeeded by Damasus. 
 who however was not established in his 
 see without a contest with Ursinus, which 
 cost a number of lives. So much were 
 Christian bishops degenerated. But it 
 
 • I purpose!)' avoid entering into details of 
 the acts of this great man, as well as of some 
 others, because their lives deserve to be coa- 
 sidered as distinct articles. 
 
 should be observed, that there was a ma- 
 terial difference in these times between 
 pastors of great cities and those of small- 
 er. What I mean, is well illustrated by 
 Ammianus.* " When I consider," says 
 he, "the magnificence and grandeur of 
 Rome, I do not d?ny, but that those who 
 are ambitious of this dignity, ought to 
 use all their endeavours to arrive at it ; 
 since they by this means procure a cer- 
 tain settlement, where they are enriched 
 by the offerings of the ladies: they ride 
 in chariots, richly clothed ; and feast so 
 splendidly, that their tables surpass even 
 those of kings. They might be truly 
 happy, if, contemning the splendour of 
 Rome, they lived like some bishops of the 
 provinces, who by the plainness of their 
 diet, their mean apparel, and the modesty 
 of their looks, which are turned towards 
 the ground, make themselves acceptable 
 to the eternal God and his true worship- 
 pers." 
 
 Thus far this sensible and candid Pa- 
 gan, who by the concluding part of the 
 passage appears to have imbibed some 
 Christian notions, and to support that 
 mongrel character, which I have else- 
 where attributed to him. While we la- 
 ment how full history is of these splen- 
 did and opulent bishops, and how scanty 
 our materials are concerning the humble 
 and obscure ones, it behooves us to be on 
 our guard against the malignant intima- 
 tions of profane historians, who represent 
 the church in these times as altogether 
 corrupt. It was very much so at Rome, 
 at Antioch, at Constantinople, and other 
 large cities, especially among the great 
 and the rich. In the story of these, we 
 see continually what an enemy riches are 
 to the divine life. But among the lower 
 orders, and in obscure places, by the con- 
 fession of Ammianus, upright and ex- 
 emplary pastors were not wanting; and 
 if we had an historical view of their la- 
 bours and success, I doubt not but the 
 Church of Christ, even in the fourth cen- 
 tury, would be seen with other eyes than 
 it is by man)'. 
 
 I am endeavouring to catch the features 
 of this Church, wherever I can find them 
 in this obscure region. I have distin- 
 guished formerly three species of dissen- 
 ters ; the Novatians, the Meletians and 
 the Donatists. The first are by far the 
 most respectable : of the second little is 
 known, and that little is not to their 
 
 • Fleury, B. X\l. 8. 
 
328 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XH. 
 
 Valens' 
 edict 
 
 againstun- 
 lawful as- 
 semblies, 
 
 A. D. 374. 
 
 credit: the third are flagitious, by the 
 confession of all writers. A fourth ap- 
 pears, the Luciferians, who, if they im- 
 bibed the spirit of Lucifer, must have 
 been firm and sincere in the love of the 
 truth. In the year 374, the emperor or- 
 dered all who held unlawful 
 assemblies to be banished a 
 hundred miles from Rorne. 
 In prosecution of this edict, 
 Damasus seems to have caus- 
 ed a Luciferian presbyter to 
 be apprehended, who held a 
 congreg-atioQ by night in a private house ; 
 and he and some of the same class were 
 banished. Notwithstanding this severity, 
 Damasus could not prevent these dissen- 
 ters from having a bishop of their own at 
 Rome, called Aurelius, who was suc- 
 ceeded by Ephesus, who also kept his 
 station at Rome, notwithstanding the en- 
 deavours of Damasus to remove him. 
 Gregory of Elvira in Spain was another 
 of their bishops, a man whose firmness 
 was extolled by Eusebius of Vercella;. 
 The Donatists had likewise a bishop at 
 Rome, and another in Spain. But vio- 
 lence and ferocity still mark this people.* 
 I have represented as fairly as I could 
 the lights of history. The reader may 
 judge for himself, whether in the general 
 church, we do not seem to behold the 
 first and most dignified rulers degene- 
 rated. Damasus^ orthodox and violent 
 in the support of orthodoxy, without hu- 
 mility and piety, is as strong a contrast 
 to the primitive bishops, as »Sharp, arch- 
 bishop of St. Andrew's, in the time of 
 
 Charles II. is to our first reformers. The 
 persecuted Luciferians may seem to re- 
 semble the Puritans of the same period ; 
 while such men as Eusebius of Vercella;, 
 and Hilary of Poictiers, may be likened 
 to archbishop Leighton. But though the 
 spirit of the Gospel probably prevailed 
 most among the Luciferians, yet, as I 
 have already observed, this spirit was 
 still in a degree preserved among the in- 
 ferior and obscure pastors of the general 
 church. But a new star is going to ap- 
 pear in the Western world, and it be- 
 hooves us to attend to its lustre. 
 Ambrose succeeded the Arian Auxentius 
 at Milan, who died in the year 
 374. He was born about the 
 year 338, while his father 
 was the emperor's lieutenant 
 in France. He was the young- 
 
 est of three children, Marcellina and Sa- 
 tyrus being born before him. After his 
 father's decease,* his mother with the 
 family returned to Rome, where he made 
 himself master of all the learning that 
 Greece and Latium could afford ; at the 
 same time his sister Marcellina, who had 
 devoted herself to a state of virginity, 
 instructed him with much success in the 
 principles of godliness. Being grown 
 to maturity, he pleaded causes with so 
 much dexterity, that he was soon taken 
 notice of by Anicius Probus, pretorian 
 prefect of Italy, who made choice of him 
 to be of his council : and having authori- 
 ty to appoint governors to several provin- 
 ces, when he gave a commission to him, 
 he said, "Go, and govern more like a 
 bishop than a judge." Ambrose in this 
 office resided at Milan for five years, and 
 was renowned for prudence and justice; 
 when one of those sudden turns of pro- 
 vidence, which are so conspicuous in the 
 lives of many persons of eminent godli- 
 ness, threw him into a course of life ex- 
 tremely different from his former. 
 
 Auxentius, by artifice and dexterity 
 had, as we have seen, imposed on Valen- 
 tinian, and preserved his seat to his death 
 in the year 374. Immediataly the bishops 
 of the province met together concerning 
 the election of a successor. The empe- 
 ror sent for them, and told them, that they, 
 as men best acquainted with the sacred 
 volume, ought to understand better than 
 he the qualifications necessary for so im- 
 portant a station. " Choose a man," said 
 he, "fit to instruct by life as well as by 
 doctrine, and we ourselves will readily 
 submit our sceptres to his counsels and 
 direction, and, as men obnoxious to hu- 
 man frailty, will receive his reproofs and 
 admonitions as wholesome physic." The 
 bishops besought him to nominate the 
 person, but Valentinian was resolute in 
 referring the determination to them, as 
 fitter than himself to decide. f In the 
 meantime factions were strong, and the 
 
 Auxentius, 
 
 bishop of 
 
 Milan, 
 
 dies, 
 
 A, D. 374. 
 
 Fleury, B. XVI. 37. 
 
 * See Paulinus's Life of Ambrose prefixed 
 to the works of that Saint. Cave ; Fleury. 
 
 + Those who have learnt from modern po- 
 litics to exclude men of the sacred office 
 from any regaid in the councils of princes, 
 will despise the weakness of Valentinian. 
 Those who remember how useful the advice 
 of Jehoida was to Joash, and who believe that 
 \)iety and the fear of God are of some conse- 
 quence in the conduct of human affairs, will 
 commend his conscientiousness and his mo- 
 desty. 
 
Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 AMBROSE. 
 
 329 
 
 Arian party vigorously laboured to pro- 
 vide a successor worthy of Auxentius. 
 The city was divided, every thing tended 
 toward a tumult, the bishops were con- 
 sulting, and Ambrose, hearing of these 
 things, hastened to the church of Milan, 
 and exhorted the people to peace and sub- 
 mission to the laws. His speech being 
 finishedi an infant's voice was heard in 
 the crowd, " Ambrose is bishop ! " The 
 hint was taken at once, the whole assem- 
 bly cried out, " Ambrose shall be the 
 man !" The factions agreed immediate- 
 ly,* and he whom secular pursuits had 
 seemed to preclude from the notice of 
 either party, was suddenly elected by 
 universal consent. 
 
 Ambrose was astonished, and peremp- 
 torily refused ; nor was any person ever 
 more desirous to obtain the office of a 
 bishop, than he was to avoid 
 
 ''^'"I'^'i?-^! ^^* ^^ ^''^^ "^^'^ methods 
 ™'* f a'/- ' which sound stranofe in our 
 on ot Ml- , , =^ . 
 
 Ia„_ ears, and are by no means jus- 
 
 tifiable. By exercising se- 
 verity on malefactors, and by encouraging 
 harlots to come into his house, he took 
 pains to convince them, that he was not 
 that character of mildness and chastity, 
 which he undoubtedly was, and which 
 all believed him to be. This extraordinary 
 hypocrisy was, however, easily detected. 
 Finding it was vain to stem the torrent, 
 he stole out of Milan at midnight, but 
 missing his way, and wandering all night, 
 he found himself in the mornino- at the 
 gate of Milan. A guard was placed about 
 his person, till the emperor's pleasure 
 should be known, because his consent 
 was necessary to part with a subject in 
 office. Valentinian sincerely consented ; 
 and the consent of Ambrose himself alone 
 was wanting. It is pleasing to see the 
 testimonj' which the human mind, when 
 left to itself, in all ajes, gives in favour of 
 modesty and integrity, in consequence of 
 the law written on the heart, which all 
 the corruption of nature and the artifice of 
 8atan cannot easily efface. Ambrose 
 again made his escape, and hid himself 
 in the country-house of a friend. A me- 
 nacing edict of the emperor brought him 
 again to Milan, because he dared not ex- 
 pose his friend to the resentment of the 
 emperor. Ambrose yielded at length, and 
 A'^alentinian gave thanks to God and our 
 Saviour, that it had pleased him to make 
 choice of the very person to take care of 
 
 * See. B. IV. 30. Soz. B. VI. 24. 
 2e2 
 
 men's souls, Avhom he had himself be- 
 fore appointed to preside over their tem- 
 poral concerns. Valentinian received his 
 general admonitions with reverence ; and 
 in particular, hearing him represent the 
 faults of some in authority with great 
 plainness : " I knew," said the emperor, 
 " the honesty of your character before this 
 time, yet I consented to your ordination ; 
 follow the divine rules, and cure the ma- 
 ladies into which we are prone to fall." 
 
 Ambrose was then about thirty-six 
 years old. Immediately he gave to the 
 church and to the poor all the gold and 
 silver which he had. He gave also his 
 lands to the church, reserving the annual 
 income of them for the use of his sister 
 Marcellina. His family he committed to 
 the care of his brother Satyrus. Thus 
 disengaged from temporal concerns, he 
 gave up himself wholly to the ministry. 
 Having read little else than profane au- 
 thors, he first applied himself to the study 
 of the Scriptures. Whatever time he 
 could spare from business he devoted to 
 readino- : and this he continued to do 
 after he had attained a good degree of 
 knowledcre.* I wish Origen had been 
 less the object of his study. But the re- 
 nown of that Father was great, and this 
 was not an age of evangelical perspicuity. 
 His public labours went hand in hand 
 with his studies. He preached every 
 Lord's day. Arianism through his la- 
 bours was expelled from Italy. 
 
 There was a presbyter of Rome, named 
 Simplician, a man of eminent learning 
 and piety, Avhom he drew over to Milan, 
 and under whose tuition he improved in 
 theology. For his knowledge must have 
 been very confined when he entered upon 
 his office, and what is very rare, he knew 
 it to be so. Simplician he ever loved and 
 reverenced. We shall hear again of this 
 presbyter, when we come to the conver- 
 sion of Augustine. It pleased God to 
 make him a useful instrument for the in- 
 struction of both these luminaries of the 
 Western church, and as he out-lived Am- 
 brose, though very old, he was appointed 
 his successor in the church of Milan. 
 From Simplician, as an instrument, it 
 pleased God successively to convey both 
 to Ambrose and to Augustine that fire of 
 divine love and genuine simplicity in re- 
 ligion, which had very much decayed 
 since the days of Cyprian: and in this 
 slow, but effectual method, the Lord was 
 
 Aug. Confess. B. VI. c. 3. 
 
330 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 preparing the way for another great effu- 
 sion of his Spirit. Ambrose now gave 
 liimself wholly to the work of the Lord, 
 and restored purity of doctrine and disci- 
 pline. 
 
 A council of bishops held about this 
 time at Valence, may deserve to be men- 
 tioned, on account of one of its rules, 
 which throws some liofht on the religious 
 state of the times. One Acceptus having 
 been demanded as bishop by the church 
 of Frejus, and having falsely accused 
 himself of some great crime to prevent 
 his ordination, the fathers of the council 
 say, that to cut off occasions of scandal 
 from the profane, they had determined 
 that the testimony which every one gives 
 of himself shall be treated as true, though 
 they were not ignorant that many had 
 acted in this manner in order to avoid 
 the priesthood. The deceit of Ambrose. 
 in endeavouring to appear what he was 
 not, seems then to have been no singular 
 case. Modest}^ tinged with superstition, 
 was a characteristic of the best characters 
 of this age. Evangelical light being dim, 
 the spirit of bondage much prevailed 
 among real saints. Let us be thankful 
 for the clearer light of divine truth, which 
 now shines in the church, and that a good 
 man may enter into holy orders without 
 that excess of fear, which prevailed over 
 Ambrose and Acceptus. But while we 
 wonder that men could use such marvel- 
 lous arts of falsehood, through modesty 
 and conscientious awe, let us not forget 
 that a future age may be as much asto- 
 nished at the fearless spirit, with which 
 such numbers can, in our days, rush into 
 the church of Christ, with no other views 
 than those of this world ; and let us be 
 wail their intrepid audacity, while we 
 smile at the superstitious simplicity of 
 the age we are now reviewing. 
 
 Valentinian died in the year 375, after 
 a reign of eleven years ; survived by his 
 brother Valens about three 
 years. Violent anger had 
 ever been his predominant 
 evil, and a fit of passion at 
 length cost him his life. Of 
 some men, we must say with the Apostle, 
 that their sins follow after, while others 
 evidence in this life what they are. Of 
 the former dubious sort seems to have 
 been the emperor Valentinian. Fierce 
 and savage by nature, though of excellent 
 understanding, and, when cool, of the 
 soundest judgment, we have seen him 
 naodestly submitting himself to the judg- 
 
 ment of bishops in divine things, and also 
 zealous in religion, so far as his know- 
 ledge would permit, which seems to have 
 been very small. We are astonished to be- 
 hold the imperious lion turned into a gen- 
 tle lamb ; and the best use to be made of 
 his character is, to prove how extremely 
 beneficial it is to human society, that 
 princes should be men of some religion. 
 Without this check, Valentinian might 
 have been one of the worst of tyrants ; 
 but by the sole means of religion he 
 passes for one of the better sort of 
 princes. 
 
 Death of 
 Valentini- 
 an, 
 A. D. 375. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF CHRIST UNDER GRA- 
 TIAN AND THEODOSIUS, TILL THE 
 DEATH OF THE FORMER. 
 
 Gratian, the elder son of Valentinian, 
 succeeded him in Gaul, Spain, and Bri- 
 tain. His younger son, an infant, suc- 
 ceeded in Italy, and the rest of the West- 
 ern world. And some time after Gratian 
 chose Theodosius as his colleague, who 
 reigned in the East. 
 
 From his early years there appear un- 
 questionable marks of real godliness in 
 Gratian, to a degree beyond any thing 
 that has yet been seen in any Roman 
 emperor. One of his first actions de- 
 monstrates it. The title of highpriest 
 always belonged to the Roman princes. 
 He justly observed, that as its whole 
 nature was idolatrous, it became not a 
 Christian to assume it. He therefore 
 refused the habit, though the Pagans still 
 gave him the title. 
 
 As he was destitute of that ambition 
 which Roman pride had ever indulged, 
 he chose a colleague, for the East, of 
 great abilities, purely for the good of the 
 states, and managed the concerns of his 
 infant brother at Rome with the affection 
 of a father. There, from the beginning 
 of his reign, Gracchus* the prefect, as 
 yet only a catechumen, laboured earnest- 
 ly to subdue idolatry. The mind of this 
 young prince being strongly fixed on di- 
 vine things, and being conscious of ignor- 
 ance, he wrote to Ambrose of Milan to 
 this effect :f "Gratian Augustus to Am- 
 brose the religious priest of Almighty 
 God. I much desire to be present in 
 
 * Fleu.v, B. XVIII. 24. 
 
 t Ambrose's Epistles, B. V. 25, 26. 
 
Ceitt. IV.] 
 
 GRATIAN. 
 
 331 
 
 body with him whom I remf.mber absent, 
 and with whom I am united in mind. 
 Come to me immediately, holy priest, 
 that you may teach the doctrine of salva- 
 tion to one who truly believes; not that 
 he may study for contention, or seek to 
 embrace God rather verbally than men- 
 tally, but that the revelation of the Di- 
 vinity may dwell more intimately in my 
 breast. For He whom I do not deny, 
 whom I own as my Lord and my God, 
 will not fail to teach me. I would not 
 conceive so meanly of him as to make 
 him a mere creature like myself, who 
 own that I can add nothing to Christ. 
 And yet while I seek to please the Father 
 in celebratincr the Son, I do not fear lest 
 the Father should envy the honours as-' 
 cribed to his Son; nor do I think so hio-h- 
 ly of my powers of commendation, as to 
 suppose that I can increase the Divinity 
 by my words. I am weak and frail, I 
 extol him as I can, not as the Divinity 
 deserves. With respect to that treatise 
 which you gave me, I beg you would 
 make additions to it by scriptural argu- 
 ments, to prove the proper Deity of the 
 Holy Ghost," Ambrose, delighted with 
 the vein of serious attention to divine 
 subjects, which appears in this letter, 
 answered him in an ecstasy of satisfac- 
 tion. — "Most Christian prince," says he, 
 " modesty, not want of affection, has 
 hitherto prevented me from waiting upon 
 you. If, however, I was not with you 
 personally, I have been present with my 
 prayers, in which consists still more the 
 duty of a pastor. I use no flattery : you 
 need it not ; and moreover it is quite for- 
 eign to my office. Our Judge whom you 
 confess, and in whom you piously believe, 
 knows that my bowels are refreshed with 
 your faith, your salvation, and your glory ; 
 and that I pray for you not only as in 
 public duty bound, but even with person- 
 al affection. — He alone hath taught you, 
 who said. He that loveth me, shall be 
 loved of my Father." Toward the close, 
 he reminds him, that his own arguments 
 for the divinity of the Son, expressed in 
 his letter, are equallj'' conclusive for the 
 divinity of the Holy Ghost, whom we 
 ought not to think the Father to envy, 
 nor ourselves to be on an equal footing 
 with him, who are mere creatures. Some 
 writings of Ambrose remain to us as the 
 consequence of Gratian's request. 
 
 The errors of good men have in some 
 instances proved prejudicial to the church. 
 This was unhappily the case with Am- 
 
 brose. All the world bore testimony to his 
 sincerity, charity, and piety : but he had not 
 strength to withstand the torrent of su- 
 perstition, which for some time had been 
 growing. He even augmented it by his 
 immoderate encomiums on virginity. The 
 little acquaintance he had with the Scrip- 
 tures before his ordination, and the influ- 
 ence of his sister Marcellina, a zealous 
 devotee, will account for this. He wrote 
 treatises on the subject: he reduced the 
 rules of it to a sort of system, and ex- 
 posed himself to the ill-will of parents, 
 by inducing a considerable number of 
 young women to follow them. It must 
 be confessed, however, that he taught 
 the essentials of Christian faith and love, 
 and built his wood, hav, and stubble* 
 on the true foundation. He had no other 
 arms but those of persuasion, and his 
 great success showed the piety, as well 
 as superstition of many of the female 
 sex.j" 
 
 Another part of his conduct was more 
 worthy of his understanding. The rava- 
 ges of the Goths gave him an opportuni- 
 ty to exercise his liberality. He scru- 
 pled not to apply the vessels of the 
 church to the redemption of captives, and 
 vindicated himself against those who cen- 
 sured his conduct.:j: In the instruction 
 of catechumens he employed so much 
 pains, that five bishops could scar^ty go 
 through so much labour as he alone. At 
 Sirmium in Illyricum, the Arian bishop 
 Photinus had caused a wide departure 
 from the faith : and there being a vacancy 
 in the year 379, Ambrose was sent for to 
 attend the election of a new bishop. The 
 Empress Justina, mother of young Va- 
 lentinian, resided there at the time.f She 
 had received a predilection for Arianism, 
 and endeavoured by her authority and in- 
 fluence to expel Ambrose from the church. 
 He continued, however, in his tribunal, 
 though insulted and harassed by the mob. 
 An Arian woman, particularly, had the 
 impudence to lay hold of his habit, and 
 attempt to draw him among the women, 
 who intended to drag him out of the 
 church. '"Though I am unworthy of the 
 priesthood," said he, '• it does not become 
 you to lay hands on a pastor; you ought 
 to fear the judgment of God." It is re- 
 
 * 1 Cor. iii. 12. 
 
 f Paulinus's Life of Ambrose. 
 :|: Ambrose de Virgiij. i books. 11 Offic. 
 Anib. 
 § PauliDUs. 
 
332 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 markable, that she died the next day. 
 The minds of men were struck with awe, 
 and Arlemius, an orthodox minister, was 
 elected without molestation. Another 
 story of the same kind deserves to be 
 mentioned here. Two courtiers of the 
 emperor Gratian, being Arians, came to 
 Ambrose, and desired him to preach on 
 our Lord's Incarnation, promising that 
 they would come to hear him the next 
 day. But they, meaning nothing except 
 ridicule and scorn, look their horses, and 
 rode out of town. It is remarkable, that 
 they were both thrown from their horses, 
 and perished. The congregation in the 
 meantime growing impatient under the 
 delay, Ambrose went up into the pulpit, 
 and told them, that he was come to pay 
 his debt, but found not his yesterday's 
 creditors to receive it ; and then preached 
 on the subject.* Those, with whom one 
 sort of doctrine is as valuable as another, 
 will find themselves little disposed to 
 relish or believe stories of this kind. But 
 the laws of history require that, where 
 such remarkable facts seem unquestiona- 
 ble, they should not be suppressed, what- 
 ever inferences men may choose to draw 
 from them. The humility and piety con- 
 nected with the Scripture doctrine of the 
 Trinity are well understood by every 
 Christian. But the foundation was here 
 laid for the enmity of Justina, which af- 
 terwards brake out against Ambrose in a 
 remarkable manner. At Antioch, Mele- 
 tius was now restored, and the churches 
 which had long been afflicted, recovered 
 breath. Constantinople for forty years 
 had been in subjec;ion to Arian impiety 
 and tyranny. By this time few remained 
 in this great city, who knew any thing 
 scriptural ; truth and godliness had fled ; 
 the times were, however, now favourable 
 for the recovery of the profession of the 
 Gospel, and Gregory of Nazianzum was 
 appointed for this purpose. He found 
 the city in a state liitle removed from 
 heathenism. 
 
 In the year 380, Theodosius, desirous 
 of co-operating with Gregory and other 
 zealous pastors in the revival of Chris- 
 tianity in the East, published a law, by 
 which he reprobated the he- 
 Ortho- jggy Qf Arius, and expressed 
 
 doxy of j^jg warm approbation of the 
 
 llieOUO- ,.,. r -.1 TT 
 
 Nicene faith. He gave no- 
 tice to Demophilus, the Arian 
 bishop of Constantinople, to 
 
 embrace the Nicene creed, to unite the 
 people, and lo live in peace. Demophilus 
 rejecting his proposal, the emperor or- 
 dered him to give up the churches. " If 
 ihey persecute us in one city," said the 
 heresiarch to the people of his commu- 
 " our Master orders us to flee to an- 
 
 nion. 
 
 sius, 
 
 A. D. 380. 
 
 » Paulinus's Life of Ambrose. 
 
 other. To-morrow, therefore, I purpose 
 to hold our assemblies without the city." 
 He found, how-ever, little encouragement 
 to proceed, and afterwards retired to 
 Berae, where he died six years after. 
 Thus within forty years from the time 
 that Eusebius of Nicomedia was violent- 
 ly intruded into Constantinople in the 
 room of Paul, the sacred places were 
 restored to the Churcli of Christ. For 
 so I shall venture to call tlic Trinitarians, 
 however low and reduced the spirit of 
 godliness was, especially in the East; 
 not only because they held the doctrine 
 of truth, but because whatever of the 
 true spirit of the Gospel was found any 
 where, rested with them. If the reader 
 recollect the barbarities exercised on 
 Paul, and the cruel conduct of the Arians, 
 while iu power, he Avill be struck with 
 the ditference between Theodosius and 
 Gregory on one side, and Constantius 
 and Eusebius on the other. I am far 
 from undertaking to vindicate all the pro- 
 ceedings of the patrons of tlie Nicene 
 faith ; "but undoubtedly their conduct was 
 full of patience ,and meekness, compared 
 with that of their opponents. Constan- 
 tinople was not now made a scene of 
 carnage and violence. Men who fear 
 God will exercise their secular prosperity 
 in religion only to defend the truth, not 
 to persL-cute its foes. And this is another 
 instance, to be added to the many, which 
 have appeared, of the connexion between 
 Christian principles and holy practice. 
 
 Gregory being now confirmed in the 
 see of Constantinople, the emperor called 
 a council in that city to settle the dis- 
 tracted state of the Eastern 
 cliurch. There came thither 
 three hundr d and fifty bi- 
 shops. But it was found 
 much easier to expel Arian- 
 ism and corruption externally 
 than intLTnally. The.council 
 was very confused and disor- 
 derly, greatly inferior in piety 
 and wi:Hdom to that of Nice, though it be 
 called the second general council. One 
 of the holiest men there was Meletius of 
 Antioch, who died at Constantinople. 
 Gregory justly observed, that as Paulinus 
 
 The se- 
 cond Ge- 
 neral 
 Council 
 held at 
 Constanti- 
 nople, 
 
 A. D. 381. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 GRATIAN AND THEODOSIUS. 
 
 333 
 
 was sound in the faith, and of unexcep- 
 tionable character, there could now be no 
 reason why the unhappy breach, so long 
 continued in that church, should not at 
 once be healed by confirming him in the 
 succession. But faction was high, and 
 charity was low at this time ; he was 
 overruled by the immoderate ; and Fla- 
 vian was constituted the successor of 
 Meletius, as if they took pleasure in 
 lengthening the reign of schism a little : 
 for Paulinus was far advanced in years. 
 In this affair the younger bishops had in- 
 fluenced the elder, though they could as- 
 sign no better reason than that, finding 
 the bishops of the West ready to support 
 Gregory's opinion, they thought those of 
 the East ought to prevail, because Jesus 
 Christ in the days of his flesh had ap- 
 peared in Asia, not in Europe. So easy 
 is it in the decline of piety for Christian 
 formalities to be preserved, while human 
 depravity reigns in the temper and spirit. 
 Gregory in disgust soon after gave up his 
 see. 
 
 This council very accurately defined 
 the doctrine of the Trinity, and enlarging 
 a little the Nicene creed, they delivered 
 it, as we now have it in our Communion 
 Service. The Macedonian heresy, which 
 blasphemed the Holy Ghost, gave occa- 
 sion to a more explicit representation of 
 the third Person in the Trinity, which, 
 it must be owned, is there expressed with 
 scriptural precision and clearness. 
 
 About the same time Palladius and Se- 
 cundianus, two Arian bishops, and the 
 chief supporters of that heresy in the 
 . West, were condemned, in a 
 Two An- council held at Anuileia, by 
 an bisliops .^i i • i r aii j 
 
 deposed at ^"^ bishop of Milan, and were 
 Aquileia. formally deposed. It is as- 
 tonishing with what artificial 
 dexterity Palladius evaded the plain and 
 direct interrogatories of Ambrose,* and 
 while he seemed to honour the Son of 
 God in the same manner as others, and 
 to reduce the contest to a verbal dispute, 
 he still reserved the distinguishing point 
 of Arius. A subtilty ever practised by 
 these heretics ! 
 
 Theodosius, earnestly desirous to re- 
 duce all who professed the Christian 
 name to an uniformity, once more at- 
 tempted to unite them by a conference at 
 Constantinople. But where the heart 
 was not the same, it appeared that out- 
 ward conformity produced only hypocri- 
 
 » rieury,B. XVIIL 10. 
 
 sy. The Novatians alone agreed cordially 
 with the general church in sentiment. 
 And Nectarius, the new created bishop 
 of Constantinople, lived on a friendly 
 footing with Agelius, their bishop, a man 
 of piety and of the first character.* In 
 consequence of this, these dissenters ob- 
 tained from the emperor as ample a tole- 
 ration as could reasonably be desired. 
 Heavy and tyrannical penalties were de- 
 nounced in edicts against the rest, which, 
 however, do not appear to have been ex- 
 ecuted. The denunciation of them itself 
 was, however, wrong; though it must 
 be owned it proceeded from the best in- 
 tentions on the side of Theodosius, who 
 actually put none of his penal laws 
 against sectaries into execution, and 
 meant only to induce all men to speak 
 alike in the church. How much better, 
 to have taken pains in promoting the pro- 
 pagation of the Gospel itself by the en- 
 couragement of zealous pastors, and to 
 have given up the zeal for a chimera of 
 no value, a pretended union without the 
 reality ! 
 
 In the year 383, Amphilocus, bishop 
 of Iconium, coming to court with other 
 bishops, paid the usual respects to the 
 emperor, but took no notice 
 of his son Arcadius, about six The bish- 
 years old, who was near the op of Ico^ 
 father. Theodosius bade him "'"^^'sbe-. 
 salute his son. Amphilocus the'°|^'pe! 
 drew near, and stroking him, ^or's 
 said, " God save you, my court, 
 child." Theemperor in anger A. D. 383. 
 ordered the old man to be dri- 
 ven from court; who with a loud voice de- 
 clared. You cannot bear to have your son 
 contemned ; be assured, that God in like 
 manner is offended with those who ho- 
 nour not his Son as himself.| The em- 
 peror was struck with the justness of the 
 remark, and immediately made a law to 
 prohibit the assemblies of the heretics. 
 
 In the same year the emperor Gratian 
 lost his life by the rebellion of Maximus, 
 who commanded in Britain. 
 Deserted by his troops, Gra- Death of 
 tian fled towards Italy. He Gratian, 
 found the usual lot of the ca- A. D. 383. 
 lamitous, a perfect want of 
 friends ; yet he might have escaped to 
 the court of Milan, where his younger 
 brother Valentinian reigned, if he had 
 not been betrayed at Lyons. Adragathius 
 invited him to a feast, and swore to him 
 
 • Socrates, B. V. c. 10. f John v. 23. 
 
334 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIV. 
 
 upon the Gospel. The sincere mind of 
 Gratian, measuring others by himself, 
 and as yet not knowing- the world (for he 
 was but twenty-four years of age) fell 
 into the snare, and his murder was the 
 consequence. All writers agree, that he 
 was of the best disposition, and well 
 skilled both in religious and secular learn- 
 ing. Ambrose had a peculiar affection 
 for him, and on his account wrote a trea- 
 tise concerning the Deity of the Holy 
 Ghost. He tell-s us (and every thing that 
 we know of him confirms the account) 
 that he was godly from his tender years. 
 Chaste, tem])erate, benevolent, conscien- 
 tious, he shines in the Church of Christ; 
 but talents for government he seems not 
 to have possessed, and his indolence gave 
 advantage to those who abused both him- 
 self and the public. Divine Providence 
 in him hath given us a lesson, that Christ's 
 kingdom is not of this world ; even a 
 prince unquestionably pious is denied the 
 common advantage of a natural death.* 
 When he was dying, he bemoaned the 
 absence of Ambrose, and often spake of 
 him. I Those who have received benefit 
 from a pastor in divine things, have often 
 an affection for him, of which the world 
 has no idea. The last movements of a 
 saint are absorbed in divine things, com- 
 pared with which, the loss of empire 
 weighed as nothing in the mind of Gra- 
 tian. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE HERESY OF PRISCILLIAN THE 
 
 CONDUCT OF MARTIN THE PROGRESS 
 
 OF SUPERSTITION. 
 
 I JOIN these subjects together, to con- 
 nect the ecclesiastical information of Sul- 
 pitius Severus, a historian who belongs 
 to this period, an Aquitanian of great 
 learning, and who wrote a summary of 
 Church history, which he extended to his 
 
 » Fieury, B. XV HI. 27. 
 
 + A chai'itable action of Ambrose, tliougli 
 in opposition to Gratiaii's views, tended no 
 doubl to raise his character in the eyes of thai 
 emperor. A pagan of some rank had spokei 
 contemptuously of Gratian, had been arraign- 
 ed, and condemned to die. Ambrose, com- 
 passionating bis case, went to court, to inter- 
 cede for bis life. It was with great diffieull\ 
 that he could procure a(hTiission into the royal 
 presence, where be prevailed at length, by his 
 importunate solicitations, and saved the life of 
 the coudenined person. 
 
 own times. What he records of transac- 
 tions which passed within his own memo- 
 ry, and also what be collected by infor- 
 mation of other parts of the empire, may 
 deserve to be very briefly reviewed. Very 
 little shall we find adapted to our pur- 
 pose ; the deep decline of evangelical 
 purity will be the chief discovery we 
 shall make : and he will thus make my 
 apology for evidencing so little of the 
 spirit of Christianity at this period, be- 
 cause so little is to be found. 
 
 The Priscillianists, a heretical sect, 
 who seem to have combined all the most 
 pernicious heresies of former times, had 
 already appeared in the time of Gratian, 
 and infected the greatest part of Spain. 
 Priscillian himself, whose character is 
 described by the classical pen of Sulpitius 
 with much elegance and energy,* was 
 exactly fitted for the office which he filled : 
 learned, eloquent, factious, acute, of great 
 powers both of body and mind, and by a 
 spurious modesty and gravity of manners, 
 extremely well qualified to maintain an 
 ascendancy over weak and credulous 
 spirits. Idacius and Ithacins, the one an 
 aged Presbyter, the other bishop of Sos- 
 suba, applied to the secular power, in or- 
 der that, by the decrees of the magistrates, 
 the heretics might be expelled from the 
 cities. The Priscillianists endeavoured 
 to gain friends in Italy; but their corrup- 
 tions were too glaring to procure them 
 any countenance either from Damasus of 
 Rome, or from Ambrose of Milan. 
 
 On the death of Gratian, Maximus the 
 usurper entered victorious into Treves. 
 While Ithacius earnestly pressed him 
 against the Pricillianists, the heresiarch 
 himself appealed to Maximus, who took 
 upon him.Heif the ofhce of deciding. Sul- 
 pitius very properly observes, that both 
 parties were highly culpable ; the heretics 
 in spreading notions entirely subversive 
 of Christianity, and their accusers in sub- 
 serving only their own factious and selfish 
 views. 
 
 In the meantime, Martin, bishop of 
 Tours, blamed Ithacius for bringing the 
 heretics as criminals before the emperor, 
 rind entreated Maximus to abstain from 
 the blood of the unhappy inen ; he said, 
 it was abundantly sufficient, that having 
 been judged heretics by the sentence of 
 the bishops, they were expelled from the 
 churches, and that it was a new and un- 
 heard evil, for a secular judge to interfere 
 
 * Sulp. Sev. p. 419. 
 
Ckct. IV.] 
 
 HERESY OF PRISCILLTAN. 
 
 335 
 
 in matters purely ecclesiastical. These 
 were Christian sentiments ; and deserve 
 to be here mentioned, as describing an 
 honest, though unsuccessful resistance 
 made to the first attempt, which appeared 
 in the church, of punishing heresy with 
 death. I scarcely know any thing more 
 disagreeable to the spirit of a really good 
 man, than to think of punishing capitally, 
 on account of their irreligion, persons who 
 (as he is constrained to believe) are walk- 
 ing the broad road to eternal destruction. 
 He has no need to enter into the political 
 arguments against persecution, which are 
 fashionable in the mouths of infidels. He 
 has much more weighty reasons against 
 it, drawn from the genius of his own re- 
 ligion. To do what in him lies to pre- 
 vent the conversion of a sinner by short 
 ening his days — how contrary is this to 
 the spirit of Him, who came not to destroy 
 men's lives, but to save them ! 
 
 Yet there were found men at this time 
 capable of such enormity, and it marks the 
 degeneracy of the age. But Ciirist had 
 still a church in the West, and Martin 
 persevered with such pious zeal in op- 
 posing the hitherto unheard-of innova- 
 tions, and was himself so much respected 
 for his piety and integrity, that he pre- 
 vailed at first, and the usurper promised, 
 that he would not proceed to blood against 
 the heretics. Two bishops, Magnus and 
 Rufus, however, changed his resolution 
 afterwards, and he referred the cause to 
 Euodius the prefect, who, after he had 
 found them guilty, (and they appear to 
 have been defiled with all the impurities 
 of the ancient Gnostics) committed them 
 to custody, and referred them again to the 
 emperor. Priscillian in the 
 PnsciUian jgg^g ^,^^ p^j ^^ death, and 
 
 oihers nut ^°"'" ^'■^i^'^ leaders of his sect, 
 todeatli ^ f'PW more were condemned 
 
 A D 384 to die, or to be banished. The 
 heresy was not extinguished 
 by this means ; f'>r fifteen years after, the 
 contention was extreme between the par- 
 ties ; Priscillian was honoured as a mar- 
 tyr ; Christianity never received a greater 
 scandal, though, like all the rest, unde- 
 served, from the mouths of its enemies ; 
 and men who feared God, and loved mo- 
 deration and charity, wept and prayed in 
 secret, despised and disregarded by the 
 two parties, who trampled on all the rules 
 of godliness. In the meantime, the sel- 
 fish and worldly passions triumpiied in 
 Spain, and though the form of orthodoxy 
 prevailed, it was evident that the power 
 
 was reduced almost to the brink of de- 
 struction. 
 
 Let us attend to our business, and catch 
 the face of the Church of Christ, if we 
 can. We see her in Ambrose, who, com- 
 ing to Maximus on an embassy from the 
 younger Valentinian, refused to hold com- 
 munion with his bishops, who had been 
 concerned in the deaths of the heretics. 
 Maximus, enraged, ordered him to with- 
 draw. Ambrose entered upon his journey 
 very readily, being only grieved to find 
 an old bishop, Hyginus, dragged into 
 exile, though it was evident that he was 
 very near his end. The generous bishop 
 of Milan applied to some of the courtiers, 
 to furnish him with conveniences,* but 
 ill vain. A number of holy men, who 
 protested against these barbarities, were 
 themselves aspersed with the charge of 
 heresy, and among the rest, Martin of 
 Tours. Thus in Gaul and Spain there 
 were three parties ; first, the Priscillian- 
 ists, men void of godliness evidently, and 
 bearing the Christian name to disgfrace it 
 with a complication of heresies ; secondly, 
 men of formal orthodoxy, who persecuted 
 the Priscillianists even to death, and ru- 
 ined them as a sect, at the same time that 
 they themselves disgraced the Gospel by 
 a life of avarice, faction, and ambition; 
 and thirdly, men who feared God and 
 served him in the Gospel of his Son, con- 
 demning the principles of the former by 
 argument only, and the practices of the 
 latter by their meek and charitable con- 
 duct. A division of men, not uncommon 
 in the Church of Christ; but let it be re- 
 membered, that the last sort are the true 
 branches of the mystical vine, and that 
 they only are to be regarded as belonging 
 to our history. 
 
 Martin was born at Ticinum in Italy, 
 and in iiis youth had served in the army 
 under Constantius and Julian ; but against 
 his will. His father, by profession a sol- 
 dier, had compelled him. For he himself, 
 when only ten years old, went to the 
 church, and gave in his name as a cate- 
 chumen, f At twelve he had a desire to 
 lead a monastic life. But being com- 
 pelled to serve in the army, he was re- 
 markable for his exemption from military 
 vices, his liberality to the poor, and his 
 reservation of nothing for himself out of 
 the pay which he received, except what 
 was necessary for daily food. At eighteen 
 
 • Ambrose, Ep. 27. 
 
 t A candidate for baptism. 
 
336 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIV. 
 
 he was baptized, and two years after- 
 wards, left the army. Sometime after, 
 falling into the hands of robbers among 
 the Alps, he was delivered bound to one 
 of them to be plundered, who, leading 
 him to a retired place, asked him who he 
 was. He answered, " I am a Christian." 
 *' Are not you afraid ]" " I never was 
 more at ease, because I know the mercy 
 of the Lord to be most present in trials : 
 I am more concerned for you, who by 
 your course of life render yourself un- 
 fit to partake of the mercy of Christ." 
 And entering into the argument of reli- 
 gion, he preached the Gospel to the rob- 
 ber. The man believed, attended his 
 instructor to the road, and begged his 
 prayers. The new convert persevered in 
 godliness ; and this relation is taken from 
 the biographical account of Martin.* 
 
 I must be brief in following our author 
 through other parts of the life of his hero. 
 It was an age of childish credulity ; the 
 human mind was sinking fast into igno- 
 rance and superstition. The Christian 
 fathers and historians relate things ex- 
 tremely absurd ; but this was the fault ot 
 the times, not of religion. The Pagan 
 writers, their contemporaries, are no way 
 their superiors. Few stories told by Sul- 
 pitius are so good in their matter, and so 
 authentic in their loundation, as this of 
 the robber. It was with difficulty that 
 Martin was at length prevailed on to quit 
 his monastery, and become bishop of 
 Tours, to which office the universal voice 
 of the people called him. He still pre- 
 served his monastic taste, and had a mo- 
 nastery two nriles out of the city. Here 
 he lived with eighty disciples, who fol- 
 lowed his example ; they lived in com- 
 mon with extreme austerity. The cele- 
 brity of his supposed miracles had a 
 mighty eiTect on the ignorant Gauls ; 
 every common action of his was magnifi- 
 ed into a prodigy; heathen temples were 
 destroyed, and churches and monasteries 
 arose in their stead. 
 
 Maximus courted the friendship of Mar- 
 tin in vain, who honestly owned, that he 
 could not countenance a murderer and 
 usurper. Maximus pleaded necessity, 
 the providence of God, and that he had 
 slain none except in the field. Overcome 
 at length by importunities, the bishop 
 supped with the usurper. A servant of- 
 fered the cup to Maximus who directed 
 him to give it to Martin, expecting and 
 
 * Sulp. vitEe Martin. 
 
 desiring to pledge him. The bishop dis- 
 appointed his hopes, and gave it to his 
 presbyter. 
 
 Wonderful is the account which Sulpi- 
 tius gives of his patience and charity. 
 But he speaks with partial affection, as 
 of a friend, who in his eyes was faultless. 
 The Scripture does not colour the charac- 
 ters of saints so highly ; and I have no 
 ambition to imitate Sulpitius. Many evils 
 attend this spirit of exaggeration. The 
 excessive admiration of men takes off the 
 mind from looking to Jesus, the true and 
 only Mediator. Sulpitius himself pro- 
 fesses his hope of obtaining much good 
 through the intercession of his deceased 
 friend. What at first were only the more 
 unguarded effusions of I'riendship, became 
 at last habits of self-righteous supersti- 
 tion ; and one of the worst corruptions of 
 religion was this way gradually intro- 
 duced, and in the end too firmly estab- 
 lished. 
 
 Maximus, whatever were his motives, 
 paid assiduous court to Martin, and to- 
 gether with his wife heard him discourse 
 of divine things. She indeed seems to 
 have admired him sincerely, and asked 
 her husband's consent, that she might be 
 allowed as a servant to attend upon him 
 at supper. It was done accordingly ; and 
 our author compares her on this account 
 to the queen of Sheba. In these transac- 
 tions we mark the progress of supersti- 
 tion. 
 
 The integrity of Martin appears very 
 conspicuous in opposing the tyranny of 
 Maximus. The latter strove in vain to 
 reconcile him to the maxims of his go- 
 vernment in the capital punishment of the 
 Priscillianists, and endeavored to persuade 
 him to communicate with the bishops, 
 who had been urgent in their condemna- 
 tion. Martin refused, till, understanding 
 that some of the king's servants were go- 
 ing to put certain persons to-death for 
 whom he had interceded, in order to save 
 their lives he consented to communicate 
 with men whose conduct he abhorred. 
 Even of this compliance he bitterly re- 
 pented, guarded against any future com- 
 munion with the party of Ithacius, and 
 lived afterwards sixteen years in retire- 
 ment. 
 
 On the whole, if less had been said of 
 his miracles, and a more distinct view 
 had been given of his virtues, Martin of 
 Tours would, I believe, appear among us 
 I'ar more estimable. That he was pious, 
 is unquestionable ; that his piety was dis- 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 AMBROSE. 
 
 337 
 
 figured with monastic superstition ex-lto complain of their losses, who never 
 ceedingly, is no less evident; but Europe spared the blood of Christians, and who 
 
 and Asia now vied with each other in the 
 promotion of false humility, and I should 
 be ashamed, as well as think the labour 
 ill spent, to recite the stories at length 
 which Sulpitius gives us. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE CONDUCT OF AMBROSE UNDER THE 
 EMPEROR VALENTINIAN THE SECOND, 
 AND THE PERSECUTION WHICH HE 
 ENDURED FROM THE 
 THER JUSTINA. 
 
 JusTiNA, the empress, was a decided 
 patroness of Arianism. After 
 
 Ambrose 
 persecu- 
 ted, 
 
 A. D. 385. 
 
 the death 
 of her husband, she began openly to sea- 
 son her son with her doctrine, and to in- 
 duce him to menace the bishop of Milan. 
 Ambrose exhorted him to support the 
 doctrine received from the Apostles. 
 Young Valentinian, in a rage, ordered his 
 truards to surround the church, and com- 
 manded Ambrose to come out of it. 
 shall not willingly," replied the bishop, 
 *' give up the sheep of Christ to be de- 
 voured by wolves. You may 
 use your swords and spears 
 against me ; such a death I 
 shall freely undergo."* After 
 this he was exposed to the va- 
 rious frauds and artifices of Justina, who 
 feared to attack him openly. For the 
 people were generally inclined to support 
 the bishop; and his residence in the city 
 where the court was held, at once in- 
 creased his influence, and exercised his 
 mind with a series of trials. 
 
 The Arians were not now the only ad- 
 versaries of the Church ; the Pagans 
 themselves, taking advantage of the mi- 
 nority of Valentinian and the confusions 
 of the empire, endeavoured to recover 
 their ancient establishment. The Senate 
 of Rome consisted still very much of Gen- 
 tiles ; and the pride of family grandeur 
 still induced the most noble to pique 
 themselves on their constancy, and to 
 scorn the innovations of Christianity. 
 Symmachus, a man of learning and great 
 powers of eloquence, headed the party, 
 and endeavoured to persuade the emperor 
 to suflTer the altar of Victory to be restored 
 to the Senate-house. Ambrose wrote to 
 Valentinian, that it ill became the Gentiles 
 
 refused them under Julian, the common 
 liberty of teaching. "If he is a Pagan 
 who gives you this advice, let him give 
 the same liberty which he takes himself. 
 You compel no man to worship what he 
 does not approve. Here the whole Se- 
 nate, so far as it is Christian, is endan- 
 gered. Every senator takes his oath at 
 the altar; every person who is obliged to 
 appear before the senate upon oath, takes 
 his oath in the same manner. The di- 
 vinity of the false gods is evidently al- 
 EMPEROR'sMO-|lo^ed by the practice. And Christians 
 are obliged by these means to endure a 
 I persecution. But in matters of religion 
 consult with God ; and whatever men 
 may say of injuiies which they suffer, re- 
 member that you injure no man by pre- 
 ferring God Almighty before him."* We 
 have still extant the address of Symma- 
 chus to the emperors on the subject in vin- 
 dication of Pagan idolatry, in which he 
 introduces Rome as a person complaining 
 of the hardships to which she was ex- 
 posed in her old age. We have also the 
 reply of Ambrose, who introduces Rome 
 observing, that it was not by the favour 
 of these gods that she gained her victo- 
 ries. In answer to the complaint, which 
 the Pagans made of the loss of their re- 
 venues, he observes, that the Gospel had 
 increased by poverty and ill-treatment, 
 whereas riches and prosperity seemed ne- 
 cessary to the very existence of their re- 
 ligion. And now that the Church has 
 some wealth, he justly glories in the use 
 she made of it, and challenges the Pagans 
 to declare what captives they had redeem- 
 ed, what poor they had relieved, and to 
 what exiles they had sent alms. But it 
 is not necessary to enlarge on this sub- 
 ject. The advantage of the Christian 
 cause in the promotion of liberality and 
 benevolence among mankind, above all re- 
 ligions, is perhaps the only thing gener- 
 ally allowed even by infidels. Symma- 
 chus being foiled at present, renewed the 
 same attempt before the emperor Theo- 
 dosius, and was vanquished a second 
 time by the eloquence and influence of 
 Ambrose. 
 
 This prelate by his talents in negocia- 
 tion at the court of Maximus, averted for 
 a time the invasion of Italy from the court 
 of Milan. But nothing could justina'a 
 move the mind of Justina in law. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 * Theodoret, B. V. c. 13. 
 
 2F 
 
 • Epistle of Ambrose, 30. 
 
338 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XV. 
 
 A D 386 ^'^ favour. In the year 386, 
 she procured a law tf> enable 
 the Arian congregations to assemble with- 
 out interruption. 
 
 Auxentius, a Scythian, of the same 
 name with the Aiiiui predecessor of Am- 
 brose, was now introduced, under the pro- 
 tection of the empress, into Milan. He 
 challenged Ambrose to hold a disputation 
 with him in the emperor's court; which 
 occasioned the bishop to write to Valenti- 
 nian, that it was no part of the emperor's 
 business to decide in points of doctrine.* 
 " Let him come to church," says he, " and 
 upon hearing, lot the people judge for 
 themselves; and if they like Auxentius 
 better, let them take him : but they have 
 already declared their sentiments." More 
 violent measures were now entered into, 
 and the fortitude of Ambrose was tried in 
 a manner which he had hitherto not ex- 
 perienced. Auxentius moved, that a party 
 of soldiers might be sent to secure for 
 himself the possession of the church called 
 Basilica : and tribunes came to demand 
 it, with the plate and vessels belonging 
 to it. At the same time, there were those 
 who represented, that it was an unreason- 
 able thing, that the emperor should not 
 be allowed to have one place of worship 
 which was agreeable to his conscience. 
 The language was specious, but deceitful. 
 .Tustina and her son, if they had thought 
 it prudent to exert their authority, might 
 have commanded the use not of one cnly, 
 but of all the churches : 'but the demand 
 of the court was, that Ambrose should do 
 what in conscience he could not, that he 
 should, by his own deed, resign the 
 chwrch into Arian hands, which as cir- 
 cumstances then stootl, would have been 
 to acknowledge, indircKtly at least, the 
 Arian creed. He therefore calmly an- 
 sw. red the officers, that if the emperor 
 had sent to demand his house or land, 
 money or goods, he would have freely re- 
 signed them, but that he could not de- 
 liver that which was committed to his 
 care. In the congregation he that day 
 told the people,] that he would not will- 
 ingly desert his right: that if compelled, 
 he knew not how to resist. " I can 
 grieve,'" says he, " I can weep, I can 
 groan. Against arms and soldiers, tears 
 are my arms, yuch are the fortifications 
 of a pastor. I neither can nor ought to 
 resist in any other manner. Our Lord 
 
 * Epistle of Ambrose, 32. 
 t Oral. iH Auxeu. p. l§9. 
 
 Paris edition. 
 
 Jesus is Almighty ; what he commands 
 to be done shall be fulfilled, nor does it 
 become you to resist the divine sentence." 
 It seemed proper to state in his own words 
 what his conduct was ; and it appears 
 he abated nothing of the maxims of pas- 
 sive submission to the civil power, which 
 Christians had ever practised from the 
 days of St. Paul, and that there is not the 
 least ground to accuse Ambrose of dis- 
 loyalty to his prince. He had served 
 him already faithfully, and we shall see 
 presently that he is again ready to expose 
 himself to danger for his service. The 
 court knew his principles, and seem not 
 to have had the least fear that he should 
 draw the people into a rebellion; but 
 they wished to menace him into a degree 
 ol compliance with Arianism. 
 
 Ambrose during the suspension of this 
 affair employed the people in singing di- 
 vine hynms and psalms, at the end of 
 which there was a solemn doxology to 
 the honour of the Trinity. The method 
 of responsive singing had been gradually 
 practit-ed in the East, and was introduced 
 by Ambrose into Milan, whence it was 
 propagated into all the churches. The 
 people were much delighted, their zeal 
 for the doctrine of the Trinity was in- 
 flamed, and one of the best judges in the 
 world, who then lived at Milan, owns 
 that his own soul was melted into divine 
 aff'ection on these occasions.* 
 
 The demands of the court v/ere novr 
 increased ; not only the Porlian church 
 which stood without the walls, but also 
 the great church newly built within the 
 city, were required to be given up. On 
 the Lord's day alter sermon, the catechu- 
 mens being dismissed, Ambrose went to 
 baptize those who were prepared for that 
 ordinance, w ben he was told that officers 
 were sent from the court to the Portian 
 church : he went on, however, unmoved 
 in the service, till he was told, that the 
 people having met with Castulus an Arian 
 presbyter in the street, had laid hands on 
 bun. Then with prayers and tears he 
 besought God, that no man's blood might 
 be shod, but rather his own, not only for 
 the pi ,us people, but also for the wicked. 
 And he immediately scntsoitie presbyters 
 and deacons, who recovered Castulus safe 
 from the tumult. The court, enraged, 
 sent cut warrants for apprehending seve- 
 ral merchants and tradesmen ; men were 
 put in chains, and vast sums of money 
 
 Aug. Coat". B. 9. 
 
Cbitt. IV.] 
 
 AMBROSE. 
 
 339 
 
 were required to be paid in a little time, 
 which many professed they would paj- 
 cheerfully, if they were sufrered to enjoy 
 the profession of their faith unm')Icsted. 
 By this time the prisons were full <'f' 
 tradesmen, and the niaofistrates and men 
 of rank were severely threateneJ ; while 
 the courtiers urged Ambrose with the im- 
 perial authority ; whom he answered with 
 the same loyalty and firmness as t)ef )re. 
 The Holy Spirit, said he, in his exhorta- 
 tion to the people, has spoken in y >u this 
 day, to this effect: Emperor, we en- 
 treat, BUT we do not figeit. The 
 Arians, having few friends among the 
 people, kept themselves within doors. A 
 notary coming to the bishop from the em- 
 peror, asked him, whether he intended to 
 usurp the empire? "I have an empire," 
 says he, "it is true, but it lies in weak- 
 ness, according to that saying of the Apos- 
 tle, 'when I am weak, then am 1 strong.' 
 Even Maxinius will clear me of this 
 charge, since he will confess it was through 
 my embassy he was kept from the inva- 
 sion of Italy." Wearied and overcome 
 at length with his res dution, the court, 
 who meant to obtain his consent, rather 
 than to exercise violence, ordered the 
 guards to leave the church, where the 
 bishop had lodged all night ; the soldiers 
 having guarded it so close, that none had 
 been suffered to go out ; and the people 
 confined there having spent their time in 
 singing psalms. The sums exacted of 
 the tradesmen also were restored. Pe;ice 
 was made for the present, though Am- 
 brose had still reason to fear for himself, 
 and expressed his desire, in the epistle 
 which he wrote to his sister INIarcellina, 
 that God would defend his church, and 
 let its enemies rather satiate their rage 
 with his blood.* 
 
 The spirit of devotion was kept up all 
 this time among the people, and Ambrose 
 was indefatigable both in praying and 
 preaching. Being called on by the peo- 
 ple to consecrate a new church, he told 
 them, that he would, if he could find any 
 relics of martyrs there. Let us not make 
 the superstition of these times greater 
 than it was. It was lamentably great; 
 enough to stain the piety with which it 
 was mixed. We are told, that it had 
 been revealed to him in a vision at night, 
 in what place he might find the relics. 
 But in the epistle wh ch he writes on the 
 subject, he says no such thing. He de- 
 
 Epis. 33. 
 
 scribes, however, the finding of the bo- 
 dies of two martyrs, Protasius and Ger- 
 vasius, the supposed miracles wrought on 
 the occasion, the dedication of the church, 
 the triumph of orthodox, and the confu- 
 sion of Arianism. Ambrose himself too 
 nuch encouraged all this, and in a lan- 
 guage which favoured the introduction of 
 )iher intercessors besides the Lord Jesus 
 'hrist, whom yet it is evident he su- 
 iremely loved, and trusted in for salva- 
 tion. Li all this, the candid and intelli- 
 i-eni reader will see the conflict between 
 godliness and superstition maintained in 
 the church of Milan, both existing in 
 some vigour, and each at present check- 
 ing the growth of the other.* 
 
 The news of M-iximus's intention to 
 invade Italy arriving at this lime, threw 
 the court of Milan into the greatest trepi- 
 dation. Agam .Tustina implored the 
 bishop to undertake an embassy to the 
 usurper, which he cheerfully 
 undertook, and executed with ^betyrant 
 great fortitude ; but it was not ji'^^jj™,"' 
 in his power to stop the pro- and kiHed 
 gress of the enemy. Theo- bv Tlieo- 
 dosius, who reigned in the dosius, 
 lOast, coming at length to the \_ d, 339. 
 assistance of Valentinian, put 
 an end to the usurpation and life of Maxi- 
 mus. By his means, the young emperor 
 was induced to forsake his mother's prin- 
 ciple^, and in form at least to embrace 
 those of Ambrose. Whether he was ever 
 truly converted to God, is not so clear. 
 That he was reconciled to Ambrose, and 
 loved him highly, is certain; 
 md in the year 392, in which Valentini- 
 he lost his life by a second ^" ^T'^^ 
 
 • ^u iir i u 'Of Am- 
 
 usurpation m the West, he |„.„se to 
 sent for Ambrose to come to baptize 
 'laptize him. The bishop in him, 
 'lis journey heard of his death, j^ jy ^92. 
 vith which he was deeply af- 
 fected, and wrote to Theodosiusf concern- 
 'ng him with all the marks of sorrow, 
 ind composed a funeral oration in his 
 oraise. The rhetorical spirit usually ex- 
 \ggerates on these occasions ; but it is 
 inconsistent with the unquestionable in- 
 tegrity of Ambrose to suppose that he did 
 aot believe the real conversion of his royal 
 mpil. The oration itself is by no means 
 ■■vorthv of Ambrose; the taste is vicious 
 ind affected. Indeed panegyric, when it 
 has not an object of magnitude sufficient 
 
 • Rpis. 85. 
 
 f Epis. 34. and de obitu Valentiniani. 
 
340 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XVI. 
 
 to fill the mind, is ever frigid and grovel- 
 ling, because it is continually affecting the 
 sublime, but has not materials to support 
 it with dignity. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE CHURCH UNDER THEODOSIUS. 
 
 It vi^ill be proper to look a little more 
 particularly at the conduct of this prince 
 towards the Church. He had been pre- 
 served in his younger years from the 
 jealousy of Valens, who, by some super- 
 stition, had been led to suspect those, 
 whose names began with THE, and to 
 seek their destruction. After his exalta- 
 tion to the empire from a private life by 
 the generous and patriotic choice of Gra- 
 tian, he reigned in the East, more vigor- 
 ously supporting Christianity, according 
 to his ideas of it, than any emperor before 
 him. His sense of justice however, de- 
 termined him to order some Christians to 
 rebuild at their own expense a Jewish 
 synagogue, which they had tumultnously 
 pulled down. I mention with concern, 
 yetM'ith historical veracity, that Ambrose 
 prevailed on him to set aside this sentence, 
 from a mistaken notion of piety, that 
 Christianity should not be obliged to con- 
 tribute to the erection of a Jewish syna- 
 gogue. If the Jews were tolerated at ail 
 in the empire, the transaction ought cer- 
 tainly to have been looked on as a civil 
 one. This is the first instance I recollect 
 in which a good man was induced, by 
 superstitious motives, to break the essen- 
 tial rules of justice ; and it marks tiie 
 growth of superstition.* Nor is there 
 any thing in the declamatory eloquence 
 of Ambrose, which moves me to pass a 
 different judgment. 
 
 The Luciferians still existing, entreat- 
 ed this emperor to grant them liberty of 
 conscience; confessing themselves to be 
 Christians, and contending that it was 
 wrong in others to give them a sectarian 
 name; at the same time declaring that 
 they coveted not the riches and grandeur of 
 other churches, and in their censures n( t 
 sparing Hilary of Poictiers and Athana- 
 sius. These last were doubtless men of 
 great uprightness and integrity. What 
 they themselves were is not so evident 
 as it were to be wished, because of the 
 scantiness of information. They speak 
 with extraordinary respect of Gregory, 
 
 bishop of Elvira, as the chief of their 
 communion ; a man doubtless of high es- 
 timation, because Ther dosius himself ad- 
 mits it, and grants them a legal toleration. 
 I have before spoken of this class of dis- 
 senters, among whom, I apprehend, it is 
 probable, marks of the presence of God 
 might be found, if their history had come 
 down to us. But the reader who knows 
 how slight our information of these things 
 is, while church history dwells chiefly 
 on what is scandalous, not what is ex- 
 cellent, will not be surprised at my si- 
 lence. The sect itself vanished soon 
 after. 
 
 Theodosius was of a passionate tem- 
 per, and on a particular occasion was led 
 by it to commit a barbarous action ; the cir- 
 cumstances of the story will be the best 
 comment on the character of this emperor, 
 of Ambrose, and of the times. At Thes- 
 salonica a tumult was made by the popu- 
 lace, and the emperor's officer was mur- 
 dered. The news was calculated to try 
 the temper of Theodosius, who ordered 
 the sword to be let loose upon them. 
 Ambrose interceded, and the emperor 
 promised to forgive. But the great offi- 
 cers of the court persuaded him to retract, 
 and to sign a warrant for military execu- 
 tion. It was executed with great cruel- 
 ty. Seven thousand were massacred in 
 three hours, without trial, and without 
 distinction ! 
 
 Ambrose* wrote him a faithful letter, 
 reniinding him of the charge in the pro- 
 phecy, that if the priest does not warn 
 the wicked he shall be answerable for 
 it.-j" " You discover a zeal," says he, 
 "for the faith and fear of God, I own; 
 but your temper is warm, soon to be ap- 
 peased indeed, if endeavours are used to 
 calm it; but if not regulated, it bears 
 down all before it." He urges the ex- 
 ample of David, and shows the impro- 
 priety of communicating with him at 
 present. " I love you," says he, " I che- 
 rish you, I pray for you; but blame not 
 me, if I give the preference to God." 
 On these principles Ambrose refused to 
 admit Theodosius into the church of Mi- 
 lan. The emperor pleaded the case of 
 David. "Imitate him," says the zeal- 
 ous bishop, "in his repentance, as well 
 as in his sin." Theodosius submitted, 
 and kept from the church eight months. 
 On the feast of the Nativity, he express- 
 ed his sorrow with sighs and tears in the 
 
 • Epis. 29. 
 
 • Arab. Epis. 51. 
 
 + Ezek. ill. 18. 
 
Cekt. IV.] 
 
 THEODOSIUS. 
 
 341 
 
 presence of RufRnus the master of the 
 offices.* "I weep," said he, "that the 
 temple of God, and consequently heaven 
 is shut from me, which is open to slaves 
 and befrgajs." Ruffinus undertook to 
 persuade the bishop to admit the empe- 
 ror. Ambrose urged the impropriety of 
 his rude interference, because Ruffinus, 
 by his evil counsels, had been the au- 
 thor of the massacre. Ruffinus telling- 
 him that the emperor was coming, " I 
 will hinder him," says he, " from enter- 
 ing the vestibule; yet if he will play the 
 king, I shall offer him my throat." Ruf- 
 finus returning, informed the emperor; 
 "I will go, and receive the refusal which 
 I desire," says he. And as he approach- 
 ed the bishop, he added, " I come to 
 offer myself, to submit to what you pre- 
 •scribe." Ambrose enjoined him to do 
 public penance, and to suspend the exe- 
 cution of capital warrants for thirty days 
 in future, in order that the ill effects of 
 intemperate anger might be prevented. 
 The emperor, pulling off his imperial 
 robes, prayed prostrate on the pavement, 
 nor did he put on those robes, till the 
 time of his penance was expired. " My 
 soul cleaveth to the dust," said he, 
 "quicken thou me, according to thy 
 word." The people prayed and wept 
 with him, and he not only complied with 
 the rules of penance, but retained visible 
 marks of compunction and sadness durino- 
 the rest of his life. 
 
 Let us make as candid an estimate, as 
 we can, of this extraordinary affair : I say, 
 as we can. Moderns hardly can be suffi- 
 ciently candid ; so different are our senti- 
 ments and views. It is certain that these 
 rules of humiliation are too severe, too 
 formal, and by no means properly calcu- 
 lated to instruct : the growth also of su- 
 perstition, and the immoderate exercise 
 of episcopal power, are both strikingly 
 evident. But what then? Was Theodo- 
 sius a mean abject prince, and Ambrose 
 a haughty or hypocritical pontiff] Nei- 
 ther the one nor the other is true. The 
 general life of the former evinces him 
 a great and wise prince, who had the 
 true fear of God before his eyes : and the 
 latter thought he did no more than what 
 the office, which he bore, required ; and 
 his affectionate regard for the emperor, 
 and sincere concern for his soul, appear 
 evident. On the whole, the discipline 
 itself thus magnanimously exercised by 
 
 4-Theodoret,B. V. 
 2f2 
 
 c. 18. 
 
 Ambrose, and humbly submitted to by 
 Theodosius, when stripped of its super- 
 stitions and formalities, was salutary. 
 Who does not see, that the contempt of 
 discipline in our days, among the great, 
 has proved extremely pernicious to the 
 interests of practical religion? 
 
 After the murder of Valentinian, a per- 
 son named Eugenius usurped the empire 
 of the West, who again erected the altar 
 of Victory, and encouraged the Pagans ; 
 but their hop'^s were of short duration. 
 Theodosius soon stripped him of his life 
 and power, and thus became sole master 
 of the Roman world. Under his authori- 
 ty the extirpation of idolatry was carried 
 on with more decisive vigour than ever. 
 At Alexandria the votaries of the re- 
 nowned temple of Serapis made an in- 
 surrection, and mnrdered a number of 
 Christians. The emperor, being inform- 
 ed of this, declared that he would not 
 suffer the glory of their martyrdom to be 
 stained with any executions, and that he 
 was determined to pardon the murderers 
 in hopes of their conversion, but that the 
 temples, the cause of so much mischief, 
 should be destroyed. There was a re- 
 markable image of Serapis in the temple, 
 of which it had been confidently given 
 out, that if any man touched it, earth 
 would open, the heaven be dissolved, 
 and all things run back into a genecal 
 chaos. A soldier however^ animated by 
 Theophilus the bishop, was so hardy as 
 to make the experiment. With an axe 
 he cleft him down the jaws ; an army of 
 mice fled out at the breach he had made; 
 and Serapis was hacked in pieces. On 
 the destruction of idolatry in Egypt, it 
 happened that the Nile did not overflow 
 so plentifiilly, as it had- been wont to do. 
 It is, said the Pagans, because it is af- 
 fronted at the prevailing impiety ; it has 
 not been worshipped with sacrifice,* as 
 it is used to be. Theodosius, being in- 
 formed of this, declared like a man who 
 believed in God, and preferred heavenly 
 things to earthly; "We ought to prefer 
 our duty to God to the streams of the 
 Nile, and the cause of piety to the ferti- 
 lity of the country; let the Nile never flow 
 again, rather than idolatry be encour- 
 aged." The event afforded a fine com- 
 ment on our Saviour's words, "Seek ye 
 first the kingdom of God, and all other 
 things shall be added unto you." The 
 Nile returned to its course, and rose 
 
 • Sozom. B. VII. e. 20. 
 
342 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XVI. 
 
 above the highest mark, which, at other 
 times, it seldom reached. The Pagans, 
 overcome in argument, made use of ridi- 
 cule, the great sanctuary of profaneness, 
 and cried out in their theatres, that the 
 old doting god was grown so weak, that 
 he could not hold his water. Numbers, 
 
 which taught men how to obtain pardon 
 of sin, and holiness of life. The Gen- 
 tile part of ihem declared, that they would 
 not give up a religion, under which Rome 
 had prospered nearly twelve hundred 
 years. Theodosius told them, that he 
 saw no reason, why he should maintain 
 
 however, made a more serious use of the their religion, and that he would not only 
 remarkable Providence, and Egypt for- cease to" furnish the expense out of the 
 sook the superstition, in which for so|exchequer, but abolish the sacrifices them 
 
 many ages it had been involved. And 
 thus the country which had nourished 
 idolatry more early and more passionate- 
 ly than others, was made the special 
 scene of the triumphs of God and his 
 Christ. 
 
 Libanius, the friend of Julian, was yet 
 alive, and held the office of Pretorian 
 prefect under the emperor. The gentle- 
 ness of this prince encouraged the sophist 
 to present him with an oration in favour 
 of the temples ; in which he trode in the 
 steps of Symmachus, and pleaded the 
 cause of the gods, as well as so bad a 
 subject would admit. It is remarkable, 
 that he argued, " Religion ought to be 
 planted in men's minds by reason, not by 
 force." Thus Pagans could now talk, 
 who forages had acted toward Christians 
 in so diffe"rent a manner.* The writer of 
 this oration was himself a palpable in- 
 stance of the clemency of Christian go- 
 vernors compared with Pagan. He lived 
 in a respectable situation, unmolested, 
 the champion of expiring Paganism ; and 
 many others were treated in the same 
 manner. 
 
 Coming to Rome, the zealous emperor 
 in a deliberate speech endeavoured to 
 persuade the senate, very many of whom 
 still patronised idolatry, to embrace the 
 Christian faith, as the only religion, 
 
 * At this very time, while Theodosius treat- 
 ed Pagans wiih moderation, under a Cluistian 
 establisliment, the Christians were treated 
 ■with unbounded cruelty under a Pagan esta- 
 blishment in Persia. The blameable zeal of 
 Audas, H bisliop, gave the first occasion to it. 
 Moved with divine zeal, as he supposed, he 
 overturned a temple in which the sacred fire 
 ■was kept.f Isdigerdes the king ordered him 
 to rebuild it, which he refusing, the Clnistian 
 Churches were ordered to be destroyed, and 
 the man to be slain. A persecution thus com- 
 mencing on specious grounds, was continued 
 for tliirty yeai-s -villi unremitting barbarity. 
 The tortures of Christians were dreadful be- 
 yond measure ; yet ihey persevered, and num- 
 bers voluntarily endured afflictions, for the joy 
 of eternal life set before them. 
 
 f Called ^upt.cv. See Theodoret, B. V. 
 •. 39. Magdeburg. Cent. 4. c. 3. 
 
 selves. The senators complained, that 
 the neglect of the rites was the grand 
 cause, why the empire declined so much : 
 a specious argument well calculated to 
 gain upon worldly minds, and which had 
 great effect on many Pagans at this time. 
 We may see by and by, what a laboured 
 and animated answer to it was written by 
 one of the greatest and ablest of the fa- 
 thers. Theodosius now made it a capital 
 crime to sacrifice, or attend the Pagan 
 rites. In vain did the patrons of idolatry 
 exercise their parts and assiduity. The 
 emperor was determined, and issued out 
 a law that made it treasonable to offer 
 sacrifice, or to consult the entrails of 
 beasts.* Incense and perfumes were like- 
 wise forbidden. Paganism never lifted 
 up its head after this; habit alone sup- 
 ported it; and objects of sense being re- 
 moved, zeal was extinguished, and as 
 Theodosius was not disposed to make 
 martyrs, so no Pagans felt any inclina- 
 tion to become such. This great prince 
 expired at Milan in the year 
 395, about sixty years of age, 
 having reigned sixteen years. 
 And the century before us 
 nearly closes with the full es- 
 tablishment of Christianity in 
 the Roman empire. The religion which 
 was of God made its way through all 
 opposition ; that which was of man, sup- 
 ported only by power and custom, failed 
 to thrive, as soon as it lost the ascendant, 
 and within a generation it ceased almost 
 universally to exist among men. 
 
 The real character of Theodosius is by 
 no means doubtful. For though the 
 praises of Ambrose may be suspected, 
 yet Aurelius Victor, a Gentile writer, 
 must be credited, when he commends 
 this emperor. His clemency, liberality 
 and generosity were admirable. He was 
 brave and successful in war; but his 
 wars were forced upon him. He was an 
 enemy to drunkenness, and was himself 
 
 Death of 
 Theodo- 
 sius, 
 
 A. D. 395. 
 
 * Cave's Introduction 
 I Fathers, Vol. II. 
 
 to the Lives of the 
 
Cent. IV,] 
 
 THE0D0SIU9. 
 
 343 
 
 a model of ^avity, temperance and chas- 
 tity in private life. By a law he forbad 
 minstrels and other servants of lewdness 
 to attend at feasts. Thus he is represent- 
 ed by a contemporary, whose account is 
 certainly to be preferred to that of a later 
 writer, the partial Zozimus, who treats 
 every Christian emperor with malig-nity. 
 I see in Theodosius the triumphs of the 
 Cross ; nor in all the Pagan history of 
 the emperors was there one to be compar- 
 ed with him. They had no principles to 
 produce humility. The excess of anger 
 was,as we haveseen,hispredoniinantevil; 
 and his case ti aches at once two lessons; 
 one is, th'at the best men need to guard 
 daily against their besetting sins ; and the 
 other is, that even our infirmities may be 
 turned to good account by the promotion 
 of our humility, and the Redeemer's glory. 
 Flaccilla, tlie wife of Theodosius, ap- 
 pears to have been a pious and humble 
 person. She was constantly reminding 
 him of the private and low condition, in 
 which they had lived together before his 
 advancement, and exhorting him to at- 
 tend to the duties of religion. She her- 
 self was an edifying pattern of conde- 
 scension and liberality. The sick, the 
 afflicted, the poor, were relieved not only 
 by her alms, but also by her benevolent 
 attention and labour. Some representino- 
 to her, that it was beneath her dignity to 
 take care of hospitals and the houses of 
 mourning, she answered, " the distribu- 
 tion of gold indeed becomes the imperial 
 dignity ; but I offer to him, who hath 
 given me that dignity, my personal la- 
 bours as a token of gratitude." That 
 grace is strong indeed, which melts not 
 under the beams of prosperity. Theodo- 
 sius was once inclined to converse with 
 Eunomius, an able Arian, who lived at 
 Constantinople, and whom, on account 
 of his heretical practices, he banished 
 thence. But Flaccilla, who trembled for 
 the salvation of her husband, (I speak 
 seriously what Mr. Gibbon does scorn- 
 fully, chap. XXVIII. vol. III.) dissuaded 
 him from it. It is ])leasant to see ortho- 
 dox profession consistently united with 
 virtuous practice ; this can only be the 
 case where men are taught of God indeed. 
 It ought to be known, that the emperor, 
 who in the cause of God never yielded a 
 tittle to heresy, in his own cause was 
 soft and flexible, and with princely li- 
 berality supported the aged mother, and 
 brought up the orphan daughters of the 
 usurper Maximus. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 REFLECTIONS ON ECCLESIASTICAL ES- 
 TABLISHMENTS. 
 
 " But what right had Theodosius to 
 make his religion that of the state 1 Ouo-ht 
 not every person, in this matter, to be 
 left to his own conscience? Is it not a 
 violation of the right of private judgment, 
 to impose religious sentiments on the sub- 
 jects of any government 1 How therefore 
 can Theodosius, or others who have act- 
 ed like him, be cleared from the charge 
 of exercising tyrannical authority ]" 
 
 There was a time, when the fallac};- of 
 such notions would have been seen through 
 with less difhculty: at present, the tide of 
 popular opinion runs strong in their fa- 
 vour, and it becomes more necessary to 
 examine their foundation. Moreover, the 
 characters of many of the brightest and 
 best Christians are so interwoven in this 
 question, and the determination of it so 
 much affects the honour of the Divine 
 operations in the propagation of Chris- 
 tianity, that the reader, I trust, will be 
 disposed to receive these reflections with 
 candour and attention, however defective 
 they may appear to him in some respects, 
 or inadequate to the solution of several 
 difficulties, which may be conceived to 
 belong to this intricate subject. 
 
 I shall take for granted, that the Gos- 
 pel is of Divine authority, and ought to 
 be received, on pain of condemnation, by 
 every one, Avho has the opportunity of 
 hearing it fairly proposed ; and that a 
 man ought no more to plead the pretence 
 of conscience for rejecting its fundamen- 
 tals, than for the commission of murder, 
 theft, or any other criminal action. The 
 reason is, because its light and evidences 
 do so unquestionably carry the impression 
 of divine goodness and divine authority, 
 that wickedness of heart, and not weak- 
 ness of capacity, must be the cause of 
 the rejection of it by any man. I send 
 those, who are inclined to dispute these 
 positions, to the many proofs given of 
 them by the best evangelical writers in 
 all ages, and above all to the Scriptures 
 themselves, which every where declare, 
 that " he that believeih not the Son shall 
 not see life, but the wrath of God abideth 
 on him."* If the reader bear these things 
 in memory, he will find some of the most 
 specious objections to ecclesiastical esta- 
 blishments overturned. 
 
 * John iii. the cud. 
 
344 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 [Chap.XVIL 
 
 For, few persons will, I think, dispute 
 the principle of general expediency and 
 utility, as directly applicable to this im- 
 portant subject. Has not every slate a 
 right to ordain what is conducive to its 
 preservation and the good of society ? 
 And, for these purposes, is any thing to 
 be compared with right religion and the 
 fear of God ■? What shall hinder, then, 
 but that the state has the same right to 
 make laws concerning religion, as con 
 cerning property, commerce, and agricul 
 ture ? Is it not a great mistake to sepa- 
 rate religious considerations from civil 1 
 And while you attempt to do so in theory, 
 will it not be found impossible in prac- 
 tice ! And should not laws be always 
 made for practice, and not for mere spe- 
 cnlation ? The more the governors feel 
 the importance of religion, (I speak not 
 now for the next life, but for this,) the 
 more concerned will they be to establish 
 it. They must do so, if they regard even 
 the temporal good of their subjects. 
 
 Then, brietly, these three considera- 
 tions, namely, 1st, the clear evidences by 
 which Christianity is supported ; 2dly, 
 the importance of its doctrines ; and, 3dly, 
 general expediency, appear to me to sup- 
 ply materials for an argument in favor of 
 ecclesiastical establishments, which ad- 
 mits of no satisfactory answer. Thus ; 
 the Gospel is of divine authority ; its 
 fundamentals are revealed with so much 
 clearness, and are of so much consequence 
 to the interests of mankind, that they 
 cannot be rejected without great wicked- 
 ness of heart; even the wrath of God is 
 declared to abide on him who believeth not 
 the Son. Under these circumstances, will 
 any man, who thinks it the duty of the 
 supreme power to consult the good of the 
 community, believe it a matter of indiffer 
 ence, whether suitable forms of prayer 
 and thanksgiving, or in short, whether a 
 convenient and well-digested Liturgy,* 
 founded on the genuine principles of re- 
 vealed religion, be composed for public 
 use, and also whether proper persons and 
 places be provided by the state, for the 
 
 * In such undei'takirgs, the genei-al aim, 
 undoubtedly, ou;^'ht to bf, not to gratity tliis or 
 that party in utntasonable deniands ; but to do 
 that, wliich most lends to ihu pi-eseivalion of 
 peace and unity in lliechurcli ; llie procurinsi 
 of reverence, and tlie exciting of piety and de- 
 TOtion in tiie public woi-.->lii\) of God ; and the 
 taking away of occasion from them that set k 
 occasion of cavil or qnaiTel against the lit- 
 urgy of the chuich. See the prefiice to the 
 Book of Common Prayer. 
 
 worship of God and for the instruction of 
 the people 1 
 
 But besides these general reasons for 
 a national establishment of true religion, 
 there are other considerations relative to 
 the same subject, which merit our atten- 
 tion. 
 
 It is certain, that from the earliest ages 
 and under patriarchal government, when 
 holy men were favored with divine reve- 
 lations, governors taught the true religion, 
 and did not permit their subjects to pro- 
 pagate atheism, idolatry, or false religion.* 
 Abraham, Isaac, f and Jacob, :|: governed 
 their families in this manner ; so did 
 Noah before thera.5 As families grew 
 into nations, the same practical ideas pre- 
 vailed. At length, when it pleased God 
 to select one nation for his service, the 
 same sentiments respecting church-esta- 
 blishment continued, whether kings, or 
 judges, or priests, were in possession of 
 the executive power. I am aware that 
 the Jewish government was a theocracy, 
 and that it has therefore many things pe- 
 culiar to itself; but so much perhaps may 
 safely be inferred from its constitution, 
 that it is lawful for the sovereign author- 
 ity to make regulations for the support of 
 true religion. It is hardly to be conceived, 
 that God would interweave into his theo- 
 cracy, what in its own nature is unlawful. 
 
 Nor is this argument, which depends 
 upon the general administration of eccle- 
 siastical affairs in the Jewish theocracy, 
 much weakened by any conclusions that 
 may be drawn from particular instances 
 of Divine interference and direction which 
 occur in the history of the same theocracy. 
 When the Jews are ordered to extirpate 
 the Canaanites, and when Agag is hewed 
 in pieces before the Lord in Gilgal, these 
 are occasional instances of Divine ven- 
 ireance executed against iniquity : we may 
 readily admit, that such instances form no 
 lawful precedents for governments to 
 follow, while we maintain that a mode of 
 ecclesiastical administration ordained by 
 God, and continued for a long series of 
 years, cannot possibly be an improper ex- 
 ample for religious magistrates to imitate. 
 However, in contending for the lawfulness 
 of such imitation, I would by no means 
 be understood to include all the particular 
 actions or measures of Jewish governors 
 in ecclesiastical matters ; the reasons of 
 these actions or measures may have long 
 
 * Gen. xviii. 19. 
 ^ Geii. XXXV .2. 
 
 •j- Gen. xxviii. 1. 
 
 § Gen. ix. toward the end. 
 
Chap. XVII.] 
 
 ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 345 
 
 since ceased to exist. In this argument 
 I have respect only, in general, to the 
 principal feature of the Jewish constitu- 
 tion, namely, the unquestionableauthority, 
 which the magistrate possessed in eccle- 
 siastical regulations: a very remarkable 
 fact ! which I recommend to the serious 
 consideration of those Dissenters from our 
 church-establishment, who do not hesitate 
 to pronounce the interference of the civil 
 magistrate in the religious institutions of 
 a nation to be always unlawful. 
 
 If these reasons and examples be well 
 weigh(;d, it will hardly be doubted, but 
 that when the Gospel was preached 
 among the Jews, if their Sanhedrim had 
 received it, they would have had a right 
 to make it the established religion of the 
 nation. They might have said, and they 
 probably would have said, " This religion 
 is true and divine; the people cannot re- 
 ject it without rejecting, in positive wick- 
 edness of heart, the authority of God him- 
 self: the doctrines of this religion are of 
 the utmost importance: it is therefore ex- 
 pedient, that it should be supported by 
 the state, and we are countenanced in 
 this conclusion by the example of our an- 
 cestors." 
 
 And in regard to such modern nations, 
 as profess to believe the Scripture-history 
 of the Jews and of Jesus Christ, it may 
 fairly be asked, What are the peculiar 
 circumstances, that should render it im- 
 proper for the governing powers to feel 
 the influence of the same reasons and ex- 
 amples ] Can any good argument be in- 
 vented to prove, that, in the momentous 
 affair of religion, they ought not to be ac- 
 tuated by the grand principle of general 
 expediency, when, in matters of less con- 
 sequence, they evidently show themselves 
 to be so actuated, and no one disputes the 
 propriety of their conduct? 
 
 If an inferior state should fear the dis- 
 pleasure of a superior one in its neigh- 
 bourhood, which might h ;ve sutficient 
 strength to destroy it, will any man deny 
 to the supreme power of this lesser state 
 a right to prescribe to its own subjects a 
 mode of conduct that should not give um- 
 brage to the greater? If no man will 
 deny this, let the concession be applied 
 to religion: Irreligion and idolatry pro- 
 voke the Almighty ; a nation wholly given 
 up to them has reason to fear his ven- 
 geance, especially if they persist in sin- 
 ful practices against light and the fairest 
 means of instruction. Then let the ma- 
 gistrate act consistently : let him only ad- 
 
 here to the acknowledged principle, that 
 the government ought to promote the good 
 of the state, and the reader sees the con- 
 sequence. Indeed I do not perceive how 
 the consequence can be avoided, unless it 
 be clearly shown, that there is something 
 in the history of mankind, which should 
 lead us to suspect the soundness of this 
 reasoning. But the practice of holy men 
 of old in different ages, and the history of 
 the earliest nations, and of the Jews, 
 have been proved to be all in favour of 
 religiius establishments. 
 
 But perhaps we may be called upon in 
 this place to explain a little more dis- 
 tinctly the meaning and extent of that 
 CONSEQUENCE, whlch wc havc affirmed to 
 be unavoidable: we may be asked, whe- 
 ther we mean to conclude, that civil ma- 
 gistrates possess an authority, not only by 
 which they may prescribe and support a 
 national establishment of religion, but 
 also by which they may compei- the sub- 
 ject to receive the religion which they 
 have instituted, and restrain him from 
 practising his own religion, if he happen 
 to think differently from the powers that 
 be. And then a further question will be 
 asked, whether this be not to encourage 
 persecution, and to exercise a tyranny 
 over the i-onscienceT 
 
 Without pretending to satisfy complete- 
 ly either these inquiries, or others of a 
 similar nature that may easily be ima- 
 gined, I endeavour to separate what is 
 certain and important in this matter from 
 what is doubtful and of less moment. I 
 say without the least hesitation, let no 
 man be compelled to become a Christian ; 
 in strict truth, he cannot. Every maa 
 not only ought to have, but must have, 
 the right of private judgment. And as it 
 is the absolute duty of Christian states, 
 even for social and political purposes, to 
 endeavour as much as possible to convert 
 all their subjects to the true religion, so 
 it is contrary to duty, that men should be 
 forced to profess what they do not be- 
 lieve, because hypocrisy will be the cer- 
 tain, and an augrmented enmity the pro- 
 bable, consequence. It is one thing, how- 
 ever, to leave a man at liberty, whether 
 he will be a believer or not, another to 
 allow him to propagate infidelity and 
 idolatry. So also it is one thing to vio- 
 late conscience by absolutely insisting on 
 and extorting confessions of faith, another 
 to preserve the sacred institutions of the 
 country from being derided and profaned. 
 The government has a right to restrain 
 
346 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 [Chap. XVIL 
 
 men, and oblige them to keep their irrr- 
 ligion to themselves, the same riirht as to 
 oblige vessels to perforin (|iiarai)tiiip,, when 
 there is reason to suspect the plague. In 
 this manner acted the great, the pious, 
 Theodosius; ho cnmpellfd no man; he 
 only restrained. Pagan ( mperors before 
 him, and Popish princes since, not only 
 restrained, but also coiTupelled. 'I'he for- 
 mer is not persecution, the latter is; and 
 I join cordially wilh the present age in 
 detesting it. 
 
 i^lrange as this conclusion may appear 
 to some, who have been habituated to an- 
 other mode of thinking, 1 seem to be sup- 
 ported, not only by the general arguments 
 which have been alicady advanced, but 
 by the positive word of God. .Job de- 
 clares, that idolatry was an ini(|nity to 
 be punished by the .Judge.* He evi- 
 dently speaks what was confessed by all 
 to he just : nor is it to be conceived, that 
 the Holy Ghost would have suffered him 
 to impose an iniquitous sentiment on the 
 Tead(;r in that manner. I repeat it; the 
 general tirguments drawn from expi'dien- 
 cy, and the example of the Jews, appear 
 to me to justify the civil magistrate, not 
 only in instituting and suj>porling eccle- 
 siastical establishments, b»it also in re- 
 straining and punishing the propagators 
 of irreligious opinions. Korean any thing 
 be more plain, than that if public utility 
 require a provision to be made for the 
 ■worship of God, and the instruction of 
 the people in true religion, the same uti- 
 lity wili require, that every thing should 
 be suppressed which has a tendency to 
 destroy the efficacy of that provision, or 
 diminish its influence? And on these 
 princij)les acted the good kings, judges, 
 and priests of Israel, in abundance of in- 
 stances. 
 
 Thus, by steps, which to such as have 
 a real reverence for revealed religion, will 
 probably appear neither tedious nor ob- 
 scure, are we arrived at several conclu- 
 sions of the utmost consequence in prac- 
 tice. 
 
 1. The supreme ])ower has no right to 
 violate liberty of conscience, by extorting 
 confessions of faith. 
 
 2. It has a right — To establish the true 
 religion, by positive institutions. 
 
 3. To ensure public respect to these in- 
 stitutions, by penal laws. 
 
 4. To restrain and punish the propaga- 
 tors of religious opinions. 
 
 * Job xxxi. 28. 
 
 But it must not be dissembled, that the 
 4th conclusion contains a j)roposilion in 
 some measure undefined, and involved in 
 difficulties, which require further discus- 
 sion. Who shall determine, to what ex- 
 tent the authority of the supreme magis- 
 trate reaches, in the suppressitpn of irre- 
 ligious opinions'? Where shall we find 
 a common arbiter between him and the 
 peoj)le, when they differ in their notions? 
 Or, is the magistrate permitted to restrain 
 and punish the propagators of every sen- 
 timent that happens to clash wilh the 
 tenets, which he has introduced into his 
 establishment? 
 
 It is much to be wished, that persons 
 whose principles and habits incline them 
 to give, in some respects, diflferent an- 
 swers to these inquiries, would, in the 
 first place, seriously endeavour to find 
 out, how far they actually think alike, 
 and by so doing come nearer to a mutual 
 agreement, rather than embitter their 
 tempers by acrimonious disputes concern- 
 inor inferior matters, widen the breach of 
 Christian friendship, and keep entirely 
 out of sight the more important consider- 
 ations, in which their judgments might 
 have concurred. Sincere Christians of 
 every denomination who have duly weigh- 
 ed the arnfuments contained in this chap- 
 ter, would then, I think, be disposed to 
 admit that the propagators of infidelity, 
 of idfjlalry, of atheism, and in short of 
 gross irreligion, ought to be efTcclually 
 restrained and punished by the civil ma- 
 gistrate ; and if this be admitted, if mea 
 of eveiy station heartily join in this con- 
 clusion, the existing laws against irreli- 
 gion will be vigorously executed, and a 
 great practical point will be gained. 
 
 Moreover, it would sorn be agreed, that 
 in matters of subordinate consequence, 
 which are evirlently notesscntial to Chris- 
 ti mity, the civil magistrate ought not to 
 interfere at all, by restraining or punish- 
 ing such pr^rsons as differ from the esta- 
 blishment, but that be should suffer them 
 to enjoy a com|)lete toleration, and to 
 serve God in their own way. 
 
 The essentials of Christianity ought, 
 in my judgment, to be effectually pro- 
 tected by the laws, against the profane 
 and libellous attacks of infidels of every 
 denomination. I do not think it sufficient 
 to say " 'i'he truth will take care of itself." 
 The unle;rnod and tlie unwary ought not 
 to be exposed to the mischievous ef- 
 fects of such publications. Nevertheless, 
 I am sensible that on this head it seems 
 
Chap. XVII.] 
 
 ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 347 
 
 impossible to define the limits of the au- 
 thority of the magistrate so precisely, as 
 to exclude all doubt and ambiguity. For, 
 besides that questions will sometimes 
 arise even respecting the essentials them- 
 selves, the expediency of the punishment 
 will frequently depend on peculiar cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 There is a great difference, for exam- 
 ple, between a serious inquirer after truth, 
 and one, who makes a mock of religion ; 
 between the man, who proposes his 
 doubts with modesty, and wishes to have 
 them removed, and the profane sceptic 
 or infidel, who under the pretence of can- 
 dour and fair investigation, secretly re- 
 joices in disseminating objections, and 
 in undermining the faith of unguarded 
 unbelievers. Add to this ; it will not 
 always be prudent to punish even those, 
 who openly and scandalously attack the 
 established religion of the country. In 
 many cases, it will be much better to 
 pass by the impudent offender with con- 
 tempt, than, by inflicting the penalty he 
 has justly incurred, to excite the curiosi- 
 ty of the public, to make the libellous 
 publication more known, and to render 
 its unworthy author of more consequence. 
 
 It is not to be expected, that all should 
 think alike. Let Christian fundamentals 
 therefore be preserved as effectually as 
 possible by an ecclesiastical establish- 
 ment, and by laws which defend and 
 support it; let there be a toleration f< r 
 those who profess themselves to hold the 
 essentials of Christianity, but may not 
 think themselves autiiorized in conseienf-e 
 to conform, in all points, to the establish- 
 ed church : This is not only allowable, 
 but peifectly just and equitable. To 
 deny it, is tyranny. Thus acted Theodo- 
 sius with respect to the Novatians : and 
 this seems the utmost limit of iiuman 
 ■wisdom in this difficult subject. 
 
 The advantages of a Christian esta- 
 blishment are doubtless great: the pre- 
 vention of general profaneness, the decent 
 observation of the Sabbath, and the op- 
 portunity of diffusing the Gospel in dark 
 and barbarous regions; all these things 
 ■were the evident good consequences of 
 tlie establishment during the fourth cen- 
 tury. But let us suppose, that Constan- 
 tine and his successors had contented 
 themselves with encouraging the Gospel, 
 and had permitted idolatry and irreligion 
 to continue unchecked. Considering the 
 depravity of human nature, one sees not 
 how, without a miracle, Christianity 
 
 would have pervaded the Roman empire 
 at all; half, or the major part, of the 
 Roman world might have remained in 
 irreligion and idolatry to this day. Simi- 
 lar advantages of an establishment may 
 be observed in the history of our own 
 country. 
 
 On the other hand, it has been fre- 
 quently said, that the great corruption of 
 the Gospel began from the days of Con- 
 stantino. This, I have shown already, 
 was not the case. The corruption had 
 begun a considerable time before, nor 
 does it appear that the decline of vital 
 religion was greater than might have 
 been expected from the general course of 
 things ; and if no establishment at all 
 had taken place, it would probably have 
 been more rapid. There would certainly 
 have been this remarkable difference, 
 namely, that half the Roman world, with- 
 out the aid of the magistrate, would have 
 remained destitute of even the form of 
 Christianity. Corruption of doctrine and 
 discipline ought not to be laid at the door 
 of ecclesiastical establishments, but to be 
 imputed to the degeneracy of men them- 
 selves. It would not be hard to point 
 out many persons in our own country, 
 who voluntarily separate from the esta- 
 blishment, and who are nearly void of 
 church-discipline, and even more deeply 
 and more systematically corrupt in doc- 
 trine than the most heterodox and une- 
 vangelical theologians, who inconsistent- 
 ly remain members of the Church of 
 England. The best ecclesiastical esta- 
 llishments cannot prevent the decay of 
 vital godliness ; but under the providence 
 of God, they strengthen th.e hands of sin- 
 cere, hnmbl,>minded believers, and check 
 the influence both of open and of dis- 
 guised enemies of Christianity. 
 
 The Liturgy alone of the Church of 
 England has long proved, and continues 
 to prove, a strong bulwark against all 
 the efforts of heretical innovators, and 
 corruptors of doctrine. 
 
 If these arguments and observations 
 were kept in view, dis^senters, who have 
 been accustomed to speak disrespectfully 
 of our ecclesiastical establishment, would 
 probably find more to commend, and less 
 to find fault with. 
 
 I shall not be surprised, however, if 
 some persons still feel themselves dissa- 
 tisfied with the result of these reflections. 
 The subject is arduous and intricate, and 
 has difficulties peculiarly its own. The 
 variety of religious opinions among mea 
 
348 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 [Chap. XVIL 
 
 is almost endless; and it is no easy mat- 
 ter to unite into one political mass, a 
 multitude of particles totally heteroge- 
 neous witii respect to each other. A 
 notion also has been maintained with 
 much industry and zeal, that religion 
 ought to be " fettered by no political in- 
 stitutions." We have been perpetually 
 asked, Why should the majority, why 
 should governors, why should any one 
 dictate to us in religion? Why have not 
 we a right to choose for ourselves, what 
 religion we wish to propagate "? However 
 confident others may be of the rectitude of 
 their system, may not we be as confident 
 of the rectitude of ours ■? Who shall de- 
 cide between us 1 
 
 This is specious, and many seem hence 
 inclined entirely to separate religious 
 from political considerations. "Appoint," 
 say they, " a good government, perfectly 
 abstracted from all religion. Let the 
 civil magistrate show himself totally im- 
 partial in regard to all modes of faith : 
 let him protect all persons so long as 
 they obey the rules of civil society. Let 
 the rights of conscience be kept sacred : 
 in religion, man is accountable to God 
 alone." Those, who hold out this lan- 
 guage, cut the gordian knot at once, and 
 would extricate us from all dilRculties, 
 provided they could prove, that it is 
 really practicable to erect a permanent 
 government perfectly detached from all 
 religious sanctions. But this would in- 
 deed be "A MIGHTY MAZE WITHOUT A 
 
 plan!" Suppose a number should choose 
 to be atheists : If this reasoning be gocd, 
 atheism, as well as any other opinion, 
 ought to be tolerated. Then, mark the 
 consequences : the use of oaths, which 
 among all civilized nations has ever been 
 the legitimate method of ending all 
 STRIFE, is at once superseded. He must 
 have a considerable degree of hardihood 
 in politics, who would attempt to support 
 a government contradictory, in its whole 
 plan, to the universal voice of ancient 
 wisdom. Certain it is, that in Scripture 
 all just government is founded on the 
 fear of God, and all legislators. Pagan as 
 well as Jewish and Christian, have, with 
 a greater or less degree of perfection, 
 proceeded on this foundation. The be- 
 lief of a future stale, of some supreme 
 Judge and Arbiter of mankind, has ever 
 been instilled into subjects by all law- 
 givers. It were easy to multiply proofs 
 of this. Suffice it to give the testimony 
 of one, who may be called himself a host, 
 
 on account of his great knowledge of 
 mankind, ihe extent and variety of his 
 learning, and the solidity of his judgment. 
 Plutarch, advers. Colotem. p. II25, after 
 having observed that no man could ever 
 say, that he saw a city without some 
 sort of temple, or some mark of divine 
 
 worship, subjoins, uyy:t TrcXt; ttV /uci Si,x.U 
 fxaKACiv fefa^sc X'^V'"' " ''^^^''^S'^) T))C 'zs-i^i ^tuv Jc^Jtj 
 a.VM^>ibutni; ttavt XTraTt, a-uTaitriv XaCsiV, » XctCxu-ct 
 
 Ttigna-ui. " A city seems to me more capa- 
 ble of being built without a foundation, 
 than a polity is capable of receiving a 
 system, or having received one, of pre- 
 servingr it, if sentiments of religion be 
 entirely removed." 
 
 Will any adversary of religious esta- 
 blishments say, that no considerable part 
 of a community will ever go the length 
 of throwing aside all relisjion: and that 
 in these enlightened times, men will at 
 least retain the belief of a God and of a 
 future state 1 — I wish the contrary sup- 
 position could be proved an extravagant 
 conjecture. — What are the present doc- 
 trines of a neighbouring nation, who have 
 not only rejected the sacred institutions 
 of the Bible, as the Sabbath, and the di- 
 vision of time into periods of seven days, 
 &c. but who have also lately discovered 
 that death is an eternal sleep, and of 
 course, that there is no reason to appre- 
 hend a future state of retribution]* — 
 When such strides as these are once 
 taken, practical atheism can be at no 
 great distance. And as to a merely theo- 
 retical belief of one self-existent Cause, 
 
 or of several self-existent causes, where 
 the Deity is excluded from being the 
 moral governor of the world, such a specu- 
 lative notion is hardly worth contending 
 for. 
 
 It is too true, that the effect of a gene- 
 ral belirf of religion on men's practice 
 is faint and languid, and by no means 
 proportioned to the importance of the 
 subject ; but perhaps we can scarce de- 
 cide how much better in its moral influ- 
 ence, some principle is than none at all. 
 Men are naturally propense to wicked- 
 ness ; the common sense of mankind has 
 in some degree always confessed this; 
 and here, by a singular concurrence of 
 circumstances, the language of poets has 
 more truth in it than that of philosophers. 
 The former speak the feeling of nature, 
 and confess that men unrestrained will 
 
 * Written about the time of the French 
 revolution and the murder of the king, 1792-3. 
 
Chap. XVII.] 
 
 ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 349 
 
 run into all sorts of wickedness ; the lat- 
 ter, by sophistry, have perverted every 
 ihiiig in morals. How is it possible 
 to construct a government, that shall 
 preserve order and decorum for such de- 
 praved beings, without some religious 
 establishment! The very attempt itself 
 is to encourage atheism; and men who 
 find the regard of the Divine authority to 
 be left out°of the class of political duties, 
 will naturally be led to the greatest and 
 the highest degrees of profaneness. To 
 propagate impiety is to propagate human 
 misery. Shall men be restrained, by the 
 civil sword, from circulating whatever 
 may be hurtful to the health and proper- 
 ty of their fellow-creatures; and will you 
 allow them, with no restraint of any 
 kind, to propagate that which will poison 
 the mind, and render human life an in- 
 tolerable scene of evil? Whether men 
 like the expression of alliance between 
 CHURCH AND STATE, or not, there is a 
 natural connexion between government 
 and religion, which, in practice, will ap- 
 pear, and have real effects, however plau- 
 sible it may seem, in theory, to reprobate 
 such connexion. 
 
 On this occasion the laudable practice 
 of some Dissenters from the established 
 church is frequently appealed to, for the 
 purpose of showing, that love of Chris- 
 tianity and of our country, and all other 
 virtues both public and private, may 
 abound and flourish without the support 
 of any laws in favour of particular opin- 
 ions. It is easy to show that there is 
 
 not much in this argument — and for this 
 end, we need neither dissect it very nice- 
 ly, nor detract from the merits either of 
 individuals or of whole sects. Let it be 
 admitted, that, in may cases, the conduct 
 of Dissenters has been useful and exem- 
 plary. Yet who will deny, that proba- 
 bly the existence, and certainly the ener- 
 gy, of sectaries themselves, frequently 
 depend in some measure on their opposi- 
 tion to the establishment] And happy it 
 is for themselves, happy for the members 
 of the established church, happy for the 
 community at large, when an opposition 
 of this sort shows itself in producing a 
 virtuous emulation. We may then ex- 
 pect to see Christian examples of indus- 
 try, learning, piety, and patriotism. 
 
 But, without an establishment provided 
 by the state, the greater part will scarce- 
 ly have any religion at all, wickedness 
 will be practised on the boldest scale ; 
 and if the form of government have a 
 
 Vol. I. 2 G 
 
 large portion of liberty in its texture, the 
 manners will be egregiously dissolute. 
 Democracy indeed, pure and unqualified, 
 is the system which will harmonize the 
 most easily with a polity altogether ab- 
 stracted from religion ; and this very con- 
 sideration affords, perhaps, no inconsi- 
 derable argument against that species of 
 government. But even if the govern- 
 ment were, in other respects, the soundest 
 and the wisest effort of human sagacity, 
 it will probably prove only a curse to its 
 citizens, unless some legal provision be 
 made for religion. God himself, there 
 is the highest reason to conclude, will 
 SET HIS FACE AGAINST IT, and confound 
 it. Nations, whose government has been 
 seasoned with religious institutions, can 
 scarce conceive to what lengths of vil- 
 lany and flagitiousness, such an atheistic 
 institution will lead its subjects ; and all 
 Europe will not be at a loss where to 
 look for an instance of its effects. 
 
 Without entering minutely into the 
 circumstances of Pagan nations, let us 
 take it for granted, that there are certain 
 fundamental articles of revealed religion, 
 a few of immense importance, which the 
 legislator ought carefully to select from 
 a number of subordinate truths and cir- 
 cumstantials. These last he may safely 
 leave to the consciences of men, by 
 providing a toleration in which they 
 may securely range. But the essentials 
 of religion it is his duty to support, and 
 not permit them to be derided and insult- 
 ed by the profane attacks either of igno- 
 rant or of learned enemies of religion. 
 To neglect them, would obviously be a 
 far greater crime in him, than in those 
 who have not had his advantages of in- 
 formation. Is it still said, Who shall 
 decide what these fundamentals are ] If 
 men would seriously weigh the doctrines 
 of the Scriptures, with a humble spirit, 
 and in the use of prayer, they would 
 probably be surprised to find how very 
 small would be their differences of opin- 
 ion. And one thing, which I propose to 
 show in the course of this history, is the 
 agreement of persons of this description 
 in all ages ; for in regard to fundamentals, 
 it is certainly much closer and more uni- 
 form than many believe. No man ought 
 to plead conscience for the neglect of that 
 duty on which his salvation must depend. 
 It is certain that these essentials cannot 
 be neglected or despised without a turpi- 
 tude of heart, which the Scripture con- 
 nects with the final ruin of the soul. 
 
350 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 [Chap. XVIL 
 
 The difficulty of providing a government 
 equitably adapted to all consciences, if 
 pushed into the extreme, supposes that 
 there is no certain criterion of divine 
 truth, and that men may, without moral 
 guilt, believe any thing or nothing. But 
 as these positions are inadmissible with 
 all but .Sceptics, and persons altogether 
 profane, the connexion between sentiment 
 and practice is too important, to justify 
 the neglect of all religion in political 
 establishments, for the sake of pleasing 
 the worst part of the human species. If, 
 after all, a government established on 
 such principles bear hard on dissolute 
 men, there seems no remedj'' ; guilt must 
 have its inconveniences. And there are 
 no common principles on which a be- 
 liever of revealed religion and an infidel 
 can unite in the formation of a govern- 
 ment. 
 
 The practical inferences are obvious. 
 The subjects of a Christian government 
 will consist of three classes. The friends 
 of the establishment, who will, of course, 
 support it ; Dissenters, who, owning its 
 fundamentals, 
 
 clesiastical establishment, framed and mo- 
 delled according to the principles incul- 
 cated in this Chapter. The great truths 
 of religion are supported by laws ; and 
 the same laws provide effectual restraints 
 against propagators of false doctrine. 
 Notwithstanding the vice, heresy, and 
 profaneness, which prevail among us, we 
 do not so much stand in need of new 
 laws, as of zealous magistrates to enforce 
 those which already exist. 
 
 It is sometimes said, that subscription 
 to articles, and other tests of religious 
 opinions, are injurious to the morals of 
 men, by inducing them to act the part of 
 hypocrites for the sake of worldly advan- 
 tage. Supposing this to happen in some 
 instances, nevertheless the answer is, 
 this inconvenience is to be hazarded, be- 
 cause unavoidable, if we aim at pro- 
 moting the general good. It is expedient 
 that there should be a public liturgy, and 
 proper persons to read the same, and to 
 teach the true doctrines of Christ ; and it 
 very necessary, that these persons 
 
 religious 
 
 differ in some 
 subordinate sentiments ; and those Dis- 
 senters, who are hostile to all religion, or, 
 at least, are fond of a religion suljversive 
 of the great truths of Christianity. The 
 members of the establishment, at the 
 same time that they support its institu- 
 tions with firmness, ought to exercise for- 
 bearance and charity towards the first 
 class of Dissenters, and to think no worse 
 of any man for diflfering in opinion from 
 himself, where it is evident that he acts 
 with uprightness. They owe charity also 
 to the second class of Dissenters, but 
 charity of a very diflTercnt kind. The first 
 class of Dissenters, convinced of the im- 
 portance and utility of religious establish- 
 ments, ought to support that, of whose 
 friendly protection they daily feel the be- 
 nefit in society, while they enjoy the pri- 
 vilege of toleration ; and to view them- 
 selves as coalescing with the churchmen, 
 who, like them, hold what is fundamen- 
 tally Christian, rather than with those 
 Dissenters who oppose Christianity it- 
 self. To persons of this last character I 
 can give no political advice, till they 
 learn antecedently, to receive the religion 
 of Jesus itself, because till then, I can 
 apply no principles to their consciences, 
 which they will admit. 
 
 The happy government, under which 
 ■we live, has, for many years past, exhibit- 
 ,ed to the world a fine example of an ec- 
 
 is _ 
 
 should be known to approve the forms of 
 worship according to which they offici- 
 ate, and to believe the doctrines which 
 they are bound to inculcate. If some 
 persons will hypocritically profess them- 
 selves believers of what in their hearts 
 they think contrary to truth, the guilt of 
 such persons will lie at their own door in 
 this case exactly as in all others, where 
 men act insincerely for the sake of gain 
 or convenience. I'he true state of this 
 question is, whether an ecclesiastical es- 
 tablishment wisel)'^ constructed, has not 
 in its nature a tendency to propagate the 
 influence of Christianity, that is, to make 
 its doctrines known, and sincerely be- 
 lieved, and its precepts diligently prac- 
 tised among all ranks of people ; and not, 
 whether a sacred institution of this kind 
 is capable of being, now and then, abused 
 and perverted, or of becoming a snare 
 and temptation to an unfair mind. 
 
 I shall conclude this subject with briefly 
 taking notice of an objection, which, on 
 its first proposal, is apt to startle the best 
 wishers to religion, and the warmest ad- 
 vocates of ecclesiastical establishments. 
 Suppose the civil magistrates should hap- 
 pen to have formed an erroneous judg- 
 ment concerning the true religion ; will 
 he not in that case, according to our own 
 principle of general expediency, be justi- 
 fied in establishing a false one 1 I scruple 
 not to give a decisive negative to this 
 question, so far as it concerns those who 
 
CSXT. IV.] 
 
 ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 351 
 
 have had an opportunity of understanding 
 and receiving the revealed will of God. 
 For, the situation of such countries as 
 have never heard of Jesus Christ and his 
 Gospel, I do not here consider. The evi- 
 dences of the truth of Christianity are so 
 full and so clear, that, as we have re- 
 peatedly said, they cannot be rejected 
 without great wickedness of heart. No- 
 thing therefore can justify the civil ma- 
 gistrate in establishing a false religion. 
 Shall we restrain and punish by positive 
 laws the individual who propagates athe- 
 ism or infidelity, and at the same time 
 shall we approve the conduct of the ma- 
 gistrate, who erects and supports a na- 
 tional establishment of false religion, and 
 who, by his institutions, prolongs and 
 extends the mischief, much more than 
 any individual, unarmed with the autho- 
 rity of laws, could possibly do? Such a 
 magistrate may indeed plead his sincerity 
 and scruples of conscience; but we have 
 the authority of the word of God for as- 
 cribing his unbelief to gross negligence, 
 or willful blindness. There is then no 
 difficulty on this head : governors of states, 
 if they support a false religion, have rea- 
 son to expect the heavy judgments of 
 God. Let them consider the history of 
 Jeroboam and of his successors in the 
 kingdom of Israel. They all sinned, and 
 
 THEY ALL MADE ISRAEL TO SIN, IN PRO- 
 VOKING THE LORD GOD OF ISRAEL TO ANGER 
 
 WITH THEIR VANITIES, that is, witli their 
 establishment of false religion :* until 
 
 THE LORD REMOVED ISRAEL OUT OF HIS 
 SIGHT. I 
 
 A real difficulty, however, respecting 
 the OBEDIENCE of the subject may occur, 
 whenever it pleases God, for the punish- 
 ment of the sins of a nation, to permit a 
 false religion to be established and sup- 
 ported by the ruling powers. 
 
 It may then be asked, whether a true 
 believer of Christianity ought not to op- 
 pose the religious institutions of the coun- 
 try in which he lives, and to propagate 
 his own opinions 1 or whether he is to 
 submit to the civil magistrate, " to bow 
 down himself in the house of Rimmon,' 
 and to surrender that faith upon which he 
 depends for eternal salvation] 
 
 The general solution of these questions 
 must be derived from a due consideration 
 of the meaning of that apostolical maxim, 
 "We ought to obey God rather than 
 
 » 1 Kings, XTi. 13. t 2 Kings, xvii. 23. 
 
 men 
 ruption 
 
 "* If, therefore, through the cor 
 of human nature, the state will 
 not establish true Christianity, but a false 
 religion, I know no way to be pursued, 
 but that of the Apostle's, namely, for be- 
 lievers to propagate and to practise di- 
 vine truth, and to suffer patiently for the 
 truth's sake, according to the will of God. 
 For, on tire one hand, I find nothing in 
 Scripture to justify Christians in resisting 
 their governors by force, or in compelling 
 them to make new ordinances ; and, on 
 the other hand, to comply with Anti- 
 Christian institutions, would be to " sin 
 a great sin," as Jeroboam's subjects did.j 
 The middle line of conduct is pointed out 
 by our Saviour in that sentence, " When 
 they persecute you in this city, flee ye 
 
 into another.":;: 
 
 Several valuable miscellaneous articles 
 must now be attended to, before we dis- 
 miss the fourth century. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE PRIVATE LIFE AND THE WORKS 
 OF AMBROSE. 
 
 If we had the real life of this bishop 
 written by Paulinus of Nola, we might 
 make a profitable use of it. 
 But that, which goes under Ambrose 
 his name,§ is so stuffed with ^'^^' 
 fables, that I scarcely know A. D. 397. 
 how to quote it. Ambrose 
 died about the year 397, admired, regret-; 
 ted, and lamented by the whole Christian 
 world. His life not improbably had been 
 shortened by the incessant activity of his 
 mind, and by the multiplicity of his em- 
 ployments ; for he was only fifty-seven 
 years old, and had been appointed bishop 
 of Milan at the age of thirty-four. 
 
 His spirit was remarkably kind and 
 sympathetic ; his benevolence was ex- 
 tended to all, but especially those of the 
 household of faith. His estate, real and 
 personal, he bestowed on the poor, and 
 for the support of the church, styling the 
 poor his Stewarts and treasurers. [j His 
 labours were immense : he administered 
 the eucharist daily, and preached com- 
 monly on the Lord's day, frequently on 
 extraordinary occasions, and spent much 
 
 Kin 
 
 <JS,XV1I 
 
 21. 
 
 » Acts, V. 29. 
 
 + M:Ut. X. 2,3. 
 
 § (t is prefixed to the works of Ambrose. 
 
 11 Orat. in Aux. 
 
352 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XVIH. 
 
 time in teaching catechumens. His tem- 
 per was heroic and strong ; and no dignity 
 or authority could shelter offenders from 
 his episcopal rebukes, where he deemed 
 it his duty to reprehend. Augustine tells 
 us, that he found it, in a manner, impos- 
 sible to have access to him, because of 
 the multiplicity of his employments. The 
 time he could spare from pastoral and 
 charitable engagements was devoted to 
 study and meditation. 
 
 The moral writings of Ambrose contain 
 various things of solid utility; his Trea- 
 tise on Offices shines among these. It 
 was evidently his wish to imitate Tully, 
 and to show the superiority of Christian 
 over philosophical morals. A noble de- 
 sign, but, considered as a whole, feebly 
 executed, because conducted without a 
 plan. He modestly owns indeed, that he 
 was called to teach, before he himself 
 had learned. But he might have both 
 preached and written better, had he al- 
 ways attended to the simple word of 
 God, and exercised his own natural good 
 sense in humble dependence on divine 
 GRACE, and paid less regard to the fanci- 
 ful writings of Origen, which corrupted 
 his understanding exceedingly. Less of 
 this, however, appears in his moral than 
 in his theological pieces. 
 
 In his usual manner, which is senten- 
 tious, and full of quick turns, he dis- 
 courses strikingly of the excellent use of 
 taciturnity, and the difficulty of acquiring 
 it. " Most men speak, when they do not 
 know how to be silent. Seldom do you 
 see any one silent, when to speak is of 
 no profit. He is wise who knows when 
 to hold his peace. — Must we then be 
 dumb 1 No ; for there is a time to speak, 
 and a time to be silent. And if we must 
 give an account of every idle word, take 
 care lest you have to answer also for idle 
 silence. Tie your tongue, lest it be wan- 
 ton and luxuriant: keep it within the 
 banks ; a rapidly flowing river soon col- 
 lects mud."* 
 
 His ideas of decorum in behaviour and 
 carriage he illustrates by the account of 
 two persons of his own diocese. The 
 first was a friend of his own, who by 
 sedulous offices recommended himself to 
 Ambrose, in order to be admitted as a 
 clergyman into his bishopric. The only 
 reason why Ambrose refused, was be- 
 cause his gestures were light and inde- 
 cent. The other he found already a cler- 
 
 • C. 2 & 3. B. i. de Officiis. 
 
 gyman, and made this sole exception, 
 namely, of indecent levity, to his con- 
 duct. His judgment was verified in both. 
 The former, during the Arian persecution 
 at Milan, deserted the faith; the latter, 
 through the love of gain, denied himself 
 to be a priest of Ambrose's diocese, to 
 avoid judicial penalties. 
 
 His directions to his clergy would de- 
 serve to be made a part of an episcopal 
 charge in every age of the Church. "It 
 becomes," says he, "the prudence and 
 gravity of clergymen, to avoid the public 
 banquets frequently made for strangers: 
 you may exercise hospitality to them at 
 your own houses, and by this caution 
 there will be no room for reproach. En- 
 tertainments of this sort take up much 
 time, and also evidence a fondness for 
 feasting. Secular and voluptuous dis- 
 course is apt to creep in ; to shut your 
 ears is impossible; to forbid, will be look- 
 ed on as imperious. Why do you not 
 employ the time which is free from cleri- 
 cal employments in reading? Why do 
 you not revisit Christ, speak to Christ, 
 hear Christ] We speak to him, when 
 we pray ; we hear him, when we read the 
 divine oracles. What have we to do with 
 other men's houses 1 Let them rather 
 come to us, who want us. What have 
 we to do with idle chit-chat? We re- 
 ceived the ministry to attend on the 
 service of Christ, not to pay court to 
 
 men 
 
 "* 
 
 In his hook of Repentance, he remon- 
 strates with great justice against the in- 
 exorable spirit of the Novatians, in refus- 
 ing to re-admit penitents into the church. 
 " Learn of me," says Christ, "for I am 
 meek and lowly in heart." "I am un- 
 merciful," says the Novatian.f In the 
 same chapter, he bears testimony to the 
 immaculate conception of .Tesus, and to 
 the native depravity of mankind. " He 
 was not like the rest of us, born in the 
 ordinary way of generation, but born from 
 the Holy Ghost, and he received from the 
 virgin a spotless body, with no taint of 
 sin. For we are all born in sin, as David 
 witnesses; I was sha])cn in wickedness, 
 and in sin did my mother conceive me." 
 I only remind the reader here of the pre- 
 servation of two important truths in the 
 Church during the days of Ambrose. 
 
 Hear how humbly and evangelically 
 he speaks of himself.:!: " How shall I 
 
 * B. i. de Officiis, 20. + B. 
 ^ B. ii. de Poenitentia, c. 8. 
 
 c. 2. 
 
/ENT, 
 
 IV.] 
 
 WORKS OF AMBROSE. 
 
 353 
 
 hear thee say to me, He has loved much, 
 and is forgiven much? I confess my 
 debts were greater than those of the peni- 
 tent woman, and more was forgriven me, 
 who was called into the ministry from 
 the noise of the forum, and the terror of 
 judicial administration. Yet, if we can- 
 not equal her, the Lord Jesus knows how 
 to support the weak, and to bring with 
 himself the fountain of living water. He 
 came to the grave himself. Oh, that 
 thou wouldest come to this my sepulchre 
 of corruption. Lord Jesus, and wash me 
 with thy tears ! If thou weep for me, I 
 shall be saved. Thou shalt call me from 
 the grave of this body, and say, come 
 forth, that my thoughts may go forth to 
 Christ and call forth thy servant. _ Though 
 bound with the chains of my sins, I am 
 entangled hand and foot, and buried in 
 dead works ; on thy call I shall come f 3rth 
 free, and be found one of those who sit at 
 thy table. It shall be said, behold a man 
 taken from the midst of secular vanity, 
 remains in the priesthood not by his own 
 strength, but by the grace of Christ. 
 Preserve, Lord, thy own gift. I know 
 myself unworthy of the episcopal office, 
 because I had given myself to this world, 
 but, by tliy grace, I am what I am. The 
 least of all bishops : yet because I have 
 undertaken some labour for thy Church, 
 preserve this fruit, lest whom thou callest 
 to the ministry, when lost, thou shouldest 
 suffer to perish in that ministry: And 
 particularly, granting me the spirit of 
 sympathizing with sinners; that I may 
 not proudly chide, but mourn and weep; 
 that wliile I deplore another, I may mourn 
 over myself, saying, Tamar is more righ- 
 teous than I.* Perhaps a young person 
 may have sinned, deceived and hurried 
 on into folly; we old persons sin also. 
 The law of the tlesh rebels against the 
 law of our mind, even in us, whose duty 
 it is to teach. Tamar is more righteous 
 than I. We blame the avarice of another ; 
 let us remember whether our conduct has 
 been stained with the same vice, which 
 secretly dwells in our corrupt nature, and 
 let each say, Tamar is more righteous 
 than I. The same may be said with re- 
 spect to the vice of anger. This is the 
 way to avoid the severity of that just re- 
 buke of our Lord concerning the mote 
 
 and the beam. He who rejoices in 
 
 another's fall, rejoices in the devil's vic- 
 tory. Let us rather grieve, when we hear 
 
 * Gen. xxxviii. 
 2g2 
 
 that a man perishes for whom Christ died. 
 Let us repent, and hope for pardon by 
 faith, not as an act of justice: God wants 
 not our money, but our faith." 
 
 Should any, who calls himself a minis- 
 ter of Christ, however dignified, distin- 
 guished, or denominated, read these lines 
 of Ambrose, and catch a little of the ten- 
 derness, humility, and charity, which they 
 breathe, and conceive more highly and 
 more reverently of his office than he did 
 before, and be stirred up to a measure of 
 the same spirit, I shall rejoice that I have 
 not laid them belbre the reader in vain. 
 In truth, the ideas of the pastoral office 
 were in Ambrose exceedingly serious, 
 meek, lowly, and devotional. Have we 
 not, too generally, great occasion to be 
 humbled, on comparing ourselves with 
 this holy servant of God. 
 
 That good men, who see and feel the 
 evil of the world, should be tempted to 
 seek for solitude and retirement, is so na- 
 tural, that one does not wonder at the 
 growth of the monastic spirit. The true 
 security against it would have been, to 
 have attended more closely to the scrip- 
 tural rules of secular conduct given to 
 Christians, and to have exercised more 
 faith in those divine promises, which en- 
 gao-e to preserve the soul in the midst of 
 the world. Such an attention and exer- 
 cise would have led Christians into a far 
 nobler method of serving God, and letting 
 their light shine before men, than that 
 self-devised one, which many took, of re- 
 tiring altogether from society. Ambrose, 
 I have already observed, unhappily con- 
 tributed much to the growth oi^ this mo- 
 nastic taste ; yet the following quotation 
 shows, how serious and upright were his 
 views, and how deeply conscious he was 
 of the difficulties of the Christian life. " I 
 wish a cautious and earnest affection for 
 the things of God were as easy to be at- 
 tained, as it is easy to speak of it. But 
 the enticement of earthly lusts frequently 
 creeps in, and the diffusion of vanity fills 
 the mind. To avoid these snares is diffi- 
 cult, to be divested of them impossible. 
 In fine, that the thing is rather matter of 
 desire than effect, the prophet confesses, 
 in saying, ' Incline my heart to thy testi- 
 monies, and not to covetousness.' Our 
 heart is not in our own power ; our thoughts 
 by sudden incursions confound the mind, 
 and draw it a different way from what we 
 have determined. Who so happy as al- 
 ways to mount upwards in his heart? 
 How can this be done without divine aid ? 
 
354 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XYHI. 
 
 Blessed is the man whose strengtli is in 
 thee."* 
 
 He who feels so strongly the power of 
 that sin which dwelleth in uri,| needs 
 the light of grace to conduct him. Nor 
 was it wanting in Ambrose. In that age 
 of declension, not of apostasy from the 
 faith, the candlestick of Milan was pos- 
 sessed of as clear and steady a light, un- 
 der the ministration of her angel,:!: as any 
 at thai time in the Christian world. Hear 
 his summary view of the Gospel salva- 
 tion : " God therefore assumed flesh, that 
 he might abolish the curse of sinful flesh, 
 and was made a curse for us, that the 
 blessing might swallow up the curse; 
 and that righteousness, pardon, and life, 
 might swallow up our sin, our condemna- 
 tion, and our death. For he underwent 
 death, that the sentence might be fulfilled. 
 — Nothing is done in the Gospel against 
 the sentence of God, since the condition 
 of the divine sentence has been fulfilled. 
 
 We are dead with Christ: why 
 
 then do we seek any more the acts of this 
 life? For we carry about us the death of 
 Christ, that the life of Christ may also 
 be manifested in us. We live therefore 
 now, not our own life, but the life of 
 Christ, of all virtues. We are risen with 
 Christ, let us live in him, let us rise in 
 him, that the serpent may not be able to 
 find in earthly things our heel, which he 
 may wound." The reader, who is well 
 versed in St. Paul's epistles, will see how 
 the spirit of them was understood by Am- 
 brose. 
 
 The palm of heavenly-mindedness, in 
 which the primitive Christians so much 
 excelled, was still in the possession of 
 many in the fourth century. The last 
 chapter of Ambrose, on the benefit of 
 death, is remarkable in this light. Take 
 notice of a few sentences. 
 
 "We shall go to those who sit down 
 in the kingdom of God with Abraham, 
 Isaac, and Jacob, because, being asked 
 to the supper, they made no excuse. We 
 shall go, where there is a paradise of 
 pleasure ; where the wretched being, who 
 fell among thieves, no longer weeps over 
 ^ his wounds, where the thief himself re- 
 joices in the participation of the heavenly 
 kingdom, where there shall be no more 
 storms or vicissitudes, but the glory of 
 
 * Ps. 84. Ambrose de Fuga seculi, C. i. 
 f Rom. vii. 17. 
 
 t Rev. i. 20 ; " the angels of the seven 
 churches." 
 
 God alone shall shine. We shall go 
 where Jesus has prepared mansions for 
 his servants, that where he is, there we 
 
 may be also. The will of Christ is 
 
 the same as performance. That we may 
 know his true will, he hath said, Father, 
 I will that those whom thou hast given 
 me, be with me, where I am, that they 
 may behold my glory. W^e follow thee, 
 Lord Jesus, but draw us that we may 
 follow ; no one rises without thee ; open 
 to us thy good, which David desired to 
 see, when he said, I believe verily to 
 see the goodness of the Lord in the land 
 of the living. Show us that good, which 
 in its nature is unchangeable, and which, 
 when we arrive at heaven, we shall never 
 cease to acknowledge and approve. There 
 thy saints are freed from errors and anxie- 
 ties, from folly and ignorance, from fear 
 and terror, from all lusts and carnal af- 
 fections. Let us seek him, and embrace 
 his feet, and worship him, that he may 
 say to us, fear not, I am the remission of 
 sins, I am the light, I am the life: he 
 that Cometh to me shall not see death : — 
 because he is the fulness of divinity." 
 
 In his three books concerning the Holy 
 Ghost, he proves his Deity, partly by ex- 
 press testimony, such as, God is a spirit,* 
 the Lord is that spirit; but chiefly by 
 showing that whatever is said of the di- 
 vine properties and acts of the Father 
 and of the Son, is said also of the Holy 
 Ghost. 
 
 In comforting Faustinus, who mourned 
 for the death of a sister, he says, " If it 
 be said to the soul, thy strength shall be 
 renewed, like the eagle ; why]" should we 
 grieve 1 why should we groan for the dead, 
 when the reconciliation of the world with 
 God the Father is made by Jesus Christ ] 
 As we hold the benefits of Christ before 
 all men, and before you, we are ambassa- 
 dors for Christ, that you should know his 
 gifts to be without repentance ; that you 
 may believe as you have always done, 
 nor bring your faith into doubt by excess 
 of sorrow, because Jesus was made sin for 
 us, that he might take away the sin of the 
 world, and we might be made the righ- 
 teousness of God in him."^ 
 
 In another epistle he gives an excellent 
 view of spiritual illumination, and of 
 
 * John iv. 24. Il is remarkable what he ob- 
 serves of the fraud committed by the Arians 
 on tl)e sacred volume at Milan, in the time of 
 his predecessor Auxentius, namely, that they 
 erased this text out of St. Jolin's Gospel. 
 
 f Psalm ciii. 5. ^ Epis. 8. B. ii. 
 
Cb^tt. IV.] 
 
 PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 355 
 
 Christ dwelling in the heart :* of which [for the furtherance of their own wicked 
 suffice it to say, that he has the same designs. The same thing must, how- 
 views and sensations as holy men have ever, be said of his works, as those of 
 
 confessed in all times and circumstaU' 
 ces. 
 
 An epistolary address to clergymen de- 
 serves to be read by persons of this order 
 in all ages. " It is," says he, " a com- 
 mon temptation to the human mind, that 
 persons meeting with some slight offence 
 in the path of duty, are inclined to depart 
 from it. In a clergyman such conduct is 
 peculiarly lamentable. Satan labours by 
 this method, if he can by no other, to of- 
 fend them. What advantage is it to me 
 to remain in the pastoral office, to be la- 
 boriously employed and ill-treated, as if 
 I had no other way of getting my bread ? 
 What ! are woildly ends the governing 
 motive, and do you not mean to lay up 
 in store for the world to come ] Say 
 
 not of thy God, he is a hard master; say 
 not of thy office, it is unprofitable. The 
 devil envies thy hope. Depart not from 
 the Lord's inheritance, that he may at 
 length bid thee enter into his joy. Fare- 
 well, my sons, and serve the Lord ; for 
 he is a good Master." 
 
 His expositions of Scripture are liable 
 to great exceptions in point of accuracy, 
 perspicuity, and order. The fancies of 
 Origenism seduced him continually into 
 vague and arbitrary interpretations. Yet 
 is he true to the fundamentals of divine 
 truth, and a rich unction of godliness will 
 at all times afford to the reader that edifi- 
 cation which is in vain to be expected 
 from cold, but more faultless comments. 
 The doctrine of predestination and elec- 
 tion he evidently misunderstands ; this 
 part of divine truth had indeed scarcely 
 seen the light since the days of Justin 
 Martyr. On justification, he is more ex- 
 plicit, and sometimes uses the term in its 
 proper forensic sense. The fathers, in 
 these times, commonly confounded it with 
 sanctification, though, in substance, they 
 held the true doctrine concerning it. Am- 
 brose is perhaps more clear of mistake, in 
 this respect, than most of them. 
 
 Yet he appears to have given into the 
 same sort of superstitions concerning the 
 dead, which I remarked in the historian 
 Sulpitius Severus; nor is it to be denied, 
 that he helped forward the growth of mo- 
 nastic bondage and prelatical pride, by 
 giving occasion to others, who followed, 
 to make use of his well-meant positions. 
 
 many of the fathers, that great injustice 
 is done to his memory by frauds and in- 
 terpolations. In the dark times, every 
 error and absurdity seems to have come 
 forth with the pretended patronage of 
 some of the renowned doctors of antiquity. 
 In one or two instances alone, works have 
 been ascribed to him, which in clearness 
 of doctrine and excellence of composition, 
 exceed the magnitude of his abilities, and 
 I shall therefore defer the consideration 
 of them at present. 
 
 But the lover of godliness will be dis- 
 posed to forget his errors and supersti- 
 tions, faults of the times rather than of 
 his disposition, and will remember only 
 the fervent, the humble, the laborious, 
 and the charitable bishop of Milan. 
 
 • Epis. 11. B. iii 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL 
 AMONG barbarians; THE PROGRESS OF 
 NOVATIANISM, AND OF MONASTICISM. 
 
 I HAVE but little to say on each of these 
 articles, partly, because materials are 
 scanty, and partly because where they 
 are more plentiful, they are uninteresting. 
 Let us, however, collect from them, if 
 we can, an enlivening ray or two of the 
 Church of Christ. 
 
 The Saracens, the descendants of Ish- 
 mael, afterwards so ennobled, or rather 
 disgraced, by Mahomet the impostor, 
 were at war with the Romans, under the 
 conduct of their queen Maovia, who was 
 a Christian. The emperor Valens made 
 peace with her, one of the conditions of 
 which was, that Moses a monk, who 
 lived in the desert between Egypt and 
 Palestine, should be appointed bishop of 
 her nation. Valens ordered him to be 
 carried to Alexandria, there to be ordain- 
 ed by Lucius. Moses, who knew the 
 Arian character of the Metropoliiato, said 
 before him and the magistrates, and all 
 the people, Stay, I am not worthy to be 
 called a bishop ; but if I am called to this 
 office, unworthy as I am, for the good of 
 souls, I take the Creator of all things to 
 witness, that I will not receive the im- 
 position of your hands, which are defiled 
 with the blood of so many holy men. If 
 you know not my faith, replied Lucius, 
 [learn it from my mouth, and judge not by 
 
856 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIX. 
 
 reports. Moses, however, was aware 
 of the Arian subtilties, and chose to stand 
 by the evidence of works. I know your 
 faith, said he ; the pastors exiled among 
 infidels, condemned to the mines, thrown 
 to the wild beasts, or destroyed by fire, 
 testify your creed ; the eyes speak more 
 strongly than the ears.* 
 
 Political necessities sometimes restrain 
 the passions of wicked men. Lucius was 
 obliged to dissemble his resentment on 
 account of the situation of Valens his 
 master, and permit Moses to receive or- 
 dination from the exiled bishops. His 
 labours among the Saracens were crown- 
 ed with success. The nation before his 
 time was chiefly idolatrous : that his work 
 was blessed among them appears from 
 hence, that he kept them in peace with 
 he Romans. But this is all the account 
 we have of the fruits. 
 
 The Goths had long harassed the Ro- 
 man empire with their incursions; but 
 their depredations were made subservient 
 to the progress of the Gospel. I have 
 observed under the last century, that some 
 captive bishops laboured among them 
 with good success. And the work was 
 of an abiding nature. Ulfilas, who is 
 called the Apostle of the Goths, was de- 
 scended from some of these. He, coming 
 ambassador to Constantine, was ordained 
 first bishop of the Christian Goths by 
 Eusebius of Nicomedia. I have shown 
 from a passage in Theodoret, that the 
 Arians seem to have imposed upon him 
 by an ambiguity of terms, in consequence 
 of which he drew over his Goths to com- 
 municate with that sect. Certain it is, 
 that this people held the Nicene faith for 
 a considerable time, if we may credit 
 Augustine. In the time of Valens, many 
 of them suffered death from an idolatrous 
 persecuting prince of their own. Ulfilas 
 coming from his countrymen on an em 
 bassy lo Valens, that he might induce 
 him to allow them a settlement in Thrace, 
 was on that occasion brought over to 
 communicate with the Arians. That he 
 was a man of superior genius and endow- 
 ments, is certain. He civilized and po- 
 lished this barbarous people, and first 
 introduced the use of letters among them, 
 and translated the Scriptures into their 
 tongue for their use, omitting the books 
 of the Kings, because he thought it might 
 encourage the ferociousness of the Goths, 
 who were already too warlike. A copy 
 
 • Sozom. B, VI. c. 38. 
 
 of his version of the four Gospels is still 
 extant, a monument of the ancient Teu- 
 tonic language. It is with regret I leave 
 the account of this great man so imper- 
 fect, whose labours and success seem to 
 show, that the hand of the Lord must 
 have been with him. But, however in- 
 nocent he and his contemporaries might 
 be of the Arian heresy, the effect of their 
 communication with the party was what 
 might be foreseen. The whole church of 
 the Goths, by degrees at least, came into 
 Arianism, and the consequences will 
 meet us in the course of this history.* 
 
 Heresies multiplied in this century, 
 chiefly through the various ramifications 
 of Arianism, which have been explained 
 with more than sufficient accuracy by 
 many writers. Of the dissenters, the 
 Meletians continued throughout the cen- 
 tury. The Donatists still remained in all 
 their ferocity ; of whom it will be more 
 convenient to speak hereafter. The No- 
 vatians have found in the candid Socrates, 
 a historian who gives us some authentic 
 information, havingr himself been ac- 
 quainted with the son of one of their 
 presbyters. In Phrygia and Paphlagonia, 
 their church was in a flourishing state to 
 his day. The general church, though 
 surely right in its principle of opposition 
 to the particular point of Novatian inflex- 
 ibility, yet afterward abused the licence 
 of re-admission into the church granted 
 to offenders; and as discipline relaxed in 
 various places, all kinds of crimes abound- 
 ed. — The people of Phrygia and Pam- 
 phylia, being habitually an abstemious 
 people, averse 'to pleasures, and to the 
 indulgence of sensuality, were on that 
 account the more disposed to admit the 
 severities of Novatianism.j" In this cen- 
 tury, a part of them separated themselves 
 still farther from the general church, by 
 appointing in a synod, that Easter should 
 be observed at the same time that the 
 Jews kept the feast of unleavened bread. 
 But as Agelius the Novatian bishop of 
 Constantinople, and other more celebrat- 
 ed bishops of their denomination, were 
 not present, a schism was formed, from 
 this circumstance, among them. Agelius 
 presided forty years over their church at 
 Constantinople, and died in the sixth 
 year of Theodosius. When he was near 
 his end, he ordained Sisinnius to be his 
 successor, a presbyter of the church,:}: of 
 
 * Excei'pt. Philostorgii apud Photium. 
 t Soc. B. IV. c. 28. I Soc. B. V. c. 21. 
 
Cent. IV.] 
 
 NOVATIANISM. 
 
 357 
 
 great learning, who had heen instructed 
 by Maximus, the famous friend of Julian. 
 The flock of Agelius murmured, because 
 he had not ordained Marcian, a man of 
 eminent piety, by whose means they had 
 weathered, in safety, the persecution of 
 Valens. The aged bishop, willing to 
 pacify them, ordained Marcian, and di- 
 rected that he should be his immediate 
 successor, and that Sisinnius should be 
 the next bishop to Marcian. 
 
 Thus slender and scanty are the ac- 
 counts left us of a bishop, who for so 
 many years presided over a great flock in 
 turbulent and trying times. On Marcian's 
 succession, one Sabbatius, a Jew, re- 
 ceiving Christianity, was advanced by 
 him to the office of presbyter, and in his 
 heart panted after a bishopric. This man 
 undertook to defend the innovation con- 
 cerning Easter, which has been mention- 
 ed ; and first, under pretence of greater 
 strictness of life, he withdrew himself 
 from the church, declaring that he could 
 not conscientiously communicate with 
 some members of the congregation. 
 
 In time, however, his views were laid 
 open, as he attempted to hold separate 
 assemblies. Marcian then found his error 
 in ordaining so ambitious a person, and 
 
 often said in his grief, that he wished he 
 had laid hands on thorns rather than on 
 Sabbatius. He took measures, however, 
 to disappoint his ambition. Calling a 
 council, he sent for Sabbatius, and desir- 
 ed him to lay open the reasons of his dis- 
 gust. The man informed them, that the 
 difference of opinion concerning Easter 
 was his grievance, as he thought that fes- 
 tival ought to be observed according to 
 the rule of the synod of Paza. The 
 bishops, suspecting his designs, obliged 
 him to swear, that he would not attempt 
 to become a bishop, and then decreed, 
 that the time of observing Easter should 
 be left indifferent, and that no schism 
 should be made in the church on that ac- 
 count. Their design of preserving unity 
 was laudable ; but it succeeded not. 
 Sabbatius drew over a number of the 
 simpler sort, and particularly those of 
 Phrygia and Galatia, to his own Jewish 
 mode, and got himself appointerl bishop 
 of his followers, in contradiction to his 
 oath. The consequence was, a variety 
 of divisions among the Novatians, con- 
 cerning the time of Easter, and other 
 frivolous subjects, and the crumbling of 
 this church into contentious parties of dif- 
 ferent kinds. 
 
 Little can be said on this subject, but 
 what must occur to the mind of a think- 
 ing reader. This most respectable of all 
 the dissenting churches seems to have 
 preserved, for a considerable time, a 
 strictness and purity of discipline and 
 manners ; but its essential characteristic 
 of narrow bigotry, in things of no mo- 
 ment, gave occasion to internal divisions 
 among its own members, which, foment- 
 ed by unprincipled persons, must have 
 perverted them much from the simplicity 
 of the Gospel. 
 
 Monasticism continued to make a rapid 
 progress through this whole century. It 
 is not worth while to trace its progress 
 particularly, nor to recite any of the ridi- 
 culous frauds, abuses and superstitions, 
 which are connected with it. Self-righ- 
 teous formality made rapid strides in the 
 Christian world; one single observation, 
 however, of an author, who has recorded 
 much of this traskwith great complacen- 
 cy, will deserve to be transcribed. " Most 
 of these famous monks," says Sozomen, 
 " lived to extreme old age ; and I think 
 that this was a mean of facilitating the pro- 
 gress of Christianity. Antioch excepted, 
 Syria was very late in receiving the Gos- 
 pel, and these monks were highly instru- 
 mental in the work, both in that country, 
 and among the Persians, and Saracens." 
 That these countries, which were before, 
 for the most part, void of the doctrine of 
 Christ, might receive spiritual advantage 
 from these superstitious men, is probable, 
 because some genuine piety was doubt- 
 less among them. That Galatia and 
 Cappadocia, which had long before been 
 full of the best Christians, should do so, 
 I very much doubt.* Superstition, draw- 
 ing with it something of real Christianity, 
 may bring a blessing to countries alto- 
 gether profane or idolatrous ; — to a people 
 already well evangelized, it can only act 
 as a poison. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 CHRISTIAN AUTHORS IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 There were several persons of the 
 name of Macarius, who lived much 
 about the same time. Hence it is as 
 difficult as it would be uninteresting to 
 
 • Sozomen, B. VI. c 34. 
 
358 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XX. 
 
 Macarius. 
 
 determine to which of them 
 the fifty homilies yet extant 
 belong. Their antiquity is doubtless great, 
 and they give no small specimen of the 
 divinity of the times. These are a few 
 of the favourite thoughts of Macarius : 
 
 " Though a man be improved in virtue, 
 he ought to look on himself as one who 
 has done nothing, and should press for- 
 ward to greater degrees, lest he lose the 
 Holy Spirit by pride or sloth. — Man is 
 capable of falling from that state of holi- 
 ness in which he is, unless he preserve 
 himself in it by humility, which is the 
 infallible mark of a Christian. — Those 
 who have not yet received grace, ought 
 to do o-ood and forsake evil by natural 
 motives ; but those who have received it, 
 being possessed of love, need not such 
 motives." — He thinks, that men may fall 
 away after the highest attainments, and 
 that it is impossible for any to be certain of 
 his salvation in this life. He observes, 
 that to grow in grace without humility 
 is impossible; that the soul after death 
 goes immediately to that place, on which 
 its love was fixed in this life ; that what- 
 ever good a man does by natural strength, 
 can never save him without the grace of 
 Jesus Christ; that if the Holy vSpirit 
 does not produce in us the love of God, 
 we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. 
 He is fond of showing, that we ought 
 always so to labour, as if all depended 
 on our own endeavours, and yet to ac- 
 knowledge that we can do nothing with- 
 out God.* 
 
 Certainly a serious and humble spirit 
 runs through these homilies, and they 
 seem to have been written by a man earn- 
 estly engaged in the divine life, and sen- 
 sible of the need of divine grace. With 
 such dim kind of light many humble 
 souls, in the dark ages, groped in their 
 way safe to the heavenly kingdom, though, 
 like Macarius, poorly furnished with 
 evangelical views and doctrines. These 
 men saw and felt, however, the necessity 
 of conversion, and the importance of a 
 principle of divine love; and hence their 
 obscure light deserves to be called mid- 
 day, compared with the darkness of 
 those, who put mere natural Jiglit in the 
 room of the illumination of the Holy 
 Ghost, and mere moral virtue in the room 
 of divine charity. 
 
 Victorinus of Africa had professed rhe- 
 toric many years at Rome, and was held 
 
 in such high reputation, that a public 
 statue was erected to his ho- ,,. . • .,. 
 nour in the city. In his old 
 age, however, he was converted, and was 
 not ashamed to confess the faith of Christ 
 in public. An animated and instructive 
 account of this is given by Augustine in 
 his Confessions, which may meet us 
 hereafter. At present, we are to view 
 him as an author. He wrote against the 
 Arians and the Manichees. In his trea- 
 tise against the latter, he addresses his 
 friend Justinus, who had been deceived 
 by them, in this manner : " In vain do 
 you macerate yourself with excessive 
 mortifications ; for after you have worn 
 away yourself by your austerities, your 
 flesh will return to the devil in darkness. 
 I advise you to acknowledge, that God 
 Almighty created you, that you may be 
 truly the temple of God, according to the 
 words of the Apostle, ' you are the tem- 
 ple of God, and his Spirit dwelleth in 
 you.' If you have not the honour to be 
 the temple of God, and to receive the 
 Holy Spirit in you, Jesus Christ is come, 
 not to save, but to destroy you."* 
 
 The spirit of godliness, unquestionably, 
 possessed this man ; but his writings are, 
 at present at least, very little interesting, 
 though the passage I have quoted shows 
 his holy taste. It were to be wished, 
 that instead of subtilizing intricate con- 
 troversies, he had favoured posterity with 
 a plain view of the Lord's dealings with 
 his own soul, which must, in a conver- 
 sion so extraordinary as his, have been 
 very instructive, and for the execution of 
 which he must have been far more com- 
 petent than for the invention or descrip- 
 tion of theological theories. But the hu- 
 mour of philosophical refinement guided 
 far too much the best writers of these 
 times, even such as Victorinus, who, be- 
 ing converted in his old age, was proba- 
 bly, never well qualified to expound the 
 Scriptures. If the reader regret how lit- 
 tle of experimental divinity is laid be- 
 fore him, I join with his complaint: but 
 my materials suffer me not to apply a 
 remedy. 
 
 Pacianus, bishop of Barcelona in Spain, 
 was a man renowned both for piety and 
 eloquence. Like most of this age, he 
 exalts too much the forms of 
 the church, and the dignity 
 of the priesthood. Yet a strain of holy- 
 fervour seems to pervade his writings, 
 
 • Du Pin, Cent. IV. Macarii. 
 
 Pacianus. 
 
 '■ Du Pin, Cent. IV. Victorinus. 
 
c«>-T. rv.] 
 
 OPTATUS— THE APOLLINARII. 
 
 359 
 
 nnd he combats the peculiar error of in- 
 flexible severity in the Novatians with 
 just argument and charitable sentiments. 
 "If man be subject to these miseries (of 
 sinning away his privileges) lot us no 
 more accuse the mercy of God, who has 
 proposed these remedies to our diseases ; 
 let us no more efface the titles of God's 
 clemency by an insupportable rigour, 
 nor hinder sinners, by an inflexible hard- 
 ness, from rejoicing in those gifts which 
 God has bestowed upon them."* 
 
 This is doubtless right; but when he 
 excludes the Novatians from any part in 
 the blessings of tl»e church, because of 
 their schisms, he doubtless falls into un- 
 charitable bigotry, in which both church- 
 men and dissenters too much abound- 
 ed ; though, I apprehend, in obscure re- 
 gions this evil more prevailed. We have 
 seen, in what Christian charity the gene- 
 ral church and Novatians could live in 
 the great city of Constantinople. 
 
 Optatus, bishop of Melevi in Nuniidia, 
 deserves a place in these memoirs, on ac- 
 count of his judicious and able treatise 
 against the Donatists. Of 
 him, as of many other sensi 
 ble writers, it is to be re- 
 gretted, that he did not 
 choose a more useful subject 
 The case of the Donatists 1 
 shall reserve to the time of Augustine, 
 whose character and conduct are much 
 connected with the history of these dis- 
 senters. Of course, I have little to say 
 of Optatus's writings. A serious spirit 
 appears in them ; and a single passage, 
 which is introduced, in the way of di- 
 gression, contains matter so truly Chris- 
 tian, that the reader will ihink it worth 
 our attention; as it demonstrates, that 
 evangelical truth was far from being lost 
 as yet amidst the thick mists of supersti- 
 tion, and that the true resting-place of 
 the soul in the doctrine of justification 
 by Jesus Christ, the true humility, and 
 real plan of sanctification were understood, 
 in some degree at least, by this author. 
 Rebuking the pride of the Donatists, who 
 boasted themselves to be holy and inno- 
 cent, he says, " Whence comes this sanc- 
 tity of yours, which the Apostle St. John 
 dared not attribute to himself, seeing he 
 says. If we say that we have no sin, we 
 deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in 
 us. He who speaks after this manner, 
 
 WISELY REFERS HIMSELF TO THE MERCY 
 
 Optatus 
 •writes 
 against the 
 Donatists, 
 
 A. D. 370. 
 
 • Du Pin, Cent. IV. Pacianus. 
 
 OF God ; for a Christian may desire good, 
 and endeavour to walk in the way of sal- 
 vation ; but he cannot be perfect of him- 
 self. For though he does run, yet there 
 will always remain something to be done 
 by God, to perfect him; .and it is neces- 
 sary that God should help a man in his 
 weakness ; for He is perfection, and there 
 never was any but Jesus Christ the Son 
 of God, who was perfect. All other men 
 are imperfect. It belongs to us, to will 
 and to run, but God only can n- i. ♦ 
 give periection. Jesus Clirist ^ jj ggQ 
 has not given us perfect holi- 
 ness, but has only promised it.* 
 
 The ApoUinarii, father and son, were 
 of Laodicea; the father a presbyter, the 
 son a reader in the Church. Both were 
 skilled in Greek literature; 
 the father taught grammar, ^P??''" 
 the son rhetoric. Epiphanius, 
 a sophist, was united with them in the 
 closest intimacy. Theodotus, bishop of 
 Laodicea, very properly fearing that the 
 connexion with a Pao-an mio^ht endangfer 
 their souls, advised them to give up his 
 acquaintance. They despised the advice, 
 and persisted. George, the successor of 
 Theodotus, afterward attempting in vain 
 the same thing, expelled them at length 
 from Christian communion. Incensed at 
 this, they set up a new sect, known by 
 the name of the ApoUinarian heresy, the 
 principal mark of which is, that it ascer- 
 tains precisely one point of the Arian 
 creed, by denying to our Saviour a hu- 
 man soul, and supposing the inferior di- 
 vine nature, which he had from the Father, 
 to supply its place. f 
 
 These men were doubtless persons of 
 superior capacity. The son, particularly, 
 was one of the greatest men of his time, 
 in learning, genius, and powers of argu- 
 ment. His answer to Porphyry is looked 
 on as the best defence of Christianity 
 against\ Paganism. He it was, who, in 
 Julian's time, endeavoured to compensate 
 to the Christian world the loss of the 
 classical authors, from the study of whom 
 they were debarred by the persecution of 
 that emperor. He wrote poems and dia- 
 logues, in imitation of Sophocles and 
 Plato, on scriptural subjects. His trans- 
 lation of the Psalms into Greek verse, 
 which remains to this day, is highly com- 
 mended. :J: 
 
 * Du Pin, Cent. IV. Optatus. 
 t Socrates, B. II. c. 46. 
 \ Du Pin. 
 
360 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XX. 
 
 What was wanting in these men? 
 Humility. There have been persons in 
 later times, like them, of good moral cha- 
 racter, learned, acute, industrious, far sur- 
 passing many real saints, in capacity, 
 and in usefulness too, so far as the ex- 
 ternals of religion are concerned. Pride 
 and self-confidence lead such men to 
 speculate, where they ought to adore; to 
 dispute, where they ought to pray ; and 
 to blaspheme, where they ought to sub- 
 mit. They treat with scorn the charita- 
 ble admonitions of their pastors and god- 
 ly friends, because they know languages 
 and sciences better than their reprovers. 
 Strangers to themselves, and to the whole 
 work of the Holy Spirit on the heart, and 
 resisting all his godly motions, they can- 
 not come to Christ, because they are un- 
 willing to descend from their prodigious 
 altitude into the valley of humiliation. 
 Ambition in them must be fed; disap- 
 pointed in the Church of Christ, they in- 
 vent corrupt refinements, and seek to be- 
 come heads of a party. He who knows 
 that God taketh the wise in their crafti- 
 ness, and revealeth himself to babes, will 
 not stumble at such cases ; and those few 
 in all ages who stand superior to the rest 
 of mankind in talents, and yet love genu- 
 ine godliness, are only secured and hedged 
 in by the Divine goodness, through a 
 charitable course of discipline, often more 
 severe than is needful for other Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 Didymus of Alexandria may be fairly 
 
 matched with Apollinarius, in greatness 
 
 of understanding and accomplishments. 
 
 -,., Though he lost his sight at 
 
 Didymus. ^^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^, 
 
 came so vigorous and successful a stu- 
 dent, that he was renowned for his skill 
 in philosophy, rhetoric and geometry. 
 He filled the chair of the famous school 
 of Alexandria with vast applause. Ori- 
 genism was his favourite system, though, 
 as far as appears, he continued always 
 sound, and I hope, humble and holy, in 
 Christian doctrine. His treatise on the 
 Holy Spirit, of which only the Latin 
 translation by Jerome has come down to 
 us, is perhaps the best the Christian 
 world ever saw on the subject. And 
 whatever has been said, since that time, 
 in defence of the divinity and personality 
 of the Holy Ghost, seems, in substance, 
 to be found in that book. 
 
 Gregory Nyssen, brother of the famous 
 Basil, was the bishop of Nyssa, a city of 
 Cappadocia. Basil, and two of his bro- 
 
 Gregory 
 
 Nyssen 
 
 banished 
 
 Restored 
 in 378. 
 Died in 
 
 379. 
 
 thers, embraced a solitary life ; 
 but Gregory married, and 
 lived in society. Under Va- 
 lens, he was faithful, and had in 
 the honour to be expelled from A. D. 374. 
 his church. In the year 378, 
 he was restored. He died to- 
 ward the end of the century. 
 In a catechetical discourse, 
 he shows a sound judgment, 
 in laying down diflferent rules of argu- 
 mentation with Pagans, Jews, and He- 
 retics. To defend the incarnation of God, 
 he shows that man is fallen, and corrupt- 
 ed, and can be recovered only by his 
 Creator ; and hence, that the Word who 
 created him, came himself to raise him 
 again. He shows also, that to be born 
 of a virgin, to eat, to drink, to die, and to 
 be buried, are not things unbecoming the 
 holy nature of God, because there is no 
 sin in them; and that the Divinity, united 
 to man, lost not its perfections, any more 
 than the soul loses its properties by its 
 union with the body. 
 
 Once visiting Jerusalem, he was hos- 
 pitably received by three religious ladies 
 of note there, Eustathia, Ambrosia, and 
 Basilissa, and contemplated with delight 
 the scenes of our Lord's abode on earth. 
 But he tells us, that he found there little 
 of true religion, and returned sorrowful to 
 Antioch, whence he wrote to the three 
 ladies, and cautioned them against being 
 imposed on by those, who desired to 
 make a prey of them. Being asked by a 
 friend, whether it was an essential part of 
 religion to make a pilgrimage to Jerusa- 
 lem, he answered in the negative, and 
 that a man had more reason to expect the 
 Spirit of God in Cappadocia, where true 
 piety prevailed, than at Jerusalem, where, 
 it seems, religion was run to a very low 
 ebb. Thus much for Gregory Nyssen, 
 whose piety at least deserves our regard, 
 though as an author, he is in no very 
 higrh estimation.* 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 EPHRAIM THE SYRIAN. 
 
 Some other persons, who lived in this 
 century, will, on several accounts, de- 
 serve a more distinct attention. I shall 
 begin with Ephraim the Syrian, who was 
 born at Nisibis in Mesopotamia, of Chris- 
 
 * Du Pin. Cave. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 EPHRAIM THE SYRIAN. 
 
 361 
 
 tian parents, and was educated with great 
 care from his infancy. His turn of mind 
 from childhood was devout, studious, and 
 contemplative, to an extreme degree 
 And since few persons in that aje knew 
 how to unite the real Christian life with 
 the practice of all the duties of societj', it 
 is not ro be wondered at, that the solitary 
 taste prevailed much in Ephraim. It is 
 rather a proof of uncommon good sense 
 or charity, or c,f both, that at length he 
 could be induced to quit his solitude,* 
 and live in the great city of Edessa, for 
 the sake of enjoying the benefit of Chris 
 tian assemblies, and of rendering himself 
 useful to his fellow-creatures. He wrote 
 much on the Scriptures, and composed 
 various devotional pieces in the Syriac, 
 his native tono-ue : which in his own life- 
 time were translated into Greek, and were 
 much admired by all the eastern churches. 
 He never was advanced further in the ec- 
 clesiastical state, than to the office of 
 deacon, and once he took a very extraor- 
 dinary method to avoid bein^ preferred 
 to the office of a bishop. He feigned 
 madness; and escaped. The reader will 
 recollect something similar in the con- 
 duct of Ambrose, and may take occasion 
 to lament the unhappy extremes of oppo- 
 site kinds, which, in different ages, have 
 disfigured the Church. In Ephraim's 
 days, the pastoral character appeared to 
 good men awful beyond measure, requir- 
 ing little less than angrelical virtue. In 
 our days, is not conveniency and love of 
 gain frequently the principal motive, and 
 decency of character the principal quali- 
 fication ■? 
 
 A noted heretic, named Harmonius, 
 the son of Bardesanes, industriously em- 
 ployed himself in composing religious 
 h3'mns for the use of the Syrians, in 
 which he interspersed his father's hereti- 
 cal notions, and the philosophy of the 
 Greeks. Ephraim, whose views of the 
 fundamentals of Christian faith were 
 strictly sound, and to whom the faith of 
 the Gospel was precious, made himself 
 master of the measures and tunes, and, 
 in the use of them, composed Christian 
 hymns, which were well received by the 
 Syrians, and sung to the same tunes as 
 those of Harmonius. He wrote also a 
 discourse on the utility of psalmody, and 
 exploded idle songs and dancing. Let 
 this be regarded as a proof of his zeal and 
 industry. Not long before his death, he 
 
 • Sozom. B. in. c. 16. 
 Vol. I. 2 H 
 
 gave an instance of charity that deserves 
 to be recorded. A severe famine raged 
 in Edessa, and many indigent persons 
 died for wauit. He waited some time, to 
 see if any would step forth to relieve 
 them ;* but finding little appearance of 
 this, the compassion of his heart at length 
 broke through all the unhappy monastic 
 restraints, by which, even in Edessa, he 
 had precluded himself from doing much 
 good to the Church; and going among 
 the rich and wealthy, he vehemently re- 
 proved their inhumanity. They did, what 
 persons of the same character do in all 
 ages ; they cleared themselves of avarice, 
 but excused themselves, on account of 
 the difficulty of finding a proper person, 
 whose discretion and fidelity might be 
 trusted in the distribution of their alms. 
 Do you think me competent to this office 1 
 replied Ephraim. All owned it without 
 hesitation. "Then I will undertake it." 
 Receiving their contributions, he caused 
 three hundred beds to be brought into the 
 public cloisters of the city, and the infirm 
 to be placed on them, and he furnished 
 them both with food and medicine. He 
 took care also of strangers, and of those 
 whom want had driven out of the coun- 
 try, and provided them all with necessa- 
 ry accommodations, till the dearth was 
 abated. 
 
 How much is it to be regretted, that 
 mistaken ideas of piety, into which young 
 converts are very apt to fall, should have 
 deprived the Christian world of so much 
 benefit, as might have arisen from the 
 talents and virtues of Ephraim ! In this 
 occasional sally, we see the outlines of 
 A GENERAL INFIRMARY, drawn and brought 
 into practice by a monk ! That men, who 
 mix with the world continually, should 
 be covetous and selfish, will surprise no 
 man who knows human depravity. And 
 what advantage did Satan gain, in these 
 times, when the best and most excellent 
 men hid themselves from the world, and 
 as much as possible attended only to the 
 cultivation of private virtues ! A strong 
 proof, this, of the low and reduced state 
 of Christian knowledge. And as I know 
 nothing more worth recording of the lifs 
 of Ephraim, let us take a short view of 
 his writings, in order to discover, if we 
 can, the spirit of his religion. If I mis- 
 take not, we may see by a few quotations, 
 which will serve instead of many in a cas« 
 where the character is exceedingly uni- 
 
 ■ ■■■-—- I — — ■ ■ I — 
 
 • Sozom. B.IILc. 16. 
 
362 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XXI. 
 
 form, that his Christian love was much 
 greater than his light, and that few men 
 were better furnished and prepared for 
 the very best use of evangelical consola- 
 tion, if the theology of his time had af- 
 forded him easy access to it. 
 
 Speaking of love, he says, " Blessed 
 is the man who possesses love, and with 
 it departs to God; for He, knowing his 
 own, will receive him into his bosom ; he 
 shall be a companion of angels, and reign 
 with Christ. By love, God the Word 
 came upon earth ; by it, paradise has 
 been opened to us, and an entrance has 
 been shown to all into heaven. Being 
 enemies to God, by love we were recon- 
 ciled. We may justly say, that God is 
 love, and he that dwelleth in love, dwell- 
 eth in God."* 
 
 Hear him mourn over himself, and 
 judge what a sense he had of natural de- 
 pravity. " From my childhood I have 
 been a vessel unprofitable and dishonour- 
 able. Warning others, I have fallen my- 
 self into their evils, twofold. Wo is me ! 
 — whence can there be any refuge, unless 
 the mercies of God shine quickly upon 
 me. Nor is there any hope of salvation 
 from works : While I speak of purity, I 
 am thinking of uncleanness : While I am 
 uttering rules for the conquest of the pas- 
 sions, my own are inwardly raging night 
 and day. What excuse can 1 make ■? 
 Alas ! what a scrutiny must I undergo "? 
 I have had the form without the power of 
 godliness. I fear, lest fire from heaven 
 should consume me, as it did the two sons 
 of Aaron. Shall I then despair of salva- 
 tion ■? By no means : this the adversary 
 desires, in order to destroy me. I do not 
 throw away myself; for I confide in the 
 mercies of God, and your prayers for me. 
 — I pray thee, cast me not away. Thou 
 knowest the wounds of my soul ; heal 
 me, O Lord, and 1 shall be healed. — 
 What shame will seize me, when those, 
 who now count me holy, shall see me 
 condemned, and when all secrets shall be 
 laid open!"f 
 
 However defective his views of evan- 
 gelical doctrine were, his ideas of that 
 humility, which enters into the essence 
 of the experience of them, are just and 
 deep. " Vain," says he, " is every en- 
 dowment without humility. Pride la- 
 bours to domineer over all, and lays a 
 snare for every one in that way which is 
 peculiar to each. The wise, the strong, 
 
 * Ephraim's Works. Oxon. f I^. 
 
 the beautiful, the ingenious, are each ex- 
 posed to danger from that in which they 
 excel. The Lord, knowing our danger, 
 hath set humility as our guard, saying, 
 ' When ye have done all, say we are un- 
 profitable servants.' Do those who la- 
 bour abundantly in the ministry glory 
 over those of a more still and quiet turn; 
 behold, the Lord commends Mary sitting 
 at his feet, as having chosen the good por- 
 tion. Are the sedate inclined to glory 
 over the active ; behold the Son of man 
 came to minister. — To be lifted up, is to 
 have a fleshly mind ; and if ye live after 
 the flesh, ye shall die. — When thou canst 
 bear grievous things, against thy will, 
 yet willingly, know that thou hast made 
 proficiency in humility. — Through pride, 
 the Pharisee was condemned ; through 
 humility, the Publican was exalted ; with 
 whom may the Lord deign to rank us in 
 his kingdom with all the just."* 
 
 Observe how divinely he exhorts, 
 though his manner of speaking evinces 
 his ignorance of the true distinction be- 
 tween moral and natural inability : " He 
 might have healed all the wounds of our 
 souls, and compelled us violently to good- 
 ness ; but he does not choose that method, 
 that our choice may have its praise. Do 
 we neglect to call for his help, when 
 he loves and pities us 1 Hath he redeem- 
 ed and enlightened us 1 He hath given 
 us to see and taste of his grace ; that we 
 might seek him without ceasing. Happy 
 he, who hath tasted of his love, and pre- 
 pared himself to be always filled with it. 
 Filled with this love, he admits no other. 
 Who would not love such a master, wor- 
 ship him, and confess his goodness 1 — 
 From his immense height and the blessed 
 bosom of the Father did he not descend 
 to US'? The Invisible became visible — 
 O wonder, full of fear and trembling! A' 
 hand of clay, formed of the dust, smote 
 the Creator of heaven and earth ; and we, 
 poor dust and ashes, cannot bear the con- 
 tradiction of a word — What wilt thou say 
 to Him in that day ^'f 
 
 Speaking of the day of Judgment, he 
 says, " An innumerable multitude, each 
 raised from the dead, and clothed with 
 his own body, exclaim, ' Glory to Him 
 who hath raised us and gathered us to- 
 gether by his loving kindness.' Blessed 
 is he who shall be counted worthy to see 
 that hour, in which all that loved the im- 
 mortal Bridegroom are taken up into the 
 
 * Ephraim's Works. 
 
 t Id. Ay. 
 
Cext. IV.] 
 
 EPHRAIM THE SYRIAN. 
 
 363 
 
 clouds to meet him. — I remembered the 
 day, and trembled, and, groaning, wept till 
 I had no more power to weep. — My days 
 have passed on, and my initpiities have 
 been multiplied. Wo is me, my beloved ! 
 What shall I do in the shame of that 
 hour, when my friends, who now see and 
 bless me in this orarb of piety, may be- 
 hold me full of iniquity within 1 O gra- 
 cious Lover of souls ! by thy compassions 
 I conjure thee, place me not at the left 
 hand with the goats ; but by thy kindness, 
 I implore thee, give me a contrite spirit, 
 and purify me, that I may be a temple of 
 thy grace. Sinner as I am, I knock at 
 thy door without ceasing ; slothful though 
 I be, yet I walk in thy way." 
 
 Will the reader hear the devotion of 
 this broken-hearted saint ]* " I beseech 
 thy goodness, heal my wounds, and en- 
 lighten my understanding, that I may see 
 thy gracious disposition towards me. 
 When my heart is infatuated, let the salt 
 of thy grace season it. — Thou alone know- 
 est, how my soul thirsts after thee, as a 
 dry land. — As thou hast ever heard me, 
 neglect not now my petition : my mind is 
 as a captive, yet seeking thee, the only 
 true Saviour. Send thy grace, that I may 
 eat and drink, and be satisfied. — Distil 
 one drop of thy love, that it may burn as 
 liquid fire in my soul, and consume its 
 thorns, even evil lusts. "| 
 
 Were I to quote the very strong de- 
 scription which he gives of his own sin- 
 fulness, persons unacquainted with the 
 power of in-dwelling sin might suspect 
 that this man, who was remarkably strict 
 and circumspect in his manners from 
 youth, must have been a man of gross 
 wickedness. For similar reasons, St. 
 Paul, on account of the strong descrip- 
 tion of his internal corruptions, in the 
 seventh chapter to the Romans, has been 
 thought to have been speaking only of 
 his life before conversion, though he evi- 
 dently speaks of himself at the time of 
 WTiting. It was deep humility of soul, 
 and a large acquaintance with the pro- 
 pensity of the natural heart itself, which 
 led both of them to describe themselves 
 as so very evil. The difference is, that 
 Ephraim's inferior knowledge of gospel- 
 grace, prevented his attainment of that 
 strength and joy, in which the Apostle 
 abounded. Yet his faith, clouded as the 
 grounds of it were, was sound. " I know 
 that the multitude of his mercies exceeds 
 
 ihe multitude of my sins. — In baptism he 
 hath given me remission of sins ; yet I need 
 to be healed of sins committed after bap- 
 tism; but he who raised the dead is able 
 ^o heal me also." Is not this the very 
 frame of an humbled soul, bowed dowa 
 with in-dwelling corruption] "I desire 
 to rise, but cannot ; the weight of sin 
 presses me down. I see, but I walk in 
 much darkness. I move my hand, but 
 I am as a paralytic." 
 
 In his last will and testament, his hu- 
 mility appears mixed with superstition 
 and dejection of spirit. A mind like his, 
 truly sensible of sin, and not fully and 
 steadily discerning the Lord Jesus, its 
 only righteousness, will flee to vain re- 
 fuges. Thus E phraim has some recourse 
 to prayers and offerings to be made for 
 him after his decease. The value of 
 clear Christian light hence appears inex- 
 pressible.* 
 
 His reverence towards the blessed God 
 appears in a book which he wrote against 
 those, who would pretend to search out 
 the nature of the Son of God. In the 
 second chapterf he says, " Unhappy, 
 miserable, and most impudent is he, who 
 desires to search out his Maker. Innu- 
 merable myriads of angels glorify with 
 reverence, and trembling adore : while 
 men of clay, full of sins, dispute with- 
 out fear, concernmg the Divinity. Their 
 body trembles not, their mind is not dis- 
 concerted ; but, secure and loquacious, 
 they speak of Christ the Son of God, 
 who suffered for me an unworthy sinner, 
 and of his two-fold generation : nor do 
 they feel how blind they are in the light." 
 The remarks which might be made on 
 this holy man have been anticipated, for 
 the most part. Undoubtedly the best 
 state of Christianity is that of a saint, 
 humbled under a sense of sin all his days, 
 yet rejoicing in Christ Jesus, and bring- 
 ing forth fruit with charity and patience. 
 This requires an evangelical knowledge, 
 both of the Law and of the Gospel. And 
 an experimental acquaintance with this 
 science is generally very simple and 
 strong, in both its parts, under the effu- 
 sion of the Holy Spirit. On the declen- 
 sion of this, toward the latter end of the 
 third century, a lower form of Christian- 
 ity, even in real saints, obtained ; and 
 our history is still travelling through the 
 twilight. The taste of this lower form 
 
 As. 
 
 t MS. 
 
 t See Dr. Owen's Preface to his x^i^oKoyK, 
 
364 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap, XXU 
 
 was to know the Law in its spirituality, 
 but not the Gospel in its consolations. — 
 Of this form was Ephraim, one of the 
 most holy men in this period ; and I 
 scarcely have found a saint, who had bet- 
 ter views, since the days of Cyprian, 
 unless we except Ambrose of Milan. But 
 by far the greater part of real good men, 
 in this whole century, and in the latter 
 part of the last, lived comparatively, in 
 bondage, looking to Jesus, sincerely, 
 confusedly. One person, how- 
 
 though 
 
 Ephraim 
 dieil about 
 
 A. D. 379. 
 
 Abraham 
 the Asce- 
 tic. 
 
 ever, was training up under the special 
 guidance of God, in the latter part of this 
 century, whose superior light was ap- 
 pointed to illuminate the next, as we 
 shall see by and by. But how does the 
 piety, the humility, the conscientious- 
 ness of such men as Ephraim, with all 
 their abject superstition, re- 
 buke the 'pride and careless- 
 ness and levity of many now 
 evangelized in the head, and 
 not in the heart, who trifle 
 with the light, and live in 
 sin, because they conceive grace to 
 abound! 
 
 I shall dismiss this Saint, after I have 
 taken a little notice of one of his com- 
 panions named Abraham, whose life he 
 has written, and whom he ad- 
 mires extremely. For fifty 
 years he lived an Ascetic, in 
 the strictest observation of 
 monastic rules, and confined 
 himself principally to his cell; though 
 the intelligent reader will think he acted 
 most like a Christian in those intervals, 
 when he left it ; in one of them particu- 
 larly, to which alone I shall confine my 
 attention. There was a great desert in 
 the neighbourhood of the "city (Edessa, 
 I suppose) in which the inhabitants were 
 all idolaters to a man ;* and though many 
 presbyters and deacons had been sent to 
 them by the bishop of the city, yet they 
 had all returned without effect, unable to 
 bear the persecution of the Pagans. One 
 day, the bishop observed among his cler- 
 gy, that he knew of no person so devoted 
 to God as Abraham, and therefore he 
 would ordain him as an evangelist of 
 these Pagans. At first he entreated him 
 but in vain ; Abraham begged to be per 
 mitted to bemoan his own evils. The 
 bishop, however, insisting on the obe- 
 dience which he owed to authority, and 
 observing how much better it was to be 
 employed in the salvation of many, than 
 
 of one soul only, Abraham at length sub- 
 mitted. He began his work with fervent 
 prayer for the divine blessing, and having 
 erected a church, he supplicated in it, for 
 the conversion of the people. His next 
 step appears not so proper; he threw 
 down the idols and altars of the Pagans; 
 the consequence of which was, that, with 
 much ill usage, he was expelled from the 
 country. He returned, however, to the 
 village, and resumed his work of prayer 
 in the church, to the astonishment of the 
 Pagans. When these came to him from 
 time to time, he began to exhort them to 
 turn from idols to the living God, on 
 which he was worse treated than before. 
 For three years, he bore their insults and 
 a constant series of persecution. His 
 patience, however, and meekness, were 
 admirable, and at length the people be- 
 gan to be softened, and comparing his 
 preaching with his practice, they con- 
 cluded that God must be with him, and 
 offered themselves voluntarily to receive 
 his doctrine. The saint rejoicing at the 
 event, desired them to give glory to God, 
 who had enlightened the eyes of their 
 hearts to know him. In fine, he gather- 
 ed them into a church, daily opening to 
 them the Scriptures. At length, when 
 he saw them confirmed in the faith of the 
 Gospel, and bringing forth the fruits of 
 it with steadiness, he abruptly retired 
 from them to his former solitude. The 
 work, however, remained firm and strong, 
 and the bishop visited and exhorted them 
 from the word of God, and ordained pas- 
 tors from among themselves. 
 
 How much better would Abraham have 
 been thus employed during the fifty years 
 of his solitude! But such were the times. 
 While the world proceeded in its usual 
 wickedness, those who were best calcu- 
 lated to reform it had a strong tendency 
 to live a recluse life ; and false fear and 
 bondage kept many from the pastoral 
 office, who might have been its brightest 
 ornaments. The mischief of this was 
 inexpressible ; the extension of the Gos- 
 pel was checked ; and every circum- 
 stance showed, that the Spirit of God 
 was no longer poured out, in his fulness, 
 among men. 
 
 £xi 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 HILARY OF POICTIERS. ' 
 
 An account of the life of Hilary is de 
 livered by a person, named Fortunatus- 
 
/EITT. 
 
 IV.] 
 
 HILARY OF POICTIERS. 
 
 365 
 
 who wrote about two hundred years after 
 him. This biographer, accordinsr to the 
 taste of the age, which was still more 
 credulous and superstitious than that of 
 Hilary, is extremely barren in matters 
 which really deserve attention, and is full 
 of prodigies and fictions. The best ac- 
 count of him therefore is to be drawn 
 from his contemporaries, and the eccle- 
 siastical historians, and above all from his 
 own writings. Of his life and actions 
 little is known, that deserves to be re- 
 corded : yet so great a man merits a dis- 
 tinct attention. 
 
 He was born at Poictiers in France, and 
 being of a very noble family, and distin- 
 guished by a liberal education, he was 
 enabled to throw a lustre on Christianity 
 after he received it. In his book on the 
 Trinity he gives us some account of his 
 conversion.* He seriously considered 
 the folly and vanity of idolatry, and was 
 led to conclude, that its professors could 
 not possibly be competent to lead men to 
 happiness. He contemplated the visible 
 frame of things, and inferred an Omni- 
 potent Eternal Being, as their Maker and 
 Preserver. He observes, that happiness 
 consists not in any external things, nor 
 in the bare knowledge of the first princi- 
 ples of good and evil, but in the know- 
 ledge of the true God. By reading the 
 books of Moses and the Prophets, he 
 found his mind enlio-htened, and his judo-- 
 ment confirmed in these ideas.f The 
 short but comprehensive account of God, 
 in the book of Exodus, "I am that I 
 am," affected him with admiration. 
 When he was carried forward to the New 
 Testament, there he learnt, that there is 
 an eternal Word, the Son of God made 
 man, who came into the world to commu- 
 nicate to it the fulness of grace. His 
 hope of happiness was now enlarged : 
 " since the Son of God was made man, 
 men may become the sons of God. A 
 man, who with gladness receives this 
 doctrine, renews his spirit by faith, and 
 conceives a hope full of immortality. 
 Having once learned to believe the Gos- 
 pel, he rejects captious difficulties, and 
 no longer judges after the maxims of the 
 world. He now neither fears death, nor 
 is weary of life, and presses forward to 
 a blessed immortality." In such a man- 
 ner does Hilary give us the history of his 
 own mind in religion. And when he en- 
 ters on the subject of the Trinity, he gives 
 
 See Cave's Life of Hilary. f Du Pin. 
 2 h3 
 
 an excellent admonition ; humility at 
 least will think so, though pride will ob- 
 ject to it. It is, that the reader would 
 think of God according to the light of 
 faith, and agreeably to the testimony of 
 God himself, divesting his mind of the 
 meanness of human opinions. " For," 
 continues he, " the chief qualification re- 
 quired in a reader is, that he be willing 
 to take the sense of an Author from what 
 he reads, and not give him one of his 
 own. He ought not to endeavour to find, 
 in the passages which he reads, that, 
 which he presumed ought to be there. In 
 such passages as describe the character 
 of the Supreme Being particularly, he 
 ought at least to be persuaded, that God 
 knew himself.* And in another part of 
 the same treatise, he makes this observa- 
 tion : " The blasphemies of the heretics 
 oblige us to do those things which are 
 forbidden us, to search into mysteries in- 
 comprehensible, to speak things ineffable, 
 and to explain that which we are not per- 
 mitted to examine. And instead of per- 
 forming with a sincere faith that which is 
 commanded us (which were otherwise 
 sufficient) namely, to worship the Father 
 and the Son, and to be filled with the 
 Spirit, we are obliged to employ our 
 weak reasonings in explaining things in- 
 comprehensible." Every sincere believ- 
 er, in every age, has had occasion to 
 make the same remark, when called to 
 contend earnestly for the faith once, deli- 
 vered to the saints. 
 
 His views of the Three Persons in the 
 Trinity are remarkably perspicuous and 
 scriptural. In speaking of the Holy Spirit, 
 he says, that he enlightens our under- 
 standings and warms our hearts ;| that 
 he is the author of all grace, and will be 
 with us to the end of the world ; that he 
 is our comforter here while we live in ex- 
 pectation of a future life, the earnest of 
 our hopes, the light of our minds, and 
 the warmth of our souls. He directs us • 
 
 * I apprehend, that if this method had been 
 followed in all ages, there never would have 
 been found any one to oppose the doctrine of 
 tlie Ti-inity. Agreeably to this, it appears 
 that Hilary, hy the study of the Scriptures 
 alone, had obtained and steadily professed the 
 Xicene faith, before he had ever seen the creed 
 of that name, or knew any thing of the Ai'iati 
 controversy. 
 
 f Thus owning his influence on the two lead- 
 ing powers of the human mind, the under- 
 standing and the will; not on one alone, but 
 on both, agreeably to the views of the best and 
 wisest in all ages. 
 
366 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. XXIH. 
 
 to pray for this Holy Spirit, to enable us 
 to do good, and to persevere in faith and 
 obedience. 
 
 There will be no occasion to take any 
 farther notice of his writings, unless it be 
 to mention his addresses to the emperor 
 on the same subject. Two he wrote 
 with decency and moderation; in the 
 third, he appears evidently to smart un- 
 der the wounds of persecution, and treats 
 the prince with an unchristian asperity, 
 for which no other apology can be made, 
 than the same which must be made for 
 Athanasius, namely, " that oppression 
 maketh a wise man mad." In general, 
 there is a proportion preserved in the 
 Church between doctrinal light and holy 
 practice. Sanctification is carried on by 
 the knowledge of the truth. And the su- 
 perior degree of that knowledge, in the 
 first and second century, will account for 
 the superior degree of Christian meek- 
 ness and charity, in those, who suffered 
 for the Gospel, compared with the prac- 
 tice of the saints of the fourth century. 
 
 Hilary, after his conversion, was sin- 
 gularly exemplary in his attachment to 
 the Gospel, avoiding any appearance of 
 countenancing the fashionable heresies, 
 and employed himself in recommending 
 his religion to others. He was married, 
 and had by his wife a daughter called 
 Abra, whose education he superintended 
 with great exactness. The gradual pro- 
 gress of superstition may be remarked 
 from his case. He certainly cohabited 
 with his wife after he was appointed 
 bishop of Poictiers, and yet he strongly 
 recommended his daughter to devote her- 
 self wholly to the service of Christ by a 
 state of virginity. To relate his active 
 employment in the Arian controversy, 
 Avould be again to introduce a subject 
 with which the reader has been already 
 satiated. Suffice it to say, that he spent 
 some time in banishment, in Phrygia, for 
 the sake of a good conscience; that he 
 was at length restored to his see; and 
 that by his lenity on the one hand, which 
 provoked the Luciferians, and by his con- 
 stancy on the other, which offended the 
 Arian emperor, he was yet enabled to be 
 of signal service to the Church, and was 
 to the West what Athanasius was to the 
 East, the pillar of orthodoxy. The Latin 
 Church, indeed, was never so much in- 
 fested with Arianism as the Greek ; and 
 France, in particular, was through him 
 preserved from the reigning heresy. He 
 died at Poictiers about the year 367. To 
 
 him the great church at Poic- 
 tiers is dedicated, and in the 
 midst of the city is a column 
 erected to him, with an in- 
 scription, at once expressive 
 of the admiration of his vir- 
 tues, and of the superstition of those who 
 wrote it.* 
 
 Hilary 
 died, 
 
 A. D. 367, 
 
 at the age 
 of 80. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 BASIL OF CiESAREA.f 
 Basil, surnamed the Great, on account 
 of his learning and piety, was descended 
 from Christian ancestors, who suffered 
 much during the persecution of Diocle- 
 sian. His grandmother Macrina, herself 
 a Confessor for the faith of Christ, and a 
 disciple of Gregory Thaumaturgus, was 
 eminently useful to him, in superintend- 
 ing his education, and fixing his princi- 
 ples. After a strict domestic education 
 in Cappadocia, his native country, he 
 travelled for. improvement in knowledge, 
 according to the custom of those, whose 
 circumstances enabled them to bear the 
 expense, and came to Athens. Here he 
 met with Gregory Nazianzen, with whom 
 he had a very cordial intimacy. At 
 length, leaving him there, he came to 
 Constantinople, and put himself under 
 the care of the famous Libanius. It is 
 certain, that he was possessed of all the 
 secular learning of the age, and if he had 
 chosen to give himself wholly to the 
 world, he might have shone as much, as 
 superior parts, strong understanding, and 
 indefatigable industry united, can effect. 
 But his mind was under a spiritual influ- 
 ence; he found an emptiness in the most 
 refined enjoyments of literature; even 
 Athens itself, he called a vain felicity. 
 He was led to seek for food for his soul, 
 and, in conjunction with Gregory, he stu- 
 died the works of Origen; and some 
 monuments of their veneration for that 
 learned father are still extant.:}: 
 
 * Divo Hilario, Urbis propugnatori, fide- 
 lissimo, assiduissimo, certissimo, Pictavorum 
 Episcopo. — " To Saint Hilary, tlie defender of 
 tlie city, most faithful, assiduous, and certain, 
 the bishop of Poictiers." 
 
 f The epistles of Basil still extant, with the 
 writings of his friend Gregory Nazianzen. 
 ami the two historians, Socrates and Sozomen, 
 afford materials sufficiently ample for his life. 
 Cave has given us a connected view of his ac- 
 tions, and Du Pin has reviewed his letters. 
 
 I Viz. The Philocalia of Origen, consisting 
 
Cbwt. IV.] 
 
 BASIL OF C.^SAREA. 
 
 367 
 
 It will scarcely be needful to add, that, 
 by this means, he contracted a taste for 
 exposition, neither the most evangelical, 
 nor the most perspicuous. In his travels 
 into Egypt he conversed with monks and 
 hermits, and prepared himself for that ex- 
 cessive attachment to the spirit of Ascet- 
 ics, which afterwards made him the great 
 supporter and encourager of those super- 
 stitions. 
 
 It is my duty, however, to look for the 
 spouse of Christ, wherever I can find her, 
 although she may be disguised by an un- 
 suitable and foreign garb. Julian the 
 apostate had known him, when they stu- 
 died together at Athens, and being now 
 advanced to the empire, he invited Basil 
 to his court. But the fear of God, and 
 the love of heavenly things, which un- 
 doubtedly predominated in this saint, suf- 
 fered him not to give way to the tempta- 
 tion for d moment. He wrote with Chris- 
 tian sincerity to the emperor, and pro- 
 voked him by his faithful rebukes ; choos- 
 ing rather lo live in Csesarea a despised 
 Christian, than to share in the honours and 
 riches of the court, to which his uncom- 
 mon endowments and abilities would have 
 advanced him. 
 
 After some time, he lived in retirement 
 at Neocffisarea in Pontus, and by his ex- 
 ample, concurring with the spirit of the 
 times, he not only drew over his friend 
 Gregory, but also great numbers, to em- 
 brace a retired life, and to employ them- 
 selves in prayer, singing of psalms, and 
 devotional exercises. And here, these 
 two friends formed the rules of monastic 
 discipline, which were the basis of all 
 those superstitious institutions which af- 
 terwards overran the church. The want 
 of a more evangelical view of doctrine, 
 and of course of that lively faith which 
 would animate and enable the Christian 
 to live above the world, though in the 
 midst of it, was, doubtless, the principal 
 cause of the overflowing of this spirit 
 among real good men in these times. To 
 flee from society seemed to them the 
 only possible way to escape the pollu- 
 tions of the world, which they sincerely 
 abhorred. Self-righteousness and igno- 
 rance fomented the evil, which gradual- 
 ly degenerated into a vapid system of 
 formality, and at length became a sink 
 of secret wickedness. But he, who 
 should, in these times, suspect the gene- 
 
 of Scriptural Questions, and Origen's Com- 
 ments, which these two friends compiled. 
 
 Caesarea, he was 
 up and down the 
 
 time, to Cassarea, 
 
 rality of monks of hypocrisy and profli- 
 gacy, woi:ld injure them much. On the 
 contrary, the flower of the flock of Christ, 
 in these days, is to be looked for among 
 them. 
 
 While Basil was employed in founding 
 monasteries in the neighbouring parts, 
 he also caused hospitals to be erected for 
 the poor ; and as he had been ordained 
 priest before he left 
 useful in preaching 
 country. 
 
 Returning, after a 
 he distinguished himself by inducing the 
 rich to supply the necessities of the 
 poor during a grievous famine ; and 
 all the world gave him credit both for 
 his charity in relieving the distressed, 
 and for his integrity in resisting the im- 
 portunities of Valens the Arian emperor. 
 The see of Ca'sarea being vacant, the 
 authority of the aged Gregory, bishop of 
 Nazianzum, the father of his friend, was 
 sincerely exerted for his promotion ; and 
 to this see he was at length advanced, 
 notwithstanding the opposition of the 
 Arians. He was soon called to with- 
 stand the repeated attacks of Valens; 
 and though he was in the utmost danger 
 of being banished from his see, he re- 
 mained immoveable in the profession of 
 the faith. 
 
 Let us attend a little to the pastoral 
 character of Basil. He found the church 
 of Ca3sarea, before his time, had been 
 scandalously neglected in its discipline. 
 OflUcers, who were a disgrace to religion, 
 ministered in the church, and the subal- 
 tern superintendents* ordained men with- 
 out the knowledge of the bishop, and 
 without any just examination; and many 
 pressed into the ministry for mere secular 
 reasons : it was reported that some were 
 even guilty of selling the priesthood for 
 money, the crime usually known by the 
 name of simony. Basil reminded his 
 clersjy of the strictness of the primitive 
 discipline, and of the care formerly exer- 
 cised by the presbyters and deacons in 
 examining the lives and manners of the 
 persons to be ordained, and 'he made 
 earnest attempts to revive the laudable 
 customs, inveighing against simony as 
 most detestable. 
 
 It would be tedious to describe the 
 diverse contests in which Basil was en- 
 gaged. Calumny, malice, and the do- 
 
 • Chorepiscopi. 
 in great dioceses. 
 
 A sort of under-bishops 
 
368 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XXHI. 
 
 mineering power of Arianism, afflicted 
 him with various trials, in which his pa- 
 tience was unwearied ; and as his body 
 became enfeebled by increasing distem- 
 pers, his mind seems to have collected 
 more vigour. Finding himself rapidly 
 declining, after he had governed the 
 church of Csesarea eight years and some 
 months, he ordained some of his follow- 
 ers, and was then obliged to take to his 
 bed. The people flocked about his house, 
 sensible of the value of such a pastor. 
 For a time he discoursed piously to those 
 who were about him, and sealed his last 
 breath with the ejaculation, "Into thy 
 hands I commend my spirit !" 
 
 It is much to be lamented, that a man 
 so sincerely pious, so profoundly learned, 
 and of so elegant and accomplished a 
 genius, should have suffered so much, 
 both in mind and body, from the monas- 
 T, -1 1- 1 tic spirit. But his excessive 
 . ^ „ austerities broke his consti- 
 ' tution, and left him for years, 
 ^^'^ ' ' in a very imperfect state of 
 health. He died in the year 379. 
 
 His doctrine appears, from his works, 
 to be too much clouded with self-righ- 
 teous and superstitious mixtures, to con- 
 tribute materially to the instruction and 
 the consolation of sincere souls, though 
 it is evident, that he reverenced the in- 
 fluences of the Holy Spirit, and placed 
 his hope of salvation in Christ Jesus. 
 Hear how Basil speaks of faith. " Faith, 
 above all natural methods, draws the 
 soul to a firm acquiescence in the word : 
 Faith, which is the effect, not of geome- 
 trical conclusions, but the result of the 
 energy of the Spirit."* So clearly spi- 
 ritual was his religion, with all its im- 
 perfections ! To this testimony of Basil 
 concerning divine faith, as distinct from 
 that which is merely natural, it may be 
 proper to add that of Nemes de homine, 
 c. 2. another Greek father, whose time 
 seems not far remote from Basil's. "The 
 doctrine of the divine oracles hath its 
 credibility from itself, because of its di- 
 vine inspiration." On one subject, name- 
 ly, the love of heavenly things in oppo- 
 sition to earthly, he excelled, both in 
 precept and example. In this the power 
 of grace appeared in him through life, 
 and even the whole system of his errors 
 in divinity was connected with it. The 
 very principle of the ascetic life was 
 with Basil a supreme desire to live above 
 
 the world. Those who understand the 
 foundation of the Gospel better than he 
 did, may find it not amiss to attend to 
 such pathetic exhortations as these : 
 
 " One says,* I will give to-morrow, to 
 excuse himself from giving to-day. Alas ! 
 do you know whether you shall be alive 
 to-morrow? Another says, I am poor, I 
 have need enough myself of all my means. 
 Yes, you are poor, you are destitute, but 
 it is of love, of benignity, of faith, and of 
 mercy. A third says, whom do I wrong? 
 I keep only my own. I ask you, from 
 whom did you receive those riches, and 
 whence did you bring them 1 Did you 
 not come naked from your mother's womb, 
 and shall you not return naked to the 
 dust? Whence did this wealth come? 
 from chance? what is this but Atheism? 
 if you confess that you received it from 
 God, why did it fall to your lot rather 
 than to another's? God is not unrigh- 
 teous in the unequal division of property 
 among men. Why are you rich, and 
 why is this man poor ? it is, that you may 
 receive the reward of dispensing your 
 goods faithfully, and that the poor may 
 receive the recompense of his patience. 
 When, therefore, you appropriate to your- 
 self that wealth which belongs to many, 
 and of which you are the steward, you 
 are a robber. — We know not what neces- 
 sities may happen. Can you make this 
 apology, while you spend your wealth 
 on a thousand superfluities ? — But I want 
 it for my children, — But, is it from you, 
 that your son received life? is it not from 
 God ? ought he, then, to hinder you from 
 obeying God's commandments ? The 
 riches that you will leave him, may be 
 the occasion of his ruin. Who knows, 
 whether he will make a good or a bad 
 use of them ?" — the pretences of those, 
 who think to exempt themselves from 
 doing good in their lifetime, by leaving 
 their goods, by will, to the poor, he thus 
 refutes: "Wretched men, to practise no 
 good works, but with ink and paper ! It 
 seems, you wish you could have enjoyed 
 your riches for ever, and then you would 
 never have obeyed the precepts of the 
 Gospel ; it is to death, it seems, and not 
 to you, that the poor are indebted. God 
 will not be thus mocked ; that which 13 
 dead is not to be offered to the sanctuary : 
 offer up a living sacrifice." — It is certain, 
 that those, who rely on Divine Provi- 
 dence, are like the springs which are not 
 
 * Basil on Psahn cxv. 
 
 • Basil's Homilies. Du Pin. 
 
Cbn T. IV.] 
 
 GREGORY NAZIANZEN. 
 
 369 
 
 dried up by drawing from them, but send 
 forth their waters with greater force. If 
 you are poor, lend your money upon in- 
 terest to God, who is rich. 
 
 Different vices predominate in differ- 
 ent periods. If, by reviewing various 
 ages, I can gain a more enlarged way of 
 thinking, and cease to admire exclusive- 
 ly that in which I live, this will be one 
 advantage of my historical travel. Cer- 
 tain it is, that the present age is remark- 
 able for a selfish and narrow mode of 
 conception, and a contempt of antiquity. 
 How many, whose reading has scarcely 
 reached farther than a Monthly Review 
 or Magazine, are apt to felicitate them- 
 selves on ther exemption from supersti- 
 tion, and to deride all monks as perfect 
 fools ! If we conceive a man in Basil's 
 days, possessed of the same contracted 
 spirit, and capable of foreseeing the ex- 
 cessively mercantile taste of the pre- 
 sent race of men; would not he be dis- 
 posed to censure their covetousness 1 
 and would not the vice appear as ridicu- 
 lous to such a one, as superstition does 
 to the moderns 1 Is it not as absurd and 
 foolish in its nature"? — The wisdom of 
 man lies not in satirizing the vices of 
 others, but in correcting his own. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 GREGORY NAZIANZEN. 
 
 He was born at Arianzum, an obscure 
 village belonging to Nazianzum in Cap- 
 padocia, and came into the world about 
 the time of the Nicene council.* His fa- 
 ther, of the same name, a person of rank, 
 had been brought up among a particular 
 sect, most resembling the Samaritans, who 
 professed a mixture of Judaism and Pa- 
 ganism. To this opinion, as it had been 
 the religion of his family, Gregory the 
 elder was in early life extremely devoted. 
 But marrying a lady of rank, and of sin- 
 cere Christian piety, he was gradually 
 induced to attend to the doctrines of the 
 Gospel. Her prayers and persuasions 
 were equally ardent. Gregory the elder 
 
 * Though I have consulted Socrates and So- 
 zomon, yet the account of Cave is so full and 
 circumstantial, and so well supijorled by ori- 
 ginal authoiities, that I shall liave little occa- 
 sion to do any thinjj^more than to abridge the 
 life of Greg-ory, written by the latter, except 
 to a\ail myself nf ijie industry of Du Pin, 
 •when I make a few remarks on the works of 
 this Father. 
 
 dreaming one night that he sung that pas- 
 sage, " I was glad when they said unto 
 me, let us go into the house of the Lord," 
 and feeling an uncommon pleasure on the 
 occasion, informed his wife of the circum- 
 stance, who exhorted him to comply with 
 the call of God to his soul. And soon 
 after, Leontius bishop of Ceesarea, coming 
 to Nazianzum, in his way to the council 
 of Nice, Gregory the elder was encou- 
 raged and assisted by him, and then re- 
 ceived from the bishop of Nazianzum 
 catechetical instruction, and the ordinance 
 of baptism. 
 
 Nazianzum itself had but newly re- 
 ceived Christianity. The bishop who 
 baptized Gregory the elder, was the first 
 of its pastors, and died soon after. A 
 long vacancy took place, and the town 
 was overrun with ignorance and vice. 
 Gregory the elder at length was appointed 
 to the see, which he filled for forty-five 
 years with great success among the peo- 
 ple. His son, Gregory the younger, 
 the famous Gregory, usually called Gre- 
 gory Nazianzen, making uncommon ad- 
 vances in learning, in several semina- 
 ries, went to Athens, to complete his 
 education. During the voyage, a re- 
 markable providence was made subser- 
 vient to his conversion. A storm sud- 
 denly arose, and the vessel was for seve- 
 ral days in imminent danger. Gregory 
 lamented his want of baptism and of se- 
 rious Christianity, and with vehement 
 prayers devoted himself to God to be his 
 ibrever, if he would be pleased to spare 
 his life at that time. When he had finish- 
 ed his prayer, the tempest ceased, and the 
 ship was securely conducted to her port. 
 
 His acquaintance with Basil at Athens 
 has been mentioned. Here also he con- 
 versed with Julian the apostate, and, with 
 that intuitive penetration into character, 
 which seems a peculiar gift to some minds, 
 he foretold what a curse he would one day 
 prove. See, said he, what a pest the Ro- 
 man empire nourishes in its bowels ! 
 Yet Julian, at that time, had done nothing 
 to justify such suspicions. He attended 
 Christian forms ; nor was he naturally 
 savage or inhuman. The penetrating eye 
 of Gregory discerned, however, the em- 
 bryo of the apostate and the scorner, in 
 his bold and fearless spirit of disputation, 
 and in his presumptuous curiosity ; — tem- 
 pers in youth, which, if strong and pre- 
 dominant, and accompanied with quick- 
 ness of parts, without special grace, sel- 
 dom fail to produce remarkable fruits of 
 
370 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XXIV. 
 
 impiety in maturer age, and are rather 
 cherished than damped by sobriety of 
 manners and intenseness of application. 
 Pride converts every specious virtue into 
 nourishment for herself; and Satan knows 
 no agent in the world so proper as pride 
 for the promotion of his kingdom of dark- 
 ness. 
 
 After his baptism, he felt himself 
 strongly inclined to the ascetic life, but 
 was, though reluctant, made a presbyter 
 by his father. The old man, better versed 
 in prayer than disputation, was once im- 
 posed on, by Arian subtleties, to commu- 
 nicate with that sect, while betook them 
 to be what they were not, but was reco- 
 vered from the snare by the arguments of 
 his more learned son. The latter, after 
 giving away for some time to the mo- 
 nastic spirit of solitude, was prevailed on 
 at length to return to Nazianzum, and to 
 employ himself in a manner more worthy 
 of a Christian, by assisting his aged fa- 
 ther in his pastoral cares. 
 
 His friend Basil ofleringhim the bishop- 
 ric of Sasima, in his diocese of Cajsarea, 
 and the place being very mean and ob- 
 scure, the pride of Gregory was hurt, and 
 for sometime a coldness subsisted between 
 the two friends, both of whom appear not 
 to have possessed, in any great degree, the 
 humble simplicity of better times. Their 
 fondness to Platonism, and their accurate 
 acquaintance with secular learning, had 
 doubtless no tendency to supply the de- 
 fects of their Christian views of doc- 
 trine. 
 
 Gregory rejecting the offer of Sasima, 
 continued to assist his father, and had 
 then an opportunity of enforcing a Chris- 
 tian duty, constantly allowed to be such 
 in the primitive times, namely, submission 
 to the higher powers, as well as to give 
 the most excellent advice to the governor 
 of Nazianzum — to use his power with 
 moderation. Some civil tumults and 
 broils at that place furnished him with 
 this occasion. 
 
 His father dying near a hundred years 
 old, and his mother soon after, both of 
 them persons of uncommon piety, Gre- 
 gory was induced to go to Constantinople. 
 Here, under the emperor Valens, Arianism 
 was at its height, and Gregory preached 
 to a few Christians in a sort of conventi- 
 cle ; but, growing popular and successful, 
 he was at last appointed bishop ; and at 
 length, under Theodosius, he was con- 
 firmed in the charge. It proved, however, 
 extremely uneasy to him, notwithstand- 
 
 ing the kindness of the emperor. His 
 liberality and integrity were indeed ad- 
 mirable, and his private life and manners 
 were most exemplary. But the weakness 
 of his body, the irratibility of his temper, 
 and his extreme deficiency in talents for 
 (jovernment, rendered him, notwalhstand- 
 ing the just renown of his incomparable 
 oratory, unfit for so public a station. 
 
 The Gospel was, however, adorned by 
 his virtues, and particularly, by the meek- 
 ness with which he forgave a person who 
 had been suborned to murder him, and 
 who, having been baffled in his purpose 
 by Providence, came to him in agony 
 of conscience, and confessed his inten- 
 tions. 
 
 While he was at Constantinople, the 
 famous council was held there for the set- 
 tlement of the peace of the church ; du- 
 ring the course of which, Gregory, a man 
 of tried honesty, but void of political re- 
 finement, found himself so much opposed 
 by those who envied him, and his best 
 desio-ns so much misconstrued, that he 
 entreated Theodosius to accept his resig- 
 nation. His farewell sermon, in which 
 he reminded his audience of what God 
 had done by him from his first preaching 
 among them, when he was attacked with 
 stones by the Arians, is a master-piece of 
 eloquence, and moved the passions of the 
 audience exceedingly. There is in it too 
 great a show of eloquence, and too little of 
 the Gospel of Christ. 
 
 A second synod being held at Constan- 
 tinople, Gregory, disgusted with the treat- 
 ment he had met with in the first, and be- 
 ing also afflicted with a very infirm state 
 of health, refused to come, and expressed 
 himself with unbecomingacrimony against 
 councils in oreneral. However, he exerted 
 
 • • • 1 
 
 himself sincerely to promote unity in the 
 church, and was unbounded in his liber- 
 ality to the poor. In his time he was 
 looked on as an admirable theologian. 
 And indeed, in justness of taste, eloquence 
 and secular learning, he was inferior to 
 few; and these shining qualities, in an 
 age more contentious than simple with 
 respect to religion, procured Q,,e„ory 
 him an admiration for Chris- -■ ° ^ 
 tian knowledge above his de- 
 serts. He died in ihe year 
 389, in his own country. 
 
 His principal writings are his sermons. 
 The first of them describes the difficulties 
 and importance of the pastoral office, 
 blames the forwardness of many to under- 
 take it, and describes himself confounded 
 
 dies, 
 
 A. D. 389. 
 
Cekt. IV.] 
 
 GREGORY NAZIANZEN. 
 
 371 
 
 under a sense of his insufficiency. In 
 two other discourses he inveighs against 
 Julian in a manner that discovers more of 
 the orator than the Christian. In another 
 discourse, he endeavours to reconcile the 
 minds of the people of Nazianzum to the 
 payment of taxes. He observes, that Je- 
 sus Christ came into the world at a time 
 when a tax was levied, to show that God 
 is 'present at such scenes ; that he was 
 made man, and did himself pay taxes, to 
 comibrt those who were in bondage, and 
 to teach them to bear it patiently ; that 
 by thus abasing himself he taught kings 
 to treat their subjects with moderation ; 
 that tribute was a consequence of the first 
 sin, because war, the cause of tribute, 
 was the consequence of sin, and a just 
 punishment of God. 
 
 His warm and pathetic addresses to 
 deceased saints were evidently little else 
 than mere strokes of oratory. They were 
 accompanied with the expression of a 
 doubt, whether the saints understood what 
 he said. He seems, however, to have 
 strengthened the growing superstition, 
 and encouraged that worship of saints, 
 which he certainly did not intend, in the 
 manner in which it was afterwards prac- 
 tised. Unguarded passages of this sort 
 occur in othex writers of these times, none 
 of whom really designed to inculcate idol- 
 atry. 
 
 In another discourse, he protests against 
 the too common practice of delaying bap- 
 tism, which, from the example of Con- 
 stantine, had grown very fashionable, for 
 reasons equally corrupt and superstitious. 
 Men lived in sin as long as they thought 
 they could safely, and deferred baptism 
 till their near approach to death, under a 
 groundless hope of washing away all 
 their guilt at once. He presses the bap- 
 tism of infants, and refutes the vain pre- 
 tences of those who followed the fashion- 
 able notions. 
 
 His poems demonstrate a rich vein of 
 genius and a sensibility of mind. Nor 
 is there wanting a true spirit of piety. 
 ■ In the fifty-eighth are some excellent re- 
 flections on the falsehood of mere human 
 virtue, the necessity of divine grace 
 through Jesus Christ, and of an humble 
 confidence in it, and the danger of perish- 
 
 ing through pride and vain glory. A 
 humility of this sort was evidently at the 
 bottom of Gregory's religion ; but I much 
 doubt whether his less learned parents 
 did not understand it, practically, much 
 better than he. Mankind are naturally 
 more favourable to gifts than to graces, 
 and even good men are but too ready to 
 suppose there is much of the latter, wher- 
 ever there appears an abundance of the 
 former. 
 
 Epiphanius, bishop of Cyprus, was not 
 inferior to many in this century for un- 
 feigned purity of faith and m?.nners. But 
 the particulars of his life are 
 for the most part uninterest- Epiphani- 
 
 Ti • u us bora 
 
 mg. It IS proper, however, ^^^^^ 
 
 to mention his zeal in tearing . „ ^ 
 
 a painted curtain which he • • - > 
 
 saw in a place of public wor- „?^*^" „ 
 
 , ■ riM ■ ^ Uislion ot 
 
 ship. Ihis seems at once a Cvm-us in 
 
 proof of his detestation of 355 
 images and pictures in reli- ^jjg^i j^ 
 gion, and also of the weak 403. 
 beginnings of that supersti- 
 tion in the fourth century. In this place 
 let us not omit to observe his very lauda- 
 ble spirit of beneficence. Numbers from 
 all parts sent him large sums to distribute 
 to the needy, in confidence of his charity 
 and integrity. His steward one day in- 
 formed him, that his stock was nearly 
 exhausted, and blamed his profuse libe- 
 rality ; but he continued still as liberal as 
 before, till all was gone; when he re- 
 ceived suddenly from a stranger a large 
 bag of gold. Another story deserves to 
 be recorded as a monument of Divine 
 Providence, the rather, as it seems ex- 
 tremely well authenticated.* Two beg- 
 gars agreeing to impose on him, one 
 feigned himself dead, the other begged of 
 Epiphanius to supply the expenses of his 
 companion's funeral. Epiphanius grant- 
 ed the request ; the beggar on the depar- 
 ture of the bishop desired his companion 
 to rise ; but the man was really dead ! — 
 To sport with the servants of God, and 
 to abuse their kindness, is to provoke 
 God, himself, as the bishop told the sur- 
 vivor. 
 
 ♦ Sozom. B. VII. c. 27. 
 
372 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY V. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. 
 
 Some brief account of this renowned 
 Father will properly introduce the fifth 
 century to the acquaintance of the reader, 
 because the transactions with which his 
 story is connected extend a few years 
 from the last century into this, and are 
 very descriptive of the religious state of 
 the East at that time. 
 
 He was, at the commencement of the 
 century, bishop of Constantinople, where 
 the emperor Arcadius resided, while his 
 brother Honorius reigned in the West: 
 these two were the sons and successors of 
 the great Theodosius. But we must look 
 back to the rise of John Chrysostom. He 
 p, was born at Antioch* about 
 
 torn bor; the year 354. His parents 
 were persons oi some rank, 
 A. U. 3j4. ^^j j^y ^j^g ^^j.g ^^ j^jg mother 
 
 (for he lost his father soon after his birth) 
 his education was attended to in a very 
 particular manner. By her means, he 
 had the advantage of being early preju- 
 diced in favour of Christianity. Yet, 
 being naturally studious of eloquence, he 
 devoled himself to the care of that great 
 master, Libanius of Antioch, who being 
 one day asked, who would be capable of 
 succeeding him in his school; "John," 
 said he, " if the Christians had not stolen 
 him from us." So great was the idea he 
 had formed of his powers of eloquence. 
 
 He prognosticated right. It would be 
 easy to produce abundance of instances 
 of his oratorical abilities. I wish it were 
 in my power to record as many of his 
 evangelical excellencies. 
 
 Having pleaded a little time in the 
 Forum, he began to find a vacancy in his 
 mind not to be supplied by secular arts 
 and studies. The Spirit of God seems, 
 from that time, to have drawn him to 
 study the Scriptures, and one material 
 advantage he derived from his master 
 Diodorus, who was afterwards bishop of 
 Tarsus : By him he was taught to forsake 
 the popular whims of Origen, and to in- 
 vestigate the literal and historical sense 
 of the Divine word ; a practice, in which 
 
 • Cave's Life of this Father. 
 
 he differed from most of the fathers of his 
 times. 
 
 He contracted an intimate friendship 
 with one Basil, whom, by a deceit, he 
 drew into the acceptance of a bishopric ; 
 nor is he ashamed to justify himself in 
 doing evil that good may come,* We 
 have seen the deliberate fraud practised 
 by Ambrose to avoid a bishopric.f And 
 I find Chrysostom, in his exposition of 
 the second chapter of the epistle to the 
 Galatians, supposes, that both Paul and 
 Peter were laudably engaged in fraud, 
 because their views were charitable and 
 pious. We shall afterwards have occa- 
 sion to consider this matter a little more 
 fully, when we come to the controversy 
 between Jerom and Augustine on the sub- 
 ject. At present, suffice it to observe, 
 that the decline in doctrine had evidently 
 produced a decline in ethics ; that the ex- 
 amples of men, otherwise so justly re- 
 putable, as Ambrose, Chrysostom, and 
 Jerom, + must have had a pernicious ef- 
 fect on Christian morals; and that the 
 growth of austere superstition was unfa- 
 vourable to truth and integrity. 
 
 Notwithstanding the entreaties of his 
 pious mother, he lived in monastic aus- 
 terities for some time; after which, Fla- 
 vian, bishop of Antioch, promoted him to 
 the ofhce of presbyter in his ge.jitionat 
 diocese. About the year 379, Antioch 
 a sedition broke out at Anti- . jj ^-^ 
 och, on account of taxes, and 
 the people dragged about the streets the 
 statues of Theodosius, and of his excel- 
 lent lady Flaccilla, and of their two sons, 
 in contempt. But finding afterwards the 
 danger of the emperor's resentment, this 
 inconstant and turbulent people were in 
 the greatest distress. Antioch had ever 
 been very favourable to the name, at least, 
 of Christianity, since the time that the 
 disciples were first called Christians at 
 Antioch. But luxury and the love of the 
 world, were, it is to be feared, much more 
 common in these times than godliness, 
 
 * Sacerdotio, B. I. 
 
 f See page 3'29 of this Volume. 
 
 :|: The reader will carefully observe, that 
 Augustine is not involved in this censure, in 
 the least degree. Let it be observed also, that 
 these pious frauds had no connexion with the 
 love of lucre, and arose more properly from 
 superstition, than from hypocrisy. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. 
 
 373 
 
 even among the Christian inhabitants. 
 About two hundred thousand citizens 
 made up the sum total; and half of these 
 were Christians. John failed not to im- 
 prove the opportunity. Serious as he 
 himself was in Christian views, so far as 
 he understood them, and excellent as a 
 preacher of the law, he exhorted them to 
 repentance, and verj" properly made the 
 awful suspense they were then in, an in- 
 structive emblem of our expectation of 
 the daj' of judgment. Hymns and lita- 
 nies were composed to solicit God to 
 move the heart of the emperor to pity ; 
 and man)'', who had never attended the 
 house of God, and had spent their whole 
 time in the theatre, now joined in divine 
 worship with much earnestness and as- 
 siduity, Flavian the bishop, though aged 
 and infirm, undertook a journey to Con- 
 stantinople to deprecate the wrath of the 
 emperor. Libanius the sophist also did 
 the same; but the generality of the phi- 
 losophers hid themselves in holes and 
 corners, end did nothing for their country 
 in danger; while the monks left their 
 cells, and flocked into the cit}', and en- 
 treated the magistrates and judges to be- 
 have with lenity. One Macedonius par- 
 ticularly* addressed the Commissioners, 
 and desired them to admonish the empe- 
 ror not to destroy the image of God, lest 
 he should provoke the Divine Artist ; 
 which he might think would be the case, 
 when he reflected how angry he himself 
 was for the sake of brazen statues. Thus, 
 even monks, who exhibited Christianity 
 in a degenerate form, exceeded in benevo- 
 lence and active virtue the boasted and 
 boasting sons of philosophy ! 
 
 The spirit of Chrysostom, in the mean 
 time, was softened and overawed with 
 the mingled sensations of pity and devo- 
 tion, while he observed the severe pro- 
 ceedings of the courts, and the vain in- 
 tercessions of relations for husbands and 
 fathers. He was led to reflect how awful 
 the day of judgment will be, when not a 
 mother, sister, or father can arrest the 
 course of Divine justice, or give the least 
 relief to nearest relations ; asd, in his 
 homilies, he with much eloquence and 
 piety enforced these considerations on a 
 gidd}', unthinking people. Pastors may 
 take the hint from hence to improve tem- 
 poral scenes to the spiritual benefit of 
 their audiences. 
 
 The generous and gfood-natured Theo- 
 
 * Theodoret, B. V. c. 20. 
 Vol. I. 21 
 
 dosius expostulated with Flavian on the 
 unreasonableness and ingratitude of the 
 citizens of Antioch to himself, who had 
 ever been as a parent and benefactor to 
 them. Flavian, admitting the truth of 
 his observations, and confessinfr the arr- 
 gravated guilt of the city, pressed him 
 with the divine rule, If ye forgive men 
 their trespasses, your heavenly Father 
 will also forgive you. And his pathetic 
 and pious admonitions prevailed. Theo- 
 dosius owned, that if the great Lord of 
 tlie world for our sake, became a servant, 
 and prayed for his murderers, it highly 
 became himself to forgive his fellow- 
 servants; and with great tenderness he 
 solicited the bishop to hasten his return, 
 and to deliver the citizens from their 
 fears. In the mean time the active cha- 
 rity of the monks and clergy had pre- 
 vailed on the judges to suspend their 
 proceedings till they heard from the em- 
 peror; and Flavian himself returned at 
 length with the news of the city being 
 fully restored to his favour. These are 
 some of the triumphs of the Gospel. Its 
 mild influence on society, in the suppres- 
 sion of the fights of gladiators and other 
 savage practices, and in the kind and li- 
 beral behaviour of emperors towards their 
 subjects, even in limes when true reli- 
 gion was at no great height, demonstrate, 
 not only that states act unwisely, when 
 they venture to reject Christianity alto- 
 gether, and to substitute mere elhics in 
 its stead; but also, that it is the duty of 
 governors and legislators, as much as in 
 them lies, by positive institutions to pro- 
 mote the knowledcre and influence of that 
 divine religion. 
 
 In the year 398, Chrysostom, by the 
 advice of Eutropius, chief chamberlain 
 of the palace, was appointed 
 bishop of Constantinople, be- 
 ing hurried thither by a frau- 
 dulent scheme, such as he 
 himself had approved in like 
 cases. The qmperor Arca- 
 dius, a character of the most insipid in- 
 significance, fixed in the metropolitical 
 chair a person of great integrity, activity, 
 and virtue indeed ; but surely not through 
 any wisdom of his own. John began 
 immediately to attempt the reformation 
 of his diocese. He put an end to a cus- 
 tom of the clergy of keeping matrons in 
 their families, which caused much scan- 
 dal ; he censured their covetousness and 
 their luxury ; retrenched the expenses of 
 the bishop's table, and applied the sur- 
 
 MaJe Bi- 
 shop of 
 Constanti- 
 nople, 
 
 A. D. 398. 
 
374 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 plus to the needy ; built a large hospital* 
 for the infirm, and put it under the most 
 salutary regulations. Such ministers as 
 refused to amend their lives, he suspend- 
 ed from their offices; and the Avidows 
 who were maintained by the church, 
 were admonished to abstain from their 
 gay manner of living, or else to marry. 
 And he pressed the laity, whose employ- 
 ments filled up the day, to attend divine 
 worship in the evening. 
 
 The common people heard him gladly, 
 as, for a time at least, they generally 
 will hear, in all ages, a preacher who 
 speaks to the conscience, though severe- 
 ly, yet faithfully, with earnest desire ex- 
 hibited in his whole manner to do them 
 good. Even some of the Dissenters at- 
 tended on his preaching; nor did bela- 
 bour in vain in reclaiming heretics. f 
 The Clergy, indolent and corrupt as they 
 then were, opposed him vehemently, and 
 watched opportunities against him. The 
 wealthy and the great, offended at his 
 plain reproofs, were as ill-disposed as 
 the clergy. Chrysostom however perse- 
 
 *The superiority of Christianit}-, consider- 
 ed ki an elliical and political point of view, to 
 ail other religions, may deserve to be an ob- 
 ject of attention. We have seen great proofs 
 of it already. It is difficult to prove a negative 
 proposition ; I can only say, therefore, that I 
 do not recollect any such humane and bene- 
 ficent provisions for the poor in the wliole cir- 
 cle of ancient Paganism ; nor do 1 remember 
 any one of the philosophers, who was ever 
 sedulously employed, by word or deed, for the 
 lower ranks of men. True religion visits the 
 fatherless and widows in their affliction. With 
 ]ustice might Ambrose, observing the liberal- 
 ity which the church exercised to the needy, 
 ask the Pagans, Let them tell me, what cap- 
 tives were redeemed, what hospitals maintain- 
 ed, what exiles provided for, by the income of 
 the temples ? 
 
 f A visible reformation of manners in a 
 capital, which had long suftered under Arian 
 impiety, and had fallen into a general relaxa- 
 tion of discipline, attended his labours. Per- 
 sons, who hitherto had frequented the public 
 shows, now came in crowds to public worship. 
 Here he exjjounded various parts of the New 
 Testament. He preached tliree times a week, 
 and sometimes seven days successively. The 
 crowd vas so great, that to place himself 
 -where he miglit be heard, he was obliged to 
 sit in the middle of the church, in the reader's 
 desk. He reformed likewise the churches of 
 the neighbouring provinces of Thrace, Asia, 
 and Pontus. It appears that various churches 
 in {be East were administered with shameful 
 corruption and profligacy, and several bishops, 
 by the vigour of Chrysosiom's zeal, were de- 
 posed. 
 
 vered ; nor did he confine his cares to 
 Constantinople. In order to overcome 
 the Arianism of the Goths, he ordained 
 some persons of their country, to whom 
 he assigned a church within the city, and 
 by their industry he reclaimed many. 
 He himself often preached there, and 
 prevailed on others of the clergy to do the 
 same. He made liberal and active at- 
 tempts to spread the Gospel among bar- 
 barous nations, though the troubles which 
 afterwards befel him, must have checked 
 both these and other Christian designs.* 
 In an age of luxury and extreme re- 
 laxation of discipline, it might be expect- 
 ed that the uprightness and inflexible in- 
 tegrity of Chrysostom would expose 
 him to many inconveniences. During 
 the negligent administration of his pre- 
 decessor Nectarius the successor of Gre- 
 gory Nazianzen, a remarkable alteration 
 for the worse, in point of discipline, had 
 taken place. There had been a presby- 
 ter, whose special office it was to receive 
 the confession of penitents, and by his 
 authority they were admitted to the com- 
 munion. Superstition, most probably, 
 had guided too much the formalities of 
 this discipline; but profanenjess was still 
 worse, and the Lord's Supper was now 
 open to all sorts of characters, no other 
 rules being prescribed than what men 
 chose to impose on themselves. It was 
 not in the power of Chrysostom, in a me- 
 tropolis so dissolute, and so much under 
 the secular influence, to restore the dis- 
 cipline of the church in this respect. 
 What was wanting, he supplied by 
 preaching with the most laudable energy, 
 and he exhorted men to repent again and 
 again, and then to attend the Lord's Sup- 
 per. He was evidently speaking of pri- 
 vate, not of public penitence. Yet his 
 expressions were perversely interpreted 
 by two sorts of men, of very opposite 
 characters, the Novatians, and the more 
 dissolute persons of the general church. 
 The former still maintained their favour- 
 ite point, of never receiving the lapsed at 
 all ; the latter accused him of giving a 
 license to sin. Yet if the distinction be- 
 tween private and public penitence be at- 
 tended to, the innocence of Chrysostom's 
 expressions will be sufficiently clear, and 
 he will appear to have only exhorted 
 them to repentance on the encouragement 
 of the divine mercies in Christ, which 
 offer pardon to repeated and multiplied 
 
 * Fleury, B. XX. 40. Sozom. B. VIU. c. 5. 
 
Cejtt. v.] 
 
 JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. 
 
 375 
 
 transgressions. With what malevolence 
 this great man was treated by the disso- 
 lute, may be easily conceived, when so 
 grave a person as Socrates the historian, 
 who had a partial fondness for Novatian- 
 ism, expresses his wonder, that Chrysos- 
 tom should have given such encourage- 
 ment to sin, in his sermons, and have 
 contradicted the canons of the church, 
 which had been made with the excessive 
 rigour that characterized the third centu- 
 ry, and had forbidden the indulgence of 
 communion to be granted any more than 
 once to offenders.* Nor is this the only 
 instance in which the zeal and upright- 
 ness of good men exposes them, in a 
 malignant world, to the censure of opposite 
 characters; of those, who carry the pro- 
 fession of strictness too far, and of those, 
 who scarce pretend to any at all. Chry- 
 sostom was accused, on this account, by 
 the profligate bishops, and was also cen- 
 sured by Sisinnius, bishop of the Nova- 
 tians in Constantinople, who wrote a 
 book against him and censured him with 
 great severity. 
 
 Of this Sisinnius I shall not record 
 what Socrates thinks it worth while to 
 spend one chapter upon.f For, though he 
 evidently desires to interest the reader in 
 his favour, he records nothing but what 
 tends to show him to have been a polite, 
 facetious, well-bred gentleman, who made 
 himself very agreeable to all parties, and 
 was a contrast to the severity of Chrysos- 
 tom by his engaging manners. He sur- 
 vived the latter, and lived on terms of 
 amity with Atticus his successor ; and I 
 should with pleasure reciie an account of 
 his pious labours and success in the mi- 
 nistry, could I find any real proof that he 
 was endowed with the spirit of the Gos- 
 pel, and exhibited it in his conduct. 
 Though the article of dress is but an ex- 
 ternal thing, his wearing white garments, 
 against the mode of the time, when the 
 clergy were habited in black, was certain- 
 ly indecent; nor is his saying, that there 
 was no scripture which required the wear- 
 ing of black, a satisfactory apology. 
 
 It is not from such courtly characters 
 as these, that reformation in the Church, 
 in an age of corruption like that at the be- 
 ginning of this century, is to be expected. 
 Chrysostomwas doubtless endowed with 
 many qualities which belong to a reformer. 
 Socrates owns his extreme temperance, 
 and at the same time blames him for the 
 
 vice of anger, and the charge seems but 
 too just. 
 
 Tills infirmity, too common to men of 
 generous and noble minds, gave, no doubt, 
 o-reat advantagfe to his enemies, and con- 
 curred with various circumstances to 
 crush the bishop of Constantinople. A 
 synod at length, held and managed by 
 Theophilus bishop of Alexandria, his de- 
 termined enemy, and one of the worst ec- 
 clesiastical characters in history, support- 
 ed by the influence of the proud Eudoxia, 
 the empress, condemned him with extreme 
 injustice. I shall not stain these pages 
 with a detail of their iniquitous proceed- 
 ings.* It is more to our purpose to notice 
 his conduct under the severe persecution. 
 Chrysostom, foreseeing the effect of the 
 storm which was gathering round him, 
 addressed himself to the bishops who 
 were his friends, assembled in the great 
 room of his house. f " Brethren, be 
 earnest in prayer; and as you love our 
 Lord Jesus, let none of you for my sake 
 desert his charge. For, as was St. Paul's 
 case, I am ready to be offered up, and the 
 time of my departure is at hand. I see I 
 must undergo many hardships, and then 
 quit this troublesome life. I know the 
 subtilty of Satan, who cannot bear to be 
 daily tormented with my preaching. By 
 your constancy you will find mercy at the 
 hand of God ; only remember me in your 
 prayers." The assembly being afflicted 
 with vehement sorrow, he besought them 
 to moderate their grief; " for to me to live 
 is Christ, and to die is gain." " I always 
 told you this life is a road in which joys 
 and sorrows both pass swiftly away. 
 The visible scene of things before us is 
 like a fair, where we buy and sell, and 
 sometimes recreate ourselves. Are we 
 better than the patriarchs 1 Do we excel 
 the prophets and apostles, that we should 
 live here for ever ]" When one of the 
 company passionately bewailed the deso- 
 lations of the Church, the bishop, striking 
 
 * Among the other charges, he was accused 
 of saying, " If thou sinnest again, repent 
 again ; and as oft as liiou sinnest, come to me 
 and 1 will heal thee." This is the ca- 
 
 airain 
 
 lumny already spoken to. 
 
 That he spoke con- 
 and had written a 
 
 * Socrat. B. YI. 21. 
 
 t Chap. 22. 
 
 tenniiibly of the clergy, 
 whole book stuffed with falsehood against 
 them ; these also were among the articles of 
 accusation, which, in general, betray the folly 
 and malice of his enemies, and are more than 
 sufficiently confuted by the piety and godly 
 zeal, which appear in his writings still extant. 
 f Cave's Life of Chrysostom, Pallad. vita 
 Chrysost. p. 67. 
 
376 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the end of his right fore-finger on the 
 pahn of his left hand (which he was ac- 
 customed to do, when much in earnest) 
 said, " Brother, it is enough, pursue the 
 subject no further; however, as I request- 
 ed, desert not your churches. As for the 
 doctrine of Christ, it began not with me, 
 nor shall it die with me. Did not Moses 
 die ? and did not Joshua succeed him ? — 
 Paul was beheaded, and left he not Timo- 
 thy, Titus, ApoUos, and many more be- 
 hind him ]" 
 
 Eu^.ysius bishop of Apamea answered, 
 " But if we keep our churches we shall 
 , be compelled to communicate and sub- 
 scribe." " Communicate," returns he, 
 " you may, that you make not a schism 
 in the church :* but subscribe not the de- 
 crees ; for I am not conscious of having 
 done any thing, for which I should deserve 
 to be deposed." 
 
 As Theophilus assumed a power, which 
 doubtless belonged not to him, and as 
 Chrysostom observed, it did not become 
 a man that lives in Egypt to judge one 
 that lives in Thrace, the bishop of Con- 
 stantinople refused to own the authority 
 of the court. His enemies deposed him 
 for contumacy, and to support their views, 
 they informed the emperor Arcadius, that 
 he had been guilty of treason, meaning 
 the affront he had put on the empress in 
 calling her Jezebel; and it is not impro- 
 bable, but that he had, in some of his 
 sermons, compared her to the wife of 
 Ahab, whom, in truth, she much resem- 
 bled in pride and cruelty. 
 
 * In this he doubtless acted with great pro- 
 priety. Corrupt as the Eastei-iv churcli then 
 was, the corruption was rather in pi-aclice 
 tlian in doctrine. And such a separation as 
 afterwards took place at the Reformation, 
 ■wouhl have been very unjustifiable. Good 
 men by remaining in it might do a thousand 
 times more good, than thej' would be capable 
 of doing by deserting it. And so long as the 
 doctrine itself is preserved sound and pure, 
 by the continuance of lioly men in the church, 
 wlio in that case can remain with a clear con- 
 science, revivals may be expected from time 
 to time. Of this we shall sliortly see a solid 
 instance in the Western church, and such we 
 have seen in the church of England in our own 
 times. Separation seems only justified in the 
 case of a total cori-uption and incurable mala- 
 dy, such as that at the time of the Reformation. 
 Plasty and intemperate schisms rend the 
 church into miserable fragments, prevent, as 
 far as man can prevent, any great and general 
 revival of godliness, and are strongly guai'ded 
 against in the epistolary writings of the New 
 Testament. 
 
 The people of Constantinople,however, 
 who sincerely loved the bishop, insisted 
 on his being heard by more equitable 
 judges, and so strong was their agitation, 
 that Chrysostom, fearing a popular insur- 
 rection, delivered himself up secretly to 
 the officer, who came to execute the im- 
 perial warrant against him. He was con- 
 veyed immediately to a port in the Black 
 Sea. As soon as it was known that he 
 was gone, the whole city was in an up- 
 roar; many blamed the emperor, who, in 
 so weak a inanner, had given up the 
 most upright of men to the malice of his 
 wife and of Theophilus. The tumtilt was 
 at length so violent, that Eudoxia herself, 
 frightened at the danger, pressed her hus- 
 band to recal him, and even wrote to Chry- 
 sostom a letter full of protestations of 
 sorrow and respect. Chrysostom was, 
 therefore, restored to his bishopric. But 
 the calm season lasted not long. A silver 
 statue of the einpress was solemnly erect- 
 ed in the street just before the great church 
 of St. Sophia. It was dedicated with 
 many heathenish extravagancies; and the 
 people used to meet there in sports and 
 pastimes, to the distraction of the congre- 
 gation. The bishop, iinpatient of these 
 things, blained them from the pulpit, and 
 with great imprudence began his sermon 
 after this manner : " Now again Herodias 
 rages and is vexed, again she dances, 
 again she desires John's head in a char- 
 ger."* 
 
 The enemies of the bishop could not 
 desire a greater advantage. And they im- 
 proved it to the utmost. Numbers w^ere 
 ready to gratify the resentment of Eu- 
 doxia. And Arcadius, overcome by im- 
 portunity, again ordered his deposition. 
 He was suspended and confined : His 
 friends and followers were dispersed, ri- 
 fled, killed, or imprisoned. Edicts were 
 issued, severely threatening all that re- 
 fused to renounce communion with Chry- 
 sostom. It was the season of Easter, 
 when the catechumens, who had been in- 
 structed, were to receive baptism. The 
 friends of Chrysostom fled into the fields 
 to keep the festival there. The emperor 
 
 * The rashness of Chrysostom in tliis affair 
 was so great, that I could not easily believe 
 this account. But I see the truth of the story 
 is coi>firmed by the authorily botli of Socrates 
 and Sozomen, and on consuhing them it does 
 not appear that any apology can be made for 
 the bishop. He certainly mixed not the wis- 
 dom of llie serpent with the innocence of the 
 dove. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. 
 
 377 
 
 himself went out that day into a meadow 
 adjoining to the city, and espied a fiekl 
 covered with white. These were the 
 catechumens who had been baptized the 
 nig-ht before, and had then their white 
 garments upon them, being near three 
 thousand in number. The emperor, being 
 told that they were a conventicle of here- 
 tics, ordered a party of soldiers to disperse 
 them. Several women of quality were 
 very rudely treated on this occasion, and 
 numbers were imprisoned and scourged. 
 Receiving at length a warrant, signed by 
 the emperor, to depart, Chrysostom ex- 
 horted the deaconesses to continue their 
 care of the church, and to communicate 
 _,, with the bishop who should 
 
 . „ •• „ be chosen bv common consent 
 torn retires . , . •'^ , , . , 
 
 from his 1'^ "^^ room,* and he retired 
 See. once more from his See, in the 
 
 year 404. 
 Arsacius, brother of Nectarius, being 
 appointed bishop in his stead, the i'riends 
 of Chrysostom, in opposition to the ad- 
 vice which he had given them, refused to 
 
 submit, and formed separate 
 Arsacius assemblies, and were severely 
 Bishop \n persecuted by the name of Jo- 
 his stead, annites. Among these friends 
 A D 404 ^^'^^ ^^ opulent lady, called 
 • * * ' Olympias, who had honoured 
 him abundantly, and appears to have 
 profited much by his ministry. She had 
 acted in the church as a deaconess, and 
 was now banished to Nicomedia, whence 
 she supplied the exiled prelate with mo- 
 ney. Here she lived many years, an ex- 
 ample of piety, 
 
 Chrysostom himself was conveyed to 
 Cucusus in Armenia, a barren cold re- 
 gion, infested with robberjr, and mourn 
 fully marked already with the murder of 
 
 Paul, the former bishop of 
 Chrysos- Constantinople. His journey 
 torn is con- ^^ ^j^j^ ^jj^^g ^^^^ attended 
 
 CuJu'susin ^^'i.t'i ™^"y grievous hard- 
 Armenia. ships, though sweetened with 
 the compassionate care of va- 
 rious persons, who keenly sympathized 
 with injured innocence. At Cucusus, 
 however, he met with very generous 
 treatment. Here he preached frequently 
 to a people who heard him gladly. A 
 grievous famine raging in those parts, he 
 was enabled, by the liberality of Olym- 
 
 * Hence it is evident, that the appearance 
 of a popular election of bishops was still kept 
 up at Constantinople ; but it could only be the 
 appearance. 
 
 2 i2 
 
 pias, to relieve the poor. And he re- 
 deemed many captives which had been 
 taken by the Isaurian robbers. He had 
 formerly conceived a plan for converting 
 the Pao-ans which were still in Phoenicia, 
 and had made some progress in it. But 
 understanding that the design had met 
 with a check, he an'ain made vigorous at- 
 tempts for the support of so good a work, 
 and ordered sums of money for the erec- 
 tion of churches, and the support of mis- 
 sionaries. He seemed to recover his 
 health for a time, but winter approaching 
 he felt the usual effects of that season on 
 persons of weak constitutions. His sto- 
 mach had unhappily received much inju- 
 ry from the austerities of his youth, and 
 never recovered its tone. The next spring 
 he recruited, but always obliged to ob- 
 serve the strictest retrimen.* 
 
 At Constantinople, Atticus was chosen 
 to succeed Arsacius, who died in the year 
 405, and the Joannites were . 
 still persecuted in the Eastern ^j^f ^'"^ 
 church. Chrysostom himself ' 
 
 was obliged to move from A. . ; 
 place to place on account of ^^^ Atti- 
 danger from robbers, and, as cus sue- 
 
 • CfGflS to 
 
 he wrote to Innocent, bi- ^^^^ g^^ 
 shop of Rome, who sincerely, 
 though unsuccessful!}'^, laboured in his 
 cause, he was in the third year of his 
 banishment, exposed to famine, pesti- 
 lence, war, continual sieges, an incredi- 
 ble desolation, to death every day, and to 
 the Isaurian swords. 
 
 His enemies, beholding with an evil 
 eye, the respect every where paid to him, 
 procured an order for him to be removed 
 to Pityus, the very shore of the Black 
 Sea. In his way thither, he was brought 
 to an Oratory of Basiliscus, who had suf- 
 fered martyrdom under Dioclesian's per- 
 secution. Here he desired to rest, but 
 his guards, who had all along treated him 
 with brutish ferocity, refused him the in- 
 
 * This great imbecility was one reason why 
 he had always dined alone, when bishop of 
 Constantinople. It is well known, that to 
 persons of liis weak habit, the attendance at 
 feasts and entertainments is one of the severest 
 punisliments. Chrysostom had still more 
 weighty reasons for his recluseness; the sump- 
 tuousness of Constantinople was in a manner 
 proverbial, and he tliought it his duty to check 
 it. If any thing can add to the wickedness of 
 those accusations which drove him from his 
 See, it is, that he was charged with pride for 
 dining in solitude. Yet he had been very hos- 
 pitable to the poor, and was an uncomraou 
 pattern of beneficence and liberality. 
 
378 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 A. D. 407. 
 
 dulgence. Nature was however exhaust- 
 ed : he had not gone four miles, before he 
 was so extremely ill, that they were 
 oblifred to return with him. Here he re- 
 ceived the Lord's Supper, made his last 
 prayer before them all, and having con- 
 cluded with his usual doxology, " Glory 
 r-i .. „„ be to God for all events," he 
 
 torn dies breathed out his soul, in the 
 fifty-third year of his age, in 
 the year 407. The Joannites 
 continued their separate assemblies, till 
 the year 438, when Proclus, then enter- 
 ing on the See, put an end to the schism, 
 by making a panegyric on Chrysostom's 
 memory, and procuring an order from the 
 emperor Theodosius II. the son of Arca- 
 dius, that his body should be brought 
 back to Constantinojjle with great funeral 
 solemnity. He, who in his lifetime, had 
 met with so many enemies, was now uni- 
 versally esteemed and admired, and The- 
 odosius himself sincerely bewailed the 
 injury done to so excellent a personage 
 by his parents. 
 
 I have formerly observed, that the cor- 
 ruption of Christianity was deeper and 
 stronger in great cities than in the coun- 
 try. The bishopric of Damasus at Rome, 
 was an unhappy proof of this in the 
 West; and in the East, the bishopric of 
 Chrysostom, in the beginning of this 
 century, affords a lamentable proof of the 
 same thing. Never was there a more 
 striking confirmation of the truth of the 
 Christian doctrine, the original and na- 
 tive depravity of man. How often have 
 we been told, that whatever is said, in 
 the writings of the New Testament, of 
 the carnal mind, and its enmity against 
 God, of the wo denounced against those 
 of whom all men speak well, of the per- 
 secution which must be sustained by 
 those who love the Lord Jesus, belongs 
 only to the apostolical age, or at least to 
 the times preceding the era of Constan- 
 tino, when heathenism prevailed in the 
 Roman empire! Behold, the empire is 
 become Christian; idolatry and all the 
 rites of heathenism are subjected to legal 
 jjenalties ; the profession of the Gospel is 
 become exceedingly honourable; and the 
 externals of religion are supported by the 
 raunificence of emperors, and by the fa- 
 shion of the age, even with excessive 
 sumptuousness. Behold a bishop of the 
 first See, learned, eloquent beyond mea- 
 sure, of talents the most popular, of a ge- 
 nius the most exuberant, and of a solid 
 understanding by nature; magnanimous 
 
 and generous, liberal I had almost said to 
 excess, sympathizing with distress of 
 every kind, and severe only to himself; 
 a man of that open, frank, ingenuous tem- 
 per, which is so proper to conciliate 
 friendship ; a determined enemy of vice, 
 and of acknowledged piety in all his in- 
 tentions ! Yet we have seen him exposed 
 to the keenest shafts of calumny, expelled 
 with unrelenting rage by the united ef- 
 forts of the court, the nobility, the clergy 
 of his own diocese, and the bishops of 
 other dioceses. What is to be said 1 
 His successor Atticus lived long in peace ; 
 and, by a cautious conduct preserved the 
 good will of men in general ; though he 
 had joined in the persecution of Chrysos- 
 tom. Sisinnius too, the Novatian, had 
 in a degree joined in the same opposition. 
 Both these men, however, by elegant and 
 affable manners, conciliated the good will 
 of man, and seem to have passed through 
 life without any persecution. Whether 
 men are of the general church, or of the 
 dissenters, it matters not: the favourer 
 the enmity of mankind depends not on 
 such external distinctions. What either 
 of these two did in opposing sin, I know 
 not ; nor is there enough recorded of them 
 to fix their characters with certainty. 
 With Chrysostom, who was evidently 
 their superior in holiness and virtue, we 
 have seen how hard it fared. He was 
 choleric, and too vehement, no doubt; but 
 he knew the importance of divine things, 
 and v/as, therefore, much in earnest, and 
 the best charity was, doubtless, at the 
 bottom of all his zeal. If the world natu- 
 rally loved what was good, could it not 
 have thrown a candid veil over one fault, 
 the frequent attendant of the most upright 
 minds'? Should it lavish its favours on 
 men of ambiguous virtue and pusillani- 
 mous prudence 1 Certainly it seeth not 
 as God seeth ; it loves flattery and ap- 
 proves the decent appearance of virtue; 
 not plain truth, not genuine virtue. Such 
 seems the just conclusion from the case: 
 real godliness, under Christian as well as 
 heathen governments, is hated, dreaded, 
 and persecuted. And the important doc- 
 trine of our native depravity is confirmed 
 by such events, and proves itself to the 
 senses of mankind. 
 
 I miss my aim in this history, if I 
 show not the constant connexion between 
 the doctrines of the Gospel and holy prac- 
 tice. This connexion is sufficiently plain 
 in the history of Chrysostom ; though, 
 had he known divine truth more exactly. 
 
Ce-xt. v.] 
 
 JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. 
 
 379 
 
 and entered more experimentally into the 
 spirit of the Gospel, he would have been 
 more humble, and would have known 
 better how to govern his own temper. 
 
 This great man, however, though dead, 
 YET SPEAKS by his works. He laboured 
 much in expounding the Scriptures, and 
 though not copious in the exhibition of 
 evangelical truth, still he every where 
 shows that he loved it.* On those words 
 of the Apostle, that we might be made 
 the righteousness of God in him, he says, 
 "What a saying! — what mind can com- 
 prehend it? He made a just person a sin- 
 ner, that he might make sinners just. 
 But the Apostle's language is still strong- 
 er: He doth not say, he made him a sin- 
 ner, but sin, — that we might be made, 
 not righteous, but righteousness, even 
 the righteousness of God. For it is of 
 God, since not of works (which would 
 require spotless perfection) but by grace 
 we are justified, where all sin is blotted 
 out." Here is a plain testimony to the 
 Christian doctrine of justification, and 
 under this shelter, this holy man, no 
 doubt,. found rest for his own soul. 
 
 Those who think every thing too much 
 which is bestowed on a minister of Christ, 
 may read a just defence of the mainte- 
 nance of pastors, and a proper rebuke of 
 their own uncharitableness, in his com- 
 ment on Philippians, chapter the eleventh. 
 On the fourth chapter of Thessalonians, 
 in opening the Apostle's direction against 
 fornication, he forcibly rebukes the pru- 
 dential avarice of many parents, who 
 protract the marriage of their sons, till 
 they are far advanced in life. In the 
 mean time they are led into various temp- 
 tations ; and if they do marry afterwards, 
 are too much corrupted by vicious habits 
 to behave with that decorum in the mar- 
 riage-state, which they might have done 
 in more early life. He recommends, 
 therefore, early marriages; and the ad- 
 vice deserves the more attention, as coming 
 from a man, who often expresses his ad- 
 miration of the monastic life, which, how- 
 ever, he does without throwing any re- 
 proach on matrimony. 
 
 In occasionally speaking of that pas- 
 sage of St. Paul to the Romans, " it is 
 not of him that willeth, nor of him that 
 runneth,"! he introduces the doctrine of 
 free-will in the same manner as most of 
 the fathers did, who spake of it at all, 
 
 * Horn. 2, on 2d Epis. to Cor. chap. v. 
 
 t In his exposition on Hebrews, 7lh chapter. 
 
 from the days of Justin, and observes, 
 that the whole is said to be of God, be- 
 cause the greatest part is. So hard press- 
 ed is he with the plain words of the 
 Apostle, which are directly opposite to 
 the system he had imbibed. But Platonic 
 philosophy had done this mischief to the 
 Church, to the great hurt of Christian 
 faith and humility.* 
 
 The chief use of his Treatise on the 
 Priesthood, is to excite in young minds 
 a serious awe with respect to the danger 
 of miscarrying in an office so important 
 and so sacred, and to check the levity 
 and presumption with which so many 
 undertake it! He lays down, however, 
 some good views of the difficulty of steer- 
 ing clear of extremes, in suiting instruc- 
 tions to particular cases, in checking 
 impertinent curiosity, and in directing 
 the people to useful objects. 
 
 The practical views of this writer, so 
 far as ihey relate to the regulation of the 
 conduct, are the most striking. Having 
 lived in two great imperial cities, where 
 plays and shows were very frequent, he 
 earnestly inveighed against those disor- 
 ders. He calls the stage an academy of 
 incontinence. " What harm, say you, is 
 there in going to a play ] Is that suffi- 
 cient to keep one from the Communion ?" 
 I ask you, can there be a more shameless 
 sin, than to come to the holy table defiled 
 with adultery ] Hear the words of him 
 who is to be our Judge. Jesus Christ 
 saith, whosoever looketh on a woman to 
 lust after her, hath committed adultery 
 with her already in his heart. What can 
 be said of those, who passionately spend 
 whole days in those places, in looking 
 on women of ill-fame : with what face 
 will they pretend to say, they did not 
 behold them to lust after them? — They 
 see women adorned on purpose to inspire 
 lust. If, in the church itself, where 
 Psalms are sung, the Scripture is read, 
 and the fear of the Almighty appears, 
 lust will creep in like a thief, how shall 
 the frequenters of the stage| overcome 
 the motions of concupiscence? 
 
 * It may be worlli while just to mention, 
 that lie pathetically rebukes the sloth and 
 negligence ot parents and masters, who would 
 tlirow all tiie work of instruction on ministers, 
 and do nothing iheinstlves tor the s|)ii itual 
 benefit of thuir housL-hold. A plain thought, 
 but how true at this (lay ! 
 
 f Balls and public meetings of entertainment 
 are as much the objects of his indignation as 
 plays. Ciames of chance also he represents 
 as the occasions of blasphemies, losses, anger. 
 
380 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Augustine's confessions abridged. 
 
 From the latter end of the third century 
 to the former part of the fifth, we have 
 seen a gradual declension of godliness ; 
 and when we view, in the West, the in- 
 crease of monastic darkness and supersti- 
 tion ; in the East, the same evils to a still 
 greater degree, attended with such an aug- 
 mentation of iniquity, that even where 
 all the formalities of godliness are pre- 
 served, the power of it is hated and per- 
 secuted, in the same manner as by Pa- 
 gans; in fine, when the vestiges of 
 Christian truth are scarcely discernible, 
 we shall not be far amiss in pronouncing, 
 that, in such a state of Religion, the 
 wholesome effects of the first elfusion of 
 the Spirit of God are brought to a close. 
 It is evident, that real Christianity, 
 notwithstanding its nominal increase un- 
 der Christian emperors, must soon have 
 been extinct, if God had not interposed 
 with a second great effusion of his Spirit. 
 He did so in the course of the fifth cen- 
 tury, and the Church rose again from its 
 ruins in one part at least of the Empire.* 
 It behoves us to attend to this gra- 
 cious display of divine goodness; and 
 for this purpose, we must look back into 
 the last century, to trace the secret 
 springs of this dispensation. They par- 
 ticularly involve the private life of Au- 
 gustine, bishop of Hippo. He was the 
 great instrument of reviving the know- 
 ledge of evangelical truth. By a very 
 remarkable work of divine grace on his 
 own soul, he was qualified to contend 
 with the growing corruptions. It is a 
 happy circumstance, that we have, in his 
 Confessions, a large and distinct account 
 of his own conversion. And who could 
 relate it like himself? — I proceed to give 
 an account of these Confessions: the pro- 
 priety and importance of so long a detail 
 will afterwards appear.f 
 
 Augustine,'' s Confessions Abridged. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 Thou art great, Lord, and most wor- 
 thy to be praised; great is thy power, 
 and of thy wisdom there is no end. A 
 man, a portion of thy creation, wishes to 
 praise thee, a man carrying about him 
 his mortality, carrying about him the 
 evidences of his sin, and a testimony 
 that thou resistest the proud ; even such 
 a man wishes to praise thee. Thou ex- 
 citest him, that he should delight to 
 praise thee. For thou hast made us for 
 thyself, and our heart is restless till it 
 finds rest in thee. 
 
 Who shall give me to rest in thee? 
 that thou mayest come into my heart, 
 and inebriate it, that I may forget my 
 own evils, and embrace thee, my only 
 good ■? What art thou to me 1 Pity me, 
 that I may speak. What am I to thee, 
 that thou shouldst command me to love 
 thee, and be displeased with me, if I do 
 not, and threaten me with the greatest 
 miseries'? Is that itself a small misery, 
 to be destitute of the love of thee? Alas ! 
 alas ! tell me, by thy compassions, O 
 Lord, my God, what art thou to me? 
 Say unto my soul, i am thy salvation. 
 So speak, that I may hear. Behold ! the 
 ears of my heart are before thee, O Lord ; 
 open them, and say unto my soul, i am 
 thy salvation. May I run after this 
 voice and apprehend thee. Hide not 
 THY FACE from ME. May I Ale,* that I 
 may see it, lest I die indeed. My soul 
 is a habitation too narrow for thy entrance ; 
 do thou enlarge it. It is in ruins ; do 
 thou repair it. It has what must offend 
 thine eyes, I know and must confess : 
 but who shall cleanse it? or to whom 
 shall I cry but to thee? Cleanse me 
 
 FROM MY SECRET FAULTS, AND KEEP ME 
 FROM PRESUMPTUOUS SINS. I BELIEVE, AND 
 
 THEREFORE SPEAK. Lord, thou kuowest : 
 
 quarrels, and all manner of crimes. Du Pin. 
 Chrysostom. 
 
 The trutli is, men who really fear God, in 
 all ages have been united against these tilings ; 
 and ^for this reason, whicii is felt by them, 
 though not by others, namely, thatthey have too 
 serious a conflict with indwelling sin, to give 
 themselves up to external incitements of evil. 
 
 * The Western, as will appear in the course 
 of the narrative. 
 
 t The life of this great man was written by 
 Possidius, sometimes called Possidonius, a 
 
 pious presbyter of his diocese, afterwards bi- 
 sliop of Calama. Though poorly written, it 
 yet deserves to be mentioned, as it confirms 
 the autlienticity of the historical parts of the 
 Confessions. Augustine was born in the city 
 of Tagasta in Numidia, of creditable parents. 
 His father, Patricius, continued a Pagan till 
 near his death ; his motlier, Monica, was re- 
 nowned for Christian Piety. At the time of 
 his full conversion to the Gospel he was up- 
 wards of thirty years of age. 
 
 PossiD. Life of August. 
 * He seems to wish to undergo any mortifi- 
 cation, even loss of life itself, rather than lose 
 the enjoyment of his God. 
 
Cest. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 381 
 
 Have I not confessed to thee my sins, and 
 hast not thou pardoned the iniquity of 
 my heart] I will not contend in judo^- 
 ment with thee, who art truth itself: for 
 I would not deceive myself. I will not 
 contend in judirment with thee, for if 
 thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, who 
 can stand'?* 
 
 But, suffer me to speak, who am dust 
 and ashes. Suffer me to speak, because 
 I address thy mercy, and not the scorn- 
 fulness of proud men. Perhaps thou de- 
 rides! the simplicity of my thoughts, yet 
 wilt thou turn and exercise compassion 
 upon me. What else would I say, O 
 Lord, my God, than that I know not 
 whence I came hither into this, — shall I 
 call it mortal life, or living death ? Thy 
 compassionate consolations supported me, 
 and thou gavest me the nourishment of 
 infancy. 
 
 Hear me, God. Wo to the sins of 
 man I Thou pitiest him, because thou 
 madest him, and madest not sin in him. 
 Who shall inform me of the sin of my in- 
 fancy ■? For none is clear from sin in thy 
 sight, not even the infant, whose life is 
 only one day. Could it be right in me 
 to solicit with tears, what it would be 
 noxious to receive ; to express vehement 
 indignation against my parents and bet- 
 ters, if they did not comply with my will ; 
 and to endeavour, though with feeble 
 blows, to avenge myself upon them'? 
 The imbecility of my infant limbs was 
 innocent, not so the spirit of the infant. 
 I have seen and observed an infant full of 
 envy ; pale with anger, he looked at his 
 fellow-suckling with bitterness in his 
 countenance. Since I was conceived in 
 iniquity, and my mother nourished me in 
 her womb in sin, where. Lord, where, or 
 when was I innocent? But I pass by 
 this whole time, no traces of which I re- 
 collect, f 
 
 What miseries. Lord, did I experience, 
 when I was directed, in the plan of my 
 educatioi^ to obey my teachers, in order 
 
 • It is obvious to observe, how a mind like 
 
 Augustine's, altogether resting on grace, an(] 
 free justification, is freed from tiie solicitude 
 of self-vindication in any piivt of iiis conduct^ 
 whereas, those who rest for salvation, in any 
 degree on tliemselves, are ever tennjted to 
 extenuate their sins. 
 
 -j- The serious reader will not be inclined to 
 pass ovei', in levity, these stiiking proofs of 
 the sinful propensity of nature exerting itself 
 antecedent to the growth of reason or the power 
 of habit. 
 
 that I might acquire that knowledge, 
 which might be subservient to the attain- 
 ment of false riches and honour ? Yet, I 
 sinned ; O thou, who ordaincst all things, 
 except our sins; I sinned in rebellion 
 against the orders of parents and masters. 
 That literature which they wished me to 
 acquire, with whatever intention, was yet 
 capable of being applied to a good use. 
 !My disobedience arose not from the love 
 of better things, but from the love of play, 
 and from a fondness for games and shows. 
 Behold these things with an eye of mercy, 
 and deliver us who now call on thee ; de- 
 liver also those who do not call on thee 
 as yet, that they may call on thee, and 
 experience thy deliverance I ! 
 
 I had heard from childhood of the eter- 
 nal life promised unto us through the hu- 
 mility of the Lord our God condescending 
 to our pride. Thou sawest, when I was 
 yet a boy, and seemed to be on the brink 
 of death, through a sudden and violent 
 pain of the stomach, with what eagerness 
 I begged Christian baptism from the 
 charity of my mother and of the church. 
 My mother, who travailed in birth for my 
 eternal salvation, was hastening to com- 
 ply with my desires, that I might wash 
 away my sins, confessing thee, O Lord 
 Jesus ; when I suddenly recovered my 
 health. A relapse into presumptuous sin, 
 after baptism, being judged more dan- 
 gerous, and the prospect of life admitting 
 too great a probability of such relapse, 
 my baptism was still deferred. Thus did 
 I at that time believe in Christ, my father 
 being the only infidel in our family. My 
 mother was zealous that thou shouldst 
 be my Father, rather than he : and in this 
 she was favoured with thy help : obedi- 
 ent as she was to her husband, according 
 to thy command, in this point she pre- 
 vailed over him. Was the delay of my 
 baptism for my benefit? What is the 
 cause, that we hear every where such 
 sounds as these, let him do what he 
 
 WILL, he is not yet BAPTIZED. HoW 
 
 much better for me, had I been, in more 
 early life, initiated into the fold of Christ !* 
 
 * The narrative before us may justly be 
 called a history of the usual operations of the 
 Spirit of (iod on his ])eople. Convictions in 
 early life, on remarkable occasions, are com. 
 mon among these, and usually wear a\va)',as in 
 the case of Augustine. The examples of Con- 
 stantine and Constantius deferring their bap- 
 tism, seems to have made the practice fashion- 
 able, not from any idea of the unlawfulness of 
 infant baptism, but from the selfish and perni- 
 
382 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 Yet, in childhood itself, though little 
 dreaded by my mother, in comparison of 
 the dangers of youth, I was indolent; and 
 I improved in learning only through ne- 
 cessity. A false worldly ambition Avas 
 the only motive laid before me by my 
 teachers; but thou, who numberest the 
 hairs of our heads, improvedst their error 
 to my advantage, whilst thou justly 
 punishedst the great sins of so young an 
 offender by their corrections. The learn- 
 ing, which with no holy intention they 
 taught me, was sanctified by thee, and 
 my guilty laziness was scourged. So hast 
 thou ordained, that a mind disordered by 
 sin should be its own punishment. 
 
 But why I hated Greek literature, in 
 which I was instructed when very young, 
 I do not even yet sufficiently understand. 
 For I was fond of Latin learning, not in- 
 deed the first rudiments, but those things 
 which classical masters teach. To read 
 and write, and learn arithmetic, would 
 have been as severe drudgery to my spirit, 
 as all the Greek literature. I lay this 
 also to the account of my native depravi- 
 ty, which prefers the worse, and rejects 
 the better. The uses of reading, writing, 
 and. arithmetic, are obvious ; not so the 
 study of the wanderings of jEneas, which 
 I attended to while I forgat my own. — 
 Of what use was it to deplore the 
 self-murdering Dido, while yet I could 
 bear unmoved the death of my own soul, 
 alienated from thee daring the course of 
 these pursuits, — from thee, my God, my 
 life. O thou light of my heart, and bread 
 of my inward man, and true husband of 
 my soul ! I loved thee not. I committed 
 fornication against thee, and (such the 
 spirit of the world) I was applauded with 
 "well done" on all sides, and I should 
 have been ashamed to have been found 
 otherwise disposed. Yet the friendship 
 of the world is fornication against thee. 
 This is the kind of literature, which has 
 arrogated to itself the name of polite and 
 liberal. Learning, of real utility, is look- 
 ed on as low and vulgar. Thus, in my 
 childhood did I sin by a vicious prefer- 
 ence. Two and two make four, was to 
 me an odious sing-song ; but the wooden 
 horse, the burning of Troy, and the ghost 
 of Creusa, were most enchanting specta^ 
 
 cious notions which lie has stated. No won- 
 der that he who justly thought that his own 
 Boul had suffered much hy the delay, was af- 
 terwards a strenuous asserter of the expedien- 
 cy of more early haptism. 
 
 cles of vanity. Yet why did I hate Greek 
 literature, when employed in the same 
 sort of objects? Homer is most agreea- 
 bly trifling; to me, however, when a boy, 
 he was by no means agreeable. I sup- 
 pose Virgil would be the same to Grecian 
 youths, on account of the difficulties of 
 learning a foreign language. Discipline 
 is needful to overcome our puerile sloth, 
 and this also is part of thy government of 
 thy creatures, O God, for the purpose of 
 restraining our sinful impetuosity. From 
 the ferulas of masters to the trials of mar- 
 tyrs, thy wholesome severities may be 
 traced, which tend to recal us to thee 
 from that pernicious voluptuousness, by 
 which we departed from thee. 
 
 Hear my prayer, O Lord, let not my 
 soul faint under thy discipline, nor let me 
 faint in confessing to thee thy mercies, 
 by which thou hast delivered me from all 
 my own evil ways ; that thou mayest en- 
 dear thyself to me, above all the blan- 
 dishments which I was following, and 
 that I may love thee most ardently, and 
 embrace thy hand with all my heart, that 
 thou mayest free me from all temptation, 
 even to the end. O my King and my 
 God, may whatever useful thing I learnt 
 when a boy, serve thee ; may -what I 
 speak and read and number, serve thee ; 
 because while I was learning vain things, 
 thou gavest me thy discipline, and in 
 those vain things forgavest the sins of my 
 delights. For in them I learnt many use- 
 ful words, though they might have been 
 learned, abstracted from this connexion 
 with vanity. 
 
 Alas ! the torrent of human custom ! 
 who shall resist thee 1 How long will it 
 be, ere thou be dried up 1 How long wilt 
 thou roll the sons of Eve into a great and 
 tempestuous sea, which even they, who 
 have fled for refoge to the cross, can 
 scarcely escape? Have not I read of 
 Jove, at once the thunderer and the adul- 
 terer ? What is this, but to teach men to 
 call their crimes no crimes, while they 
 have the sanction of gods whom they imi- 
 tate? Terence introduces a profligate 
 young man justifying his lewdness by 
 the example of Jove, while he beholds on 
 the wall a picture of Jupiter and Danae,* 
 and excites himself to lust by divine tui- 
 tion. Shall He, who shakes heaven 
 
 WITH HIS THUNDER, DO THESE THINGS ; 
 AND MAY NOT I, A POOR MORTAL, DO THE 
 
 SAME ? Yet I, my God, now indulged by 
 
 * Terence in Eunuch. 
 
Cejtt. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS, 
 
 383 
 
 thy grace to behold thee in peace, learnt 
 these things with pleasure, was delighted 
 with them, and was called a boy of pro- 
 mising genius. The motives of praise 
 and disgrace then spurred on my restless 
 heart to literary exertions. What accla- 
 mations were made to a puerile exercise 
 of mine on a particular occasion! Were 
 not all these things smoke and wind 1 
 Was there not another way of exercising 
 my talents, — in celebrating ihy praise] 
 But, what wonder, that I departed far 
 from thee, my God, when men were pro- 
 posed to me as objects of imitation, who 
 would blush to be detected in barbarism 
 or solecism, in reciting their own actions, 
 though innocent; and at the same time 
 might recite the story of their own lewd- 
 ness, not only with impunity, but even 
 with commendation, provided they did so 
 with a copious and elegant flow of dic- 
 tion. O thou God of long-suffering, who 
 permittest men thus to affront thee ! Wilt 
 thou not deliver from this horrible pit the 
 soul that seeks thee, that thirsts after thy 
 delights, and says. Thy face. Lord, will 
 I seek] It was by the darkness of libi- 
 dinous affection that the prodigal son* 
 went to a great distance from thee, his 
 Father, gracious in bestowing on him thy 
 gifts ; and still more gracious to him 
 when returning in indigence. How stu- 
 diously exact are men in observing the 
 rules of letters and syllables, while they 
 neglect the rules of eternal salvation! 
 Thou dwellest on high, in inaccessible 
 light, and scatterest penal blindness on 
 unbridled lusts. A man shall seek the 
 fame of eloquence, while, before the 
 crowded audience, he guards against the 
 least false pronunciation, and guards not 
 at all against the fiercest malevolence of 
 his own heart, raging against his fellow- 
 creatures. 
 
 In this school did I wretchedly live. 
 To please men was then to me the height 
 of virtue, whilst I saw not the whirlpool 
 of baseness in which I was cast from thine 
 eyes. For what more filthy than I, all 
 this time, deceiving by innumerable false- 
 hoods both masters and parents, through 
 the love of play and amusements 1 I 
 even robbed the store-houses of my pa- 
 rents, either from the spirit of gluttony, 
 or to bestow things agreeable to my play 
 fellows. In my plays, I often sought to 
 obtain fraudulent victories, overcome by 
 the desire of vain excellence. Yet, what 
 
 should I dread so much to suffer, or be 
 so ready to accuse, in another, if detected, 
 as that very thing which I did to others; 
 in which, however, if I myself was de- 
 tected, I was more disposed to rage than 
 to submit. Is this puerile innocence? far 
 from it, O Lord. Change the scene only 
 from pedagogues and masters, from nuts 
 and balls, and sparrows, to prefects, kings, 
 gold, and estates, and we see the vices of 
 men, just as heavier punishments succeed 
 to ferulas. 
 
 Still, O Lord, in my childhood I have 
 much to praise thee for. Many, many 
 were thy gifts ; the sin was mine that I 
 sought pleasure, truth, and happiness, not 
 in thee, but in the creature, and thence 
 rushed into pains, confusions, and errors. 
 I thank thee, O my delight and confi- 
 dence, for thy gifts ; but do thou preserve 
 them for me, and the things which thou 
 hast given me shall be increased and per- 
 fected, and I shall be with thee, because 
 thou hast given me to be so.* 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 I AM willing to recollect the scenes of 
 baseness and carnal corruption which I 
 passed through in my youth, not that I 
 may love them, but that I may love thee, 
 my God. I do it from the love of thy 
 love, recollecting my own very evil ways 
 in the bitterness of memory, that thou 
 mayest be endeared to me, O Delight 
 that never deceives; Delight happy and 
 secure ; thou which coUectest and bind- 
 est together the dispersed parts of my 
 
 * Luke XV. 
 
 * ll is a very unjust surmise of .Mr. Gibbon, 
 to infer from Augustine's unwillingness to 
 learn Greek, that he never attained the know- 
 ledge of that language; wlien he tells us, tliat 
 he was doubtless a person of uncommon (luick- 
 ness of parts. His slotli and oilier vicious 
 practices in childhood were, I suppose, such 
 as are common to children. But few are dis- 
 posed to look on them as serious evils. To 
 Augvistine's mind they appeared what they 
 were, the marks of an apostate nature. 
 Though, since the destruction of Pagan idola- 
 try, there is by no means tlie same danger of 
 reading classic authors, yet how justly blama- 
 ble is the practice of leading boys so much to 
 lewd poets, instead of acquainting them with 
 the more solitl excellencies of many prose 
 authors? A. just selection of the most inno- 
 cent and useful auliioi s, and a perpetual com- 
 parison ot'tlieir sentiments with those of Chris- 
 tianitv, will not only guai-d against the poison 
 of the classics, but instruct youth in the neces- 
 sity and importance of Revelation. School- 
 masters, as well as children, may learn, in 
 what we have seen, just matter of rebuke for 
 exulting literary above moral excellence. 
 
384 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 broken soul. While averse from thee, 
 the only God, I vanished into a variety 
 of vanities !* For in my youth I even 
 burned to be satiated with forbidden plea- 
 sures, and became as rottenness in thy 
 sight, while I pleased myself, and desired 
 to please the eyes of men. 
 
 What was it that I delighted in, but 
 to love and be beloved'? But by the ex- 
 cess of passion, the serenity of affection 
 was not distinguished from the darkness 
 of lust. My tender years vrere hurried 
 along through the whirlpool of flagitious- 
 ness? Thy displeasure was all the time 
 embittering my soul, and I knew it not. 
 The noise of my carnal chains, and the 
 punishment of my pride, rendered me 
 deaf to thy voice : I went far from thee, 
 thou sufTeredst it: I was tossed and agi- 
 tated ; and 1 overflowed with the ebulli- 
 tions of lewdness, and thou wast silent, 
 
 my too tardy joy ! At that time thou 
 wast silent, and I wandered deeply from 
 thee among many barren seeds of woes, 
 in a state of proud degradation, and rest- 
 less weaiiness. Thy omnipotence is not 
 far from us, even when we are very far 
 from thee ; I might have heard thy voice, 
 recommending a single life devoted to 
 God, allowing indeed matrimony, and 
 frowning on lewdness.f But I burst all 
 legal bonds, yet escaped not thy scourges; 
 — who of mortals can? For thou wast al- 
 ways prescnt,severely merciful, mixingall 
 my unlawful delights with bitter alloys, 
 that I might seek for pleasure without 
 alloy or obstacle, and not be able to find 
 the possibility of this, but in thee ; thee, 
 
 1 say, O Lord, who connectest pain with 
 the breach of thy laws, who smitest that 
 thou mayest heal, and slayest us that we 
 may not die from thee. Where was I, 
 and how long did I live in exile from thy 
 house, in that sixteenth year of my age, 
 when the madness of lust seized me al- 
 together, and I willingly suffered the 
 reins to fall from my hands'? To the dis- 
 grace of our nature, this species of lust 
 is every where tolerated, though forbid- 
 den by the laws.:!: My friends took no 
 
 • Tlie beautiful thought, thus diffusively ex- 
 pressed ii\ oui- author's usuhI maimer, is hap- 
 pily painted in a single word by tiie Psalmist, 
 UNITE my ikeart to fear thy name. Psalm 
 Ixxxvi. 11, t 1 Cor. vii. 
 
 ^ Would to God that this were not the case 
 in Christian countries, as well as Pagan ! If 
 the reader feel himself inclined to ti'eat with 
 levity the serious mannei- in wliicii juvenile 
 vjces are treated by the author, he will, when 
 
 pains to bridle me by the wholesome re- 
 straint of marriage; their anxiety was, 
 that 1 should acquire the arts and graces 
 of eloquence. 
 
 That year I had vacation from my stu- 
 dies, being returned from Madaura, a 
 neighbouring city, where I had begun to 
 learn oratory, to my father's house at 
 Tagasta. He, with a spirit above his 
 circumstances, for he was but a poor 
 freeman of the town just mentioned, de- 
 termined to send me to Carthage, that I 
 might have the greatest advantages of 
 proficiency. Why do I relate these things 
 before thee, my God, to my fellow-crea- 
 tures, the f^w of them, who may read 
 these lines'? — ^That both I and they may 
 consider out of how great a depth it be- 
 hoves us to cry to thee. And what is 
 nearer than thine ears, if the heart con- 
 fide in thee, and the life flow from faith '? 
 Who did not then extol the noble spirit 
 of my father, laying out so much money 
 on the education of his son; a spirit, so 
 much superior to that of many much 
 richer citizens, who had not the heart to 
 send their sons to Carthage'? While yet 
 he had no concern in what manner I 
 grew up to thee. Whether I was chaste 
 or not, cost him no thought, provided I 
 was eloquent. In this year of va^^ation 
 my passions were rampant without con- 
 trol. This pleased my father, who ex- 
 pressed his pleasure on the occasion to 
 my mother. She had lately begun to 
 feel thy holy love, and had been washed 
 in the laver of regeneration. He was a 
 catechumen in profession. Instantly, she 
 conceived a pious trepidation on my ac- 
 count. My God, thou spakest to me by 
 her, and warnedest me strongly against 
 the ways of vice. Thy voice in her I 
 despised, and thought it to be only the 
 voice of a woman, which made not the 
 least impression on my mind. So blind- 
 ed was I, that I should have blushed to 
 be thought less wacked than my compa- 
 nions, and even invented false stories of 
 my sinful exploits, to obtain their com- 
 mendation. My pious parent was pre- 
 vented from encouraging me to marry, 
 because she thought the usual studies, 
 which I was now to enter upon, might 
 be serviceable to promote in me the work 
 of true religion. My father thought lit- 
 
 better informed of the malignity of sin, con- 
 demn his own taste, not tiiat of Augustine. 
 The same contrast may he extended to the 
 case of his theft, which follows. 
 
Cest. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 385 
 
 tie of thee, but much of his son in vain 
 expectations. Thus vviiile they both were 
 too anxious for my literary improvements, 
 I made progress in vice, and shut myself 
 up in the darkness of sin, so as to bar up, 
 against myself, the admission of thy 
 truth as much as possible. 
 
 Thy law certainly punishes theft, O 
 Lord, and so does the law* writtex in 
 the hearts of men. For, what thief can 
 bear another? Yet, compelled by no 
 want, I deliberately committed theft ; 
 through the wantonness of iniquity and 
 the contempt of justice. It was not the 
 effect of the theft, but the sin itself, 
 which I wished to enjoy. There was a 
 pear-tree in the neighbourhood of my 
 father's vineyard, loaded with fruit, 
 though not of the most tempting kind. 
 At dead of night, in company with some 
 profligate youths, I plundered the tree: 
 the spoil was principally thrown to the 
 hogs; for I had abundance of better fruit 
 at home. Behold my heart, my God, 
 behold my heart, which thou hast pitied 
 in its deep abyss of sin. What did I 
 mean, that I should be gratuitously wick- 
 ed? I loved destruction itself. In the 
 common course of wickedness men have 
 some end in view. Even Catiline him- 
 self loved not his crimes, but something 
 else, for the sake of which he perpetrated 
 them. We are deceived by appearances 
 of good, embracing the shadows, while 
 we follow our own lusts, instead of seek- 
 ing the substance, which is only in thee. 
 Thus, the soul commits fornication, when 
 it is turned from thee, and seeks, out 
 of thee, that pleasure, honour, power, 
 wealth, or wisdom, which it never will 
 find in its genuine purity, till it return 
 to thee. All, who remove themselves 
 far from thee, and set up themselves in 
 opposition, perversely imitate some attri- 
 bute of God; though even by such imitation 
 they own thee to be the Creator of the 
 universe. This is the general nature of 
 sin. It deceives by some fictitious sha- 
 dow of that good, which in God alone is 
 to be found. But what vicious or per- 
 verse imitation of my Lord was there in 
 my theft? lean conceive none, unless 
 it be the pleasure of acting arbitrarily 
 and with impunity against law ; — a dark 
 similitude of Omnipotence. O rotten- 
 ness ! O monster of life, and profundity of 
 death! Could I delisfht in what was not 
 
 * lie means the voice of natural conscience. 
 See Romans, ch. ii. ver. 15. 
 Vol. I. 2 K 
 
 lawful, merely because it was not lawful ? 
 What reward shall I give to the Lord, that 
 I can now recollect these things without 
 fear of damnation? I will love and bless 
 thee. Lord, because thou hast pardoned 
 such horrible evils. I impute it to thy grace 
 that thou hast melted my sins as ice is melt- 
 ed. I impute also to thy grace my exemp- 
 tion from those evils which I have not com- 
 mitted. For of what was I not capable, 
 who loved even gratuitous wickedness? 
 I am sensible that all is forgiven ; not 
 only the evils which I have actually com- 
 mitted, but also those evils which by thy 
 guidance I have been kept from commit- 
 ting. He who, called b}'' thee, hath 
 avoided the evils which he hears me 
 confessing, should not deride me a poor 
 patient healed by the Physician, since he 
 himself is indebted to the same Benefac- 
 tor for his health, or, to speak more pro- 
 perly, for his being afflicted with a less 
 degree of sickness. 
 
 the unsearchable seduction of per- 
 nicious friendship, the avidity of doing 
 mischief from sport, the pleasure of mak- 
 ing others suffer; and this without any 
 distinct workings, either of avarice or of 
 revenge! We hear others sajs Let us 
 go, let us do it, and we are ashamed to 
 appear defective in impudence. Who 
 can unfold to me the intricacies .f this 
 knot of wickedness ? It is filthy, I will 
 pry no more into it. I will not see it. 
 Thee will I choose, O righteousness and 
 innocence, light truly honourable, and 
 satiety insatiable ! With thee is perfect 
 rest, and life without perturbation. He 
 who enters into thee, enters into the joy 
 of his Lord, and shall not fear, and shall 
 be in the best situation in thee, the Best 
 of Beings. I departed from thee; I erred 
 and strayed, O my God, from thy firm 
 and upright ways ; and in my youth I 
 became to myself a region of desolation. 
 
 BOOK III. 
 
 1 CAME to Carthage surrounded and 
 agitated with flagitious lusts. After thee, 
 O^my God, the true bread of life, I hun- 
 gered not; and though famished with 
 real indigence, and longing after that 
 which satisfieth not, I had no desire for 
 incorruptible food, not because I was full 
 of it, for the more empty I was, the more 
 fastidious I grew. My sordid passions, 
 however, were gilded over with the de- 
 cent and plausible appearances of love 
 and friendship. Foul and base as I was, 
 I affected the reputation of liberal and 
 
386 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 polite humanity. I rushed into the lusts 
 with which I desired to be captivated. 
 My God, my mercy, with how great bit- 
 terness didst thou, in thy extraordinary 
 kindness, mix those vain allurements by 
 which I was miserably enslaved and 
 beaten ! for beaten I truly was with all 
 the iron rods of envy, suspicion, fear, in- 
 dignation, and quarrelling. The specta- 
 cles of the theatre, in particular, now 
 hurried me away, full of the images of my 
 miseries, and the fomentations of my fire. 
 The arts of the Fornm also engaged 
 my ambition; the more fraudulent the 
 more laudable. Pride and arrogance now 
 elated my soul, though I was far from 
 approving the frantic proceedings of the 
 men called eversores, who made a prac- 
 tice of disturbing modest pleaders, and 
 confounding their minds by riots. Amidst 
 these things, in that imbecility of judg- 
 ment which attends youth, I studied the 
 books of eloquence with the most ardent 
 desire of vain-glory, and in the course of 
 my reading dipped into the Hortensius 
 of Cicero, which contains an exhortation 
 to the study of philosophy. This book 
 was the instrument of effecting a remark- 
 able change in my views. I suddenly 
 gave up the fantastic hope of reputation 
 by eloquence, and felt a most ardent 
 thirst after wisdom. In the mean time, 
 I was maintained at Carthage at my mo- 
 ther's expense, being in the nineteenth 
 year of my age, my father having die'd 
 two years before. How did I long, my 
 God, to fly from earthly things to thee, 
 and yet I know not what thou wert doing 
 with me. At that time, O light of my 
 heart, though I was unacquainted with 
 the apostolical admonition, take heed, 
 
 LEST ANY MAN SPOIL YOU THROUGH PHILO- 
 SOPHY AND VAIN deceit;* thou knowest 
 what was the sole object of my delight 
 in the Ciceronian volume, namely, that I 
 was vehemently excited by it to seek for 
 wisdom, not in this or that sect, but 
 wherever it was to be found. And the 
 only thing which damped my zeal was, 
 that the name of Christ, that precious 
 name, which from my mother's milk I had 
 learned to reverence, was not there. And, 
 Avhatever was without this name, however 
 just, and learned, and polite, could not 
 wholly carry away my heart. I deter- 
 mined therefore to apply my mind to the 
 Holy Scriptures, to see what they were ; 
 and I now see the whole subject was im- 
 
 penetrable to the proud, low in appear- 
 ance, sublime in operation, and veiled 
 with mysteries; and my frame of heart 
 was such as to exclude me from it, nor 
 could I stoop to take its yoke upon me. 
 I had not these sensations when I attend- 
 ed to the Scriptures, but they appeared 
 to me unworthy to be compared with the 
 dignity of Cicero. My pride was dis- 
 gusted with their manner, and my pene- 
 tration could not enter into their meaning.* 
 It is true, those who are content to be 
 little children, find by degrees an illu- 
 mination of their souls ; but I disdained 
 to be a child, and elated with pride im- 
 agined myself to be possessed of manly 
 wisdom. 
 
 In this situation I fell in with the 
 Manichees, men who had in their mouths 
 the mere sound of Father, Son, and Holy 
 Ghost, and were always talking of the 
 TRUTH, THE TRUTH, and yet formed the 
 most absurd opinions of the works of na- 
 ture, on which subjects the heathen phi- 
 losophers far excelled them. O truth, 
 how eagerly did I pant after thee, while 
 they only used the word with their 
 mouths, or repeated it in many huge 
 volumes ! But they taught me to look for 
 my God in the Sun and Moon, and also 
 in a number of splendid phantasms of 
 their own creation. f I endeavoured to 
 feed on these vanities, but they being not 
 my God, though I then supposed so, I 
 was not nourished, but exhausted. How 
 far did I wander tlien from thee ! exclud- 
 
 * Coloss. ii. 
 
 * An excellent description of the usual ef- 
 fect of a liltle Scriptural study on a proud 
 mind, which, by the just judgment of God, is 
 given up to judicial infatuation and specious 
 delusion, in some way or odier. 
 
 t The Manichees, so called from Manes 
 their founder, had existed about a hundred 
 years. It would not be worth while to notice 
 them at all, were it not for their connexion 
 with the life of Augustine. Like most of the 
 ancient heretics, they abounded in senseless 
 whims, not worthy of any solicitous explana- 
 tion. This tliey had in common with the Pa- 
 gan Philosophers, that they supposed the su- 
 preme Being to be material, and to penetrate 
 all nature. Their grand peculiarity was to 
 admit of two independent principles, a good 
 and an evil one, in order to solve the arduous 
 question concerning die oi-igin of evil. Like 
 all heretics, they made a great i)aradeof seek- 
 ing truth with liberal impartiality, and were 
 dius qualified to deceive unwary spirits, who, 
 far from suspecting their own imbecility of 
 judgment, and regardless of the word of God, 
 and hearty prayer, have no idea of attaining 
 religious knowledge by any other method than 
 by natural reason. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 387 
 
 HUSKS WHICH THE 
 
 ed even from the 
 
 SWINE DID eat! For the fables of the 
 poets, which I did not believe, though I 
 was entertained with them, were prefer- 
 able to the absurdities of these lovers of 
 truth. Alas ! alas! by what steps was I 
 led into Satanic depths! Panting after 
 truth, I sought thee, my God, not in in- 
 tellectual, but in carnal speculations; for 
 I would confess all to thee, who didst 
 compassionate my misery, even while I 
 was hardened against thee. The Mani- 
 chees seduced me, partly with their subtle 
 and captious questions concerning the 
 origin of evil, partly with their blasphe- 
 mies against the Old Testament Saints.* 
 I did "not then understand, that though 
 the divine rule of right and wrong is im- 
 mutable in the abstract, and the love of 
 God and our neighbour is always indis- 
 pensably necessary, yet that there were 
 particular acts of duty adapted to the 
 times and seasons and circumstances in 
 which they were placed, which abstract- 
 ed from such consideration \yould be un- 
 lawful. In much ignorance I at that 
 time derided thy holy servants, and was 
 justly exposed to believe most ridiculous 
 absurdities. And thou sentest thy hand 
 from above, and freedst me from this 
 depth of evil, while my mother was 
 praying for me, more solicitous on ac- 
 count of the death of my soul, than other 
 parents for the death of the body. She 
 was favoured wiih a dream, by which 
 thou comfortedst her soul with hope of 
 my recovery. She appeared to herself 
 to be standing on a plank, and a person 
 came to her and asked her the cause of 
 her affliction; and on being answered, 
 that it was on my account, he charged 
 her to be of good cheer, for that where 
 she was, there also I should be. On 
 which she immediately beheld me stand- 
 ing by her on the same plank. Whence 
 was this but from thee, gracious Omni- 
 potent, who takest care of each and all 
 of us, as of single persons T When she 
 related this to rne, 1 endeavoured to 
 evade the force of it, by observing, that 
 it might moan to exhort her to be what I 
 was. Without hesitation she replied, it 
 was not said, where he is, there thou 
 
 shall be; but, where thou art, there he 
 shall be. Her prompt answer made a 
 stronger impression on my mind than the 
 dream itself. For nine years, while I 
 was rolling in the filth of sin, often at- 
 tempting to rise, and still sinking deeper, 
 did she in vigorous hope persist in inces- 
 sant prayer. I remember, also, that she 
 entreated a certain bishop to undertake to 
 reason me out of my errors. He was a 
 person not backward to attempt this, 
 where he found a docile subject. " But 
 your son," says he, "is too much elated 
 at present, and carried away with the 
 pleasing novelty of his, error, to regard 
 any arguments, as appears by the plea- 
 sure he takes in puzzling many ignorant 
 persons with his captious questions. Let 
 him alone ; only continue praying to the 
 Lord for him; he will in the course of 
 his study discover his error. I myself, 
 perverted by my mother, was once a 
 Manichee and read almost all their books, 
 and yet at length was convinced of my 
 error, without the help of any disputant." 
 All this satisfied not my anxious parent ; 
 with floods of tears she persisted in her 
 request; when at last he a little out of 
 temper on accovmt of her importunity, 
 said, "■ Begone, good woman ; it is not pos- 
 sible that the child of such tears should 
 perish." She has often told me since, 
 that this answer impressed her mind like 
 a voice from Heaven. 
 
 * The Manichees objected to the cliarae- 
 ters of Abraham, Isaac, Jacoh, Moses, David, 
 kc. on account of various actions allowed un- 
 der the dispensation of their times, hiU for- 
 bidden under tlie New Testament, and ihence 
 formed an argument against the Divinity ot 
 the Old Testament. 
 
 BOOK IV. 
 
 For the space of nine years, namely, 
 from the nineteenth to the twenty-eighth 
 year of my age, I lived deceived and de- 
 ceiving others, seducing men into various 
 lusts, openly by what are called the lib- 
 eral arts, and secretly by a false religion: 
 in the former proud, in the latter super- 
 stitious; in all things seeking vain glory, 
 even to theatrical applauses and conten- 
 tious contests; and to complete the dis- 
 mal picture, a slave to the lusts of the 
 flesh. So infatuated was I with the 
 Manichean follies, that I drew my friends 
 into them, and with them practised the 
 impieties of the sect. The arrogant may 
 despise me, and all who have never felt 
 a salutary work of self-humiliation from 
 thee, my God. But I would confess to 
 thee my own disgraces, for thy glory. 
 What am I, left to myself, but a guide 
 rashly conducting others to a precipice] 
 And when I am in a better state, what 
 am I, but an infant feeding upon thee, 
 the bread that perisheth not] What is 
 
388 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. U. 
 
 any man, since he is flesh 1 Let the 
 proud and the strong- despise us; but we 
 who are weak and poor would confess to 
 thee. 
 
 At this time I maintained myself by 
 teaching rhetoric ; and without fraud I 
 taught my scholars, not how to oppress 
 the innocent, but sometimes how to vin- 
 dicate the guilty. I lived also with one 
 woman, but without matrimony. At this 
 time I ceased not also to consult astrolo- 
 gers; nor could I be induced by the argu- 
 ments of a very sensible physician, nor 
 by the admonitions of my excellent friend 
 Nebridius, to reject these follies. 
 
 While I was teaching rhetoric in this 
 manner in my native town, I enjoyed the 
 friendship of a young man of my own 
 age, a school-fellow and companion from 
 infancy. Indeed there is no true friend- 
 ship, except thou cement it among those 
 who cleave to thee, through the love shed 
 abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, 
 which is given to us. But it was a 
 friendship too sweet, inflamed by the fer- 
 vour of similar studies. For I had drawn 
 him aside from the true faith, which he 
 held not in a deep and genuine manner, 
 into the Manichean follies, on account of 
 which my mother bewailed me. And lo ! 
 thou who pursuest thy fugitives, O God 
 of vengeance and source of mercies, and 
 convertest us to thyself by wonderful 
 methods, lo ! thou removedst him from 
 tills life, when I had scarcely enjoyed his 
 friendship a year after my return to Ta- 
 gasta. While he lay a long time sense- 
 less in a fever, and his life was despaired 
 of, he was baptized without his own 
 knowledge; a thing which I regarded 
 with great indifference, as not doubting 
 but he would retain my instructions which 
 had been instilled into his mind, rather 
 than that which had been applied to his 
 body, when he was ignorant of the mat- 
 ter. However, against all expectation he 
 recovered. As soon as I had an opportu- 
 nity of conversing with him, I attempted 
 to turn into ridicule his late baptism, in 
 which I expected his concurrence. But 
 he dreaded me as an enemy, and with 
 wonderful freedom suddenly admonished 
 me, that if I would be his friend, I should 
 drop the subject. Confounded at this un- 
 expected behaviour, I deferred the con- 
 versation, till he should be thoroughly 
 recovered. But he was removed from 
 my madness, that he might be saved with 
 thee, my God, and that I might have com- 
 fort afterwards in reflecting on his salva- 
 
 tion. In a few days the fever returned, 
 and he died. How miserable was my 
 life ! My country was a punishment, my 
 father's house a wonderful infelicity, and 
 whatever I had enjoyed in common with 
 him, without him was torment itself. I 
 found I could now no longer say. He will 
 come shortly, as I was wont to do. If I 
 said, Hope in God, my soul refused; for 
 the man whom I had lost was an object 
 preferable to the phantasm,* on which I 
 was bid to fix my hopes. Weeping alone 
 was sweet to me, and supplied the ab- 
 sence of my friend. 
 
 Wretched I now was, and wretched is 
 every soul that is bound by the friendship 
 of mortal things. Behold my heart, my 
 God, my hope, who cleansest me from 
 the contagion of such affections, and di- 
 rectest my eyes to thee, and pluckest my 
 feet out of the net. O madness! not 
 knowing how to love men as men. — O 
 foolish man ! bearing with no moderation 
 the lot of humanit}'. The load of misery 
 burdened me, which I knew thou alone 
 couldst cure; but I was unwilling and 
 impotent, because when I thought of thee, 
 I had only a shadowy idol before me. If 
 I attempted to throw my burden on thee, 
 it returned upon myself, as I found no- 
 thing that would support it. I fled how- 
 ever from my country, and came to Car- 
 thage. 
 
 Time, other objects, and other friend- 
 ships, gradually lessened my sorrow. 
 But happy is he who loves thee, and his 
 friend in thee, and his enemy for thy sake. 
 For he only loses no friend to whom all 
 are dear in him who is never lost ; and 
 Avho is he but our God, who made and 
 fills heaven and earth. None loses thee 
 but he who lets thee go ; and he who dis- 
 misses thee, whither does he fly, but from 
 the PROPITIOUS to the adverse 1 God of 
 power! turn us, and show thy face, and 
 we shall be saved. For, wherever the 
 soul of man turns itself, it fixes upon sor- 
 row, except in thee. Be not vain, my 
 soul, and make not the ear of thy heart 
 deaf with the tumult of vanity. The 
 word itself calls to thee to return ; there 
 is the place of rest not to be disturbed. 
 There with God fix thy mansion; there 
 entrust whatever thou hast, my soul, 
 when fatigued with vanities. If souls 
 please thee, love them in God, and carry 
 them with thee to him as many as thou 
 
 * He means the fantastic idea of God> which 
 is a Maiiicliee he had embraced. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 389 
 
 canst, and say to them, let us love him, 
 he made these things, and he is not far 
 off. The good ye love is from him, but 
 it will deservedly be bitter, if ye love it 
 to excess, deserting him. Ye seek a 
 happy life : he who is our life descended 
 hither and destroyed death. After his 
 descent, will ye not ascend and live] 
 But why ascend, since ye are too high 
 already] Come down, that ye may as- 
 cend to God. For by rising up against 
 him ye have fallen. Tell your friends 
 these things, that they may weep ; and 
 so take them with thee to God, if indeed 
 thou sayest these things from his Spirit, 
 and if indeed the fire of his love burn in 
 thee. 
 
 I made approaches to thee, O Lord, 
 and thou repelledst me, because thou re- 
 sistest the proud ; and what was prouder, 
 than to assert that I vv'as naturally what 
 thou art]* Alas! of what avail was it 
 that I understood the logic of Aristotle, 
 and what are called the liberal arts ! I 
 had, it is true, a facility of comprehen- 
 sion, and an acuteness in argumentation, 
 thy gift ; but I sacrificed not thence to 
 thee. Hence they were to me a curse, 
 and not a blessing. Yet, all this time, I 
 looked on thee as an immense lucid body, 
 of which I myself was a fragment. How 
 much better was it with thy children of 
 more tardy genius, who did not recede 
 from thy nest, but were fledged and grew 
 up in safety in thy Church, and nourished 
 the wings of love with the food of sound 
 faith I Lord our God, let us trust in the 
 shadow of thy wings. "Do thou carry 
 us to hoary hairs. "f When thou art our 
 strength, we have strength ; our own is 
 weakness. 
 
 BOOK V. 
 
 Receive the sacrifice of my confessions, 
 and heal all my bones, that they may say. 
 Lord, who is like unto thee ] The heart 
 that is shut against thee excludes not 
 thine eye, nor does the hardness of men's 
 hearts repel thine hand, but thou soften- 
 est them when thou pleasest, in compas 
 sion or in vengeance, and none can hide 
 himself from thy flame. But may my 
 soul praise thee, that it may love thee, 
 and may it acknowledge thy compas- 
 
 sions, that it may praise thee I Let men 
 be converted and seek thee; and behold, 
 thou art in the heart of those who confess 
 to thee, and cast themselves upon thee, 
 and in thy bosom deplore their evil ways ; 
 and thou in mercy wilt wipe away their 
 tears, that they may weep the more, and 
 rejoice in tears, because thou. Lord, re- 
 freshest and comfortest them. 
 
 In the sight of my God I will give an 
 account of the twenty-ninth year of my 
 age. A Manichee bishop, named Faus- 
 tus, had now come to Carthage, a great 
 snare of the devil, and many were en- 
 chanted by his eloquence, which though 
 I could not but commend, I yet distin- 
 guished from truth. Report had repre- 
 sented him as a very liberal and accom- 
 plished scholar. And as 1 had read many 
 things of the philosophers, I compared 
 them with the tedious fables of the Mani- 
 chees, and found the former more proba- 
 ble. Thou regardest, Lord, the humble; 
 the proud thou beholdest afar off. No 
 doubt the foretelling of eclipses, and other 
 things that might be mentioned, demon- 
 strate the truth of the philosophical sci- 
 ences in secular things. Unhappy is that 
 man who knows all these things and 
 knows not Thee; but blessed is he who 
 knows the'e, though he knows not these 
 things. But he who knows both thee 
 and them, is not happier on their account, 
 but on account of thee alone is happy, if 
 knowing thee he glorify thee as God, and 
 be thankful, and be not vain in his imagi- 
 nations. For, as he is in a better situa- 
 tion, who possesseth a tree, and is thank- 
 ful to thee for the use of it, though he 
 knows neither its height nor breadth, than 
 he who measures it, and counts all its 
 branches, and neither possesses it, nor 
 knows nor has learned his Creator; so 
 the believer, whose property all the riches 
 of the world are, and who having no- 
 thing, YET POSSESSETH ALT, THINGS, by 
 
 cleaving to thee whom all things serve, 
 is indisputably better than the most know- 
 ing natural philosopher upon earth, who 
 lives in the neglect of thee.* 
 
 Yet the rashness of the Manichee wri- 
 ter, who undertook to write of Astronomy, 
 though completely ignorant of the science, 
 ■ inexcusable, especially as he contended 
 
 IS 
 
 * In this blasphemy the Manichees followed 
 " the Pagan philosophers. They had no idea, 
 also, that God was a spirit. Hence our Au- 
 thor's long conflict, before he could form a 
 spiritual idea of God. 
 f Isaiah xlvi. 4. 
 
 2 k2 
 
 * An excellent comparison between the state 
 of an illiterate believer, who feeds on Christ by 
 (aith.and that of an accomplished man of science, 
 even of one skilled in speculative theology 
 among other branches of knowledge, but desti* 
 lute of spiritual life. 
 
390 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. IT. 
 
 that the Holy Ghost resided personally 
 in hira. The ignorance of a believer in 
 such subjects is very excusable ; even if 
 he fancy' his mistaken notions in natural 
 philosophy to be branches of religion. 
 But who can bear to hear a pretender: to 
 infallible inspiration vending absurdities 
 on the works of nature 1 Here then I had 
 my doubts concerning the divinity of 
 Manicheism, and in vain proposed them 
 to those of the sect whom I met with. 
 " You must wait till the all-accomplished 
 Faustus come to Carthage," was all the 
 answer I received. On his arrival I 
 found him an agreeable speaker, and one 
 who could deliver their dotages in a more 
 persuasive tone. But by this time I was 
 surfeited with these subjects, and I had 
 been taught by thee, my God, who hast 
 instructed me marvellously, but secretly, 
 that style and manner, however excellent, 
 were not the same thing as sound argu- 
 ment. The address, indeed, the pathos, 
 the propriety of language, and facility of 
 expression in clothing his sentiments, de- 
 lighted me ; but my mind was unsatisfied. 
 The proofs of ignorance in science which 
 I saw in Manicheism, connected with pre- 
 tensions to infallibility, staggered my 
 mind with respect to their whole system. 
 On freely conversing with him, I found 
 him possessed of an ingenuous frankness, 
 more valuable than all the subjects of my 
 investigation. He owned his ignorance 
 in all philosophy, and left me convinced 
 of it. Grammar alone, and some Cicero- 
 nian and other classical furniture, made 
 up his stock of knowledge, and supplied 
 him with a copiousness of diction, which 
 received additional ornament from his na- 
 tural vivacity of imagination. My hope 
 of discovering truth was now at an end : 
 I remained still a Manichee, because I 
 despaired of succeeding better on any 
 other plan. Thus that same Faustus, 
 who had been the snare of death to many, 
 was the first who relaxed my fetters, 
 though contrary to his own mtention. 
 ThyTiands, my God, in the secret of thy 
 providence, forsook not my soul : day and 
 night the prayers of my mother came up 
 before thee, and thou wroughtest upon 
 me in ways marvellous indeed, but secret. 
 Thou didst it, my God : for man's goings 
 ARE FROM THE LORD: and who affords 
 salvation but thy hand, which restores 
 what thou hast made 1 It was from thy 
 influence that I was persuaded to go to 
 Rome to teach, instead of Carthage. The 
 deep recesses of thy wisdom and mercy 
 
 must be confessed by me in this dispen- 
 sation. I understood, that at Rome a 
 teacher was not exposed to those turbu- 
 lent proceedings, which were so common 
 at Carthage. Thus the madness of one 
 set of men, and the friendship of others, 
 promising me vain things, were thy means 
 of introducing me into the way of life and 
 peace, and in secret thou madest use of 
 their perverseness and my own. Here I 
 detested real misery, there sought false 
 felicity. But the true cause of this re- 
 moval was at that time hidden both from 
 me and my mother, who bewailed me 
 going away, and followed me to the sea- 
 side ; but I deceived her, though she held 
 me close with a view either to call me 
 back, or to go along with me. I pretend- 
 ed that I only meant to keep company 
 with a friend till he set sail ; and with 
 difficulty persuaded her to remain that 
 night in a place dedicated to the memory 
 of Cyprian. But that night I departed pri- 
 vily; and she continued weeping and pray- 
 ing. Thus did I deceive my mother, and 
 SUCH a mother ! \^et was I preserved from 
 the dangers of the sea, foul as I was in 
 all the mire of sin, and a time was coming, 
 when thou wouldest wipe away my mo- 
 ther's tears, with which she watered the 
 earth, and even forgive this my base un- 
 dutifulness. And what did she beg of 
 thee, my God, at that time, but that I 
 might be hindered from sailing ? Thou, 
 in profound wisdom regarding the hinge 
 of her desire, neglectedst the particular 
 object of her present prayers, that thou 
 mightest gratify the general object of her 
 devotions. The wind favoured us, and 
 carried us out of sight of the shore when 
 in the morning she was distracted with 
 grief, and filled thine ears with groans and 
 complaints ; whilst thou, in contempt of 
 her violent agonies, hurriedst me along by 
 my lusts to complete their desires, and 
 punishedst her carnal desire with the just 
 scourge of immoderate griefs.* She loved 
 my presence with her, as is natural to 
 mothers, though in her the affection was 
 uncommonly strong, and she knew not 
 what joy thou wast preparing for her from 
 my absence. She knew not; therefore 
 she wept and wailed. Yet after she had 
 
 * It requires a mind well seasoned with 
 Christian discernment and humility, to admire in 
 all this the Providence of God working good 
 out of evil; to separate what is truly holy and 
 humble in the affections of our author's mother, 
 Crom what was really carnal and earlhly ; and 
 hence to discover the justness of his reflections. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 391 
 
 wearied herself in accusing my perfidy 
 and cruelty, she returned to her former 
 employment of praying for me, and went 
 home, while I went to Rome. 
 
 And there I was punished with the 
 scourge of bodily sickness, and I drew 
 nigh to hell, carrying the load of all my 
 sins, original and actual. For Christ had 
 not freed me from them by the body of 
 his flesh through death. For how could 
 a fantastic death, such as I, a INIanichee, 
 then believed his to be, deliver my soi.il ! 
 Whither must I have gone, had I at that 
 time departed hence, but to the fire and 
 torments worthy of my deeds, according 
 to the truth of thy appointment !* She 
 was ignorant of this, and yet prayed for 
 me, being absent. But ihou, every where 
 present, heardest her, and pitiedst me. 
 Still in the crisis of my danger, I desired 
 not thy baptism as I had done when a 
 boy : I had grown up to my own disgrace, 
 and madly derided thy medicine of hu- 
 man misery. How my mother, whose 
 affection both natural and spiritual to- 
 ward me was inexpressible, would have 
 borne such a stroke, I cannot conceive. 
 3Iorning and evening she frequented the 
 church, to hear thy word and to pray, and 
 the salvation of her son was the constant 
 burden of her supplications. Thou heard- 
 est her, O Lord, and performedst in due 
 season what thou hadst predestinated. 
 Thou recoveredst me from the fever, that 
 at length I might obtain also a recovery 
 of still greater importance. 
 
 The Manichees are divided into two 
 bodies, auditors, and elect. He, in whose 
 house I lodged, was of the former sort. I 
 myself was ranked among the latter. 
 With them I fancied myself perfectly sin- 
 less, and laid the blame of the evils I com- 
 mitted on another nature, that sinned with- 
 in me|, and my pride was highly gra- 
 tified with the conception. jMy attachment 
 to this sect, however, grew more lax, as 
 I found the impossibility of discovering 
 truth, and felt a secret predilection in fa- 
 vour of the academic philosophy, which 
 commends a state of doubt and uncertain- 
 ty.:]: My landlord, who had not so much 
 
 experience of the sect as I had, was ele- 
 vated with their fancies. I checked his 
 sanguine views ; and though the intimacy 
 I had contracted with this people (for a 
 number of them live at Rome) made me 
 backward to seek elsewhere for truth, I 
 was however little solicitous to defend the 
 reputation of their tenets. It was a deplora- 
 ble evil with me, that my prejudice was so 
 strono^ atjainst the Christian faith. When 
 I thought of thee, my God, I could not con- 
 ceive any thing but what was corporeal, 
 though of the most excellent subtil ty ; but 
 what was immaterial, appeared to be no- 
 thing. And here I seemed incurable in 
 error. I did not conceive it possible, that a 
 good Being should create an evil one, 
 and therefore chose to admit limits to the 
 infinite Author of Nature, by supposing 
 him to be controlled by an independent 
 evil principle. Yet, though my ideas 
 were material, I could not bear to think 
 of God being flesh. That was too gross 
 and low in my apprehensions. Thy only 
 begotten >Son appeared to me as the most 
 lucid part of thee, afforded for our salva- 
 tion. I concluded, that such a nature 
 could not be born of the Virgin Mary 
 without partaking of human flesh, which 
 I thought must pollute it. Hence arose 
 my fantastic ideas of Jesus,* so destruc- 
 tive of all piety. Thy spiritual children 
 may smile at me with charitable sympa- 
 thy, if they read these my confessions ; 
 such, however, were my views. Indeed, 
 while I was at Carthage the discourse of 
 one Helpidius had moved me in some de- 
 gree, who produced from the New Testa- 
 ment several powerful arguments against 
 their positions ; and their answer appeared 
 to me to be weak, which yet they did not 
 deliver openly, but in secret. They pre- 
 tended that the Scriptures of the New 
 Testament had been falsified by some, 
 who desired to insert Judaism into Chris- 
 tianity, but they themselves produced no 
 
 * Does the reader think this liarsh? Let him 
 consider whether it can be any thing else than 
 the want ofa firm belief of the word of God, and 
 a contempt of his holiness and authority, that 
 can make him think so, and he will do well to 
 applv the awful case to his own conscience. 
 
 t tvery human soul was supposed by the Ma- 
 nichees to have in it a mixture of the gi>od and 
 the evil principle. 
 
 t A very natural and common effect of rea- 
 
 soning pride. When a man attempts to discover 
 and adjust religious truth by leaning to his own 
 understiinding, he frequenlly finds scepticism the 
 sole result of his most painful investigations; and 
 every thing appears doubtful to him, except the 
 incompetency^ of liillcn man to understand these 
 things, and tfie projiriety of seeking a new na- 
 ture and a spiritual understanding from above. 
 If the errors of Maiiichcism appear very absurd, 
 there are other modes of deviation from Scrip- 
 ture truth, which would appear no less so, were 
 they as unfa.shionable in our times. 
 
 * It is evident that this sect comprehended in 
 it the fundamental errors of the Docile*, of whom 
 we have spoken repeatedly. 
 
392 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [CuAP.n. 
 
 uncorrupted copies.* Still did I pant 
 under those masses of materialism, and 
 was prevented from breathing the simple 
 and pure air of thy truth. 
 
 Some unexpected disadvantages in the 
 way of my profession laid me open to 
 any probable offer of employ in other parts 
 of Italy. From Milan, a requisition was 
 made to Symmachus, prefect of Rome, to 
 send a professor of rhetoric to that city. 
 By the interest of my Manichean friends 
 I obtained the honour, and came to Milan. 
 There I waited on Ambrose the Bishop, 
 a man renowned for piety through the 
 world, and who then ministered the bread 
 of life to thy people with much zeal and 
 eloquence. The man of God received me 
 like a father, and I conceived an affection 
 for him, not as a teacher of truth, which 
 I had no idea of discovering in thy Church, 
 but as a man kind to me ; and I studious- 
 ly attended his lectures, only with a cu- 
 rious desire of discovering whether fame 
 had done justice to his eloquence or not, 
 I stood indifferent and fastidious with re- 
 spect to his matter, and at the same time 
 was delighted with the sweetness of his 
 language, more learned indeed, but less 
 soothing and agreeable than that of Faus- 
 tus. In their thoughts there was no com- 
 parison ; the latter erred in Manichean 
 fallacies, the former taught salvation in 
 the most salutary manner. But salvation 
 is far from sinners, such as I then was, 
 and yet I was gradually approaching to 
 it, and knew it not. As I now despaired 
 of finding the way to God, I had no con- 
 cern with sentiment ; language alone I 
 chose to regard. But the ideas which 
 I neglected came into my mind, together 
 with the words with which I was pleased. 
 I gradually was brought to attend to 
 the doctrine of the bishop. I found rea- 
 son to rebuke myself for the hasty con- 
 clusions I had formed of the perfectly 
 indefensible nature of the law and the 
 prophets. A number of difficulties, start- 
 
 * The Manichees, like all other heretics, could 
 not stand belbre the Scriptures. They profess- 
 edly rejected the Old Testament, as helonsing 
 to the malignant principle; and when they were 
 pressed with the authority of the New, as cor- 
 roborating the Old, they pretended the New was 
 adulterated. Is there any new thing under the 
 sun ? Did not Lord Bolingbroke set up the autho- 
 rity of St. John against St. Paul? Have we not 
 heard of some pans of the Gospels as not genu- 
 ine, because they suit not Socinian views? Ge- 
 nuine Christian principles alone will bear the 
 test, nor fear the scrutiny of the whole word o( 
 God. 
 
 ed upon them by the Manichees, found 
 in the expositions of Ambrose a satisfac- 
 tory solution. The possibility of finding 
 truth in the Church of Christ appeared ; 
 and I began to consider by what argu- 
 luents I might convict Manicheism^of 
 falsehood. Could I have formed an idea 
 of a spiritual substance, their whole fa- 
 bric had been overturned, but I could not. 
 Moreover, I found that the philosophers 
 in general explained the system of nature 
 better than the Manichees. It seemed 
 shameful to continue in connexion with 
 a sect replete with such evident absurdi- 
 ties, that I could not but prefer to them 
 the Pagan philosophers, though I dared 
 not trust these with the healing of my 
 soul, because they were without the sav- 
 ing name of Christ. In conclusion, I de- 
 termined to remain a catechumen in the 
 church recommended to me by my pa- 
 rents, till I saw my way more clearly. 
 
 BOOK VI. 
 
 O Thou ! my hope from my youth, 
 where wast thou 1 Thou madest me wiser 
 than the fowls of heaven ; yet I walked 
 through darkness and slippery places. 
 My mother was now come to me, coura- 
 geous through piety, following me by 
 land and sea, and secure of thy favour in 
 all dangers. She found me very hopeless 
 with respect to the discovery of truth. 
 However, when I told her luy present 
 situation, she answered, that she believed 
 in Christ, that before she left this world 
 she should see me a sound believer. To 
 thee her prayers and tears were still more 
 copious, that thou wouldest perfect what 
 thou had St begun, and with much zeal 
 and affection she attended the ministry 
 of Ambrose. Him she loved as an angel 
 of God, because she understood that I 
 had broken off from Manichean con- 
 nexions through his means, and she con- 
 fidently expected me to pass from sick- 
 ness to health, though with a critical 
 danger in the interval. 
 
 She had been used to bring bread and 
 wine for the coiumemoration of the saints ; 
 and still retaining the African custom, 
 she was prohibited by the door-keeper, 
 understanding that the l)ishop had forbid- 
 den the practice. Another person would 
 not soon have been obej^ed, but Ambrose 
 was her favourite, and Avas himself 
 amazed at the promptitude of her obedi- 
 ence. The reasons of the prohibition 
 were, the fear of excess, and the danger 
 of superstition, the practice itself being 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 393 
 
 very similar to those of the Paj^ans.* In- 
 stead therefore of a canister full of the 
 fruits of the earth, she henceforward, on 
 the commemoration-days of the martyrs, 
 gave alms, according- to her ability, to the 
 poor, and received the Lord's Supper, if 
 it was celebrated on those occasions. Am- 
 brose himself was charmed with the fer- 
 vour of her piety and the amiableness of 
 her good works, and often brake out in 
 his preaching, when he saw me, congra- 
 tulating me Ihat I had such a mother, 
 little knowing what sort cf a son she 
 had, who doubted of all these things, and 
 even apprehended that the way of life 
 could not be found. Nor did I groan to 
 thee in prayer for help, being intent only 
 on study, and restless in discussions and 
 investigations. In a secular view, Am- 
 brose himself appeared to be a happy 
 man, revered as he was by the imperial 
 court; only his celibacy appeared tome 
 in a melancholy light. But what hope 
 he bore within, what struggles he had 
 against the temptations of grandeur, what 
 was his real comfort in adversity, his 
 hidden strength and joy derived from the 
 bread of Life, of these things I could form 
 no idea ; for I had no experience of them ; 
 nor did he know the fluctuations of my 
 soul, nor the dangerous pit in which I 
 was enslaved. It was out of my power 
 to consult him as I could wish, surround- 
 ed as he was with crowds of persons, 
 whose necessities he relieved. During 
 the little time in which he was from 
 them, (and the time was but little) he 
 either refreshed his body with food, or his 
 mind vith reading. Hence I had no op- 
 portunity to unbosom myself to him. A 
 few Mords of conversation sufficed not. 
 I expected in vain to find him at leisure 
 for a long conversation.! I profited, how- 
 ever, by his sermons. Every Lord's day 
 I heard him instructing the people, and I 
 was more and more convinced of the fal- 
 sity of the calumnies which those de- 
 ceivers had invented against the divine 
 books. And when I found, that the Mo- 
 saic expression of man made after the 
 image of God, was undsrstood by no be- 
 
 * Here is a striking instance of the growth ol 
 Pasjan superstition in tlie church. Tlie torrent 
 was strong, and notwithstaniiing occasional 
 checks which it received.at length overspread all 
 Christendom, and quite obscured the light of the 
 Gospel. 
 
 t Doubtless, could the modesty of Augustine 
 have prevailed on him to desire such a confer- 
 ence, he might have obtained it. And what a 
 bishop then was, may be seen in Ambrose. 
 
 liever to imply that God was in human 
 form, though I still could form no idea of 
 a spiritual substance, I was glad, and 
 blushed to think how many years I had 
 falsely accnsed the Church, instead of 
 learning by careful inquiry.* 
 
 The state of my mind was now some- 
 thing altered ; ashamed of past miscar- 
 riages and delusions, and hence the more 
 anxious to be guided right for the time 
 to come. I was completely convinced of 
 the falsehood of the many things I had 
 once uttered with so much confidence. I 
 was pleased to find, that the Church of 
 Christ was plainly free from the mon- 
 strous absurdity of which I had accused 
 her. I found, too, that thy holy men of 
 old held not those sentiments with which 
 they were chal-ged. And I was pleased 
 to find Ambrose very diligently com- 
 mending a rule to his people, "the letter 
 killeth, but the spirit giveth life ;"f when 
 the bishop, removing the mystic veil, 
 opened to us those things, which accord- 
 ing to the letter might seem to teach per- 
 verseness : what he said was agreeable 
 to me, thousrh I was far from being con- 
 vinced of its truth. :t^ My former mistakes 
 and blameable rashness rendered me now 
 exceedingly sceptical, and I wanted the 
 fullest intuitive evidence. By faith, in- 
 deed, I might have been healed ; but hav- 
 ing experienced a bad physician, I now 
 dreaded a good one. By believing alone 
 could I be cured; yet for fear of believ- 
 ing false things, I refused to be healed, 
 resisting thy hands, who hast made for us 
 the medicines of faith, and hast sprinkled 
 them over the diseases of the world, 
 and hast attributed so great authority to 
 them. 
 
 I could not, however, but prefer- the 
 general doctrine of the church, and think 
 
 * A remarkable iiistanceof partiality, attended 
 with a remarkable I'rankncss of confession. Au- 
 gustine l()r nine years believed that the general 
 church held the "corporeal foi;m of the Supreme 
 Being, though he might with ease have learned 
 the contrary at any time. But heresy in all ages 
 acts in the same disingenuous spirit. 
 
 t An im|)ortant observation surely! abused 
 much by Origen, and many of his followers, to 
 liinciful and capricious purposes. In Augustine, 
 however, the distinction between letter and spi- 
 rit was generally made comniensuratc with that 
 between flesh and spirit, and in effect distin- 
 guishi'd self-righteous from evangelical religion. 
 
 I it would be well, if many, who stumble at 
 the Old Testament, were more convunced of 
 their own ignorance and incompetency, for want 
 of a just and solid acquaintance with its typical 
 nature, and the laws of interpreting it. 
 
394 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 it was more reasonable to enjoin faith in 
 subjects incapable of demonstration, than 
 to require the belief of most absurd fa- 
 bles after pretending to promise us know- 
 ledge. 
 
 By degrees, thou. Lord, with a mild and 
 merciful hand regulating and composing 
 my heart, enabledst me to consider how 
 many things I believed which I had never 
 seen, what credit I gave to friends, to 
 physicians, to many others, without which 
 the common affairs of life could never be 
 transacted ; also, how firmly I believed 
 who were my parents, though I could not 
 possibly have any demonstration concern- 
 ing the matter. Thus thou persuadest 
 me, that those who believed thy books 
 were not to be condemned for credulity, 
 but those who disbelieved them were to 
 be condemned for unreasonable obstinacy, 
 especially as their credibility was esta- 
 blished by the great authority which 
 they had obtained throughout the world. 
 " How do you know that those books 
 were divinely inspired?" appeared to me 
 now a question implying a doubt not 
 worthy to be attended to. For, amidst 
 all the contentiousness of philosophers, 
 which had so much agitated my mind, I 
 had ever preserved the belief of thy ex- 
 istence and Divine providence. Some- 
 times, indeed, this belief was stronger, 
 sometimes weaker, yet it never left me, 
 notwithstanding my great perplexity con- 
 cerning thy nature, or the way of ap- 
 proaching thee. As we are too infirm to 
 discover truth by abstract reasoning, 
 and therefore need the authority of di- 
 vine revelation, I apprehended, that thou 
 wouldest never have given such high au- 
 thority and influence to the Scriptures 
 through the world, unless this had been 
 the appointed means of our knowing thee, 
 and seeking thy will ; and now the ab- 
 surdities, which the literal interpretation 
 of many things seem to involve, after I had 
 heard a probable exposition of several of 
 them, I referred to the depth of mysteries ; 
 and hence the authority of thy book ap- 
 peared more venerable and more credible, 
 as it lay open to every one's view, and 
 yet reserved the dignity of the secret 
 by the most profound sentiments ; oifering 
 themselves to all in a language the most 
 open and the most humble, and exercising 
 the attention of serious minds. I con- 
 sidered these things, and thou wast pre- 
 sent with me ; I sighed, and thou heard- 
 est me ; I fluctuated, and thou directedst 
 my course ; I went along the broad way 
 
 of the world, and thou didst not desert 
 me.* 
 
 My heart was thirsting after honours, 
 profits, and marriage, and thou deridest 
 me. In these lusts I suifered the bitter- 
 est difficulties; thou being so much the 
 more propitious, the less thou sufferedst 
 any thing to be pleasant to me which was 
 not thyself. See, Lord, my heart. Now 
 let it stick close to thee, which thou hast 
 freed from the tenacious glue of death. 
 How miserable was I, and how didst 
 thou cause me to feel my misery on that 
 day, when I was preparing to excite a 
 panegyric to the emperor, in which there 
 were many falsehoods, and I expected 
 applause, even from those who knew 
 them to be falsehoods, when my heart 
 brooded over its anxieties, and passing 
 through a certain street of Milan, I saw a 
 poor beggar, I suppose at that time with 
 a full belly, jocund and merry ! I sighed, 
 and spake to my friends who were with 
 me, of the many pains of our madness, 
 because from all the toils, which with so 
 much labour and vexation we underwent, 
 we expected only that same rest and se- 
 curity, which that beggar had already at- 
 tained, though we were uncertain whe- 
 ther we should ever reach it. In truth, 
 he was not possessed of true joy, but I, 
 by the ambiguous windings of art, sought 
 it in a more delusory way. He, however, 
 was evidently merry, I full of anxiety ; 
 he at his ease, I full of fear. Were I 
 asked, whether frame of mind I should 
 prefer, I should without hesitation choose 
 his. Yet if I were asked, whether I 
 would be Augustine, or the beggar, I 
 should say the former. How perverse 
 was this! Much to this purpose did I 
 say to my friends, and often observed 
 
 * We have seen here the close thoughts of an 
 original thinker, who had once as strong a preju- 
 dice as any against Scripture-truth; owning his 
 rashness in condemning what he had not un- 
 derstood ; convinced of^ the rationality of the 
 Scriptures, after he had in some measure disco- 
 vered the true key to their meaning; persuaded 
 of their divinity, trom their providential propa- 
 gation in the world ; owning the unreasonable- 
 ness ofexpecting demonstration, and of refusing 
 assent to grounds of faith such as determine us 
 in common life; spying a divine beauty in the 
 plainness and simplicity of their language, 
 adapted to all capacities: and comprehending at 
 length the necessity of a serious mind, in order 
 to render them effectual to saving purposes. — 
 Sceptics and infidels would do well to follow 
 him in this train of thought: they need not to be 
 ashamed to imitate a person so acute and inge- 
 nuous. 
 
Cejtt. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 395 
 
 how things were with me ; and I found 
 myself miserable, and I grieved, and 
 doubled that misery. And if any thing- 
 prosperous smiled upon me, I was back- 
 ward to lay hold of it, because it flew 
 away almost before I could lay hold of 
 it.* 
 
 My most intimate conversations on 
 these subjects were with Alypius and 
 Nebridius. The former, my townsman, 
 had studied under me both at Tagasla 
 and at Cartilage, and we were very dear 
 to each other. The torrent of fashion at 
 the latter place hurried him into the Cir- 
 censian games, of which he became ex- 
 travagantly fond. I was vexed to see 
 him give into a taste so destructive of all 
 sobriety and prudence in youth, and can- 
 not but take notice of the providential 
 manner in which he was delivered. 
 While I was one day expounding in my 
 school at Carthage, an allusion to the 
 Circensian games occurred as proper to 
 illustrate my subject, on which occasion 
 I severely censured those who were fond 
 of that madness. I meant nothing for 
 Alypius; but thou. Lord, who hadst de- 
 signed him for a minister of thy word, 
 and who would est make it manifest, that 
 his correction should be thy own work, 
 infixedst a deep sting of conviction into 
 his heart; he believed, that I spake it on 
 his account, loved me the more for it, and 
 shook off the Circensian follies. But he 
 was afterwards involved in Manicheism 
 with me, deceived by the appearance of 
 good. Afterwards he came to Rome, to 
 learn the law, and there was ensnared 
 with a new evil, a fondness for the bar- 
 barous sports of gladiators, to which he 
 had a strong aversion. Some friends of 
 his carried him to them by force, while 
 he declared with great confidence, that 
 his mind and eyes should still be alienated 
 from those spectacles. For a while he 
 closed his eyes with great resolution, till, 
 on a certain occasion, when the whole 
 house rang with shouting, overcome by 
 curiosity, he opened his eyes to see what 
 was the matter. Beholding a gladiator 
 wounded, on the sight of the blood he 
 was inebriated with the sanguinary plea- 
 sure. He gazed, he shouted, he was in- 
 flamed, he carried away with him the 
 
 madness, which stimulated him to repeat 
 his visits ; he became enamoured of the 
 sports, even more than those who had 
 dragged him thither against his will, and 
 seduced others. Thence thou with a 
 strong and merciful hand recoveredst him 
 at leno-th, but long after, and tauo-htest 
 him to put his confidence not m himself, 
 but in thee.* On another occasion, 
 Alypius was apprehended as a thief, and 
 circumstances seemed to tell so much 
 against him, that it was by a particular 
 providence his innocence was cleared. 
 But he was to be a dispenser of thy word, 
 an examiner of many causes in thy 
 Church, and he learned caution and wis- 
 dom from this event. Him I found at 
 Rome, and he removed with me to Milan, 
 and practised in the law with uncommon 
 uprightness and integrity. With me, he 
 was uncertain with respect to his plan of 
 religion and the way of happiness. 
 
 My friend Nebridius also left a good 
 paternal estate in the neighbourhood of 
 Carthage, for the sake of enjoying my 
 company ; and we three were panting af- 
 ter happiness, till thou shouldest give us 
 meat in due season ; and amidst all the 
 bitterness which attended our worldly 
 concerns, while we were wishing to see 
 the end of these things, we found our- 
 selves in darkness, and we said with 
 siffhs, How loner 1 Yet we still followed 
 objects with which we were dissatisfied, 
 because we knew nothing better to sub- 
 stitute in their room. 
 
 As to myself in particular, I reviewed 
 attentively how long I had been in pur- 
 suit of the true wisdom, with a determi- 
 nation to give up secular pursuits in case 
 of success. I had begun at nineteen, and 
 I was now in my thirtieth year, still 
 miserable, anxious, procrastinating, fed 
 with tantalizing hopes, solicited in my 
 conscience to set apart a portion of time 
 each day for the care of my soul. " Your 
 mornings are for your pupils : why do not 
 you employ to serious purpose thovaf- 
 ternoons'? But then what time shall I 
 have to attend the levees of the Great, 
 and to unbend my mind with necessary 
 relaxation ? What, then, if death should 
 
 * A lively picture ol' human vanity, perfectly 
 agreealiie to the whole tenuur of ecci-esiastes, 
 and evidencing the distress of those in hiyh lile 
 to be at least equal to that of their inferiors. 
 Ambition receives no cure from the review, 
 till the man knows what is better. 
 
 * It is obvious to observe licnce the folly of 
 self-confidence, and the bewildiing power of 
 temi)taIion over so weak and corrupt a creature 
 as man. Many who would deem it impossible 
 thai llioy should enter with spirit into the obsce- 
 nity of tlic stage, or the cruelties of the slave 
 trade, by a little indulgence, may soon becoiue 
 what belbrehand they would abhor. 
 
396 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. 11. 
 
 suddenly seize you, and judgment over- 
 take you unprepared 1 Yet, on the other 
 side, what if death itself be the extinc- 
 tion of my being! But far be from my 
 soul the idea. God would never have 
 given such high proofs of credibility to 
 Christianity, nor have shown himself so 
 marvellously among men, if the life of 
 the soul be consumed with the death of 
 the body. Why, then, do I not give my- 
 self wholly to seek God 1 But do not 
 be in too great a hurry : you have friends 
 of consequence, by whom you may rise 
 in the world !" 
 
 In such an agitation of mind as this 
 did I live, seeking happiness, and yet 
 flying from it. To be divorced from the 
 enjoyments of the world I could not bear, 
 
 farticularl}^ from female society ; and as 
 had no idea of acquiring continency 
 but by my own strength, I was a stranger 
 to the way of prayer and divine supply 
 of grace. Thou, Lord, wilt give, if we 
 solicit thine ears with internal groaning, 
 and in solid faith cast our care on thee. 
 My mother was solicitous and importu- 
 nate for my being married, that I might 
 in that state receive baptism. I promis- 
 ed marriage to a person who was then 
 too young; and as she was agreeable to 
 me, I consented to wait almost two years. 
 During this interval, a number of us, 
 about ten in all, formed a scheme of liv- 
 ing in common in a society separate from 
 the world in which a townsman of mine, 
 Romanianus, a man of considerable opu- 
 lence, was particularly earnest. But some 
 of us being married men, and others desi- 
 rous of becoming so, the scheme came to 
 nothing. Thou deridedst our plans, and 
 preparedst thy own, meaning to give us 
 food in due season, and to open tliine 
 hand, and fill our souls with blessedness. 
 In the mean time my sins were multi- 
 plied, and the woman with whom I had 
 cohabited, returning into Africa under a 
 vow of never more being acquainted with 
 cnir sex, and leaving with me a natural 
 son which I had by her, I, impatient of 
 the delay, took another woman in her 
 room. Praise and glory be thee, O 
 Fountain of Mercies ! I became more 
 miserable, and thou approachedst nearer. 
 Thou wast going to snatch me out of the 
 mire of pollution, and I knew it not. The 
 fear of death and future judgment was 
 the check which restrained me. Tliis had 
 never left me amidst the variety of opin- 
 ions with which I was agitated, and I 
 owned to Alypius and Nebridius, that 
 
 the Epicurean doctrine would have had 
 the preference in my judgment, could I 
 have fallen in with Epicurus's idea of 
 the annihilation of man at death ; and I 
 inquired why we might not be happy, if 
 we were immortal, and were to live in a 
 perpetual state of voluptuousness without 
 any fear of losing it; ignorant as I was 
 of the misery of being so drenched in 
 carnality, as not to see the excellency of 
 embracing goodness itself for its own 
 sake. I did not consider, that I confer- 
 red on these base topics with friends 
 whom I loved, and was incapable of 
 tasting pleasure, even according to the 
 carnal ideas I then had of pleasure with- 
 out friends.* 
 
 O my serpertine ways ! Wo to the soul 
 which presumed, if it departed from thee, 
 that it should find any thing better. I 
 turned on every side, and all things were 
 hard, and thou alone wast my rest ; and 
 lo ! thou comest and freest us from our 
 miserable delusions, and placest us in 
 thy way, and comfortest us, and sayest, 
 " Run, and I will bear you ; I will carry 
 you through, and bear you still." 
 
 BOOK VII. 
 
 And now the older I grew, the more 
 defiled was I with vanity, still destitute 
 of the spiritual idea of God ; not conceiv- 
 ing however of thee, Lord, as existing 
 in human form, an error of which, I now 
 saw, I had unjustly accused the catholic 
 church, but still viewing thee as an ob- 
 ject of sense, however refined ; and when 
 I removed the ideas of space and quanti- 
 ty, thou seemest to be nothing at all. 
 For thou hadst not yet illuminated my 
 darkness. The arguments of my friend 
 Nebridius appeared to me conclusive 
 against the Manichean idea of an inde- 
 pendent evil principle in nature. I was 
 grown firm in the belief, that in the Lord 
 is nothing corruptible, mutable, or in any 
 sense imperfect; that evil must not be 
 imputed to him, in order that we may 
 clear ourselves of blame, with the Mani- 
 chees. Still however, a question distressed 
 me, how came evil into being at all "? Ad- 
 mitting that it lies in the will of man, 
 that the distinction between a natural and 
 moral inability is real and just, and that 
 
 * A strong intimation that happiness con- 
 sists in love of friendsliip. Wlience the plea- 
 sure of friendship wiili Jesus, an Almiglitj, 
 all-sufficient friend, made man for us, and 
 sympathizing with us, appears to give us tiie 
 jiist and adequate idea of bliss. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 397 
 
 the former is not the proper subject of 
 blame as the latter is; still I incjuired, 
 wUo ingrafted into my stem this cyon of 
 bitterness, seeing that I was created by 
 Him who is intiuite sweetness! I in- 
 quired whence came evil, and I saw not 
 the evil which was in my investigations. I 
 stated the great ditHculty in various lights, 
 and it still appeared as inexplicable as 
 ever. The taith, however, of Christ our 
 Lord and Saviour remained firm with me, 
 rude and uninformed indeed ; yet my 
 mind forsook it not, and was imbibing it 
 daily more and more.* 
 
 From the vain science of astrology also, 
 which I had cultivated with obstinacy, I 
 was delivered, partly by the reasonings of 
 my excellent friend Nebridius, and partly 
 by a story which I heard of a master and 
 slave born at the same point of time, 
 whose different fortunes in life appeared 
 to be a sufficient confutation of all pre- 
 dictions by the stars ;f and the case of 
 Esau and Jacob in holy writ illustrated 
 the same thing. But it was thou, and 
 thou only, who recalledst me from the 
 death of all error, O thou life that know- 
 est not death, and thou wisdom who il- 
 luminatest indigent minds. Thou break- 
 est this bond for me; still I was seeking 
 whence comes evil. Yet, by all the 
 fluctuations of thought thou didst not 
 suifer me to be seduced from the faith of 
 thy existence, of thy perfections, of thy 
 providence, or to doubt that in Christ thy 
 Son and in the Scriptures thou hast laid 
 down the way of salvation. What were 
 the groanings, the labours of my heart ! 
 While I silently inquired, distressed and 
 confounded, thou knewest the whole, thou 
 knewest what I suffered, and, no man 
 
 * I have emleavoured to compress the au- 
 thor's accouiils of his difficulties in these two 
 questions of liie substance of God, and of tlie 
 origin of evil, into a small compass, not lliink- 
 ing it needful to translate ihem at large. Ma- 
 niclieism was the cause of his trouble in regard 
 to the former. The latter is in all ages a 
 natural temptation to our proud minds, and 
 we are slow to learn to answer it with St. Paul: 
 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest 
 against God? Rom. ix. Humility will end 
 the subject there ; and pride is not to be satis- 
 fied by any investigations. 
 
 f Few men have candour enough to put 
 themselves in the places and scenes of others. 
 Nothing is more certain than this, that Augus- 
 tine and Melanctbon were men of extraordi- 
 nary understan(hng ; both however were ad- 
 dicted to astrology, an absurdity, which even 
 the weakest in our age escapes. Such is the 
 difference of the times ! 
 
 whatever, not my most intimate friends, 
 could know, by any description which I 
 could give, the bitterness of my soul. 
 My folly was, to look for a local, external 
 happiness. No such was found to re- 
 ceive me. By the original dignity of 
 my nature, I was above all sensual ob- 
 jects ; and thou, my true joy, madest me 
 subject to thyself, and subjectedst to me 
 the works of thy hands. This was the 
 middle region of health, in which I might 
 serve thee and rule the body. But I 
 proudly rose up against thee, and was 
 justly punished, by being enslaved to 
 those things which should have been my 
 subjects ; they gave me no respite nor 
 rest. My pride separated me from thee, 
 and closed my eyes with its own tumid 
 importance. But thou. Lord, remninest 
 for ever, and retainest not anger for ever; 
 thou pitiest us, and rememberest that we 
 are dust and ashes. It pleased thee to 
 remove my deformities, and by internal 
 incentives thou agitatedst me, that I 
 might be impatient till thou madest thy- 
 self assuredly known to me by interna' 
 illumination. The morbid tumours of 
 my mind were gradually lessening under 
 thy secret medicinal hand, and the eyes 
 of my understanding, darkened and con- 
 founded as they were, by the sharp eye- 
 salve of salutary pains, were healing day 
 by day. 
 
 And first as thou wouldst show me 
 how thou resistest the proud, and givest 
 grace to the humble; and how great thy 
 mercy is shown to be in the way of hu- 
 mility; thou procnredst for me, by means 
 of a person highly inflated with philoso- 
 phical pride, some of the books of Plato 
 translated into Latin, in which I read 
 passages concerning the divine Word, 
 similar to those in the first chapter of St. 
 John's Gospel ; in which his eternal di- 
 vinity was exhibited, but not his incarna- 
 tion, his atonement, his humiliation, and 
 glorification of his human nature. For 
 Thou hast hid these things from tlie wise 
 and prudent, and revealed them to babes ; 
 that men might come to thee weary and 
 heavy laden, and that thou mightest re- 
 fresh them ; thou, who art meek and low- 
 ly in heart, who directest the meek in 
 judgment, and teachest the gentle thy 
 ways, seeing our low estate, and forgiv- 
 ing all our sins. This is a knowledge 
 no't to be attained, while men are lifted 
 up by the pomp and grandeur of what 
 appears to them a sublimer doctrine. 
 Thus did I begin to form better views of 
 
 Vol. L 
 
 2L 
 
398 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. II. 
 
 the Divine nature, even from Plato's 
 ■writings, as thy people of old spoiled the 
 Egyptians of their gold, because what- 
 ever good there is in any thing is all thy 
 ovrn ; and at the same time I was ena- 
 bled to escape the evil which was in 
 those books, and not to attend to the 
 idols of Egypt. 
 
 However, I was hence admonished to 
 retire into myself under thy guidance, 
 and I was enabled to do it, because thou 
 art my helper. I entered, and saw with 
 the eye of my mind the immutable light 
 of the Lord, perfectly distinct from sensi- 
 ble light, not only in degree, but in kind. 
 Nor was it in the same manner above my 
 mind, that oil is above water, or as hea- 
 ven is above earth, but superior, because 
 he made me, and I was inferior, because 
 made by him.* He who knows truth, 
 knows this light, and he who knows it, 
 knows eternity. Love knows it. O eter- 
 nal truth, true love, and loving eternity ! 
 Thou art my God, I pant after thee day 
 and night. And when I first knew thee, 
 thou tookest me that I might see that " to 
 be" which I saw ; and that I who saw, 
 "as yet was not." Thou impressedst 
 repeatedly my infirm sight, thou shinedst 
 on me vehemently, and I trembled with 
 love and horror, and I found that I was 
 far from thee in a region of dissimilitude, 
 as if I heard thy voice from on high, " I 
 am the food of those that are of full age ; 
 grow, and thou shalteat me." Nor shalt 
 thou change me into thyself, but shalt thy- 
 self be changed into me. And I said, can 
 God be nothing, since he is neither dif- 
 fused through finite nor infinite space? 
 And thou criedst from afar, " I am that I 
 am,"-|- and I heard with my heart, and 
 could not doubt. Nay I should sooner 
 doubt my own existence, than the truth 
 of that which is understood by the things 
 that were made. 
 
 I now began to understand, that every 
 creature of thine hand is in its nature good, 
 and that universal nature is justly called 
 
 on to praise the Lord for his goodness.* 
 The evil which I sought after has no po- 
 sitive existence; were it a substance, it 
 would be good, because every thing in- 
 dividually, as well as all things collec- 
 tively, is good. Evil appeared to be a 
 want of agreement in some parts to others. 
 My opinion of the two independent prin- 
 ciples, in order to account for the origin 
 of evil, was without foundation. Evil 
 is not a thing to be created ; let good 
 things only forsake their just place, office 
 and order, and then, though all be good 
 in their nature, evil, which is only a pri- 
 vative, abounds and produces positive 
 misery. I asked what was iniquity, and I 
 found it to be no substance, but a perver- 
 sity of the will, which declines from thee 
 the Supreme Substance to lower things, 
 and casts away its internal excellencies, 
 and swells with pride externally.f 
 
 And I wondered that I now began to have 
 a desire after thee, and no longer took a 
 phantasm for thee. I was not urgent to 
 enjoy thee, my God, for though I was 
 hurried toward thee, by thy beauty, I 
 was presently carried downward from 
 thee by my own weight, and I could no 
 longer sin without groaning; the weight 
 was carnal habit. The memory of thee was 
 with me, and I did not doubt of the reality 
 of that divine essence to which I should 
 adhere, but of myself being ever brought 
 into a state of spiritual existence. I saw 
 thy invisible things, by the things which 
 were made, but I could not fix my atten- 
 tion to thee ; my corruption exerting it- 
 self, I returned to my usual habits, but I 
 could not shake off the fragrance of me- 
 mory, smelling the true good, regretting 
 the loss, and impotent to taste and en- 
 
 I now sought the way of obtaining 
 strength to enjoy thee, and found it not, 
 till I embraced the mediator between God 
 
 * He had been long corrupted by tbe Atlie- 
 istic views wbich lie liad lesrned from the 
 Mauichees, and no wonder that he now found 
 it so difficuh to conceive aright of God. There 
 appears somelliing; divinely spiritual in the 
 manner of his deliverance. That the Platonic 
 Looks also should give the first occasion is 
 very remarkable ; though I ajiprehend tlie 
 Latin translation which he saw, liad ini[)roved 
 on Plato, by the mi.xture of something scrip- 
 tural, according to the manner of the Ammo- 
 nian ))hiloso])hers. 
 
 ■J- Exodus iii. 
 
 * Psalm cxlviii. 
 
 f Perhaps a more just account of the man- 
 ner in which evil is produced can scarcely be 
 "■iven ; it is certainly well calculated to confute 
 the i)rinciiiles of ManicheisiTi. 
 
 :j: In many true converts this was their state 
 exactly, while God was turning them from 
 darkness lo light. Such a sense of God, as 
 never before was known, is attained, sufficient 
 to conquer the false and injurious thoughts of 
 him, -which had been before imbibed, be they 
 what they may. Bui the man feels his impo- 
 tence with respect to good, and he must, with 
 Augustine, struggle and endure for a time, 
 till the strength of Jesus is perfected in his 
 weakness. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 399 
 
 and man, the man Christ Jesus, who is 
 
 ABOVE ALL, GOD BLESSED FOR EVER,* Call- 
 ing- and saying, I am the Way, the Truth, 
 and the Life. For the Word was made 
 flesh, that thy wisdom mi^ht suckle our 
 infancy. But I did not yet in humility 
 hold the huuil)le Jesus, ray Lord, nor 
 know the mysterious power of his weak- 
 ness, that he mi^ht humble, nourish, and 
 at length exalt heavy-laden souls. Far 
 other thoughts had I conceived of Christ. 
 I had viewed him only as a man of une- 
 qualled wisdom. But, of the mystery of 
 the Word made flesh, I had not formed 
 the least suspicion. Only I concluded 
 from the things written of him, that he 
 must have had a human soul. Alypius 
 indeed had conceived, that the catholic 
 faith denied him the spirit of a man, and 
 was a longer time prejudiced against the 
 truth, because he confounded the Church 
 with the Apollinarian heresy. As to my- 
 self, I was not till some time after taught 
 to distinguish the truth from the opinion 
 of Photiuus;[ but there must be heresies, 
 that they who are of the truth may be 
 made manifest. 
 
 But when, by reading the Platonic 
 books I began to conceive of the immate- 
 rial infinite Supreme, I talked of these 
 things like a person of experience, but 
 was perishing, because void of Christ, I 
 desired to appear wise, was puffed up 
 with knowledge, and wept not. Love, 
 on the foundation of humility, which is 
 Christ Jesus, was to me unknown. The 
 books of Plato knew not this ; still would 
 I remark the providence of my God, in 
 leading me to study them, before I search- 
 ed the Scriptures, that I might remember 
 how I had been affected by thorn ; and 
 when afterwards my wounds should be 
 healed by thy hands through the Scrip- 
 tures, I might distinguish the difference 
 between presumption and confession, be- 
 tween those who see whither we ought 
 to go, without knowing the means, and 
 those who see the way itself leading to 
 the actual inheritance. Had 1 been in 
 formed at first by thy Scriptures, and 
 thou hadst endeared thyself to me in 
 their familiarity, an after-acquaintance 
 
 * Here is a clear testimony to the authenti- 
 city and genuine interpretation of tiiitt remark- 
 able text, Horn. ix. 5. the liglit ol' wiiich has 
 been so |>eculiarly ofTensive to those wlioni 
 fashionable heresies in our age have dark- 
 ened. 
 
 f Which seems to have been the same with 
 Sabellianisra. 
 
 with Plato might either have shaken my 
 faith, or raised in me an undue estimation 
 of the worth of his writings. 
 
 With eagerness, therefore, I took up 
 the inspired volume,* and particularly 
 the Apostle Paul ; and those questions, 
 in which he once had seemed inconsistent 
 with himself, and the law, and the pro- 
 phets, were now no more. There now 
 appeared one uniform tenor of godliness, 
 and I learnt to rejoice with trembling, 
 and I took up the book, and found what- 
 ever truth I had read there, is said with 
 this recommendation of thy grace, that 
 he who sees should not so glory as if 
 HE HAD not RECEIVED, not Only that which 
 he sees, but the power of seeing itself. f 
 For what hath he, which he hath not re- 
 ceived ■? And he who cannot see afar, 
 should however walk in the way, by 
 which he may come, see, and lay hold. 
 For though he be delighted vi^ith the 
 
 LAW OF GOD I.V THE INWARD MAN, YET 
 WHAT SHALL HE DO WITH THE OTHER LAW 
 IN HIS MEMBERS WARRING AGAINST THE 
 LAAV OF HIS MIND, AND BRINGING HIM INTO 
 CAPTIVITY TO THE LAW OF SIN, WHICH IS 
 
 IN HIS MEMBERS ^ For thou. Lord, art 
 just, but we have sinned and dealt wick- 
 edly, and thy hand is heavy upon us, and 
 we are justly delivered up to the power 
 of the old sinner who has the power of 
 death, because he persuaded us to follow 
 his will, by which he did not stand in the 
 trt.th. Who shall deliver us from the 
 body of this death, but thy grace through 
 Jesiis Christ our Lord, in whom the prince 
 of this world could find nothing worthy 
 of death, and who by his death blotted 
 out the hand-writing that was against us ? 
 The Platonic books had nothing of this, 
 nor the face of piety, the tears of confes- 
 sion, the sacrifice of a troubled spirit, a 
 broken and contrite heart, salvation, the 
 spouse, the holy city, the earnest of the 
 Holy Spirit, the cup of our redemption. 
 In them no one hears, "Come unto me 
 all that labour and are heavy laden, and 
 
 * It may be remarked liere, how depraved 
 the taste of man is, and liow mutii and how 
 jon;^ he will siificr before lie give himself 
 simply to the inslruclion of God's own words.^ 
 
 f He means tlie iiicstiin:il)le ])rivilege of 
 spirinial MtKlerstandiiig, tbi-ougli his want of 
 Hhicii St. Paul had long appeared to him con- 
 trailictory, confused, and disgusting. The 
 man is well (nullified to recommend toothers 
 tlie value of divine teaching, who, like Augus- 
 tine, is experiencing it in himself. Nothing 
 teaclies humility like such experience. 
 
 4: Rom. vii. 
 
400 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. U. 
 
 I will give you rest." It is one thing to 
 see a land of peace at a distance, Avith no 
 practicability of attaining it, and another 
 to pursue the right road towards it, under 
 the care of the heavenly Commander, 
 who made the road for our use. I was 
 wonderfully affected with these views, 
 while I read the least of thine apos- 
 tles, and I considered thy works and 
 trembled. 
 
 book viii. 
 
 All my bones shall say, Lord, who 
 IS like unto thee! Thou hast broken 
 my bones in sunder. How thoubreakest 
 them, I will relate; and all who worship 
 thee, when they hear these things, shall 
 bless the Lord. Though now confirmed 
 in my doctrinal views, my heart was yet 
 uncleansed. I approved of the Saviour, 
 in general, who is the Way, but was of- 
 fended with his narrow way, and thou in- 
 spiredst me with a desire of going to Sim- 
 plician, an aged, experienced Christian, 
 even from his youth, who seemed capable 
 of instructing me in my present fluctua- 
 tions. My desires no longer being in- 
 flamed with the hope of honour and mo- 
 ney, I was displeased with the servitude 
 of the world in which I lived. Thy 
 sweetness was now more agreeable in 
 mine eyes ; but another tie still detained 
 me, in which I had permission indeed in 
 a legal way, though exhorted to the high- 
 er and nobler practice of celibacy.* I 
 had heard from the mouth of Truth, that 
 there are eunuchs, who have made them- 
 selves eunuchs for the kingdom of 
 heaven's sake. 
 
 I went to Simplician, the spiritual fa- 
 ther of bishop Ambrose himself, who 
 loved him as his father. I explained to 
 liim luy religious situation. When I was 
 relating, that I had read some Platonic 
 books translated by Yictorinus, a Koman 
 rhetorician, who had died a Christian, he 
 conofratulated me on having met with that 
 philosopher rather than any of the rest; 
 because they are full of fallacy, but in 
 him intimations are given of God and of 
 his word.f Then for my practical in- 
 struction, he gave me the narrative of the 
 conversion of Victorinus, with whom he 
 
 * Corinthians vii. 
 
 f Hltc I ai)prehend is a proof of (lie decay 
 of Cliristian taste in the Churcli at tliat time, 
 the consequence of Amnionianisrn and Oi-i- 
 genisni, n;imelv, a disposition to find in Plato 
 ■what he lias not. What communion hath the 
 temple of God with idols ? 
 
 had been intimate at Rome. Thy grace 
 was indeed admirable in that convert. 
 He was a man of great learning, far ad- 
 vanced in life, well skilled in all liberal 
 knowledge; he had read, criticised, and 
 illustrated many philosophers; he had 
 taught many illustrious senators; had 
 been honoured by a statue erected in the 
 Roman Forum, as a reward of his labours; 
 and even to his old age was a worshipper 
 of idols, and a partaker of all the rites, to 
 which almost the whole Roman nobility 
 at that time were addicted ; moreover, he 
 had, many years, defended the monstrous 
 and absurd objects of worship, to which 
 the common people had been accustomed, 
 but now he was not ashamed to become 
 a child of thy Christ, an infant of thy 
 fountain, with his neck subjected to the 
 yoke of humility, and his forehead sub- 
 dued to the reproach of the cross. O 
 Lord, thou, who bowedst the heavens and 
 earnest down, who touchedst the moun- 
 tains, and they smoked, by what means 
 didst thou insinuate thyself into his heart ! 
 He read, as Simplician told me, the holy 
 Scripture, and studiously investigated all 
 Christian literature, and told luy instruct- 
 or, not openly, but in secrecy as to a friend, 
 "Know that I am already a Christian." 
 He answered, " I shall not believe it, nor 
 rank you among Christians, till I see you 
 in the Church of Christ." But he smil- 
 ing, answered, " Do walls then make 
 Christians V This kind of dialogue was 
 frequently repeated between them. For 
 Victorinus feared to ofl'end his friends, men 
 of rank and dignity, and he dreaded the loss 
 of reputation. ]3ut after that, by further 
 studying of the word, and by secret pray- 
 er, he had acquired more strength, and 
 feared to be denied by Christ before the 
 angels, if he denied hiiu before men, and 
 felt himself condemned for being ashamed 
 of Christian sacraments, though he had 
 not been ashamed of demon-worship, he 
 blushed at his false modesty, and sud- 
 denly said to Simplician, " Let us go to 
 the Church, I wish to be made a Chris- 
 tian." The venerable old saint, unable 
 to contain his joy, went with him when 
 he was imbued with the first sacraments 
 of instruction. Not long after, he gave 
 in his name, that he might have the bene- 
 fit of Christian baptism. Rome was as- 
 tonished ; the church rejoiced. The proud 
 saw and were indignant, and gnashed 
 with their teeth and pined away ; but, the 
 Lord his God was the hope of thy ser- 
 vant, and he no longer regarded lying 
 
CEyT. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 401 
 
 vanities. At length, when the season 
 came on of professing' his belief, which 
 
 The joy of Victorinus's conversion indeed 
 was greater, because his influence and 
 
 profession is usually delivered at Rome authority, it was hoped, miffht be useful 
 from a high place, in the sight of the to the salvation of many. For, far be it 
 faithful, in a certain form of words gotten j from thee, that in thy house there should 
 by heart, by those who are to partake of 
 thy grace in baptism, an ofler was made 
 by the presbyters, that he should repeat 
 them more secretly, as was the custom 
 for some who were likely to be disturbed 
 through bashfulness. But he chose ra- 
 ther to profess his salvation in the sight 
 of the holy multitude ; for there was no 
 salvation in rhetoric, and yet he had pub- 
 licly professed it. When he mounted the 
 pulpit to repeat, — all who knew him, 
 (and who was there that did not know 
 him?) with a whisper of congratulation 
 resounded his name. Amidst the general 
 joy, the sound, though checked with de- 
 cent reverence, went round, " Victorinus, 
 Victorinus !" They exulted at the sud- 
 den sight of him; and were as suddenly 
 silent, that they might hear him. He 
 pronounced the form of words with an 
 excellent confidence, and all wished to 
 hold him in their bosom, and they actual- 
 ly did so in love and joy.* 
 
 O gracious God ! what is the cause, 
 that men more rejoice in the salvation of 
 a soul despaired of, than if it had always 
 been in a state of se.-urity ! For even 
 thou, merciful Father ! rejoicest more over 
 one penitent, than over ninety and nine 
 just persons, that need no repentance, 
 and we hear with peculiar pleasure the 
 recovery of thy prodigal son. Now what 
 is the reason, that the mind i.s more de- 
 lighted with things recovered, than with 
 things never lost? Human life is full of 
 such instances. Is this the law of human 
 happiness? How high art thou in the 
 highest, and how inscrutable in the deep- 
 est I Thou never recedest from us, and 
 with reluctance we return to thee. Awake, 
 O Lord, and do, quicken and recal us, in- 
 flame and carry us along; burn, be sweet 
 to our taste, and let us now love and run. 
 
 be respect of persons, since thou rather 
 
 HAST CHOSEN THE WEAK THINGS OF THE 
 WORLD TO CONFOUND THE STRONG, AND 
 
 BASE THINGS OF THE WORLD, yea, and 
 things which are not, to bring to nought 
 things that are.* What a treasure had 
 the heart and tongue of Victorinus been 
 to Satan I Well did it become thy sons 
 to exult, because our king had bound the 
 strong man, and they saw his goods taken 
 from him, and cleansed, and fitted for thy 
 honour, and to every good work. 
 
 Hearing these things from Simplician, 
 I was inflamed with the desire of imita- 
 tion. But after he had informed me further 
 that Victorinus, on occasion of Julian's 
 prohibitory law, had given up his profes- 
 sorship, I found an inclination to imitate 
 him, bound as I was, to the same calling, 
 not by a foreign chain, but by my owa 
 iron will. The enemy held my will, 
 thence formed my chain, and held me 
 fast. From a perverse will was formed 
 lust, from the indulgence of lust was 
 formed habit, and habit unresisted became 
 necessity. Of such links was my chaia 
 of slavery composed ; and the new will, 
 which was beginning in me, to worship 
 thee freely, and enjoy thee, my sole cer- 
 tain pleasure, was not yet strong enouo-h 
 to overcome the old one, hardened by 
 custom. Thus two wills, the old and 
 the new, the flesh and the spirit, contend- 
 ed within ni3, and between them tore my 
 very soul.f Thus did I understand by 
 my own experience what I had read, that 
 the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and 
 the spirit against the flesh. t I in- 
 deed was actuated by both, but more by 
 that which I approved, than Ijy that which 
 I disapproved. I had now no just excuse; 
 truth was certain to me, yet I was loth to 
 
 • I thought a careful translation of this 
 story was proper. It is an instance of vic- 
 torious grace, something like that which we 
 have more at large related by Augustine con- 
 cerning himself. It shows how disreputable 
 real Christianity was among the great, even 
 in countries where it was the established re- 
 ligion, as was then the case at Rome; and what 
 grace is needful to cause men to be willing to 
 bear the cross of Christ; and it illustrates also 
 some Christian customs and discipline at that 
 time. 
 
 2l2 
 
 * 1 Cor. i. 
 
 t Excellent comment on Rom. vii. — A de- 
 scription only to be fully understood by expe- 
 rienced Christians. 
 
 ^ Galat. V. where the same subject is more 
 briefly handled: the conflict is well known to 
 true Christians all their days, though it most 
 strikes their minds at first. In the unconvert- 
 ed it can have no existence, because the will is 
 inclined only one way, and it is therefore quite 
 a different thing from the conflict between 
 reason and passion, with which it has beea 
 confounded. 
 
402 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 serve thee, and was as afraid to be rid of gave themselves up to God in the same 
 my impediments, as I ought to have been way, and forsook tlie world, I felt myself 
 of contracting them. My meditations on confounded. About twelve years had now 
 thee, were like the attempts of men de- elapsed from the nineteenth year of my 
 sirous of awaking, but sinking again into life, when I read Cicero's Hortensius, to 
 sleep. I had not a heart to answer thee, this time since I had begun to seek wis- 
 AWAKE THOU THAT SLEEPEST, AND ARISE dom, and I was yet at a distance from 
 FROM THE DEAD, AND CHRIST SHALL GIVE joy. In the entrance on youth, I had 
 THEE LIGHT.* By and b)^ — shortly — let prayed for chastity, and had said, " Give 
 me alone a little — these were the answers me chastity and continence, but grant 
 of my heart. But, by and by had no | not my request immediately." For I was 
 bounds, and let me alone a little, went to afraid, lest thou shouldest quickly hear 
 a great length. In vain was I delighted, my prayer, and heal this distemper of 
 with thy law in the inner man, when; concupiscence, which I wished rather to 
 another law in my members warred; be fully gratified than extinguished. And 
 against the law of my mind. Wretched I had gone on perversely in depraved su- 
 man that I am ! who shall deliver me from perslition, with a heart at enmity against 
 the body of this death, but thy grace thy truth, and had deferred from day to 
 
 through Jesus Christ our Lord] 
 
 jNIy anxiety increasing, I daily groaned 
 to thee, I. frequented thy church as often 
 as I had leisure from those employments 
 under the weioht of which 1 p-roaned. 
 Alypius was with me during his vacation 
 
 day to devote myself to thee, under the 
 pretence that I was uncertain where the 
 truth lay. Now that it was certain, I was 
 still a slave, and " 1 hear of others, who 
 have not studied ten or twelve years as I 
 have done, and who, notwithstanding, 
 from the law, which was his practice, as; have given themselves up to God." Such 
 
 rhetoric was mine. Our other friend, Ne 
 bridius, was gone to assist Verecundus at 
 Milan, in teaching grammar, who studi- 
 ously avoided attendance upon the great, 
 that he might command leisure to im- 
 prove his mind. On a certain day, Poli- 
 tian, an African, one of our townsmen, 
 came to visit me and Alypius. We sat 
 down to converse, and upon the play-ta- 
 ble which was before us, he saw a book, 
 opened it, and found it to be the Apostle 
 Paul, to his great surprise; for he sup- 
 posed it to have been a book relating to 
 my profession. He, though a soldier at 
 court, was a devout person, and congratu- 
 lated me on my taste. On my informing 
 him, how earnestly I studied those epis- 
 tles, he gave me an account of Anihony 
 the Egyptian monk, a character to that 
 hour unknown to us ; he informed us also 
 of a number of monasteries, of which we 
 knew nothing. There was even a monas- 
 tery at Milan under the care of Ambrose 
 at that time, of which we had not heard. | 
 Wlien he had given a narration also of 
 two of his companions, who suddenly 
 
 * Ephesians v. 
 
 t Should the serious reader find himself in- 
 clined to blame this monastic taste, I agree 
 ■with him : but let the principle have its just 
 praise ; it originated in a desire of freedom 
 froij the temptations of the world ; and hi 
 professors of godliness observe, how much the 
 excessive indulgence of the commercial spirit 
 prevents their own progress in our times. 
 
 were my thoughts. What pains did I 
 not take to spur my reluctant spirit ! My 
 arguments were spent, a silent trepida- 
 tion remained, and I dreaded deliverance 
 itself as death. " What is this," said I 
 to Alypius, " which you have heard 1 Il- 
 literate men rise and seize heaven, while 
 we, with all our learning, are rolling in 
 the filth of sin." In the agitation of my 
 spirit I retired into the garden belonging 
 to the house, knowing how evil I was, 
 but ignorant of the good thou hadst in 
 store for me. Alypius followed me, and 
 we sat remote from the house, and with 
 vehement indignation I rebuked my sin- 
 ful spirit, because it would not give itself 
 up to God. I found I wanted a will. 
 tStill was I restrained, and thou, in secret, 
 wast urgent upon me with severe mercy. 
 Vanities of vanities, my old mistresses, 
 shook my vesture of flesh, and whisper- 
 ed. Are we to part] and for ever] The 
 evil suggestions which I felt, may thy 
 mercy avert from the soul of thy servant! 
 Canst thou live without us] they said; 
 but with less and less power. On the 
 other hand appeared the chaste dignity of 
 Continence. Canst thou not, said she, 
 perform what many of both sexes have 
 performed, not in themselves indeed, but 
 in the strength of the Lord] Cast thyself 
 on him, fear not, he will not suffer thee 
 to fall. Turn a deaf ear to the sugges- 
 tions of the flesh ; they speak of pleasure, 
 but not as the law of thy God. Such 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CON'FESSIONS, 
 
 403 
 
 was my internal controversy. When 
 deep meditation had collected all my 
 misery into the view of my heart, a 
 great storm arose, producing a large 
 shower of tears. To give it vent, I rose 
 up hastily from Alypius. The sound of 
 my voice appeared pregnant with weep- 
 ing, and he remained motionless in the 
 same place. I prostrated myself under a 
 fig-tree, and with tears bursting out, I 
 spake to this effect : How long. Lord, 
 wilt thou be angry 1 for ever 1 remember 
 not my old inicpiities. For I perceived 
 myself entangled by them. How long 
 shall I say to-morrow 1 why should not 
 this hour put an end to my slavery 1 Thus 
 I spake, and wept in the bitterness of my 
 soul, and I heard a voice, as from a neigh- 
 bouring house, repeating frequently, 
 " Take up and read, take up and read." 
 I paused, and began to think, whether I 
 ever had heard boys use such a speech 
 in any play, and could recollect nothing 
 like it. I then concluded that I was or- 
 dered from heaven, to take up the book, 
 and read the first sentence I cast mine 
 eyes upon. I returned hastily to the place 
 where Alypius was sitting; for there I had 
 placed the'book of St. Paul's Epistles. I 
 
 me, and say to my soul, I am thy salva- 
 tion. Who and what am I ] what evil 
 am I notl Was it my will, or words, or 
 deeds, that have done it] No: but thou, 
 Lord, good and merciful, by thy power- 
 ful right hand delivered me from the 
 depths of misery ; and thoroughly cleansed 
 the very bottom of my heart of all its cor- 
 ruptions. The whole of my evil lay in a 
 will stubbornly set in opposition to thine. 
 But where lay my free-will of old time, 
 and from what deep secret was it called 
 out in a moment, by which I bowed my 
 neck to thy easy yoke, and my shoulders 
 to thy light burden, Christ Jesus, my 
 helper and Redeemer 1 How sweet was 
 it, in a moment to be free from those de- 
 lightful vanities, to lose which had been 
 my dread, to part with which was now 
 my joy ! Thou ejectedst them, O my 
 true and consummate delight, and thou 
 enteredst in their room, sweeter than 
 all pleasure, but not to flesh and blood; 
 clearer than all light, but to the inner 
 man; higher than all honour, but not to 
 those who are high in their own conceits. 
 Now was my mind set free from the cor- 
 roding cares of avarice and ambition and 
 lust, and I conversed familiarly with thee, 
 
 seized it, opened, and read what first my light, my riches, my Saviour, and 
 
 my God. 
 
 I determined in thy sight to give up 
 my employments, not abruptly, but gra- 
 dually.* And opportunely, the vintage 
 
 struck my eyes ; '* Not in rioting and 
 drunkenness, not in chambering and wan- 
 tonness, not in strife and envying; but 
 put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
 make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil 
 the lusts thereof." Nor did I choose to 
 read any thing more, nor had I occasion. 
 Immediately at the end of this sentence, 
 all my doubts vanished. I closed the 
 book, and with a tranquil countenance 
 gave it to Alypius. He begged to see 
 what I had read, I showed him it, and he 
 read still further.* " Him that is weak 
 in the faith receive ye ;" which he ap- 
 plied to himself, as he told me. With a 
 placid serenity and composure suitable to 
 his character, in which he far excelled 
 me, he joined with me in going to my 
 mother, who now triumphed in the abun- 
 dant answers given to her petitions. Thus 
 didst thou turn her mourning into joy. 
 
 BOOK IX. 
 
 O Lord, I am thy servant, and the son 
 of thine handmaid, thou hast broken my 
 bonds in sunder. Let my heart and 
 tongue, and all my bones say. Lord, who 
 is like unto theel and do thou answer 
 
 Rom. 
 
 end, and xir, 
 
 beginning. 
 
 * I would suggest four particular remarks 
 on the narrative of our author's conversion. 
 
 1. That it does please God in every age to 
 distinguish some of the works of his Holy Spi- 
 rit l)v extraorditiarv circunisiances. It is of 
 liule consequence, to deliate whether the voice 
 heard in tlie garden was miraculous or not, 
 whether literally true, or an impression on 
 his mind. Eiliier way it was equally from 
 God, and sheds a lustre on the conversion of a 
 great and eminently holy personage, who was 
 called to testify remarkal)ly for God in his day. 
 
 2. There is generally some master-sin, which 
 impedes the work of God in all his people; 
 Augustine's was sensuality, and in the morli- 
 ficaUnn of that master-sin the grace of God is 
 peculiarly illustrated. 3. The great medium 
 of deliverance always is, the written word of 
 God testifying of Jesus, and salvation only hy 
 putting him on through faith. 4. Man's ex- 
 tremity is God's opjiortnnily. In our weak- 
 ness thoroughly felt God appears. Is it to be 
 wondered, that the Saint before ns proved so 
 strong and zealous a champion of the effectual 
 grace of God, and was made use of to revive 
 the clear doctrine of it in the church, and was 
 trained up by his own experience to defend it 
 against the suhtilties of Pelagius :■ He who 
 foresaw what Pelagius would introduce, in his 
 
404 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 vacation being at hand, I resolved to con- 
 tinue in my employment till that time. I 
 was glad also, that I had an opportunity 
 of saying to my scholars, what was true, 
 that the care of my health, which had 
 suffered much from fatigue, obliged me to 
 cease from the laborious office of teach- 
 ing. And to have given up the work be- 
 fore the vacation might have appeared ar- 
 rogant, and exposed me to the censure of 
 vanity. But should any of thy servants 
 think, that I did wrong in remaining in 
 the chair of deceit a day longer, 1 will 
 not contend. But hast not thou, most 
 merciful Lord, washed away this, with 
 all my other deadly sins, in the laver of 
 refeneration 1 
 
 Our friend Verecundus was seized with 
 a distemper, and receiving baptism in the 
 midst of it, departed this life in thy 
 faith and fear. Not long after my con- 
 version, my friend Nebridius also, though 
 he had sunk into the error which takes 
 away the proper manhood of thy Son, 
 was recovered ; and becoming a faithful 
 Christian, in Africa his own country, 
 quitted this tabernacle of clay, and now 
 lives in Abraham's bosom. He no more; 
 puts his ear to my mouth, but his spirit- 
 ual mouth to thy fountain to receive as 
 much wisdom as he is capable of — happy 
 without end. 
 
 It is pleasant to me to remember and 
 confess how thou didst teach me and my 
 friend Alypius, in the country, where we 
 enjoyed the affectionate and sedulous care 
 of my mother. We were both in the 
 capacity of catechumens, and I read with 
 pleasure the Psalms of David. With what 
 mingled pity and indignation did I look 
 on the Manichees, who madly rejected 
 the antidote of life. O that they saw the 
 internal eternal life, whicii because I had 
 tasted, I grieved that I could not show 
 it to tliem ! 
 
 Tlie holidays being finished, I signified 
 to my scholars, that they must provide 
 themselves another teacher. And I wrote 
 to Ambrose an account of my errors, and 
 of my present desire ; and begged him to 
 recommend some part of thy word more 
 particularly to my attention, as a proper 
 preparative for baptism. He pointed out 
 to me the prophet Isaiah, I apprehend, on 
 account of his superior perspicuity in ope- 
 ning the Gospel. However, finding the 
 
 adorable wisdom, tliusprovided an experienced 
 Yjastor of his churcli, who in due time should 
 ■withstand his corruptions. 
 
 first part of this prophet more obscure, 
 and apprehending the rest to be similar, 
 I deferred the reading of him, till I was 
 more experienced in the Scriptures. The 
 time approaching in which I must give in 
 my name, I left the country and returned 
 to Milan. There I received baptism with 
 Alypius and the boy Adeodatus, the fruit 
 of my sin. He was almost fifteen years 
 old, and, in understanding, he exceeded 
 many learned men. I glorify thee for thy 
 gifts, my God ; for I had nothing in the 
 boy but sin. For that I brought him up 
 in thy religion, thou, and thou only, in- 
 spiredst me. I looked with trembling at 
 his prodigious genius. But thou soon 
 removedst him from the earth, and I re- 
 member him with greater satisfaction, as 
 I have now no anxiety for his childhood, 
 his youth, or his manhood. Nor could 
 I at that time be satisfied with contempla- 
 ting the mystery of redemption. The 
 hymns and songs of thy church moved my 
 soul intensely ; thy truth was distilled by 
 them into my heart; the flame of piety 
 was kindled, and my tears flowed for joy. 
 This practice of singing had been of no 
 long standingat Milan. It began about the 
 year when Justina persecuted Ambrose. 
 The pious people watched in the church, 
 prepared to die with their pastor. There 
 my mother sustained an eminent part in 
 watching and praying. Then hymns and 
 psalms, after the manner of the East, 
 were sung, with a view of preserving the 
 people from weariness ; and thence the 
 custom has spread through Christian 
 churches. 
 
 Thou, who makest men to be of one 
 mind in a house, unitedst to us one of 
 our young townsmen, Euodius, who had 
 served in the army, and was now regene- 
 rated. We determined to return to Africa ; 
 and when we were at the mouth of the 
 Tiber, my mother departed this life. I 
 must not pass by the conceptions of my 
 soul concerning her, who endured labour 
 for my temporal birth, and laboured in 
 heart for my spiritual birth. She had 
 been brought up in a Christian family, 
 but did not so much commend her moth- 
 er's care, as that of a decrepid old servant 
 of the house, who had nursed her father, 
 whose years and character were highly 
 respected, and who superintended the ed- 
 ucation of her master's daughters. She 
 never suffered them to drink even water, 
 except at meals, telling them that if ever 
 they became mistresses, the custom of 
 drinking would remain, but they would 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 405 
 
 then indulge it in -wine, not water. Yet 
 my mother Monica, notwithstanding the 
 care of this provident governess, when 
 young, had learned by degrees to drink 
 wine, having been sent to draw it for the 
 use of the family. By what method was 
 she delivered from this snare ? Thoii 
 providedst for her a malignant reproach 
 from a m^id of the house, who, in a pas- 
 sion, called her drunkard. From that 
 moment she gave np the practice forever. 
 Thus didst thou prepare a cure for her 
 evil practice, by the malevolent railing of 
 another, that no man may attribute it to his 
 own power, if his admonitions of another 
 be attended with salutary effect.* 
 
 After her marriage with my father Pa- 
 tricius, she endeavoured to win him over 
 to thy service by the amiableness of her 
 manners, and patiently bore the injuries 
 of his unfaithfulness. She still looked 
 for thy mercy, that, learning to believe in 
 thee, he might become chaste. His tem- 
 per was passionate, but his spirit be- 
 nevolent. She knew how to bear with 
 him when angry, by a perfect silence and 
 composure ; and when she saw him cool, 
 ■would meekly expostulate with him. 
 Many matrons in her company would 
 complain of the blows and harsh treatment 
 they received from their husbands, whose 
 tempers were yet milder than that of Pa- 
 tricius ; then she would exhort them to 
 govern their tongues, and remember the 
 inferiority of their condition. And when 
 they expressed their astonishment, that it 
 was never heard that Patricius, a man of 
 so violent a temper, had beaten his wife, 
 or that they ever were at variance a single 
 day, she informed them of her plan. 
 Those who followed it, thanked her for 
 the good success of it ; those who did not, 
 experienced vexation. Her mother-in- 
 law, nt first, was irritated against her by 
 the whispers of servants. But she over- 
 came her by mild obsequiousness, inso- 
 much that she at length informed her son 
 of the slanders of those backbiters, and 
 desired that they might be restrained. 
 Thus she and her mother-in-law lived in 
 perfect harmony. It was a great gift, 
 which, O my God, thou gavest to her. 
 
 • I could not prevail willi myself to puss over 
 aUogtlliL-r lliis, and a t\:w more circumstantes. 
 ol'domesiic lite, uliicli follow. Let llie pietv 
 and prudence, which they breathe, compen- 
 sate for theii' simplicity. 'To a serious mind 
 they will i)erhaps appear, not only not con- 
 temptible, but even iustructive. 
 
 that she never repeated any of the fierce 
 things, which she heard from persons who 
 were at variance with one another, and 
 was conscientiously exact, in sayincr no- 
 thing but what might tend to heal and 
 to reconcile. 
 
 I might have been tempted to think this 
 a small good, had I not known by grie- 
 votis experience the innumerable evils 
 resulting to society from the contrary 
 spirit, by which men extend mischief like 
 a pestilence, not only repeating the words 
 of angry enemies to angry enemies, but also 
 adding what never had been said ; where- 
 as the human mind should not be content 
 with negative goodness in such cases, but 
 should endeavour to promote peace by 
 speaking what is good, as my amiable 
 mother did. through the effectual teaching 
 of thy Spirit. At length, in the extremity 
 of life, she gained her husband to thee, 
 and be died^in the fiith of Christ. 
 
 It was through thy secret appointment 
 that she and I stood alone at a window 
 facing the East, in a house at the mouth 
 of the Tiber, where we were preparing 
 for our voyage. Our discourse was high- 
 ly agreeable, and forgetting the past, we 
 endeavoured to conceive aright the nature 
 of the eternal life of the saints. It was 
 evident to us, that no carnal delights de- 
 served to be named on this subject; 
 erecting our spirits more ardently, we as- 
 cended above the noblest parts of the 
 material creation to the consideration of 
 our own minds, and passing above them, 
 we attempted to reach heaven itself, to 
 come to thee, by whom all things were 
 made. There our hearts were enamoured, 
 and there we held fast the first fruits of 
 the Spirit, and returned to the sound of 
 our own voice, which gave us an emblem 
 of the Divine Word. We said, if the 
 flesh, the imagination, and every tongue 
 should be silenced, for they proclaim, we 
 
 MADE XOT OURSELVES, BUT HE AVHO RE- 
 
 MAiNETH FOR EVER : If thcse thiugs should 
 now hold their peace, and God alone 
 should speak, not by any emblems or 
 created things, but by himself, so that we 
 could hear his word ; should this be con- 
 tinued, and other visions be withdrawn, 
 and this alone seize and absorb the spec- 
 tator forever, is not this the meaning of, 
 " Enter ihou into the joy of thy Lord 1"* 
 
 * Matth. XXV. In Kev. xxi. 23. the same 
 sublime tliou<;bt is described under the medi- 
 um of si<^lit, which here is couveyed under the 
 medium of hearing. 
 
406 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHUKCH 
 
 [Chap.H. 
 
 At that moment the world appeared to us 
 of no value : and she said, Son, I have 
 novr no delight in lile. What I should 
 do here, and why I am here, I know not, 
 the hope of this life being quite spent. 
 One thing only, your conversion, was an 
 object for which I wished to live. My 
 God has given me this in larger measure. 
 What do I here? — Scarcely five days 
 after, she fell into a fever. A brother of 
 mine, who was with us, lamented that 
 she was likely to die in a foreign land. 
 She looked at him with anxiety, to see 
 him so grovelling in his conceptions, and 
 then looking at me, said, Place this body 
 any where; do not distress yourselves 
 concerning it. I could not but rejnice and 
 give thee thanks, that she was delivered 
 from that anxiety, with which I knew^ she 
 always had been agitated in regard to 
 a sepulchre, -which she had provided for 
 herself, and prepared near the body of her 
 husband. 1 knew not the time when this 
 void had been filled by the fulness of thy 
 grace, but I rejoiced to find this evidence of 
 it. I heard afterwards, that while we were 
 at Ostia she had discoursed with some 
 friends, in my absence, concerning the 
 contempt of life, and they, expressing 
 their surprise that she did not fear to leave 
 her body so far from her own country ; 
 " Nothing," said she, " is far to God, and 
 I do not fear that he should not know 
 where to find me at the resurrection." 
 She departed this life on the ninth day of 
 her illness, in the fifty-sixth year of her 
 age, and the thirty-third of mine.* 
 
 BOOK X. 
 
 Now, Lord, my groaning testifies that 
 I am displeased with myself; but thou 
 art light and pleasure, and art loved and 
 desired, that I may blush for myself, and 
 renounce myself, and choose thee : and 
 neither attempt to please thee, nor myself, 
 but by depending on thee. For when I 
 am wicked, then to confess to thee is no 
 other thing than to be displeased with 
 myself; and when godly, this is nothing 
 else, but to confess that thou aff'ordest 
 that gift to me. The confessions of my 
 
 *In what follows to llie end of this Book, 
 the Author gives a very amiable picture of 
 the filial affections, tempered by piety and re- 
 signation, which he felt on this occasion, not 
 indeed without a mixture of the superstition 
 of praying for the dead, which was growing in 
 this ceiiturj'. In him the evangelical spirit, 
 however, predominates extremely, even while 
 he is indulging the superstitious. But let it 
 sufhce to have given this general account. 
 
 past evils, which thou hast forgiven, 
 changing my mind by faith and by bap- 
 tism, when they are read and heard, ex- 
 cite the heart, that it sink not in despair, 
 but may watch in the love of thy mercy, 
 and the sweetness of thy grace, by which 
 the weak, brought to feel liis own weak- 
 ness, is made strong. But what advan- 
 tage will result from my confessing, as 
 I now propose, not what I was, but what 
 I now am ] I will discover myself to 
 such as will rejoice over me for what is 
 good, and will pray for and syinpathize 
 with we in regard to what is evil, more 
 secure as I am through thy mercy, than 
 my innojcence. I am a little child, but 
 my P^ather always lives, and is my sufil- 
 cient guardian. What temptations I can 
 or cannot resist, I know not. But my 
 hope is this, that thou art faithful, that 
 thou dost not suffer us to be tempted 
 above that we are able, but with the 
 temptation also makest a way to escape, 
 that we may be able to bear it.* Lord, 
 1 love thee; thou hast smitten my heart 
 with thy Word, and I have loved thee. 
 But what do I love, when I love thee ? 
 not the heavens and the earth, nor any 
 created beauty. They cry aloud, we 
 are not God, he made us. Where shall 
 I find thee, but in thyself, above me '? Too 
 late did I love thee, thou primaeval Beau- 
 ty ! Thou calledst aloud, and overcamest 
 my deafness : thou shonest, and dispell- 
 edst iny darkness. Thou wast fragrant, 
 and I panted after thee. I tasted, and 
 hungered and thirsted after thee: thou 
 touchedst me, and I was inflamed into 
 thy peace. When I shall stick wholly 
 to thee, I shall no more have pain and 
 fatigue, and my whole life shall live full 
 of thee. But now, because thou sup- 
 portest him whom thou fillest, because I 
 am not full of thee, I am a burden to my- 
 self. My wholesome griefs and perni- 
 cious pleasures contend together, and I 
 know not on which side the victory 
 stands. Woe is me! Thou art my phy- 
 sician, I am sick. Thou art merciful, I 
 am wretched. All my hope lies in thy 
 immense mercy. Give w4iat thou com- 
 mandest, and coumiand what thou wilt. 
 Thou commandest us to keep from the lust 
 of the flesh, from the lust of the eyes, and 
 from the pride of life : and what thou com- 
 mandest, thou hast given me. Yet there 
 still live in my memory the images of 
 evils, to which I had been habituated, 
 
 * 1 Cor. X. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CONFESSIONS. 
 
 407 
 
 and they occur to me even in sleep. Is 
 not thy hand, O God, able to heal all the 
 diseases of my soul, and to sanctify even 
 the hours of rest] I would rejoice vv^ith 
 trembling in what thou hast given me, 
 and mourn over that which is imperfect, 
 and hope that thou wilt perlect thy mer- 
 cies, when death shall be swallowed up 
 in victory. 
 
 There is another evil of the day, and 1 
 wish the day may be sufficient for it. 
 We refresh the continual ruins of the 
 body by food, till this corruptible shall 
 put on incorruption. Thou hast taught 
 me to use food as medicine. But while 
 I am passing from the uneasiness of hun- 
 ger to the rest of satiety; in the very 
 passage the snare of concupiscence is 
 laid for me; and the bounds of innocence 
 are not easily defined, and a pretence for 
 indulgence is made on that very account. 
 These temptations I daily endeavour to 
 resist, and I call on thy right hand ibr 
 my salvation, and make known to tliee 
 my agitations of soul, because I am not 
 yet clear on this subject. I hear my 
 God, "let not your heart be overcharged 
 with surfeiting and drunkenness."* The 
 latter is far from me, let it not approach 
 me ; the former sometimes steals ujjon 
 me, keep it at a distance from me. Who 
 is there. Lord, that is perfectly temper- 
 ate'? Whoever he be, let him magnify 
 thy name. But I am not he, I am a sin- 
 ful man. However, I magnify thy name, 
 and he who overcame the world, and 
 numbers me among the weak members 
 of his body, intercedes for my sins. 
 
 In regard to the enticement of smells, 
 I am not solicitous. When they are ab- 
 sent, I want them not : when present, I 
 do not refuse them, content to be without 
 them entirely. So I think ; but such is 
 my miserable darkness, that I must not 
 easily credit myself, because, what is 
 within, generally lies hid, till experience 
 evidence it. The only hope, the only confi- 
 dence, the only firm promise, is thy mercy. 
 
 The pleasures of the ear have deeper 
 hold on me. I find even while I am 
 charmed with sacred melody, I am led 
 astray at times by the luxury of sensa- 
 tions, and oifend, not knowing at the 
 time, but afterwards I discover it. Some- 
 times, guarding against this fallacy, I err 
 in the other extreme, and could wish all 
 the melody of David's Psalms were re- 
 moved i'rom my ears, and those of the 
 
 * Luke xxi. 
 
 church, and think it safer to imitate the 
 plan of Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, 
 who directed a method of repeating the 
 psalms more resembling pronunciation 
 than music. But when I remember my 
 tears of affection at my conversion under 
 the melody of thy church, with which 
 I am still effected, I again acknowledtre 
 the utility of the custom. Thus do°I 
 rtuctuate between the danger of pleasure, 
 and the experience of utility, and am in- 
 duced, though with a wavering assent, 
 to own that the infirmity of nature may 
 be assisted in devotion by psalmody. 
 Yet when the tune has moved me more 
 than the subject, I feel guilty, and am 
 ready to wish I had not heard the music. 
 See where I am, and mourn with me, ye 
 who are conscious of any inward feelings 
 of godliness. I cannot expect the sym- 
 pathy of those who are not. Thou, Lord, 
 my God, hear and pity and heal me. 
 
 The pleasures of the eye I find to en- 
 tangle me from time to time. But thou 
 deliverest me, sometimes without pain, 
 because I fall into them gently; at other 
 times with pain, because I stick in them. 
 
 Another form of manifold danger is 
 added, a curious spirit, ptiUiated by the 
 name of knowledge. Surrounded as we 
 are with objects, when can I say I am 
 freed from this ] What vehement tempta- 
 tions have I had from the enemy, to ask 
 of thee a sign : But I beseech thee by 
 our king, Jesus Christ, that, as I am far 
 from consenting to it, so I may be farther 
 and farther. What a trifle diverts me 
 from a thought of great importance, and 
 unless thou quickly admonish me by the 
 conviction of my infirmity, either to di- 
 vert the thought by some serious medita- 
 tion, or to despise it altogether, I should 
 become absolutely dull. My life is full 
 of these evils, and even my prayers are 
 often disturbed, and while 1 apply my 
 heart to thine ears, I am overborne by a 
 torrent of vanities. 
 
 What can give hope, .except thy mercy, 
 by which thou hast begun to renew us ? 
 And thou knowest how much thou hast 
 done for me already. I carry thy yoke, 
 and find it easy, as thou hast promised. 
 It always was so, but I did not believe it, 
 when I was afraid to take it upon me; 
 but thou, O Lord, thou who alone rulest 
 without pride, because thou hast no su- 
 perior, can I in this life be exempt from 
 pride ? Well done, well done, I find 
 scattered in the nets by the enemy every 
 where. Daily, Lord, we feel these temp- 
 
408 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 tations. Thou knowest, on this head, the 
 groans of my heart, and the floods of 
 mine eyes. Nor can I easily see, that I 
 grow more free from this pest of pride ; 
 and I much fear my secret evils, which 
 thou knowest. 1 am poor and needy, and 
 my best method is to seek thy mercy in 
 secret groans and in self-abhorrence, till 
 thou perfect that which concerneth me. 
 
 There is another internal evil, by which 
 a man, without seeking to please others, 
 pleases himself with thy good things, as 
 if they were his own ; or if he allows 
 them to be thine, yet he is apt to fancy 
 them bestowed upon him for his own 
 merits; or he pleases himself with in- 
 dulging an invidious spirit against others. 
 In all these dangers thou seest the trem- 
 bling of my heart ; I feel my wounds 
 healed every now and then by thee; but 
 I feel not an exemption from them. Some- 
 times thou introducest me into an uncom- 
 mon affection, into a sweetness past the 
 power of description, which, were it per- 
 fected in me, 1 should not see what life 
 would want to complete its felicity. But 
 I sink back by the weight of misery, and 
 am held entancrled. 
 
 Whom shall I look to as my mediator 1 
 Shall I go to angels ] IMany have tried 
 this, and have been fond of visions, and 
 have deserved to be the sport of the illu- 
 sions which they loved. A mediator be- 
 tween God and man must have the nature 
 of both. The true Mediator, whom in 
 thy secret mercy thou hast shown to the 
 humble, and hast sent, that by his exam- 
 ple they might also learn humilitj^ the 
 man Christ Jesus, hath appeared a media- 
 tor between mortal sinners, and the im- 
 mortal Holy One, that, because the 
 wages of righteousness is life and peace, 
 by his divine righteousness he might 
 justify the ungodly^ and deliver them 
 from death. He was shown to ancient 
 saints, that they might be saved bjr 
 faith in his future suiferings, as we by 
 faith in the same sufferings already past. 
 How hast thou loved us, Father, deliver- 
 ing up thy only Son for us ungodly ! For 
 whom he, our priest and sacrifice, who 
 thought it no robbery to be equal with 
 thee, was subjected to death. Well may 
 my hope be strong through such an inter- 
 cessor; else I should despair. Many and 
 great are my diseases, thy meclioine 
 larger still. Were he not made flesh for 
 us, we could not dream of having any 
 union with him. Terrified with my sins 
 and the weight of my misery, I was de- 
 
 sponding, but thou encouragedst me, say- 
 ing, Christ died for all, that they which 
 live, should not live to themselves, but to 
 him that died for them.* Lo, I cast all 
 my care on thee. Lord, that I may live. 
 Thou knowest my weakness and igno- 
 rance, teach and heal me. He hath re- 
 deemed me with his blood, in whom are 
 hid all the treasures of wisdom and know- 
 ledge. Let not the proud calumniate me, 
 if with the poor I desire to eat and be 
 satisfied, and to praise the Lord.| 
 
 Augustine, after his conversion, re- 
 turned with some friends into Africa, and 
 lived upon his own estate for almost 
 three years, retired from the world. A 
 desire to oblige a person of some conse- 
 quence in Hippo, who requested his in- 
 structions, brought him at length to that 
 city, where Valerius was bishop, — a per- 
 son of great piety; but, on account of his 
 slender acquaintance with the Latin 
 tongue, scarcely adequate to the office of 
 pastor in that place. Augustine, through 
 the strong and urgent desires of the peo- 
 ple, was ordained presbyter to Valerius; 
 but wept on the occasion, from the genu- 
 ine sense which he had of the importance 
 of the office. He told Possidius that his 
 tears were by some misconstrued,:]: as if 
 he regretted that he had not been chosen 
 bishop. Such poor judges are man}', of 
 the views and sensations of godly men ! 
 Valerius rejoiced that God had heard his 
 prayers, and that the people would now 
 be supplied with such a pastor. He gave 
 him licence to preach in the presence of 
 the bishop, a thing before unknown in 
 Africa: but which, from the good effects 
 of this precedent, afterwards grew com- 
 mon. Here his ministry was useful in 
 the instruction and edification of the 
 brethren, and also in the defeat of various 
 heresies. Divine truth, which had been 
 
 * 2 Cor. V. 
 
 + Psalm xxii. 26. We see in tliis last book 
 ihf author's description of tlie conflicl between 
 flesii and spirit after his cniiversion, and the 
 repose ot" liis soul for peace and lia])|jiness 
 only on tlie Lord Jesus as liis rigliteousness 
 and strength. I sjiall make no i'ui'ther re- 
 marks than to repeat his own observation in 
 his i-etractations. " These confessions praise 
 the God oF rigliteousness and goodness, and 
 excite the liumaTi understanding ami aft'ection 
 tow ard iiim. They did this in me while I was 
 writing them, and they do it still, when I read 
 them. What others may tbink of them, let 
 them judge ; but I know they have much 
 leased and do please many of the brethren." 
 
 I Possid. Life of Aug. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 
 
 409 
 
 almost buried amidst many schisms and 
 distractions in Africa, now raised up its 
 head again ; and Fortiinatus, the great 
 leader of tlie Manichees, was obliged, in 
 confusion, to leave Hippo, when he found 
 himself, by the confession of the hearers, 
 vanquished in a conference with Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 Heretics vied with the members of the 
 general church in their attention to the 
 pastoral labours of Augustine, whose 
 fame began gradually to spread through- 
 out the Western world. Valerius re- 
 joiced and gave thanks on the account, 
 and being solicitous to preserve such a 
 treasure to his church, he took care to get 
 Augustine elected bishop of Hippo, in 
 conjunction with himself. Age and in- 
 firmities rendered Valerius very inade- 
 quate to the work; and every true Chris- 
 tian will doubt which more to admire, the 
 godly zeal of Augustine, tempered with 
 modesty and charity, or the unfeigned 
 humility of Valerius. Augustine, after 
 he had strongly resisted the inclinations 
 of the bishop and all the church, at 
 length accepted the office; the duties of 
 which he continued to discharge after the 
 decease of Valerius. His zeal and labo- 
 riousness increased with his authority. 
 The monastery of his institution became 
 renowned in Africa ; and about ten bish- 
 ops of undoubted piety known to our au- 
 thor,* came from this seminary. These 
 instituted monasteries after the same pat- 
 tern, and from them other churches were 
 supplied with pastors ; and the doctrines 
 of faith, hope and charity, by these means, 
 and also by Augustine's writings, which 
 were translated into the Greek tongue, 
 were diffused and enforced with increas- 
 ing vigour through the Christian world 
 His writings, however, never seem to 
 have had any permanent influence in the 
 Eastern church. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 
 
 It is the part of an intelligent agent to 
 choose the fittest season for the execution 
 of arduous enterprises, or the introduc- 
 tion of important innovations. This rule, 
 we may safely conclude, is observed by 
 Satan in all his attempts against the 
 Church of Christ. While the belief and 
 
 experience of divine influences were 
 strong and vigorous in Christian societies, 
 it was in vain for him to attempt to per- 
 suade men, that such influences were of 
 no necessity or value; he could do no 
 more than seduce them to counterfeit, 
 abuse, or misapply them. Hence the 
 wildness and incoherence of j\Iontanism. 
 But now that the holy influence of the 
 Spirit of God was generally damped by 
 superstition, or quenched by licentious- 
 ness, Satan felt himself emboldened to 
 erect a new heresy, which should pretend 
 to the height of purity, supported by 
 
 MERE HUMAN NATURE, CXClusive of the 
 
 operations of divine grace altogether. 
 This was Pelagianism :* and as this evil 
 now entered the Church for the first 
 time, and in a greater or less degree has 
 continued to this day ; as it is directly 
 subversive of Christianity, and as it in- 
 troduced a controversy, not trivial and 
 frivolous like many others, but of un- 
 speakable importance, it eminently falls 
 within the plan of this History, to state 
 the circumstances and consequences with 
 perspicuity. 
 
 Augustine, of Hippo, had been trained 
 up under the Lord's wholesome discipline, 
 by an extraordinary conversion, as we 
 have seen, during the latter part of the 
 last century. Thus did the all-wise God, 
 
 who IS WONDERFUL IN COUNSEL AND EX- 
 CELLENT IN WORK, secretly stir up a 
 SCOURGE for Pelagius, against the time 
 that he should make his appearance ; and 
 his heresy was eventually one of the 
 grand means of introducing juster views 
 of Gospel grace, than had for a long time 
 obtained in the Church, and of reviving 
 Christian truth, humility and piety. The 
 effects of this effusion of the vSpirit were 
 solid, though never brilliant, operative 
 during this century and many centuries 
 afterwards, in the production of much real 
 godliness in the minds of many individ- 
 uals, particularly of monastic persons, to 
 whom, for ages, Augustine's writings 
 were a great and useful light; indeed, 
 next to the word of God, the greatest 
 means of grace which they had in times 
 extremely unfavourable to improvement. 
 Hence, besides the immediate benefit 
 which the Church received in his own 
 
 Vol. h 
 
 Possid. 
 2M 
 
 * In this chapter I purpose to describe its 
 rise and progress historically. What 1 have 
 said of its precise nature, will be confirmed in 
 the proper place by the authentic lights of an- 
 tiquity. 
 
410 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. III. 
 
 time, the ntility of this providential dis- 
 pensatioa reached to the time of the 
 Reformation itself, and even beyond it in 
 Popish countries ; though the reader must 
 not expect any great or strong display of 
 the plantation of new churches, or any 
 sudden and marvellous change in the ex- 
 ternal appearance of the Church. The 
 light Ave are now to contemplate never 
 broke out into a vivid extensive flame, 
 but shone with faint, though steady rays, 
 with a moderate degree of brightness at 
 first, and afterwards glimmered through 
 many ages. 
 
 Pelagius was born in Britain, and was 
 in his own time called Erito.* His com- 
 panion Coelestius v.^as an Irishman, by the 
 testimony of Jerom. He calls him a 
 Scot, and that name in those times meant, 
 as is known to the learned, a native of 
 Ireland. They were both laymen; the 
 former, by profession, a monk, who, as 
 far as appears, always maintained a cha- 
 racter of fair and decent morals. In the 
 heat of contention there were who denied 
 this; but it is admitted by Augustine 
 with his usual candour, and we might 
 have been certain of it, independently of 
 his authority ; because otherwise it would 
 have been impossible for him ever to have 
 become a person of lasting reputation in 
 the religious world. He travelled from 
 monastery to monastery, through various 
 parts of the Empire. His heretical opin- 
 ions did not appear till he was far advanced 
 in life ; before that time Augustine owns 
 (though he speaks by hearsay) his repu- 
 tation for serious piety to have been great 
 in the Christian world ; and those who 
 know the difference between holiness and 
 mere morality will not be surprised at 
 this. Augustine allows the genius and 
 
 * I make large use of Jansenius in this nar- 
 rative ; he has prefixed llie Iiistoi-y ot tlie 
 heresy to his trcaiise called Angusline : The 
 accounts seem accurate, and well supported by 
 aulliorllies of coiiteinpoiary writers, particu- 
 larly Jerom and Augustine. I have consulted 
 these two with much care and attention, and I 
 find Janseiiitis so exact and well-informed in 
 those things of which wo have an opportunity 
 lo form an estimate, that it seems reasonable 
 to give him credit for his extracts from the 
 Gesta Pelag. of Aug. — a work which we have 
 not in the 'jonmion editions of that I'atiier, be- 
 cause it was not discovered till abont the time 
 of Jansenins, being found, as he tells us, in an 
 Abbey at Fesulte, in Italy. 
 
 Since I wrote this, 1 have seen the Gesta 
 Pelag. in a more recent edition of Augustine, 
 and am still further confirmed in my opinion 
 of tlie accurate industry of Jansenius. 
 
 capacity of both these men to have been 
 of the first order : and this testimony from 
 him is derisive with me against that of 
 Jerom, who treats the understanding and 
 endowments of both with great contempt ; 
 but Jerom was not apt to allow any lau- 
 dable qualities to an adversary. 
 
 Isidore of Pelusium applies to Pelagius 
 that passage of Hosea ; " grey hairs are 
 here and there upon him, yet p^]ao.;an. 
 he knoweth it not." This j^^^ *.,. 
 author is understood thence pearsabout 
 to intimate, that he fell into j^_ p ^q^ 
 this heresy in old age. It be- or 405. 
 gan to appear about the year 
 104 or 5. Chrysostom, writing to his 
 friend, the deaconess Olympias, says, " I 
 am much grieved for Pelagius the monk ; 
 consider what crowns must be reserved 
 for those who stand firm, when men who 
 have lived in so much mortification and 
 continency appear to be so carried away." 
 His first writings were an Epistle to Pau- 
 linus of Nola and other little works, in 
 which his erroneous views of grace were 
 so artfully expressed, and so guarded with 
 cautious terms, that Augustine owns he 
 was almost deceived by them. But when 
 he saw his other writings of a later date, 
 he discerned that he might artfully own 
 the word grace, and by retaining the 
 term, break the force of prejudice, and 
 avoid offence, and yet conceal his meaning 
 under a general ambiguity. 
 
 For, by a dexterity very common with 
 heretics, Pelagius, while he laid open to 
 his converts the whole mystery of his 
 doctrine, iinparted only so much to others 
 as might be more calculated to ensnare 
 their affections than to inform them of 
 his real opinions. He used to deliver his 
 views under the modest appearance of 
 qtieries, started against the doctrines of 
 the church, and those as not invented by 
 himself, but by others. The effect of 
 poisoning the minds of men was, perhaps, 
 more powerfully produced by this, than it 
 would have been by a more direct and po- 
 sitive method. To this he added another 
 artifice; he insinuated himself into the 
 favour of women of some rank, of weak 
 minds, and unacquainted with the spirit 
 of the Gospel, though professing religion ; 
 and, by their means, he diffused his tenets 
 with much success. Ccelestius, more 
 open and daring in speech, pursued a 
 method not so replete with deceit, and 
 was therefore exposed to detection more 
 easily than his master. 
 
 Pelagius, having travelled over the 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 
 
 4!1 
 
 monasteries of Egypt, settled at leni^th at 
 Rome, where his attempts to undermine 
 the whole doctrine of divine (jracfN by 
 degrees, notwithstanding all his caution, 
 gave umbrage to the Church. Unguarded 
 moments also will hajipen to the most 
 artful, and at times discover them to the 
 most unwary. A bishop, who was a col- 
 league of Augustine, mentioning to Pela- 
 gius those words of the Confessions, 
 " Give what thou commandest, and com- 
 mand what thou wilt;" he contradicted 
 with great vehemence, and expressed 
 much indignation at the sentiment. 
 
 Rome being taken by the Goths about 
 the year 410, numbers fled into Africa, 
 and among the rest the two heresiarchs. 
 Pelagius vras received at 
 Hippo, in Augustine's ab- 
 sence, where his stay was 
 very short. The bishop of 
 Hippo saw him once or twice 
 at Carthage ; but was himself 
 very busy in settling a con- 
 ference with the Donatists, and nothin* 
 material passed between them. Pelagius 
 leaving Africa passed over in- 
 to Palestine ; there his labours 
 attracted the attention of Je- 
 rom, who lived a m.onastic 
 life in the samse country, and 
 wrote against his opinions, justly calling 
 on him to speak clearly what he meant, 
 and complaining of his ambiguities. 
 
 In the mean time Cog-lestius in Africa 
 more openly discovered his sentiments, 
 and made such attempts to propagate 
 „ , .. them in Carthage itself, that 
 
 in Afiiea. ^^ "^^^^ summoned to appear 
 before a synod, which was 
 held bv Aurelins, bishop of that city. He 
 was accused of denying orisrinal sin ; and 
 ■when he was pressed with the custom of 
 the Church in baptizing infants, as a 
 proof of her belief in all ages that infants 
 needed redemption, he declared that they 
 had no need of remission, and yet ought 
 to be baptized, that they might be sancti- 
 fied in Christ. Coelestiiis 
 was condemned as a heretic 
 in the year 41-2, and disap- 
 pointed of his hopes of rising 
 in the church ; for he had 
 either obtained or was about 
 to obtain the office of a pres- 
 byter, in Africa. 
 A fragment of the acts of this synod is 
 preserved by Augustine,* though he him- 
 
 Rome ta- 
 ken and 
 phindeied 
 by llie 
 Gollis, 
 
 A. D. 410. 
 
 Pelasrius 
 spreads Ins 
 errors in 
 rulestine. 
 
 self was not present at it, in which is the 
 following passage : " Aurelius said, Read 
 what follows, and it was read : That the 
 sin of Adam hurt himself alone, and not 
 mankind. Cceleslius said, I owned that 
 I was dubious concerning the communi- 
 cation of sin by descent from Adam (yet in 
 such a manner, that I shall bow to tlie au- 
 thority of those to whom God hath given 
 the grace of superiorskill) ; because I have 
 heard different things from those who at 
 least were presbyters in the church. Pau- 
 linus, a deacon, said, Name them. Ccb- 
 lestius answered, The holy presbyter* 
 Ruffinus at Rome : I heard him deny any 
 communication of sin by descent. Being 
 pressed, if he could name any more, be 
 said, Is not one priest sufficient? On 
 being asked, whether he had not asserted, 
 that infants are born in a state in which 
 Adam was before transgression, all that 
 could be obtained from him was, That 
 infants needed baptism, and ought to be 
 baptized."! 
 
 Indeed Pelagianism itself seemed little 
 more than a revival of Deism, or what is 
 commonly called natural religion. Adam, 
 it is said, would have died, whether he 
 sinned or not. Men might be saved by 
 the Law, as well as the Gospel : infants 
 just born are in the same state as Adam 
 before transgression. Men's death de- 
 pends not on that of Adam, nor does their 
 resurrection depend on that of Christ. 
 These tenets were objected to Coslestius, 
 and condemned. In a book which he of- 
 fered to the council, he owned that chil- 
 dren were redeemed by Christ, and yet 
 he would not confess that the effects of 
 Adam's sin passed upon them. So in- 
 consistent are men, bent on the support 
 of error, and yet willing to appear in some 
 measure Christian! 
 
 In the mean time Pelagius, in his man- 
 
 Coelestius 
 is con- 
 demned at 
 Carthage 
 as a here- 
 tic, 
 
 A. D. 412. 
 
 • In his book on Original Sin, cap. S. 
 
 *Tliis is lie, who was famous tor ins contro- 
 versy willi Jerom, and for the translation of 
 Origen's works, and of wlinm, though lie seems 
 to lie not much in the line of our history, we 
 shull liave occasion to say a little more here- 
 after. 
 
 t Two plain inferences seem deducible from 
 this fragment; 1. That the riglit of baptizing 
 infants'was allowed on all sides to have been 
 of aposlolical and jjriniilive authority. It is 
 inifiossilile that men so shrewd and learned as 
 Cffilestius and his master, would not have ob- 
 jected to the novelty of infant-baptism, had it 
 "been a novelty. 2. The belief of original sin 
 had uiiiversaliv obtained, and must have been 
 equallv apostolical. One presbyter only was 
 named by Coelestius, as favouring the doctrine 
 of Pelagius. 
 
412 
 
 HISTOKY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 ner, was still writing against the doc- 
 trines of the Gospel ; while Augustine, 
 than whom no man was ever more cau- 
 tious and deliberate in the whole contro- 
 versy, answered in his writings the evil 
 tendency of the Pelagian tenets, "avoid- 
 ing," says he,* "the name of Pelagius, 
 thinking that I might more easily profit 
 him, if, preserving friendship, I should 
 yet spare his modesty." But more of 
 this hereafter. 
 
 _ Cffilestius, driven from Africa, fixed 
 his seat in Sicily, and by the questions 
 which he there excited, gave occasion to 
 Augustine to employ his pen in answer- 
 ing him. Nor did the heresy cease in 
 Africa: the bisliop of Hippo was em- 
 ployed not only in writing, but also in 
 preaching against the new notions, and 
 gave his testimony in a solemn manner 
 from the pulpit at Carthage. 
 
 Pelagius himself wrote in the most re- 
 spectful manner to Augustine, and in the 
 highest terms extolled his character. It 
 is certain, that the impressions made on 
 Augustine's mind in favour of Pelagius 
 were strong, and not easily erased, be- 
 cause he had been taught to believe him 
 to be a person of great virtue. Nothing 
 but the completest evidence of heresy 
 could have induced him to make an open 
 rupture. And a soul like his, humble 
 and charitable in a high degree, would, I 
 doubt not, long entertain the best hopes 
 of a man whom he had once esteemed. 
 In this spirit he wrote to him the follow- 
 ing guarded letter: 
 
 " I thank you for your kind letter. The 
 Lord requite you good, by which you 
 may be ever good, and live with the 
 Eternal for ever. Though I cannot own 
 the good things in myself, which your 
 friendly Epistle mentions, yet I should 
 
 yet 
 be ungrateful did I not thank you ; at the 
 same time admonishing you rather to pray 
 for me, that I may become such, from the 
 Lord, as you think me to be." 
 
 In the year 413 an occasion was offered 
 to Pelagius of discovering himself more 
 openly to the world. A virgin, named 
 Demetrias, of the illustrious 
 race of the Anicii, one of the 
 most ancient and noble fami- 
 lies of Rome, having fled into 
 Africa on account of the inva- 
 sion of the Goths, was, by 
 the exhortation of Augustine, 
 induced to consecrate her vir- 
 
 Pelagius's 
 Letter lo a 
 Virgin 
 named 
 Deme- 
 trias, 
 
 A. D. 413. 
 
 * Lib. de Gestis Pelag. 
 
 ginity to God. The piety of the action 
 was extolled in these superstitious days 
 by all the Christian world, and the bishop 
 of Hippo joined with others in congratu- 
 lating her. For sufficient proof has al- 
 ready appeared, that he escaped not the 
 infection of the age, though he mixed 
 with it as much real humility as most 
 persons of those times. Pelagius wrote 
 to her a long and extremely elegant let- 
 ter, exhorting her to seek true perfection, 
 in which he plainly directs her to look to 
 nature, not to grace, for strength : yet, it 
 is written with so much artifice, that in 
 his apology afterwards to Innocent, bishop 
 of Rome, he appeals to it as a justification 
 of his orthodoxy.* Augustine, some 
 years after, wrote a refutation of it, ad- 
 dressed to Juliana, the mother of Deme- 
 trias. Pelagius wrote also another letter 
 to a certain widow, full of the same adu- 
 latory strains, in which he so grossly dis- 
 covers himself, that, as will shortly ap- 
 pear, he had noway left but to disown it. 
 In the year 415, or nearly so, two Avell- 
 disposed young men, Timasius and Jacob, 
 meeting with Pelagius, were by him in- 
 duced to enter on the monas- 
 tic life, in the commendation 
 of which all parties were but 
 too strongly agreed. 13 ut they 
 imbibed also his self-righteous doctrine, 
 from which, however, by the labours of 
 Augustine, they were afterwards deliver- 
 ed. On this occasion, they showed Au- 
 gustine a book of Pelagius, in which he 
 vehemently accused those who pleaded 
 the faultiness of human nature as an ex- 
 cuse for their sins, and in which, while 
 he seemed to be only inveighing against 
 a licentious abuse of Gospel grace, he 
 evidently denied the existence of all 
 grace, and maintained, that by that term 
 were to be understood the natural endow- 
 ments of the human mind seasoned and 
 directed by free-will ; and these endow- 
 ments, so seasoned and directed, ho ac- 
 knowledged to be the free gifts of God. 
 The bishop of Hippo, with extreme re- 
 luctance, at length admitted the full con- 
 viction of the heretical character of Pela- 
 gius and answered the book; yet he 
 concealed his name, lest Pelagius, being 
 offended, might become still more incura- 
 ble. Augustine owns that he afterwards 
 repented of this step, because he had 
 
 Timasius 
 and Jacob, 
 
 A. D. 415. 
 
 * A farther view of this letter shall be given 
 iiereafter, among what may be called the pe- 
 lagian PAPEBS. 
 
Ckxt. v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 
 
 41^ 
 
 probably increased the pride of the here- 
 tic, through an ill-judged fear of giving 
 him pain. 
 
 For Pelagius, liearing of Augustine's 
 proceedings, loudly complained, that 
 some of his books had been stolen from 
 him ; and others reckoned as his, which 
 were not so. It is difficult to deal with 
 deceitful men; yet the African bishop 
 used the most prudent method. He sent 
 his own book and Pelagius's together to 
 Innocent, of Rome, desiring him to mark 
 the sentiments of each, "and if he denies 
 that these are his sentiments, I contend not; 
 let him anathematize them, and in plain 
 terms confess the doctrine of Christian 
 grace. I have, says he, sufficient witnesses, 
 men who have a great regard for him, who 
 will attest that I had the book from them, 
 and that it has not been falsified by mo." 
 Innocent, in reply, condemned the book 
 altogether, as containing horrible senti- 
 ments, hitherto unprecedented in the 
 Christian world. How much more re- 
 putable would it be to the characters of 
 many, like Pelagius, would they at once 
 own what they are, and make no preten- 
 sions to the doctrines of grace! Bat this 
 sincerity would not so effectually serve 
 the cause of Satan in the world. 
 
 While Jerom in the East, and Augus- 
 tine in the West, were opposing Pela- 
 gianism, the heresiarch himself was sum- 
 moned to appear in the latter 
 Pelagius p^d of the same year 415, be- 
 sumn.o.ied f^^g ^ ^^,^^.^ of fourteen bi- 
 
 Svho.1 of S^OPS 0^" Palestine, at Lydda, 
 Diospolis. then called Diospolis. Here 
 he had every advantage which 
 an accused person could wish for. His 
 two accusers, Heros and Lazarus, bi- 
 shops of Gaul, were absent, because one 
 of them was sick at that time. The 
 court were poorly acquainted with the 
 Latin tongue, in which the works of Pe- 
 lagius were written, and John of Jerusa- 
 lem, one of the principal bishops, was 
 prejudiced in favour of Origenism, and 
 of Pelagius. The Eastern church itself 
 was more corrupt in doctrine, and more 
 inclined to support innovations than the 
 Western; and the heresiarch himself, in 
 capacity, presence of mind, and circum- 
 spection, far exceeded all his judges. 
 
 Yet the letter to the widow above 
 mentioned was so fulsome, and so re- 
 plete with self-righteous doctrine, that 
 he found it necessary to deny, that he 
 had written the things imputed to him. 
 He had described her as the only righ- 
 2 m2 
 
 teous person upon earth, with whom piety 
 found a refuge, when it could find none 
 elsewhere; and he taught her to pray in 
 this form: "Thou knowesl. Lord, how 
 holy, innocent, and clean these hands 
 are which I extend to thee; how just and 
 clean these lips, and free from all guile, 
 with which I pray for thy mercy." In 
 no part of his conduct did he lay himself 
 more open to censure. He preached a 
 perfection, attainable in this life, a per- 
 fection too, drawn altogether from nature. 
 However, by denying this charge, and 
 by dexterously evading and explaining 
 away all the rest,* he obtained an ho- 
 nourable acquittal. If there was any 
 fault at all in the conduct of Augustine 
 toward this man, it was a fault indeed of 
 the most amiable kind, an excess of ten- 
 derness and lenity. Pelagius knew how 
 to take advantage of it, and produced to 
 the court the short letter of the bishop of 
 Hippo to him,which has been given above. 
 .Tohn, bishop of Jerusalem, defended 
 Pelagius in the synod with great earnest- 
 ness, and he was at last received as a 
 Christian brother. P"'lushed Pei^crius 
 with his victory, he prepared defended 
 to improve the advantage by the 
 which it gave him. Though bishop of 
 he was acquitted, as holding Jerusa- 
 the doctrines of grace, and 
 not as inimical to them, he wrote to a 
 friend, that fourteen bishops had agreed 
 with him, that man might be without sin, 
 and easily keep the commands of God, if 
 he would ; concealing at the same time 
 his confession of the necessity of divine 
 grace, by which he had eluded condem- 
 nation. With similar artifice, he trans- 
 mitted an account to Augustine of his ac- 
 quittal. He wrote also four books on 
 free-will, in which he openly took away 
 original sin, and gloried at the same time 
 in the acts of the synod of Palestine. 
 And his partizans, being incensed against 
 Jerom and the Komau ladies, who lived 
 in monasteries under his direction in Pa- 
 lestine, made a scandalous assault upoa 
 them, of which Jerom complained to In- 
 nocent of Rome, who afterwards expostu- 
 lated with John, l)ishop of Jerusalem, for 
 conniving at the burnings and plunderings 
 of which the Pelagians had been guilty. 
 Augustine also wrote to John in a mild 
 but firm tone, to undeceive him concern- 
 ino- the real doctrines of Pelagius ; and 
 
 * Gesf. Pelag. The recital of the parlicu-» 
 lars would be tedious :\nd uniiistructive. 
 
414 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. HI- 
 
 v^s: 
 
 Council of 
 Carthasre. 
 
 sent him both his own treatise on Nature 
 and Grace, and that of Pelagiiis ; and re- 
 ceiving afterwards the acts of the synod 
 of Diospolis, he published the history of 
 Pelagianism, from which we have taken 
 many of the foregoing particulars, 
 
 A council being held the next year at 
 Carthage, on various exigencies of the 
 church, Orosius, returning from Pales- 
 tine, brought them the letters 
 of Heros and Lazarus against 
 Pelagius. Though the acts 
 of the Eastern council had not yet reach- 
 ed this African synod, yet they had now 
 sufficient information to alarm their minds. 
 The council wrote to Innocent of Rome 
 their plain sense of the controversy, which 
 was — that unless Pelagius and his parti- 
 zans, in express terms rejected the senti- 
 ments ascribed to him, they should be 
 excommunicated, to prevent others from 
 being imposed on by false pretensions.* 
 These equitable determinations were sign- 
 ed by sixty-eight bishops. A nother synod 
 of Numidian bishops, assembled at Mile- 
 vam, wrote also to Rome to the same 
 effect. Augustine also, his friend Aly- 
 pius, now bishop of Tagasta, Aurelius of 
 Carthage, and two other bishops, wrote 
 letters in their own names to Innocent, 
 more distinctly explaining the subject, 
 and showing how the Eastern council 
 most probably had been imposed on by 
 the subtilty of Pelagius ; at the same 
 time intimating their fear, lest Rome it- 
 self, where he had long lived, should be in- 
 fected with the heresy. Innocent, in his 
 answer, entered fully into the views of 
 the Africans, and in the same conditional 
 manner condemned the authors of the he- 
 resy. As it however still spread in a 
 secret manner, it needed to be extirpated 
 by argument. For this the bishop of 
 Hippo was peculiarly qualified. And for 
 more than twenty years he was employed 
 in writing and preaching against the he- 
 resy. _^__ 
 
 * I wonder not that the advocates for the pa- 
 pacy have argued from these frequent appeals lo 
 Rome, for ihe infaUibihly and dominion of ihe 
 Pope. Bat the truth is, nothing could he further 
 from the thoughts of the Africans. We shall see 
 shortly that they withstand and correct the errors 
 of a Roman bishop; nor have I seen any thing in 
 Augustine's voluminous writings that indicates 
 such a subjection. Tlie word of God was as yet 
 allowed to be the great standard of doctrine ; 
 and the frequent correspondence with Rome 
 arose from the importance of the situation of thai 
 church as fixed in the metropolis of the EtTipire, 
 nnd as being the centre of intelligence to the 
 Christian world. 
 
 Coelestius 
 comes to 
 Rome, 
 
 A. D. 417. 
 And here. 
 
 The two heresiarchs now endeavoured 
 to elude the force of the decrees against 
 them. Coelestius, who had been in Asia 
 for some time, and had ob- 
 tained the office of presbyter, 
 visited Rome in the year 417. 
 He applied to Zozimus, the 
 successor of Innocent, and re- 
 cited his libel before him. 
 with an unlimited degree of complaisance, 
 he submitted his sentiments innplicitly to 
 the bishop of Rome, professing a desire 
 to be corrected by him, if as a man he 
 erred in any point, and complained of the 
 precipitation with which he had been 
 condemned. 
 
 Zozimus, deceived by his artifices, wrote 
 to the African prelates, complaining of the 
 malice of the Gaulish bishops, and de- 
 claring, that unless within two months 
 he heard more decisive proofs against 
 Coelestius, he should consider him as a 
 Christian brother. The African bishops, 
 in reply, complained of the precipitation 
 of Zozimus, and at length sent to Rome 
 such complete proofs against Cffilestius, 
 that he withdrew himself from the exami- 
 nation, and avoided the means of a public 
 detection. Zozimus however still delayed 
 his condemnation, for which he is justly 
 blamed by Augustine.* 
 
 Pelagius, using the same methods 
 which Coelestius did, wrote to Innocent, 
 with whose death he was unacquainted. 
 Some fragments of his letters are pre- 
 served by Augustine. A sample of them 
 is as follows : " Lo, let this epistle clear 
 me before you, in which I say that we 
 have a free-will to sin and not to sin, 
 which in all good works is always helped 
 by divine aid." And " this power we 
 say is in all in general, in Christians, 
 Jews, and Gentiles. In all tliere is 
 free-will equally by nature, but in Chris- 
 tians alone is it helped by grace. In 
 others there is a good condition, naked 
 and unarmed; in those who belong to 
 Christ, it is fortified by his assistance. 
 Persons therefore are to be condemned, 
 who, when they have free-will, by which 
 they might come to faith, and obtain the 
 grace of God, abuse their liberty; but 
 those are to be rewarded, who, using free- 
 will aright, obtain the favour of God, and 
 keep his commands." He adds more to 
 the same purpose, never once either ad- 
 mitting the doctrine of original sin, or de- 
 fining what he means by divine assist- 
 
 * B. 2. to Bonif. c. 3. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY, 
 
 415 
 
 ance, which with him may mean no more 
 than the benefit of external revelation, or 
 the preservation of our natural powers. 
 Had he once expressly declared, that he 
 did not believe any real influence of di- 
 vine ^race on the mind inclining it to 
 what is good, which he knew the Chris- 
 tian world before his time believed, and 
 which if he himself had believed, he 
 would have exjjressed ; there would have 
 been an honesty in his heretical pravity, 
 which would have entitled his character 
 to a greater degree of respect. As the 
 
 case stands, and, as he must have known 
 that his opponent used the terms grace 
 and divine assistance in a quite different 
 sense from that in which he used them, 
 he appears by his own words to have 
 been an insincere disputant. He sent also 
 to Rome a symbol of his faith, written in 
 the same style of ambiguity, and attended 
 with the same adulatory strains to the 
 bishop of Rome, which Ccelestius had 
 used on the like occasion. 
 
 Zozimus, to whom his letters came, 
 was imposed on by them, as he had 
 been by those of Ccelestius ; and he wrote 
 to the African bishops, that he was con- 
 vinced, that Pelagius was innocent. The 
 latter answered him very properh;, that 
 it was not sufficient for Pelagius and Cce- 
 lestius to own in general that they ap 
 proved of all that he approved of; that it 
 behooved them expressly to confess, that 
 we need the grace of Jesus Christ, not 
 only to know, but also to do righteousness 
 in every act. Thus they showed that they 
 had, what Zozimus had not, a clear and 
 accurate conception of the subject. But 
 they had Augustine among them ; where- 
 as men, whose consciences have had lit- 
 tle exercise on these subjects, are seldom 
 quick in comprehending them, nay, are 
 apt to be imposed on by plausible terms, 
 though they be in other respects men of 
 enlarged and cultivated understandings. 
 Zozimus was, however, open t6 con 
 viction ; for the bishops of Rome had not 
 yet learned to be infallible. The in-' 
 structions of Augustine corrected his mis- 
 takes, and being further acquainted with 
 the subject by some writings of Pelagius, 
 which were brought to him at Rome, 
 he openly condemned the two heretics. 
 Whether he had done so or not, there is 
 not the slightest ground to believe, that 
 the African bishops and churches would 
 not have persevered, by their own autho 
 
 doubtless of great service to the general 
 cause of Christian truth at this period. It 
 has often been said, that men called he- 
 retics have not the advantage of being 
 heard, because their writings are not ex- 
 tant. I have therefore been solicitous to 
 furnish the reader with all the light which 
 can be obtained on that side of the ques- 
 tion. Notwithstanding the scantiness of 
 materials, Arius I think was sufficiently 
 proved guilty from his own mouth, and 
 so was Pelagius ; but of the latter we 
 have much larger remains. On this oc- 
 casion it will be proper to mention a pas- 
 sage from his exposition of the Epistle 
 to the Romans, quoted by Zozimus, as it 
 shows at the same time the strength of 
 his prejudices and the shrewdness of his 
 understanding. " If Adam's sin hurt those 
 who were not guilty, the righteousness 
 of Christ profits those who believe not." 
 The Pelagians bitterly censured Six- 
 tus, a presbyter of Rome, afterwards bi- 
 shop, for being active in condemning 
 those whom before he had patronized. 
 Augustine exposed their unreasonable- 
 ness in reviling that very lenity and cau- 
 tion which had been so slow to condemn, 
 till the fullest evidence was obtained, 
 and admonished vSixtus not to be content 
 with anathematizing Pelagius, but to be 
 also laborious in warning and 
 the people. 
 
 The Emperor Honorius also passed 
 the sentence of banishment from Rome 
 on the Pelagians the same year in which 
 their doctrines were condemn- 
 ed, that is, the year 418. 
 Ccelestius retired to Constan- 
 tinople, where his tenets were 
 opposed by Atticus the bi- 
 shop, and his views of pro- 
 pagating them were disappointed. The 
 party were, however, indefatigable; let- 
 ters were written to the bishop of Thessa- 
 lonica, in which they professed their de- 
 sire to defend the Catholic faith against 
 the heresy of the Manichees, and in that 
 specious manner they vindicated their 
 praises of the powers of human nature. 
 Augustine answered their arguments, 
 whTch had been sent by eighteen of the 
 party to Thessalonica ;* xMticus also 
 wrote against theni to Rome, and the sect 
 underwent a general condemnation. 
 
 Pelagius, who was still in Palestine, 
 complained of the treatment which he had 
 received, and being interrogated there 
 
 teaching 
 
 Pelagians 
 banished 
 1))' Hono- 
 rius, 
 
 A. D. 418. 
 
 rity, in rejecting Pelagianism : but the 
 concurrence of the bishop of Rome was 
 
 B. 1. to Boniface. 
 
416 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HL 
 
 concerning the disputed points by some 
 persons of respectable characters, he an- 
 swered with such subtile ambiguity, that 
 he again imposed on his examiners, who 
 explained to Augustine in writing the re- 
 sult. The latter, roused by repeated acts 
 of dissimulation, wrote his treatise on 
 Original Sin and the Grace of Christ, in 
 which he detected and exposed the arti- 
 fices of Pelagius. The wiles of the party 
 were not yet exhausted ; they charged the 
 general Church with condemning mar- 
 riage, and the workmanship of God in 
 the creation of man ; I suppose malicious- 
 ly deducing those consequences from the 
 doctrine of original sin ; and this drew 
 another reply from the argumentative pen 
 of Augustine.* 
 
 One Julian, a young person of great 
 spirit and self-confidence, now arose in 
 defence of Pelagianism, and wrote with 
 great vehemence and asperity, and in 
 a very voluminous manner. He described 
 himself as the little David, who was to 
 fight against the Goliah of Hippo, and 
 declared that it was [)roper to decide the 
 contest by a single combat, while the 
 rest of the church should be in peace. I 
 love to lay open to the reader all along 
 the connection between principle and 
 practice; and, if I show not the indisj)u- 
 table superiority of the orthodox Cliris- 
 tians, in disposition and temper, I miss 
 one of the most important points, which 
 I have in view through the whole history. 
 Indeed the strength and excellence of Au- 
 gustine's cause lies in its tendency to pro- 
 mote humility, while the weakness and 
 turpitude of the Pelagian cause lies in 
 supporting the spirit of pride. How can 
 this be shown better than by proving 
 from facts, that the Pelagians v.'ere proud 
 men, and tliat those who sincerely em- 
 braced the doctrines of grace were hum- 
 ble. To the boasting language of Julian, 
 Augustine modestly replied, " Who ]iro- 
 mised )'ou a single combat on my side ] 
 Where, when, Jiow, who were present, 
 who the arbiters'? Far be it from me to 
 assume to myselff in the general church, 
 what you are not ashamed to do among 
 the Pelagians. I am one of the many 
 who refute your profane novelties as we 
 can." The most specious argument used 
 by Julian was the use made of the impe- 
 
 rial sanction against his party. How far 
 the secular arm ought to be applied to the 
 support of religion, has been already con- 
 sidered; and it was the duty of the ma- 
 gistrate then, as at all times, to determine 
 how far the good of the people committed 
 to his charge is connected with the spread- 
 ing of opinions. I recollect, however, 
 no account of any particular cruelties ; 
 nor does any thing more seem to have 
 been actually done against the Pelagians 
 by the state, than barely to inhibit the 
 dissemination of their doctrines.* 
 
 Another argument used by Julian was 
 drawn from the pains taken by the adver- 
 saries of Pelagius to seduce the people. 
 Finding the vulgar every where preju- 
 diced against the Pelagians, he speaks 
 of the dregs of the populace stirred up 
 against them, mariners, cooks, butchers, 
 &c. : f but this is no uncommon event. 
 The doctrines of grace, persecuted and 
 despised as they always have been by the 
 great, bid fair for a more unprejudiced 
 hearing among the poor. The common 
 people heard our Lord gladly. The doc- 
 trines, which represent the misery of man 
 and his need of grace, speak to the con- 
 sciences of men ; and those, whom de- 
 ceitful learning and vain philosophy have 
 not sophisticated, cannot but receive some 
 impression. Pelagianism, so far as it re- 
 spects the doctrines of sanctifying grace, 
 is pretty much the same thing with that 
 which is now called Socinianism. The 
 abettors of the latter make the same com- 
 plaints of the common people at this day ; 
 and they may thank themselves for the 
 desertion of their congregations. Julian 
 inscribed his writings to one Turbantius, 
 a bishop, whom he highly commends ; 
 but this bishop afterwards forsook Pela- 
 
 * B. I. de imp. 1 B. G. contra Julian. 
 
 Apud Catiiolici's. In general I choose to avoid 
 Ihe expression of Catiiolics, and prefer the term 
 general ihurch as more pruper, in opposition to 
 the unfair use made of the word by the Papists. 
 
 Notwithstanding the emperor's sen- 
 tence in 418, Ccelestius ventured again 
 to show hinnself in Rome, and about the 
 year 420 was again expelled 
 by an edict. Pelagianism be- 
 ing now reduced to the lowest 
 ebb, Satan seems to have 
 changed his inode of attack- 
 ing the church, by inducing 
 
 Ccelestius 
 expelled 
 Rome by 
 an edict, 
 
 A. D. 420. 
 
 * I have rather laid down the principles on 
 which the civil power should act in a case of 
 this nature, thau given any opinion of the recti- 
 tude or impropriety of its condutt in the case of 
 the Pelagians. Let the reader judge for him- 
 self: the labours of the ecclesiastics in counc ils 
 and writings stand on a very diflerent fouiida- 
 lion. 
 
 t Aug. contra Julian, B. S. 
 
Cent, v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 
 
 417 
 
 some ignorant persons, vmder a mistaken 
 idea of honouring the doctrines of grace, 
 to support opinions subversive of the free 
 agency of man, and particularly to forbid 
 men to rebuke sinners, and direct them 
 only to pray for their conversion.* Au- 
 gustine obviated these mistakes, and ex- 
 plained the consistency between the di- 
 vine grace and human duty in his trea- 
 tise on Rebuke and Grace. 
 
 The two heresiarchs, after this, were 
 reduced to a state which is of all others 
 the most grating to proud minds, a state 
 of obscurity. The island of Britain, it is 
 certain, was afterwards disturbed with 
 their doctrines, which, by the skill and 
 authority of Germanus, whom we shall 
 have occasion to mention hereafter, were 
 confuted and overcome. Hence it is pro- 
 bable, that Pelagius, after having tra- 
 velled through the Roman empire, and 
 attempted in vain to overturn the doctrines 
 of grace, retired to his native country 
 But nothing certain seems to be known 
 further, either concerning him or Cifiles- 
 tius. 
 
 There was a person named Leporius, 
 a monk, afterwards a presbyter, who 
 boasted of his purity, and ascribed it 
 to his own power, and not to the grace 
 of God. The man, however, was in- 
 structed by some teachers in Gaul, and 
 particularly by the labours of Augustine, 
 to know himself better. In Africa he 
 publicly owned the folly of his pride, and 
 wrote also into Gaul a very humble con- 
 fession of his self-ricrhteousness. I know 
 not how to obtain a sight of his writings ; 
 but they would probably give us an edi- 
 fying view of the conversion of a Phari- 
 see. f 
 
 If Satan cannot gain his point entirely, 
 in aspersing the grace of God, he will be 
 content to do it in part. And this, for the 
 trial of men's sincerity, was unhappily the 
 case in regard to this present controversy 
 Pare Pelagianism itself was lost at least 
 for many ages : nor did any man dare, for 
 a long series of years, to revive it. The 
 ■works of Aucrustine were found so agree- 
 
 * See Mosheim, Vol. I. Quarto Edit. p. 189. 
 It is not the business oC a history to pnlarue on 
 the metaphysical difKcuUies with which thissuli- 
 jent is necessarily clouded. I shall only here 
 refer the reader to Edwards's ma.stcrly treatise 
 on Free-will, which I think has not yet been 
 answered. Had Mosheim better understood the 
 grounds of the subject of human liberty, he 
 would not so rashly have charged Augustine 
 with inconsistency. 
 
 t Cassian, B. 1. de Incar. Christi. 
 
 able to the Scriptures, that while they 
 were regarded as the sole standard of 
 Christian authority, a doctrine which set 
 aside the necessity of grace altogether, 
 could gain no hearing in the church. And 
 in the Western world such an addition of 
 light was obtained, as no doubt proved 
 highly serviceable to advance the king- 
 dom of Christ. But tares were sown : 
 Semi-Pelacrianism arose, and maintained 
 itself among many, and continues to this 
 day the admired system of all those who 
 seek to unite the art-; of secular greatness 
 with some regard for Christian orthodoxy. 
 Its language is, that though man cannot 
 persevere in virtue without divine grace, 
 yet he can turn himself at first to God. 
 Vitalis of Carthage, seems to have been 
 its beginner, who taught that our obedi- 
 ence to the Gospel was no otherwise the 
 effect of grace, than that men cannot be- 
 lieve, except the word be preached to 
 them. Thus, external revelation was put 
 in the room of the secret, effectual energy 
 of the Holy Spirit. The Pelagians, who 
 had lost their first ground, retreated 
 hither, and maintained, that grace was 
 given according to that merit of men,which 
 they showed in attending to the word 
 and to prayer. Some presbyters in Mar- 
 seilles were at the head of this scheme, 
 which is so specious, and carries such 
 an air of moderation between vicious ex- 
 tremes, that it seems folly to oppose it 
 by any other arms than those of Scripture 
 and experience. Men, who know them- 
 selves, and sufl^er the decisions of the di- 
 vine word to prevail over their consciences, 
 will see through the delusion, which can 
 scarcely fail to overcome all whose reli- 
 gion is theory without conscience. 
 " John Cassian, a Scythian, a monk of 
 eiuinence, and a man much renowned at 
 that time, was the pillar of this doctrine. 
 He lived at Marseilles, and opposed the 
 bishop of Hippo. Prosper and Hilary 
 withstood him, and some monuments of 
 the writings of the fonuer will afterwards 
 be considered. In consecpience of their 
 desires, Augustine wrote his two last 
 books on Predestination, and the gift of 
 perseverance. Still, however, the con- 
 test between Semi-Pelagianism, and the 
 adversaries to it, continued some time; 
 Cassian labouring on one side, and Pros- 
 per and Hilary on the other. 
 
 Such was the rise, progress, and con- 
 sequences of this most important heresy 
 in the Church of Christ. There must 
 
 INDEED BE HERESIES IN THE CHURCH, THAT 
 
 :>^. 
 
418 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 THEY WHICH ARE APPROVED MAY BE MADE 
 
 MANIFEST. The effects of them are, that 
 the wicked in the church are more dis- 
 tinctly separated from the godly; the 
 former are made worse, or at least appear 
 so to be; the latter are purified and made 
 white, and every way improved, both in 
 the understanding, spirit, and power of 
 true religion. Let frivolous controversies, 
 which involve no nutrimental truths of 
 godliness, be hushed and buried in ob- 
 livion, as soon as possible, because they 
 are incapable of producing any thing but 
 strife and vanity. But it was indefensi- 
 ble in Mosheim to lament over the Pela- 
 gian disputes, as erroneous on both sides, 
 when in truth the controversy was the 
 same which has ever been between holy 
 men and mere men of the world ; between 
 grace and human merit;* and though in 
 Augustine's time the question turned prin- 
 cipally upon sanctification, in Luther's 
 time on justification, yet the glory of God 
 in the grace of Jesus Christ, the import- 
 ance of genuine fiuth, and the nature and 
 ■efficacy of the influences of the Holy 
 Ghost, were equally concerned in the 
 controversy between Augustine and Pela- 
 gius, between Luther and the Papists, 
 and I will venture to say, on scriptural 
 grounds, between Paul the Apostle and 
 Saul of Tarsus, — that is, between the 
 spirit and doctrine of an humbled publi- 
 can, and of a self-righteous Pharisee. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 PELAGIAN DOCUMENTS. 
 
 The question, " Whether man needs 
 the influence of the Holy Spirit to render 
 liim truly pious and holy, or he has sufli- 
 cient resources in his own nature for this 
 end," involves so much of the very es- 
 sence and genius of Christianity, that 
 compared with it a thousand other objects 
 of debate in the church are reduced to 
 mere insignificance. For on the right 
 resolution of this question will depend, 
 what ideas we ought to form of the Chris- 
 tian doctrines of original sin, regeneration, 
 salvation by the grace of Jesus Christ, 
 
 * See Moslieim, Eccl. Ilist. pasife 57, con>- 
 j)are(l with page 27S, Qu«ito Edit. Vol. I. That 
 lie, who ill one place maintains the importance 
 of justificatiGii liy faith, should in another de- 
 spise tlie controvei-sics occasioned by it, seems 
 
 a jjreat and nianifest inconsistency, 
 
 and sanctification by the Holy Ghost. All 
 parties are convinced that men ought to 
 be good and virtuous; but does it there- 
 fore follow that the Pelagian opinions on 
 these points imply no more than a mere 
 nominal difference of system 1 So men 
 are always willing to represent the sub- 
 ject, who have no sense of innate deprav- 
 ity. But those who feel themselves " tied 
 and bound with the chain of their sins," 
 will think it of essential importance to in- 
 quire, how they may be freed from this 
 state; nor can they be contented with the 
 external decencies of morality, while they 
 find themselves void of the love of God 
 and internal holiness. The Scripture de- 
 cides this controversy clearly and amply ; 
 but it is my business to state as faithfully 
 as I can the sentiments of the ancient 
 church upon it. Till Pelagius arose, the 
 necessity of internal efficacious grace was 
 not disputed. He denied the existence of 
 such a principle altogether; though, as 
 we have seen, with much artificial equivo- 
 cation. I must do justice to both parties ; 
 and review briefly, yet clearly, the senti- 
 ments of those who distinguished them- 
 selves in the controversy. One conclu- 
 sion to be drawn from the whole is this, 
 that as there is no new thing under the 
 sun, so the Lord raises up from age to 
 age, men to defend his real truths in the 
 world. 
 
 I shall begin with taking some notice 
 of a treatise found in the works of Am- 
 brose, which I omitted in the review of 
 his writings, because, both the difference 
 of style, and the reference in it to the 
 Pelagian controversy, which was after 
 his time, demonstrate it not to 
 be his. Much has been said* 
 to determine who was the au- 
 thor of it. Its title is, Of the 
 Vocation of all the Gen- 
 tiles. Whoever wrote it,| 
 he was evidently a person well versed in 
 Scripture, master of a good style, and 
 well skilled in argumentation. As he has 
 exhibited that moderate view of the doc- 
 trine of grace, which I think most agree- 
 able to Scripture, and remarkably coinci- 
 dent with the doctrines of the Church of 
 England, it will be proper to mention his 
 leading thoughts, as a suitable introduc- 
 tion to the rest. 
 
 Ambrose 
 on the Vo- 
 cation of 
 the Gen- 
 tiles. 
 
 his 
 
 * See Du Pin's elaborate criticism 
 Hist, of Cent. V. 
 
 t It seems, however, to have been tlie prO' 
 duction of this century. 
 
Czyr. v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN DOCUMENTS. 
 
 419 
 
 He begins, like a man of deep reflec- 
 tion, conscious of the difficulties which 
 his subject involves: "A great and ardu- 
 ous question," says he, " is agitated be- 
 tween the defenders of Free-will and the 
 preachers of the Grace of God. It is in- 
 quired, wliether God would have all men 
 to be saved ] and as this is undeniable, it 
 is further inquired, why the will of the 
 Almighty is not fulfilled ? — Thus, no 
 limit is found of contrary disputations, 
 while men do not distinguish what is 
 manifest from what is secret," He de- 
 scribes the efiects of the Fall as destruc- 
 tive of faith, hope, understanding, and 
 will, for the purposes of holiness and 
 salvation; and he affirms, that no man 
 has any resources for deliverance ; be- 
 cause, though by natural understanding 
 he may endeavour to oppose his vices, 
 and may, in an outward way, adorn this 
 temporal life, yet he cannot proceed to 
 true virtue and eternal bliss. " ForXvith- 
 out the worship of God, what seems to 
 be virtue, is sin, and cannot please God."* 
 — Let no man trust in human strength, 
 which, even when entire, stood not; but 
 let him seek victory by Him, who alone 
 is invincible, and conquered for all. And 
 if he seeks, let him not doubt but that the 
 desire of seeking has been received from 
 Him whom he seeks. — He goes on to 
 quote the well-known passages from the 
 prophets, concerning the effectual grace 
 of God. " For he writes his laws on 
 their hearts, that they may receive the 
 knowledge of God, not by man's teach- 
 ing, but by the instruction of the great 
 Teacher, because neither is he that plant- 
 eth any thing, nor he that watereth, but 
 God that giveth the increase — To this 
 day is fulfilled what the Lord promised 
 to Abraham without condition, and gave 
 without law. — And those who obey not 
 the Gospel are the more inexcusable; but 
 it is certain that they are not according to 
 the foreknowledge of God the sons of 
 Abraham. He promised that these should 
 obey, when he said, I will give them one 
 heart and one way, that they may fear me 
 for ever. He promised that they should 
 persevere, when he said, I will put my 
 fear into their hearts, that they shall not 
 depart from me." 
 
 He takes particular notice of the direc- 
 tion, in the first Epistle to Timothy, of 
 praying for all men without exception ; 
 
 * See Article XIIL of the Church of Eng- 
 land. 
 
 and observes, that it was regarded in all 
 Christian assemblies ; and that the church 
 prayed not only for the regenerate, but 
 for all, even the worst of characters. 
 " And, what she prayed for them was 
 doubtless, that they might be converted. 
 And, as conversion was what it was not 
 in their power to do for themselves, the 
 merciful and just Lord would have us to 
 pray for all, that where we see innumera- 
 ble persons recovered from such an 
 abyss of evil, we may not doubt that God 
 has performed these great things ; and 
 praising him for what he has done, may 
 hope he will still do the same for those 
 who are yet in darkness. As for those, 
 for whom the prayers of the church are 
 not heard, we ought to refer it to the se- 
 crets of Divine Justice. We know but 
 in part. O the depth!—" 
 
 Thus does this judicious Divine resolve 
 into human ignorance the great difficulty 
 which has agitated men of thought in all 
 ages. Whoever is disposed to do the 
 same will have no objection to admit the 
 doctrine of election in this sense; nor 
 is any other submission of the under- 
 standing required, than that reasonable 
 one which bishop Butler so admirably 
 enforces in his Analogy. " The redemp- 
 tion of Christ, he observes, would be 
 looked on in a mean light, if Justification, 
 which is by grace, were made to depend 
 on previous merits. — If then grace find 
 some of the vilest characters, whom it 
 adopts in the very departure out of life, 
 when yet many, who seem less guilty, 
 are void of this gift, w'ho can say this 
 is without the dispensation of God?" 
 And he goes on to prove salvation to be 
 of mere grace altogether, by a happy ar- 
 rangement of Scripture passages. 
 
 "If it be asked, why the Saviour of all 
 men has not given this sensation to all to 
 know the true God and his Son Jesus 
 Christ, — what God hath secreted from us 
 should not be investigated ; what he hath 
 manifested should not be denied. No 
 genius whatever can discover the reasons 
 of the divine dispensation in these things. 
 Doubtless, however, the whole good of 
 man, from the beginning of faith to the 
 consummation of perseverance, is a divine 
 work and gift." Yet he demonstrates, 
 that men's departure from God is the 
 consequence of their own will, and not 
 properly the act of a divine constitution. 
 And he proves from Scripture likewise, 
 that Christ died for all men, and that he 
 
420 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 is so to be preached to all the world.* 
 He maintains,! on the whole, three pro- 
 positions : 1st, That it is the property of 
 the Divine Goodness to desire that all 
 may be saved, and come to the knowledge 
 of the truth. 2d, That every one who is 
 saved is directed by the grace of God, 
 and by the same grace kept unto the end. 
 The 3d modestly protests, that not all the 
 plan of the divine will can be compre- 
 hended, and that many causes of divine 
 works are above human understanding. 
 " If insidious malignity will stop, if inso- 
 lent presumi)tion will demur, these things 
 being firmly established, we need not 
 distract ourselves with endless q uestions." 
 
 But enough has been said to give the 
 reader an idea of this author, whose 
 thoughts and views of Scripture are 
 greatly superior to those of the fourth and 
 fifth centuries in general. Whosoever 
 he was, he seems to have taken up his 
 pen toward the close of the Pelagian con- 
 troversy in a modest and temperate spirit. 
 
 So exactly are his sentiments coincident 
 with those of the best and wisest in all 
 ages of Christianity, that we may see the 
 great benefit resulting to the church, in 
 the event, from the Pelagian controversy ; 
 and while we look at the writings of the 
 rest, his ideas will stand as a model, 
 solid and scriptural. 
 
 St. Peter tells us of those who privily 
 bring in damnable heresies.:)^ In Pelagius 
 this insidiousness we have observed to 
 be very remarkable : but it seems a com- 
 mon character of heresy. A free and open 
 and consistent support of what is believed 
 to be true is as common a mark of gen- 
 uine orthodoxy. I shall attempt, how- 
 ever to lay before the reader, so far as 
 the deceitfulness of the man and the 
 
 us so highly injured by fraud. Here is a 
 remarkable instance : some short notes 
 on St. Paul's Epistles are subjoined to 
 Jerom's undoubted comments, which were 
 certainly not written by Jerom, an open 
 Anti-Pelagian, but must have been writ- 
 ten by Pelagius himself, or some genuine 
 disciple of his. They agree with the 
 account, which Augustine gives of Pela- 
 gius's work of this sort; and certainly 
 St. Paul's expression, in the ninth of the 
 Romans, " It is not of him that willeth, 
 nor of him that runneth," is interpreted in 
 the Pseudo-Jerom exactly as Augustine 
 tells us Pelagius interpreted it.* On the 
 passage, " without the law sin was dead," 
 the commentator asserts, they are mad 
 who assert that sin is derived to us 
 from Adam. Nor will he allow, that 
 Adam and Christ introduced, the one sin, 
 the other righteousness into the world, 
 in any other sense than by example. He 
 all along supports that forced interpreta^ 
 tion. On the passage, " by the offence 
 of one many be dead," he observes, be- 
 cause not only sinners, but righteous men 
 also die by a common and natural death. 
 What St. Paul speaks of concupiscence 
 he will allow to be understood only of 
 depraved habit; and in the seventh of 
 Romans maintains that St. Paul speaks 
 in an assumed character. The works of 
 the law which cannot justify, he main- 
 tains to be circumcision and the other 
 rites of the Mosaic law, and not moral 
 works. And the grace derived from 
 Christ, he contends to be his example. 
 Something he allows of grace in the for- 
 giveness of sins, nothing in the effectual 
 work of sanctification. Charity, he ob- 
 serves, is from ourselves : and he main- 
 tains also, that real saints are perfect and 
 
 scantiness of materials will afford, a view spotless. Predestination also he excludes, 
 
 of Pelagianism from Pelagius's own 
 mouth. Some of the documents have 
 been glanced at in the course of the his- 
 tory already. Besides these, he wrote, 
 in imitation of Cyprian, a treatise of 
 Testimonies. Jerom gives an account of 
 this work, and from him it appears, that 
 it contained the same things which were 
 objected to him in the Palestine synod. 
 He wrote also some short notes on St. 
 Paul's Epistles, doubtless with a view 
 to accommodate them to his own system. 
 I have repeatedly to regret, that the 
 works of the Fathers have come down to 
 
 except what is founded on the foreknow- 
 ledge of men's faith and obedience. 
 Thus it appears that heresies are re- 
 
 B. 2. 
 
 , VI. 
 
 f 2 Peter ii. 
 
 + C.X. 
 
 * B. (le Gest. Pelag. c. xvi. — See Jansenius, 
 B. 1. — Pelagius said, that it was to be uiider- 
 slond as spoken by an adversary, tliat llie 
 Apostle was personating one wlio was finding 
 fault, and asking how St. Paul's doctrine of 
 free-will could stand, since it does not depend 
 on him lliat wills or runs, hut on God that 
 sliowetli mercy. Thus is St. Paul raade to 
 defend a doctrine quite opposite to the whole 
 current of his argument; and that which he 
 really maintained is put into the mouth of an 
 adversary. However strained and unnatural 
 the interpretation be, it has been equalled by- 
 modern Pelagians, who are commonly called 
 Socinians. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 PELAGIAN DOCUMENTS. 
 
 421 
 
 vived, from age to age, with new names, 
 and under new dresses, carrying the 
 appearance of something original, and nat 
 allowed to be the same things which had 
 been long ago exploded and refuted. For 
 how often have we heard all this, which 
 appears to be real Pelagianism, main- 
 tained in our own times?* 
 
 The last treatise, which we have review- 
 ed, was probably that of Pelagius alto- 
 gether, or certainly it belonged to some of 
 his disciples, and is itself a sufficient proof, 
 that his tenets were not misrepresented 
 by his antagonists.f Further proofs, 
 however, of what Pelagianism is, drawn 
 from the writings of its own defender, 
 remain to be considered. 
 
 There is, in the fourth volume of 
 .Terom's works, which indeed consists of 
 tracts by various authors, an explanation 
 of a creed, inscribed to Damasus, which, 
 by its agreement with divers citations 
 from it b)"^ Augustine, in the most exact 
 manner, appears to belong to Pelagius, 
 and it is worthy of his subtilty.' He 
 mentions the common articles of faith, 
 and anathematizes various heresies, which 
 all the church condemns ; and, among the 
 rest, " the blasphemy of those, who say, 
 that anything impossible is commanded 
 to man by God. We so confess free-will, 
 that we say we always need the assistance 
 of God, and those are equally in error, 
 who say that man cannot sin, with those 
 who say he cannot avoid sin. For both 
 take away the liberty of the will. But 
 we say, that man always can sin and not 
 sin, that we may confess that we are 
 always free in our wills. This is the 
 faith, blessed father, (Damasus, of Rome) 
 which we have learned in the Catholic 
 church, which we have always held and 
 do hold. In which, if there is any posi- 
 tion less skilful and less cautious, we 
 desire to be corrected by you." The fault 
 of the creed is certainly not want of 
 caution, but the excess of it. Under the 
 specious term of freedom of will, in which 
 natural+ and moral inability are con- 
 founded, as if they were the same thing, 
 he underrnined the essential doctrine of 
 the influence of the Holy Spirit, though 
 
 * Jans. B. 1. 
 
 f Since I wrote the above, I have seen the 
 Benedictine edition of Au;^ustine's Works, 
 and find these Pelagian Xotesin the last vol- 
 ume, which the editors, without hesitation, 
 ascribe to Pelagius. 
 
 ^ .Tans. B. 1. vii. 
 
 Vol. I. 2 N 
 
 in a very covert manner ; and asserted 
 with an audacity almost unparalleled, 
 that he had learned his creed in the Ca- 
 tholic church, which had at all times 
 hitherto expressly owned the doctrines of 
 grace and the fall of man, while he him- 
 self appears not to have believed either 
 the one or the other, and was labouring 
 with all his might to eradicate both from 
 the Christian world. 
 
 But let the reader judge for himself 
 what the real sentiments of this ambiguous 
 politician were, from a work undoubtedly 
 his, by his own confession.* I mean the 
 letter to Demetrias, and which is falsely 
 ascribed to Jerom. As it is much too 
 long to quote, I shall select such parts as 
 tend most decisively to show the real re- 
 ligious opinions of this heresiarch, which 
 have been much misrepresented in our 
 times. 
 
 " To Demetrias, a Virgin; 
 
 " If, in dependence on the greatest ge- 
 nius and equal knowledge, I should think 
 myself capable of writing, yet I could not 
 enter on so arduous a task without great 
 fear. However, I must write to Deme- 
 trias, a virgin of Christ, noble and rich, 
 and what is greater than these, one who 
 tramples on nobility and riches by the ar- 
 dour of faith — who, sprung from t!ie no- 
 blest family, and brought up in the great- 
 est wealth and delicacies, hath suddenly 
 broke from the most tenacious blandish- 
 ments of life, who hath cut down the 
 flower of youth by the sword of faith, 
 that is, by her will. But it is ditTicult to 
 treat with such a character, in which 
 there is so great a desire of learning, and 
 so great ardour for perfection, that any 
 doctrine, however perfect, can scarcely 
 equal her merit. We write at the en- 
 treaty of her holy mother. As often as I 
 have to speak of the plan of a holy life, I 
 use first to slfow the powers of human 
 nature, and what it really can do, and 
 thence to encourage the mind of the 
 hearer to press after virtue, lest it should 
 be of no service to call men to that which 
 they have presumed to be impossible. 
 For hope is the spring and source of all 
 activity in the road of virtue. If persons 
 despair, their efforts flag entirely. The 
 resources of nature are therefore to be de- 
 clared, that men may press toward the 
 mark of perfection, lest, while men are 
 unconscious of their inherent powers, 
 
 Jerom's 4th, torn, V. 
 
422 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 they think they have not what they really 
 have. Let this be the foundation of a 
 spiritual life, that the virgin may know 
 her own strength, which she may then 
 exercise well, when she has learned that 
 she has it. First, then, measure the 
 goodness of human nature from its Au- 
 thor, who, when he made all things very 
 good, must have made man perfectly so. 
 Let man learn to know the dignity of his 
 nature, when he sees strong animals 
 placed in subjection to him. God would 
 have him to be a volunteer, not a slave ; 
 and therefore he left him in the hand ot 
 his own counsel. Take care you stumble 
 not on the rock of the ignorant vulgar; 
 and do not think that man was created 
 evil, because he can do evil. In the 
 freedom of the will all the honour and 
 dignity of nature consist; and from the 
 same principle originates the praise of 
 every good man. There would be no vir- 
 tue in man, if he could not pass to evil 
 Man could not practise goodness sponta^ 
 neously, were it not equally in his power 
 to do evil. But most persons impiously, 
 no less than ignorantly, find fault as it 
 were with the divine workmanship. The 
 goodness of nature is so apparent, that it 
 shows itself even among Gentiles. How 
 many virtuous philosophers have we read 
 and heard of! whence their goodness, 
 were not nature good 1 How much more 
 virtuous may Ciiristians be, who have 
 Christ's instructions, and the assistance 
 of divine grace."* 
 
 He goes on to speak of the virtues of 
 Abel, Enoch, Melchizedec, Abraham, 
 Isaac, .Tacob, and Job, and describes them 
 as all derived from the natural powers of 
 man, " that you may understand, how 
 great is the goodness of nature." He pro- 
 ceeds to deny the apostasy and depravity 
 of nature in the fullest manner, asserting, 
 " that the only cause which makes it 
 difficult to do well, is the force of bad 
 habit." " Now, if before the law, and 
 long before the coming of our Saviour 
 Christ, men led holy lives, how much 
 more after his coming are they able to do 
 it." He speaks of the grace of Christ, 
 expiation by his blood, and encourage- 
 
 * Augustine teaches us what Pelagius means 
 by grace, as we shall see elsewhere. Ceitain 
 it is, that he never allows it to mean tlie opera- 
 tion of sanctifying influences. The whole cur- 
 rent of tlie letter before us, denying the evil 
 nature of man as a lapsed creature, and assert- 
 ing the sufficiency of man in his own powers, 
 is opposed to such a sentiment. 
 
 ment derived from his example ; but he 
 only just mentions these things, without 
 insisting on them. " Why do we loiter 
 and blame the infirmity of nature ? He 
 would not command us what is impossi- 
 ble." Some rules of morality, which are 
 indeed the best part of the letter, lose 
 their efficacy, because the writer laid the 
 foundation of them all in pride and self- 
 sufficiency. 
 
 Augustine and his friend Alypius be- 
 ing both together at Hippo, received a 
 letter from Juliana, the mother of Deme- 
 trias, who acknowledges the receipt of 
 their letter, warning against heresies. 
 She thanks them for the admonition, but 
 appears to insinuate that it was unneces- 
 sary to her family, which had never been 
 infected with any heresy. She seems to 
 mean the errors relating to the Trinity, 
 and to have had no clear idea of the Pela- 
 gian heresy, then new in the world. 
 These two charitable pastors having 
 heard of the letter which had been sent 
 to Demetrias, thought it right to detect 
 the poison contained in it more fully, by 
 a reply:* 
 
 " Your words oblige us not to be silent 
 concerning those who labour to corrupt 
 what is sound — nor is it a small error, for 
 men to think they have in 
 themselves whatever is ob- 
 tained of righteousness and 
 piety ; and that God helps us 
 no further than by the light of 
 revelation; and that nature 
 and doctrine are the only 
 grace of God. To have a good will, and 
 to have love, the queen of virtues, they 
 say our own arbitration suffices. But 
 what says the Apostle! The love of 
 
 GOD IS SHED ABROAD IN OUR HEARTS BY 
 THE HOLY GHOST, WHICH IS GIVEN TO US, 
 
 that no man may think he has it from 
 himself. I find in the same letter of Pe- 
 lagius to Demetrias these words :t ' You 
 have therefore something on account of 
 which you may be preferred to others, for 
 nobility and opulence are rather of your 
 family than of you ; but spiritual riches 
 none can confer on you, but yourself. In 
 these you are justly to be praised, in 
 these deservedly to be preferred to others, 
 which cannot be but from yourself and in 
 yourself.':!: True it is, they must be in 
 
 Remarka- 
 ble letter 
 of Augus- 
 tine and 
 his friend 
 Alypius. 
 
 * Id. 12. 
 
 ■f They are the very same in the foregping 
 letter, but I omitted to quote the part. 
 
 4 Pelagius followed the maxims of philoso- 
 
Curr. v.] 
 
 PELAGL^N DOCUMENTS. 
 
 423 
 
 you ; but to say they are from you, is 
 poison. Far be the virgin of Christ from 
 hearing these things, who piously knows 
 the poverty of the human heart, and 
 therefore knows not how to be adorned 
 but with the gifts of her spouse. Let her 
 rather hear the Apostle : I have betrothed 
 you to one husband, that I may present 
 you a chaste virgin to Christ; but I fear, 
 lest as the serpent beguiled Eve, &c.* 
 In every thing give thanks. Ye do so, 
 because ye have it not of yourselves. For 
 who hath distinguished you from Adam, 
 the mass of death and perdition ? Was 
 it not he who came to seek and save the 
 lost] When the Apostle says, who 
 made thee to differ ? does he answer, my 
 good will, my faith, my righteousness 1 
 2oes he not say, what hast thou that thou 
 hast not received 1 We hope, considering 
 the humility in which Demetrias was edu- 
 cated, that when she read the words 
 which I quoted from the letter, if she 
 have read them, she sighed, smote her 
 breast, and perhaps wept, and prayed, 
 that as these were not her words, so 
 neither might they be her creed, that she 
 might glory, not in herself, but in the 
 Lord. We well know how sound you 
 are in the doctrine of the Trinity, but 
 there are evils of another kind than those 
 which affect that article of the Christian 
 faith, evils which injure the glory of the 
 
 on the grace of Scripture revelation, and 
 the example of Christ; but he loved to 
 expatiate most freely on the powers of 
 nature itself. But grace, as it means the 
 gift of the Holy Spirit, renewing and 
 sanctifying the will, he denied altogether. 
 Augustine defended this as an essential 
 of godliness, and therefore it appears al- 
 ways prominent on the face of the Pela- 
 gian controversy. It was a point of the 
 utmost consequence ; for it draws along 
 with it all the other essential doctrines. 
 
 In the works of Ambrose* we have an- 
 other letter, under the name of Ambrose, 
 addressed to the same virgin Demetrias : 
 it seems written in the latter 
 times of the controversy, and 
 could not therefore be a let- 
 ter of Ambrose. Probably it 
 was written by the anonymous 
 author of the treatise on the Calling of 
 the Gentiles. Certainly it resembles his 
 manner both in style and sentiment; and 
 a few quotations from it will deserve to 
 be inserted here. He appears to have 
 seen, in perfect harmony with Augustine, 
 that the real stress of the controversy 
 lay, not in a speculative set of doctrines, 
 but in the solid provision made for hu- 
 mility. The doctrine of efficacious grace 
 provides for this, Pelagianism excludes 
 it. And on this single point the whole 
 merit of the controversy may safely be 
 
 Another 
 letter to 
 Deme- 
 trias. 
 
 whole Trinity. If j^ou narrowly observe, made to depend. " There must," he ob 
 
 though the writer speaks of grace, he 
 do^s it with guarded ambiguity ; it may 
 mean nature, or doctrine, or forgiveness 
 of sins, or the example of Christ. But 
 find, if you can, one word that owns a 
 positive influence of the Holy Spirit on 
 the mind, actually imparting the power of 
 loving God : gladly would we see such a 
 confession in some much-admired writers ; 
 but as j'et we could never discover it." 
 
 From these two Epistles the state of 
 the Pelagian controversy appears. The 
 heretic, though little inclined to regard 
 grace in any sense, did not deny that for- 
 giveness of sins might be granted ; but as 
 he denied the corruption of nature, he 
 could never think sin to be so sinful as 
 the word of God describes it. He dwelt 
 
 phers, not of the Scriptures. Horace says, 
 aquum mi animum ipse paraho. But I might 
 quote passages without end from the classic 
 authors to the same purpose, whom numbers 
 called Christian since the time of Pelagius 
 have followed. What is this but to call Pagan- 
 ism Christianity ? 
 • 2 Cor. xi. 2, 3. 
 
 serves, " be an uniting grace, which con- 
 federates and harmonizes the multifold 
 unity of the saints and their beautiful va- 
 riety. This grace is true humility. In 
 various duties there are various degrees 
 of virtue: but in genuine humility every 
 thing is solid and indivisible, and there- 
 fore it makes all its subjects to be one, 
 because it admits of no inequality. The 
 peculiarity then of this grace lies in the 
 confession of the grace of God, which is 
 wholly rejected, unless it be wholly re- 
 ceived. — That man ejects himself out of 
 grace, who distrusts its fulness, as if man 
 needed the help of God in one part, and 
 did not need it in another part of his ac- 
 tions ; as if any moment could be assigned, 
 in which it would not be ruinous to him 
 to he deprived of the Holy Spirit. He, 
 indeed, in the essence of the Deity, is 
 every where, and all-comprehensive; but 
 is conceived in a certain manner to recede 
 from those, whom he ceases to govern. 
 And the cessation of his aid is to be con- 
 
 ^ * Ep. Ixrdv. p. 185. 
 
424 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 ceived as his absence, Avliicli that man 
 madly thinks to be useful to hinisell". who 
 rejoices in his wood actions, and thinks 
 that he rather than God hath wroug-ht 
 them. The grace of God must therefore 
 be owned in the fullest and most unquali- 
 fied sense; the first oflice of which is, 
 that his help be felt.* We have not re- 
 ceived, says the Apostle, the spirit of the 
 world, but the Spirit of God; that we 
 mit^ht know the thing's that are freely 
 g-iven to us of God. Whence, if any 
 man think that he has any good things of 
 which God is not the author, but himself. 
 he has not the Spirit of God, but of the 
 world, and swells with that secular wis- 
 dom, of which it is written, I will destroy 
 the wisdom of the wise. — Amidst all the 
 evils of men, to glor}' in our own intel- 
 lects, instead of divine illumination, iu 
 knoAving God, and to be elated in our- 
 selves at the expense of the divine glory, 
 is most dangrcrons. To desire to be pre- 
 ferred before all, is mischievous; much 
 more so to take a man's hope from tlie 
 Lord, and fix it on himself. Is not this 
 to fulfil that scripture, ' Cursed is the 
 man tiiat trusteth in man, and maketh 
 flesh his arm, and whose heart departetii 
 from the Lord.'f It is the very sin of 
 the devil, which ejected him from heaven. 
 And he drew our first parents into the 
 same, causing them to rest iu the liberty 
 of their own will. — Men more easily 
 guard against this pride in evil things ; in 
 virtues it is most studiously to be repelled, 
 because he to whom praise seems due, is 
 speciously ensnared by the temptation. — 
 Satan, in this respect, has his eye pecu- 
 liarly on the active, the sober, the chaste, 
 and "the virtuous; he would ruin them by 
 the pride of self-sufficiency. Innumera- 
 ble souls, and the churches in general, 
 have withstood the infection of the new 
 doctrine; but some souls have imbibed 
 the poison. Hence the insidious com- 
 mendation of human nature, and the de- 
 fence of its original rectitude as ever pre- 
 served unblemished. Hence Adam's sin 
 has been asserted to be noxious only by 
 example; hence in fact the abolition of 
 infant-bapti3m ; hence the unsound con- 
 fession of grace, as bestowed according 
 to merit; hence the perfidy of owning, 
 among us, the wounds of original sin. 
 and of declaring, among their own parti- 
 sans, that Adam hurt us only by exam- 
 ple. But while the Lord Jesus says, the 
 
 • 1 Cor. ii. 
 
 -{- Jerem. xvii. 
 
 Avhole need not a physician, but the sick, 
 they, though silent, cry aloud in pride, 
 We are whole, we need not a physician. — 
 Consider what is done in regeneration, 
 not lookino- onlv at the external sign, but 
 also at the inward grace. Are not vessels 
 of Avrath changed into vessels of mercy? 
 and men born not of blood, nor of the will 
 of man, but of God? Says not Christ, 
 without me ye can do nothing'? Does 
 any man say, that he abides in Christ, 
 who doubts of Christ's working in him V 
 — After quoting a number of very perti- 
 nent scriptures, he goes on: "Every 
 godly motion of the illuminated mind is 
 not to be separated from the human will, 
 because man does nothing right, except 
 what he does willingly ; but a right in- 
 tention of mind is the effect of the inspira- 
 tion of the divine will. Other sins mar 
 only the virtues to which they stand op- 
 posed; this of self-righteousness, whUe it 
 assumes all, mars every thing. The 
 image of God is genuine, Avhen it is 
 adorned with no other ornaments than 
 what are received from the Heavenly 
 Husband. — Humility and charity are kin- 
 dred virtues, inseparably connecled, inso- 
 much, that what St. Paul asserts of the 
 latter,* may safely be predicated of the 
 former. 
 
 The whole epistle is excellent, and a 
 treasure of evangelical doctrine. But let 
 us proceed to other monuments of an- 
 tiquity. 
 
 The letter of the African council, f in 
 which Anrelius, of Carthage, presided, 
 and which was addressed to Innocent, of 
 Rome, contains the following 
 sentiments : " They (the Pe- 
 lagians) attempt, by their 
 praises of free-will, to leave 
 no room for the grace of God, 
 by which we are Christians, the Lord 
 saying, if the Son shall make you free, 
 ye shall be free indeed. They assert, 
 that the grace of God consists in this, 
 that he hath so created the nature of man, 
 that bv his own will he can fulfil the 
 law of God. The law itself too they 
 reckon to belong to grace, because God 
 hath given it for a help to men. — But the 
 real grace of God, by which a man is 
 caused to delight in tbe law after the in- 
 ward man, they will not acknowledge, 
 though they dare not openly o])pose it. 
 Yet,"what else do they in effect, while 
 thev teach, that human nature is alone 
 
 A letter 
 from the 
 African 
 Council. 
 
 » 1 Cor. xiii 
 
 t Ep. 90. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN DOCUMENTS. 
 
 425 
 
 sufficient to enable men to obey the law 1 
 Not attending to the Scripture, ' it is not 
 of him that willeth, nor of him that run- 
 neth, but of God that shovvcth mercy ;' 
 And. ' we are not sufficient of ourselves 
 to think any thing as of ourselves.' We 
 beseech you to observe the necessary con- 
 sequence of such opinions, namely, that 
 we have no occasion, on their plan, to 
 pray, that we enter not into temptation : 
 nor had our Lord occasion to say to Peter, 
 1 have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail 
 not. He might have contented himself 
 with exhorting or commanding him to 
 keep his faith. And, instead of saying to 
 his disciples, watch and pray, it would 
 have sufficed to say, watch. When St, 
 Paul prays, that the IJphesian?' might be 
 strengthened with might in the inner 
 man by his Spirit, they, in consistency 
 with their plan, might have said, they 
 might be strengthened with might, by the 
 ability of nature received in our creation. 
 It follows too, that infants need not to be 
 baptized at all, as being perfectly inno- 
 cent, and needing no redemption." 
 
 Innocent* agreed with the ideas of the 
 council in his reply. Wc have next in 
 order the letter of the Milevitanian coun- 
 cil to the same Innocent,] in which Pela- 
 gianism is opposed in a similar manner, 
 and a good use is made of the contrast 
 between the first and second Adam, in 
 the fifth chapter to the Romans. And 
 from these and many other testimonies, it 
 is evident that the great instrument by 
 which Pelagius deceived men was, that 
 he used the word grace in a sense which 
 certainly is not scriptural. With him, 
 whatever is the gift of God, is called 
 grace ; so that a man, who, by the use of 
 his natural powers, in conjunction with 
 the aid of the revealed will of God, should 
 expect to please God, might be said to 
 seek to be saved by grace ; though it is 
 certain, that the term in the New Tes- 
 tament is restrained to spiritual bless- 
 ings. 
 
 Augustine, in conjunction with a few 
 
 other bishops, wrote again to Innocent.:^: 
 
 " Without doubt," says he, " the grace 
 
 f by which we are saved, is not 
 
 Au usTuie ^'^^^ ^^''^^' ^'^^^'^ "^^ ^^^ ^'■^" 
 - ' ' ated. For if those bishops§ 
 
 who acquitted Pelagius, had 
 
 understood that he called that 
 
 grace, which we have in common with 
 
 to Inno- 
 cent. 
 
 • 91. t 92. 
 
 § He means the Synod at Lvdda. 
 2n2 
 
 t 95. 
 
 the wicked, and that he denied that which 
 wc have as Christians and sons of God, 
 he would have appeared intolerable. I 
 blame not then his judges, who under- 
 stood the word grace in its common ac- 
 ceptation. Pelagius alone is not now our 
 object; perhaps he is corrected; (I wish 
 it may be the case;) but many souls are 
 in danger of being beguiled. Let him be 
 sent for to Rome, and asked what he 
 means precisely by the term grace ; or let 
 him explain himself by letter; and if he 
 be found to speak in the same manner as 
 the church of Christ, let us rejoice in him. 
 For whether he calls gTace free-will, or 
 remission of sins, or the precept of the 
 law, he explains not that grace of the 
 Holy Spirit, which conquers lusts and 
 temptations, and which He who ascend- 
 ed into heaven has poured on us abun- 
 dantly. He who prays, ' lead us not into 
 temptation,' does not pray, that he may 
 be a man, that he may have free-will, nor 
 for the remission of sins, the subject of 
 the former petition, nor that he may re- 
 ceive a command. Prayer itself then is a 
 testimony of grace; and we shall rejoice 
 that he is right, or corrected. Law and 
 grace are to be distinguished : the law 
 commands, grace bestows. If you will 
 look into the book of Pelagius, given us 
 by Timasius and Jacob,* and take the 
 trouble to examine the places, which we 
 have marked, you will find, that to the 
 objection made to him, that he denied the 
 grace of God, he replies, that this grace 
 was the nature in which God created us. 
 If he disown the book, or those passages, 
 vve contend not, let him anathematize 
 them, and confess in plain words the 
 grace which Christian doctrine teaches, 
 which is not nature, but nature saved ; 
 not by external doctrine, but by the sup- 
 ply of the Spirit and secret mercy. For 
 though natural gifts may be called grace, 
 yet that grace, by which we are predesti- 
 nated, called, justified, glorified, is quite 
 a different thing. It is of this the Apos- 
 tle speaks, when he says, if by grace, 
 then it is no more of works. And, to 
 him that worketh not, but believeth on 
 Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith 
 is counted for righteousness. For if 
 Christ had not died for our sins, Pela- 
 gius's possibility of nature, which he 
 makes to be grace, would have been just 
 the same." 
 
 But I must quote no more of this ex- 
 
 96. 
 
426 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 . cellent epistle, in which the very hinge 
 on which the controversy turned, is ex- 
 plained, and which affords an easy key 
 to solve all the perplexities and ambi- 
 guities, with which the opposers of grace, 
 ancient or modern, so much darken the 
 subject. 
 
 Innocent agrees with Augustine, but 
 writes not like a master of the subject. 
 Indeed his importance in the controversy 
 was rather founded on his local situation, 
 than on any great character either of 
 learning or piety. 
 
 In his letters to Sixtus, the Roman 
 presbyter, Augustine answers Pelagian 
 objections.* "They think that God is 
 by this means made a respec- 
 Letters to ^^^ ^f persons. They do not 
 Sixtus. consider, that due punishment 
 
 is inflicted on the condemned, not due 
 grace bestowed on the acquitted. But it 
 is unjust, they say, that one be acquitted, 
 the other punished in the same cause. 
 Truly, it is just that both be punished. 
 Who can deny it?" lie goes on to quote 
 Rom. ix. — "But why the Lord frees this 
 man rather than that, let him examine, 
 who can fathom the depth of divine judg- 
 ment; but let him beware of the preci- 
 pice. In the mean time, to him, who 
 lives as yet by faith, and sees but in part, 
 it is enough to know or believe, thai 
 God frees none but by gratuitous mercy 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ, and that 
 he condemns none but with the strictest 
 truth by the same our Lord Jesus Christ." 
 
 Vitalis, of Carthage, though not a Pe- 
 lagian by profession, taught that men 
 were indebted to their own free-will for 
 their conversion to God, and not to the op- 
 erations of divine grace. Augustinef un- 
 dertakes to convince him of his error, by 
 pressing upon his conscience the duty 
 confessed by Christians to be binding on 
 all men who professed Christianity, name- 
 ly, to pray for their fellow creatures ; for 
 infidels, that they might believe ; for 
 catechumens, that God would inspire 
 them with a desire for regeneration ; 
 and for the faithful, that they may perse- 
 vere. He shows, that the necessary con- 
 sequence of Vitalis's sentiments was, 
 that the pastors should content them- 
 selves with preaching the doctrine to 
 men without praying tor them, as he con- 
 fined his idea of divine grace to the exhibi- 
 tion of the doctrine to mankind. He 
 presses this argument on the conscience 
 
 * 104, 105. 
 
 tl07. 
 
 of Vitalis, by giving repeated scriptural 
 proof of the duty of praying for all sorts 
 of men, which would be rendered alto- 
 gether nugatory by the Pelagian senti- 
 ments. 
 
 The letter to Anastasius breathes an 
 evangelical spirit of charily, distinguishes 
 that Christian grace from the spirit of 
 slavish fear, and in no mean 
 degree leads the humbled soul ,^ f.'" ° 
 irom the Law to the Gospel, gj^g^ 
 opposing, toward the close, 
 the Pelagian pride, which, teaching man 
 to trust in himself, mars the whole design 
 of Christianity.* The whole is so ex- 
 cellent, that I am tempted to transcribe ; 
 but brevity must be studied, and it will 
 be no conV3mptible fruit of my labour, if 
 young theological students be incited to 
 read such a Divine as Augustine for 
 themselves. 
 
 In a small epistolary treatise con- 
 cerning the Baptism of Infants,! he ar- 
 gues from the confessed antiquity and 
 propriety of their baptism, 
 admitted by Pelagians them- J^" ^'^J?" 
 selves, to the proot oi the infants, 
 doctrine of original sin, and, 
 toward the close, he thus rebukes the 
 pretensions to perfection made by those 
 heretics: "As to their affirming, ihat 
 some men have lived or do live with- 
 out sin, it were to be wished it were so; 
 it is to be endeavoured, that it maybe so; 
 it is to be prayed, that it may be so; nor 
 yet is it to be trusted, that it is so. For 
 to those, who wish and strive and pray 
 with just supplication, whatever remains 
 of sin is daily remitted through this their 
 cordial prayer, forgive us our trespasses, 
 as we forgive them that trespass against 
 us. Whoever asserts that this prayer is 
 in this life unnecessary to any of the 
 most holy persons, (I except the most 
 HOLY ONE alone,) he greatly mistakes, 
 and pays a compliment, I am persuaded, 
 very unacceptable to him whom he com- 
 mends. If he think himself to be such a 
 one, 'he deceives himself, and the truth 
 is not in him,' for no other reason but 
 that he thinks falsely. The Physician, 
 who is not needful for the whole, but for 
 the sick, knows in his method of cure 
 how to perfect us for eternal salvation, 
 who does not even take away death, the 
 wages of sin, from those whose sins he 
 yet°forgives, that even in their struggles 
 
 * Ep. 144. 
 
 t Ep. 16, of the Appendix to tlie Epist. 
 Paris Edit. 
 
Cent, v.] 
 
 PELAGIAN DOCUMENTS. 
 
 427 
 
 to overcome the fear of it, they might 
 undertake a contest for the sincerity of 
 faith : and in some things he does not 
 assist even his righteous ones to perfect 
 righteousness, lest they should be lifted 
 up ; that so, while no man living is justi- 
 fied in his sight, we might be indebted 
 constantly to him for forgiveness, and 
 thank him for the same; and thus by 
 holy humility be healed and recovered 
 from that first cause of all vices, the 
 
 SWELLING OF PRIDE." 
 
 I may not dwell much on the larger 
 treatises. The tliree books to IMarcelli- 
 nus against the Pelagians are the works 
 of a master. In them he solid- 
 Three ]„ confutes the idea of sinless 
 books to 1- .• J • 
 ,, , pertection, and in answeringf 
 
 linus. their arguments, shows the 
 
 nature of the controversy at 
 that time. He defends the doctrine of 
 original sin, and the custom of baptizing 
 infants, and evinces the novelty of the Pe- 
 lagfian notion of man's origfinal innocence 
 since the fall.* 
 
 In his book of Nature and Grace he 
 argues in much the same manner, and 
 opposes a Pelagian writer, who extolled 
 ^ .- nature, and who found fault 
 
 andGrace. ^^'ith those who charged their 
 sin on the weakness of the 
 human powers. In this treatise he ob- 
 serves, that Pelagianism appears to him 
 to make a man forget why he is a Chris- 
 tian.! His two books,:!^ written express- 
 ly against Pelagius, contain a shrewd 
 answer to a shrewd adversary. Augus- 
 tine's inaccurate notion of the term justi- 
 fication, confounding it with sanctitlca- 
 tion, appears very plainly in this treatise,§ 
 of which more hereafter. In the same 
 treatise appears also Pelagius's false no- 
 tion of grace, as consisting in external 
 revelation only. The heretic's idea of 
 "power" from God, and of "will" from 
 man, mentioned in the beginning of this 
 treatise, is remarkably descriptive of his 
 sentiments. Augustine's tract of Pre- 
 destination and Grace is agreeable to his 
 other works.ll In the same volume are 
 the epistles of Prosper and Hilary, con- 
 cerning Semi-Pelao-ianisui in Gaul. Their 
 coincidence in sentiment with Augustine 
 is apparent, and the rise of this heresy 
 and its views are by them illustrated. 
 
 His observations on the good of perse- 
 verance show us his notion of this grace. 
 
 * Aug. opera, torn. vi. -j- Tom. vi. 
 
 ^Id. §p. 1G6. II Id. 
 
 whicli seems, however, differ- 
 ent from the account in the ^" Perse- 
 sixth and tenth chapters of ^'•■'■»"'=e. 
 St. John. 
 
 Satan ever inclines men to extremes ; 
 and there were not wanting those, who, 
 owning the doctrine of grace so strenu- 
 ously preached by Augustine, began to 
 think it wrong or absurd to rebuke men 
 for sin. " If I act wrong, I am not to be 
 blamed, but God is to be prayed to, to 
 give me what he has not given me. It 
 would be right to blame me, if, through 
 my own fault, I were debarred of the 
 power of doing good." 
 
 To answer these objections, and to 
 show the consistency of the doctrines of 
 grace with the use of means, exhortations, 
 and endeavours, Augustine wrote his lit- 
 tle tract of " Rebuke and 
 Grace."* He cannot be said On Rebuke 
 to have done full justice to ^'"^ Grace. 
 the subject : it required an accurate 
 course of argumentation. f But the little 
 which he says, is sufficient for serious 
 and humble minds. The proud and the 
 careless alone are overcome by such per- 
 versions as these which occasioned the 
 tract. " man, in precepts and com- 
 mands, know what thou oughtest to pos- 
 sess ; in rebukes, know that thou art dis- 
 obedient through thy own fault; in prayer, 
 know whence thou mayest receive what 
 thou desirest." 
 
 " Thou art to be rebuked, because thou 
 art not willing to be rebuked. Thou 
 would St not have thy vices to be shown 
 thee; thou wouldst not have them smit- 
 ten, nor have the wholesome pain, that 
 thou mightest seek the physician." 
 
 " This is the utility of rebuke, which 
 is used salubriously, sometimes in a 
 greater, sometimes in a less degree, ac- 
 cording to the diversity of sins; and is 
 then wholesome, when the supreme Phy- 
 sician pleases." He shows that original 
 sin in itself deserves rebuke, that I'rom 
 the pain of rebuke the regenerated will 
 may arise, if the person rebuked be a son 
 of promise, " that while the rod of cor- 
 rection sounds outwardly, God within 
 may work to will and to do by secret in- 
 
 spiration 
 
 He shows the difference between the 
 state of Adam, when perfect, and that 
 of the best Christian^ while on earth. 
 
 * Tom. vi. 
 
 f See the subject fully, anc] as nppears un- 
 answerablj, considered' in Edwards's Free- 
 will. 
 
428 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 " They, though far less comfortable than 
 he, because of the manifold conflict of the 
 new and the old man, are nevertheless 
 supplied with much stronger grace, even 
 that of God made man, to emancipate 
 them from their evils." 
 
 Jerom's writings against Pelagianism 
 should now be considered. But of them 
 it will suffice to say that he is no less than 
 Augustine determined in his opposition 
 to the heresy. His doctrine of grace is 
 sound ; and a humility of spirit highly 
 adapted indeed to the subject, but very 
 contrary to the natural temper of that cho- 
 leric writer, appears. One short sentence 
 deserves to be immortalized : H^c ho- 
 
 ailNIBUS SOLA PERFECTIO, SI IMPERFECTOS 
 SE ESSE NOVERINT.* " ThIS IS THE ONLY 
 PERFECTION OF MEN, TO KNOW THEM- 
 SELVES IMPERFECT." 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A SHORT VIEW OF AUGUSTXNe's "CITY 
 OF GOD." 
 
 The subject of this great work is so 
 much of a piece with^the history before us, 
 
 - the work itself is so remarkable a monu- 
 ment of genius, learning, and 
 Augustine's pjety united, and deserves so 
 City of God. ^gj J both of the classical 
 
 ' scholar, and the theologian, that the 
 reader will either expect some account of 
 it, or at least excuse me, if I attempt it. 
 Ecclesiastical antiquity has been too 
 much depreciated in our times, and stu- 
 dents in divinity have been discouraged 
 from the study of the Fathers. In truth, 
 a selection of them ought to be made; to 
 praise or dispraise the primitive writers 
 in general is obviously absurd. But Au- 
 gustine's City of God deserves an un- 
 qualified commendation. The young stu- 
 dent who shall meditate on it with deep 
 attention, will find it richly to repay his 
 labour ; and the following review of its 
 plan and contents may teach him what 
 he is to expect from it. 
 
 The capture of Rome by Alaric the 
 Goth, and the subsequent plunder and 
 miseries of the imperial city, had opened 
 the mouths of the Pagans to blaspheme 
 the true God, and to accuse Christianity 
 as the cause of the declension of the em- 
 pire. However trifling such an argument 
 may now appear, at that time it had so 
 great weight, that it gave occasion to 
 
 • Jerom's works, vol. i. 91. P. Go. 
 
 Augustine, in his zeal for the house ov 
 God, to write this treatise. 
 
 The work itself consists of twenty-two 
 books. The first states the objections 
 made by the Pagans, and answers them 
 in form. It was a remark- g^ j. jgj 
 able fact, that all who fled 
 to the church called the Basilicas of the 
 Apostles, whether Christians or not, 
 were preserved from military fury. The 
 author takes notice of this singular cir- 
 cumstance, as a proof of the great autho- 
 rity of the name and doctrine of Christ, 
 even among Pagans, and shows that no 
 instance can be found in their history, 
 where many vanquished people were 
 spared out of respect to their religious 
 worship. He justly observes, therefore, 
 that the evils accompanying the late dis- 
 aster ought to be ascribed to the usual 
 events of war, the benefits to the power 
 of the name of Christ. His thoughts on 
 the promiscuous distribution of good and 
 evil in this life are uncommonly excellent. 
 " If all sin, he observes, were now punish- 
 ed, nothing might seem to be reserved to 
 the lastjudgment. If theDivinity punished 
 no sin openly now, his providence might 
 be denied. In like manner, in prosperous 
 things, if some petitions for temporal 
 things were not abundantly answered, it 
 might be said that they were not at God's 
 disposal. If all petitions were granted, 
 it might be thought that we should serve 
 God only for the sake of worldly things." 
 And in a number of elegant allusions he 
 goes on to show the benefit of aflSictions 
 to the righteous, and the curse which ac- 
 companies them to the wicked.* He 
 mentions also the propriety of punishing 
 the godly often in this life, because they 
 are not sufficiently weaned from the world, 
 and because they do not rebuke the sins 
 of the world as they ought, but conform 
 too much to the taste of ungodly men. 
 He answers the objections drawn fron- 
 their sufierings in the late disaster. "Ma- 
 ny Christians, say they, are led captive. 
 It would be very miserable, he owns, if 
 they could be led to any place, where 
 they could not find their God." In the 
 same book he excellently handles the 
 subject of suicide, demonstrates its cow- 
 
 * Pari raotu exagitalum et exhalat liorribi- 
 liter coenura, et suaviter fragrat unguentum,&c. 
 It is a just recommendation of tliis treatise, 
 that its Latinity is of a superior taste to that of 
 his other works, which were written to the 
 populace ; this was meant for the perusal of 
 philosophers. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CITY OF GOD. 
 
 429 
 
 ardice, and exposes the pusillanimity of show, that, by Cicero's confession, the 
 Cato. He mentions the prayer of Pau- Roman state -vvas completely ruined be- 
 linus, bishop of Nola, who had reduced fore the times of Christianity. The book 
 himself to poverty for the sake of Christ,' concludes with a pathetic exhortation to 
 when the Barbarians laid waste his city: , unbelievers. 
 
 " Lord, suifer me not to be tormented on In the third book he demonstrates that 
 account of cjold and silver; for where all the Pagans had no more help from their 
 my wealth ts thou knowest." For there religion against natural evils, than they 
 he had his all, where the Lord hath direct- had against moral. He re- ^^^^ 3,,^ 
 ed us to lay up our treasure, and he counts the numberless mise- 
 strongly insists, as the fullest answer to ries endured by the Romans long before 
 objections, that the saint loses nothing by the coming of Christ, such as would by- 
 all his afflictions. j malice have been imputed to the Chris- 
 Having sufficiently spoken to the par- tian religion had it then existed, some of 
 ticular o'ccasion, he proceeds, in the which were more calamitous, than any 
 second book, to v.age OFFEN- thing which they had lately sustained 
 Book 2d. gj^,j, ^^,^jj WITH THE PAGANS, from the Goths. 
 
 and shows that while their religion pre- In the fourth book he demonstrates 
 vailed, it never promoted the real benefit that the Roman felicity, such as it was, 
 of men. In this book he proves his point was not caused by their religion. Here 
 with respect to moral evils. Immoral he weighs the nature of that 5300^41},, 
 practices were not discouraged or pro- glory and extent of empire 
 hibited in the least by the popular idola-, with which the carnal heart is so much 
 try, but, on the contrary, vice and flagiti- captivated ; and demonstrates, in the most 
 ousness w^ere encouraged. He triumphs solid manner, that a large extended em- 
 in the peculiar excellence of Christian pire is no more an evidence of felicity, 
 institutes, because by them instruction, than immense property is in private lile ; 
 was constantly diffused among the body' and whoever has been fascinated by po- 
 of the people, of which the whole system litical writers, ancient or modern, into aa 
 of Pagan-worship was void. His obser- admiration of this false glory, may see it 
 vations on Stage-plays,* and on the vici-! excellently combated by the reasonings 
 ous manners oT the Romans, even in the of Augustine. The Pantheistic philoso- 
 best times of their republic, as confessed; phy, of which the old sages are full, is 
 by Sallust, or at least deduced by fair in- ridiculed, and the futility of all the^popu- 
 
 ference from his writings, are extremely 
 worthy of attention. I have not seen a 
 more just estimate any where of Roman 
 
 lar religions exposed. In the conclusion 
 he give's a short view of the dispensations 
 of Providence toward the Jews, and shows 
 
 virtue, than is to be found in this andihe superiority of their felicity, so long 
 some of the following books. The clas- as they were obedient, to that of the Ro- 
 sical reader will do well to attend to his mans. 
 
 remarks, after he has made himself mas-j In the fifth book he describes the virtue 
 ter of the historical facts. And, it is only of tlie old Ramans, and what reward was 
 one instance among many of the unhappy 'given to it here on earth — shadowy re- 
 propensity of the age to infidelity, that, ward for shadowy virtue. He Root 5th. 
 the specious sophisms of Montesquieu gives an excellent account of 
 concernin<j- the virtue of the Roman re- the vice of vain-glory, and contrasts it 
 public, are so much sought after and held with the humility of Christians. He de- 
 in such veneration, while the solid argu- monstrates that it was the true God who 
 ments of Auo-ustine are scarcely known' dispensed his mercies and judgments to- 
 among us. °He eloquently describes' ward the Romans. A more striking view 
 what 'sort of felicity a carnal heart would of the emptiness of warlike grandeur can- 
 desire, and, in the description, shows tlie not be found, than in the account \yhich 
 unreasonableness of its wishes. In the he gives of the condition of the victors 
 same book will be found some valuable* and the vanquished, and in the demon- 
 remains of Cicero de Republica, a most siration that the latter were no way in- 
 profound and ingenious treatise, of which ferior to the former in point of real hap 
 
 a few fragments are preserved by Angus 
 tine, and which are introdu ced by him, to 
 
 * By RoniHi) laws, players could not be ad- 
 mitted into Uoniau cilizenship. 
 
 piness, except in the crisis of battle. 
 
 In the same book he argues against 
 Cicero, and shows the consistency of the 
 prescience of God with the free agency 
 
430 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap.V. 
 
 of man. In this and some other parts of 
 his works, the discerning reader may see 
 some traces of that ingenious work, Jona- 
 than Edwards's Enquiry on Free-will. 
 He takes notice of the total defeat sus- 
 tained by Rhadagases, tlie barbarous Pa- 
 gan, in Italy, and reminds the Gentiles 
 how insultingly they had declared, be- 
 forehand, that he would certainly be vic- 
 torious. His observations on the ill suc- 
 cess of the pious emperor Gratian, and 
 the prosperity of Constantino and Theo- 
 dosiua, deserve also our attention. 
 
 Having shown, in the first five books, 
 that Paganism could do nothing for men 
 j,n temporal things, in the five following 
 books he proves, that it was 
 Five fol- g^jgQ totally insignificant with 
 Looki respectto the next life.* Here 
 
 we meet with some valuable 
 fragments of the very learned Varro, who 
 divides religion into three kinds, the fa- 
 bulous, the philosophical, and the politi- 
 cal. Here too we have a clear and his- 
 torical detail of the opinions of the an- 
 cient philosophers."!" 
 
 Of the remaining books, the four first 
 describe the beginning, the four middle 
 the progress, and the fom last the issues 
 of the two states, namely, the city of God 
 and the World ; the history of both, and 
 the different genius and spirit of each, are 
 throughout conceived with great energy 
 by the author, and are illustrated with 
 copiousness and perspicuity. 
 
 The eleventh book begins with a just 
 and solid view of the knowledge of God 
 by the Mediator, and the authority of the 
 Book 11th Scriptures. A number of ques- 
 tions, which respect the be- 
 ginnings of things, rather curious than im- 
 portant, follow. Among these there is, 
 m the twelfth chapter, an occasional com- 
 parison of the felicity of the just in this 
 life with that of Adam before his fall, 
 which deserves a better character. His 
 metaphysics concerning the origin of evil 
 are intespersed. But the greater part of 
 the book may be omitted with little loss 
 to the reader. Yet his cen- 
 sure of Origen in the twenty- 
 third chapter deserves atten- 
 tion. 
 In the twelfth book the question con- 
 cerning the origin of evil is still more 
 explicitly stated ; and the opinions of 
 Book 12th those who pretend to account 
 for the origrin of the world in a 
 
 Book 14th. 
 
 Origen 
 censured. 
 
 ♦ Book vi. 
 
 + Book viii. 
 
 manner different from the Scriptures, and 
 to give it an antiquity much superior to 
 that which is assigned to it in them, are 
 refuted. 
 
 The thirteenth book describes the fall 
 of man ; but questions of little or no mo 
 ment are interspersed; and the nooki"rh 
 subtilty of the learning of his 
 times meeting with his argumentative 
 mind, leads him here, as in various other 
 parts of his writings, into trifling disqui- 
 sitions. I do not, however, reckon of this 
 sort his account of the difference between 
 an animal and spiritual body, because it 
 throws some good light on the fifteenth 
 chapter of the first epistle to the Corin- 
 thians. 
 
 The fourteenth book contains matter 
 more interesting than the foregoing three, 
 though it is not without unimportant spe- 
 culations. A just idea of the 
 magnitude of the first sin is 
 given, and the justice of God is excellent- 
 ly vindicated. In the close of this book 
 he contrasts the two states in a very 
 graphical manner. " Two sets of afl^ec- 
 tions have produced two states : self-love 
 produced an earthly one to the contempt 
 of God ; the love of God produced a hea- 
 venly one to the contempt of man. That 
 glories in man, this in the Lord. That 
 seeks glory from men, to this, God, the 
 witness of the conscience, is the greatest 
 glory. That exalts the head in its own 
 glory, this says to its God, thou art my 
 
 GLORY, AND THE LIFTER UP OF MY HEAD. 
 
 In that the lust of power reigns, in this 
 men serve one another in love, governors 
 in providing, subjects in obeying. That 
 loves its ow^n strength, this says to its 
 
 God, I will LOVE THEE, O LORD, MY 
 
 STRENGTH. lu that, wise men live ac- 
 cording to man, and pursue the goods of 
 body or mind, or both, or if they know 
 God, honour him not as God, nor are 
 thankful. In this, human wisdom is of 
 no account, godliness is all, in which the 
 true God is worshipped, and the reward 
 is expected, in the society of saints and 
 angels, that God may be all in all." 
 
 In the fifteenth book, he enters upon the 
 second part of the history of the two states, 
 namely, their progress. He describes 
 very justly the two types, B^oklSih. 
 Sarah and Agar, and illus- 
 trates the spirit and genius of the two 
 sects by the cases of Cain and Abel. He 
 confutes those who would make the lives 
 of the Antediluvians of shorter duration 
 than that assigned them in Scripture. His 
 
Ce»t. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S CITY OP GOD. 
 
 431 
 
 reflections on the Ark and the Deluge are 
 just, though to us they contain little that 
 is new ; and in the last chapter he shows 
 that the literal and allegorical sense of 
 Scripture ought both to be supported, 
 
 without depreciating either 
 
 The sixteenth book carries on the his- 
 tory of the city of God from Noah to Da- 
 vid, and contains important instruction 
 
 ■o I ir.u throughout,especially to those 
 
 Book 10th. , f ' / A iu r, ™„ 
 
 who have not read the same 
 
 things in modern authors. 
 
 The seventeenth book may be called 
 the prophetic history. He shows a dou- 
 ble sense must necessarily be affixed to 
 Ro kfth ^^^® words of the prophets, 
 ° ' ■ in which sometimes the lite- 
 ral, sometimes the spiritual, and some- 
 times both senses are applicable. He 
 justly observes, therefore, that the Scrip- 
 tures are to be understood in a tripartite 
 sense. And he gives an admirable in- 
 stance of his views in Hannah's song in 
 the first book of Samuel, in which a king 
 is prophesied of, at a time when no king 
 was in Israel. His comments on the 
 Psalms are excellent also to the same 
 purpose. These views are so remote 
 froin the usual mode of reasoning in our 
 times, that they will not easily find credit 
 in the world. But I will venture to affirm, 
 that the more men study the Scriptures, 
 the more they will see the justness of 
 Augustine's remarks, and the necessity 
 of admitting them. 
 
 In the eighteenth book he displays 
 much learning in describing the times of 
 the world coeval with those 
 of the church of God, prior to 
 the birth of Christ. He proves the su- 
 perior antiquity of prophetic authority to 
 that of any philosophers. The remarka- 
 ble harmony of the sacred writers, in the 
 promotion of one system, and the endless 
 .discordancies of philosophers, are ably 
 contrasted. Yet he proves from the ear- 
 liest times, that the citizens of the new- 
 
 Book 18th. 
 
 sound, many reprobates are mixed with 
 the good ; both are collected into the Gos- 
 pel-net, and both, included in this world 
 as in a sea, swim promiscuously till 
 they reach the shore, where the bad shall 
 be severed from the good, and in the 
 good, as in his temple, God shall be all 
 in all." — Christ chose disciples meanly 
 born, obscure and illiterate, that whatever 
 great things they should do, he might be 
 m them, and do all. One he had among 
 them, whose evil he turned to good, by 
 making it an instrument of his passion, 
 and affording an example to his church 
 of enduring evil. His holy church being 
 planted, so far as his bodily presence 
 required, he suffered, died, rose again, 
 showing by his passion what we ought 
 to sustain for truth, by his resurrection 
 what to hope for in eternity ; and this is 
 an additional lesson to the great mystery 
 of redemption, by which his blood was 
 shed for the remission of our sins. He 
 proves that the faith of the Gospel is 
 strengthened by the dissensions of here- 
 tics ; and after some observations on An- 
 tichrist, as just as might be expected in 
 his time, he concludes with a remark on 
 a Pagan prophecy, which affirmed that 
 the Christian religion would only con- 
 tinue three hundred and sixty-five years. 
 "What may be doing, says he, at the 
 end of this period in other parts of the 
 world, it may be needless to inquire. I 
 will mention what I know; in the re- 
 nowned city of Carthage, the imperial 
 officers, in the year following the predicted 
 extinction of Christianity, overturned the 
 temples of the idols, and brake the images. 
 And for the space of thirty years since 
 that time, the falsity of the pagan divina- 
 tion being notorious, occasion hath beea 
 given to render the progress of the Gospel 
 still more triumphant." 
 
 The four last books describe the issues 
 
 of the two states. The nineteenth de- 
 
 the studious attention of every 
 
 serves 
 
 Jerusalem were not confined absolutely scholar who would accurately i3ookl9th 
 
 to Jewry 
 
 In speaking of the times of Christ and 
 the propagation of the Gospel, he ob- 
 serves,* " In this malignant world, in 
 these evil days, whilst the church is pro- 
 curing future dignity by present humility, 
 and is disciplined by the incentives of 
 fear, the torments of pain, the fatigue of 
 labours, and the dangers of temptations, 
 rejoicing only in hope, when her joy is 
 
 • Chap, xlix. 
 
 distinguish between theology 
 and philosophy. He contrasts the ideas 
 of happiness exhibited by both with great 
 clearness, and, while he does justice to 
 all the good that is found in secular sys- 
 tems, he points out their fundamental 
 errors. The principles of evangelical 
 virtue are stated ; the miseries of life are 
 described, and both the true relief against 
 them which the Gospel proposes is exhi- 
 bited, and the false consolations of philo- 
 sophy are justly exposed. In fine (for 
 
432 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 my limits admit not a longer detail) the 
 reader will find here the mass of secular 
 philosophy reduced to order, its errors 
 detected, and the very picture of the 
 Christian state and genius delineated. 
 
 The twentieth book undertakes to de- 
 scribe the last judgment. But as the 
 » vigorous and discursive genius of the 
 Book20th. ^"thor led him to handle a 
 multitude of intricate ques- 
 tions, and to undertake the exposition of 
 some of the most difficult prophecies in 
 the Scripture, for which the early times 
 in which he lived were unequal, through 
 want of the evidence of their accomplish- 
 ment, almost the whole is very uninte- 
 resting. 
 
 In the two last books he gives his ideas 
 of the punishment of the wicked, and of 
 the happiness of the righteous in a future 
 state. The former, though it 
 Former of j^^g ^ fixture of curious ques- 
 iast books, tions, more subtil than im- 
 portant, will from the eleventh 
 chapter to the end deserve a careful peru- 
 sal. I have not seen, in so small a 
 compass, a sounder answer to the objec- 
 tions of men against the Divine justice 
 in punishing sin eternally, than is to be 
 found in the eleventh and twelfth chapters. 
 It appears that the Lord's Prayer was 
 daily used by the church* in his time, 
 and," though he seems to give an unsound 
 interpretation to our Lord's words, of 
 making friends of the mammon of un- 
 righteousness, yet he confesses his 
 interpretation would be dangerous in 
 practice; and he protests against the 
 ideas of those who imagine they can atone 
 for their sins by alms. He refutes various 
 presumptions ofmen who expect to escape 
 the damnation of hell without a sound 
 conversion. 
 
 In the last book, which describes the 
 eternal rest of the city of God, he dwells 
 a little on the external evidences of Chris- 
 
 T .T» , tianity, and in speaking of 
 
 Last Book. • • , , i -u „ " 
 
 miracles, he describes some 
 
 which were wrought in his own time. 
 One of them, the healing of a disorder, 
 seems peculiarly striking, because it was 
 in answer to prayer. I have again to re- 
 gret the scholastic and subtil taste of 
 his times intervi'oven with most important 
 matter. The twenty-second chapter gives 
 as striking a proof, drawn from facts, of 
 human apostasy as I have seen. The 
 reflections in the two next chapters are 
 
 * Chap. last. 
 
 also admirable. And he closes with a 
 delightful view of the eternal felicity of 
 the Church of God. 
 
 Should the very imperfect sketch I have 
 given of this work, one of the greatest 
 efforts of genius and learning in any age, 
 induce any classical scholars to peruse it 
 with candour and attention, and, by the 
 blessing of God, to imbibe some portion of 
 the heavenly spirit of the author, I shall 
 have cause to rejoice. One caution I 
 must however give in reading it, which, 
 indeed, is generally necessary in reading 
 the Fathers, and it is that which I would 
 keep steadily in view throughout this 
 history. We must forget our own times, 
 spirit, taste, and manner : We must trans- 
 plant ourselves into those of the author, 
 and make allowances for his modes both 
 of thinking and speaking, which are ex- 
 tremely different from our own. Without 
 this reasonable degree of candour, to 
 which, however, few minds are suffi- 
 ciently inclined, it is impossible to make 
 a just estimate of the works which pass 
 under our examination. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Augustine's conduct toward the 
 donatists. 
 
 The active spirit of the bishop of Hippo 
 found sufficient employment in his long 
 course of private and public labours 
 against the Pelagians, the Manichees, and 
 the Donatists, besides the general care of 
 the African churches, and the peculiar 
 inspection of his own diocese. 'I'he two 
 former sects he in a manner eradicated : 
 his own experience in religion fitted him 
 for the work. The last sect he opposed 
 with much success. Vital godliness, it 
 is true, is not so much interested in this 
 opposition, nor does his conduct here 
 merit in all respects that praise in regard 
 to them, which it does in regard to the 
 others. 
 
 Let us distinguish the Donatists as they 
 ought to be. Some of tliem were, com- 
 paratively speaking, a mild and peaceable 
 people ; others, called the Circumcelli- 
 ONES, were a mere banditti, sons of vio- 
 lence and bloodshed, who neither valued 
 their own lives, nor those of their neigh- 
 bours, and frequently were remarkable 
 for committing suicide in a fit of frenzy. 
 They had a peculiar malice against the 
 pastors of the general church, and way- 
 laid them, from time to time, attacked 
 
Ce:st. v.] 
 
 THE DONATISTS. 
 
 433 
 
 them with armed force, and mutilated, or 
 even killed them. They burnt the houses 
 of those who would not comply with their 
 sect, and were guilty of many detestable 
 enormities. Augustine himself was seve- 
 ral times way-laid by these miserable 
 men, and once by a peculiar providence, 
 through the mistake of his guide, was led 
 into a different road from that by which 
 he had intended to travel, when he was 
 going through one of his usual visitations 
 of his diocese, a work which he was wont 
 to discharge with frequency and labour. 
 He learnt afterwards, that by this means 
 he had escaped an ambush which they 
 had laid for him. 
 
 There was nothing peculiarly doctrinal 
 in the whole scheme of the Donatists : 
 they ditfered from the general church 
 only concerning a matter of fact, namely, 
 whether Caeciiian had been legally or- 
 dained. Augustine justly observes in his 
 controversy with them, that, if their oppo- 
 nents had been mistaken, such a circum- 
 stance justified not at all their separation 
 from the general church, since Jesus 
 Christ, his grace and doctrine, remained 
 the same. Yet for such a trifle, even 
 from the close of the third century to this 
 which is before us, did these schismatics 
 think it worth while to rend the body of 
 Christ, when the articles of belief were 
 the same in both parties. So much had 
 men forgotten to keep the unity of the 
 spirit in the bond of peace ! The peace- 
 able Donatists abhorred the madness of 
 the Circumcelliones, aud yet had not the 
 discernment to see and lament the evils 
 which their own needless schism had 
 occasioned. They themselves were crum- 
 bled into parties, and subdivided into 
 little bodies which condemned one ano- 
 ther, each arrogating to itself the title of 
 the true church, while they all joined to 
 condemn the general church. In the 
 mean time they were extremely active in 
 re-baptizing multitudes in Africa ; for the 
 baptism of the general church was not by 
 them allowed to be valid. 
 
 Augustine owns, concerning one party 
 of them, the Rogatians, that they care- 
 fully distinguished themselves from the 
 Circumcelliones. Whether the rest did 
 so, is not so evident. This may be safely 
 affirmed, that all truly humble and godly 
 persons of the Donatist name (and 1 hope 
 there were many such in Africa) must 
 have separated themselves from them 
 entirely. But it was very difficult for 
 others to make the just distinction: Afri- 
 VoL. I. 2 
 
 ca was full of these schismatics, and the 
 furious party were undoubtedly very nu- 
 merous. Let us briefly state the methods 
 used by Augustine with respect to this 
 people. 
 
 At first, when he saw the vast numbers 
 of them with which Africa swarmed, his 
 heart was struck with horror at the 
 thought of exposing them to the penal 
 laws of the empire ; and he wrote to the 
 Imperial court his sentiments and wishes, 
 which were, that the lawless and savage 
 conduct of the Circumcelliones might be 
 restrained by the civil sword, but that no 
 other arms should be used against the 
 peaceable Donatists, than preaching and 
 arguments ; because, as he observed, com- 
 pulsive conversions were not genuine, 
 and tended only to harden men in sin. 
 
 Other bishops of the general church 
 in Africa were not so moderate : they de- 
 sired that the civil restraints should be 
 exercised on the whole Donatist name, 
 and signified these sentiments to the Im- 
 perial court, at a time when their spirits 
 were heated by the savage treatment of a 
 certain bishop, who had fallen into the 
 hands of the Circumcelliones, and was be- 
 lieved to have lost his life. Under the 
 impression of this belief, on account of 
 many enormities which had been prac- 
 tised by the banditti, the court issued- 
 orders for fines to be imposed on the 
 Donatists, and banishment on their bi- 
 shops. It was not till after these edicts 
 were promulged, that it appeared, that 
 the injured bishop had escaped with 
 life. Auo-ustine owns that he afterwards 
 retracted his opinion, when he saw the 
 good eflfects of the interposition of the 
 civil magistrate. Many of the Circum- 
 cilliones, he observes, with much humili- 
 ty and joy confessed their error, and re- 
 turned into the bosom of the church: 
 numbers too, who had never joined in 
 
 their enormities, and who had nothing 
 to plead for their schism but custom and 
 tradition, and the shame of inconstancy, 
 and the fear of molestation from the Cir- 
 cumcelliones, when they found them- 
 selves exposed to the laws for the de- 
 fence of their schism, began to examine 
 the grounds on which it stood, saw and 
 confessed their error, and united them- 
 selves to the general church with every 
 mark of serious repentance. Moved by 
 these considerations, and convinced by 
 the effects rather than the reason of the 
 case, the bishop of Hippo repeatedly 
 supported in his writings the justice aud 
 
434 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 reasonableness of the imperial methods 
 of opposing the Donatists. 
 
 It is certain, however, that he continu- 
 ed all the time extremely tender in his 
 conscience concerning this subject. He 
 repeatedly and earnestly pressed the ma- 
 gistrates on no account to shed blood, 
 and in all his writings and conduct on 
 this occasion demonstrated, that he was 
 led by principle, by the fear of God, and 
 by a charitable compassion for the souls 
 of men, in his contentions with the Do- 
 natists. I know it is not easy for men 
 to believe this, who are themselves pro- 
 fane and careless, and with whom all 
 sorts of religion are of equal value, be- 
 cause they are apt to measure others by 
 themselves. Yet, whoever shall take pains 
 to weigh the writings of Augustine, and to 
 CO mpare them with his practice and gene- 
 ral temper, will feel an invincible convic- 
 tion, that I have not been betrayed into 
 an excess of candour in forming this 
 judgment. In truth, the case was mixed 
 and complicated ; one sort of conduct 
 ought to have been held toward the fu- 
 rious, another toward the peaceable. But 
 it was difficult to distinguish in real fact, 
 though none in cur times will doubt, that 
 Augustine's first sentiments w«re more 
 just than his second. He largely insists 
 on the unreasonableness of the Donatists 
 in confining the mercies of salvation to 
 themselves, as if all the world had been 
 unchristian, and Africa alone were pos- 
 sessed of the truth. And he observed, 
 that their absurdity appeared still strong- 
 er in confining salvation to some particular 
 spots of Africa, when they had subdivid- 
 ed themselves into little parties, each 
 pretending to monopolize the truth. But 
 then the general church should not have 
 imitated this bigotry, in condemning the 
 v/holc body of the Donatists. Highly 
 culpn.ble as these were in breaking the 
 unity of the church, the peaceable part of 
 them, V. ho feared God, and wrought righ- 
 teousness, should have been oAvned as 
 brethren by the general church, and the 
 furious alone should have been rejected 
 as unchristian, and exposed to the civil 
 law for their crimes. It was an erro- 
 neous notion of the unity of the church, 
 and the dread of schism on the one hand, 
 which led Augustine into the mistake; 
 and it wr.s an abuse of the right of con- 
 science on the other, which seduced the 
 Donatists.* 
 
 * It would be equally tedious and uninter- 
 
 The bishop of Calama, one of the dis- 
 ciples of Augustine, going to visit his 
 diocese, was attacked by the Circumcel- 
 liones, robbed, and so ill-treated, that he 
 escaped with difficulty. Upon this, Cris- 
 pinus the Donatist bishop of Calama, was 
 fined by the magistrate according to the 
 laws. He denied himself to be a Dona- 
 tist, and the two bishops of Calama ap- 
 peared in court, and pleaded before a 
 great multitude, nor did Augustine refuse 
 his assistance to the church on this occa- 
 sion. The Donatist was convicted, and 
 required to pay the fine. But the disciple 
 of Augustine, satisfied with his victory, 
 begged that the fine might be remitted, 
 which request was granted accordingly. 
 The pride of the Donatist refused to 
 stoop, and he appealed to the Emperor, 
 Vv'ho ordered the law to be executed with 
 the greatest rigour on the whole party. 
 The bishops of the general church, how- 
 ever, with Augustine at their head, im- 
 plored for them the imperial clemency, 
 and were successful in their petition. 
 
 No doubt it would have been far more 
 agreeable to the maxims of Christianity, 
 had no methods but those of argument 
 been employed against the Donatists. 
 But the difficulties of the case have been 
 stated ; and the conduct of Augustine, 
 and no doubt of other godly persons in 
 Africa, was in general of a piece with the 
 
 esting to take notice of the endless perversions 
 with which Mr. Gibbon has filled the history 
 of the cluu-ch. A remark or two may be made, 
 to guard those who read his History against 
 his deceptions. In reading him (ci)ap. xxxiii. 
 Vol. 111. Decline and Fall of the Roman Em- 
 pire) I Mas surprised to meet with two repre- 
 sentations, for neither of wliieh I could find 
 any foundation in original records, botli re- 
 lating to tliese Donatists. The first is, that 
 he ascribes the madness, and tumult, and 
 bloodshed of the Circumcelliones to tlie im- 
 perial persecutions in Augustine's time. I 
 will not say how far these outrages might be 
 increased by them ; but the Donatists had eve^r 
 been an unruly and turbulent sect. Their 
 very origin was scandalous, and in Julian's 
 cime their furious conduct deserved the inter- 
 ference of the civil magistrate, Aug. ad Donat. 
 Ep. 105. Fleury, Vol. II. B. xv. C. 32. His 
 second account is still more glaringly false. 
 He ascribes the success of the Vandals in Afri- 
 ca to the effect of the same prosecution of the 
 Donatists, who, he supposes, joined the arms 
 of Genseric against the general church. Ot 
 this no pioof "appears at all. He might as 
 justly have ascribed tlie Pretender's invasion 
 of Scotland, in the last rebellinn, to the revi- 
 val of godliness in Great Britain, which took 
 place about the same time. 
 
Ckitt. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S WORKS. 
 
 435 
 
 mild behaviour which they displayed on 
 this occasion. Instances, however, of 
 iniquitous and oppressive exactions from 
 the peaceable Donatists would naturally 
 take place, amidst the inditrnavion of 
 men's minds against the Circumcelliones. 
 Nor is there any thing in all this wliich 
 impeaches the acknowledged sincerity, 
 meekness, and piety of the bishop of Hip- 
 po, notwithstanding the mistake of judg- 
 ment, which happened to him in common 
 with the whole church at that time. It 
 is a delicate and dilficult matter to settle, 
 in all cases, how far the civil magistrate 
 ought to interfere in religion. Different 
 ao-es are apt to run into different extremes, 
 as either superstition or profaneness pre- 
 dominates. Doubtless there is a middle 
 path of rectitude in this subject, which I 
 have endeavoured to describe on a former 
 occasion, though, to apply it with exact- 
 ness to all cases and circumstances would 
 be difficult in itself, and foreign to the 
 design of this history. Donatism, how- 
 ever, under the charitable and argumenta- 
 tive labours of Augustine, received a 
 blow, from Avhich it never recovered, and 
 the sect dwindled gradually into insigni- 
 ficance ; and the most pleasing part of 
 the story is, that by the suppression of 
 the Circumcelliones, the ecclesiastical 
 face of Africa must have been abundantly 
 meliorated, and in all probability, a great 
 accession made to the real church of 
 Christ.* 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE REST OF AUGUSTINe's Vv'ORKS 
 REVIEWED. 
 
 The two tracts on Lying, addressed to 
 Consentius, demonstrate the soundness 
 of the author's views in morality. Such 
 
 indeed is the connexion between one 
 
 part of divine truth and ano- rr. 
 
 1 rftcls on 
 ther, that those who have the Lyin"-. 
 
 justest and the largest views 
 of Gospel-grace, have always the most 
 exact and extensive ideas of moral duty, 
 and what is more, exemplify ihem in life 
 and conversation. For the same self- 
 righteousness, which tarnishes the lustre 
 of divine grace, always induces its votary 
 to curtail the demands of the divine law, 
 to adulterate it with pride and the love of 
 the world, and to render a thousand things 
 allowable in practice, which an humble 
 and holy soul must abhor. We have seen 
 what vague and dangerous notions of 
 veracity had begun to prevail during the 
 progress of superstition, from which even 
 such men as Ambrose and Chrysostom 
 were not exempt ; and that what are call- 
 ed pious frauds had in some instances 
 been esteemed laudable. Augustine in 
 the treatise before us, defines Ij'ing to be 
 " The saying of one thing and thinking of 
 another;" and in all cases, even for the 
 most pious and salutary purposes, he ex- 
 cludes lying as unchristian. The second 
 chapter of the epistle to the Galatians had 
 been perversely interpreted in that part of 
 it which relates to the dissimulation of Pe- 
 ter.* He rescues the divine oracles from 
 the abuse, and demonstrates from the most 
 express and determinate decisions of the 
 New Teetament, that all deceit of the 
 tongue is wicked. The task was worthy 
 of him who was the principal instrument 
 of the revival of godliness in the church. f 
 
 * After examining Augustine's writing con- 
 cerning the Donatists, pailicniarly tlie letters 
 48, 50, 61, and 127, and the narrative of Fos- 
 sidonins, I have endeavoured to compress into 
 this chapter the sulistance of tiie historii-al 
 information whicii tiiey contain, witlnml trou- 
 bling myself or the reader viih ])articidar 
 citations" I have done on this occasion, wiiat 
 I profess to do generally, to the best of my 
 ability, namely, formed my judgment on ori- 
 ginal'evidences, and not on the opinions and 
 reasonings of any modern whatever. Labo- 
 rious task! compared witii the case of copy- 
 ing other historians ; invidious also, because 
 it often obliges one to correct moilern rep- 
 resenutions J But it is the task of a real 
 historian. 
 
 * Aug. Opera, torn. iv. page 2. Paris edi- 
 tion, 1571. 
 
 f In this Chapter, the other works of Au- 
 gustine, whicli have not fallen under our 
 consideration in the preceding Chapters, are 
 considered, so far as I think them wortliy of 
 the reader's particular attention. Those parts 
 of his voluminous writings, which are either 
 mere i-ejietitions of wliat has been elsewhere 
 illustiateil, or seem not to convey any inter- 
 esting instruction, or handle subjects which 
 have been much belter treated by those who 
 have hail the advantage of later imj)rovements, 
 are omitted. — Tlie book, of Meditations, though 
 more known to English readers than any other 
 of the works ascribed tn Augustine, on ac- 
 count of the translation of it into our language 
 by Statihope, seems not to be his, both on ac- 
 count of its style, which is sententious, concise, 
 abrupt, and void of any of tiiose classical ele- 
 gancies, which now and iheti appear in our 
 autiior's genuine writings, and also on account 
 of the prayers to deceased Saints whici* it 
 contains. This last circumstance peculiarly 
 marks it to have been of a later date than the 
 
436 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 His treatise on faith and works was 
 written to obviate the Antinomianism, 
 which some were in his time desirous 
 Aujustine °^. introducing. Men, who 
 on Faith. Still persevered in their sins, 
 desired to he haptized ; and 
 there were those who supported their un- 
 reasonable wishes, and thought it suffi- 
 cient to teach them, after baptism, how 
 they ought to live, still holding out a 
 hope to their minds, that they might be 
 saved as by fire, because they had been 
 haptized, though they never repented of 
 their sins. In answer to these dangrerous 
 abuses, our author shows, that the true 
 saving faith works by love, that the in- 
 struction of catechumens includes morals, 
 as well as doctrines ; that the labour of 
 catechising is exceedingly profitable to 
 the church, and that persons ought to be 
 catechized before they receive baptism, 
 that they may know how vain it is to 
 think of being eternally saved without 
 holiness. He justly observes, that the 
 eunuch's answer to Philip, " I believe 
 that .Tesus is the Son of God," virtually 
 and radically involved in it, a knowledge 
 of the true character of the person and 
 offices of Christ, and of the qualities 
 which belong to his members. He sup- 
 ports his doctrine by Scripture authority, 
 particularly by that of St. James in his 
 second chapter; and against those who 
 say, that they would believe in Christ 
 and come to him, and are hindered, he 
 observes, " We do not prohibit such as 
 are willing, from coming to Christ, but 
 we prove by their own practice that they 
 are not willing to come to Christ ; nor do 
 we forbid them to believe in Christ, but 
 demonstrate that they are not willing to 
 believe in Christ, who suppose that adul- 
 terers can be his members." On the 
 whole, he reprobates the most dangerous 
 notion of the possibility of baptized per- 
 sons being saved in their sins, and recom- 
 mends strongly an attention to church- 
 discipline, and to the wholesome practice 
 of catechizing, showing through the 
 whole a zeal for the cause of holiness, 
 and a fear of men's abusing the doctrines 
 of grace.* 
 
 age of Augustine. Frauds of this kind were 
 commonly ])ractised on the works of the 
 Fathers in tlie monastic times. For the most 
 part, liowever, tliis hook may be read wiili 
 profit by tlie serious reader, because of tlie 
 devotional spirit in which it resembles the 
 genuine works of Augustine. 
 * Id. p. 18. 
 
 In a small treatise to Simplician the 
 aged bishop of Milan, who was both the 
 instructor and the successor of Ambrose, 
 he undertakes to solve the Treatise to 
 difficulties usually grounded simplician 
 on the ninth chapter to the 
 Romans. And he defends the doctrine of 
 divine grace in his usual manner. His 
 remarks on " It is not of him that willeth, 
 nor of him that runneth, but of God that 
 howeth mercy," will deserve to be tran- 
 scribed. " It is not said, it is not of him 
 that is unwilling and despises, but of 
 God who hardens. — Nothing is done by 
 God to make men worse ; only that is 
 not bestowed by him upon some men, 
 which might make them better. Since 
 human society is connected by giving and 
 receiving, who does not see, that no man 
 is accused of iniquity, who exacts what 
 is due to himself, or remits the same ] 
 This idea of equity is impressed onus by 
 the Divinity. All men die in Adam, 
 being one mass of iniquity : this death 
 may be called a debt due to Divine Jus- 
 tice, which, whether it be exacted, as 
 with some, or remitted, as with others, 
 there is no iniquity."* 
 
 The treatise on catechising the ignorant 
 deserves to be read, both for the solid 
 and pious vein of instruction which runs 
 through it, and also for the q^ pjjjg_ 
 light which it throws on the chisin". 
 customs of the Church. It 
 appears, that whoever desired to be ad- 
 mitted into the church, was obliged to at- 
 tend the catechist ; and the work, in our 
 author's manner of practising it, was very 
 important. The person to whom he 
 writes, had expressed a concern, because 
 he could not please himself in his manner 
 of speaking. Augustine observes, that 
 this may easily happen, even when there 
 is no particular fault in our manner of 
 exhorting. He owns that it was gene- 
 rally the case with himself. And that 
 the reason is, the mind of a serious preach- 
 er or catechist conceiving in one glance 
 a beauty and weight in his subject, to 
 express which his words are too slow or 
 inadequate, he feels ashamed and disap- 
 pointed; yet, continues Augustine, he 
 ought not to conclude, that his words are 
 lost, or that they appear as mean to the 
 hearers, as they do to himself. " We 
 see," says he, "but in a glass darkly, 
 and we must patiently labour to make 
 greater improvement in divine life. Yet 
 
 * Id. p. 147. 
 
Cbxt. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S WORKS. 
 
 437 
 
 it is desirable to catechise with a cheer- 
 ful spirit, and with sensible comfort in 
 one's own mind. This, however, is the 
 gift of God." 
 
 In the method of catechising, he re- 
 commends to begin with narration, to 
 give to the pupils a clear and succinct 
 view of the great facts, relative to our 
 religion, both in the Old and New Testa- 
 ment, and to dwell more largely on the 
 more important, and only glance at those 
 which are less so. In the whole manner 
 of doing this, the teacher should have his 
 eyes steadily fixed on the great end, 
 LOVE, and refer everything, which he re- 
 lates, to the plan, of divine love in the 
 gift of Jesus Christ, describing the fall 
 and the redemption, and the method of 
 God in winning back the apostate spirits 
 of men to love him, in return for his free 
 love to us in Jesus Christ. Yet he ob- 
 serves, that without fear of Divine wrath, 
 there can be no motive for sinners to ap- 
 proach to the God of love, or any suffi- 
 cient inducements to engage their minds 
 to seek him. Nor should the catechist 
 be too shy in conveying his instructions, 
 because the catechumen's motives may 
 be merely worldly. It often happens, 
 says he, through the mercy of God, that 
 he, who applied to us for instruction with 
 carnal views, is brought to feel the value 
 of that, of which at first he only made 
 pretence. But it would be useful, if the 
 catechist could know beforehand what 
 was the frame of the catechumen. If he 
 cannot, he must interrogate him himself, 
 and regulate his discourse by the answers 
 he receives. If the catechumen owns, 
 that fear of Divine wrath for sin, or the 
 terror of some powerful awakening admo- 
 nition from God, has led him to apply for 
 information, the catechist has then the 
 fairest opening for instruction. 
 
 When he has finished his narration, he 
 should add exhortation, laying open the 
 hope of resurrection, and the awful 
 views of divine judgment, of heaven and 
 hell. He should arm the catechumen 
 against the scandals and temptations to 
 which he may be exposed from the per- 
 verseness of heretics, the malice of open 
 enemies, or the evil lives of nominal 
 Christians. And he is particularly to be 
 directed, amidst all the precepts givenliim, 
 how to please God and live a holy life, 
 not to trust in any of his works, but in 
 the grace of God alone. 
 
 If the person hath had a liberal educa- 
 tion, he must not be offended by a tedious 
 2o3 
 
 and diffusive view of things respecting 
 the facts of Christianity, though a fuller 
 display of the same facts will be needful 
 for the unlearned. — The discourse must 
 be varied; it will be necessary in some 
 things to be more large, as in others to 
 be more brief. For instance, in guarding 
 him against the pride of learning, and in 
 forming his taste, he will need to be se- 
 riously instructed to avoid faults of a mo- 
 ral rather than those of a literary nature, 
 and to dread the want of grace in his 
 words and deeds, rather than a solecism 
 or barbarism in language, and to take 
 particular care not to despise illiterate 
 Christians. 
 
 He hath already hinted at one discou- 
 ragement with which the catechist is apt 
 to be affected. Another is, that whereas he 
 would rather himself read or hear things 
 useful for his own improvement, he is 
 obliged repeatedly to have recourse to 
 things, which to himself are now no 
 longer necessary. No doubt this is one 
 cause in all ages, why so few love the 
 office of instructing the ignorant. Those 
 who themselves are ighorant, are not fit 
 to instruct, and those who are knowing, 
 are apt to be above the task. A pastor, 
 he observes, is engaged in some agreeable 
 study, and is told that he must proceed to 
 catechise. He is vexed that the course of 
 his work is interrupted, and from the agi- 
 tation of his mind, is less fitted to dis- 
 charge the work itself. 
 
 Hence, he concludes, it is necessary 
 that the teacher should himself learn 
 those things, which may exhilarate his 
 own mind : for God loveth a cheerful 
 giver. He adds, that the meek and cha- 
 ritable example of the Son of God should 
 to this end be placed before him, to shame 
 him out of his pride and impatience ; that 
 if indeed we have any more useful study 
 to prosecute, respecting ourselves, we 
 may then expect that God will speak to 
 us in it more powerfully, when we have 
 undertaken cheerfully to speak for liim as 
 well as we could to others ; and that the 
 tediousncss of that trite and plain road of 
 catechising should be smoothed by divine 
 love in the heart; and that when we con- 
 sider t!-.at we are poor judges of the best 
 order of things, and how much bettt^r it is 
 to leave the direction of times and sea- 
 sons with the all-wise God, we shall not 
 take it amiss, that the providential calls 
 of duty disturbed the order which we had 
 prescribed to ourselves, and that, in short, 
 his will took place before ours. 
 
438 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 Treatise 
 on Pa- 
 tience. 
 
 In interrogating the catechumen, he is 
 to be asked, whether he means to be a 
 Christian for the sake of this life or the 
 next. And one of the most important cau- 
 tions to be g-iven him is, that lie desire to 
 be a Christian solely on account of eter- 
 nity. 
 
 He concludes with the form of a cate- 
 chetical instruction, which is itself no 
 mean sermon, comprehending the very es- 
 sentials of the Gospel salvation by Jesus 
 Christ through faith,* the most important 
 doctrines connected with the most mate- 
 rial Christian duties. — But enough of this 
 subject: let those pastors, with whom re- 
 ligion is mere form, read and blush, and 
 learn and imitate. 
 
 In his treatise on patienee,f he is soli- 
 citous to show that its origin is from di- 
 vine grace, and that it is a virtue, in its 
 whole nature, distinct from 
 any thing seemingly resem- 
 bling it, which may arise from 
 natural resources. To pave 
 the way to an illustration of this thought, 
 he starts an objection, natural enough to 
 an infidel mind : " If men, to gratify their 
 secular desires, can without divine grace, 
 by the mere strength of nature, endure 
 patiently the greatest hardships, why may 
 not men by the same strength endure af- 
 flictions through the love of eternal life]" 
 In answer to this, he observes, that the 
 stronger men's desires are after worldly 
 things, the more firmly and resolutely 
 will they endure hardships to obtain the 
 gratification of their selfish desires, whe- 
 ther riches, praise, or whatever else. In 
 like manner, the more sincerely they love 
 heavenly things, the more cheerfully will 
 they endure what they are called to suffer 
 on their account. Now worldly desire 
 originates from the human will, is 
 strengthened by the delight w^hicli the 
 mind takes in worldly objects, and is 
 confirmed by custom. But the love of 
 God has no such origin; it is not from 
 ourselves, it is altogether by the Holy 
 Ghost given to us. And he goes on to 
 show, that electing grace, not in conse- 
 quence of any works of man, but previous 
 to them all, while he is ungodly and 
 without strength, chooses him to salva- 
 tion, and bestows on him the whole 
 power to will and to do, and is itself the 
 first and decisive source of all the good 
 which he does, which good is all along 
 assisted, supported, and maintained to 
 
 the end, and at length rewarded here- 
 after. 
 
 It is not in commenting on the Scrip- 
 tures, that the peculiar excellencies of 
 Augustine appear. The fanciful mode of 
 Origen vitiated the whole plan of exposi- 
 tion, from his days to the Reformation. 
 Yet, Augustine has far less of it, and en- 
 ters more precisely into the sacred oracles 
 than most of the fathers of his time ; but 
 he does this better in expounding a parti- 
 cular point of doctrine, which he has be- 
 fore him, than in any of his orderly com- 
 ments. His exposition of the Psalms is 
 full of pious sentiments, and he breaks 
 out from time to time into beautiful and 
 pathetic observations. He sees Christ 
 every where in the Psalms, though he is 
 not always happy in his manner of ex- 
 pounding the passages. On his exposi- 
 tion of St. John's Gospel, similar observa- 
 tions may be made. It cannot, however, 
 be denied, that extremely imperfect as 
 his expositions are, they have been highly 
 useful to the church, because the lights 
 which they contained were not only bene- 
 ficial to pious men in the dark ages, but 
 afforded also much assistance to the re- 
 formers, when a more judicious and intel- 
 ligent vein of interpretation took place. 
 
 His treatise on Christian doctrine* de- 
 serves to be perused throughout by young 
 ministers; for the purpose of forming the 
 taste and directing the man- 
 ner, as well as enlightening 
 the understanding, and warm- 
 ing the heart of him who un- 
 dertakes to instruct mankind. 
 As a preacher, Augustine doubtless ex- 
 celled ; but his excellence lay in exhibit- 
 ing that which was useful to the vulgar, 
 not that which was entertaining to the 
 learned. Perhaps, in no age was the pas- 
 toral taste more depraved, than it is in 
 the present. A highly finished, elaborate 
 and elegant style, is looked on as the per- 
 fection °of a Christian speaker, and the 
 manner, rather than the matter, is the 
 chief object. It is not considered, that an 
 artificial and polished arrangement of sen- 
 tences is lost on a vulgar audience; and 
 those who affect it, are, it is to be feared, 
 little moved themselves with the import- 
 ance of divine things, and are far more so- 
 licitous for their own character as speak- 
 than for the spiritual profit of their 
 
 Treatise 
 on Chris- 
 tian Doe- 
 trine. 
 
 crs. 
 
 Id. p. 21". 
 
 f Id. p. 243. 
 
 hearers. Yet m no age 
 miu-htv ever more clearly 
 
 "did God 
 show, by 
 
 Al- 
 
 the 
 
 * Toil), iii. beginning:. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S WORKS. 
 
 439 
 
 effects, what was a^eeable in his sight. 
 What a number of learned and elaborate 
 sermons have been preached to no pur 
 
 pose; 
 
 even the truth of the doctrine that 
 
 is in them is rendered, in a ^reat measure, 
 useless by the wisdom of words, with 
 which it has been clothed: While plain 
 artless colloquial addresses to the popu- 
 lace, by men fearing God, and speaking 
 of divine things in fervour and charity, 
 have been attended with de.aionstration 
 
 OF THE SPIRIT AND OF POWER, and SOuls 
 
 have been rescued, through their means, 
 from sin and Satan. Classical and orna- 
 mental knowledge is not the first thing to 
 be aimed at by a pastor. If he is yet very 
 young, his time indeed is laudably em- 
 ployed in cultivating his faculties in this 
 respect. And if his genius for eloquence 
 be strong and acute, he will soon learn 
 the justest rules sufficiently for the pur- 
 pose of his profession. There is indeed 
 an eloquence in the Scriptures, but it is 
 an eloquence adapted to the subject, plain- 
 ly divine. A pastor who has talents for 
 speaking, attended with superior learning 
 and endowments, will study to attain " a 
 diligent negligence," that he may never 
 overshoot the capacities of his audience, 
 either by refined reasonings or by artificial 
 elegancies of diction. Plain, downright, 
 above all things perspicuous and intelli- 
 gible, without being rude or clownish, he 
 will descend to the lowest comprehension 
 of his audience; and his grandeur and 
 sublimity will appear in things, not in 
 words. He will gladly give up his repu- 
 tation to the fastidiousness of critics; for 
 he has souls to bring into Christ's fold, 
 and is not solicitous of the praise of men. 
 He will show, without designing it, from 
 time to time, that he can speak more ela- 
 borately, and more elegantly; but elo- 
 quence will follow his subject, not go be- 
 fore it. This will be the plan of a man of 
 genius and learning in the work of the 
 pulpit: he will humble himself, that 
 Christ may be exalted. But Christ can 
 do his work by workmen of sloAver and 
 more ordinary capacities, and he often has 
 done so.* 
 
 I have not wandered from the subject 
 of CHRISTIAN doctrine, handled by Augus- 
 tine. What I have mentioned are in a 
 great measure his ideas.* One import- 
 ant rule he adds, wliicli, thougli jilain to 
 every serious mind, is loo much overlook- 
 ed by many. " Let our Christian orator," 
 says he, " who would be understood and 
 be heard with pleasure, pray before he 
 speak. Let him lift up his thirsty soul 
 to God, before he pronounce any thing. 
 For, since there are many things which 
 may be said, and many modes of saying 
 the same thing, who knows, except he 
 who knows the hearts of all men, what 
 is most expedient to be said at the pre- 
 sent hour ] And who can cause us to 
 speak what we ought, and as we ought, 
 unless he in whose hands we and our 
 words are'? And, by these means, he 
 may learn all that is to be taught, and 
 may acquire a faculty of speaking as be- 
 comes a pastor. At the hour itself of 
 speaking, a faithful spirit will think his 
 Lord's words adapted to his circum- 
 
 * Augustine knew how to praolise his owni 
 rules of eloquence, and two instances related by 
 himself show liim.notwilhstanding the defective 
 taste of his ase, to have been no mean orator. 
 \Vhile he acted as a presbyter at Hippo, under 
 Valerius his bishop, he was appointed by him to 
 preach to the people, in order to reclaim them 
 from riotous feasting on solemn days. lie opened 
 the Scriptures, and read to them the most vehe- 
 
 ment rebukes. He besought them by the igno- 
 minv and sorrow which they brought upon 
 themselves, and by the blood of Christ, not to 
 destroy themselves, to pity him who spake to 
 them with so much affection, and to show some 
 regard to their venerable old bishop, who, out 
 of tenderness to thern, had charged him to in- 
 struct iheni in the truth. " I did not make them 
 vvecp."t says he, " by tirst weeping over them, 
 but while I Was preai hing, their tears prevented 
 mine. Then I own I could not restrain myself. 
 After we had wept together, I began to entertain 
 great hope of their amendment." He now varied 
 from the discourse he had prepared, because the 
 present softness of their minds seemed to require 
 something different. In fine, he had the satisfac- 
 tion to find the evil redressed from that very 
 day. 
 
 The other occasion was this: "We must not 
 imagine," says he, " that a man has spoken pow- 
 erfully, when he receives much applause. This 
 is sometimes given to low turns of wit, and 
 merely ornamental eloquence. But ihe sublime 
 overwhelms the mind with its vehemence, it 
 strikes ihem dumb; it melts them into tears. 
 When I endeavoured to persuade the people of 
 Cffisarea to abolish their barbarous sports, in 
 which, at a cerlnin time of the year, they fought 
 publicly for several days, I said what I could ; 
 but while I heard only their acclamaiiotis, I 
 thought I had done nothing : when they wept, 1 
 entertained a hope that the horrible custom 
 which they had received from their ancestors 
 would be abolished.— It is now upwards of eight 
 years since that time, and by ilie grace of God 
 iliey have ever since been restrained from the 
 practice." Here was true eloquence, and, what 
 is of far more consequence, true piety in a 
 preacher. 
 * B. iv. 
 
 t Ep 29. to Alypius. 
 
440 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap.VII. 
 
 stances : ' Think not what or how ye 
 shall speak, for it is not ye that speak, 
 but the Spirit of your Father which 
 speaketh in you.' If the Holy Spirit 
 speak in those who are delivered up to 
 persecutors for Christ, why not also in 
 those who deliver Christ to learners 1 
 But, on the other side, if any say, that 
 men need to know no rules nor follow 
 any studies, if the Holy Ghost make men 
 teachers, it might be said also, men need 
 not to pray, because our Lord saith, 
 'Your Father knoweth what ye have need 
 of before ye ask him ;' and at this rate 
 the rules of St. Paul to Timothy and 
 Titus might be superseded. Prayer and 
 study therefore should go hand in hand ; 
 and the two epistles to Timothy and that 
 to Titus are of standing authority in the 
 church, and ought to be deeply meditated 
 upon by every one who undertakes the 
 office of a teacher." 
 
 The whole treatise deserves to be stu- 
 died by junior pastors ; the fourth book 
 particularly ; in the latter part of which 
 
 Excellence ^^ ^^^^ '^^^^^ ^^^- ^^^^^^ ^°^^^ 
 ofBooklV. ^f style so judiciously de- 
 scribed by Cicero, exempli- 
 fies them by Scripture instances, and in- 
 structs his vounf Christian orator how 
 to adapt them to the nature of the sub- 
 jects which lie before him. 
 
 His treatise on the Trinity* is very 
 elaborate. Perhaps all that has ever been 
 said in any age, in vindication and expla- 
 nation of that great mystery, 
 Augustine jg contained in this book. It 
 ™' } '.^ is in perfect unison with the 
 
 expositions and sentiments or 
 all the pious men who preceded him, and 
 particularly with the views of Novatian 
 in his treatise on the same subject. Whe- 
 ther the writers were of the general 
 church, or dissenters, they are perfectly 
 unanimous in confessing the Trinity in 
 unity, and in proving the doctrine from 
 Scriptures, and in leaving something 
 after all inexplicable in the subject; but 
 in a manner congruous to the incompre- 
 hensibility of the Divine essence. Au- 
 gustine does full justice indeed to the ar- 
 gument, but it must be confessed, be goes 
 too far ; he loses both himself and his 
 readers, by metaphysical subtilties and 
 vain attempts to find analogies and simi- 
 litudes, yet with a spirit so humble and 
 cautious, as to separate carefully his con- 
 
 * Tom. iii. 
 
 jectures from divine truth, and to leave 
 the authority of Scripture unviolated. He, 
 who has leisure, may peruse the whole 
 work with profit. The humble and seri- 
 ous spirit of the author appears particu- 
 larly in the several prefaces to its parts, 
 and in the prayer at the close, an extract 
 of which is as follows : " O Lord our 
 God, we believe in thee the Father, the 
 Son, and the Holy Ghost. For the Truth 
 would not have said. Go, baptize all na- 
 tions, in the name, &c. if thou wert not a 
 Trinity. Nor wouldest thou command us 
 to be baptized in the name of him who is 
 not God. I have sought thee, and ex- 
 amined and laboured much in composing 
 this treatise. My God, my only hope, 
 hear me, lest, through weariness, I cease 
 to seek thee. Thou, who wilt be found, 
 and hast given me increasing hope of 
 finding thee, give me strength to seek 
 thee. Before thee are my strength and my 
 weakness. Preserve that and heal this. 
 Before thee are my knowledge and igno- 
 rance. Where thou hast opened to me, 
 uphold me, when I enter ; where thou 
 hast shut up, open to me when I knock. 
 I would remember thee, understand thee, 
 love thee. Augment in me these things, 
 till thou perfectly form me anew. I know 
 it is written, in the multitude of words, 
 there wanteth not sin : but I would to 
 God I spake only concerning thy word, 
 ;md in praising thee ; I should then do 
 what is acceptable in thy sight, though I 
 spake much. For thy Apostle would not 
 have directed his son in the faith to 
 preach the word, and to be instant in sea- 
 son,* out of season, were not this the 
 case. Free me, O God, from the much 
 inward speaking, which, Avhile I fly to 
 thy mercy, I feel in my miserable soul. 
 For my thoughts are not silent when my 
 tongue is. Many, alas! are my thoughts, 
 which thou knowest to be vain. Grant 
 me not to consent to them; and, if my 
 nature delights in them, grant me to dis- 
 approve and not to dwell on them, even 
 in a slumbering manner. Nor let them 
 be so strong, as to proceed to any thing 
 active; let my will, my conscience, be 
 safe from them under thy defence. When 
 we come to thee, many of those things we 
 now say, shall cease, and thou shalt re- 
 main alone all in all, and we shall with- 
 out end say one thing, praising thee in 
 one, being made one in thee. What is 
 
 * 2 Tim. iv. 
 
Cent, v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S WORKS. 
 
 441 
 
 thine in these books, may thine acknow- 
 ledge ; if there be any thing of mine, may 
 thou and thine forgive !" 
 
 On Augustine's Sermons, I shall make 
 only one remark. Tiie reader would not 
 think them to be the works of the learned 
 
 . .- , and eloquent author of the 
 Auffustine's ... ^^l-, i i-. , 
 Sermons. City of God. 13ut we must 
 remember, that in them he 
 was addressing, not scholars, but, the po- 
 pulace. They are plain and simple, but 
 weighty and serious. He follows his 
 own pastoral rules, and is himself the 
 preacher he describes. 
 
 Amidst the many arduous and laborious 
 employments of Augustine, in support of 
 the doctrines of Christianity, and in the 
 pastoral care, he yet found time to man- 
 age a large epistolary correspondence, a 
 great part of which is preserved, and 
 some specimens of it shall close this 
 chapter. 
 
 The correspondence between him and 
 the famous Jerom, the monk of Palestine, 
 begins with the 8th, and ends with the 
 19th epistle. The principal 
 subject of it was the repre- 
 hension of St. Peter by St. 
 Paul mentioned in the 2d 
 chapter to the Galatians. Je- 
 rom, following the stream of 
 the Greek expositors, who had gone be- 
 fore him, and who imitated the vicious 
 mode of Origen, had asserted, that Paul 
 could not seriously blame Peter for that 
 which he had practised himself, in the 
 circumcision of Timothy, and that, there- 
 fore, his rebuke of Peter was an officious 
 lie, in which the two Apostles understood 
 one another in private, and that the de- 
 sign was to deceive the people with a 
 charitable view. Jerom,* it seems, car- 
 ried his admiration of both 
 the Apostles to a superstiti- 
 ous excess, and could not 
 bear to think of Peter being really found 
 fault with for dissimulation. To main- 
 tain the honour of Peter, he is driven to 
 undertake the vindication of deceit, when 
 employed for a charitable purpose, and, 
 what is worse, to fix the stain of a lie on 
 a part of the revealed word of God, and 
 to represent Paul, when writing by in- 
 spiration, as guilty of falsehood. Such 
 mean and dangerous views attend super- 
 stition and self-righteous formality! I 
 have not seen a practical case, which more 
 
 Opposed 
 
 by Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 Epistolary 
 correspon- 
 dence of 
 Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 evidently showed the low declining state 
 of godliness in these times. 
 
 Augustine, jealous of the honour of the 
 divine word, and sensible of the danger 
 of admitting falsehood, either into the 
 books of inspiration, or into common life, 
 with the same zeal that moved 
 him to write against lying of 
 all sorts, undertakes to clear 
 up the subject, and with great 
 accuracy explains the whole transaction, in 
 the manner which we saw stated in the be- 
 ginning of this volume.* Two essential 
 points of Christianity are connected with 
 liis exposition, namely, the doctrine of jus- 
 tification by faith alone in Christ Jesus, 
 and the duty of abstaining from deceit of 
 the tongue of all kinds. All along, how- 
 ever, he treats the aged presbyter with a 
 modesty becoming a junior. 
 
 Jerom is chafed to find himself contra- 
 dicted, defends his interpretation by the 
 authority of Origen, its inventor, and 
 seems to rebuke the daring 
 spirit of Augustine, for ven- 
 turing out of the common 
 road, and advises him, if he 
 burned with a stronof desire of glory. 
 
 Jerom is 
 displea- 
 sed. 
 
 Jerom 's 
 sentiments. 
 
 rather to seek out some champion of his 
 own age, with whom he might contend,, 
 than to molest him who was a worn-out 
 veteran. The angry monk seems to have 
 measured the temper of the bishop of 
 Hippo by his own. Learned as he un- 
 doubtedly was, he was still more distin- 
 guished for vain glory than for learning, 
 and seems to have known too little of that 
 sincere love of truth, which is connected 
 with humility, the love of God, and the 
 desire of leading souls to heaven, and i& 
 unmixed with all selfish considerations ; 
 a love of which, doubtless, reigned in the 
 breast of Augustine. 
 
 Augustine finding' that he had, though, 
 without design, given offence, answered 
 to this effect: " In your letters I 
 find many proofs of your kind- 
 ness, and some marks of your 
 disgust. — Far be it from me to 
 be offended; I shall rather have 
 reason to be thankful, if I be in- 
 structed and corrected by your 
 correspondence. But, dearest brother, you 
 would not think that I could be hurt by 
 your answers, if you did not feel yourself 
 hurt by my writings. As I cannot believe 
 that you would think of hurting me un- 
 
 Tom. ii. from p. 9 to 19. 
 
 Cluistian 
 mildness 
 and mo- 
 deration of 
 Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 * See p. 39, supra. 
 
442 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [CuAP. vn. 
 
 justly, it remains that I own my fault, in 
 having- offended you by those letters, 
 which I cannot deny to be mine. Why 
 do I strive against the stream, and not ra- 
 ther ask pardon ] I beseech you, therefore, 
 by the gentleness of Christ, that if I have 
 offended you, you would forgive, lest you 
 be induced by hurting me in return to 
 Tender evil for evil." He goes on in a 
 strain of mildness very uncommon among 
 •controversialists, and I observe nothing 
 in the whole course of the debate, (which 
 is far too long to quote,) that ought justly 
 to give offence to Jerom. So unreasona- 
 bly has our author been censured for heat 
 and temerity, by writers who seem not to 
 have been much acquainted with his 
 ■works.* But these are faults vastly re- 
 mote from Augustine, nor do I know any 
 human author, ancient or modern, who 
 dealt in controversy, so remarkably free 
 from censoriousness and malignity. " I 
 was much affected, says he^ with the 
 conclusion of your letter, in which you 
 say, I wish I could embrace you, and by 
 mutual conference teach or learn some- 
 thing. I say, for my part, I wish at 
 least we lived nearer one another, that 
 we might confer together more easily by 
 letter. For I see there neither is nor can 
 be so much knowledge of the Scriptures 
 in me as in you. If I have any ability 
 this way, I employ it in the service of 
 God. Nor have I leisure, because of ec- 
 clesiastical occupations, to attend to more 
 scriptural studies than those which relate 
 to the pastoral care." 
 
 In the same letter he deeply laments 
 the fierce quarrel which had arisen be- 
 tween Jerom and Ruffinus, and which, 
 at tliat time, made a great noise in the 
 Christian world. " I confess 
 Quarrel I was much affected, that so 
 between grievous a discord should 
 Jerom and arise between two such inti- 
 Kuffinus. mate friends, united in a bond 
 of union, well known to al- 
 most all the churches. I saw in your 
 letters what pains you took to moderate 
 your anger. Wo to the world because of 
 offences ! Truly that scripture is fulfill- 
 ed. Because iniquity abounds, the love 
 of many waxes cold. But why do I la- 
 ment this of others, since I know not 
 what I myself shall do 1 1 may with 
 
 How delusive, and vet how common a 
 thing IS It, to form our idea of characters from 
 the report of others, rather than from our 
 own knowledge and careful investigation ' 
 
 difficulty, perhaps, know myself at pre- 
 sent, but what I shall be hereafter I know 
 not. — While I am refreshed with your 
 kind words, I am again stimulated with 
 the keenest grief, to see two men, to 
 whom God had given to suck the honey 
 of his word together in the sweetest 
 friendship, fall into such a state of viru- 
 lent hostility. Wo is me. I would fall 
 at your feet, I would weep as long as I 
 could, I would entreat as much as my 
 affections would permit, now each one 
 for himself, now both for each other, and 
 for others, and particularly the weak for 
 whom Christ died, who now behold your 
 animosities with great danger of hurt to 
 themselves. — But I tell you that my con- 
 cern was really deep and strong, when I 
 found you were really offended with me, 
 and it has led me to be more prolix, per- 
 haps, than I ought." 
 
 This is a specimen not only of the 
 moderate temper, but also of the ardent 
 charity, which every where appears in 
 the writings of this author. Jerom him- 
 self was moved, and begs that the de- 
 bate might be closed on both sides. And 
 he appears ever after to have both es- 
 teemed and loved Augustine." 
 
 The people of Madaura sent a person, 
 named Florentius, to Augustine, with a 
 letter, desiring his assistance in some se- 
 cular affair. The inhabitants 
 of this place were as yet devot- -., 
 ed to idolatry, and, through an t^ AugfTs- 
 insincerity very common with tine from 
 profane and careless minds, the people 
 they addressed their epistle, of Madau- 
 " To Father Augustine, in '"''• 
 the Lord, eternal salvation ;" 
 and closed it with these words, " We 
 wish you, Sir, in God and his Christ, 
 for many years to rejoice in your clergy." 
 It behooved not him, who had written a 
 book in defence of strict unequivocal 
 truth in all things, to pass these compli- 
 ments unnoticed. He tells the Madau- 
 rians* that he had, as far as God permit- 
 ted, attended to the business of Floren- 
 tius, and then proceeds to expose the 
 inconsistency of such professions with 
 their idolatrous practices. On the first 
 sight of them he owns he was suddenly 
 struck with a belief of their conversion, 
 or at least with a hope, that they desired 
 to be converted by his ministry. " I 
 asked the bearer of your letter, says he, 
 whether ye were Christians, or desired 
 
 * £[). 42, 
 
ClITT. v.] 
 
 AUGUSTINE'S WORKS. 
 
 443 
 
 so to be. By whose answer I was griev- 
 ed, that the name of Christ was, to you, 
 become an object of derision. For I 
 could not think that there was any other 
 Lord, except the liOrd Christ, throug-h 
 whom a bishop could properly be called 
 father. If ye wrote this with sincerity, 
 what hinders you from seeking salvation 
 in the same Lord, by whom ye salute 
 us ] If 3'e wrote thus with a jocose de- 
 c^itfulness, do ye impose on me the care 
 of your business, in such a manner that 
 instead of extolling- with due veneration, 
 ye msult by your flattery, that name, 
 through which I have power to do any 
 thing for you ] Dearest brethren, know 
 that I speak this with inexpressible con- 
 cern for you, believing that a rejection of 
 my warning will aggravate your condem- 
 nation." He goes on to lay open briefly, 
 but strongly, the evidences of Christian- 
 ity ; and then tells them, that " there is 
 an invisible God, the creator of all things, 
 whose greatness is unsearchable ; that 
 there is a person,* by whom the invisi- 
 ble Majesty is exhibited, the Word, 
 equal to him who begat him ; and that 
 there is a Sanctity, the sanctifier of all 
 things which are done in holiness, the 
 inseparable and undivided communion of 
 the invisible Deity and the Word. Who 
 can look, with a serene and sincere mind, 
 at this IBeing of beings, which I have 
 laboured to express, though unable to 
 exhibit with accuracy, and in beholdino-, 
 forget himself, and obtain eternal salva- 
 tion, unless, confessing his sins, he pull 
 down all the mountains of his pride, and 
 lower himself to receive God his teacher? 
 Therefore the Word humbled himself, 
 that we might more fear to be elated with 
 the pride of man, than to be humbled 
 after the example of God. Christ cruci- 
 fied is our object. Nothing is more po- 
 tent than divine humilitj'. — I beseech 
 you, if ye named Christ not in vain, in 
 your epistle, that I may not have written 
 this in vain. But if ye did it iu unthink- 
 ing gaiety of heart, fear him whom the 
 subject world now expects its Judge. 
 The affection of my heart, expressed in 
 this page, will be a witness at the day 
 of judgment, to comfort you, if ye be- 
 lieve, to confound you, if ye remain in 
 infidelity." 
 
 * I use the word Person, because I can 
 scarcely otherwise express the autlior's mean- 
 ing ; but it is proper to tell the reader that 
 there is nothing for it in tlie original. 
 
 The Madaurians, I suppose, expected 
 not such a letter. It deserved to be in 
 part laid before the reader, as a proper 
 example of the open, manly, affectionate 
 method in which Christians should reply 
 to unmeaning compliments, or polite dis- 
 simulation. Maximus, a grammarian, 
 answered by a letter,* partly compli- 
 mentary, partly satirical, the most spe- 
 cious sentiment of which is, that Pao-ans 
 and Christians, all believing one God, 
 mean much the same thing. Augustine, 
 in reply, gives him to understand, that 
 the subject requires not levity, but seri- 
 ousness, and that, by the help of the one 
 living and true God, he will discuss these 
 things more at large, when he shall per- 
 ceive him to be in good earnest, giving 
 him to understand, that the Christians in 
 Madaura worshipped none but the living 
 and true God. 
 
 A letter to Macedonius, concerning the 
 road to true felicity,f deserves the serious 
 perusal of every proud philo- 
 sopher. Men who seek happi- i^f^^'V'' 
 ness from themselves, thouo-h , :,f<f^ 
 Christians in form, are in 
 effect, on the same plan as the ancient 
 Stoics, whose proud pretences are justly 
 ridiculed in this letter. Our author owns, 
 that extreme torments would make life 
 miserable, if the subject of them were 
 destitute of hope, even though he were 
 possessed of some virtues. He describes 
 the way of felicity to lie through a course 
 of humility, of faith, of the love of God 
 and our neighbours, and of the hope of a 
 future life of bliss. 
 
 In reply to Dioscorus,:}: he justly guards 
 him against the curious and presumptuous 
 spirit of philosophizing, and dares to pro- 
 nounce, in opposition to Cle- „ , , 
 
 » 1 J • /-> • Renlv to 
 
 mens Alexandrmus, Origen, Dioscorus. 
 and several others of the 
 fathers, that Christian piety needs not 
 the assistance of secular instruction, but 
 ought to depend solely on the Scriptures, 
 and he cautions his friend against the 
 pride of secular learning, representing 
 humility to be the first, the second, the 
 third, the all in true religion, as Demos- 
 thenes said of delivery in oratory. Here 
 is another point, in which we see the 
 revival of apostolical truth in the West, 
 by the grace of God, under the hand of 
 Augustine. 
 
 In his letter to Proba, on prayer,§ he 
 
 *Ep. 
 + Ep. 
 
 43. 
 56. 
 
 t Ep. 52. 
 4 Ep. 121. 
 
444 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 gives a sound and judicious exposition of 
 the Lord's prayer ; and observes, that it 
 
 is so full and comprehensive, 
 Letter on ^jj^j though a man may pray 
 Proba'^ ° ^^ other words, and those of 
 
 great variety, yet every lawful 
 subject of prayer may be reduced to one 
 or other of the petitions which it contains. 
 Proba was a rich widow, and had a nume- 
 rous family ; and when we consider the 
 larsre extension and fashionableness of the 
 monastic spirit at that time, it seems an 
 instance of candour in Augustine, that he 
 does not hint to her a word of advice to 
 follow the custom of the religious in that 
 age, but contents himself with directing 
 her to serve God in her present station. 
 He advises her to be a desolate widow* 
 in her frame and spirit, looking for hea- 
 venly things, not earthly, and shows 
 within how small a compass our prayers 
 for temporal things ought to be confined. 
 As a remedy against much speaking 
 in prayer, he advises to utter short and 
 quick ejaculations, rather than long-con- 
 tinued petitions, if the mind be not in a 
 fervent state ; but if the spirit be intent 
 and vigorous, the petitions, he thinks, 
 may be prolonged without any danger of 
 offending against our Lord's precept in the 
 Sermon on the Mount. And he speaks in 
 an instructive manner on the office of the 
 Holy Spirit, as interceding for the saints 
 with unutterable o-roaninos. The great 
 object in pra3Ter, he observes, should con- 
 stantly be, the enjoyment of God ; and he 
 adds, that however inadequate the belie- 
 ver's conceptions be, yet he has a distinct 
 idea of his object; so distinct, that you 
 can never impose on a real saint by offer- 
 ing him something else in the room of it. 
 He knows what he wants, and he knows 
 that this or that is not the thing which he 
 wants. The whole epistle, if we except 
 a few fanciful expositions, after the man- 
 ner of Origen, is excellent, and breathes 
 a superior spirit of godliness. 
 
 One Cornelius wishing to receive from 
 him a consolatory letter, on account of 
 the loss of his wife,|- Augustine, who 
 
 knew that, notwithstanding 
 Consolato- ^j^jg request, he lived in the 
 rv letter to /• i i- ^ n 
 
 Cornelius, excess oi uncleanliness, tells 
 
 him, in allusion to the words 
 of Cicero against Catiline, " I could wish 
 to be gentle, I could wish, in so great 
 dangers, not to be negligent, but can a 
 bishop patiently hear a man, who lives in 
 
 * 1 Tim. V, 5. 
 
 t Ep. 125. 
 
 sin, with greediness asking for a pane- 
 gyric on his godly spouse, to mitigate his 
 sadness on account of her decease V He 
 goes on to exhort him to repentance, with 
 as much severity as might be expected 
 from a faithful pastor of the mildest tem- 
 per. 
 
 In the close of a letter to Florentina,* 
 he reminds her, " that though she had 
 learned something salutary from him, yet 
 she ought firmly to remember, that she 
 must be taught by the innner t ,. . . 
 Master of the inner man, who p^orentina 
 shows in the heart the truth 
 of what is said, because neither is he that 
 planteth anything, nor he that watereth." 
 While such views of divine teaching pre- 
 vailed in the church, even all the ashes of 
 superstition could not extinguish the fire 
 of true godliness. It is the infelicity of 
 our times, that not only the profane, but 
 many serious persons are not a little irre- 
 verent in their ideas of spiritual illumi- 
 nation ; and when I think of the miserable 
 effects of this temper on the human mind, 
 I am at a loss to determine whether I 
 most dislike the childish superstitiousness 
 of Augustine's age, or the proud preten- 
 sions to rationality of the present. To so 
 much greater a degree has profaneness 
 advanced under the latter than under the 
 former. 
 
 The letter to Ediciaf deserves to be 
 
 attended to as characteristic of tlie taste 
 
 of the times. This woman had, unknown 
 
 to her husband, made a vow , ,. 
 
 c i 1 X- T l.etter to 
 
 or perpetual continency. In £(]ieia 
 
 so great reputation, however, 
 were such practices ot that time, that her 
 husband consented afterwards to her re- 
 solution, and they still lived together, 
 though he would not suffer her to assume 
 the habit of a nun. Some time after, 
 two travelling monks imposed on her 
 simplicity to such a degree, that she gave 
 nearly all her property to them, though 
 she had a son of her own by her husband. 
 Augustine reminds her of St. Paul's di- 
 rection, which she had broken ::f: and it 
 is indeed observable, with what wisdom, 
 even the most occasional rules of the divine 
 word are delivered, as the breach of them 
 is ever attended with mischievous conse- 
 quences. He finds fault with her vow 
 in the first place, because made without 
 her husband's consent, and with her dis- 
 posal of her property in the second place 
 for the same reason ; and, as the husband, 
 
 Ep. 132. t Ep. 199. t 1 Cor. vii. 5. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 LIFE AND DEATH OF AUGUSTINE. 
 
 445 
 
 incensed at her folly, had now fallen into 
 libidinous practices, he teaches her to 
 hun:ible herself deeply before God, as 
 having been a great instrument of his fall, 
 and directs her to submit to her husband, 
 to entreat his forgiveness, and to use 
 every healing method in her power. The 
 whole subject is an instance of piety and 
 good sense struggling in the bishop of 
 Hippo, against the torrent of absurdity 
 and fashionable superstition. 
 
 At Calama, a colony in Africa, the 
 Pagan interest seems to have much pre- 
 dominated ; so that, notwithstanding the 
 imperi-al laws inhibiting their public rites, 
 the party performed a religious solemnity 
 in the city, and came with a crowd of 
 dancers before the church. The clergy 
 endeavouring to [jrevent this, the church 
 was attacked with stones. The insult 
 was repeated, and Christians found them- 
 selves unable to obtain justice. Their 
 buildings were burned and plundered, 
 one Christian was killed, and the bishop 
 was obliged to hide himself. And so 
 deep-rooted was the prejudice of the 
 colony against Christianity, that the ma- 
 gistrates and men of rank chose to be 
 tame spectators of these enormities. One 
 person alone, a stranger, but as it seems 
 a character of great influence, interposed, 
 saved many Christians, whose lives had 
 been in imminent danger, and recovered 
 much of their property which had been 
 plundered ; whence Augustine justly con- 
 cludes,* how easily the whole mischief 
 might have been checked, had the magis- 
 trates done their duty. Nectarius, a 
 Pagan of the place, wrote a neat and 
 genteel letter to the bishop of Hippo, 
 begging his interest with the reigning 
 powers to prevent, as much as possible, 
 the punishment of the guilty. Augustine 
 states to him the facts, as above, and ap 
 peals to his conscience, whether it was 
 possible or ri^ht for government to over- 
 look such crimes. He shows, that Chris- 
 tians lived in peace and good will 
 toward all men, and that he would do the 
 best he could to procure such a tempera- 
 ture of justice and mercy, as might pre- 
 vent the repetition of these evils, and 
 induce Pagans to take care of their best 
 interests. He tells him, that he himself 
 had been at Calama lately, and had taken 
 occasion to warn them of the danger of 
 their souls. They heard his exhortation, 
 and entreated his interest. "But God 
 
 forbid," says he, " that it should be any 
 pleasure to me to be supplicated by those 
 who refuse to supplicate our Lord." As 
 Nectarius himself had spoken of his love 
 to his country, Augustine is not sparing 
 in his admonitions to him, to seek an 
 acquaintance with a heavenly country, 
 and preaches to him the truth and excel- 
 lency of the Gospel, as well as exposes, 
 in his usual manner, the futility of Pa- 
 ganism. 
 
 -♦ 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS PARTICULARS CON- 
 CERNING AUGUSTINE. 
 
 I HAVE comprised, in several distinct 
 chapters, a variety of matter relating to 
 the bishop of Hippo, for the sake of per- 
 spicuity ; two more chapters must be 
 added, one containing various articles of 
 his life and conduct, including the ac- 
 count of his death ; and the other, a view 
 of his theological character. It is not in 
 my power to gratify the reader with any 
 thing like a regular history of the effu- 
 sion of the spirit of God, which took 
 place toward the end of the last, and in 
 the beginning of this century. We have 
 a far more particular account of Au<tus- 
 tine's literary works, than of his minis- 
 terial. On the whole, however, some 
 genuine information may be collected, 
 concerning the great work of God in 
 this day. 
 
 The Manichees could not fail to attract 
 a considerable portion of his attention ; 
 he had himself suffered extremely through 
 their means ; they abounded in Africa, 
 and God abundantly blessed his labours 
 in opposing their doctrines, and in re- 
 covering' souls which had been seduced. 
 One instance, to the honour of divine 
 grace, deserves to be recorded in the verj"- 
 words of the writer.* " Not only I (Pos- 
 sidonius) who write this life, but also 
 other brethren, who lived together with 
 the bishop in Hippo, know that he once 
 said to us, being at table together: 'Did 
 you take notice of my sermon to-day in 
 the church, that its beginning and end 
 were not according to my custom ; that I 
 did not finish what I proposed, but left 
 my subject in suspense'?' We answered. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 Ep. 202. 
 2P 
 
 ♦ Possidonius, Vita Aug. 
 
446 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHTRCH: 
 
 [CHAP.Vm. 
 
 we were at the time astonished, and now 
 recollect it. • I believe.' said he, ' the 
 reason was, because the Lord, perhaps, 
 intended some erroneous person in the 
 coQOfregation, through my forgetfolness 
 and mistake, to be taught and healed; 
 for, in his hand are we and our discourses. 
 For, while I was handling the points of 
 the question proposed, I was led into a 
 digression, and so, without concluding 
 or explainins the subject in hand, I ter- 
 minated the argument rather against Ma- 
 nicheism, on which I had no design to 
 have spoken a word, than concerning the 
 matter proposed.' Next day, or t^vo 
 days after, so far as I can remember, 
 came a merchant, called Firmus, and 
 while Aueustine was sitlingr in the mo- 
 nastery, in ccr presence, he threw him- 
 self at his feet, shedding tears, entreat- 
 ing his and our prayers, and confessing 
 that he had lived many years a Manichee ; 
 that he had vainly spent much money in 
 the support of that sect, and that, by the 
 bishop's discourses, he had, through di- 
 vine mercy, been lately convinced of his 
 error, and restored to the church. Au- 
 gustine and we inquired by what sermon 
 in particular he had been convinced ; he 
 informed us ; and as we all recollected 
 the substance of that discourse, we ad- 
 mired, and were astonished at the pro- 
 found counsel of God for the salvation of 
 souls, and we glorified and blessed his 
 holy name, who, when, whence, and as 
 he pleases, by persons knowing and un- 
 knowinof. works out the salvation of men. 
 From that time, the man, devoting him- 
 self to God. gave up his business, and, 
 improving in piety, was by the will of 
 God compelled against his own will, in 
 another reffion, to receive the office of 
 Presbyter, preserving still the same sanc- 
 tity; and, perhaps, he is yet alive bevond 
 sea." 
 
 AusxiStine detected also the base and 
 blasphemous practices of the Manichees, 
 and thus guarded the minds of the un- 
 warv. One cf them, by name Felix, 
 coming to Hippo to sow his sentiments, 
 Augustine held a public dispute with 
 him in the church, and, after the second 
 or third conference, Felix owned himself 
 convinced, and received the Gospel. 
 
 Arianisra also being introduced into 
 Africa by the Goths, who professed it. 
 engaged the attention of Ausrustine, and 
 he exerted himself in a controversy with 
 Maximinus their bishop. 
 
 Of his labours against Pelagianism it 
 
 will now only be needful to say,* that 
 he lived to see the fruit of them in the 
 growth of Christian purity, both in his 
 own chtirch and in other parts of Africa. 
 
 WhUe he thus endeavoured to promote 
 the cause of piety, he was always ob- 
 served to bear, with much patience and 
 meekness, the irregularities of the per- 
 verse, and to be more disposed to mourn 
 over them with grief, than resent them 
 with anger. 
 
 To the manifold labours of this bishop 
 in preaching, visiting, and writing, was 
 added the troublesome employment of 
 hearing causes. For, according to the 
 rules of 1 Cor. vi. the Christians of Hip- 
 po used to bring matters of controversy 
 before the bishop. And the examination 
 and decision of these engaged him till 
 the hour of repast, and some times he 
 was employed in them fasting the whole 
 day. Certainly it is not reasonable that 
 a Christian pastor should be statedly 
 employed in such things : but Augus- 
 tine, followingr the customary practice 
 of the time, made it subservient to the 
 purest purposes. He had by this an 
 opportimity of examining the disposi- 
 tions of his people, and their improve- 
 ments and defects in faith and good 
 works ; and he explained to them, occa- 
 sionally, their duties as Christians, by 
 opening to them the word of God, by 
 exhorting them to piety, and by rebuking 
 sinners : And in all this he acted with 
 perfect disinterestedness. 
 
 In attendance on councils he was fre- 
 quent, and in them he distinguished him- 
 self in the defence both of Christian 
 doctrine and discipline. In ordaining 
 clergymen, he took care to follow the 
 custom of the church, and to act with the 
 concurrence of the majority of the peo- 
 ple, t His dress, furniture, and diet, 
 were moderated between extremes ; and 
 it will deserve to be mentioned, as an 
 instance of superiority to popular super- 
 stition, that he always drank wine, but 
 with great moderation. He constantly 
 practised hospitality; and at table en- 
 couraged reading or argument; and as 
 his spirit, ever humble and tender since 
 his conversion, could not bear the too 
 fashionable mode of detraction and slan- 
 der, he had a distich written on his table, 
 which intimated, that whoever attacked 
 the characters cf the absent were to be 
 
 * Possidonias. 
 
 fid. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 LIFE AND DEATH OF AUGUSTINE. 
 
 447 
 
 excluded.* Nor was he content with a 
 formal declaration ; he seriously warned 
 his g-uests to abstain from defamation. 
 " On one occasion," says his biographer, 
 " some bishops, his intimate friends, 
 breaking the rule in conversation, he at 
 length was so much roused as to say, 
 that either those lines must be erased 
 from the table, or he himself would 
 rise from the midst of the meal, and 
 go into his bedchamber; and of this 
 I and others who were present are wit- 
 
 He was conscientiously attentive to 
 the wants of the poor, and sedulously 
 relieved them out of the revenues of the 
 church, or the oblations of the faithful. 
 And, in answer to the invidious com- 
 plaints of some concerning the riches 
 amassed by the church, he freely offered 
 to give them up to any of the laity who 
 would take the charge of them. Doubt- 
 less the growth of superstition was even 
 then brinoring on that accession of wealth 
 to the clergy, which aftera'ards grew to 
 so enormous a height. But purer hands 
 than those of Augustine never handled 
 the possessions of the Church; he seems 
 chargeable, even with inattention to his 
 own ricrhts ; as he committed the whole 
 of the temporals to his clergy in succes- 
 sion, and never made himself sufficiently 
 acquainted with particulars, to be able, 
 from his own inspection, to correct any 
 mismanagement. He himself lived per- 
 fectly unconnected with the world, at one 
 table and in one house, Avith his clergy, 
 and never purchased house or land. He 
 checked also the fashionable method of 
 men's leaving their possessions to the 
 church, whenever he saw reason to think 
 that the testators had near relations, who, 
 in justice and equity, had a preferable 
 claim. With much pleasure did he with- 
 draw as soon as possible from any secu- 
 lar cares which he had not been able to 
 avoid, that he might give himself wholly 
 to divine things. Hence he always re- 
 mained, as much as possible, content with 
 old buildings and utensils, lest he should 
 be entangled with concerns of this nature. 
 Yet to relieve the indigent, and to re- 
 deem captives, he scrupled not to sell 
 the vessels of the church, after the exam- 
 ple of Ambrose. 
 
 His abstinence from the society of wo- 
 
 men we should think, in our times, to 
 have been carried beyond the due bounds ; 
 yet it hindered not his provident care for 
 their spiritual welfare. 
 
 A little before his death, he v/as em- 
 ployed in revising and correcting his 
 works. This care produced the publica- 
 tion of his RETRACTATIONS, the chlcf use 
 of which book is, that it enables us to fix, 
 with a considerable degree of precision, 
 what were his genuine works and 
 thoughts. It pleased God, however, not 
 to suffer him to depart this life without a 
 cloud of grievous affliction ; and the re- 
 lish of heaven, after which for many 
 years he had panted with uncommon ar- 
 dour, was quickened still more by a bitter 
 taste of the evils cf this life in declining 
 age. 
 
 Genseric, king of the Vandals, invaded 
 Africa, and made a dreadful desolation. 
 To the tender mind of Augustine,* the 
 
 Qaisquis amat dictis absentuiii rodere vitam, 
 Hauc mensara ventitam noverit esse sibi. 
 
 Poss. 
 
 * The tenderness of his spirit, on one occasion 
 led him into an error in conduct, which much 
 afflicted him. Fussala was a little city in the 
 extremity of his diocese, forty miles from Hippo. 
 The country about it was full of Donatists ; and 
 their reunion to the church was accompanied 
 with much difficulty. The priests sent by Au- 
 siustine were maimed, blinded, or murdered. 
 Augustine, on account of the distance, was not 
 capable of serving the people as he could wish; 
 and ho at length determined to settle a bishop 
 there, who should undertake the charge of Fus- 
 sala and the neighbouring district. As soon as 
 he had found a proper priest, he desired the pri- 
 mate of Numedia to come over, and in conjtinc- 
 tion with himself, ordain him. The priest, 
 whom he had chosen, retracted, and the primate 
 was arrived. Augustine was unwilling to send 
 him l)ack witliout doing the business, and 
 through the facility of his temper, was induced 
 to present, for ordi'nadon, a young man named 
 Anthony, whom he had from infancy educated 
 in his monastery, who had never been tried as 
 he ought to have been. The bishop of Hippo 
 had soon occasion to repent of his good nature. 
 The young prelate was complained of by his 
 flock, for rapacity and licentiousness, and was 
 too scandalous in his manners to be endured any 
 longer. His connexion with Fussala was there- 
 fore dissolved by a Ibnnal sentence. Anthony, 
 however, appealed to the bishop of Rome, who 
 was inclined to support him. Augustine insisted 
 on the propriety of his expulsion, and maintained, 
 that compassion for the man himself, as well as 
 iiir the people, whom he had so much abused, re- 
 quired that the sentence should be supported, 
 lesi he should be hardened still more in iniquity. 
 Anthony himself made restitution of the sums of 
 which he had defrauded them; yet he prevailed 
 afterwards on the primate of Numedia to be- 
 lieve him innocent, and to interest himself in his 
 favour. Thespiritof Augustine, then threescore 
 and eight years of age, was much broken with 
 this affair.' Hecondemned hisown imprudence, 
 and observed, that the danger into which An» 
 
448 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 devastation of the country, the cruelties 
 inflicted on the pastors, the desolation of 
 churches, and the destruction of all 
 church-order which ensued, must have 
 been peculiarly afflictinp^. Count Boni- 
 face, one of the greatest Roman heroes of 
 those times, undertook the defence of 
 Hippo against the Barbarians. He had 
 not been M'ithout convictions of divine 
 things, and Augustine, who was intimate 
 with him, had endeavoured to improve 
 those convictions to salutary purposes. 
 But, to seek human glory, and the honour 
 vi^liich Cometh from God only, at the 
 same time, was found to be incompatible. 
 Boniface gained a shining reputation, and 
 followed the world. In these trying 
 times the bishop of Hippo again endea- 
 voured to draw him from the love of the 
 world to God, and Boniface seems all 
 along to have sinned reluctantly. What 
 God might do for him at last, during the 
 time that he lived after the mortal wound, 
 which he received in a duel, we know 
 not. The man, however, was brave and 
 sincere, and had a steady regard for men 
 of real godliness. He defended Hippo 
 for fourteen months, which, after that 
 time, with all Africa, fell under the power 
 of the Vandals. 
 
 But Augustine was taken away from 
 the evil to come. While he mourned un- 
 der the miseries of the times, in company 
 with Possidonius and several bishops, 
 who had fled for shelter to Hippo, he 
 told them, that he had prayed, either that 
 God would free them from the siege, or 
 endue his servants with patience, or take 
 him out of the world to himself. In the 
 third month of the siege he 
 was seized with a fever, which 
 ended in his dissolution, in 
 the year 430. He lived seven- 
 ty-six years, forty of which 
 he had been a presbyter or bishop. He 
 used to say, that a Christian should never 
 cease to repent, even to the hour of his 
 death. He had David's penitential psalms 
 inscribed on the wall, in his last sickness. 
 
 Death of 
 
 Au.q;us- 
 
 tine, 
 
 A. D. 430, 
 
 and he read and wept abundantly ; and for 
 ten days before he expired he desired to 
 be uninterrupted, that he might give him- 
 self wholly to devotion, except at certain 
 intervals. He had preached the word of 
 God constantly, till his last sickness. He 
 left no will : he had neither money nor 
 lands to leave. He left his library to the 
 church. Of his own relations he had 
 taken competent care before. " In his 
 writings," says Possidonius, " the holy 
 man appears : but those who could have 
 heard and seen him speak in public, and 
 particularly in private conversation, would 
 have seen still more." Pity it is, that a 
 man, who had known him for forty years, 
 should have left us so imperfect an ac- 
 count. But the vigour of the human 
 mind was then much declined, and super- 
 stition made men childish, though it did 
 not destroy the spirit of piety. 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE THEOLOGY OF AUGUSTINE. 
 
 tliony had cast both himself and the people, so 
 much affected him, that he was almost resolved 
 to relinquish the episcopal office, and bewail his 
 error, ihe remainder ol his days, in privacy.t 
 As it appears that Augustine still governed the 
 church of Fussala after this, it seems that the 
 dispute was settled to his satisfiiction, and that 
 Anthony was not restored to his Sect Theslory 
 deserves to be noticed, as illustrating the church 
 discipline of the times, and the character of Au- 
 gustine. 
 
 t Ep. 209. I Ep. 224. 
 
 The serious reader, from a considera- 
 tion of the mournful condition of the Afri- 
 can churches in regfard to external thino-s 
 at the time of Augustine's death, will na- 
 turally be led to inquire what became of 
 them after the decease of this prelate. It 
 is ever to be remembered, that the real 
 prosperity of the church is not to be esti- 
 mated by outward circumstances. The 
 Roman empire was dissolving on all 
 sides; and its fairest provinces in Africa 
 fell into barbarous haruls at the time of 
 Augustine's death. But the light which, 
 through his means, had been kindled, was 
 not extinct; for, as it depended not on the 
 grandeur of the Roman empire, so neither 
 was it extinguished by its decline. W^e 
 shall have an opportunity of visiting 
 Africa again, and at present shall close 
 the whole narrative of Augustine, with a 
 brief view of his Theology. The subject 
 is important, not only as tending to illus- 
 trate the revival of the Gospel in the 
 West in his time, but also as exhibiting 
 the views of the best and wisest Chris- 
 tians 'in Europe from that period to the 
 days of Luther. For a thousand years 
 and upwards, the light of divine grace, 
 which shone here and there in individuals, 
 during the dreary night of superstition, 
 was nourished by his writings, which, 
 next to the sacred Scriptures, were the 
 guides of men who feared God ; nor have 
 
Cent, v.] 
 
 THEOLOGY OF AUGUSTINE. 
 
 449 
 
 we in all history an instance of so exten- 
 sive utility derived to the church from the 
 writings of men. 
 
 From the review of the Pelagian con- 
 troversy, the attentive reader will see, 
 that the article of justification* must be 
 involved in Augustine's divinity; and 
 doubtless it savingly flourished in his 
 heart, and in the hearts of many of his 
 followers; yet the precise and accurate 
 nature of the doctrine itself seems not to 
 have been understood by this holy man. 
 He perpetually understands St. Paul's 
 term to justifv, of inherent righteous- 
 ness, as if it meant, sanctification; still 
 he knew what faith in the Redeemer 
 meant; and those parts of Scripture, which 
 speak of forgiveness of sins, he under- 
 stands, he feels, he loves; but St. Paul's 
 writings concerning justification he un- 
 derstands not sufficiently, because the 
 precise idea of that doctrine entered not 
 formally into his divinity. 
 
 I have given, if I mistake not, the out 
 lines of Augustine's views in this most 
 important Christian doctrine. It had been 
 pitiably suffocated, as it were, in the rub- 
 bish of the growing superstition, and had 
 been gradually sinking in the church from 
 .Tustin's days to his own. And I more 
 admire, that he was enabled to recover its 
 constituent parts so well as he did, than 
 that he did not arrange and adjust them 
 perfectl)'. Mosheim is pleased to repre- 
 sent him as a contradictory writer. I sus- 
 pect that this writer's prejudices warped 
 his understanding. In truth, if our au- 
 thor's sentiments be understood, he will 
 appear, from his own plan, to be one of 
 the most consistent writers in the world ; 
 and, if we make allowance for his mis- 
 take in the point just mentioned, which 
 yet he implicitly, though not explicitly, 
 understands, few writers, I think, in any 
 age, may be read with more profit. 
 
 To what has been delivered from his 
 writings on the subject of justification, 
 little needs to be added here. Two quo- 
 tations deserve to be read, on account of 
 the solid truth which they contain. " He 
 was made sin, as we are made righteous- 
 ness, not our own, but of God; nor in 
 ourselves, but in him, as he was made 
 sin, not his own, but ours ; nor was he 
 appointed so in himself, but in us."f 
 
 * I have introduced here a few sentences 
 out of the Theological Miscellany for Sep- 
 tember 1785, taken from an Essay on Justifi- 
 cation, which I wrote in that publication. 
 
 + EncLirid. ad Lauren, c. 41. 
 2p2 
 
 See this blessed doctrine illustrated 
 experimentally in his exposition of the 
 130th Psalm, 2, 3,4. " Behold he cries 
 under the load of his iniquities. He 
 looked round himself, he surveyed his 
 life, he saw it on all sides covered with 
 flagitiousness ; wherever he looked, he 
 found no good in himself. And he saw 
 on all sides so great and so many sins, 
 that trembling, as it were, he cried out. 
 If thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquities, 
 who shall stand 1 For he saw almost 
 the whole of human life surrounded with 
 sins, like barking dogs ; all consciences 
 to be upbraided ; not a holy heart to be 
 found that could presume on its own 
 righteousness : which, because it cannot 
 be found, therefore let every heart rest 
 on the mercy of the Lord his God, and 
 say, if thou, Lord, &c. But what is my 
 hope ] There is a propitiation with thee." 
 So constantly, in all ages, do real good 
 men feel alike on this subject : " The 
 humble shall hear and be glad." 
 
 The peculiar work for which Augus- 
 tine was evidently raised by Providence 
 was, to restore the doctrine of divine 
 grace to the church. A vain philosophy 
 had corrupted it partially under Justin, 
 far more completely under Origen. What 
 wonder : To trust in ourselves was the 
 avowed boast of all the Philosophers. 
 An idea of providential kindness in ex- 
 ternal things floated in the minds of 
 some : but virtue and every internal ex- 
 cellence they expected only from them- 
 selves.* In this they only copied the 
 impression of that self-righteousness 
 which is natural to all. The distinguish- 
 ing glory of the Gospel is to teach hu- 
 mility, and to give to God his due honour; 
 and Augustine was singularly prepared 
 for this by a course of internal experi- 
 ence. He had felt human insufficiency 
 completely, and knew, " that in himself 
 dwelt no good thing." Hence he was 
 athuirably qualified to describe the total 
 depravity and apostasy of human nature, 
 and he described what he knew to be 
 true. Thus, in the West, the doctrine 
 
 * Hear Tally, de Nat. Deor. \irtutem 
 nemo unquain Den acceptam retulit nimirum 
 recte ; propter virtuteni enim jure laudamur, 
 et in virtute recte gloiiamur, quod non con- 
 tiiigeret, si donum a Deo, non a nobis liabe- 
 remus. It is sufficient to tell the English 
 reader, that in this sentence the same self- 
 sufficiency of (he human heart, which mere 
 moral preaching encourages, is expressed by 
 the Pagan philosopher, as the undoubted creed 
 of all mankind. 
 
450 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chaf. TX. 
 
 of grace was happily revived ; and ro- 
 mantic theories, built on mere reasonings, 
 gave way to scriptural truth, supported 
 by experience. And, in all ages, in spite 
 of pride and prejudice, the doctrine of 
 grace has this advantage over the minds 
 of men, that conscience, wherever it is 
 awakened to do its office, always speaks 
 in its favour. 
 
 The rise and progress of Pelagianism 
 gave Augustine an opportunity of illus- 
 trating the doctrine of grace in the strong- 
 est manner. He himself was by no means 
 forward and urgent in the work. Those, 
 who have spoken of him as heated with 
 the spirit of controversy, knew not Au- 
 gustine.* He was rather slow and cau- 
 tious in controversy, and so are all men 
 of argumentative minds and humble dis- 
 positions. He was by no means at first 
 so clear in his ideas of salvation being 
 altogether of grace, as he afterwards 
 was : particularly, that faith was alto- 
 gether the gift of God, was not a propo- 
 sition so clear to his mind, till deeper 
 experience and more attentive search of 
 the Scriptures confirmed him in the truth. 
 When, in his inquiries after divine truth, 
 he was led to see and to be fully convinc- 
 ed of the total apostasy of man ; and 
 when he reflected, that he himself was 
 changed by effectual grace, not only with- 
 out the co-operation, but even in spile of 
 the resistance of his nature, he was gra- 
 dually brought to acquiesce in St. Paul's 
 views of predestination. It was a doc- 
 trine that, with him, followed experi- 
 mental religion, as a shadow follows the 
 substance ; it was not embraced for its 
 own sake. He wrote sparingly, how- 
 ever, upon it for a long time, content to 
 give plain scripture testimonies, and fear- 
 ful of involving the bulk of readers in 
 inextricable labyrinths. 
 
 It is the impious boldness of heretics, 
 avowedly opposing divine truths, because 
 they are above their reason, which at 
 length necessitates modest and cautious 
 spirits to speak out more plainly concern- 
 ing the deep truths of God, lest they 
 should leave them to the insults of the 
 enemy. In the further progress of the 
 controversy, the most daring attempts 
 were made to erase from men's minds all 
 ideas of grace ; and the specious at- 
 tempts of Semi-Pelagianism in France 
 seemed ready to overthrow the arguments 
 of Augustine in the minds of many. 
 
 * Viz. Grotius. 
 
 The Eastern church, for the most part, 
 more philosophical than the Western, 
 was infected with those half views of 
 grace ; and, unless the bishop of Hippo 
 meant by silence to give countenance to 
 opinions, supported only by corrupt na- 
 ture, reasoning pride, and the authority 
 of some great names in the church, it 
 behooved him to defend the doctrine of 
 efficacious grace more explicitly. He 
 did so at length, particularly in his latter 
 writings ;* he proves the truth from 
 Scripture, appealing to its simple gram- 
 matical sense ; and as the Antinomian 
 contempt of the use of means appeared 
 in some warm, but injudicious admirers 
 of his doctrine, he states this matter 
 also with his usual strength of argument 
 and perspicuity, and shows the consis- 
 tency between the exhortations and the 
 decrees of God. 
 
 Another subject, of which the reader, 
 versed in theological controversy, would 
 wish to be informed, is, whether Augus- 
 tine held " particular redemption." Very 
 few words will suffice for this. He con- 
 stantly connects the doctrine of grace 
 with the influences of the Holy Spirit ; 
 I cannot find that he does so with the re- 
 demption of the Son of God. In one 
 place, the text, " who would have all to 
 be saved," is explained by him ambigu- 
 ously and variously. But, in truth, whe- 
 ther Christ died only for the elect, or for 
 all men, was never the object of his con- 
 troversies ; and certainly, in his practical 
 discourses, he always represents the sa- 
 crifice of Christ as universal ; so every 
 preacher should do, if he means to profit 
 his hearers. On occasion of the contro- 
 versies, Augustine was objected to, as 
 denying that Christ died for all. But 
 Prosper, his admirer and follower, and 
 as strict a predestinarian as auy writer in 
 any age, maintains that Augustine held, 
 " that Christ gave himself a ransom for 
 all." Doubtless the natural and obvious 
 sense of Scripture is the same,! and the 
 notion of particular redemption was un- 
 known to the ancients, and I wish it had 
 remained equally unknown to the mo- 
 
 * In the foregoing deduction I liave attend- 
 ed to llie progress of things, as they appear 
 tVoni tlie ])ubIication of Augustine's works at 
 different limes. 'l"o cite (larticular passages 
 Mould be tedious; to tliose who read him lor 
 themselves, needless — to those who do not, 
 uninteresting. 
 
 f See puriiculaily 1 Tim. it. 
 
Ceht. v.] 
 
 THEOLOGY OF AUGUSTINE. 
 
 451 
 
 derns. But let us mention the peculiar 
 excellence of his theology. 
 
 Humility is his theme. A man may 
 hold the doctrines of grace in the clearest 
 manner, yet himself be proud. He may 
 not have a distinct view of some of them, 
 particularly that of which we have been 
 speaking, yet he may be humble ; though 
 without some real knowledge of grace 
 it is impossible he should be so. But 
 the true advantage of just and accurate 
 Christian sentiments, is, that they teach 
 humility. Am I obliged to support the 
 doctrines of grace by such arguments as 
 mere human reason, unassisted by reve- 
 lation, could invent ? No : I confess rea- 
 son in this sense is beneath them ; and if 
 I be truly humble, I shall be content to 
 bear the scorn of philosophers for the 
 confession. Augustine taught men what 
 it is to be humble before God. This he 
 does every where with godly simplicity, 
 with inexpressible seriousness. And in 
 doing this no writer, uninspired, ever ex- 
 ceeded, I am apt to think ever equalled 
 him, in any age. They wrong this fa- 
 ther much, who view him as a mere con- 
 troversialist. Practical godliness was his 
 theme, and he constantly connects all his 
 views of grace with humility.* 
 
 Few writers have been equal to him in 
 describing the internal conflict of flesh 
 and spirit, mysterious but certain, igno- 
 rantly confounded by philosophers with 
 the conflict between reason and passion, 
 and misrepresented by the profane as en- 
 thusiastic. He describes this in a man- 
 ner unknown to any but those who have 
 deeply felt it ; and the Pelagian preten- 
 sions to perfection oblige him to say more 
 than otherwise would be needful, to 
 prove that the most humble, and the most 
 
 holy, have, through life, to combat with 
 indwelling sin. 
 
 Two more practical subjects he delights 
 to handle, charity* and heavenly-minded- 
 ness. In both he excels wonderfully, 
 and I shall only wish young students in 
 divinity to convince themselves of this by 
 reading him. A reference of all things to 
 a future life, and the depth of humble 
 love, appear in all his writings; as in 
 truth, from the moment of his conversion, 
 they influenced all his practice. For he 
 never seems to have lost his first love. 
 Hence there is manifest in his works a 
 singular innocence of spirit. No pride, 
 no self-conceit, no bitterness, ever dis- 
 cover themselves in any expression. 
 Calm, equable, modest, cautious of of- 
 fending, never pathetic, except when 
 roused by zealous love of God and his 
 neighbour; these are the lights in which 
 he constantly exhibits himself. The times 
 were highly unfavourable, the defects of 
 superstition often cloud his writings; yet, 
 at intervals, he vigorously struggles 
 against it, and in one passage particular- 
 ly laments the growing servilities, the 
 straining at a gnat, and the swallowing 
 of a camel, owning that he conformed, 
 through love of peace and charity, to 
 some things. 
 
 His own words well deserve to be quo- 
 ted, as they evidence the power of good 
 
 • This virtue ever ai)pears conspicuous in 
 Augustine, untl perjietually checks the dai'ing 
 anil adventurous spirit of investigation, whicii, 
 as a man of genius and letters, formed a strik- 
 ing part of liis character. In speaking of the 
 difficulties attending the doctrine of original 
 sin, he abhors every idea of attempting to 
 solve them in an unscviptural manner. He 
 chooses rathi-r to be content with his igno- 
 rance. '• Though I now desire, and beg ear- 
 nestly of God that he will help me out of my 
 ignoi-ance by your means (he is writing to 
 Jeromt) : nevertheless, if 1 cannot obtain it, 
 I will pray for patience ; since we believe in 
 him, with a promise never to murmur, though 
 he dolh not lead us into perfect knowledge of 
 some particular things. I am ignorant of 
 many things, more than I can enun)erate." 
 t Letters to Jerora. Aug. Ep. 165. 
 
 * I do not remember to have seen a contro- 
 versial writer of so charitalde a spirit as Au- 
 gustine, in matters of dispute. The proofs 
 of this are endless. Take a single instance, 
 and Sue how he treats an opponent. " If, in 
 the heat of the dispute, an injurious word may 
 have escaped him, I am willing to think it 
 arose from the necessity of supporting his opi- 
 nions, rather tlian from the design of offend- 
 ing me. For when I am a stianger to the 
 temper of a man, I think it much better to 
 have a good opinion of him, than to blame him 
 too hastily. Perhaps he had a kind intention, 
 designing to undeceive me. In th.'Ucase I am 
 obliged to liim for his good will, though I am 
 under a necessity of disapproving his senti- 
 ments, "f 
 
 His own practice which he mentions, de- 
 serves to be attended to by all conti-oversia- 
 lists : " When I answer any person in speak- 
 ing or writing, though provoked by contume- 
 lious language, so far as the Lord affords to 
 me, I bridle myself, and restrain the spurs of 
 vain indignation ; I consult for the hearer or 
 reader, and thus endeavour not to be superior 
 to another in railing, but to be more salutary 
 by convincing him of his error. B. 3. against 
 Petilian. 
 
 t Ep. 166. 
 
452 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 sense and divine grace united in with- 
 standing the prevailing torrent. " I * 
 cannot approve the new practices intro- 
 duced almost with as much solemnity as 
 sacraments ; neither dare I censure them 
 too freely, lest I should give offence to 
 any one ; but it grieves me, that so many 
 salutary precepts of Scripture should be 
 held cheap, while our religion abounds 
 with commandments of mere men. — 
 Therefore, as to all those customs which 
 are not contained in the Scripture, ordained 
 by councils, or sanctioned by the tradition 
 of the church, and which do not carry in 
 their appearance an evident reason for their 
 existence, I am free to say, they ought to 
 be laid aside. Admit, it cannot be proved, 
 that they are contrary to the faith ; yet 
 they burden religion with servile usages, 
 which God, in his mercy, intended to 
 make free : in this respect the condition 
 of the Jews is more tolerable; they are 
 subject indeed, but to divine ordinances, 
 not to the precepts of men. However, 
 the Church, surrounded as she is with 
 chaff and tares, endures many things, yet 
 she cannot tolerate what is contrary to 
 Christian faith and practice." He parti- 
 cularly condemns the custom of divining 
 by the Gospel, and of managing tem- 
 poral concerns according to words which 
 strike the eye at the first opening of the 
 book. 
 
 His conduct toward the Donatists bids 
 the fairest for reprehension ; but he acted 
 sincerely: you differ with him in judg- 
 ment, but it is impossible for you to 
 blame his temper and spirit, if you read 
 him candidly. He carefully checks his 
 people for calumniating the Donatists, 
 and is constantly employed in moderating 
 and healing. 
 
 Finally, in Ethics he is superior to 
 most. On the subject of veracity and of 
 faithfulness to oaths, and in general in 
 the practice of justice, in the love of 
 mercy, and in walking humbly with his 
 God, as he wrote most admirably, so he 
 practised most sincerely. 
 
 .^CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE LIFE AND AVORKS OF JEROM. 
 
 This renowned monk was born at Stri- 
 don, a town in the confines of Dalmatia 
 
 Ep. to Jaiiuavius, 119, 
 
 and Pannonia, under the emperor Con- 
 stantine, in theyear331. The 
 place was obscure, and was Jerom 
 rendered still more so by the v"*^' „„^ 
 desolations of the Goths. Nor • • -^ • 
 is it a very clear case whether it ought to 
 be looked on as part of Italy or not.* 
 That Jerom was of a liberal and opulent 
 family, appears from the pains taken 
 with his education, which was finished 
 at Rome, that he might there acquire the 
 graces of Latinity. He was in truth the 
 most learned of the Roman fathers, and 
 was eminent both for genius and industry. 
 He was brought up in Christianity from 
 infancy, and hence, like other good men, 
 who have had the same advantages, he 
 appears never to have known the e'xtreme 
 conflicts with indwelling sin, which, to 
 later converts, have given so much pain, 
 and often have rendered them more emi- 
 nently acquainted with vital religion. 
 
 After his baptism at Rome, he travelled 
 into France, in company with Bonosus, 
 a fellow-student. He examined libraries, 
 and collected information from all quar- 
 ters; and, returning into Italy, he deter- 
 mined to follow the profession of a monk: 
 a term, which did not, at that time, con- 
 vey the modern idea of the word. In 
 Jerom's time, it meant chiefly the life of 
 a private recluse Christian, who yet was 
 fettered by no certain rules nor vows, but 
 acted according to his own pleasure. 
 Such a life suited the disposition of a stu- 
 dious person like Jerom. He was, how- 
 ever, made a presbyter of the church, but 
 never would proceed any further in eccle- 
 siastical dignity. He spent four years in 
 the deserts of Syria, reading and studying 
 with immense industry. A commentary 
 on the prophet Obadiah, which he pub- 
 lished, bore strong marks of juvenile in- 
 discretion, as he afterwards frankly own- 
 ed. And here, by the assistance of a Jew, 
 who visited him, Nicodemus-like, in the 
 evenings, lest he should give umbrage to 
 his brethren, he acquired the knowledge 
 of the Hebrew tongue, and with indefati- 
 gable labour he studied also the Chaldee 
 and the Syriac. 
 
 On his return to Rome, he became in- 
 timate with Paula, the illustrious de- 
 scendant of the Pauls, so famous in 
 Roman story, with Marcella, and other 
 opulent ladies. The monastic life, which 
 had long flourished in the East, was only 
 
 * Er.Tsni. Life of Jerom, prefixed to his 
 Works. 
 
Cext. v.] 
 
 JEROM. 
 
 453 
 
 beginning- to be fashionable in the West. 
 The renowned Athanasius, and his Egyp- 
 tian friends, rendered respectable, during 
 their exile at Rome, by their sufferings 
 for the faith, contributed to throw a dig- 
 nity on such a course of life : and the zeal 
 of Jerom nursed the same spirit among 
 serious persons. The ladies 1 have men- 
 tioned, were hence induced to impart a 
 celebrity to the monastic taste by their 
 own example. 
 
 Paula, her daughter Eustochium, her 
 son-in-law Pammachius, Marcella, and 
 others, admired and revered Jerom ; and 
 he, whose temper was choleric and impe- 
 rious to a great degree, seems to have 
 lived in much harmony with females, pro- 
 bably because he more easily gained sub- 
 mission from them than from persons of 
 his own sex. 
 
 Spleen and calumny hastened the depar- 
 ture of Jerom from Rome. This great man 
 had not learned to command his passions, 
 and to disregard the breath of fame. Un- 
 just aspersions on his character affected 
 him with a very blameable acrimony. He 
 retired again to the East: there several 
 of his admirers followed him. He chose 
 Bethlehem as the seat of his old age, 
 where Paula erected four monasteries, 
 three for the women, over which she pre- 
 sided, and one for the men, in which 
 Jerom lived the rest of his life, enjoying 
 at times the society of his learned friends. 
 He instructed the women also in theology, 
 and Paula died, after having lived twenty 
 years in the monastery. 
 
 I shall not spend any time in vindi- 
 cating the chastity of Jerom, because his 
 whole life was a sufficient an>>Aver to ca- 
 lumny in that respect. He 
 was certainly serious in the 
 very best sense of the word, 
 and died in the 91st year of 
 his age, in the year 420. 
 Yet it is to be lamented, that a man of 
 so great sincerity, and of a mind so vigo- 
 rous, should have been of so little service 
 to mankind. The truth is, his knowledge 
 of theology was contracted and low. He 
 confessed, that while he macerated his 
 body in the deserts, he was thinking of 
 the pleasures and delights of Rome. He 
 understood nut the true Gospel-mystery 
 of mortifying sin, and, by his voluntary 
 humility and neglect of the body, added 
 to the fame and splendour of his volumi- 
 nous but ill-digested learning, he contri- 
 buted more than any other person of an- 
 tiquity to the growth of superstition. His 
 
 Jerom 
 dies at the 
 age of 91, 
 A. D. 420. 
 
 quarrel with Ruffinus is a reproach to both 
 their memories. Yet, of the two, Jerom 
 seems to have been more evangelical in 
 his views ; because Origen was erroneous 
 in his doctrines : and it is a sufficient ac- 
 count of so uninteresting a controversy to 
 say, that Ruffinus defended, Jerom accu- 
 sed, Origep. 
 
 For the view of his controversy with 
 Augustine, I must refer the reader to the 
 accounts of that Father of the Church. 
 
 Jerom was, however, humble before 
 God, and truly pious: and of him it must 
 be said, to the honour of Christian godli- 
 ness, how much worse a man he would 
 have been, had he not known Christ 
 Jesus ; and how much better, if he had 
 known him with more clearness and per- 
 spicuity ! 
 
 The works of a writer so superstitious, 
 though sound in the essentials of Chris- 
 tianity, will not deserve a very particular 
 review. Here and there a vigorous and 
 evangelical sentiment breaks out amidst 
 the clouds. His epistles discover him to 
 have been sincere and heavenly-minded, 
 though his temper was choleric. In a 
 letter to Nepotian * there are various rules 
 worthy the attention of Pastors, concern- 
 ing the contempt of riches, the avoiding 
 of secular familiarities, and the regulation 
 of external conduct. One observation 
 will deserve to be distinctly remem- 
 bered : " A clergyman easily subjects 
 himself to contempt, who never represses 
 invitations to dinner, however frequent." 
 He wrote an epitaph upon the death of 
 this same Nepotian sometime after,! elo- 
 quent, pious, pathetic. In this he con-^ 
 fesses the doctrine of original jerom's 
 sin, and celebrates the victory 
 of Christ over death. He 
 makes an excellent use of 
 the public miseries of the 
 times, by recommending more strongly a 
 practical attention to piety. Hence, alsa» 
 he makes the best apology which could 
 be invented for his favourite solitude. 
 
 In his letter^ to Rusticus the monk, 
 the learned reader, who would see a prac- 
 tical comment on St. Paul's cautions 
 against voluntary humility in 
 the Epistle to the Colossians, 
 may behold it in Jerom. He 
 abounds in self-devised ways 
 of obtaining holiness, while the true way 
 of humble faith in Jesus is not despised 
 indeed, but little attended to. 
 
 epilaph oa 
 the death 
 of Nepo- 
 tian. 
 
 His letter 
 to Rusti- 
 cus. 
 
 " Paris Edit. 
 
 vol. i. 6 G. 
 ^15 G. 
 
 t Id. 8 D. 
 
454 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 Another 
 letter to 
 Florentius 
 
 A short letter to Florentius shows gen- 1 
 uine humility and acquiescence in Christ, 
 as his sole hope, after all his austerities. 
 He calls himself a polluted 
 sinner altogether ; " yet, be- 
 cause the Lord sets free the 
 captives and looks to the 
 humble and the contrite, perhaps he may 
 say to me also, lying in the grave of 
 wickedness, Jerom, come forth." It was 
 this humble faith in Christ which check- 
 ed the impetuosity and arrogance of his 
 natural temper, repressed his vain-glory, 
 and in some degree changed a lion into 
 a lamb. For Jerom, though exactly 
 formed by constitution and habit, to sus- 
 tain the character of a Pharisee, was too 
 deeply conscious of internal pollution to 
 be one in reality. 
 
 Toxotius, the son of Paula, had mar- 
 Tied LcBta, by whom he had a daughter, 
 whom the grandmother destined to virgi- 
 nity. .Terom writes to the mother,* ad- 
 vising, that the child be sent to Bethlehem, 
 when grown up, and promising himself 
 to superintend her education. At present 
 he gives rules for her education, while 
 an infant, which are useful, but mixed 
 •with superstition. Laeta's father, it seems, 
 ^was a Pagan, Jerom, however, despairs 
 not of his conversion : " All things, he 
 says, are possible with God. Conversion 
 it never too late. The thief from the 
 cross passed into Paradise. Despair not 
 of your Father's salvation. A relation of 
 yours, Gracchus, whose very name is 
 expressive of patrician nobility, a few 
 years ago broke in pieces and burnt the 
 images of idolatry, and received the faith 
 of Christ." Behold the spirit of meek- 
 ness and charity adorning one of the most 
 rugged tempers in the world, and admire 
 the effect of victorious grace in Jerom. 
 
 I am disgusted with the repeated les- 
 sons of superstition with which his epis- 
 tles present us. He knew, however, 
 better things. In a letter to 
 his Paula, he rebuked her 
 immoderate sorrow for 
 death of her daughter 
 
 Jerom 
 ■writes 
 Paula. 
 
 to 
 
 the 
 Ble- 
 silla, in strains at once evangelical and 
 tender.f In a letter to Pammachius,:j: 
 who became a monk after the decease of 
 his wife Paulina, the daughter of Paula, 
 he speaks with holy rapture on the lovo 
 of Christ, according to the ideas of the 
 book of Canticles : " Whether you read 
 or write, or watch or sleep, let love al- 
 
 ways sound a trumpet in your ears ; let 
 this trumpet excite your soul ; overpow- 
 ered with this love, seek in your bed Him 
 whom your soul loveth." How much is 
 it to be regretted, that Jerom and his 
 friends should have so hidden their tal- 
 ent ; that persons who loved Christ sin- 
 cerely, had not learned, like the Apostles 
 and first Christians, to profess him in the 
 most public walks of society, and by 
 preaching and conversation to have in- 
 structed mankind in general ! But such 
 conduct would have required a self- 
 denial and a charity, larger and of a more 
 sublime nature than theirs ; to live in the 
 world, and yet remain separate from it, 
 shows a divine strength indeed. 
 
 Jerom confesses, that Gregory Nazi- 
 anzen was his preceptor in theological 
 expositions.* The eastern mode, thus 
 caught by Jerom, and pursued by a mind 
 eager, and adorned with learning and elo- 
 quence, became highly respected in the 
 West. — Jerom, as a theologian, seems 
 greatly inferior to his contemporary Au- 
 gustine, though in style and diction 
 superior. 
 
 In the foregoing century, Jovinian, an 
 Italian monk, taught, first at Rome, and 
 afterwards at Milan, some points of doc- 
 trine directly opposite to the ^ . . , 
 -' *^r . T • Jovinian s 
 
 growmg superstitions. It is doctrines, 
 not easy to state, with confi- 
 dence, either the character or the senti- 
 ments of the man. His works are lost. 
 The most celebrated teachers of the 
 Church opposed him vehemently. Am- 
 brose, Jerom, and Augustine, joined their 
 testimonies against him. The last, in- 
 deed, wrote very little, and that little from 
 popular rumour, rather than from any 
 distinct knowledge of the subject ; for the 
 weight of popular prejudice overwhelmed 
 Jovinian speedily, so that his doctrines 
 could never enter Africa, nor give the 
 bishop of Hippo anjopportunity of know- 
 ing him. Had this been the case, I 
 should have expected, from his candour 
 and judgment, that fair and distinct delin- 
 eation of Jovinian, which we seek in vain 
 from the choleric and prejudiced Jerom. 
 W^e have of the latter two books against 
 Jovinian,! intemperate, fierce, and ill- 
 supported by Scripture or argument. I 
 have endeavoured, as well as I can, to 
 discover what were his real opinions ;X 
 
 19 G. 
 
 t57G. 
 
 :t59G. 
 
 *106D. fTom. xi. rD. 
 
 :j: Wliatever tliey were, he was condemned 
 in a councii, held by Ambrose at Milan, as a 
 
CllTT. v.] 
 
 JEROM. 
 
 455 
 
 Mosheim 
 censured. 
 
 but, in wadingf througfh the torrent of Je- 
 rom's abuse, I find no very certain vestiges; 
 such is the violence and intemperance of 
 his spirit and language. One single quo- 
 tation is all that I can discover, which 
 can be called Jovinian's own, the language 
 of which is barbarous in the extreme, and 
 justifies Jerom's censure upon him in one 
 respect, as a man void of all classical cul- 
 ture and elegance. The sense of it* 
 seems to be this : " Having satisfied 
 those who were invited to hear me, not 
 for the sake of my glory, but that I may 
 deliver myself from unjust accusations, I 
 sow my field, and visit the new planta- 
 tions, the tender shrubs, delivered from 
 the whirlpool of vices, fortified by troops. 
 For we know the Church, through hope, 
 faith, and charity, inaccessible, invinci- 
 ble. In her there are none immature, 
 every one is teachable ; none can subdue 
 her by violence, or elude her by art." 
 
 I admire the positiveness of Mosheim 
 in deciding so peremptorily for the cha- 
 racter of a man,f of whose writings 
 nothing has come down to us, 
 but a single sentence so bar- 
 barous and doubtful. Cer- 
 tainly he opposed the prejudices in favour 
 of celibacy and fasting. A monk himself, 
 he disclaimed any superior dignity or 
 estimation, on account of his abstinence 
 from matrimony ; nor did he think that 
 fasting added any intrinsic excellence to 
 a character. Thus far is certain; and 
 that he saw so much truth in such an 
 age, proves him doubtless to have been a 
 man of strong sense and manly under- 
 standing. But before I dare call him "a 
 worthy opposer of the reigning supersti- 
 tions," I ought to know his motives. He 
 might be influenced by the pure love of 
 God, the faith of Jesus, and unfeigned 
 humility. He might be moved by a 
 spirit merely prudential, worldly, and 
 even profane. For true Christians and 
 Deists will unite in opposing supersti- 
 tion, from motives very opposite. We 
 are, indeed, always strongly inclined to 
 think well of those persons in past ages, 
 who happened to favour our peculiar senti- 
 ments orprejudices; and, on the contrary, 
 we are apt to judge harshly of those who 
 thought in a different manner. Does this 
 propensity account for Mosheim's hasty 
 approbation of the character of Jovinian 1 
 
 heretic, and was, by the emperor Honorius, 
 banished to the island Boa. 
 
 • 8 G. t Mosheim, Cent. iv. c. iii. 22. 
 
 Whether it does or not in this instance, I 
 cannot but observe, that this sort of men- 
 tal imbecility forms one of the most 
 capital defects of that ecclesiastical his- 
 torian : as to myself, I can only say, I 
 endeavour to guard against it. 
 
 Let us hear, however, what are the four 
 propositions of Jovinian. I wish I could 
 give them in his own words, instead of 
 those of his adversary. The 
 first is, that virgins, widows, "^J^^ ^°^^ 
 and married women, who have [ion^°of" 
 once been washed in Christ, jovinian. 
 if in other works they differ 
 not, are of the same excellence. Second- 
 ly, he endeavours to prove, that those 
 who have been regenerated cannot be 
 subverted by the devil. The third shows, 
 that there is no distinction in the sight of 
 God, between those who abstain from 
 meats, and those who receive them with 
 thanksgiving. The fourth, that all who 
 keep their baptism shall be equally re- 
 warded in the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 From information so scanty, two very 
 opposite opinions may be deduced: first, 
 that Jovinian, blest with divine illumina- 
 tion, and the faith of God's elect, entered 
 fully into the spirit of apostolical Chris- 
 tianity, condemned the seJf-righteous taste 
 of the times in ascribing merit to intrinsic 
 excellence, to fasting, and celibacy; re- 
 commended them only as external helps 
 of godliness in certain cases; placed all 
 the hope of salvation on the grace of Je- 
 sus in unfeigned faith and humility; as- 
 serted the perpetuity of this grace in the 
 elect; and while he reprobated the fic- 
 titious virtues of proud men, was zealous 
 for the glory of God and his Christ. 
 Whetlier this was Jovinian's view or not, 
 it undoubtedly was that of the apostles. 
 If it was his, he was no heretic, as he has 
 been represented, but a faithful confessor 
 of Christ. That which strongly inclines 
 me to hope, on the whole, that this was 
 his real character, and that even good 
 men of his age were deceived concerning 
 him, is the soundness with which he in- 
 terprets Scripture in the few instances to 
 be collected from Jerom's confused ac- 
 count. He observes that those who fell 
 were only baptized with water, not with 
 the Holy Ghost, as appears from the case 
 of Simon Magus, showing from St. John, 
 that he who is born of God doth not com- 
 mit sin. He mentions the presence of 
 Jesus at the marriage of Cana, in support 
 of his vindication of matrimony ; to which 
 Jerom returns an answer too ridiculous to 
 
456 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. X. 
 
 Brief ac- 
 count of 
 Vigilan- 
 tius. 
 
 deserve mentioning. There are other 
 things in Jerom's opposition, weak be- 
 yond measure, and which show that 
 sound argumentation was not the talent 
 of this celebrated Father. 
 
 If, on the other hand, Jovinian's oppo- 
 sition to the fashionable austerities sprang 
 from the love of the world ; if he held that 
 all sins were really equal, and that the 
 devil had no power at all to draw the re- 
 generate into sin, he might be a Stoic, an 
 Epicurean, an Antinomian; a character 
 very remote from that of a Christian. A 
 little clear information of Jovinian's own 
 life, and even a larger specimen of his 
 writings, might have solved this doubt. 
 
 About the beginning of this century, 
 Vigilantius, a presbyter, a man remarka- 
 ble for eloquence, who was born in Gaul, 
 and afterwards performed his 
 ecclesiastical functions in 
 Spain, treading in the steps 
 of Jovinian, exhorted and 
 wrote with much energy 
 against the custom of performing vigils 
 in temples consecrated to martyrs, and 
 against the vvhole apparatus of pilgrim- 
 ages, relics, addresses to saints, volun- 
 tary poverty, and the like. I have here 
 to regret, as in the former instance, the 
 want of materials for estimating the cha- 
 racter of this man, whom Mosiieim scru- 
 ples not to call the good Vigilantius.* 
 He quotes indeed Bayle's dictionary; 
 whence I gather, that the presbyter be- 
 fore us was agreeable to that self-con- 
 ceited sceptic; but the ambiguity remains 
 unremoved. He might oppose supersti- 
 tion from the faith and love of Christ, or 
 from prolaneness and sensuality. As no 
 specific blot, however, is affixed to the 
 moral characters of Jovinian and Vigilan- 
 tius, amidst an intemperate effusion of 
 satire, the probability is, on the whole, 
 that they were pious men, and deserved 
 to be ranked in a very different class from 
 that of heretics. 
 
 Jerom wrote apologies for his books 
 against Jovinian,f which gave additional 
 strength to the charges of asperity justly 
 brought against him by many. His com- 
 mendation of rhetoric is excessive, and 
 his vain-glory odious, though it seems 
 imknown to himself. The best instruc- 
 tion to be collected from them is, to see 
 how the defect of Christian principle 
 fails not to appear in the defect of hu- 
 
 mility, meekness, and love. Augustine 
 and Jerom, in principles and practice, 
 form in this respect a strong contrast. 
 The pieces against Vigilantius deserve 
 the same censure. He absurdly gives to 
 saints a sort of omnipresence and inter- 
 cessory power. 
 
 I have said already, that the contest 
 between Jerom aad Ruffinus is uninter- 
 esting. It is a deplorable evidence of the 
 weakness and corruption of human nature, 
 even in men constantly engaged in reli- 
 gious studies ! A sincere and practical 
 attention to the real peculiarities of the 
 Gospel, can alone secure the genuine ho- 
 liness of professors, and mortify the whole 
 body of sin. When Jerom is calm and 
 unruffled, and looks to Jesus Christ in 
 faith and love, he seems quite another 
 man from what he is Vi'hen engaged in 
 controversy. For a single page of Jo- 
 vinian or Vigilantius, I would gladly 
 give up the whole invectives of Jerom 
 and Ruffinus. 
 
 It is remarkable, that Jerom confesses 
 the vast obscurity of the whole Epistle to 
 the Romans.* To one who studied so 
 much, and whose mind was so clouded 
 with self-righteous superstitions, it must 
 appear in that light. He evidently speaks 
 as one irresolute, embarrassed, and con- 
 fused. His immensity of verbal learning, 
 in which he much excelled Augustine, 
 was not combined vv-itli that luminous 
 perspicuity, and comprehensive judgment 
 of doctrine, which enabled the latter to 
 see his way through various mazes, and 
 to find order and beauty, where the former 
 beheld inextricable confusion. Such is 
 the difference between divine and human 
 teaching! 
 
 Hence Jerom, in his very voluminous 
 exjiositions,! speaks at random; is alle- 
 gorical beyond all bounds, and almost al- 
 ways without accuracy and precision ; 
 lowers the doctrine of illumination in 
 1 Cor. ii. to things merely moral and 
 practical ; hints at something like a first 
 and second justification before God; as- 
 serts predestination, and, as it were, re- 
 tracts it, owns a good will as from God 
 in one place, in another supposes a power 
 to choose to be the whole of divine grace ; 
 never opposes fundamental truths deliber- 
 ately, but though he owns them every 
 where, always does so defectively, and 
 often inconsistently. It must be con- 
 
 * Mnsheim, Cent. v. c. iii. 14. 
 + sr D. 43 D. 44 G. 
 
 • 58 D. Tom. ult. of vol. 
 f Vol. ii. throughout. 
 
Ce3tt. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 457 
 
 fessed, the reputation of this father's 
 knowledge and abilities has been much 
 over-rated. There is a splendour in a pro- 
 fusion of ill-digested learning, coloured 
 by a lively imagination, which is often 
 mistaken for sublimity of genius. This 
 was Jerom's case; but this was not the 
 greatest part of the evil. His learned ig- 
 norance availed, more than any other 
 cause, to give a celebrity to superstition 
 in the Christian world, and to darken the 
 light of the Gospel. Yet, when he was 
 unruffled by contradiction, and engaged 
 in meditations unconnected with supersti- 
 tion, he could speak with Christian aifec- 
 tion concerning the characters and offices 
 of the Son of God. 
 
 It was a marvellous effect of Divine 
 Providence, that while all other truths 
 were more or less clouded, that which re- 
 lates to the person of the Son of God, on 
 whom rests the salvation of men, should 
 remain unsullied. From St. John's days 
 to Jerom we have seen the whole church 
 unanimous in a comprehensive view of 
 the Godhead and manhood of the divine 
 Saviour: whoever opposed either, could 
 never obtain the free sanction of the 
 church. Imperial violence was ever found 
 necessary to extort the admission of such 
 persons into the church as pastors. This 
 essential article of Christianity seems 
 even to have been studied with the mi- 
 nutest accuracy ; and few perhaps, even 
 of the best modern divines, have attained 
 the precision of the ancients. Heresiarchs 
 have not failed to take advantage of this 
 circumstance, and the narrow and imper- 
 fect conceptions, which some authors 
 have formed of the person of Jesus Christ, 
 have emboldened them to suppose, that 
 the assertion of the manhood enervates 
 the proof of the Godhead. Inferiority to 
 the Father, confessed in any light, seems 
 to startle many minds unaccustomed to 
 the generous and extensive habits of 
 thinking, in which the fathers excelled on 
 this subject; while yet the answer is so 
 easy to all supposed difficulties of this 
 nature; " equal to the Father as touching 
 his Godhead, and inferior to the Father 
 as touchinsf his manhood."* 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF CHRIST IN THE WEST. 
 
 It is time to take up the connected 
 thread of history again. But the reader 
 
 must not expect a successive detail of 
 the proceedings of the Roman princes. 
 Alter the death of Theodosius, the em- 
 pire was torn by various convulsions, 
 tending, in the West particularly, to its 
 destruction. It is my duty to watch only 
 the real Church amidst these scenes ; for 
 she lived while the secular glory of Rome 
 was destroyed. Honorius, the son of 
 Tiieodosius, reigned there, while his 
 brother Arcadius governed at Constanti- 
 nople. 
 
 Honorius, or to speak more properly, 
 his ministers, (for he himself was, like 
 Arcadius, a very feeble prince,) protect- 
 ed the external state of the church, and 
 followed the steps of Theodosius in ex- 
 tirpating the remains of idolatry, and in 
 supporting orthodoxy, against the Dona- 
 tists, and all heretics. The superior ad- 
 vantages of a Christian above a Pagan 
 establishment, even in times of such 
 decline as the present were, appear in 
 the hitmanity of a number of laws and 
 edicts, by which idolatrous impurities 
 and savage games were abolished, and 
 due care was taken of the needy and the 
 miserable. In what, for instance, but in 
 a Christian government, shall we find so 
 
 humane a law as that of Ho- tj „ „ 
 , . , Humane 
 
 norms, enacted in the year j^^^ ^f 
 409, by which judges are di- Honorins, 
 rected to take prisoners out of ^ jy ^,j,j_ 
 prison every Sunday, and to 
 inquire if they be provided with neces- 
 saries, and to see that they be properly 
 accommodated in all things. 
 
 In this reign, Rome was sacked by 
 the Goths ; and an opportunitj^ was given 
 for the exercise of many Christian vir- 
 tues, by the sufferings to which its in- 
 habitants were exposed. But enough 
 has been said of this subject, in the re- 
 view of Augustine's City of God. 
 
 Germanus, bishop of Auxerre, was one 
 of the greatest ornaments of Gaul in this 
 century. He was a person of quality, 
 and exercised the profession of a coun- 
 sellor in the former part of his life. Am- 
 ator,* hiS predecessor in the See, fore- 
 saw however, I apprehend, some symp- 
 toms of grace in him, and ordained him 
 deacon. A month after the decease of 
 
 * Athanasian Creed. 
 Vol. I. 2 Q 
 
 * He foresaw these, by the observation 
 which he made of the frame of liis spirit, 
 ratiier tlian by any special revelation. From 
 various places in Fleury I have collected this 
 short account of Germanus, and, stripping it 
 oF the marvellous, have retained only the cred- 
 ible. 
 
458 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 Amator, he was unanimously elected 
 bishop by the clergy, nobility, citizens, 
 and peasants, and was forced to accept 
 ttie office notwithstanding the great re- 
 luctance which he discovered. He em- 
 ployed himself in the foundation of mo- 
 nasteries, and ill enriching the church, 
 while he impoverished himself; and for 
 thirty years, from his ordination to his 
 death, he lived in extreme austerity. 
 
 About the year 430, tliat is, about the 
 
 time of Augustine's death, he visited the 
 
 island of Great Britain, with 
 
 Germanus ^n intention to oppose Agri- 
 
 \isits j.q]jj^^ ^j^g gQj^ q£ g^ Pelagian 
 
 Br'UHin bishop called Severinus, who 
 
 ' ,' propagated heresy among the 
 A. D. 430. churches there. Hence it is 
 probable, that Pelagius, after he had 
 ceased to be famous in the world, had 
 retired into his native country, and there 
 died. It is no wonder that his opinions 
 should there find abettors. Lupus, bi- 
 shop of Troyes, accompanied Germanus 
 in the mission, which was undertaken on 
 the recommendation of a numerous coun- 
 cil in Gaul. Lupus governed his church 
 fifty-two years, and was highly renowned 
 for sanctity. These two bishops, on 
 their arrival, preached not only in the 
 churches, but nlso In the higliways, and 
 in the open country, and vast crowds at- 
 tended their ministry. The Pelagians 
 came to a conference; the doctrines of 
 grace were debated; the bishops, sup- 
 porting themselves by express passages 
 of Scripture in the hearing of all the peo- 
 ple, were allowed to be victorious, and 
 Pelagianism was reduced to silence. At 
 this time, the Picts, a race of barbarians 
 who inhabited the north, and the Saxons, 
 a German nation, called in by the Bri- 
 tons, as it is well known, to assist them 
 against the Picts, united their forces 
 against the natives. The latter, terrified 
 at the approach of the enemy, had re- 
 course to Germanus and Lupus. Many, 
 having been instructed by them, desired 
 baptism ; and a great part of the army re- 
 ceived it at Easter, in a church which they 
 made of boughs of trees twisted together.* 
 The festival being over, they marched 
 against the enemy, with Germanus at their 
 head. He, still remembering the pro- 
 fession in v/hich he had spent great part 
 of his youth, posted his men in a valley 
 through which the enemy were to pass, 
 surprised, and defeated them. After 
 
 Beda, 1 IlisL 
 
 these thing-s the two bishops returned to 
 the Continent. The deacon Palladius 
 being ordained bishop of Scot- 
 land, arrived there in the year Palladius 
 431. Scotland had never be- ordained 
 fore seen a bishop, and was b'shop ot 
 n ^ ' 1 1 Scotlanu. 
 
 in a state oi extreme barbar- 
 ism. 
 
 The same year died Paulinus of Nola, 
 who had been bishop there payjitmg 
 twenty years. He was the bishop of 
 intimate friend of Augustine, Nola dies 
 and appears through the mist a. D. 431. 
 of superstition which clouds 
 his narrative, to have been one of the 
 best Christian? of the age. He was a 
 mirror of piety, liberality and humility, 
 worthy of a more intelligent age, and of 
 more intelligent writers than those, who 
 have recorded his life. For I choose to 
 dismiss him with this general character, 
 rather than to tarnish his memory with 
 repeating the romances of those who 
 meant to honour him. 
 
 We have seen how the doctrines of 
 grace were defended in Britain, and it is 
 not to be doubted, but this was done with 
 some saving eflicacy. In Gaul, the doc- 
 trine of Semi-Pelagianism still maintain- 
 ed its ground, and Prosper and Hilary, 
 who had written an account of it to Au- 
 gustine, exerted themselves in defending 
 the doctrines which he had taught. Cce- 
 lestine, of Rome, supported the same 
 cause ; and in the same year he published 
 nine articles, which will de- 
 serve some consideration, as 
 
 IX Arti- 
 cles of 
 
 they show that the spark of f^3i,h™j)j. 
 
 truth was still alive amidst 
 
 lished by 
 
 the mass of corruption in the Ccelesiine, 
 Western Church, and still, a. D. 341. 
 under God, preserved some 
 degree of Christian holiness. In these 
 articles, it is owned that all men are, by 
 nature, under the power of sin, by reason 
 of the Fall, from which nothing but grace 
 can deliver any man — that man is not 
 good of himself; he needs a communica- 
 tion of God to him from God himself — 
 nor can a man, though renewed, overcome 
 the flesh and the devil, except he receive 
 daily assistance — that God so worketh 
 upon the hearts of men, that holy thoughts, 
 pious intentions, and the least motion to- 
 ward a good inclination, proceed from God. 
 "We learn also, says Ccelestine, what 
 we are to believe, from the prayers ap- 
 pointed by the Apostles through the 
 world, and observed with uniformity 
 through the whole church; wherein it is 
 
 \ 
 
Cbjjt. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 459 
 
 petitioned, that faith may be granted to 
 infidels, idolaters, Jews, and heretics; 
 charity to schismatics, repentance to sin- 
 ners, and regeneration to catechumens. 
 These prayers are not empty forms; their 
 elffcts are visible in the conversion of 
 many, for which thanks are returned to 
 God. We must confess, that the grace 
 of God prevents the merits of man; th;\t 
 it doth not take away free-will, but de- 
 livers, enlightens, rectifies, and heals it. 
 (Jod is willing, such is his goodness, 
 that his gifts should be our merits, and 
 grants an eternal reward to them : he 
 works in us to will and to do according 
 to his pleasure; but his gifts are not idle 
 in us; we co-operate with his grace, and, 
 if we find remissness proceeding from 
 our weakness, we immediately have re- 
 course to him. As to the more difficult 
 questions Avhich have been discussed at 
 large, we do not despise them, but need 
 not treat of them. Suffice it that we 
 have declared what we believe essential 
 to the faith."* 
 
 Thus vigorously and perspicuously did 
 a bishop of Rome maintain the apostolic 
 doctrines, and so strong was the light 
 which, in an age of superstition, had 
 beamed forth from the writings of Au- 
 gustine. I could not resist the pleasure 
 of adding so valuable a testimony of the 
 continuation of Christian Faith in the 
 West. 
 
 Palladius, the pastor of Scotland, be- 
 ing dead, Cielestine sent Patrick into 
 parts in his stead. He was 
 born in Scotland,! at a place 
 now called Dunbarton. Hav- 
 ing been carried captive into 
 Ireland, and having remained 
 there a few years, in which time he learnt 
 the language and customs of the country, 
 he was by some pirates afterwards con- 
 veyed inio Gaul; and after various ad- 
 ventures he returned a volunteer into 
 Ireland, with a view to undertake the 
 conversion of the barbarous natives, who 
 seem, till this time, to have been without 
 any acquaintance with Christianity. It 
 is delightful to observe the motions of 
 Providence, in causing the confusions of 
 war and desolation to be subservient to 
 the propagation of the Gospel. Patrick, 
 intent only on the cause of Christ, amidst 
 all the various scenes in which he was 
 tossed to and fro, was not discouraged 
 by the ill success which at first attended 
 
 • Fleury, c. xii. 26. f rieurj-,B. xxvi. 13. 
 
 his laljours. The barbarous Irish refused 
 to hear him, and he returned into Gaul, 
 and spent some time with Germanus, of 
 Auxerre, whose services in Britain have 
 been mentioned. The conversation and 
 example of Germanus inflamed his mind 
 with fresh zeal, and by his advice he 
 
 the same 
 
 The la- 
 bours of 
 Patrick. 
 
 went to Kome ; that he might be strength- 
 ened in his pious views by the authority 
 of Ccelestine. From this bishop he re- 
 ceived such support and assistance as 
 enabled him to revisit Ireland; and at 
 length his success was so great, that to 
 this day he is looked on as the apostle of 
 Ireland. He first taught the Irish the 
 use of letters ; and while we pass over 
 in silence the fictions of which these 
 ages are full, there is no reason to doubt 
 but that he was the instrument of real good 
 to the Irish, both with respect to this life 
 and the next; nor ought such events to 
 be omitted in the History of the Church 
 of Christ. It were only to be washed, 
 that we knew them more cir- p . . 
 cumstantially. He died about [^^^l^'"' 
 the year 460, in an advanced ^ jy 450. 
 age. 
 
 In the mean time the clergy of Mar- 
 seilles, who, in the latter times of the 
 Pelasfian controversy, with Cassian at 
 their head, had endeavoured 
 to chalk out a middle path 
 betw-een Augustine and Pela- 
 gius, propacfated Semi-Pela- 
 gianism with success, not- 
 withstanding the strenuous 
 endeavours of Coelestine of Rome. Nor 
 ouo-ht we to be surprised at this ; the 
 doctrine of Semi-Pelagianism strongly 
 recommends itself to the depraved taste 
 of mankind ; it divides the work of sal 
 vation between free grace and human 
 ability in such a manner, that it both re- 
 tains a specious appearance of humility 
 toward God, and at the same time flatters 
 the pride of man. Fallen creatures can- 
 not but feel weakness and ignorance in 
 some deo-ree ; and therefore they do not 
 easily hetieve themselves perfectly suffi- 
 cient fir their own salvation; yet they 
 love independence, and struggle to pre- 
 serve it; and hence it is, that Semi-Pe- 
 lagian notions are so peculiarly grateful 
 to^the nature of corrupt man. But it 
 may be observed, that this very circum- 
 stance itself forms an insuperable objec- 
 tion to their truth. That can never be 
 the wisdom of God in a mystery,* which 
 
 Semi-Pe- 
 li\gianism 
 supported 
 by Cas- 
 siun. 
 
 • 1 Cor. ii. 7. 
 
460 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XL 
 
 men in their natural state so readily and 
 cordially approve. Prosper still conti- 
 nued, with the arms of Scripture, to op- 
 pose the opinions of Cassian, and to 
 defend the doctrines of the grace of God ; 
 Marius Mercator also laboured in the 
 same cause. Gaul and the neighbouring 
 countries no doubt received benefit from 
 their endeavours. Semi-Pelagianism was 
 so far checked, that during the dark ages 
 after this time, the doctrines of grace 
 were cordially received by godly persons, 
 particularly in the monasteries. All, 
 who were thoroughly humbled and con- 
 trite, found the comfort of them ; while 
 those monks, whose religion was phari- 
 saic, found ilie Semi-Pelagian scheme to 
 suit their self-righteous pride.* In this 
 manner were religious men in the West 
 divided : Cassian's authority prevailed 
 the more, because of the serious and de- 
 vout spirit which other parts of his writ- 
 ings possessed, or seemed to possess ;f 
 but, as the times grew more corrupt in 
 practice, Semi-Pelagianism gained the 
 ascendant. 
 
 About the year 439, Genseric, king of 
 the Vandals, surprised Carthage:(: in the 
 
 midst of peace, and used his 
 Genseric victory with great cruelty. 
 the 'N ;iii- He himself was an Arian by 
 dal siir- profession, as the barbarous 
 nVAIl, o nations who had received 
 
 Christianity generally were. 
 A. D. 439. How this happened, we have 
 
 seen before. It does not ap- 
 pear that the Arians were altered in their 
 dispositions. The same unprincipled 
 wickedness, which had ever characteriz- 
 ed that party, remained. Genseric show- 
 ed the greatest malice against the clergy; 
 drove a number of them from their 
 churclies, and martyred man)^ Indeed 
 the abominations of the times seemed to 
 
 * Tlioun-h tliis must have been the case for 
 the most part, yet exceptions ^viU occur in the 
 course of this history. Tliere were those 
 whose hearts were better taught than their 
 understandings. 
 
 T I speak ambiguously, because I have no 
 access to Cassian, except indirectly by the 
 short account of l)u Pin. I scarcely need to 
 say, after the accounts I have given of good 
 men before his time, that notwithstanding the 
 views of Prosper ajipear to me more humble, 
 and holy, and consistently scriptural, yet there 
 might be and there were real good men, on 
 the Semi-Pelagian scheme : for it ought not 
 to be confounded with Pelagianism itself: the 
 tlieory of this excludes the very idea of grace. 
 
 i Victor A'itens, B. i. 
 
 call for such a scourge. The light of di- 
 vine grace revived in the West, purified 
 man)' souls, and fitted them for suffer- 
 ings ; but with the majority, both super- 
 stition and practical wickedness increas- 
 ed. Carthage itself was sunk in vice ; 
 lewdness was amazingly predominant. 
 So deplorable a thing is it for men to de- 
 part from the simplicity of Christian 
 faith ! The superstitions now increasing 
 daily, only fortified them the more in 
 self-righteousness; and natural depravity, 
 while grace was neglected, grew to an 
 enormous height. Oppression and cruelty 
 domineered at Carthage ; and the poor of 
 the place, in the anguish of their misery, 
 were induced to beseech God to deliver 
 the city to the Barbarians.* 
 
 * The account of a council held at Brnga, in 
 Lu.^itania,t will both illustrate the melancholy 
 situation of civil affairs in this century (for in the 
 former part of it the council seems to have been 
 held) and will also throw some light on Ihe state 
 of religion in Portugal, a country which has 
 hitherto furnished us with no memoirs. The 
 bishop Pancratian, being presi- 
 dent, said, Ye see, brelliron, the Council of 
 havoc made by the Barbarians. Braga. 
 Brethren, let our care be for the 
 salvation of souls, fearing lost llie miseries of the 
 times should seduce our flocks into the way of 
 sinners ; and therefore let us give them an ex- 
 ample of suffering in our own persons for Jesus 
 Christ, \\lio suffered so much for us. And as 
 some of the Barbarians are Arians, others idola- 
 ters, let us confess our faith. He then declared 
 in few words the articles of Christian confession, 
 to which they all assented. Elipand, of Conim- 
 bra, said, The Barbarians are among us; they 
 besiege Lisbon, in a little lime they will be upon 
 us. Let every one go to his abode ; let him com- 
 fort the faithful, decently conceal the bodies of 
 the saints, and send us an account of the eaves 
 where tiiey are deposited. All the bishops hav- 
 ing approved of the motion ; Pancratian added, 
 Go homo in peace, except brother Potamius, be- 
 cause his church at .(Eminium is destroyed, and 
 his country ravaged. Potamius generously an- 
 swered, I did not receive the episcopal function 
 to sit at my ease, but to laliour ; let rne comfort 
 my flock, and suffer with them for Jesus Christ. 
 You have well spoken, replied the president, 
 God be with you. God maintain you in your 
 resolution, said all the bishops. Let us depart 
 with the peace of Jesus Christ. 
 
 At this council ten bishops subscribed to the 
 decrees. Arisbert of Porto, (I suppose the pre- 
 sent Oporto,) wrote to a friend, a little after the 
 council, in these affecting terms : 1 pity you, bro- 
 ther — may God look on our misery with the eyes 
 of liis mercy. Conirnbra is taken, the servants 
 of God are iiillen by the edge of the sword. Eli- 
 pand (one of the bishops of the council) is carried 
 away captive ; Lisbon has redeemed itself with 
 gold. Igaedita is besieged ; nothing to be seen but 
 
 + Fleury, B. xxiii. 6. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 461 
 
 He who informs us of these things is 
 Salvian, priest of Marseilles.* From 
 him we learn, that many nominal Chris- 
 tians attended Pagan sacrifices, and after- 
 wards went to the Lord's Supper. Lewd- 
 ness was so common among them, that 
 after the Vandals became masters of Car- 
 thage, they put a stop to tlie disorders, 
 and obliged the prostitutes to marry. For 
 these Barbarians had not yet attained the 
 corrupt refinements of Roman luxury. 
 Salvian very justly observes, that the 
 miseries of these orthodox Christians 
 ought to give no offence, because they 
 were only Christians in name. They 
 were in reality very idolatrous in their 
 practices, and even amidst the horrors of 
 war and public calamities, continued im- 
 pure and voluptuous. And oppression 
 and injustice were so grievous, that the 
 dominion of the Barbarians was really 
 more tolerable than that of the Rom-\ns. 
 It was worth while to mention these 
 things, as containing no improper illus- 
 tration of the adorable justice of Provi- 
 dence, in punishing the wickedness of 
 nominal Christians, not only at Carthage, 
 but in general in this century through the 
 Western empire. What happened to the 
 ancient Jewish Church when grown 
 wicked and idolatrous, and retaining only 
 the form of religion, happens also to 
 Christian nations. God is glorified by 
 taking the power out of their hand, that 
 they may no longer profane his holy 
 name. 
 
 Genseric expelled the bishops from 
 their Sees ; and in case of any resistance, 
 he made them slaves for life ; and this 
 punishment was actually inflicted on se- 
 veral bishops, and on many hiymen of 
 qualit}-. Quod vult Deus, bishop of 
 Carthage, and a number of clergy, were 
 expelled, and they fled bj'sea to Naples. 
 Others having suffered divers torments 
 in Africa were put on board an old bark, 
 and lauded in Campania. Arian bishops 
 were now put into possession of the va- 
 
 miserv, groaninsr, and anguish. You have seen 
 what" the Siievi have done in Gaihcia ; judge 
 what the Alani are doing in Lusitaiiia. 1 send 
 vou the decrees of the faith you ask for : I will 
 send you all, if I discover the place where you 
 are hidden. I expect the same fate daily. The 
 Lord have mercy on us. 
 
 The sympathizing reader, who enjoys at his 
 ease the civil and religious privileges of our 
 country, will do well to consider how ihankliil 
 he ought to be for blessings, of which these pious 
 men were deprived. 
 
 • Salvian de Gubern. B. 7. 
 2q 3 
 
 cant Sees.* Some bishops, who still 
 remained in the provinces, presented 
 themselves before Genseric, and entreat- 
 ed, that as they had lost their churches 
 and their wealth, they might at least be 
 allowed to remain without molestation in 
 Africa, for the comfort and support of the 
 people of God. " I have resolved to 
 leave none of your name or nation," was 
 the reply of the stern Barbarian ; and it 
 was with difficulty that he was withheld, 
 by the entreaties of those about him, 
 from ordering them to be thrown into the 
 sea. 
 
 Yet, amidst the decline of Roman great- 
 ness, the growth of idolatrous super- 
 stition, and the horrors of the times, it is 
 pleasing to see the improvements of 
 human society through the influence of 
 Christianity, corrupted and imperfect as 
 it then was. I have before noticed the 
 extinction of the savage games and sports 
 of the Romans. Of a piece Dgoyg- 
 with this was the abolition a"-ainstthe 
 of the barbarous custom of custom of 
 exposing children, a custom exposing 
 which had continued amidst children, 
 all the grandeur of Rome, pf',',". ?''*• 
 Constantine, in the year 331, jA? ^ 3?ti r 
 had made a decree to obviate jn442. ' 
 it; so had Honorius in the 
 year 412. Still, however, those who took 
 care of the children were molested. And 
 now in the year 442, in a council held at 
 Vaison,"!' it was ordained, that on Sunday 
 the deacon shall give notice at the altar, 
 that an exposed child hath been taken up, 
 and that if any will claim it, he may do 
 so within ten days; otherwise that he 
 who shall afterwards claim such a child, 
 shall have the church censure of Homi- 
 cide denounced against him. 
 
 In the year 443, Genseric Genseric 
 passed over into Sicily, and persecutes 
 so far as his arms prevailed, !''^„. ."'"'^'' 
 extended the persecution of ^ q ^„ 
 the church into that island. 
 
 Germ anus, of Auxerre, was called a 
 second time into Great Britain, to assist 
 the church against the Pelagian heresy, 
 which again spread itself there. He set 
 out in the year 446, and 
 baffled the attempts of those 'lermanus 
 who disturbed the faith of the "rre "up- 
 Romans. The authority of -^^^^^ jj^g" 
 this person was exceedingly church in 
 "•reat in these times, and it Great BrU 
 
 * Victor Vitens, B. i. 
 + Fleury, B. xxvi. 52. 
 
462 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 tain a- must be confessed that he 
 
 gainst the employed it to the best pur- 
 
 Pelasfians. ^i .• r 
 
 ° poses, the propagation oi 
 
 Christian doctrine, and the benefit of 
 human society. But I am inclined nei- 
 ther to credit nor to relate his miracles ; 
 and I am sorry that I have little else to 
 
 r,„ „„^ tell the reader concernino- him. 
 
 (]ies He died in the year 448, hav- 
 
 A. D. 448. ing held the See ofAuxerre 
 thirty years. 
 
 Attila, the Hun, now made terrible ra- 
 vages in various parts of the empire ; yet, 
 R "■ of ^"*^^ ^^ ^^^ ascendant w^hich 
 Attila. religion, supported by any to- 
 
 lerable decorum of manners, 
 must ever maintain over ignorant barba- 
 rism, that his respect for it, in some mea- 
 sure, had already checked his progress in 
 Gaul ; and an embassy of Leo, bishop of 
 Rome, from the emperor of the West, 
 determined him not to invade Italy. This 
 was in the year 452. Two years after, 
 Genseric, king of the Vandals, arrived at 
 Rome, which he found without defence: 
 Leo went out to meet him, and persuaded 
 him to be content with the pillage, and to 
 abstain from burnings and murders. He 
 returned into Africa with many thousand 
 captives. This circumstance gave occa- 
 sion to an exercise of the Christian grace 
 of charity, worthy to have a place in these 
 annals. 
 
 After a long vacancy,Deogratias was or- 
 dained bishop of Carthage in the year 454, 
 at the desire of Valentinian, the Roman 
 y^ ^ emperor, and as it seems by 
 
 tiasor- *^^ connivance at least of 
 
 dained Genseric. The captives of 
 
 bishop of the latter were divided among 
 Carthage, i^ig followers, who separated 
 A. D. 45-i. liusbands from wives, and 
 children from parents. The heart of Deo- 
 gratias was moved with compassion ; and 
 to prevent these disorders, he undertook 
 to redeem the captives by the sale of all 
 the vessels of gold and silver belonging 
 to the churches. As there were no places 
 laro-e enough to contain the multitude,* 
 he^placed "them in two great churches, 
 which he furnished with beds and stravy-, 
 giving order for their daily accommoda- 
 tion with all necessaries. He appointed 
 physicians to attend the sick, and had 
 nourishment distributed to them in his 
 presence by their directions. In the night 
 he visited all the beds, giving himself up 
 to this work, notwithstanding his age and 
 
 * Vict. Vit. B. i. 
 
 infirmities. He lived only three years in 
 his bishopric, was endeared to the me- 
 mory of the faithful by his virtues ; and 
 while Arians performed military exploits, 
 and dealt in blood, this follower of Augus- 
 tine honoured the real doctrines of the 
 Gospel by acts of meekness and charity. 
 It is thus that we still trace the real 
 church of Christ, and see the connexion 
 of principles and practice in the disciples 
 of tire Lamb. The sight of so much 
 goodness was too much for Genseric; he 
 took care to suffer no more such bishops, 
 and, in process of time, the orthodox 
 bishops in Africa were reduced to three. 
 
 Several godly persons, after a variety 
 of hardships and tortures, came into the 
 hands of Capsur, a Moorish king, the re- 
 lation of Genseric. These being arrived 
 at the desert where he lived, and seeing 
 there a number of profane sacrifices, be- 
 gan by their discourse and manner of life 
 to bring over the Barbarians to the know- 
 ledge of God, and gained a great mul- 
 titude in a country where the name of 
 Jesus had not yet been heard of. Desir- 
 ous of establishing the Gospel there, they 
 sent deputies, who having crossed the de- 
 sert, arrived at a Roman city ; for some 
 part of Africa still remained connected 
 with the Roman empire. The bishop 
 sent priests and ministers, who built a 
 church, and baptized a great number of 
 Barbarians. The Pagan king informed 
 Genseric of these transactions, who, in- 
 censed at the zeal of these pious men, 
 condemned them to death. The convert- 
 ed Moors bewailed themselves ; and the 
 martyrs as they passed by, said to each 
 of them, Brother, pray for me ; God has 
 accomplished my desire; this is the way 
 to the heavenly kingdom. 
 
 Genseric ordered the bishops to deliver 
 up the sacred vessels and books ; which 
 they refusing, the Vandals took them by 
 force, and plundered every thing. Vale- 
 rian, bishop of Abbenza, above four-score 
 j-ears of age, was driven alone out of the 
 city, and all person were prohibited from 
 lodging him in their houses. He lay 
 naked a long time in the public road, ex- 
 posed to the weather, and thus expired 
 for the faith of Christ. 
 
 The Orthodox celebrating Easter in the 
 church of a town called Regia, the Arians 
 assaulted and massacred them. Gen- 
 seric ordered, that none but Arians should 
 serve in his family, or in that of his chil- 
 dren. A person named Armogastus, in 
 the service of Theodoric, the king's son. 
 
Ce.xt. v.] 
 
 THE CHUKCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 463 
 
 was treated with a variety of insults, till 
 death put a period to his sufferings. 
 
 Another, named Archinimus. was flat- 
 tered by Genseric himself, and was pro- 
 mised immense wealth, if he would re- 
 ceive Arianism; but his constancy was 
 invincible, and Genseric having given 
 secret orders to the executioners, that if 
 he showed undaunted courage at the mo- 
 ment of execution, his life should be 
 spared ; he by this means was suffered to 
 live. 
 
 Satur, steward of Himeric's house,* 
 was very free in his censures of Ariani;sm. 
 Being accused, he was threatened with 
 the loss of all his property, and was fur- 
 tlier told, that his wife should be married 
 to a Iveeper of camels if he persevered. 
 His wife, who had several children and 
 a suckling infant, entreated him to com- 
 ply. He answered, " Thou speakest as 
 one of the foolish women speaketh.f Let 
 them do what they will, I must remember 
 the words of the Lord, Whoever doth not 
 leave wife, or children, or lands, or houses, 
 cannot be my disciple." They stripped 
 him of all, and reduced him to beggary. 
 
 Genseric afterwards ordered the great 
 church of Carthage to be shut up, and 
 banished the ministers : and wherever his 
 arms prevailed, he made the people of 
 God to feel his fury. The whole empire 
 of the West, indeed, was 
 falling into ruin. Odoacer, 
 king of the Heruli,made him- 
 self master of Rome in the 
 year 476, and though he was 
 obliged to give way to the 
 arms of Theodoric the Goth, 
 yet Roman emperors have ceased in Italy 
 ever since.j: Africa, we have seen, bow- 
 ed under the yo^e of the Vandals; Spain, 
 and a great part of Gaul was held in sub- 
 jection by the Goths; the other part of 
 Gaul, was subjugated by the Franks, 
 who. in process of time, became masters 
 of the whole country, which from them 
 bears the name of France; and the south- 
 ern part of Great Britain was overpowered 
 at length by the Saxons. These were 
 idolaters, and the small remains of the 
 ancient Britons, Christians by profession, 
 
 Rome 
 taken by 
 Odoaeei', 
 A. D.476. 
 
 afterwards 
 victorious 
 
 retired into the inaccessible mountains of 
 Wales. The poverty of the northern parts 
 of the island was their security. And we 
 must be content to leave the fruits of the 
 labours of Germanus, Palladius, and Pa- 
 trick, in a very low state, till we shall 
 have occasion to speak of the conversion 
 of the Saxons. The Franks also were at 
 present idolaters; the Barbarians, who 
 ruled in the other parts, were Arians, 
 though it does not appear that any of them 
 persecuted the faithful with so much rage 
 as the Vandals did. Evaric, kinw of the 
 Goths in Spain, seemed ambitious to 
 tread in the steps of Genseris : he forbad 
 the ordination of bishops in the room of 
 those who were deceased, and sent others 
 into banishment. The churches fell into 
 decay, and congregations seldom assem- 
 bled. Indeed it was a very gloomy sea- 
 son with the Western church in general. 
 The wrath of God was evidently poured 
 out on the churches for mercies long 
 abused ; but there were those who, by tlie 
 principles of divine grace, were enabled 
 in patience to possess their souls, and to 
 evidence that the real church was far 
 from being extinguished. 
 
 Among the stars that illuminated this 
 disastrous period, was Sidonius of Ly- 
 ons.* He was one of the noblest families 
 in Gaul, and was a celebrated 
 orator and poet. About the 
 year 472, he was, contrary to 
 his wishes, appointed bishop 
 of Clermont, in Auvergne. 
 His liberality was highly 
 laudable, and even before he 
 was bishop, he did frequently, unknown 
 to his wife, convert his silver plate to the 
 use of the poor. His brother-in-law,! 
 Ecdicius, was remarkably distinguished 
 for the same virtue. The Goths having 
 ravaged the country during the scarcity 
 occasioned by a grievous famine, which 
 was added to the national afflictions, 
 Ecdicius collected 4,000 of both sexes, 
 whom he lodged in his houses, and nour- 
 ished during all the time of the scarcity. 
 Patiens, bishop of Lyons, also ^he boun- 
 extended his bounty to the ty of 
 remotest parts of Gaul. The Patiens, 
 
 Sidonius 
 of Lyons 
 made bi- 
 shop of 
 Clermont, 
 
 A. D. 472. 
 
 * Huneric was the son and successor of 
 Genseric. 
 
 t Job ii. 10. 
 
 i I have not thought it worlh wliile to men- 
 tion particularly the emperors of tbe West 
 since ihe death of the great Theodosius, as 
 they are all cliaracters very feeble or obscure, 
 and no war iiiterestina: in church-history. 
 
 * I dare not, however, rank this man amonfr 
 the ornaments of the Church of Christ. I find 
 him continually with princes and emperors, 
 writing their "panegyrics, and absorbed in 
 secular politics. Of his evangelical taste and 
 spirit, I know no sufficient evidence. 
 
 t Fleurv.B. xxix. 30. 
 
464 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 bishop of providence of God was re- 
 Lyous. markable in tempering the 
 
 miseries of the Christians, in 
 these times, by raising up such exemplars 
 of munificence. Patiens possessed the 
 pastoral character in a great degree, and 
 reclaimed many of the Burgundian Arians. 
 His virtues were admired by Gonde- 
 baud, the Burgundian King, who resided 
 at Lyons. 
 
 A council was held in Gaul, from the 
 confused accounts of which it appears 
 that Semi-Pelagianism was still very 
 prevalent there ; nor is it to be wondered 
 at, if we consider the little light of the 
 Scriptures which now remained in the 
 church, 
 
 Genseric dying in the year 477, was 
 succeeded by liis eldest son Huneric* 
 He began his reign with a mild aspect 
 Death of toward the faithful, and, after 
 Genseric, ^n interval of twenty-four 
 A. D. 477. years, permitted them to or- 
 dain a bishop of Carthage, 
 but under this condition, that the Arians 
 at Constantinople should have the same 
 liberty, which those of the general church 
 had at Carthage. The people protested 
 against the condition, and with good rea- 
 son, because the power was out of tiieir 
 hands, and they said, " We will not 
 accept a bishop on such terms. Jesus 
 Christ will govern the church, as he has 
 done hitherto." But Huneric disregard- 
 ed the protestation: and Eugenius was 
 elected bishop of Cartl.age. 
 
 All mankind soon bore witness to his 
 virtues. The revenues of the church 
 were indeed in the hands of the Arians; 
 but large sums were every 
 The vir- ^^y brought to him, all which 
 Eu"enius ^^ faithfully distributed to 
 bishop of the needy, and reserved to 
 Carthage. himself no more than daily 
 bread. The Arian bishops 
 soon murmured ; they represented him as 
 a dangerous preacher, and expostulated 
 with Eugenius himself for suffering per- 
 sons to hear him who wore the Vandal 
 habit, which was, it seems, at that time 
 perfectly distinct from the Roman. God's 
 house, he replied, is open to all, without 
 respect to persons. 
 
 Huneric, who had only complied thus 
 far with the inclinations of the Roman 
 Christians in his dominions, to oblige 
 the court of Constantinople, where the 
 emperor of the East reigned, began gra- 
 
 * Victor Vit. B. ii. 
 
 dually to show the ferocity of his spirit. 
 Fearing that he should lose his Vandals, 
 if they attended the preaching of Euge- 
 nius, he ordered guards to watch at the 
 door of the church, who, when they saw 
 a man or woman in a Vandal habit, struck 
 such persons on the head with short 
 staves jagged and indented, which, being 
 twisted into the hair, and drawn back 
 with sudden violence, tore off both the 
 hair and skin.* Many suffered extremely 
 by these means; women, who had been 
 thus treated, were led through the streets, 
 with a crier going before, to exhibit them 
 to the people. The faithful, however, 
 remained firm; and those who belonged 
 to Huneric's court could not be induced 
 to receive Arianism. He deprived them 
 of their pensions, and sent them to reap 
 corn in the country. As these persons 
 had been educated like gentlemen, the 
 punishment was equally severe and re- 
 proachful. But they bore the cross for 
 the sake of Him who gave himself for 
 them. 
 
 Victor, bishop of Vita, to whom, as an 
 eye-witness and fellow-sufferer, we are 
 indebted for the history of this memorable 
 persecution, relates some visions, which 
 were looked on as preludes of the horrible 
 desolations which approached. We may 
 pass by these without any loss to the 
 reader, and also without any impeach- 
 ment of the general credulity of the 
 historian. Huneric at first ordered, that 
 none should hold any office who was not 
 an Arian. He afterwards confiscated the 
 possessions of the rejected orthodox, and 
 banished their persons into Sicily and 
 Sardinia. He seized the consecrated 
 virgins, and treated them with excessive 
 cruelty and indecency, with a view to 
 extort evidence from them against the 
 bishops. But nothing could be drawn 
 from them to suit the tyrant's purpose, 
 though many died under the torments. 
 
 Huneric afterwards banished pastors 
 and people, to the amount of four thou- 
 sand nine hundred and seventy-six, into the 
 desert. Felix, of Abbirita, had 
 been bishop forty-four years, lei'secu- 
 and by the palsy had lost his Hu„ei.ic 
 speech, and even his under- 
 standing. The faithful, compassionating 
 his case, implored the king, that the old 
 man might be allowed to end his days 
 quietly at Carthage. Huneric, as if he 
 had been ambitious to outstrip the Pagan 
 
 * Fleury, B. xxx. 
 
Czyr. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 465 
 
 emperors in persecution, said, " Let him 
 be tied to wild oxen, and be so carried, 
 where I ordered ;" on which, they tied 
 him across a mule lilce a piece of timber. 
 These Christian heroes were conducted 
 to the two cities of Sicca and Lares, 
 where the Moors were directed to receive 
 and conduct them into the desert. They 
 were at first confined in a prison, where 
 their brethren were allowed to have access 
 to them, to preach, and to administer the 
 Lord's Supper. Some young children 
 were of the number, several of whom were 
 tempted by their mothers, to admit Arian 
 baptism; but out of the mouths of 
 BABES AND SUCKLINGS STRENGTH was Or- 
 dained, and they continued faithful. 
 
 The guards were soon after severely 
 chastised for granting these privileges ; 
 none were permitted to visit the prison- 
 ers ; they were thrown one upon another, 
 and, for want of room, could not withdraw, 
 to comply with the necessities of nature. 
 The effect of this was horrible beyond 
 description. Some of their brethren found 
 means to enter unobserved among them, 
 and of these was Victor, our author, who 
 sunk up to the knees in the odure. How 
 strong was that grace which caused 
 them patiently to endure, rather than free 
 themselves by unfaithfulness ! 
 
 The ]\Ioors at length ordered them to 
 inarch. They went out on the Lord's 
 day, their clothes, their heads, and their 
 faces covered all over with filth, and they 
 sang as they went, " Such honour have 
 all "his saints." Cyprian, bishop of 
 Uniziba, comforted them, and gave them 
 all he had, wishing for thehonour of being 
 carried with them. This was not granted 
 him at present. He afterw^ards was con- 
 fined, suffered much, and was sent into 
 banishment. There is a voice in man 
 which speaks loudly in favour of suffering 
 innocence. The whole country resound- 
 ed with the cries and groans of the people, 
 flocking to behold them, and throwing 
 tlieir children at their feet. Alas, said 
 they, to whom do you leave us "? Who 
 shall baptize these children ] Who shall 
 administer the Lord's supper to us 1 Why 
 are we not permitted to go with you ? 
 Among the rest, a woman was observed 
 leading a child by the hand. Run, my 
 boy, said she, observe what haste these 
 holy men make to receive the crown. 
 Being reproved for desiring to go along 
 wilhlhcm, she replied, I am the daugh- 
 ter of t!ie late bishop of Zurita ; and I am 
 carrying this child, who is my grandson, 
 
 Edict of 
 Huneric, 
 
 A. D. 483. 
 
 lest he be left alone, and the enemy 
 draw him into the snares of death. The 
 bishops, with tears in their eyes, could 
 only say, God's will be done. As they 
 travelled, when the aged or the young, 
 who wanted strength, were not able to 
 advance, the Moors pricked them forward 
 with their javelins, or threw stones at 
 them. Such as were not able to walk 
 were tied by the feet, and dragged along. 
 Many died in the march ; the rest arrived 
 at the desert, and were fed with barley, 
 nor were even allowed this after a season. 
 In the year 483, Huneric sent an edict 
 to Eugenius, with orders to read it in the 
 church, and dispatched couriers with co- 
 pies of it through Africa. The 
 purport of the Edict was, 
 after upbraiding the faithful 
 bishops for their zeal in 
 spreading their doctrines, to 
 command them all to appear at Carthage, 
 to dispute with the Arian bishops on a 
 certain day, artd to prove their faith, if 
 they could, by the Scripture. 
 
 The most alarming words were, "re- 
 solving not to suffer any scandal in our 
 provinces." The bishops interpreted 
 them to mean, that he would not suffer 
 any who professed the doctrine of the 
 Trinity to remain in his dominions. They 
 therefore drew up a remonstrance, con- 
 taining in substance a petition, that Hu- 
 neric would send for the bishops who 
 were beyond the seas. Huneric, regard- 
 less of the remonstrance, persecuted the 
 most learned bishops under various pre- 
 tences. He banished the 
 bishop Donatian, after giving 
 him a hundred and fifty bas- 
 tinadoes. He treated others 
 also with great cruelty, and 
 forbad any of his sect to eat with the 
 faithful. 
 
 ' On the first of February, tha day ap- 
 pointed for the conference, the bishops 
 resorted to Carthage from every part of 
 Africa, and from all the islands subject 
 to the Vandals. Huneric, for many days, 
 made no mention of the conference, and 
 separated those of the greatest abilities 
 from the rest, that he might put them to 
 death on false pretences. One of the 
 most learned, named Laetus, he burned 
 alive, with a view of intimidating others. 
 At length, when the conference was 
 opened, the orthodox chose ten of their 
 own number, to answer for the rest. 
 Cirila, the chief of the Arian bishops, 
 w-as seated on a magnificent throne, with 
 
 Huneric 
 banishes 
 DouatJan. 
 
466 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XI. 
 
 his partisans sitting in an exalted station, 
 while the orthodox continued standing 
 below. The latter saw what a mock- 
 conference it was likely to prove, and re- 
 monstrated ; the Arian.^ ordered one hun- 
 dred bastinadoes to be given to each of 
 them. May God look down on the vio- 
 lence that is offered us, said Eugenius. 
 Cirila finding them better prepared than 
 he imagined, made use of several cavils 
 to avoid the conference. The orthodox 
 foreseeing this, had prepared a confes- 
 sion* of faith, in which the Trinitarian 
 doctrine is very explicitly declared, and 
 which concludes thus : " This is our 
 faith, supported by the authority of the 
 evangelists and apostles, and founded 
 upon the society of all the general 
 churclres through the world ; in which 
 by the grace of God Almighty, we hope 
 to persevere til! death." 
 
 The Arians, incensed at this confes- 
 sion, reported to the king that the ortho- 
 dox had raised a clamour, to avoid the 
 conference. The tyrant had taken his 
 measures ; orders were sent through the 
 provinces, by virtue of which the churches 
 ■were all shut in one day, and their reve- 
 nues given to the Arians. He allowed 
 the orthodox till the first of June in the 
 same year, that is, 484, to consider whe- 
 ther they would merit pardon by a retrac- 
 tion. 
 
 Such were the measures made use of 
 to obliterate the doctrines of divine grace 
 in Africa, where they had been so glo- 
 riously revived by Augustine 
 
 standing, cried two of them, that we 
 should swear at a venture, without know- 
 ing what is contained in the paper? In 
 the issue, of four hundred and forty-six 
 bishops, who came to the conference, 
 forty-eight died, many of them, proba- 
 bly, through hard usage ; forty-six were 
 banished into Corsica, three hundred and 
 two into other places; and most of the 
 rest made their escape. 
 
 Among those sent into exile was Vigi- 
 lius, of Thapsus, a man famous for his 
 writings. To prevent the persecution 
 from being more fierce, he 
 composed a number of trea- vis'lbis 
 tises under the names of some exiled, 
 of the most renowned fathers, 
 as he himself acknowledged with regard 
 to several of them. The celebrated creed, 
 called that of Athanasius, is ascribed to 
 him.* He appears to have meant well ; 
 but the artifice was extremely culpable ; 
 and partly by his practice, and partly by 
 his example, he has caused much confu- 
 sion and uncertainty in the works of the 
 fathers. Vigilius himself retired to Con- 
 stantinople. 
 
 Huneric, as if the very soul of Gale- 
 rius had been assumed by him, pursued 
 his sanguinary designs with vigour. He 
 sent executioners among the 
 laity, who whipped, hanged. Further 
 and burned alive the faithful, cruelties 
 Euorenius, before he left Car- of Hune- 
 ihage, had written a strenu- 
 ous letter, to warn his flock : 
 
 •Cruelties 
 of Hune- 
 ric. 
 
 and it must be owned that many of them 
 Huneric ordered the bishops' gave the noblest proofs of sincerity. Do- 
 to be expelled from Carthage,, nysia, while she was scourged, and the 
 
 stripped them of horses and 
 changes of raiment, and for- 
 bad, under terrible penalties, any one to 
 give them victuals or lodgings. The 
 bishops remained without the walls of 
 the city, exposed to the weather; and 
 meeting accidentally with the king, they 
 all came to him: "Why, say they, are 
 we treated thus?" He looked with fury, 
 and ordered some armed horsemen to 
 ride in among them, who wounded many. 
 Huneric could not but be conscious that 
 his conduct was no less absurd than ini- 
 quitous. On second thoughts, he ordered 
 them to go to a place called the Temple 
 of Memory, where they we're shown a 
 paper rolled up, and were required to 
 swear to what was contained in it. Are 
 we like beasts, void of sense and under- 
 
 biood was streaming from her body, said, 
 " Ministers of the devil, what you now 
 do to confound me with' shame (for they 
 had stripped her naked), is my glory;" 
 and she exhorted the rest to suff'er mar- 
 tyrdom. Looking severely at her son, 
 whom she saw dreading the torture, " Re- 
 member, son, said she, that we have 
 been baptized in the name of the Trinity. 
 Let us not lose the garment of salvation, 
 lest the Master should say. Cast them 
 into outer darkness." The young man 
 upon this suffered death with constancy : 
 and she thanked God with a loud voice, 
 
 Victor, B. iii. 
 
 * I have wondered why persons, who love 
 not tl>e doctrine of the Trinity, should triumph 
 so much on account of tliis circuTnstance. If 
 the sentiments of the creed lie defensil)le by 
 Scripture, the name of Vigiliiis cannot dis- 
 grace them ; if they be not, that of Athana- 
 sius can do them no honour. 
 
ClITT. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 467 
 
 embracinor his body. Many suffered with 
 her, strencrlhened by her exhortations.* 
 
 The suiferings of many others were 
 very dreadful ; it is even painful to write 
 or read the narratives. A woman called 
 Victoiia, with amazing constancy sup- 
 ported her cruel tortures, unmoved also 
 by the entreaties of her husband, who 
 besought her to pity their common chil- 
 dren. 
 
 Victorian, of Adrumetum, was at that 
 time governor of Carthage under the 
 king. He was the wealthiest man in 
 Africa : to gain him over to Arianism was 
 to gain a prize ; and Huneric assured him 
 of his particular favour, if he would sub- 
 mit to be re-baptized, and renounce the 
 Trinitarian creed. "Tell the king," said 
 he, " if there were no other life after this, 
 I would not for a little temporal honour 
 be ungrateful to my God, who hath 
 granted me the grace to believe in him." 
 The king, incensed at an answer truly 
 christian, tormented him grievously ; and 
 thus he slept in Jesus. At Tambaia, two 
 brothers continued a whole day suspend- 
 ed, with large stones fastened to their 
 feet. One of them, overcome with the 
 torture, at length desired to recant, and 
 to be taken down. " No, no, said the 
 other; this, brother, is not what we swore 
 to Jesus Christ ; 1 will testify against 
 you, when we come before his awful 
 throne, that we swore by his body and 
 blood, that we would suffer for his sake." 
 He said much more, to rouse and encou- 
 rage him; at length his fellow-suff'erer 
 cried out, " Torment as you please, I will 
 follow my brother's example." The ex- 
 ecutioners were quite fatigued with tor- 
 turing them by hot irons and hooks, and 
 at length dismissed them, remarking that 
 every one appeared ready to follow the 
 example of the two brothers, and that 
 none was brought over to Arianism. — I 
 see still tlie marks of the true church pa- 
 tiently suffering for the truth's sake, and 
 victorious in suffering. 
 
 At Typasa, the secretary of Cirila was 
 ordained bishop by the Arians. The in- 
 habitants seeing this, transported them- 
 selves into Spain, as the distance was 
 but small: some, who could meet with 
 no vessels, remained in Africa. The new 
 bishop laboured by courtesy to win their 
 favour; but they, in contempt of his mi- 
 nistry, assembled themselves in a pri- 
 vate house for public worship. Huneric 
 
 • Victor, B. V. 
 
 hearing of this by a message from the 
 bishop, ordered their tongues to be cut 
 out and their right hands to be cut oft", 
 in the public market-place. He seems to 
 have permitted them to retire to Constan- 
 tinople, but to have been determined to 
 prevent their open confession of the Tri- 
 nity. Shall I, in compliance with modern 
 prejudices, throw a veil over the rest, or 
 shall I proceed according to historical 
 veracity ] — imperiosa trahit Veritas. A 
 miracle followed, worthy of 
 God, whose majesty had been a miracu- 
 so daringly insulted, and lous inter- 
 which must at that time have position, 
 much strengthened the hearts 
 of the faithful, who needed indeed some 
 peculiar consolations amidst such scenes 
 of horrible persecution. The miracle it- 
 self is so well attested, that I see not 
 how it can be more so. The reader shall 
 have both the fact and its proofs. Though 
 their tongues were cut out to the root, 
 they spake as well as before. " If any 
 one doubt the fact, says Victor of Vita, 
 let him go to Constantinople, where he 
 will find a sub-deacon, called Reparatus, 
 one who was thus treated, who speaks 
 plainly, and who has a particular respect 
 shown him in the palace of the emperor 
 Zeno, especially by the empress." 
 
 vEneas, of Gaza, a Platonic philoso- 
 pher, a cautious and prudent person,* was 
 at that time at Constantinople, and writes 
 thus in the conclusion of his 
 Dialogue on the Resurrection ; Proofs of 
 "I myself saw them, heard H'e mira- 
 them speak, and wondered, culous in- 
 that their utterance could be tjon *'" 
 so articulate. I searched for 
 the organ of speech, and not trusting my 
 oars, was resolved to have the proof of 
 the eyes. Causing them to open their 
 mouths, I saw that their tongues were 
 plucked out even by the roots, and was 
 then more surprised, that they could live, 
 than that they could speak." Is this suf- 
 ficient evidence ? Hear more: Procopius, 
 the historian, in his History of the Van- 
 dalic War,f says, Huneric ordered the 
 tongues of many to be cut out, who were 
 
 * Gilihon (Decline of Rom. Emp. vol. iii. c. 
 xxxviii.) is struck with this tvideiiof, in con- 
 junction « ilh that of the rest. Yet he intimate's 
 that tiie infidel's sus|)icinn is, inciu-ahle. Does 
 lie allude to hiinsell i" To what purpose does 
 he say so, it' he does not? If lie does, what is 
 this hut to deny all reasonable evidence, and 
 confess himself to be unreasonable ? 
 
 f ^^. I. c. viii. 
 
468 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XI, 
 
 afterwards seen in the streets of Constan- 
 tinople when I was there, talking with- 
 out any impediment, or feeling any incon- 
 venience from what they had suffered. 
 Count Marcellinus, in his Chronicons, 
 says, " I have seen some of this company 
 of faithful confessors at Constantinople, 
 who had their tongues cut out, but spake 
 nevertheless without any imperfection in 
 tlieir utterance." To name only one more 
 witness: the great emperor Justinian, in 
 a Constitution published by him for 
 Africa, after it had fallen into his do- 
 minion, testifies, that he had beheld the 
 same.* 
 
 Numbers were maimed in various ways. 
 Some lost their hands, some their feet, 
 others their eyes, their noses, or their 
 ears. Dagila, wife of one of the King's 
 cup-bearers, though nobly born and 
 brought up tenderly, was severely 
 scourged and banished into a desert, joy- 
 fully forsaking her house, husband, and 
 cliildren. 
 
 Seven monks of Capsa having been 
 persuaded to come to Carthage, Hattered 
 with fair promises and the royal favour, 
 showed, however, that they had an- 
 other SPIRIT in them. Inflexibly firm in 
 the profession of the Trinity, and disap- 
 pointing the hopes of Huneric, they were 
 mart3rred by his orders. 
 
 The whole clergy of Carthage, after 
 having been almost starved with hunger, 
 were exiled. Elpidiphorus, who had 
 been baptized into the faith of the Trinity, 
 and who had had for his sponsor the dea- 
 con ^Nlurilta, was more active than others 
 in tormenting the faithful. As they were 
 preparing to stretch Muritta on the rack, 
 the venerable aged person suddenly drew 
 out, from under his robe, the linen with 
 which he had covered Elpidiphorus at 
 his coming out of the font, and spreading 
 it in the view of the whole company, he 
 said to the apostate, who sat as his judge, 
 "Behold the linen which shall accuse 
 you at the coming of the great Judge, and 
 shall cast you headlong into the lake of 
 brimstone, because you have clothed your- 
 self with cursing, by renouncing the true 
 baptism and the faith." Elpidiphorus 
 was confounded, and unable to answer. 
 Two Vandals, who loved the faith, ac- 
 companied by their mother, forsook their 
 wealth, and followed the clergy into ba- 
 nishment. Theucarius, an apostate, ad- 
 vised the Arian governors to recall some 
 
 * 13. l.Cod. deOff. Afr. 
 
 of the young children, whom he, accord- 
 ing to his office, had taught to sing the 
 service of the church, and whom he knew 
 to have the best voices. Messengers 
 were sent to recall twelve, who, weeping 
 and holding the banished clergy^ by their 
 knees, refused to leave them. They were 
 separated from them by force, and were 
 brought back to Carthage. But neither 
 flatteries nor the bastinado could cure 
 them of their attachment. These, after 
 the persecution was over, were held in 
 high estimation in the church. The Arian 
 bishops went every where armed with 
 swords, accompanied by their clergy. 
 One, named Anthony, distinguished him- 
 self by his cruel treatment of Eugenius of 
 Carthage, who was his prisoner, and 
 whose life he in vain attempted to destroy 
 by repeated severities. Another bishop, 
 called Habet Deum, was bound by him 
 hand and foot. Another, stopping his 
 mouth, poured water on his body. "My 
 brother," said the Arian, unbinding him, 
 " you are now a Christian as well as we ; 
 what should hinder you in future, from 
 obeying the will of the king?" " While 
 you were stopping my mouth, I made," 
 said the holy confessor, " a protestation 
 against your violence, which the angels 
 have written down, and will present to 
 God." 
 
 The barbarity was general : persons 
 were stopped on the highways, and 
 brought to Arian bishops, who rebap- 
 lized them, and gave them certificates, to 
 prevent their suffering the same violence 
 again. None were permitted to pass from 
 place to place without these certificates. 
 The Arian clergy went, even in the night 
 time, with armed men into houses, carry- 
 ing water with them, with which they 
 sprinkled persons in their beds, crying 
 out that they had made them Christians. 
 They put the physician Liberatus, and 
 his wife, into separate prisons; when 
 somebody informed the latter, that her 
 husband had obeyed the king, " Let me 
 see him," says she, " and I will do what 
 is well-pleasing to God." They took her 
 out of the prison to her husband, to whom 
 she said, taking him by the throat, " Un- 
 happy man, unworthy of the grace of 
 God, why will you perish eternally for a 
 transitory glory? Will your gold and sil- 
 ver deliver you from hell-fire'?" " What 
 is the matter, wife," he replied ; " what 
 have they been telling you] I am what 
 I was by the grace of Jesus Christ, and 
 will never renounce the faith." 
 
Gevt. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 469 
 
 Cresconius, a presbyter of the city of 
 Myzenta, was found dead in a cavern of 
 Mount Zica. Various persons of both 
 sexes fleeing from the persecution, suf- 
 fered thus through cold and hunger. 
 
 At length, after a horrible reign of 
 seven years and ten months, in which 
 time the church was purged by as severe 
 a persecution as any ever 
 known, in the year 485 died 
 the tyrant Huneric of a dis- 
 ease, in which he was cor- 
 roded by worms, — a signal 
 monumentof Divine justice ! Gontamond, 
 his nephew and successor, stopped the 
 "ed Eugenius to 
 Carthage. In the year 487, 
 a council was held at Rome, 
 with Felix, the bishop, at its 
 
 Death of 
 Huneric 
 the tyrant, 
 
 A. D. 485. 
 
 persecution, and recall 
 
 Council at 
 Rome, 
 A. D. 487. 
 
 head,* in which were forty 
 bishops of Italy, four of Africa, and se- 
 venty-six priests. The rules of penance, 
 prescribed by this synod, on occasion of 
 the late persecution, partook partly of the 
 prevailing superstitions, and partly of the 
 primitive strictness of discipline. Clerg}^- 
 men, Avho had suffered themselves to be 
 re-baptized, were deprived not only of the 
 ministry, but even of lay-communion, till 
 their death. Other articles breathe the 
 same severe spirit; yet I rejoice, amidst 
 the excess of discipline, to find, that real 
 religion was honoured. One rule of the 
 council deserves to be mentioned for its 
 good sense: ' No clergyman shall receive 
 into his city the penitent of another bishop, 
 without his certificate in writing.' 
 
 In the year 493, Theodoric, the Ostro- 
 goth, now complete master of Italy, after 
 he had ruined Odoacer, made a law to re- 
 strain all the adherents of the 
 latter from making a will, or 
 disposing of their estates. All 
 Italy was alarmed, and Epi- 
 phanius, bishop of Pavia, was 
 applied to, that he might in- 
 tercede with the king. Lawrence, bishop 
 of Milan, joining with him, they went to- 
 gether to Ravenna, where Theodoric re- 
 sided. | Epiphanius obtained favour for 
 all, except some few leaders of the party. 
 Theodoric, who had before honoured and 
 experienced the virtues of Epiphanius, 
 discoursed with him in private, and said, 
 " You see the desolations of Italy ; the 
 Burgundians have carried away captive a 
 number of the inhabitants ; I wish to re- 
 deem them; none of the bishops is so pro- 
 
 Odoacer 
 mastered 
 by Theo- 
 doric, 
 
 A. D. 493, 
 
 Epiphani- 
 us and 
 Victor 
 coniinis- 
 sioned to 
 redeem 
 the cap- 
 tives in 
 Burgundy, 
 A. D. 494. 
 
 kinor, re- 
 
 • Ep. 7. Felix. 
 Vol. I. 
 
 + Ennodius Vita. Epiph. 
 2R 
 
 per as yourself, undertake the embassy; 
 I shall order what money is necessary for 
 you." Epiphanius accepted 
 the commission on condition 
 that Victor, bishop of Turin, 
 might be his companion. In 
 the year 494, Epiphanius 
 passed the Alps ; all the peo- 
 ple came out to see him, and 
 brought presents, which he 
 distributed among the poor. 
 Arriving at Lyons, where 
 Gondebaud, the Burgundian 
 sided, he advised him to dismiss the cap- 
 tives without ransom. It seems astonish- 
 ing, that one Arian king should negotiate 
 with another of the same sect, by means 
 of a Trinitarian; but it is just to notice 
 these things, that the reader may not sus- 
 pect all Arians to have had the spirit of 
 Eusebius, of Nicomedia, or of Huneric 
 the Vandal. The true triumphs of real 
 godliness and virtue, in softening the 
 miseries of human society, appear in 
 these transactions of Epiphanius. Let 
 philosophers say that this was all the ef- 
 fect of superstition : it is my duty to show, 
 that even in a superstitious age, godliness 
 did exist, and did perform what mere su- 
 perstition could not; and Philosophy 
 should stop her mouth, when it is re- 
 membered, that she seldom ever did so 
 much good to society, as the Christian 
 religion did, even when discoloured by* 
 superstition. 
 
 Gondebaud, who was no stranger to 
 the character of Epiphanius, restored to 
 him v.'ithout ransom all the prisoners, 
 except those who were taken armed, they 
 being the property of the captors. Six 
 thousand were sent away without ran- 
 som; and Theodoric's money, aided by 
 the liberality of Syagria, a lady of quali- 
 ty and of good works, and of Avitus, 
 bishop of A^ienne, redeemed the rest. 
 Epiphanius travelled to Geneva, to ob- 
 tain the release of the captives there, and 
 was equally successful with Gondegisi- 
 las, the brother of Gondebaud. He re- 
 turned into Italy with troops of redeemed 
 captives, and easily obtained for them 
 from Theodoric the recovery of their lands. 
 
 This excellent person was born at 
 
 Pavia in the year 438. From early life 
 
 he was devoted to divine ser- . 
 
 vices, and at twenty years of I"P"»- 
 J • J J "'^s was 
 
 age, was ordamed deacon. 1,0,.,, ^^_ 
 
 He was made bishop at the Pavia 
 
 age of twenty-eight; and it a. d'438 
 
 must be confessed that he ' ' * 
 
470 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 gave himself wholly to the service of 
 God and the good of mankind. He was 
 often successfully employed in public 
 affairs. In the year 474, he had been 
 sent by Nepos, at that time emperor of the 
 West, to Evaric, king of the Visigoths, 
 then residing at Toulouse, though after 
 the Visigoths were ejected from Gaul, 
 they resided in Spain. Epiphanius ne- 
 gotiated a peace with Evaric successful- 
 ly, but refused an invitation to dine with 
 him, because he was an Arian. In 476, 
 Odoacer, making himself master of Italy, 
 Epiphanius, by his intercession, obtained 
 the deliverance of a number of captives ; 
 and with no other fund, than the supplies 
 of Providence, he repaired the city of 
 Pavia, which had been pillaged, and re- 
 built the churches. When Theodoric 
 entered Italy in 489, Epiphanius came to 
 him to Milan, and was courteously re- 
 ceived. He still softened the horrors of 
 war during the contest between Odoacer 
 and Theodoric, and did good to all, even 
 He died supporting those who had 
 A n 4or piU^gPd his lands. In the 
 year 496 he died, being fifty- 
 eight years of age. 
 
 About this time decretals of Gelasius, 
 bishop of Rome, were published: a few 
 of them relating to ordination* will de- 
 serve to be mentioned, "He who is 
 taken from a monastic life, may be or- 
 .dained priest in a year's time; but he 
 must not be illiterate; he who cannot 
 read, can only be a door-keeper. All 
 laymen that shall be ordained shall have 
 six months probation ; and cannot be ad- 
 mitted priests till after eighteen months. 
 Bishops are forbidden to receive, much 
 less to promote, such clergymen as pass 
 from one church to another." 
 
 Gelasius| himself seems to have been 
 an ornament to Christianity. He died 
 Death of in the year 496. He composed 
 Gelasius, ^ treatise against some Ro- 
 A. D. 496. ™^ns, who had a desire to 
 re-establish the ancient super- 
 stition of the Lupercalia.:}; "I forbid, 
 
 [Chap. XL 
 
 says he, any Christian to practise these 
 superstitions: leave them to heathens. 
 I think it my duty to declare to Chris- 
 tians, that they are fatal. I doubt not 
 but my predecessors solicited the em- 
 perors to abolish this abuse ; they were 
 not heard, and this ruined the empire." 
 — It appears hence how slowly and stub- 
 bornly the old idolatries departed out 
 of Christendom. The testimony of Ge- 
 lasius deserves our attention, because 
 his manners were holy. He was inces- 
 santly employed in prayer, reading, writ- 
 ing or business, and in conversation on 
 spiritual things with godly men. Idle- 
 ness and luxury were equally avoided by 
 him; negligence in a bishop he esteemed 
 dangerous to souls; and his liberality to 
 the poor was unbounded. To all this, 
 it may not be quite insignificant lo add, 
 that he composed hymns after the man- 
 ner of Ambrose. 
 
 About the year 496, Clovis, king of the 
 the Franks, was baptized, and received 
 into the general church. He p, . 
 himself, perfidious, ambitious, baptized 
 
 and cruel, was no honour to * t-» -n'c 
 ,. .' , . . A. D. 496. 
 
 any religious denomination. 
 
 But some remarkable circumstances of 
 Providence attended his reception of 
 Christianity; which will therefore de- 
 serve a place in these memoirs. The 
 Franks, or French, were a German nation 
 known long before; who dwelt about the 
 lower Rhine. Having passed this river, 
 they entered into Gaul, under the conduct 
 of Pharamond, their first king, about the 
 year 420. Clodio, Merovaeus, a q /OQ 
 Childeric, and Clovis, reign- 
 ed in succession after him. Like the 
 rest of the barbarous nations, who deso- 
 lated the lower empire, they still advanc- 
 ed gradually in conquests, and Clovis 
 ruined the Roman power entirely in Gaul. 
 But he had to contend with other barbar- 
 ous invaders, all of whom, however, he 
 subdued at length, and by much carnage 
 and violence he became the founder of 
 
 * Fleury, B. xxx. Sec. 34. 
 
 t Fluery, B. xxx. 41. 
 
 + Gibbon, in Vol. iii. c. xxxvi. Decline, &c. 
 is pleased to accuse Gelasius of absurd pre- 
 judice, because he supposed those who were 
 for still preserving the festival of the Luper- 
 calia to he only nominal Christians. After 
 having told the less learned reader, that this 
 festival was an ancient piece of idolatry, in 
 honour of the idol god Pan ; that young men, 
 and even magistrates ran nalced through the 
 streets ; tliat they— modesty forbids me fur- 
 
 ther to explain the indecencies of the cere- 
 monies ; suffice it to say, that the whole was 
 calculated to encourage libidinous vices — I 
 would ask such a writer, whether those, who 
 were for still preserving this abomination, 
 could be any more than nominal Christians; 
 whether he knows any evil more severely and 
 more constantly condemned in Scripture than 
 idolatry ; and, lastly, whether the expression 
 "harmless festival," (it is Gibbon's) does not 
 fasten on him, who uses it, the charge of im- 
 pudence, or ignorance of Scripture, or ma- 
 levolence against the word of God. 
 
Ckst. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. 
 
 471 
 
 the French monarchy. Wicked as he 
 was, he was fitted to become an useful 
 instrument of Providence, like Henry 
 VIII. of England, many ages after. 
 He had married Clotilda, niece of Gon- 
 debaud, king of the Burgundians; she 
 was zealous for the doctrine of the Trini- 
 ty, though both her uncle and the whole 
 nation of the Burgundians professed Ari- 
 anism. Could her private history be 
 known, it would probably be instructive 
 and edifying. For what else could in- 
 duce a royal lady, brought up among 
 heretics, and given in marriage to a 
 powerful Pagan, to persevere alone so 
 firmly in the apostolical faith, but the 
 grace of God and the effectual operation 
 of his Spirit, in an age when divine truth 
 had scarce a single patron of great power 
 in Europe'?"* 
 
 Having a son by her husband Clovis, 
 she endeavoured to persuade him, to per- 
 mit the child to be baptized, and earnest- 
 ly reasoned with him on the vanity of his 
 idols, and preached Christianity to him 
 with much sincerity. Clovis, who, it 
 seems, had great affection for his queen, 
 consented at length to the baptism of the 
 infant; but he died a few days after. 
 Clovis in a rage declared, "I have lost 
 my child, because he has been devoted 
 to your deities ; had he been devoted to 
 mine, he would have lived." The pious 
 queen answered, "I thank God, who has 
 thought me worthy to bear a child, whom 
 he has called into his kingdom." She 
 had afterwards another son, who was 
 baptized by the name of Clodomer. On 
 his falling sick the king said, " Yes, I 
 see he will die like his brother, because 
 he has been baptized in the name of 
 your Christ." The mother prayed for 
 his recovery, and the child was restored 
 to health. Clotilda persevering in her 
 exhortations, Clovis heard them, patient 
 but still inflexible. It pleased God at 
 length to give him a striking lesson, 
 from which he ought to have learned the 
 true art of happiness. Fighting with the 
 Alemanni, he was upon the point of be- 
 ing entirely defeated. Finding himself 
 in the utmost danger, he lifted up his 
 eyes to heaven with tears, and said, " 
 Jesus Christ! whom Clotilda affirms to 
 be the Son of the living God, I implore 
 thy aid. If thou givest me victory, I 
 will believe and be baptized ; for I have 
 called upon my own gods in vain." — 
 
 While he was speaking, the Alemanni 
 turned their backs, and began to flee, and 
 at length submitted and craved quarter. 
 
 Penetrated with a sense of divine good- 
 ness, as many wicked men have been 
 for a time, Clovis submitted to the in- 
 structions of Remi, bishop of Rheims, 
 whom the queen sent to teach him. The 
 chief difl^iculty he started was, that his 
 people would not follow him in his 
 change of religion. This was obviated 
 by the facility with which they received 
 Remi's lessons. What the lessons were, 
 and what exercises of mind and con- 
 science attended the change, we know 
 not; the external circumstances and forms 
 alone we are informed of, and they are 
 not very instructive. The king himself 
 was baptized at Rheims, and so was his 
 sister, and three thousand of his army. 
 He was at that time the only prince who 
 professed orthodox Christianity. Anas- 
 tasius, the Eastern emperor, favoured 
 heresy ; the rest of the European princes 
 were Arians. Thus a woman was em- 
 ployed as the instrument of a change in 
 her husband ; it is true the change was 
 only nominal, but it was followed by 
 very signal effects in Europe, namely, by 
 the recovery of the apostolical faith, and 
 no doubt by the happy conversion of 
 many individuals. 
 
 In the year 494, Gontamond, the Van- 
 dal, still increasing his kindness to the 
 church, opened all the places of public 
 worship, after they had been 
 shut ten years and a half, 
 and, at the desire of Euge- 
 nius, recalled all the other 
 bishops. He died in the 
 year 490, and was succeeded 
 by his brother Thrasamond. 
 
 Gontamond 
 favours the 
 Christians, 
 
 A. D. 494. 
 
 Dies, 496. 
 
 * Grear. Tur. 11. hist. c. xxvi. 
 
 And here I finish the general history of 
 the West, for this century. Much, both 
 ofDivine providence and of Divine grace, 
 appears in it. Superstition had grown 
 gradually in this and the former century. 
 Relics, and various other instruments of 
 the same class, were fast advancing into 
 reputation. The monastic solitudes were 
 strongly calculated to augment these 
 evils° and, in the writings of various 
 pious persons, the unguarded and very 
 injudicious addresses to martyrs, which 
 occur frequently, and which Avere rather 
 rhetorical flights than real prayers, coun- 
 tenanced exceedingly the growing spirit 
 of apostasy. Every new ceremony, 
 while men were in this frame, strength- 
 
472 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 [Chap. XU. 
 
 ened the superstitious spirit, and rendered 
 them less disposed to depend on the Sa- 
 viour, that is, as the apostle says, to 
 HOLD THE HEAD,* in the faith and love 
 of the Gospel. Had it not been for the 
 great and solid revival of the doctrine of 
 grace in this century, the wholesome 
 effects of which continued all along in 
 the West, Christianity itself, humanly 
 speaking, would have been in danger of 
 total extinction. The intelligent reader 
 will admire the providential and gracious 
 goodness of the Lord, in preparing, fur- 
 nishing, and giving success to the impor- 
 tant labours of Augustine, through which 
 so many in Africa were enabled to glorify 
 their Saviour by faithfulness to death, 
 under a severe persecution. The despi- 
 sed, desolated church, at once overborne 
 by heretics, and by barbarous Pagans, 
 still lived in Italy, Spain, France, and 
 Britain, to the end of the century, when 
 Providence raised up a Clovis to support 
 that, of which he himself, however, knew 
 not the value. We leave the church in 
 Italy and Spain, only tolerated, but mildly 
 treated, particularly in the fo?mer ; in 
 Britain, confined to the mountains of 
 Wales and Cornwall*; in France, ready 
 to rise again into eminence ; and in 
 Africa, just recovered from a dreadful 
 scourge, in which she had gloriously 
 suffered. The changes of a secular kind, 
 though very great in all this period, and 
 alone moving the hearts of worldly men, 
 could hot destroy the Church, whose 
 root is not in the world. The patience of 
 the godly was exercised by them, the sins 
 of the Church were scourged, and the 
 Gospel was communicated to Barbarians. 
 The general current of corrupt doctrine 
 was strongly set in : idolatry was too 
 deeply rooted in men's hearts, to be erad- 
 icated from any, except those who were 
 Christians indeed, and we shall ere long 
 see it established in the formality of pub- 
 lic worship. Nothing, however, had 
 hitherto happened but what had been pre- 
 dicted. The persecutions of the Church, f 
 the short interval of peace, if: and the des- 
 olations of the empire which succeeded,§ 
 had all been revealed to St. John. And 
 it may deserve to be remarked, that even 
 amidst all this degeneracy and decay, 
 whoever chooses to compare Christian 
 emperors or priests with Pagans in sim- 
 ilar situations, will find a great superiority 
 
 of character in the former. The melio- 
 rating of the condition of slaves, the 
 abolition of tortures, and of other cruel or 
 obscene customs, the institution of various 
 plans for the relief of the poor, and the 
 general improvement of the order of soci- 
 ety, are to be attributed in a great measure 
 to the benevolent influence and operation 
 of the Christian relisfion. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE EASTERN CHURCH IN THE 
 FIFTH CENTURY. 
 
 The life and transactions of Chrysos- 
 tom have introduced us into this scene 
 already, and prepared us to expect no 
 very great work of the spirit of God. The 
 vices which tarnished the West, were 
 superstition, polemical subtilty, and mo- 
 nasticism. These same vices, meeting 
 with little or no check from the revival, 
 which took place in Africa, and spread 
 a benign influence through the Latia 
 churches, prevailed in the East almost 
 universallj', and each of them in a much 
 higher degree; yet here and there, the 
 Spirit of God condescended to move 
 amidst the chaos, and it is our duty to 
 watch and discern its operations. 
 
 Arsaces, who was very old, and who 
 had been appointed bishop of Constanti- 
 nople in the room of Chrysostom, died in 
 the year 405. In the next 
 year Atticus, who had been 
 a principal agent in the perse- 
 cution of Chrysostom,* suc- 
 ceeded him. He seems a 
 person extremely well adapt- 
 ed to an age and metropolis 
 of formal and decent relio-ion, neither so 
 zealous as to give offence by his animad- 
 versions, nor so dissolute as to excite 
 disgust by his immoralities. He under- 
 
 Dealh of 
 
 Arsaces, 
 bishop of 
 Constanti- 
 nople, 
 
 A. D. 405. 
 
 Stood i,mankind, had good sense ; and 
 though he had little learning,! yet he 
 
 * Coloss. ii. 
 i lb. viii. 1. 
 
 19. 
 
 f Rev. vi, 
 § lb. viii. 
 
 * It is veiT possible this expression may be 
 too strong. The authority for it rests uith 
 Palladius, p. 95. The panegyrical biographer 
 of Chrysostom might easily magnify the 
 courtly connivance of Atticus into positive 
 persecution. 
 
 f Socrates contradicts this ; he will have it, 
 that Atticus had much learning, piety, and 
 prudence. I doubt not but he was largely 
 possessed of the last quality. The considera- 
 tion of the taste and spirit of an author, will 
 explain these contradictions. Decency and 
 
Cest. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE EAST. 
 
 473 
 
 possessed the art of showing off that little 
 to the best advantage. So exquisite a 
 courtier as he, would naturally gain over 
 large numbers of the discontented ; yet 
 there were some, who chose rather to 
 meet for worship in the open helds than 
 to communicate with Atticus. This bi- 
 shop used to compose sermons, which he 
 recited from memory ; at length he ven- 
 tured to preach extempore, but he was not 
 admired from the pulpit. 
 
 Atticus was certainly a person of a 
 candid temper and beneficent disposition. 
 It had been the custom to mention with 
 honour the names of former bishops in the 
 church; and, with a view to conciliate 
 the friends of Chrysostom, he took care 
 to have his name mentioned among the 
 rest. He distributed alms to the poor of 
 other churches besides his own, and sent 
 three hundred pieces of gold to Callio- 
 pius, a presbyter of Nice, for the use of 
 such poor as were not common beggars, 
 but persons who were ashamed to beg, 
 and also for the poor of any other commu- 
 nion besides that of the general church.* 
 He said to Asclepias, bishop of the No- 
 vatians, " You are happy, who have for 
 fifty years been employ^ed in the service 
 of the church ;" and, on all occasions, he 
 behaved with kindness to these dissent- 
 ers, and very justly owned their faithful- 
 ness to the common cause of Christianity 
 in the days of Constantius and Valens. 
 Were all this liberality of sentiment and 
 practice founded on Cliristian faith and 
 love, it would doubtless be highly lauda- 
 ble in Atticus : such as he is, in virtues 
 and vices, I have represented his charac- 
 ter, and must leave him to that Being to 
 whom judgment belongs. He died in the 
 twenty-first year of his bishopric. 
 
 Durino- the reign of Theodosius the 
 younger, the son and successor of Arca- 
 dius, the Christians in Persia were per- 
 secuted grievously, says Theodoret;| 
 were kindly protected, and allowed to 
 propagate the Gospel there, says Socra- 
 tes.:}: Very circumstantial details are 
 given by both writers, perfectly conform- 
 able to this opposition of accounts. As 
 both the writers were well informed and 
 credible, I judge, that both accounts may 
 be true in different periods of the reign 
 of Isdegerdes ; and the more so, as the 
 Persian Majri mig-ht have a great share of 
 
 the king's confidence at one time, and not 
 at another. And, as the persecution was 
 occasioned by the indiscreet zeal of a 
 Christian, it is most probable, that the 
 favourable period was first m order. Ac- 
 cording to these views, the series of 
 events seems summarily to have been as 
 follows : Maruthas, bishop of Mesopo- 
 tamia, acquired the favour of the Persian 
 monarch, and, notwithstanding the fraud- 
 ulent arts of the Magi, almost persuaded 
 him to be a Christian. But toward the 
 end of his reign, a bishop, called Audas, 
 presuming probably on the royal favour, 
 destroyed one of the temples, where the 
 Persia'ns adored the fire. The action was 
 no less contrary to Christian meekness, 
 than to moral prudence, and deserves to 
 be noticed, as a warning to Christians in 
 all ages, to unite the subtilty of the 
 serpent with the innocence of the dove. 
 Isdegerdes, on the complaint of the Magi, 
 who only wanted such an advantage, 
 sent for Audas, and in soft terms com- 
 plained of the injury, and ordered him to 
 rebuild the temple. Audas refused to 
 comply, and Isdegerdes in a rage ordered 
 all the Christian churches in his dominions 
 to be destroyed. He had not himself any 
 real degree of Christian light, to enable 
 him to make allowances for the miscon- 
 duct of an individual. Nor did it ever 
 appear more plainly how unequally the 
 Church of Christ contends with the 
 world, since the mistake of one person 
 laid the foundation of a cruel persecution 
 of thirty years. Isdegerdes began it; 
 
 good sense, not much of zealous godliness, 
 appear to have been predominant in Socrates. 
 
 * Socrates, B. vii. c. 25. 
 
 + Theod. B. xi. c. 39. 4 B. vii. c. 8. 
 
 2 R 2 
 
 and his son and successor Vararanes, in- 
 infiamed by the Magi, afflicted the Chris- 
 tians with outrageous barbarity. 
 
 Tlie Magi procured orders to be issued 
 out to the chiefs of the Saracens, subjects 
 of Persia, to guard the roads, and to ap- 
 prehend all Christians, that they might 
 not fly to the Romans. Aspebetes, one 
 of those chiefs, touched with compassion 
 at their distress, on the contrary, assisted 
 them in making their escape. Being ac- 
 cused of this at the court of Persia, he 
 fled with his family to the Romans. He 
 took along with him a number of Arabs, 
 who, together with himself, received 
 Christiairbaptism, and the real church of 
 Christ probably received an accession 
 from this event. 
 
 The afflicted Christians implored the 
 aid of Theodosius, and their entreaties 
 were seconded by the humanity of Atti- 
 cus, the bishop. In the mean lime, the 
 1 Persian king sent to demand that the 
 
474 
 
 HISTORY OP 
 
 [Chap, XII, 
 
 Christian fugitives sliould be delivered 
 into his hands. To this the emperor 
 would not consent, and a war was the 
 consequence, in which, so far at least as 
 Christianity is concerned, Theodosius 
 had the advantage. An action of Aca- 
 dus, bishop of Amida, on the frontiers 
 of Persia, in the course of this war, de- 
 serves more praise than any military ex- 
 ploits whatever. The Romans* had taken 
 seven thousand prisoners, whom they 
 would not restore, and who were perish- 
 ing by famine. The Persian king was 
 much vexed at this, but knew not how 
 to relieve them. Acacius, touched with 
 the distress of the captives, assembled 
 his clergy, and spake thus to them : 
 " Our God has no need either of dishes 
 or cups; since, then, our Church has 
 many gold and silver vessels from the 
 liberality of the people, let us, by means 
 of tliem, free and relieve these captive 
 soldiers." In effect, he ordered the ves- 
 sels to be melted down, paid the ransom 
 of the Persians to the Reman soldiers, 
 gave the captives provisions and necessa- 
 ries for their journey, and sent them 
 home to their king. This was to con- 
 quer in a Christian manner. The king- 
 desired personally to make his grateful 
 acknowledgments to the bishop, who was 
 accordingly directed by Theodosius to 
 wait upon the monarch. 
 
 Theodosius had a reign of uncommon 
 length, forty-one years, though he died 
 at the age of forty-nine. He was a fee- 
 ble prince, and held the affairs of govern- 
 ment with a remiss and nefjliwent hand. 
 The public, however, was benefited by 
 the vigorous wisdom of his sister Pul- 
 clieria, who, though only two years 
 older, maintained, by meekness and dis- 
 cretion, that ascendant over him, which 
 superior capacity always gives. I have 
 no great matter before me concerning the 
 real Church of Christ at present ; and I 
 am not disposed to add one more history, 
 to the many already published, concern- 
 ing superstitious and marvellous acts, the 
 fame of which now abounded, especially 
 in the East. Let us look, tlien, at the 
 court of Constantinople a little, and see 
 if we cannot discern some dim traces at 
 least of the features of the Church. 
 
 Pulcheria devoted herself to a life of 
 virginity, before she was quite fifteen, 
 and persuaded her two sisters to do the 
 same. At sixteen she took the title of 
 
 * Socrates, B, vii. 21. 
 
 Augusta, and as she had always the pru- 
 dence to preserve her brother's honour, 
 she governed in his name with much suc- 
 cess ; for she was the only descendant of 
 the great and first Theodosius, who pos- 
 sessed any eminence of character. She 
 accustomed her brother to pray frequent- 
 ly, to honour the ministers, and to be 
 upon his guard against novelties in reli- 
 gion. He had the honour of completing 
 the destruction of idolatrous temples and 
 worship. The young emperor rose early 
 to sing with his two sisters the praise of 
 God. He had a great part of the Scrip- 
 tures by heart, and could discourse of 
 them with the bishops, like an aged mi- 
 nister.* He took great pains to collect 
 the books of Scripture and their interpre- 
 ters. His meekness and forgiveness of 
 injuries were exceedingly great. Being 
 once asked, why he never punished with 
 death those who had injured him, 
 "Would to God, he replied, I could 
 recall the dead to life." To another 
 asking him of the same thing, he said, 
 " It is an easy thing for a man to die, but 
 it belongs to God alone to recover life 
 when departed." His clemency to cri- 
 minals seems to have been excessive. In 
 compliance with the customs, he exhibit- 
 ed, but with reluctance, the shows of the 
 circus. In the midst of the exhibitions 
 there was once a dreadful tempest; in 
 consequence of which the emperor order- 
 ed the criers to warn the people, that it 
 would be much better to leave the shows, 
 and betake themselves to prayer. The 
 motion was accepted : the emperor saner 
 hymns as an example to the rest, and the 
 whole assembly gave themselves up to 
 devotion. 
 
 On occasion of good success in his 
 wars, the news arrivino- while he was 
 exhibiting shows a second time, he per- 
 suaded the people, in the same manner, 
 to leave their pleasures, and to join in 
 prayer and praise. He made a law, to 
 forbid in every city even Jews and Pa- 
 gans to attend the theatre and the circus 
 on the Lord's day, and on certain festi- 
 vals. He made laws also to prevent the 
 progress of Judaism ; but it ought to be 
 added, that he prohibited the molestation 
 of Jews or of Pagans, so long as they 
 lived peaceably under the government. 
 He reduced the penalty of death against 
 heathenism to banishment and confisca- 
 tion of goods. Such was Theodosius's 
 
 * Socrates, B. vii. 22. 
 
Cest. v.] 
 
 THE CHURCH IN THE EAST, 
 
 475 
 
 seal, ■which, if it contributed little to 
 the propagation of vital godliness, was 
 doubtless very efficacious in the promo- 
 tion of external religion. 
 
 But, notwithstanding all the enco- 
 miums lavished on this emperor, who ap- 
 pears to have truly feared God in the 
 main, it is evident, that the powers of 
 his mind partook of the childish imbeci- 
 litv of his age. A monk, to whom he had 
 refused a favour,* had the boldness to 
 excommunicate him. Theodosius was so 
 much affected, that he declared he would 
 not touch a morsel, till the excommuni- 
 cation was removed. Though informed 
 by the bishop of Constantinople, that he 
 must not regard so irregular an excom- 
 munication, he could not be easy, till the 
 monk Avas found and had restored him to 
 communion. In what bondage did con- 
 scientious persons then live ! but how 
 little reason have those to triumph over 
 them, who live without conscience, and 
 shut their eyes against the light of the 
 Gospel ! 
 
 Sisinnius succeeded Atticus at Con- 
 stantinople, by the general desire of the 
 people. He was a man of simple man- 
 ners, courteous, and exceedingly liberal 
 to the poor, a character much resembling 
 his predecessor. 
 
 The virtue of mutual forbearance be- 
 tween the general church and dissenters 
 prevailed beyond doubt at this time; the 
 prudent and moderate characters of the 
 bishops of both parties, as well as the 
 uncommon meekness of the emperor, 
 contributed much to this.f Could I add 
 to this any clear account of the internal 
 vigorous operations of divine grace, the 
 glory of the Eastern church would have 
 been seldom rivalled: but superstition 
 corroded the vitals of practical religion. 
 One remarkable event, belono-inof lo the 
 reign of Theodosius, deserves, however, 
 
 in 
 
 to be recorded : a Jewish impostor, 
 Crete, pretended that he was Moses, and 
 that he had been sent from heaven, to 
 undertake the care of the Cretian Jews, 
 and conduct them over the sea. He 
 preached a whole year in the Island, with 
 a view of inducing them to obey his di- 
 rections. He exhorted them to leave all 
 
 * Theodoret, v. 30. 
 
 f Let an instance of this be drawn from the 
 funeral of Paul, bishop of tiic Xovatians, 
 whose corpse was attended to his grave with 
 einging of psalras by Christians of all deno- 
 minalions. The man, for his holiness of life, 
 had beeu held in universal estimatiou. 
 
 their substance, and promised to conduct 
 them through the sea, as on dryland, and 
 bring them into the land of promise. 
 Numbers were so infatuated, as to ne- 
 glect their business, and leave their pos- 
 sessions to any who chose to seize them. 
 On the day fixed by the impostor, he 
 went before them, and they followed with 
 their wives and little ones. It was a me- 
 morable instance of that "blindness* 
 which has happened to Israel till the ful- 
 ness of the Gentiles be come in," and 
 fulfils the vScripture account of their penal 
 folly. When he had led them to a pro- 
 montory, he ordered them to throw them- 
 selves into the sea. None of them, it 
 seems, had the caution, to insist on big 
 setting the example. Those who were 
 at the brink of the precipice leaped down, 
 many of whom perished, partly dashed 
 against the rocks, and partly drowned ; 
 and many more would have perished, had 
 not a number of fishermen providentially 
 been present, who saved their lives. 
 These, enlightened at length by experi- 
 ence, prohibited the rest from taking the 
 leap. And they all now sought the im- 
 postor, in order to destroy him : but he 
 had made his escape. Many of the Cre- 
 tian Jews were on this occasion brought 
 over to the Christian faith. 
 
 Two controversies shook the churches 
 of the east in this reign, on which far 
 more has been written than tends to edi- 
 fication. The first was the Nestorian, 
 which was occasioned by the obstinacy 
 of Nestorius, in objecting to a common 
 phrase of the orthodox, namely, " ]Mary 
 the mother of God." He seems to have 
 regarded the union between the divine 
 and human nature of Jesus Christ rather 
 as moral than real, and to have preferred 
 the idea of a connexion between the two 
 natures to an union. As the last century 
 had been remarkable for heresies, raised 
 on the denial of the union of the three 
 Persons in the Trinity, so this was dis- 
 turbed by heresies, raised on the denial of 
 the union of the divinity and humanity of 
 the Son of God. Cyril, the bishop of 
 Alexandria, the opposer of Nestorius, 
 seems, on the whole, to have expressed 
 no more than the faith of the primitive 
 church. But the serpentine wits of the 
 East, favoured also by a lano-uage of ex- 
 quisite subtilty and copiousness, found no 
 end in cavilling. Eutyches, the monk, 
 raised a second heresy, which denied the 
 
 Rom. 
 
476 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIII. 
 
 existenc. of two natures in the person of 
 Jesus Christ. This extreme is opposite 
 to that of Nestorius. How indecently 
 and fiercely these controversies were agi- 
 tated, how very little of practical godli- 
 ness was applied to them by any party, 
 and how much the peace of the church 
 was rent, is well known. It belongs only 
 to my purpose, and it is all the good 
 which I can find in general to have re- 
 sulted from the contests, to mention, that 
 the doctrines of Scripture were stated by 
 the two councils of Ephesus and Chalce- 
 don, and by the writings of those who 
 were most esteemed in the church at that 
 time. Such was the provident care of 
 Christ over his Church, in the preserva- 
 tion of the fundamental truths relating to 
 his person, and the union of the two na- 
 tures in it, that all attempts to remove 
 them from the mind by explaining them 
 according to men's own imaginations, 
 were subverted; and the doctrine was 
 transmitted safe to the Church in after 
 ages, as the food and nourishment of 
 humble and self-denying souls. The 
 writings of Leo, bishop of Rome, are de- 
 servedly admired for their strength and 
 perspicuity in clearing up this subject. 
 
 Theodosius died in the year 450. His 
 sister Pulcheria remaining sole mistress 
 of the Eastern empire, gave herself in 
 
 marriage, for political reasons, 
 A. D. 450. ^Q Marcian, whom she made 
 emperor; nor does it appear that her reli- 
 gious virtues suffered any diminution till 
 her death. Both Marcian and Pulcheria 
 were as eminent for Christian piety as a 
 superstitious age permitted persons of 
 their exalted stations to be ; and Marcian, 
 who survived, died at the age of sixty- 
 
 five, in the year 457, renown- 
 A. D. 457. g^ £qj, j^jg services to religion 
 
 The preservation of orthodoxy, the en- 
 couragement of good morals, and the de- 
 struction of idolatry, were his favourite 
 objects. 
 
 Of his successor Leo, it is remarkable, 
 that he forbad any judiciary proceedings 
 on the Lord's day, or any plays and games. 
 
 This law bears date 469. At 
 A. D. 469. gQ ij^tg a pgjjo(j £ii^ the f^jH 
 
 observance of the most ancient of all di- 
 vine institutions receive the sanction of 
 human authority!* The same year he 
 made a law against Simony, requiring 
 men to be promoted to the episcopal of- 
 fice without their own choice, and de- 
 
 * See Genesis ii. 
 
 daring those, who are active in their en- 
 deavours for the promotion, to be un- 
 worthy of the office. 
 
 Gennadius, archbishop of Constantino- 
 ple, died about the year 473. p ,. 
 The most remarkable thing I ,y,^^ 
 find in him is, that he never . r* 47-3 
 ordained any clergymen who 
 could not repeat the Psalter without 
 book. 
 
 But I am disgusted with the prospect. 
 It grows worse in the East to the end of 
 the century. Doctrinal feuds and mar 
 lignant passions involve the whole. Pos- 
 sibly in the view of some private and ob- 
 scure scenes in the next Chapter, the 
 reader may find something more worthy 
 of his attention. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 CHRISTIAN WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The great luminary of the fifth century 
 has been copiously reviewed. The great- 
 est praise of some of the rest is, that they 
 illustrated and defended the evangelical 
 views of faith and practice through him 
 revived ; yet amidst the gloom of super- 
 stition we may discover several rays of 
 godliness, even among persons who had 
 never read the bishop of Hippo. 
 
 Mark,* the hermit, lived about the be- 
 ginning of this century. He wrote on the 
 spiritual life, and describes the conflicts 
 and labours of men truly serious for eter- 
 nity. Many of the ascetical or mystic 
 writers are tarnished with Semi-Pelagian- 
 ism. Mark is in the main a humble ad- 
 vocate for the doctrines of grace, and 
 feels the depravity and helplessness of 
 human nature. He describes views of 
 the spirituality of the Law and the grace 
 of the Gospel; and, amidst all his care to 
 promote practical godliness, he protests 
 against the idea of our being justified by 
 our works, as a very dangerous notion. I 
 regret that I can communicate no more of 
 such a man. Even of his country I can 
 find no account, except that he belonged 
 to the Eastern church. 
 
 Theophilus, bishop of Alexandria, the 
 unrighteous persecutor of Chrysostom, 
 does not deserve a place in this list, on 
 account of his writings, which are futile, 
 
 * See Du Pin, from whom I derive particu- 
 lar inforraatioa on subjects of this nature. 
 
CE^r. v.] 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 477 
 
 and breathe a worldly spirit. But a re- 
 flection he made at the hour of his death 
 may merit the attention of political and 
 ambitions dignitaries of the church. 
 " How happy," said he, " art thou, 
 Arsenius, to have had always this hour 
 before thine eyes !" which shows, said a 
 writer of that time, that monks who re- 
 tire from the world to mourn in the wilder- 
 ness, die more peaceably than bishops, 
 who go out of their dioceses to disturb 
 the peace of the church by caballing at 
 court. It seems, Theophilus had lived, 
 as if he were never to die. 
 
 Paulinus, of Nola, if not one of the 
 most learned, was one of the most humble 
 and pious writers of his time. He was 
 ■p y born at Bourdeaux about the 
 
 of Nola y^''^ ^^^' ^^ ^^^ ^ classical 
 born ' Style and taste, and being of 
 A D 45" ^^ illustrious familj'', had ad- 
 vanced to the greatest digni- 
 ties oi the empire. He married Therasia, 
 a rich lady, by whom he obtained a great 
 estate. It pleased God to inspire his 
 wife with the love of heavenly things, 
 and she had great influence in inducing 
 her husband to prefer a retired life before 
 the grandeur of the world. In the prose- 
 cution of this scheme there was as much 
 of genuine piety, and as little of supersti- 
 tion as in any saints of these times. He 
 gradually parted with his wealth, and ob- 
 served in one of his epistles, tliat it was 
 to little purpose for a man to give up his 
 worldly wealth, except he denied him- 
 self; and that a man might renounce the 
 world heartily, who did not part with all 
 his riches. The people of Barcelona in 
 Spain, where he lived in retirement, con- 
 ceived so great an esteem for him, that 
 they insisted on his ordination. He writes 
 thus on the occasion to a friend : " On 
 Christmas-day," said he, " the people 
 obliged me to receive the order of priest- 
 hood, against my will : not that I have 
 any aversion to the office ; on the contrary, 
 I could have wished to have begun at the 
 porter's order, and so have gradually risen 
 into the clerical ; I submitted, however, 
 to Christ's yoke, and am now engaged in 
 a ministrj' beyond my merit and strength. 
 — I can scarcely yet comprehend the 
 weight of that dignity ; I tremble, when 
 I consider its importance, conscious as I 
 am of my own weakness: but he that 
 giveth wisdom to the simple, and out of 
 the mouths of sucklings perfects praise, 
 is able to accomplish his work in me, to 
 ^ve me his grace, and to make me 
 
 worthy, whom he called when un- 
 worthy."* 
 
 After this he lived sixteen years at 
 Nola, in privacy, where at length he was 
 ordained bishop in 409. The „ 
 
 incursions of the Goths dis- J^»"l'"u^ 
 , , , . ^ . , ordained 
 
 turbed hmi lor some time ; and bisliop 
 
 on this occasion it was that . ^^ !„ 
 , 1 • ,1 *i .. A. D. 409. 
 
 he prayed m the manner that 
 
 his friend Augustine tells us, that the 
 Lord would not suffer him to be tormented 
 on account of worldly goods, as he had 
 long been weaned from them in his affec- 
 tions. It pleased God, that after the as- 
 sault of Nola by the Goths -qj ^ 
 was over, he peaceably en- ^_ ^t. 431. 
 joyed his bishopric till his 
 death in 431. 
 
 This holy person was intimately ac- 
 quainted with Alipius, bishop of Tagasta, 
 whom we have already celebrated as 
 the townsman and friend of Augustinev 
 Through this connexion he became ac- 
 quainted with the writings of the bishop 
 of Hippo, which were peculiarly adapt- 
 ed to the taste of one, who, like Paulinus, 
 knew what indwelling sin means. Hence 
 arose a very peculiar friendship between 
 the two bishops, cemented by their com- 
 mon interest in the privileges and doc- 
 trines of the Gospel. 
 
 His letter to Amandus gives an excel- 
 lent view of his divinity, which illustrates 
 both from the Old and New Testament, 
 much after the manner of the bishop of 
 Hippo. In writing to Delphinus, who 
 had been dangerously sick, he speaks of 
 the benefit of afflictions to the righteous, 
 as they exercise their godliness, keep 
 them from pride, and imprint in them the 
 fear of divine justice, which will dread- 
 fully confound the ungodly, since it so 
 severely chastises the righteous. 
 
 Paulinus was intimate with Sulpi- 
 
 * This iiumble and serious language is the 
 obvious effect of a spirit truly conscientious, 
 deeply sensible of the holiness of God, and its 
 own unworlhiness. Tiiere is not any thing, in 
 wiiich primitive piety appears to more advan- 
 tage, wlien compared to modern religion, than 
 in a review of men's conduct witli respect to 
 the pastoral office. In our times it frequently 
 iiappens, that youths, who have really a reli- 
 gious cast, fancy themselves adequate to the 
 most important of all offices, before they hare 
 attained liie age of twenty. Parents also too 
 ofien look on tlieir dullest children, as compe- 
 tent to the sacred function ; and it is much to 
 be feared, that worldly lucre is the spring that 
 animates many to press into the ministry, who 
 never had any charity for their own souls. 
 
478 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XIII. 
 
 cias Severus, the historian, who was a 
 priest of Agen, a person of noble birth, 
 fine talents, and much superstition; a 
 disciple of Martin of Tours. That he 
 could unite so much elegance of the Ro- 
 man language with so much childishness 
 of thought, forms one of those inconsis- 
 tencies, which abound in human nature. 
 And yet there want not here and there in 
 his History marks of good judgment, and 
 every where a spirit ofjpiety prevails. 
 Paulinus, comparing Sulpicius's conver- 
 sion with his own, prefers that of his 
 friend, " because, said he, in one of his 
 letters, he had at once shaken off the 
 yoke of sin, and broken the bands of flesh 
 and blood in the flower of his agfe ; and 
 at a time when he was renowned at the 
 bar, and in the career of worldly honour, 
 he despised human greatness, that he 
 might follow Jesus Christ, and preferred 
 the preaching of fishermen before all the 
 pieces of Ciceronian eloquence." 
 
 Severus had desired to have Paulinus's 
 picture. The bishop of Nola refused, 
 and called his request a piece of folly. 
 He takes occasion, however, to give a 
 picture of his own heart. Here is one 
 passage of it, much admired by Augus- 
 tine:* "How should I dare to give you 
 my picture, who am altogether like the 
 earthly man, and by my conduct repre- 
 sent the carnal person? On every side 
 shame oppresses me. I am ashamed to 
 have my picture drawn as I am, and I 
 dare not consent to have it made other- 
 wise. I hate what I am, and I am not 
 what I would wish to be. But what 
 avails it me, wretched man, to have evil 
 and love good, since I am what I hate, and 
 sloth hinders me from endeavouring to do 
 what I love 1 1 find myself at war with my- 
 self, and am torn by an intestine conflict. 
 The flesh fights against the spirit, and the 
 spirit against the flesh. The law of the 
 body opposes the law of the spirit. Wo 
 is me, because I have not taken away the 
 taste of the poisoned tree, by that of the 
 saving cross. The poison communicated 
 to all men from our first parent by his 
 sin yet abideth in me."f 
 
 In a letter to Florentius, bishop of Ca- 
 hors, the reader may perhaps find an ob- 
 jection obviated, which might arise from 
 the last article, namely, How can a man 
 who finds himself so miserable, enjoy 
 any consolation'? "Jesus Christ, says he, 
 is the rock containing that spring of liv- 
 ing water, which we happily find not far 
 from us, when we are very thirsty in this 
 world : this is that which refreshes us, 
 and prevents us from being consumed by 
 the heat of concupiscence. This is the 
 rock on which the house is founded, that 
 shall never fall. This is the rock, which 
 being opened at the side, casts out water 
 and blood, to make us taste of two whole- 
 some fountains, the water of grace, and 
 the blood of the sacrament, which proves 
 at once both the source and the price of our 
 salvation." 
 
 In another letter to Augustine, he dis- 
 courses on the felicity of the saints after 
 the resurrection : " All their employment 
 shall then be, to praise God everlasting- 
 ly, and to give him continual thanks." 
 
 This holy bishop was the delight of 
 his age. He led a retired and temperate 
 life, but with no great austerity, singu- 
 larly remarkable for the tenderness of 
 his conscience, the meekness of his spirit, 
 and a constant sense of his own imbecil- 
 ity, and of the need of divine grace. 
 
 Isidore, of Pelusium in Egypt, spent 
 his whole life in the monastic state, and 
 he did honour to a course of life by no 
 means the wisest. He lived in the prac- 
 tice of serious piety, and by a number of 
 letters which he has left, he appears to 
 have known the world much better, and 
 to have been more useful to the Church, 
 and to society, than might have been ex- 
 pected from a monk. 
 
 He observes on the Holy Scriptures, 
 that there is a divine wisdom in ordering 
 some things to be very plain, and others 
 obscure, at once to encourage our investi- 
 gation, and to check our presumption. 
 He gives good rules for the exposition of 
 
 * Ep. 86 of Aug. 
 
 +A11 diis is the peculiar language of a Chris- 
 tian, arising from just views of indwelling sin 
 in its nature and its constant influence. Paul- 
 inas describes from the heart such things as 
 none but a truly enlightened mind can know 
 for original sin is not known at all, except by 
 experience. I need not say to the evangelized 
 reader, how consonant this language is to that 
 
 of the best men in the Old Testament, and ia 
 the New. And although decent Pharisees 
 may be inclined to think it excessive, I will 
 add, that it is even too faint for the occasion. 
 Every real Christian knows that no words can 
 sufficiently describe the strength of internal 
 corruption. Hence humility, the faith of 
 Christ, the preciousness of the Gospel to the 
 mind, and all the true holiness which is exer- 
 cised under the sun ; and uniformly it appears, 
 that men who know the most of native wick- 
 edness, are the most holy in their lives and 
 conversations. 
 
Ce:tt. v.] 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 479 
 
 Scripture, guards against the fanciful 
 interpretations of concise expressions, 
 where the connexion has not been consi- 
 dered, and teaches us not to attempt to 
 draw the mysteries of the Gospel from 
 every passage of the Old Testament. 
 He agrees with the orthodox in the great 
 doctrines of the Gospel ; his views of 
 divine grace are sound in the main, but 
 escape not the taint of Semi-Pelagianism, 
 which seems to have prevailed over the 
 Eastern church: the doctrine of the Afri- 
 can luminary never making any great 
 progress among the Greek churches. 
 
 His conduct on occasion of the Nesto- 
 rian controversy was admirable. He en- 
 deavoured to heal the ferocious spirits of 
 the disputants, and condemned the tem- 
 pers of those, whose doctrines he yet ad- 
 mitted to be sound. 
 
 The great excellence of this writer is 
 his practical rules. For a specimen, take 
 his advice to a physician who lived 
 wickedly. " You profess a science re- 
 quiring much wisdom ; but you act incon- 
 sistently: you cure small wounds for 
 others, and heal not your own distem- 
 pers, which are great and dangerous. 
 — - - ?j 
 
 Cassian 
 die iVIonk, 
 
 Begin at home 
 
 Cassian was a monk from his child- 
 hood, and spent the latter part of his life 
 at Marseilles. He has been 
 before mentioned as the fa- 
 ther of Semi-Pelagianism. 
 His plausible views of moderation led 
 him into inextricable confusion. He al- 
 lows that grace is necessary even for the 
 beginning of faith. Yet he affirms that 
 man can naturally choose good, but needs 
 grace to accomplish it. He thinks that 
 sometimes grace, and sometimes the will 
 of man, is the first mover. The cases of 
 St. Paul and St. Matthew seem to him 
 to illustrate the first position ; those of 
 Zaccheus and the penitent thief the se- 
 cond. In such endless jargon is a sensi- 
 ble man involved, while he vainly mixes 
 opposite things, and forgets the Scripture 
 declaration, "if by grace, then is it no 
 more of works; otherwise grace is no 
 more grace." Yet his system has since 
 been adopted by many of the more decent 
 sort of Christian professors, and will, 
 whatever may be said, recommend itself 
 to all of them, who are unacquainted 
 with the entire depravity of human na- 
 ture. In him, Semi-Pelaofianism found 
 a very powerful guardian, because his 
 learning and morals were unquestionably 
 respectable. And it happens in this case, 
 
 that a system which discovers its ab- 
 surdity and extreme inconsistency to 
 every man endued with any real deorree of 
 self-knowledge, exhibits a most plausi- 
 ble appearance in theory, and seems 
 to shun the opposite rocks of self-righ- 
 teousness and Antinomianism. So it 
 pretends;* "but wisdom is justified of 
 her children." 
 
 CoELESTiNE, bishop of Romo, has al- 
 ready been noticed as supporting Pros- 
 per and Hilary, disciples of Augustine in 
 Gaul, against the intrusions of Semi-P^ 
 lagianism. He reproved those 
 French bishops who favoured ^.'e'estine 
 ,, 1 i • cm • J bishop of 
 
 the doctrines ot Cassian, and j^g^g 
 
 he published some articles 
 concerning grace, of which a summary 
 has already been given. The earnestness 
 of his manner shows that he felt what he 
 said ; and his testimony to the bishop of 
 Hippo deserves to be recorded. " We 
 have always had Augustine, of blessed 
 memory, in our communion, whose life 
 and merit is well knovv'n ; his fame hath 
 been unblemished, and his knowledo-e is 
 so indisputable, that my predecessors 
 have looked upon him as one of the most 
 excellent teachers of the Church. All 
 
 * Cassian wrote monastic rules and institu- 
 tions, in which he teaches " for doctrines the 
 commanilments of men." He instructs tlie 
 poor monks in their duties of implicit sub- 
 mission, and of voluntary humility, by which 
 their understanding would rather be enslaved, 
 than any true mortification of sin acquire<L 
 In notliing does the system of Augustine tri- 
 umpli moi-e sensibly over that of Cassian, 
 than in this point of view. I conceive these 
 two men both engaged in the design of leading 
 men to a holy life. Witii superstition they 
 both were infected. But in Cassian the fasl>- 
 ionable evil prevails, reduces itself into a sys- 
 tem, and leads the devotees into a tedious 
 number of artificial externals, with an inten- 
 tion to break the human will, and force it into 
 something like virtue. What for instance, 
 can be more absurd than his directions to the 
 young probationer, to sulyect himself absolute- 
 ly to tlie will of his sujjerior in the convent ? 
 To submit to orders in a manner impossible 
 to be executed, to endure hardships and cross- 
 es, without any reason biU the arbitrary will 
 of a master? Follies which, in the papacy, 
 have continued for ages after. But see Au- 
 gustine. His system leads him to stem a tor- 
 rent of superstition : to attempt, at least, to 
 emancipate Christians from the yoke of boniW 
 age : to teach true, not fictitious, internal, not 
 merely external, humility : to lead the soul to 
 Christ, to instruct men in love, to enforce 
 Christian practice from spiritual motiTesrin 
 fine, to aim at purity of heart, and heavenly- 
 mindedness. 
 
480 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chip. XID. 
 
 orthodox Christians have ever thought 
 well of him ; and he hath heen generally 
 reverenced through the whole world." — 
 The church of Rome, though at this time 
 much degenerated from primitive purity, 
 must not, however, be deemed antichris- 
 tian, while the doctrines of Christ were 
 supported in it. And though secular am- 
 bition was gradually making its way 
 among her bishops, yet some of them 
 were real good men and faithful pastors; 
 and I am willing to believe that Cceles- 
 tine was of the number. 
 
 See the zeal and uprightness of this 
 bishop, in the subject of episcopal ordi- 
 nation. A person, named Daniel, who 
 had come from the East, retired into 
 France. The monastery where he lived 
 accused him of scandalous crimes. Yet 
 he had the address to get himself ordain- 
 ed a bishop in that country. Coelestine, 
 in vain, had endeavoured to prevent this. 
 He blames the bishop who had ordained 
 him, and declares, that he had lost the 
 episcopal dignity himself by ordaining one 
 so unworthy. It does not appear that he 
 fulminated a degree of excommunication 
 against him. The superior dignity of 
 the bishop of Rome in the Western world 
 was hitherto rather founded on the opu- 
 lence of the see, and the civil importance 
 of the city of Rome, than on any positive 
 claims of dominion. Ccelestine's conduct 
 was more like that of a Christian bishop 
 than of a pope. He found fault with the 
 conduct of the hierarchy in France, in 
 raising at once to the episcopal office* 
 laymen who had not gone through the 
 several gradations of the priesthood. He| 
 DECREES, that when a bishop is to be 
 chosen, the clergy of the same church, 
 whose characters are known, and who 
 have deserved well, be preferred to 
 strange and unknown clergymen ; that a 
 bishop be not imposed on any people 
 against their consent, but that the votes 
 and agreement of the clergy, people, and 
 magistrates, be followed ; that no clergy- 
 man be chosen out of another diocese, 
 when there is any one in the same church 
 fit to be ordained bishop. 
 
 * Fleury, B. xxiv. 56. 
 
 f I use rehictantly the word Decree, lie- 
 cause for some time the admonitions oF ihe 
 Lishop of Rome had gone by the name of De- 
 cretals ; though certainly as yet, bishops, out 
 of Italy at least, were not under his jurisdic- 
 tion. However, the imperative style of the 
 Roman bishops at this time is indefensible, 
 and intimates the too great growth of their 
 power. 
 
 The same soundness of judgment which 
 led Coelestine to oppose interested ordi- 
 nations, and the undue interference of se- 
 cular ambition, induced him also to op- 
 pose the democratic spirit, as appears 
 from his letter to the bishops of Calabria 
 and Apulia, whom he forbids to ordain 
 laymen bishops on the demand of the peo- 
 ple. " When this demand is against the 
 rules of the Church, it should never be 
 complied with."* 
 
 The three contemporary Greek histo- 
 rians, who continued ecclesiastical his- 
 tory, Avhere Eusebius ended, through the 
 fourth and part of the fifth century, are 
 Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret of 
 Cyrus. I have made use of them all 
 along, and find them particularly service- 
 able, where I have not the much more 
 satisfactory lights of the fathers them- 
 selves, Avhose transactions are recorded. 
 The first is doubtless a judicious writer, 
 remarkable for his candour to the Nova- 
 tians, and for a generous peaceable tem- 
 per. Neither he nor Sozomen furnish us 
 with sufficient documents, from which a 
 decisive judgment of their own personal 
 characters may be formed. The latter is 
 less judicious, and very fond of monks. 
 The third, however, surpasses 
 all men in admiration of mo- P''^'"^'^^^'^ 
 nastic institutions, and is ere- a^,.^^ 
 dulous beyond measure in 
 subjects of that nature. Yet was he 
 himself one of the most learned and best 
 men in the Eastern church. His pacific 
 conduct displeased the bigots, during the 
 noise of the Nestorian and Eutychian 
 controversies. It is evident, that his own 
 views were orthodox ; hut because he in- 
 clined to healing methods, he 
 was condemned at one of the Conderan- 
 synods, and was not without |' '", 'r 
 difnculty remstated. Hear Ephesus, 
 him speak in his letter to 
 Leo of Rome, which will give us an epi- 
 tome of his character and story.f " I 
 have been a bishop these twent}''-six 
 years without reproach. I have brought 
 over to the Church above a thousand 
 Marcionites and many Arians. There is 
 not now an heretic in the eight hundred 
 parishes of my diocese. Often have I 
 been assaulted with stones, and have sus- 
 
 * Coelestine succeeded Boniface I., A. D. 
 423: died in 432. He sent Deputies to the 
 tliird General Council held at Ephesus, in 
 June 431. 
 
 t P'leury, xxvii. 44. 
 
/EXT, 
 
 v.] 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 481 
 
 tained combats with Pagans and Jews. — 
 Restored Reject not, I beseech you, 
 at tlie ^y humble prayer, nor de- 
 
 Fourth spise my old age, loaded with 
 
 General disgrace, after so many la- 
 Council hours. — God is my witness, 
 heul at iIjjj^ j am not concerned for 
 
 Chalcedon , , . 
 
 A D 4"1 '^^y *^^^'" honour, but on ac- 
 count of the scandal given, 
 and lest several of the ignorant, and par- 
 ticularly of the converted heretics, should 
 look on me as heretical, seeing the autho- 
 rity of those who have condemned me ; 
 and without considering that for so many 
 years of my episcopacy, I have neither 
 acquired house, nor land, nor money, but 
 have embraced a voluntary poverty." 
 
 He was born at Antioch, in the year 
 386, and ordained bishop of Cyrus, a 
 Th H • t '^^^y of Syria, by the bishop of 
 born at Antioch, about the year 420. 
 
 Antioch, The inhabitants spake chiefly 
 A. D. S86. the Syriac tongue, few of 
 Ordained them understood Greek ; and 
 bishop of heathenish ignorance prevail- 
 Cyrus, pjj among them. The most 
 
 A. D.420. shining part of Theodoret's 
 character appeared in his pastoral employ- 
 ments. He laboured, and suffered for the 
 love of Christ, and was often in danger of 
 his life from the rage of the multitude. 
 But God gave success to his endeavours 
 in the mariner stated above, and he found, 
 what persevering pastors often find, the 
 love of his people to attend him at his 
 latter end. He resided constantly in his 
 diocese, and no doubt was signally useful 
 in it, by preaching and by example. 
 When called, which was but seldom, by 
 the superior bishop or patriarch of Anti- 
 och, to attend his synod, he went and 
 preached on those occasions at Antioch in 
 a manner that left a deep impression. All 
 the time he was bishop, he had no suits 
 at law with any man, nor did he or his 
 clergy ever appear at the judgment-seats. 
 His" liberality was unbounded; and in 
 every part of Christian morals he appears 
 to have exhibited that peculiar spirit 
 which none but true Christians are able 
 to do. 
 
 Tlie authority of Leo, bishop of Rome, 
 was of service to him in the persecution 
 before spoken of; and he died peaceably 
 in his bishopric ; though calumny and 
 prejudice after his death prevailed so far 
 as to procure his condemnation in the 
 time of .Tustinian. His works are large, 
 on a variety of subjects ; but they speak 
 not for him equally with his life ; and it 
 
 Vol. I. 2 S 
 
 will be sufficient to say, that his theology, 
 with a strong mixture of superstition, 
 was of the same kind as that of Chrysos- 
 tom. But his spirit was humble, hea- 
 venly, charitable ; and he seems to have 
 walked in the faith, hope, and love, of 
 the Gospel, a shining ornament in a dark 
 age and country. 
 
 Leo, bishop of Rome, was one of the 
 greatest men of his time. In secular 
 affairs, his successful negotiations have 
 already been noticed. In the 
 church, it must be owned that Leo made 
 he took much pains concern- bishop of 
 ing matters of discipline ; l^o"**^* 
 that so fir as appears from A. D. 440. 
 circumstances, he supported 
 the cause of truth and uprightness in ge- 
 neral, though with a constant attention 
 to the amplification of the Roman See. 
 Antichrist was not yet risen to its sta- 
 ture; but was growing apace. He at- 
 tempted to extend his influence in France, 
 but met with a firm resistance. The ce- 
 libacy of the clergy was more strictly en- 
 forced by him than by any bishop of 
 Rome before. Yet, in Christian doctrine 
 he was not only evangelical in general, 
 but also in a very elaborate and perspi- 
 cuous manner, so as to evince the pains 
 he had taken to understand the Scriptures. 
 His letter to the Eastern churches, on the 
 divine and human nature of Christ, is 
 allowed to have been remarkably scriptu- 
 ral. He opposed Pelagianism with much 
 zeal ; he detected the evasions of its de- 
 fenders, who made grace the effect of 
 human merits ; and he resolved every 
 thing into the grace of God in so full and 
 clear a manner, that if his own heart was 
 influenced by the sentiments which he 
 espoused, he must have been a humble, 
 holy Christian. But his piety was not 
 so unquestionable as his capacity and ac- 
 curacy of sentiment. Candour, however, 
 will rather mcline to impute what is sus- 
 picious in his conduct, to the times, than 
 to his disposition. Leo justly reproved 
 the great and scandalous violations of 
 order and decorum in the African ordina- 
 tions of bishops, which preceded the in- 
 vasion of Genseric. And he has left us 
 several decrees, from which the reader 
 may collect what were the ancient ideas 
 of pastoral and ecclesiastical discipline. 
 
 " What, says this prelate, can be the 
 meaning of laying hands suddenly on 
 any man ; but the conferring of priests' 
 orders on persons of whose worth we are 
 ignorant, — ^before we have had time to 
 
482 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 try them; before they have approved 
 themselves competent by their industry, 
 and have given some tokens of knowledge 
 and experience]" 
 
 He is of opinion, that pastors should 
 have passed through all the inferior 
 orders, and have exercised them for 
 some time, before they be appointed 
 bishops. 
 
 He declares, that those who have not 
 been chosen by the clergy, nor desired 
 by the people, nor ordained by the bish- 
 ops of the province, with the consent of 
 the metropolitan, are not to be accounted 
 bishops. 
 
 " He ought to be chosen bishop, v/ho 
 is chosen by the clergy and people. In 
 case their judgment be divided, the me- 
 tropolitan should prefer him who is of 
 greatest worth, and hath most votes. But 
 no man should be appointed bishop whom 
 the people refuse." 
 
 " He, who would go from one church 
 to another, out of contempt of his ow^n, 
 shall be deprived both of that which he 
 hath, and of that which he would have ; 
 that he may neither preside over those 
 whom, through avarice, he hath desired, 
 nor those whom, through pride, he hath 
 despised." 
 
 Bishop Leo himself preached and fed 
 his flock at Rome; and a number of his] 
 sermons are yet extant. The faith of the 
 church, concerning the union of the di- 
 vine and human nature in the person of 
 Christ, was not neglected in the course 
 of his ministry. This was still the pre- 
 vailing doctrine, notwithstanding the 
 subtil and manifold opposition made to 
 it. Leo himself was one of the ablest 
 instruments of its vindication ; and whe- 
 ther it is probable that he was so only in 
 a speculative manner, let the reader judge 
 from the following passage of his ninth 
 sermon on the Nativity. "For unless 
 faith believe, that both substances were 
 united in one person, language explains 
 it not ; and therefore matter for divine 
 praise never fails, because the abilities 
 of him who praises never suffice. Let us 
 rejoice, then, that we are unequal to 
 speak of so great a mystery of our mer- 
 cy; and when we are not able to draw- 
 forth the depth of our salvation, let us 
 feel that it is good for us to be vanquish- 
 ed in our researches. For no 
 Leo dies, man more approaches to the 
 A. D. 461. knowledge of the truth, than 
 he who imderstands, that in 
 divine things, though he makes much 
 
 proficiency, something always remains 
 for him to investigate." 
 
 Hilary, bishop of Aries,* was the 
 successor of Honoratus in that see. The 
 latter was abbot of the monastery of 
 Lerins,f an isle of France, 
 famous in those days for its Hilary, 
 monks. He took pains to bishop of 
 draw Hilary into serious Aries. 
 Christianity, which in these times was 
 too much connected with the monastic 
 life. Honoratus himself was afterwards 
 chosen bishop of Aries, and his disciple 
 Hilary was unanimously elected to suc- 
 ceed him. Hilary has left us the Life of 
 Honoratus ; in which he vindicates the 
 custom of writing encomiums on deceas- 
 ed holy men. He says, with a happy 
 inconsistency, for he must be considered 
 as a Semi-Pelagian, " God is praised in 
 his saints, as all their worth and excel- 
 lency ought to be imputed to the Author 
 of Grace." An excellent sentiment, and 
 truly Christian! Let it only be firmly 
 and consistently maintained, and let it 
 influence the heart; men then must be 
 humble, the grace of Christ must engage 
 their whole dependence ; and they, who 
 hold in sentiment the doctrines of Cassian, 
 will only be found to be illogically de- 
 fective in their arguments, not unsound 
 in their practical views. However, the 
 fashionable prevalence of the sentiments 
 of Cassian in France, and the plausible 
 support which they received from several 
 highly respected characters, besides Hi- 
 lary of Aries, would no doubt have a 
 pernicious effect on the minds of the next 
 generation. 
 
 No fault can be found with Hilary's 
 writing the life of a saint. But the man- 
 ner of his doing it, though unhappily by 
 no means singular, is to be blamed. 
 With him, Honoratus is all excellency, 
 and looks more like an angel than a man. 
 Suffice it just to mention the circum- 
 stances of his exit. He fell into a lan- 
 guishing distemper, which yet hindered 
 him not from executing his priestly office. 
 He preached in the church in the year 
 
 * This is not the Hilary, who, in conjunction 
 with Prosper, supported in France the doctrine 
 of Augustine, concerning grace. His sentiments 
 approach more to Semi-Pelagianism; yet he de- 
 serves a place in these memoirs, because he held, 
 implicitly at least, the fundamentals of divine 
 truth; was truly humble and pious; and evi- 
 denced to all men. that he was a sincere member 
 of the Churr^h of Christ. 
 
 + Now called St. Honorat, or Ilonore de Le- 
 rin. 
 
Cejtt. v.] 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 483 
 
 Honoratas 
 dies, 
 
 A. D. 429. 
 
 429, but his disease increasino-, he died 
 a few days after, Hilary bears 
 witness to the piety of his 
 last hours, having' been pre- 
 sent with him. 
 The Life of Hilary himself is written, 
 it is supposed, by Honoratus,* bishop of 
 Marseilles, with the same partial exag- 
 gerations. Yet some circumstances are 
 mentioned which bear strong marks of 
 credibility. He often admonished in pri- 
 vate the governor of the city, whose con- 
 duct had been very faulty, and seeing him 
 one day come into church with his guards, 
 he brake off in the midst of his discourse, 
 and said, that those, who disregarded 
 private admonitions, were unworthy ofj 
 public. It is recorded, to the praise of 
 this bishop, that, though he knew how 
 to address the most polished auditory, 
 and occasionally showed great literary 
 powers, he could, however, adapt him- 
 self in the plainest manner to the appre- 
 hensions of the vulgar : a rare, but pre- 
 cious talent of a preacher, and surely 
 more dependent on the heart than the 
 head. The labours of this holy person 
 were very great, and in preaching he was 
 so zealous, that he was obliged to check 
 himself by a sign agreed on, lest he 
 should carry his discourse to too great a 
 length. Prosper candidly allows, that 
 his life and death were holj". Leo, of 
 Rome, who had an unhappy quarrel with 
 him in his lifetime, spake ho- 
 nourably of him after his 
 death. I have only to regret 
 that I have it not in my power 
 to gratify the reader with more 
 particulars of the labours and works of 
 so pious a man, and so zealous a preacher. 
 ViNCENTius, of the same monastery of 
 Lerins, was likewise renowned for his 
 piety. He left behind him a 
 treatise on the marks of here- 
 sy. With him, besides the 
 testimony of Scripture, uni- 
 versality and antiquit}^ are 
 added as essential and concurring requi- 
 sites of the evidence of orthodoxy ; and 
 though popery can b^'no means stand the 
 test of these, (for it had not as yet pro- 
 perly existed in the church,) it has not- 
 withstanding availed itself of his rules, 
 and pressed them into her service. 
 E'leh erius EucHERius, of Lyons, is 
 Bp. of another of the same stamp, 
 
 Lyons, and his excellent life and 
 
 Hilary 
 died, 
 
 A. D. 449. 
 
 Vincen 
 tius of 
 Lerins. 
 
 See page 484 of this Vol. 
 
 death are attested by Pros- A. D. 434. 
 per. Died, 450. 
 
 Prosper, of Ries in Aquitain, was a 
 layman who distinguished himself in this 
 century in the defence of the doctrines of 
 grace. He largely extracted from Au- 
 gustine's works the fundamentals of his 
 positions ; and wrote with much earnest- 
 ness a defence of them. He was enu-ao-- 
 ed in a laboured controversy with the 
 Semi-Pelagians in France ; but contro- 
 vers}', managed with a spirit like his, 
 serious, candid, and argumentative, not 
 abusive and censorious, and conversant 
 on topics of real importance, is an advan- 
 tage, not a detriment to the cause of true 
 religion. He bears a cheerful testimony 
 to the solid piety of several of his oppo- 
 nents in France, as we have seen already, 
 and appears only zealous for divine truths, 
 and not for any particular party. It was 
 an advantage to the truth revived by Au- 
 gustine, that under the cautious and ju- 
 dicious management of Prosper, it was 
 cleared of objections and explained, and 
 rescued from aspersions, without losing 
 any thing of its sterling purit)^ Of Pros- 
 per himself, I can say nothing; except 
 that his writings speak for his piety, hu- 
 mility and integrity. Suffice it to give 
 two or three quotations,* one of %vhich 
 obviates the most specious objections 
 that have been made to the sentiments of 
 Augustine : " Setting aside that distinc- 
 tion which the divine knowledge confines 
 within the secret of eternal justice, we 
 ought most sincerely to believe and pro- 
 fess, that God would have all men to be 
 saved ; since the apostle, whose sentence 
 this is, most earnestly directs, what in 
 all churches is most purely observed, that 
 prayer be made to God for all men, 
 whence, that many perish, is the desert 
 of those who perish ; that many are sav- 
 ed, is the gift of the Saviour, f 
 
 " Let human debility, says he, ac^ 
 knowledge itself, and the condemned 
 succession of all generations in the first 
 man ; and when (he dead are quickened, 
 the blind illuminated, the ungodly jus^ 
 
 * Pro. Aug. doct. 
 
 + The allenlive reader has seen this to be the 
 spntimentoCthe anonymous author of the calling 
 of Iho Gentiles. Perhaps no two propositions 
 are more certainly and decisively scriptural than 
 these two of Prosper. It is tlie vain attempt to 
 flear them of a supposed ineonsistenoy, which 
 has confounded many reasoners. The Church 
 of England has exactly hit this medium in all 
 her public writings. To know where to stop is 
 true wisdom. 
 
484 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. XHI. 
 
 tified, let them confess Jesus Christ their 
 life, and light, and righteousness." 
 
 "We act with liberty, but with liberty 
 redeemed, over which God is the gov- 
 ernor." 
 
 " Grace does more than persuade and 
 teach by kind advice and exhortation ; it 
 changes also the mind within, and forms 
 it anew, and from a broken vessel makes 
 it new in the energy of creation. This, 
 not the admonitions of the Law, not the 
 words of a prophet, not nature so studi- 
 ously preferred to her, performs. He 
 only who made, renews. An apostle 
 may run through the world, preach, ex- 
 hort, plant, water, rebuke, and be urgent; 
 but that the hearer may benefit by these 
 means, neither the scholar, nor the teacher 
 effects, but grace alone. — This orders 
 the seed of faith to take root in the mind, 
 this keeps and cherishes the harvest to 
 maturity — It is God who raises the dead, 
 frees the prisoners, pours understanding 
 into dark hearts, and infuses love, by 
 which we love him again: and the love 
 which he infuses is himself." 
 
 Once more : hear his vigorous testi- 
 mony to the entire depravity of nature, 
 from a practical sense of which, he was, 
 I doubt not, led to see the suitableness 
 of his views of grace to the exigencies of 
 fallen humanity. 
 
 " The mind, which originally had light 
 from the Supreme Light, involves the 
 will in darkness, and leaving the light, 
 chooses to grow black in earthly dark- 
 ness ; nor can it voluntarily lift up its 
 captive eyes on high, because, by the 
 robbery of the tyrant, it hath even lost 
 the knowledge of the greatness of the 
 wound under which it lies prostrate." 
 
 Primasias was an African bishop, who 
 for some years attended the ministry of 
 Augustine, whose views he followed, as 
 appears from his writings, 
 particularly his comments on 
 St. Paul's epistles. But 
 though he seems conversant 
 in the writings of Augustine 
 and Jerom, he is not a mere copyist, but 
 discovers an original vein of thought, and 
 appears to have been well furnished with 
 polite learning. He says, " Faith is the 
 gift of God, and is infused by the secret 
 inspiration of grace, not by human labour, 
 nor by nature, but by the Holy Spirit," 
 He vehemently opposes self-righteous 
 sentiments, and defends with much accu- 
 racy the genuine doctrines of the Gospel." 
 It is surprising, that of so able a writer, 
 
 Primasius, 
 a disciple 
 of Augus- 
 tine. 
 
 we should have no account with respect 
 to his life and transactions.* 
 
 TiMOTHEUs JElurus, bishop of Alex- 
 andria, wrote nothing worthy of a distinct 
 memorial. I mention him only as an in- 
 stance of the unhappy state of that once 
 flourishing Christian city. It had a suc- 
 cession of turbulent, ambitious bishops : 
 the bad effect on the inhabitants was but 
 too fully evidenced by their conduct : 
 they had murdered his predecessor, and 
 the way which he took to fix himself in 
 his See, was by flattering them in their 
 vices. I scarcely remember anything 
 good of Alexandria in all this century. 
 It seems to have been precipitating itself 
 into the darkness of Mahometanism, 
 which God was preparing for it as a 
 scourge on account of its dreadful abuse 
 of the light of the Gospel. 
 
 Salvian, priest of Marseilles, was an 
 eloquent, neat and beautiful writer. His 
 manner is very serious, and he presses 
 the necessity of good works, and parti- 
 cularly of almsgiving, with great vehe- 
 mence. He excels in vindicating the 
 judgments of God on the wicked nominal 
 Christians of his time. But of his ac- 
 quaintance with real Christianity, from 
 the scanty materials M'hich I have seen 
 of him, I find no evidence. 
 
 HoNORATUs, bishop of Marseilles, is 
 celebrated as a great extempore preacher ; 
 his ministry was much attended by clergy 
 and people, and he was desi- 
 red often to preach in other 
 churches. Gelasius, bishop 
 of Rome, had a high esteem 
 for him. These accounts may 
 seem simple and mean ; but 
 much evidence arises from 
 them, that true religion had some preva- 
 lence in France in this century. Much 
 preaching and much controversy on mat- 
 ters of evangelical importance, though 
 attended with evils, prove that Christ is 
 present by his Spirit. 
 
 Faustus, bishop of Ries, was an En- 
 glishman, and was first a monk of the 
 monastery of Lerins, of which he was 
 chosen abbot. After the death of Maxi- 
 mus, bishop of Ries, he was chosen his 
 successor. He composed several trea- 
 tises, governed his diocese unblamably, 
 led a holy life, and died regretted and 
 esteemed by the church. Though, in the 
 controversy which has so much called for 
 our attention in this century, he favoured 
 the Semi-Pelagians, he seems to have 
 
 Honoratus, 
 tiie bishop 
 of Mar- 
 seilles, 
 died about 
 
 A. D. 594. 
 
 * Centur. Magdeb. ('entury V. 
 
Cent. V.] 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 485 
 
 done so rather through fear of the ab- 
 uses of predestination, and a misunder- 
 standing of the consequences of Augus- 
 tine's doctrine, than through the want of 
 piety and humility. For he composed a 
 treatise concerning Saving Grace, in 
 which he showed that the grace of God 
 always allures, precedes, and assists the 
 human will, and that all the reward of 
 our labour, is the gift of God. A priest, 
 named Lucidus, was very tenacious of 
 the sentiments of Augustine, and was op- 
 posed at least by the greater part of the 
 French bishops in his neighbourhood. 
 Fanstus endeavoured to correct his ideas, 
 by suggesting, that we must not separate 
 grace and human industry ; that we must 
 abhor Pelagius, and yet detest those who 
 believe that a man may be in the number 
 of the elect without labouring for salva- 
 tion. He adds many other cautionary 
 maxims of the same kind, to which no 
 sober and judicious follower of Augustine 
 will object. His treatment of Lucidus is 
 gentle and candid. Hence I wonder not 
 that the presbyter was induced, at the 
 council which was called, to asseiit to all 
 that was required of him. 
 
 On the whole, after a careful review of 
 the lights of antiquity on this subject, it 
 appears to me, that there were a number 
 of serious and pious persons on both sides 
 of the question in France ; that the con- 
 troversy was carried on with a degree at 
 least of moderation ; that men, who really 
 feared God, and lived by faith on his 
 Son, in practical humility, diifered rather 
 in Avords than in things, while they deba- 
 ted on this difficult subject ; that yet the 
 views of Augustine are scriptural, and 
 most consistent, and would in all ages, 
 be allowed so to be, if men had a suffi- 
 cient degree of patient attention to distin- 
 guish his positions from the abuses 
 which may be made of them; that the 
 Semi-Pelagian notions have, however, 
 been held by men, whose experience was 
 contradictory to their sentiments, men 
 truly pious and holy; but, that the danger 
 of these notions (as all errors in subjects 
 relating to grace must be dangerous) lies 
 in the bad use, which persons unacquain- 
 ted with the operations of the Holy 
 Spirit will be sure to make of them. 
 France was at this time divided between 
 the two parties ; but as ignorance of true 
 religion increased, Augustine's views of 
 grace grew less and less fashionable, and 
 were confined to particular situations, 
 while wickedness flourished. 1 
 
 2s2 
 
 Gelasius. 
 
 I add only, that profaneness has no 
 right to triumph on account of these con- 
 troversies. Their existence, and the se- 
 rious and charitable manner of conducting 
 them, showed that real godliness was 
 alive in that country ; nor is it probable, 
 that there was, in any part of the world, 
 at that time, more genuine piety than in 
 France. When men are silent on topics 
 of divine grace, when they gladly listen 
 to the sneers of secular writers, who af- 
 fect to treat all the controversialists with 
 equal contempt, and are, content to think 
 so superficially on religion, as. to live 
 without any determinate sentiments on 
 the doctrines of Scripture, then is the 
 time when wickedness will reign without 
 a check; and then what is called philoso- 
 phy will domineer. God hath left such a 
 people, for the present at least, to their 
 own imaginations. 
 
 Victor, of Vita, of whose affecting 
 history of the African perse- 
 cutions I have made much use, * '*^'°''' 
 and who himself suffered for righteousness 
 sake, will deserve to be added to this list. 
 Of Gelasius, bishop of Rome, no more 
 needs to be added to what has 
 been said, than that he wrote 
 zealously against Pelagiauism. 
 
 Julian Pomerius, a priest in France 
 about the end of this century, deserves at- 
 tention for his practical works. A few 
 sentences, descriptive of the 
 characters of good and bad 
 bishops and preachers, will 
 show the taste of the times, as well as af- 
 ford some sentiments not uninteresting to 
 the pastors of this day. 
 
 " A wicked bishop seeks after prefer- 
 ment and riches; chiefly aims to gratify 
 his passions, to confirm his authority, and 
 to enrich himself. He avoids the labori- 
 ous and humbling part of his office, and 
 delights in the pleasant and the honoura- 
 ble." Julian applies to such men's con- 
 sideration the views of the 31th chapter 
 of Ezekiel. "A good bishop converts 
 sinners to God by his preaching and ex- 
 ample — lastly, he holds himself fast to 
 God only, in whom alone he puts his trust." 
 The difference between a good and a 
 bad preacher he thus lays down: "The 
 one seeks the glory of Jesus Christ, by 
 explaining doctrines in familiar discourse. 
 The other uses the utmost strength of his 
 eloquence to gain reputation. The latter 
 handles trifles with elaborate language; 
 the former elevates a plain discourse by 
 I the weight of his thoughts." 
 
 v4. 
 
 Julian 
 Pomerius. 
 
486 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY VI. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE LIFE OF FULGENTIUS, AND THE 
 STATE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCHES 
 IN HIS TIME. 
 
 In the year 495, a storm began again to 
 lower over the African Churches. Thrasa- 
 mond, whose reign then commenced, as 
 obstinate in Arianism as Hu- 
 Thrasa- neric, but more sagacious and 
 "^ond, less bloody, mingled the arts 
 
 king of the ^^ o-entleness and severity 
 Af. ;„n ao-amst them. On the one 
 
 J\H ICa, 111 
 
 beo-ins his hand he strove to gain over 
 reign, the orthodox by lucrative mo- 
 
 A. D. 495. tives, on the other he forbad 
 the ordination of bishops in 
 the vacant Churches.* Eugenius, whose 
 faithfulness was so severely tried in the 
 former persecution, had been called to 
 sleep in Jesus before the commencement 
 of this. The African bishops showed 
 however that divine grace had not for- 
 saken them. They determined unani- 
 mously not to obey an order, which 
 threatened the extinction of orthodoxy. 
 They ordained bishops, and filled the va- 
 cant Sees, though they foresaw the proba- 
 bility of Thrasamond's resentment. But 
 they thought it their duty to take care of 
 their flocks at this hazard, rather than to 
 seem to consent to the king's unrighteous 
 prohibitions. Thrasamond, 
 enraged, determined to banish 
 
 Thrasa- 
 
 ^cuir'" ^'^^™ a^l- Fulgentius about 
 wiili se- that time was chosen bishop 
 verity. of Ruspae. In him we behold 
 
 another instance of the effects 
 of the religion revived under Augustine. 
 Fulgentius's life is written by one of his 
 disciples, and dedicated to Felician, a 
 bishop, who was the successor of Fulgen- 
 tius. The review of it, and of his own 
 works, will give us a specimen of the 
 power of divine grace victoriously strug- 
 gling under all the disadvantages of mo- 
 nastic superstition, and the childish igno- 
 rance of a barbarous age. Fulgentius 
 was descended from a noble family in 
 Carthacre, where his father was a senator. 
 
 • See Fleury, B. XXX. Vol. iii. 
 
 His grandfather Gordian, flying from the 
 arms of Huneric, retired into Italy. Af- 
 ter bis decease, two of his sons, returning 
 into Africa, now settled under the Vandal 
 government, found their family-mansion 
 possessed by the Arian clergy. By royal 
 authority however they received part of 
 their patrimony, and retired to Constanti- 
 nople. In that part of the world, at Tel- 
 lepte, Fulgentius was born, being the son 
 of Claudius, one of the brothers, and of 
 Marriana, a Christian lady, who, being 
 soon left a widow, gave her son a very 
 liberal education, for which Constantino- 
 ple afforded at that time peculiar advan- 
 tages; and thus his mind became stored 
 with Greek and Roman learning. As he 
 increased in religious seriousness, he in- 
 clined more and more to a monastic life, 
 for which he gradually prepared himself 
 by successive austerities in Africa, the 
 country of his father, to which he return- 
 ed with his mother. He was received 
 into the monastery of Faustus, a bishoj) 
 whom the Arian persecution had banished 
 from his diocese to a place contiguous to 
 it, where he erected his monastery. The 
 spirit and fashion of the times so trans- 
 ported him, that, at first, he refused even 
 to see his own mother who came to visit 
 him, though he afterwards behaved to her 
 with the greatest filial duty. He under- 
 went severe bodily sufferings from the re- 
 newal of the Arian persecution. He was 
 beaten with clubs so cruelly, that he con- 
 fessed afterwards he scarcely found him- 
 self capable of enduring the pain any 
 longer, and was glad to induce his tor- 
 mentors by some conversation to allow an 
 interval to his afflictions. For he seems 
 to have been of a weak and delicate con- 
 stitution, and the softness of his early 
 education rendered him unfit to bear much 
 hardship. His mind, hov/ever, appears 
 to have been serene and faithful to his 
 Saviour, whom, in real humility and sin- 
 cerity though tarnished with the supersti- 
 tion of the times, he served according to 
 the fundamentals of the Gospel. The 
 Arian bishop of Carthage, who had known 
 Fulgentius, and esteemed his character, 
 highly disapproved of this treatment, 
 which he had received from a presbyter 
 
Cent. Yl.] 
 
 THE LIFE OF FULGENTIUS, ETC. 
 
 487 
 
 Fulgen- 
 tius, Bish- 
 op of Rus- 
 piE, ba- 
 nishe(U 
 into Sar- 
 dinia. 
 
 of his own religion and diocese, and told 
 the injured youth, that, if he would make 
 a formal complaint before him, he would 
 avenge his cause. Many advising him to 
 do so, " It is not lawful," says Fulgen- 
 tius, " for a Christian to seek revenge. 
 The Lord knows how to defend his ser- 
 vants. Should the presbyter through me 
 be punished, I shall lose the reward of 
 my patience with God, and the more so, 
 as it would give an occasion of stumbling 
 to the weak, to see an Arian punished by 
 a Monk." By and by he retired into the 
 more interior parts of Africa. Some time 
 after he sailed to Syracuse, and then 
 visited Rome, and saw there king Theo- 
 doric in the midst of a magnificent assem- 
 bly. If men in this life, seeking vanity, 
 attain such dignity, what will be the 
 glory of saints who seek true honour in 
 the new Jerusalem ] — this was the reflec- 
 tion of Fulgentius. Ruspae in Africa was 
 the place to which, much 
 against his will, he was at 
 length elected bishop: but 
 this exaltation lessened not 
 the severity of his way of life : 
 and by the Arian persecution 
 he was banished into Sardinia, 
 in company with other faith- 
 ful witnesses of orthodoxy. Upwards of 
 sixty bishops were with him in exile. 
 Thrasamond sent more still into Sardinia, 
 in all 220, exerted himself mightily in 
 overcoming the constancy of the orthodox, 
 and delighted to ensnare them with cap- 
 tious questions. Fulgentius was sent for 
 by him to Carthage, and by his skill in 
 anmment, and his readiness in answering 
 questions, excited the king's admiration — 
 till through the advice of his Arian clergy, 
 who looked on the presence of Fulgentius 
 as dangerous at Carthage, he was re- 
 manded to Sardinia. Soon 
 after, Hilderic, the successor 
 of Thrasamond, in the year 
 523, favouring the orthodox, 
 put a total end to the persecu- 
 tion, and Ruspaj once more 
 beheld her bishop. 
 
 He lived among his flock from this 
 time to his death, eminent in piety, hu- 
 mility, ~ 
 
 Hilderic 
 succeeds 
 Thrasa- 
 mond, 
 
 A.D. 52.3. 
 
 and charity. For near seventy 
 days he suffered extreme pains 
 in his last sickness — "Lord, 
 give patience here and rest 
 hereafter," was his constant 
 prayer — and he died at length, 
 as he had lived, an edifying example of 
 every Christian virtue. I feel almost 
 
 Fulgentius 
 dies, 
 
 A.D. 529. 
 
 ashamed to have written so barren a life 
 of a man undoubtedly excellent in godli- 
 ness. But the reader, as well as myself, 
 must be content with the poverty of ma- 
 terials. In an age of learning and genius 
 the life of Fulgentius would have shown 
 abundantly. In his treatise to Morinus 
 on Predestination, he observes,* " The 
 internal master, from whom we have re- 
 ceived the supply of celestial doctrine, 
 not only opens to inquirers the secrets of 
 his words, but does also himself inspire 
 the grace to make inquiry. For we can- 
 not so much as hunger after the bread 
 which comes down from heaven, unless 
 an appetite be given to persons before 
 fastidious, by him who deigns also to 
 give himself to satisfy the hungTy. From 
 him it is, that thirsting we run to the 
 fountain, who aflfords to us himself, that 
 we may drink." He afterwards expresses 
 himself with great energy " on the in- 
 ternal doctrine of divine inspiration, 
 where truth speaks the sweeter, as it is 
 the more secret." I shall not expect any 
 man, but one who is truly taught of God, 
 to give a candid interpretation of this. " I 
 pray to be taught many more things which 
 I do not know, by him, from whom I have 
 received the little which I do know. I 
 beg by his preventing and following 
 grace to be instructed," f &c. In what 
 follows he shows how seriously he had 
 made the sentiments of Aug-ustine his 
 own, in discussing points exceedingly in- 
 tricate, with that author's modesty and 
 dexterity, particularly in resolving all sin 
 into pride.^ 
 
 In a subject so arduous as Predestina- 
 tion, it is very easy to push men into 
 difficulties. Our Author observes§ that 
 some Frenchmen had objected to Augus- 
 tine, that he had described men as predes- 
 tinated not only to judgment but also to 
 sin : from which charcfes the learned and 
 holy Prosper defended the sentiments of 
 the African prelate, whose death pre- 
 vented any answer from himself. Prosper 
 says, the unbelief of men is not generated 
 from predestination ; for God is the author 
 of good, not of evil. Infidelity is not to 
 be referred to the divine constitution, but 
 only to the divine prescience. 
 
 With equal dexterity he defends the 
 faith of the Trinity, in a book addressed 
 to king Thrasamond. Let it suffice to 
 mention one argument for the divinity of 
 
 Book I. Ch. 
 Ch. XVU. 
 
 I. 
 
 t Ch. IV. 
 § Ch. XXX. 
 
488 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the Holy Ghost, toward the close. " If 
 he can quicken who is not God ; if he can 
 sanctify who is not God ; if he can dwell 
 in believers who is not God ; if he can 
 give grace who is not God, then the Holy 
 Ghost may be'denied to be God, If any 
 creature can do those things, which are 
 spoken of the Holy Ghost, then let the 
 Holy Ghost be called a creature." In a 
 treatise on the incarnation and grace of 
 Jesus Christ* he answers the trite objec- 
 tion against divine election drawn from 
 the words, " God would have all men to 
 be saved," by showing that upon the 
 views of those who see no mystery in the 
 subject, but resolve the distinction into 
 the merits or demerits of men. Almighty 
 God ceases to be incomprehensible, as 
 the Scripture describes him to be. He 
 allows the great truth, that God would 
 have all men to be saved, and yet there is 
 a depth, not to be fathomed by man in the 
 destruction of so many sinners. Much 
 more might be quoted from this author, 
 on subjects essentially connected with the 
 Gospel of Christ. But the diifusiveness 
 of the quotations from Augustine may 
 supercede the necessity of enlarging on 
 the views of one, who so closely followed 
 his steps, and who wrote and lived with 
 a similar spirit. 
 
 Besides several doctrinal treatises, we 
 have also a few epistles of this saint. 
 The fourth of Proba, concerning prayer, 
 H's F 's- deserves to be carefully studi- 
 tles. ^^' It is an excellent sample 
 
 of the humble piety of the 
 African school. He instructs the lady in 
 his favourite doctrine of grace connected 
 with humility, and justly infers, that if a 
 man as yet innocent could not remain so 
 by his natural power, much less can this 
 be expected from him now that he is in a 
 state of so great depravity. He describes, 
 in a pathetic manner, the snares arising 
 from the craft of Satan, and the corrupt 
 workings of the heart, declaring that 
 though the Lord from time to time attends 
 with aids during the sharp war, lest his 
 people faint, yet our mortal nature is suf- 
 fered to be overloaded with the burden of 
 corruption, that we may feel our help- 
 lessness, and liave speedy recourse to 
 divine grace. He describes the conflict 
 between flesh and spirit; shows that it 
 must last through life; that prayer and 
 watching are ever necessary, and that a 
 conceit of our perfection would lead us 
 
 * Ch. VII. 
 
 into deadly pride. He recommends a 
 humble, contrite frame of spirit, not only 
 for the beginning, but for the whole 
 course of a Christian's progress, and con- 
 cludes with a beautiful view of the perfect 
 rest from sin which remains for him 
 hereafter. It is refreshing to the mind, 
 to see the real principles of Christianity 
 appearing in great vigour and clearness 
 in this little composition. 
 
 The epistle of Eugyptius* on Charity, 
 while it describes this greatest of Chris- 
 tian graces in a manner much resembling 
 that of Augustine, demonstrates the be- 
 nevolent spirit of the writer. In an epistle 
 to Theodoras a Senator,| he congratulates 
 him on his victory over the world. He 
 had been, it seems, a Roman consul, and 
 had given up secular pursuits through the 
 love of heavenly things. Fulgentius 
 strongly reminds him to whose grace 
 alone he was indebted for the change, 
 and recommends hnmility,:{: " a virtue 
 which neither those have who love the 
 world, nor those who profess to have re- 
 nounced the world by their own strength." 
 By which distribution of the unconverted 
 into two sorts he points out the same di- 
 vision of men, which has ever taken place 
 from the time of Christ. Pharisees and 
 Sadducees were their names among the 
 Jews ; in the Gentile world the appella- 
 tion of vStoic and Epicurean gave the 
 same distinction. In the school of Au- 
 gustine, lovers of the world formed one 
 denomination, confident boasters in their 
 own strength the other ; and in our times 
 the same difference is commonly marked 
 by the terms worldly-minded and self- 
 righteous ; while in all ages the genuine 
 religion of real humanity stands contra- 
 distinguished from both these classes. 
 Fulgentius recommends to Theodorus the 
 constant study of the Scriptures. " If 
 you come to them meek and humble, 
 there you will find preventing grace, by 
 which, when fallen, you may rise ; ac- 
 companying grace, by which you may 
 run the way of righteousness ; and fol- 
 
 * Ep. 5. t Ep. 6. 
 
 t The practice of Fulgentius agreed with his 
 doctrine. About tlie end of the year 524, a bishop 
 in an African council disputed precedency with 
 him. — The council decided (or Fulgentius, who 
 lor that time acquiesced in the authority of the 
 council. But, observing how much the other 
 was afflicted at the determination, in a future 
 council he publicly desired that it must be re- 
 versed. Ilis humility was admired, and his re- 
 quest was granted. 
 
Oest. VI.] 
 
 JUSTINE.— C.ESARIUS. 
 
 489 
 
 lowing grace, by which you may reach 
 the heavenly kingdom." 
 
 In the epistle to Venantia concerning 
 Repentance,* he steers in the middle 
 course between presumption and despair, 
 invites all men of every age to repent and 
 be converted, under the confident expec- 
 tation of acceptance with God through 
 Jesus Christ, and mentions our Lord's 
 parable of the different hours in which 
 labourers are brought into the vineyard, 
 as an argument that no time is fixed to 
 debar the returning sinner. Jesus would 
 not have come to save the lost in this last 
 age of the world, if human wickedness 
 was ever too strong for divine mercy and 
 goodness. He observes, that the great 
 defect of Judas in his repentance lay in 
 this, that he had no faith in that blood 
 which he had betrayed. He quotes per- 
 tinent scriptures, and, to comprehend in 
 one nervous sentence the whole subject, 
 he says,! " A salutary conversion is two- 
 fold ; it is when repentance leaves not 
 him who hopes in the divine favour, nor 
 hope deserts the penitent : and it is evi- 
 denced by this, if a man with his whole 
 heart renounce his sin, and with his whole 
 heart placed his hope of forgiveness in 
 God. For sometimes the devil takes 
 away hope from the penitent, sometimes 
 repentance from him who hopes. In the 
 first place he overwhelms the man whom 
 he burdens, in the second he throws him 
 down whom he sets at ease." — Hear his 
 testimony to the mystery of the Gospel. 
 " The only begotten God so loved human 
 nature, that he not only freed it from 
 the power of the devil, but also placed it 
 at the right hand of the Father in himself 
 above all ofnod ano-els." 
 
 In his epistle congerning the baptism 
 of a dying negro, v,-ho had given previous 
 proofs of sincerity, while he was a cate- 
 chumen, but in the time of baptism itself 
 was senseless and incapable of professing 
 his faith ; he endeavours to obviate the 
 doubts of those who were afraid lest his 
 incompetency should prevent his salva- 
 tion. There are two points observable in 
 this epistle, one is the custom of the 
 church in presenting infants to baptism, 
 the other is, that however rapid the pro- 
 gress of superstition had been in the time 
 of Fulgentius, yet the most destructive 
 superstitions, and those which are directly 
 subversive of Christian faith and purity, 
 both in doctrine and practice, were as yet 
 
 Ep. 7. 
 
 t Ch. V. 
 
 unknown. He assigns as a reason for 
 not baptizing the dead, that sins areirre- 
 missible alter the separation of the soul 
 from the body. He supports his opinion 
 with the declaration of the Apostle, that 
 we must be judged according to the thino-s 
 done in the body. Nothing can be more 
 conclusive against the pernicious doctrine 
 of purgatory. 
 
 I observe further that he uses the word 
 "to justify" in the same sense in which 
 Augustine does ; nor does the trae idea 
 of the word seem to be recovered by the 
 Christian world till the days of Luther.* 
 
 He speaks of the evils of the Pelagian 
 heresy, and describes the strength and 
 ability given to Augustine against it, and 
 strongly recommends the writings of that 
 father to the Christian world, as contain- 
 ing a more copious instruction of divine 
 grace, than had been known some time 
 before, though the doctrine itself, he 
 contends, had ever been held in the 
 Church.f 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE STATE OF THE CHURCH IN OTHER 
 FARTS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, TILI» 
 THE DEATH OF JUSTIN, INCLUDING 
 THE LIFE OF C^SARIUS. 
 
 In the beginning of this century, Alaric 
 king of the Visigoths reigned at Tou- 
 louse, and was sovereign of a kingdom 
 on the confines of France, and Spain, 
 though afterwards, the Visigoths, by the 
 victorious arms of the Franks, were con- 
 fined to the latter country. Most of his 
 subjects were of the general Church, and 
 he himself was an Arian ; yet he treated 
 them with great humanity, and gave 
 leave to the bishops of his kingdom to 
 meet together at the city of Agde. 
 Twenty-four bishops assembled, the pre- 
 sident of whom was Cassarius, bishop of 
 Aries. They made a number of canons, 
 relating to discipline, two or three parti- 
 culars of which may be mentioned. " All 
 clergymen who serve the church faithful- 
 ly shall receive salaries proportionable to 
 their services." This rule, so simple 
 and general, was the ancient provision 
 for the maintenance of pastors. But, by 
 another canon of this council, clergymen 
 are allowed, provided they have the bish- 
 op's leave, to reserve to themselves the 
 
 * De Verit. Pijed. B. I. C. XIV. 
 t Ibid. B. XL C. XVm. 
 
490 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H, 
 
 revenues of the Church,* savin;^ its 
 rights, but without the power of giving 
 away or alienating any part ; and here is 
 the origin of benefices. " In all Churches 
 the creed shall be explained to the com- 
 petentsf on the same day, a week before 
 Easter. All such laymen as shall not 
 receive the communion three times a year, 
 at the three great fe3tivals,:t shall be 
 looked on as heathens. Oratories may 
 be allowed in the country to those who 
 live at a great distance from the parish 
 churches, for the ease and convenience of 
 their families ; but they must appear at 
 their parish churches on certain solemn 
 festivals." This last rule showed at once 
 a regard for parochial order, and for the 
 instruction of the people. § The next is 
 equally laudable : " Laymen are ordered 
 to remain in the Church till the blessing 
 is pronounced." Caesarius was very zea- 
 lous against the abuses meant to be rec- 
 tified by this canon. He observed one 
 day some persons going out of the Church 
 to avoid hearing the sermon : " What are 
 you about, my children]" cried he with 
 a loud voice, " Where are you going 1 
 Stay, stay, for the good of your souls. 
 At the day of judgment it will be too late 
 to exhort you." This just and charitable 
 zeal prevailed at length : but he was of- 
 ten obliged to cause the Church doors to 
 be shut, after the Gospel was read, to 
 prevent the indecent practice. His peo- 
 ple were however reclaimed, and they 
 repented by degrees. There are still ex- 
 tant two of his sermons on this subject. 
 Mankind in all ages are apt to be weary 
 of God's word ; there were however pas- 
 tors in the western Church, who served 
 for charity, and not for lucre. Another 
 canon deserves to be mentioned. It for- 
 bad auguries, and divinations, and the 
 opening of the Scriptures with a view to 
 make an omen of the first words that of- 
 fered. We have seen that Augustine had 
 opposed this last mentioned superstition. 
 Here it was forbidden under penalty of 
 excommunication. Yet it still prevailed. 
 I see the African schools, virtuously but 
 unsuccessfully, struggling against the 
 increasing darkness and superstition. 
 
 * Fleury, B. XXXI. 1. Vol. IV. 
 
 t Who seem to have been those who applied 
 for baptism. 
 
 t Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide. 
 
 § The union of these two in just proportion 
 gives a perfect idea of good discipline. It would 
 be well if similar care were taken for many 
 places in our own country, far distant from parish 
 churches. 
 
 Caesarius had spent some part of his 
 youth in the famous monastery of Lerins.* 
 Hearing afterwards that he was actually 
 designed to be made bishop of Aries, he 
 hid himself among the tombs. But he 
 was taken out thence, at the age of thirty, 
 was appointed bishop, and continued in 
 that Church above forty years. He de- 
 lighted in singing, and as he found the 
 laity were apt to talk in the Church while 
 the clergy were singing, he induced the 
 laity to join with them in psalmody; 
 and, in a sermon still extant, he exhorts 
 them to sing with their hearts, as well as 
 their voices. In another sermon he ex- 
 horts them to throw off all distracting 
 thoughts, before they prostrate them- 
 selves for prayer. "Whoever," says he, 
 " in his prayers, thinks on a public place 
 of resort, or the house he is building, 
 worships that place or that house." He 
 directs them also not to be content with 
 hearing the Scriptures read in the Church, 
 but to read them also at home. 
 
 This holy man gave himself entirely 
 to reading and preaching. He preached 
 on all Sundays and holidays. If he was 
 himself hindered from preaching, he 
 caused his own sermons, or those of Au- 
 gustine, whom he highly revered, or 
 those of Ambrose, to be read by other 
 ministers. His style was plain, and 
 adapted to common capacities. He en- 
 tered into practical particulars, searched 
 the consciences of his hearers, and se- 
 verely reproved idolatrous and supersti- 
 tious usages. 
 
 He was once, by calumny, ejected 
 from his Church ; but Alaric, his sove- 
 reign, on the discovery of his innocence, 
 restored him. He was exposed to simi- 
 lar sufferings afterwards ; but was again 
 delivered, and amidst the confusions of 
 the times distinguished himself exceed- 
 ingly by acts of mercy. He 
 died in the year 542, univer- A. D. 542. 
 sally lamented. 
 
 In the mean time the cause of Arianism 
 was gradually declining, partly by the 
 progress of the Franks, and partly by 
 the influence of Sigismund, king of Bur- 
 gundy, who succeeded his father Gonde- 
 baud, having been brought over to ortho- 
 doxy by Avitus, bishop of Vienne, a year 
 before. 
 
 * This little island, which we have had re- 
 peated occasion to mention, is now called St- 
 Honorat, is close to the French coast, and lies 
 between Nice and Toulon. 
 
Cent. VI.] 
 
 JUSTINIAN. 
 
 491 
 
 Sigismuiid 
 slain, 
 
 A. D. 523. 
 
 Sigismund, king of the Burgundians, 
 having been induced, by the calumny of 
 his second wife, to put to death his son 
 Sigeric, and finding afterwards his error, 
 repented in great bitterness, and besought 
 God to punish him in this life 
 and not in the next. His 
 prayer seems to have been 
 hoard ; for, in the year 5*23, 
 he was attacked by Clodomir, 
 king of the Franks, the successor of 
 Clovis, and was afterwards slain with 
 his wife and children. Clodomir himself 
 was soon after slain in Burgundy, and 
 his three sons were brought up by Clo- 
 tilda, the widow of Clovis, their grand- 
 mother. 
 
 Such was the state of the Church of 
 Christ in France during the former part 
 of this century. In Italy, some degree 
 of genuine piety may be presumed to 
 have still existed, though I have no in- 
 teresting particulars to record. If we 
 turn our eyes to the East, the prospect is 
 far more disagreeable. Factions and 
 feuds, heretical perversions and scanda- 
 lous enormities fill up the scene. Under 
 the emperor Justin, Christianity began at 
 length to wear a more agreeable aspect 
 in some respects, and peace and good 
 order, in external things at least, were 
 in a measure restored. In the year 522, 
 Zamnaxes, king of the Lazi, a people 
 who inhabited the country anciently call- 
 ed Colchis, being dead, his 
 son Zathes repaired to Con- 
 stantinople, telling the empe- 
 ror that he was desirous of 
 receiving the Gospel, and of 
 relinquishing the idolatry of 
 his ancestors. They had been 
 vassals to the king of Persia, and had 
 been obliged to perform sacrifices after 
 the Persian mode. He put himself there- 
 fore under the protection of Justin, and 
 desired to receive the crown from his 
 hands. Justin granted his requests, and 
 thus the Lazi became vassals to the East- 
 ern Empire, and embraced Christianity. 
 The Iberians, who bordered on their ter- 
 ritories, and were also subjects to the 
 king of Persia, had already received the 
 Gospel. How far any thing of the real 
 spirit of Christ's religion was imbibed 
 by either nation, I know not. I can only 
 say, the limits of the Christian name 
 were extended in the East.* 
 
 In Arabia Felixf there were many 
 
 Zathes 
 comes to 
 Constanti- 
 nople, 
 
 A. D. 522. 
 
 » Fleury, XXXI. 59. 
 
 t Id. 60. 
 
 Christians subject to a kino-* called 
 
 Dounouas, a Jew, who caused those who 
 
 were unwilling to become Jews to be 
 
 cast into pits full of fire. In ^ , 
 
 the year 522 he besieged Ne- ^ ""^"^ 
 „,„ „ * • u i--^ 1 1 JJounouas, 
 
 gra, a town inhabited by . ,. * 
 
 Christians. Having persuad- " 
 ed theni to surrender by capitulation, he 
 broke his oath, burnt the pastors, and be- 
 headed the laymen, and carried all the 
 youth into captivity. Here then the real 
 church of Christ may be traced by suffer- 
 ings voluntarily undergone for his sake. 
 The next year, Elesbaan, king of Abys- 
 sinia, a country which, as we have for- 
 merly seen, had been Christian since the 
 days of Athanasius, supported by the 
 emperor Justin, invaded the territories of 
 the Arabian Jew, subdued his country 
 and slew him. Thus the Arabian Chris- 
 tians were relieved. Elesbaan himself 
 was very zealous, and gave this proof of 
 his zeal, that he resigned his crown to 
 embrace the monastic life. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE STATE OF THE 
 THE REIGN OF 
 
 CHURCH DURING 
 JUSTINIAN. 
 
 Justiniaa 
 becomes 
 emperor, 
 
 A. D. 52r. 
 
 On the death of Justin, surnamed the 
 Thracian, his nephew Justinian succeed- 
 ed at Constantinople in the year 527. 
 He was then forty-five years old, and 
 reigned thirty-nine. I scarce- 
 ly know any prince, whose 
 real and ostensible character 
 were so different. If one 
 judge by external things, he 
 may appear one of the wisest, the most 
 pious, and the most prosperous of men. 
 He re-united Africa and Italy to the Ro- 
 man empire; he is to this day famous 
 for his code of laws; he was temper- 
 ate and abstemious in private life, and 
 was incessantly employed in religious 
 acts and ceremonies ; he honoured monks 
 and persons reputed holy, built sump- 
 
 * Bruce, in his Travels into Abyssinia, toward 
 the latter end of the 1st vol., calls tliis king I^hi- 
 ncas, who, he says, threw Christians into jiits of 
 fire, particularly a preacher Ilawaryat, signify- 
 ing the Evanjielical, with ninety of liis compa- 
 nions. Tlie king of Abyssinia, who fought 
 against the Jew, he calls Caleb. His story, as 
 extracted from Abyssinian and Arabian annals, 
 is the same ; and their correspondence, in this 
 instance, with the Greek history, gives some tes- 
 timony to the autiienticily of the materials of 
 Bruce's Abyssinian liistory. 
 
492 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH. 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 tuous churches, endowed monasteries, 
 was liberal beyond measure in the sup- 
 port of the externals of religion, was 
 incessant in the encouragement of ortho- 
 doxy, at least of that which to him ap- 
 peared to be so; indefatigable through 
 the course of a long life in public affairs ; 
 seems scarcely to have ever unbended 
 himself in any recreations, spent much 
 time in religious speculations, rooted out 
 idolatry from its obscure corners, and 
 brought over a number of barbarous kings 
 , and nations to the profession of Chris- 
 tianity. What a character, if his heart 
 had been right ! His understanding and 
 capacity indeed have been called in ques- 
 tion; but I think unjustly. No weak 
 man could have done half of what he did. 
 He must have been a person of superior 
 talents, and of very vigorous and strong 
 faculties. But so far as appears from his 
 conduct, he was, in religion, altogether 
 the slave of superstition, in morality the 
 slave of avarice. For gold he sold his 
 whole empire to those who governed the 
 provinces, to the collectors of tributes, 
 and to those who are wont to frame 
 plots against men under any pretences. 
 He encouraged the vilest characters in 
 their detestiljle and infamous calumnies, 
 in order to partake of their gains. He 
 did also innumerable pious actions, says 
 Evagrius,* and such as are well pleasing 
 to God, provided the doers perform them 
 with such goods as their own property, 
 and offer their pure actions, as a sacrifice, 
 to God. In this emperor then it may be 
 seen more eminently what a poor thing 
 the body of christian religion is without 
 the spirit. Whatever benefit the church 
 might, in some cases, derive from his ad- 
 ministration, particularly in what relates 
 to the extension of its pale, this is to be 
 ascribed to the adorable Providence of 
 God bringing good out of evil. On the 
 other hand the evil he wrought was pal- 
 pable. Dissensions and schisms, forced 
 conversions attended with cruelties, which 
 alienated men's minds still more from 
 godliness, the growth of superstition and 
 formality, the miserable declension of real 
 internal godliness, — especially through 
 the East, where his influence was most 
 extensive, — and the increase of igno- 
 
 rance and practical wickedness, were the 
 undoubted consequences of Justinian's 
 schemes. 
 
 In truth this man attempted too much : 
 he pressed uniformity of doctrine through 
 the world by imperial menaces and arms : 
 he laboured to bring all nations into a 
 nominal attachment to Christianity: he 
 prescribed what bishops and laity should 
 believe, and was himself, in effect, the 
 pope as well as the emperor of the Ro- 
 man world ; yet, wretched being ! he 
 seems not to have known any one thing 
 in religion in a right manner. In exter- 
 nal things he could not but sometimes be 
 right, in internal religion it was hardly 
 possible he should be so ; for he was ig- 
 norant of his own heart, while his eyes 
 and ears with insatiable curiosity were 
 intent on all persons and objects. It will 
 not be pertinent to the design of this his- 
 tory to enter into a detail of the actions 
 of such a prince ; but the view of his 
 character, which I think is supported by 
 the concurrent testimony of civil and ec- 
 clesiastical historians, may teach per- 
 sons of eminence, either in power, or 
 learning, or genius, who shall give their 
 minds to religious objects, to be in the 
 first place more concerned for their own 
 genuine conversion, and for personal god- 
 tiness;* and then to contract and limit 
 their plans within the humble circle that 
 belongs to a fallible, confined, and short- 
 lived creature like man ; and steadily to 
 move within that circle in the propagation 
 and support of the Gospel of Christ, and 
 of whatever is virtuous and praiseworthy, 
 without being seduced by romantic and 
 dazzling schemes to attempt what is vastly 
 above their reach ; for by this method 
 they may be the victims of their own 
 ambition or avarice, while they think 
 they serve God, and may fill the world 
 with evil, while they vainly suppose 
 they are its benefactors. But these are 
 ideas with which the profane and the 
 careless governor has no right to meddle : 
 
 * Ch. XXX. B. 1 V. Evagrius Scholasticua. His 
 ecclesiastical history taiies us up, just after we are 
 deserted by Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret, 
 the tripartite historians of the same period : and 
 in future I must make some use of him, though 
 inliistorical merit far inferior to tlie three former 
 
 * Nothing shows in a stronger Hglit the empti- 
 ness of his mind than his boasting after lie had 
 finished the magnificent Church of St. Sophia, "I 
 have excelled thee, Solomon !" Yet was this vain 
 emperor made use of by Divine Providence as a 
 shield to support external Christianity at least in 
 the world. In his time Ciiosroes king of Persia 
 persecuted the Christians in his dominions with 
 extreme cruelty, and publicly declared that he 
 would wage war not only with Justinian, but 
 also with the God of the Christians. The mili- 
 tary measures and the rehgious zeal of Justinian 
 however checked the progress of his ferocity. 
 
Cext. VI.] 
 
 JUSTINIAN. 
 
 493 
 
 Justinian was neither the one nor the 
 other. He was in earnest through life, 
 though void of humility, faith and chari- 
 ty; and for serious spirits, the caution, 
 which his character is calculated to give, 
 will stand an instructive lesson. 
 
 In his first year lie made laws relating to 
 bishops : a few words of them will deserve 
 to have a place in this history. "The 
 absence of bishops,* says he, is the reason 
 that divine service is so negligently per- 
 formed; that the affairs of the Churches 
 are not so well taken care of, and that 
 the ecclesiastical revenues are employed 
 in the expenses of their journeys, and of 
 their residence in this city, Constantino- 
 ple, with the clergy and domestics who 
 accompany them. — Let no bishops quit 
 their churches to come to this city, without 
 an order from us, whatever may happen. — 
 If we find their presence to be necessary 
 here, we will send for them." What 
 motives induced bishops to attend the 
 courts so much, is easy to guess ; and we 
 have here a plain description how much 
 the Eastern Church was seculaiized, and 
 how it gradually ripened into a fitness 
 for desolating judgments. 
 
 Justinian says further, when an episco- 
 pal see becomes vacant, the inhabitants 
 of the city shall declare in favour of 
 three persons, whose faith and manners 
 shall be testified by witnesses, that the 
 most worthy may be chosen. He pro- 
 ceeds to lay down rules to restrain the 
 avarice of bishops; rules, which had no 
 existence in purer times, because a purer 
 spirit prevailed. 
 
 In the year S^O, a council, memorable 
 for its evangelical spirit, was held at 
 
 „ ., c Orano-e in France. Csesarius 
 Council ot P 1 J TT u J T 
 
 Oraii''e "^^^^ •'^ head. He had, as 1 
 
 A 1)" -'^q observed,tasted the doctrine of 
 Augustine concerning grace, 
 and was therefore zealous for its propa- 
 Sfation. We may reasonably suppose the 
 articles of this council to have been 
 framed in opposition to the attempts made 
 in France in favour of Semi-Pelagianism, 
 as well as to give testimony to the grace 
 of the Gospel.— Thirteen bishops were 
 present, and we have a pleasing spectacle 
 of the work of the Divine Spirit flourish- 
 ing in a considerable degree in France, 
 particularly in the parts about Orange, and 
 in the vicinity of the Rhone. " Adam's 
 sin," says the coimcil,t "did not only 
 hurt the body, but the soul ; it descended 
 
 • Fleuiy, B. XXXII. 10. t lb. 12. 
 
 Vol. I. 2T 
 
 to his posterity; the grace of God is not 
 given to men because they call upon him, 
 but that grace is the cause that men do 
 call upon him : the being cleansed from 
 sin, and the beginning of our faith, is not 
 owing to ourselves, but to grace. We 
 are not able by our own natural strength 
 to do or think any thing which may con- 
 duce to our salvation. We believe that 
 Abel, Noah, Abraham, and the other 
 fathers, had not by nature that faith that 
 8t. Paul commendeth in them, but by 
 grace." To clear the Almighty of being 
 the author of sin, they add however, " that 
 some may be predestinated to evil, we 
 not only disbelieve, but detest those who 
 think so." 
 
 These words express in substance the 
 sentiments of these holy men. But to 
 enable the reader to judge more precisely 
 for himself what they were, I shall give 
 him two passages from the fifth and se- 
 venth canons, translated at length from 
 the Latin original. " If any one say, that 
 the beginning or increase of faith, and the 
 ver)' affection of belief is in us, not by the 
 gift of grace, that is, by the inspiration of 
 the Holy Spirit correcting our will from 
 infidelity to faith, from impiety to piety, 
 but, by nature, he is an enemy to the doc- 
 trine of the Apostles." " If any man 
 affirm, that he can, by the vigour of nature, 
 think any thing good which pertains to 
 salvation' as he ought, or choose, or con- 
 sent to the saving, that is to evangelical, 
 preaching, without the illumination and 
 inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who gives 
 to all the sweet relish in consenting to 
 and believing the truth, he is deceived by 
 an heretical spirit." 
 
 I have been solicitous to preserve faith- 
 fulness to the original in this short ab- 
 stract. Doubtless the sweet relish they 
 speak of is no other than that ineffable de- 
 light in the perception and obedience of 
 the Gospel, which characterizes the godly 
 in all affos, subjects them, though unjust- 
 ly, to the charge of enthusiasm, and pro- 
 duces real practical Christianity. In eve- 
 ry effusion of the Spirit of God it always 
 appears in rich exuberance, and is as dis- 
 tinct from formal or even merely theore- 
 tical views of religion, as the substance is 
 from the shadow. I look on it as a re- 
 markable fact, that so plain a testimony 
 to vital religion should be given in the 
 South of France in the sixth century, 
 when the Christian world was ever/ 
 where so overspread with darkness. It 
 seems that in this part of France at least, 
 
494 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 Semi-Pelagianism had been checked : in- 
 deed, as several espousers of it were real 
 g-ood men, it is not to be wondered at, 
 that by further experience and attention 
 they might be led to embrace in system 
 what in their own sensations they must 
 have known to be true, namely, that man, 
 by nature, is lost and helpless in sin, and 
 that grace only can revive him. Cajsa- 
 rius, of Aries, was in all probability 
 highly instrumental in producing this 
 change of sentiment ; for we should re- 
 collect, that Hilary, of Aries, had been a 
 Semi-Pelagian. I should rejoice to be 
 able to gratify the spiritual reader with 
 the account of the lives, labours, and 
 works of these thirteen bishops of France, 
 which were probably useful and edifying. 
 But my records say no more; and this 
 is one of the thousand cases in which I 
 have occasion to regret, how little of real 
 Church-history has been written, how 
 much of ecclesiastical perversions and 
 abuses. 
 
 In the same year a council was held 
 also at Vaison,* at which were present 
 twelve bishops, of whom Ca?sarius was 
 one. They decreed, according to the cus- 
 tom observed in Italy, that all country 
 priests should receive into their houses 
 young men, who might be readers in the 
 Church, that they should educate them 
 with a paternal regard, causing them to 
 learn the Psalms, to read the Scriptures, 
 and to be acquainted with the word of 
 God; and in this way should provide 
 themselves with worthy successors. | 
 For the convenience of the people, the 
 pastors were allowed to preach not only 
 in the cities, but in all the country pa- 
 rishes. 
 
 About this time the monastic rules of 
 Benedict were established, which after- 
 wards were received through the western 
 Churches. They are full of forms, and 
 breathe little of the spirit of godliness. 
 The very best thing that I can find re- 
 corded of the superstitious founder, is the 
 zeal with which he opposed idolatry. In 
 that part of Italy, where the Samnites 
 formerly dwelt, the worship of Apollo 
 
 Council of 
 Clermont, 
 A. D. 535. 
 
 • Fleury, B. xxxii. 12. 
 
 + This is quite cousonant to the ancient me- 
 thod of educating men for the pastoral offices, 
 and supplied the want of ecclesiastical semina- 
 ries. While so much attention was paid to 
 education and the word of God, there is rea- 
 son to believe that (he doctrines of the Gospel 
 must have been taught with some success in 
 France. 
 
 had been still continued. He eradicated 
 this idolatry, and instructed the peasants 
 in Christianity. 
 
 In a council held at Clermont,* in the 
 year 535, I see canonical methods were 
 still used to prevent the interference of 
 secular power in the appointment of bish- 
 ops. " To correct the abuse 
 of obtaining bishoprics by the 
 favour of princes, it is decreed, 
 that he who is a candidate for 
 a bishopric shall be ordained by the elec- 
 tion of the clergy and citizens, and the 
 consent of the metropolitan, without ma- 
 king use of the protection of persons in 
 POWER. Otherwise the candidate shall be 
 deprived of the communion of the Church, 
 which he is desirous of governing." 
 
 Hilderic, king of the Vandals in Africa, 
 having been deposed by Gilimer, Justi- 
 nian, by his renowned general Belisarius, 
 recovered the country from the Barbarians, 
 and reunited it to the empire. This put 
 an end to the dominion of Arianism in 
 that region. The orthodox were rein- 
 stated ; two hundred and seventeen bish- 
 ops held a council at Carthage; Arians and 
 Donatists were forbidden to hold assem- 
 blies, and the lands which had been taken 
 from the Arians were restored 
 by an edict of Justinian in the 
 year 535. The face of true 
 religion was recovered in this 
 country; its spirit I cannot 
 find. The best symptom 
 was the extension of Christi- 
 anity among the Moors, by the zealous 
 care of Justinian. Ho\u far any cordial 
 change took place among them does not 
 appear. 
 
 In the year 536, Belisarius, the hero of 
 this age, took Rome from the Goths, 
 though some time elapsed after this event 
 before the Gothic power was annihilated 
 in Italy. But what has this 
 our history to do with his tri- 
 umphs ? His master showed 
 much zeal for religion, though 
 ill directed ; and what is 
 worse, not principled with the genuine 
 fear of God. The General scarcely seem- 
 ed to profess any religion at all ; and the 
 most remarkable ecclesiastical transaction 
 in which he was concerned is sufficient to 
 brand his name with eternal infamy. A 
 very brief view of it shall suffice. f The- 
 
 .lustinian 
 restores to 
 the Arians 
 their 
 lands, 
 A. D. 535. 
 
 Belisarius 
 takes 
 Rome, 
 A. D. 536. 
 
 * Fleury, B. xxxii. 44. 
 f Fleury, B. xxxii. 57, 
 
Cekt. VI.] 
 
 JUSTINIAN. 
 
 495 
 
 odora, the empress, orave an order to Vigi- 
 lius, deacon of the Roman Church, to re- 
 quire Belisarius to secure his election to 
 the bishopric of Rome, and the expulsion 
 of Silverius, at tliat time bishop. Vigi- 
 lius was in that case to present Belisa- 
 rius with two hundred pounds oi" gold. 
 The venal General executed the order on 
 the infamous conditions, and delivered 
 Silverius into the hands of Vigilius, who 
 sent him into the island of Paliuaria, 
 where he died of hunger.* It was worth 
 while just to mention this villany, that, 
 if any persons have been seduced into an 
 admiration of the character of Belisarius 
 on account of his military prowess, they 
 may see how much splendor of false vir- 
 tue may exist in a man who is altogether 
 void of the fear of God. 
 
 Justinian, though at first he seemed to 
 take some pains to correct the conse- 
 quences of this scandalous transaction of 
 his wife, of his General, and of the un- 
 principled bishop of Rome, at length suf- 
 fered the whole scheme to stand. Still 
 he persisted to meddle in religious con- 
 troversies, and issued an edict for the con- 
 demnation of Origen's error. 
 
 In the year 542, a council held at Or- 
 leans ordered, that if any person desired 
 to have a parish church erected on his 
 estate, f he should first be 
 Council of oblic-ed to endow it, and to 
 A. D 542 ^"^ ^^ incumbent. Hence 
 the origin of patronages. 
 In the year 555 died Vigilius, bishop of 
 Rome, after having governed eighteen 
 years in the see which he had so ini- 
 quitously obtained. Selfish 
 duplicity marked his charac- 
 ter more eminently than that 
 of any Roman bishop before 
 But he paid dear for his intrigues 
 
 Dealli oF 
 Vigilius, 
 A. D. 555. 
 
 him. 
 
 and dissimulation. Justinian, who had 
 the ambition of acting as an infallible 
 judge of controversies himself, suffered 
 not Vigilius to be the pope of the Church. 
 On the contrary, a little before his death. 
 he was, though very reluctant, compelled 
 by the emperor to consent to the decrees 
 of a council held at Constantinople ;:j: 
 
 * So Liberatns in his Breviary ; but Proco- 
 pius, a living witness, says, that lie was inur- 
 
 of 
 to 
 
 dered at the instigation of Antonia, tiie witV 
 Belisarius, by Eugenia, a woman devoted 
 her. 
 
 f Fleury, B. xxxiii. 15. 
 
 I This was the fifth general council, or llie 
 second of Constantinople, A. D. 553, and 27lh 
 year of Justinian. 
 
 which, by the influence of Justinian, con- 
 demned the writings called the Three 
 Chapters; that is, three books, or pas- 
 sages of books, one of which was the 
 work of the pious Tbeodorel of Cyprus. 
 The controversy itself was idle and frivo- 
 lous; yet, how many p:iges of ('hurch- 
 history, so called, does it fill! But I can 
 find no vestige of piety in the whole trans- 
 action. " Therefore eternal silence be its 
 doom." 
 
 Several western bishops, because they 
 refused to condemn the three chapters, 
 were banished by the order of Justinian. 
 What advantage was it to the Church, 
 that Italy and Africa were recovered to 
 nominal orthodoxy, and to the Roman 
 empire, when she was thus oppressed by 
 her pretended protector ! 
 
 Justinian, in his old age, fell into the 
 notion, that the body of Jesus Christ 
 was incorruptible. Having once formed 
 the sentiment, he drew up an edict, and, 
 in his usual manner, required his sub- 
 jects to embrace it. pjutychius, bishop 
 of Constantinople, had the honesty to 
 refuse the publication of it. " This, said 
 he, is not the doctrine of the Apostles. 
 It would follow from thence that the in- 
 carnation was only in fancy. How could 
 an incorruptible body have been nourish- 
 ed by the milk of its mother ] How was 
 it possible for it, when on the cross, to 
 be pierced by the nails, or the lance? It 
 cannot be called incorruptible in any other 
 sense, than as it was always unpolluted 
 with any sinful defilement, and was not 
 corrupted in the grave." 
 
 But the imperial mandate was stronger 
 than the arguments of the bishop, how- 
 ever reasonable. He was roughly treat- 
 ed, was banished from his see, and died 
 in exile : he acted however uprightly, 
 and seems from his integrity to have been 
 a Christian indeed. Anastasius, bishop 
 of Aiitioch, resisted also with much firm- 
 ness ; he was a person of exemplary 
 pietv, whom Justinian in vain endeavour- 
 ed to gain over to his sentiments. Ashe 
 knew the emperor intended to banish him, 
 he wrote a farewell discourse to his peo- 
 ple. He took pains to confirm the minds 
 of men in just ideas of the human nature 
 of Christ, and daily recited in the Church 
 that sayintr of the Apostle : " If any man 
 preach to you any other Gospel than that 
 which ye have received, let him be ac- 
 cursed."* The example of a truly holy 
 
 • Gal. i. — Evagrius, B. IV. toward the end. 
 
496 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 and upright person supporting a just cause 
 is very prevalent. Most around him were 
 induced to imitate. An opinion directly 
 subversive of the real sufferings of Christ, 
 on which the efficacy of his atonement 
 depends, appeared altogether unchristian. 
 But God had provided better things for 
 us, says Evagrius. While the old im- 
 perial pope was dictating the sentence of 
 banishment against Anastasius and other 
 prelates, he was smitten with the stroke 
 of death. Let not profane persons exult 
 over him; but let those who exercise 
 their thoughts on religion, take care to 
 study the written word with humility, 
 prayer, and pious reverence, warned by 
 the apostasy of a man, who for many 
 years had studied divinity, and fell at 
 last into an error, equally subversive of 
 the dictates of common sense, and of 
 Christian piety, and diametrically oppo- 
 site to all Scripture : let us remember, 
 however, that his follies and persecu- 
 tions were the occasion of exhibiting some 
 excellent characters even in the eastern 
 Church, who showed that they bore not 
 the Christian name without a just title to 
 that best of all appellations. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS AFFAIRS TO THE END 
 OF THE CENTURY. 
 
 Justin, the nephew of Justinian, suc- 
 ceeded.* He recalled the bishops whom 
 the late emperor had exiled, Eutychius, 
 of Constantinople, alone excepted. The 
 reason of this exception I cannot learn ; 
 but, after the decease of John, his suc- 
 cessor, who held the see twelve years, 
 Justin was prevailed on to restore Euty- 
 chius, who continued bishop of Constan- 
 tinople till his death. His integrity and 
 piety should scarcely be doubted after 
 the long course of suffering which he sus- 
 tained on account of the faith of Jesus. 
 But, in his old age he embraced a whim- 
 sical notion, that our bodies after the re- 
 surrection become thinner than air. A 
 notion which it would not have been 
 worth while to have mentioned at all on 
 its own account: but it is a specimen of 
 the low state of Christian knowledge in 
 the East, and of the predominancy of 
 Origenism and Platonism, which had 
 never been exterminated in Asia, since 
 
 * Evagi-ius, V. C. 3. 
 
 they had gained admission into the 
 Church. For the opinion, though not so 
 fundamentally erroneous as that of Justi- 
 nian, originated from the same fanciful 
 school : and we may see what a blessing 
 it was to the West to have been instruct- 
 ed in the Christian doctrines of grace 
 through Augustine, whence the purity 
 and simplicity of the faith was preserved 
 in a much superior manner, and fantastic 
 notions could not so easily be received 
 among ihem.* 
 
 A number of Britons having been ex- 
 pelled from their country by the arms of 
 the Anglo-Saxons, who had entered the 
 island in the year 446, cross- 
 ed the sea and settled in the Origin of 
 adjacent parts of France. — Briianny, 
 Hence the origin of the French A. D. 446. 
 province of Britanny. With 
 them the faith of the Gospel was pre- 
 served, as well as with their brethren in 
 Wales and Cornwall, and some parts of 
 Scotland and Ireland, while the major 
 part of England was covered with Saxon 
 idolatry. Sampson, originally a Welsh- 
 man, left his own country and came into 
 Britanny. This man founded a monas- 
 tery at Dol, and was bishop of Uol him- 
 self some years. He died 
 about the year 565, and was Death of 
 renowned for piety and learn- '''5 bishop 
 ing in his day. He had been °' ^°^' 
 educated in his native country A. D. 565. 
 by Heltut, who was said to 
 have been the disciple of Germanus, of 
 Auxerre. Thus the seed sown in our 
 island by that holy person brought forth 
 fruit ; and it is only to be regretted that 
 the accounts of these things are so slight 
 and scanty. About the same time died 
 St. Malo, who, to prevent his being ap- 
 pointed bishop of Winchester, forsook 
 our island, and fled to the coast of France. 
 To the west of Britanny there was an 
 island called Aletha, now called St. 
 Male's, the greatest part of the inhabi- 
 tants of which were Pagans. At the de- 
 sire of the few Christians wlio were 
 there, Malo laboured among them till 
 most of the inhabitants received the Gos- 
 pel, and persuaded him to reside among 
 them as their bishop, which he did till 
 his death. "j" Other British bishops are 
 celebrated, who in the same ao-e were 
 distinguished for their piety and useful 
 labours in Britanny. 
 
 * Eutychius, iiowever, before lie died, re- 
 tracted his error. 
 t Fleury, B. XXXIV. 14. 
 
Cejtt. VI.] 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS AFFAIRS. 
 
 497 
 
 Gildas, surnamed the Wise, another 
 disciple of Heltut, was born at Dumbar- 
 ton, in Scotland ; he preached with mnch 
 success, in the best sense, so far as ap- 
 pears, in his native country and in Ire- 
 land. He afterwards came over into 
 Britanny, and built the monastery of 
 Buis, which is still called by his name, 
 says my author. Two of his discourses 
 on the ruin of Great Britain are still ex- 
 tant, in which he deplores the vices and 
 calamities of the times, and, ascribing- 
 the desolations made by the Saxons to 
 the depravity of his countrymen, he with 
 honest vehemence exhorts six British 
 princes to repentance. He addresses 
 with much spirit the clergy of Great Bri- 
 tain, and rebukes them for their igno- 
 rance, avarice, and simony. 
 
 From these hints, in conjunction with 
 what has been elsewhere related, these 
 thing's are evident ; namely, that there 
 had been a considerable degree of pare 
 religion among our ancestors befjre the 
 invasion of the Saxons ; that even after 
 the declension and decay, there were 
 still faithful pastors, who carried back 
 into France that spirit of godliness which 
 the latter country, by the means of Ger- 
 manus of Auxerre, had brought over into 
 our island ; and that the poison of Pela- 
 gianism must have had a considerable in- 
 fluence in the production of that national 
 decay of piety which Gildas so feelingl}' 
 deplores. 
 
 Colomban, an Irish priest in this cen- 
 tury, came over into the northern parts of 
 Scotland, and laboured with much suc- 
 cess among the Picts.* The southern 
 parts of Scotland had been evangelized 
 long before by the instruction of Ninias, 
 a British bishop, Avho had himself been 
 instructed at Rome. Colomban lived 
 thirty-four years after his passage into 
 Britain. His disciples were remarkable 
 for the holiness and abstemiousness of 
 their lives. Thus, while the Gospel was 
 rapidly withdrawing from the East, where 
 it first arose, God left not himself with- 
 out witness in the most distant parts of 
 the West. 
 
 Radegunda, daughter of Bertharius, 
 king of Thuringia, having been taken 
 captive by the Franks in her infancy, fell 
 
 * Probably they were originally Britons 
 who fled into Scotland fi-om the arms of the 
 Saxons, and were called Picts, Lecause they 
 painted their bodies, according to the custom 
 of our barbarous ancestors. 
 2x2 
 
 to the lot of king Clotaire, who married 
 her. This woman might have been added 
 to the list of those pious persons of her 
 sex, who were made highly instrumental 
 in instructing mankind, had she not im- 
 bibed monastic ideas, the pest which 
 iufeeted godly persons, in general, in 
 these times, and which, though it could 
 not ruin their relation to God, cut otF the 
 greatest part of their usefulness. She 
 obtained a separation from her husband, 
 and followed the monastic rules with 
 great austerity to her death. These rules 
 were now grown stricter than ever; the 
 vows were made perpetual, and this godly 
 queen, who might have caused her light 
 to shine in a blessed manner in the world, 
 was shut up during the remainder of her 
 life in a nunnery. 
 
 Toward the latter end of this century, 
 the Lombards came from Pannonia into 
 Italy, and settled there under Alboinus, 
 their first king. They fixed their metro- 
 polis at Pavia. As they were Arians by 
 profession, heresy again took root in Italy, 
 whose inhabitants felt all the horrors and 
 miseries which a savage and victorious 
 nation could inflict. But the Church 
 needed the scourge ; the Roman See had 
 been dreadfully corrupt under Vigilius, 
 and formal superstition was corroding the 
 vitals of genuine godliness. 
 
 At the same time .lohn Climmachus 
 flourished, who was abbot of the monas- 
 tery of Mount Sinai, in Arabia, near to 
 which was a little monastery, called the 
 Prison, in which all who had committed 
 any great crime, since they entered on 
 the monastic state, voluntarily confined 
 themselves. The account which Clim- 
 machus gives of it is striking. The poor 
 prisoners spent their time in prayer, with 
 every possible external mark of self-denial 
 and wretchedness. They did not allow 
 themselves any one comfort of human 
 life. In their prayers they did not dare 
 to ask to be delivered entirely from pun- 
 ishment; thej' only bogged not to be 
 punished with the utmost rigour. The 
 voluntary torments they endured were 
 amazing, and this voluntary humility of 
 theirs continued till death. But I turn 
 from the disaoreeable scene to make one 
 remark : 
 
 How precious is the light of the Gos- 
 pel ! How gladly, we may suppose, 
 would many of these miserable persons 
 have received the doctrine of free forgive- 
 ness by faith in the atoning blood of Jesus 
 Christ, if it had been fjvithfully preached 
 
498 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. 
 
 among them ! How does their serious- 
 ness rebuke the levity of presumptuous 
 sinners among ourselves, who trifle with 
 the light ! how deeply fallen was the 
 East from the real genius of Christianity, 
 when men distressed for sin could find no 
 hope but in their own formalities and 
 rigid austerities ! 
 
 In the year 584, Levigildus, king of the 
 Visgoths in Spain, having married his 
 eldest son Hermenigildus, to Ingonda, 
 
 daughter of the French king, 
 Remarka- i^qctqh to find effects from the 
 Levi"-!!- marriage which he little ex- 
 <liis ° pected. Ingonda, though per- 
 
 A D 584 secuted by her mother-iu-lavv, 
 
 the wife of the Spanish mon- 
 arch, persevered in orthodox}^, and, by 
 the assistance of Leander, bishop of Se- 
 ville, under the influence of divine grace, 
 brought over her husband to the faith. 
 The father, enraged, commenced a griev- 
 ous persecution against the orthodox in 
 his dominions. Hermenigildus was led 
 into the grievous error of rebelling against 
 his father, not through ambition, it seems, 
 but throHgh fear of his father, who ap- 
 peared to be bent on his destruction. Being 
 obliged to fly into a church, he was indu- 
 ced by his father's promises to surrender 
 himself. Levigildus at first treated him 
 with kindness, but afterwards banished 
 him to Valentia. His wife Ingonda flying 
 to the Grecian emperor, died by the way. 
 Sometime after, the young prince, loaded 
 with irons, had leisure to learn the vanity 
 of earthly greatness, and exhibited every 
 mark of piety and humility. His father 
 sent to him an Arian bishop, offering him 
 his favour, if he would receive the com- 
 munion at his hands. Hermenigildus 
 continued firm in the faith, and the king 
 enraged, sent officers, who dispatched 
 him. The father lived however to repent 
 of his cruelty ; and the young prince, 
 notwithstanding the unjustifiable step in- 
 to which his passions had betrayed him, 
 had lived long enough to give a shining 
 example of Christian piety. Levigildus, 
 before he died, desired Leander, bishop 
 of Seville, whom he had much persecuted, 
 to educate his second son Recaredus* in 
 the same principles in which he had in- 
 structed his eldest. Recaredus succeeded 
 his father in the government, and embra- 
 ced orthodoxy with much zeal, the conse- 
 quence was the establishment of orthodoxy 
 in Spain, and the destruction of Arianism, 
 
 * Gregory of Tours, B. Vlll. C. ult. 
 
 which had now no legal settlement in the 
 world, except with the Lombards in Italy. 
 Though this account be general and exter- 
 nal, it seemed proper to give it, as an 
 illustrious instance of the work of Divine 
 Providence, effecting by the means of a 
 pious princess a very salutary revolution 
 in religion. 
 
 I have collected in this chapter the few 
 events which appeared worthy of notice 
 from the death of Justinian to the end of 
 this century, with a studied exclusion of 
 the concerns of Gregory the first, bishop 
 of Rome. He is a character deserving to 
 be exhibited distinctly. And in connexion 
 with his affairs, whatever else has been 
 omitted, which falls within our plan, may 
 be introduced in the next chapter. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 GREGORY THE FIRST, BISHOP OF ROME. 
 HIS PASTORAL LABOURS. 
 
 He was a Roman by birth, and of a 
 noble family. But being religiously dis- 
 posed, he assumed the monastic habit, 
 and was eminently distinguished by the 
 progress he made in piety.* It was not 
 till after he was drawn back, in a degree, 
 to a secular life, by his employments in 
 the Church, that he became thoroughly 
 sensible what advantage he had enjoyed 
 for his own soul from religious retire- 
 ment. With tears he owned that he had 
 had the world under his feet while he 
 was absorbed in heavenly contempla- 
 tion ; but was now bereft of comfort. 
 " Now," says he, " my mind, by reason 
 of pastoral cares, is oppressed with the 
 business of secular persons, and after so 
 fair an appearance of rest, is defiled with 
 the dust of earthly action. And suffering 
 itself to be distracted by outward things 
 in condescension to many, even while it 
 desires inward things, it returns to them, 
 without doubt, more faintly. I weigh, 
 therefore, what I endure : I weigh what I 
 have lost, and while I look at that which 
 
 * Bede Eccles. Hist. B. II. C. I. It 
 
 .should be observed here, tliat before this he 
 had studied the Roman jurisprudence, was 
 eminent in that and every other fashionable 
 secular kind of knowledge, had been distin- 
 guished as a senator, an<l promoted by Justin 
 IF. to the govt-rnment of the city of Rome, an 
 arduous and important office, which he had 
 discharged with singular prudence, fidelity, 
 and justice. 
 
Cejtt. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 499 
 
 I have lost, my present burdens are more 
 heavy." 
 
 In truth, in different periods of his life 
 he moved in opposite extremes. He was 
 one while dormant in the quietism of so- 
 litude; another while, involved in the 
 multiplicity of episcopal cares at Rome. 
 If his lot had been cast in the earlier and 
 purer days of Christianity, he would nei- 
 ther have been a monk, nor a bishop 
 charg-ed with such extensive secular con- 
 cerns, and so would have avoided the 
 evils of which he complains. The tjreat 
 Sees in these times, that of Rome in par- 
 ticular; through the increasing; oTowtli of 
 spiritual domination, and the load of 
 worldly business very improperly con- 
 nected with it, worldly, though in some 
 sense ecclesiastical, were indeed ag'ree- 
 able enouorh to minds like that of Vicrilius, 
 earthly and ambitious, but were fatiguing 
 beyond measure to men like Gregory, 
 who unfeignedly loved heavenly things. 
 Nothing could be. more unwise than the 
 custom which prevailed of encouraging 
 monasticism and very large episcopal 
 governments at the same time. The 
 transition from the one to the other, as in 
 Gregory's case (and it was a common 
 one,) must to holy minds, like his, have 
 been a trial of no small magnitude. The 
 serious complaints, however, which Gre- 
 gory made of this trial during the wliole 
 scene of his bishopric, proceeded from 
 the spirituality of his affections; and all, 
 who have enjoyed in private the sweets 
 of communion with God, and have found 
 how difficult it is, in the hurry of business, 
 to preserve a degree of the same spirit, 
 will sympathize with him. A medio- 
 crity, and a mixture of employment and 
 retirement is, doubtless, the best situation 
 for religious improvement. 
 
 Being drawn from his monastery, and 
 ordained to the ministry, he was sent 
 from Rome to Constantinople, to transact 
 ecclesiastical affairs. Here he became 
 acquainted with Leander, afterwards bi- 
 shop of Seville, the same person that we 
 have spoken of in the relation of the af- 
 fairs of Spain. Leander and he found in 
 each other a similarity of taste and spirit; 
 Gregory opened his heart to him : " I found 
 my soul," says he, "convinced of the 
 necessity of securing salvation; but I de- 
 layed too long, entangled with the world. 
 At length I threw myself into a monaste- 
 ry; now I thought I had placed an insu- 
 perable bar between myself and the world. 
 But again I am tossed on the tempestu- 
 
 ous ocean, and unless I may enjoy the 
 communion of my brethren, T can find no 
 solace to my soul."* 
 
 He had, however, taken with him some 
 of the brethren of his monastery, and with 
 them had enjoyed the benefit of Christian 
 discourse, and of searching the Scriptures. 
 Here, also, through their exhortation, he 
 began his long commentary on the book 
 of Job, which he finished in his episco- 
 pacy.f His residence at Constantinople 
 was not without, at least, some use to 
 the church. By his arguments and influ- 
 ence he quashed the fanciful notion of 
 the archbishop Eutychius, already men- 
 tioned, concerning the qualities of the 
 human body after the resurrection. Had 
 it not been for the timely and vigorous 
 opposition of a man so respectable as 
 Gregory was for knowledge and piety, 
 the notion might have continued, with 
 many, to the disgrace of Christianity at 
 this day. The emperor Tiberius, who 
 had succeeded Justin, supported the la- 
 bours of Gregory with his authority. 
 
 Gregory, even from his youth, was 
 afflicted with frequent complaints in his 
 stomach and bowels; and by his own ac- 
 count in his letters, he appears to have 
 suffered much in his body all his days. 
 The vigour of his mind however was not 
 depressed, and perhaps few men ever 
 profited more than he did by such chas- 
 tisements. His labours, both as a pastor 
 and an author, were continued, and in all 
 probability, received peculiar unction 
 from his afflictions. 
 
 After his return to Rome,:{: there was 
 so great an inundation of the Tiber, that 
 it flowed upon the walls of the city, and 
 threw down many monuments and an- 
 cient structures.§ The granaries of the 
 church were overflowed, by which a pro- 
 digious quantity of wheat was lost. Pre- 
 sently after, an infectuous distemper in- 
 vaded the city. Pelagius the bishop fell 
 a victim to it amonff the first. The de- 
 struction prevailed, and many houses 
 were left without an inhabitant. In this 
 distress, the people were anxious to 
 choose a bishop in the room of the de- 
 ceased Pelagius, and by unanimous con- 
 sent the election fell upon Gregory. He, 
 with that humility which formed invaria- 
 
 * Grcgor. Pi'ef. to Job, C. I. 
 
 fBede. 
 I Vita Gregor. liicert. autor. 
 § These inundations of the Tiber were not 
 uncommon. Tlie classical reader wiU recol- 
 lect in Horace, Ode II. Lib. I. 
 
 Ire dejectum monumenta regis, &;c. 
 
500 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap.V. 
 
 bly a striking feature of his cliaracter, 
 earnestly refused, and loudly proclaimed 
 his own unworthiness. He did more; 
 he wrote to Mauritius, the successor of 
 Tiberius, beseeching him to withhold 
 his assent.* Germanus, the Governor of 
 Constantinople, intercepting the messen- 
 ger, and opening the letter of Gregory, 
 informed Mauritius of the election. The 
 emperor confirmed it with pleasure. In 
 the mean time the plague continued to 
 make dreadful havoc ; and Gregory, how- 
 ever backward to receive the office of a 
 bishop, forgot not the duties of a pastor. 
 A part of liis sermon on this occasion 
 may give us some idea of the best preach- 
 ing of those times; for I know none in 
 those days which is superior, and but 
 little which is equal, to that of Gregory. 
 "Beloved brethren, we ought to have 
 feared the scourge of God before it came; 
 at least, after having felt it, let us trem- 
 ble. Let grief open to us the passages 
 of conversion; and let the punishment, 
 which we feel, dissolve the hardness of 
 our hearts. For, to use the prophet's 
 language, 'the sword hath come even 
 into the soul.' Our people, behold, are 
 smitten with a weapon of divine indigna- 
 tion, and each is carried oft' by the rapid 
 devastation. Languor does not precede 
 death, but death itself with hasty strides, 
 as you see, outstrips the tardy course of 
 languor. Every person, who is smitten, 
 is carried off", before he has opportunity 
 to bewail his sins. Conceive in what 
 state that man will appear before his 
 Judge, who is hurried off in the midst of 
 his sins. — Let each of us repent while we 
 have time to weep, before the sword de- 
 vour us. — Let us call our ways to re- 
 membrance. — Let us come before his face 
 with confession, and lift up our hearts 
 with our hands to the Lord. — Truly he 
 gives to our trembling hearts a confidence, 
 who proclaims by the prophet, 'I would 
 not the death of a sinner, but rather that 
 he should be converted and live.' Let 
 none despair on account of the greatness 
 
 • The assent of the emperor to the election 
 of a bishop of Rome appears plainly to have 
 been necessary by tlie custom of lliese times. 
 But tlie total exclusion of the people from all 
 concern in these appointments bad not yet 
 obtained. It is obvious to be noticed also, bow 
 dependent the bisliop of Rome was on the 
 emperor. Antichrist liad not yet formall) 
 begun bis reign, nor would have been known 
 atRorae to this day, hisd all the Cishnps re- 
 sembled Gregory. 
 
 of his crimes. Think how the inveterate 
 evils of the Ninevites were wiped off" by 
 three days repentance;* and that the con- 
 verted robber in the very article of death 
 obtained the rewards of life. Let us 
 change our hearts, and encourage our- 
 selves before hand with the thought that 
 we have obtained what we ask. — Impor- 
 timity, so disagreeable to man, is well 
 pleasing to the Judge of truth ; l)ecause the 
 good and merciful Lord loves to be over- 
 come by prayers. — Remember the Psalm- 
 ist : ' Call upon me in the time of trouble ; 
 so will I hear thee, and thou shalt praise 
 me.' He admonishes us to call upon 
 his name, and witnesses by this his readi- 
 ness to forgive." 
 
 Gregory concluded his discourse with 
 appointing a litanyj to be performed by 
 seven companies, who were to march at 
 break of day from different churches, and 
 to meet at one place. The first company 
 consisted of the clergy ; the second, of 
 abbots with their monks; the third, of 
 abbesses with their nuns; the fourth, of 
 children ; the fifth, of laymen ; the sixth, 
 of widows ; the seventh, of married wo- 
 men. Fourscore persons in one hour, 
 Vv'hile the people were supplicating in 
 the litany, died of the plague. Gregory, 
 however, persisted in praying and preach- 
 ing till the plague ceased. 
 
 He was all this time as eager to avoid 
 the honour of the episcopal office, as he 
 was to discharge the duty of it. The gates 
 were watched, and his flight was prevent- 
 ed for a time. But he found --, 
 
 , , . Gregory 
 
 means to be conveyed in a ^|^g Great 
 
 wicker basket out of the city, made 
 and concealed himself three bishop of 
 days. The zealous search of Rome 
 the people discovered him at ;'.?Y"st his 
 length, and he was obliged to ^-^^^^ " 
 enter upon his bishopric. This ' 
 
 happened in the year 590. ^- "• ^^"• 
 
 Gregory continued to discharge the of- 
 fice in the same spirit, in which he began 
 it. Other bishops had been sedulous to 
 adorn churches with gold or „, . . 
 silver; he gave himself whol- ^ ;|;;|f|,f" 
 ly, so far as he could, to the q,, 
 care of souls. + The melan- 
 
 iregory. 
 
 * I translate faithfully ; the expression 
 marks the want of evangelical accuracy in 
 Gregory, tliougli not surely the want of evan- 
 gelical bnmility. It is not to be imagined that 
 lie considered repentance as a proprer atone- 
 ment for sin. 
 
 t The word signifies Supplication. 
 
 i Bede. 
 
Cext. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 501 
 
 choly circumstances of his accession cor- 
 responded with the gloomy state of the 
 Church, — in the East, almost universally 
 fallen, — in the West, tarnished with much 
 superstition, and defiled by variety of 
 wickedness. The whole period of his 
 episcopacy, which was thirteen years and 
 a half,* was disastrous beyond measure, 
 because of the ferocious Lombards; and 
 Gregory himself was firmly persuaded 
 that the end of the world was near. 
 Hence he had evidently a strong con- 
 tempt of sublunary things, a-nd loved to 
 refresh his mind with prospects beyond 
 the grave. Nor has the sceptical, philo- 
 sophical taste, as it is called, of this day, 
 any reason to plume itself on comparison 
 with that of Gregory. What is there, for 
 instance, in the scene we have been just 
 reviewing, which should excite the con- 
 tempt of the philosopher, or rather, of the 
 infidel who calls himself philosopher] 
 Some superstition has appeared in it: it 
 was an age of superstition : the form of 
 Christianity was degenerated even in the 
 best; but the divine religion sparkled 
 through the gloom in the real life of hu- 
 mility, faith, and repentance. The spi- 
 ritual benefit of many, it is highly proba- 
 ble, resulted from the pastoral labours and 
 litanies of Gregory; and whether is more 
 rational, to fear the wrath of God, when 
 his hand is upon us, to weep and pray, 
 and implore his grace and mercy, in re- 
 liance on the promises of his word, be- 
 holding the scourge as really sent from 
 God ; or to harden the heart in jocose and 
 fastidious sneers at the weakness of su- 
 perstition, and to see and learn nothing 
 from the desolating judgments of the Al- 
 mighty, that may lead us to repentance. 
 
 In Gregory's works we have a collec- 
 tion of epistles, which will give us a view 
 of his labours and transactions. Disci- 
 „. _ . pline, and indefatigable atten- 
 HisEpis- ^Jqj^ ^q order, justice, mercy, 
 and piety, mark all his pro- 
 ceedings. The inordinate amplitude of 
 authority and of extensive jurisdiction, to 
 which superstition had already advanced 
 the Roman See, and which aiforded such 
 copious fuel to pride and ambition in 
 some of his predecessors and many of his 
 successors, was to him only the cause of 
 anxious care and conscientious solicitude. 
 Italy and Sicily were of themselves too 
 large a theatre of action; but with the go- 
 vernment of these he received the pre- 
 
 * Bede. 
 
 vailing notion of a superintendence of the 
 Roman See over all the churches, derived 
 from St. Peter. In him, at least, the idea 
 excited no pleasing sensations of domi- 
 nion. A fatherly inspection of Christen- 
 dom without civil power called him to in- 
 cessant labour; besides that his own dio- 
 cese was much too great for any one 
 man's capacity. Humility and the fear 
 of God were his ruling dis|)ositions; and 
 it is evident to a careful observer of Gre- 
 gory, that he exerted authority in full 
 consistency with these. Moreover he 
 found time to expound the Scriptures, to 
 perform the oflice of a sedulous pastor, 
 and to write much for the instruction of 
 mankind. Deeply must the spirit of that 
 man have been impressed with the pros- 
 pects and hopes of immortality, who 
 amidst bodily infirmities, and in times of 
 public perplexity, could persevere in such 
 a course of arduous labours. I shall en- 
 deavour to enable the reader to form a 
 judgment for himself of the man, by a re- 
 view of his letters; omitting those which 
 are the least interesting. 
 
 He directed the bishops of Sicily to 
 hold an annual visitation at Syracuse or 
 Catana under his subdeacon, and to at- 
 tend in it to things which related to the 
 public and ecclesiastical welfare, to re- 
 lieve the necessities of the poor and op- 
 pressed, and to admonish and correct 
 those who had fallen into errors. In 
 which council he begs that they would 
 be guarded against malice, envy, and dis- 
 cord, and maintain a godly unity and cha- 
 rity.* 
 
 He reminds the praetor of Sicily, whose 
 duty it was to send corn into Italy from 
 that fruitful granary of the empire, to be 
 just and equitable in his dealings, to re- 
 member that life is short, that he must 
 soon appear before the Judge of all, and 
 that he can carry away with him nothing 
 of his gains, and that only the causes and 
 methods of his (rains will follow him to 
 judgment.f 
 
 To a friend he writes thus on his pro- 
 motion : "I value not the congratulations 
 of strangers on my advancement. But it 
 is a serious grief to me, that you, who 
 know me thoroughly, should felicitate me 
 on the occasion. Ve have long known 
 my wish ; I should have obtained the rest 
 which I sought, could I have been grati- 
 fied in it."i: 
 
 " If charity," says he, writing to John 
 
 » B. I. Ep. 1. 
 
 t Ep. 2. i Ep. 3. 
 
502 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 bishop of Constantinople, " consist in the 
 love of our neighbour, why do not ye love 
 me as yourselves ? With what ardour 
 and zeal ye would fly from the weight of 
 episcopacy I know, and yet ye took no 
 pains to hinder the imposition of this bur- 
 den on me. But as the government of an 
 old and crazy vessel is committed to me, 
 ■weak and unworthy as I am, I beseech 
 you, by the Lord, that you would stretch 
 out the hand of prayer to my relief."* 
 
 The employment of deciding causes, 
 which in these times fell to the lot of 
 bishops, must have been tedious and bur- 
 densome to a mind of conscientious ex- 
 actness, like that of Gregory. Hear how 
 feelingly he complains of the load, in a 
 letter to Theoctista, sister to the em- 
 peror : 
 
 " Underf colour of the bishopric, I find 
 I am brought back to the world, in which 
 I am enslaved to such a quantity of earth- 
 ly cares, as I never remember to have 
 been infested with in my lay capacity. I 
 have lost the sublime joys of myself; and, 
 sinking inwardly, seem to rise externally. 
 I deplore my expulsion from the face of 
 my Maker. I was endeavouring to live 
 out of the world and the flesh : to drive 
 away all the phantasms of body from the 
 «yes of my mind, and to see supernal 
 joys mentally; and with my inmost soul 
 panting after God, I said, my heart hath 
 said to thee, ' thy face. Lord, will I seek.' 
 Desiring nothing, and fearing nothing of 
 tlie world, I seemed to have almost real- 
 ized that of the prophet: 'I will cause 
 thee to ride upon the high places of the 
 earth.' Surely it is so with him, who 
 looks down from his intellectual elevation 
 on all the grandeur and glory of the earth. 
 But suddenly from the height of peace 
 and stability, impelled by the whirlwind 
 of this temptation, I have fallen into fears 
 and terrors ; because though I fear not for 
 myself, I fear much for those who are 
 committed to my charge: I am shaken 
 with the fluctuations of causes on all 
 sides, and say, ' I am come into deep 
 waters, so that the floods run over me.' 
 After the hurry of causes is over, I desire 
 to return to my heart, but excluded from 
 it by the vain tumults of thoughts, I can- 
 not return." — Such is the picture which 
 Gregory draws of his mental situation in 
 the midst of all his envied greatness. Ex- 
 perience and habit might in time lessen 
 his anxieties. Nor was it through want 
 
 Ep. 4. 
 
 t Ep. 5. 
 
 of capacity for business that he suflfered 
 thus extremely. No age ever saw a 
 bishop more vigorous, firm and circum- 
 spect. The immensity of ecclesiastical 
 employment, which went through his 
 hands, seems almost incredible. I re- 
 joice to find in him such vivid tokens of 
 that spiritual sensibility and life, which 
 it is the great business of this history to 
 delineate, as it appeared from age to age 
 in the church, and which distinguishes 
 real Christians as much from nominal 
 ones, as from all other men. In the mean 
 time I have to regret, that while the 
 power and experience of godliness de- 
 cayed, the amplitude of bishoprics was so 
 much augmented, and that so much extra- 
 neous matter, which ought to have been 
 committed to other hands, was thrown 
 upon them. The consequence has been 
 that the dignitaries of the church have 
 ever since been thrown into circumstances 
 peculiarly disadvantageous. Those of a 
 secular spirit have toiled with eagerness 
 for worldly and selfish ends, without feel- 
 ing any injury to the spiritual life, he- 
 cause they had none; those of a heavenly 
 spirit have felt like Gregory under the 
 united pressures of conscientious care and 
 the tumult of thoughts very alien from 
 the Christian life, and tending to extin- 
 guish it. 
 
 The pious and upright Anastasius of 
 Antioch has been already introduced to 
 the reader's notice. Gregory had con- 
 tracted an intimacy with him while in 
 the East, and he writes to him thus in 
 answer to his letter : " I received your 
 letter, as a weary man does rest, as a 
 sick man health, as a thirsty person a 
 fountain, as one overcome with heat a 
 shade. I read not mere words ; I per- 
 ceived the heart itself to be discovering 
 your affection towards me in the spirit." 
 He goes on to complain of Anastasius's 
 cruel kindness, in having contributed to 
 his promotion, and describes his burdens 
 in his usual manner. " But when you 
 call me the mouth and lamp of the Lord, 
 and a person capable of profiting many, 
 this is added to the load of my iniquities, 
 that I receive praise instead of punish- 
 ment for my sins. How I am overload- 
 ed, no words can express ; you may form 
 some idea from the brevity of my letter, 
 in which I say so little of Him whom I 
 love above all. I have begged of the 
 emperor to allow you to visit me at 
 Rome, that while I enjoy your company, 
 we may relieve the tediousness of our 
 
Cbitt. VT.] 
 
 GREGORY I, 
 
 503 
 
 pilgrimage by conversing together of the 
 heavenly country."* It' is not easy for 
 persons, unacquainted with their own 
 heart, to believe all this S(Mi9n of unwor- 
 thiness to be genuine in Gregory; men 
 who know themselves will believe that 
 he spake sincerely. 
 
 Gregory was solicitous for the conver- 
 sion of the Lombards from the Arian he- 
 resy, and therefore he wrote to the bish- 
 ops of Italy, to avail themselves of their 
 influence to unite all the young persons 
 of that nation, who had been baptized in 
 the Arian communion, to the general 
 church, to preach to them the doctrine of 
 eternal life, and to secure to themselves 
 a pleasing account of their pastoral la- 
 bours at the last day.f Under his admi- 
 nistration a gradual accession of this 
 people was made to the church, notwith- 
 standing the great power of the Lombard 
 princes, and their obstinate attachment to 
 Arianism. Indeed the shining example 
 of Gregory himself must have made a 
 very powerful impression on the minds 
 of all who had opportunity of know- 
 ing him. He was careful to preserve the 
 great revenues of the church, but no man 
 was ever more conscientious to employ 
 them to good purposes. As he loved to 
 imitate his predecessor Gelasius,:j; he fol- 
 lowed the statement of the revenues 
 which he had drawn up, and formed an 
 estimate of them in money ; distributions 
 of which he made to the clergy, monas- 
 teries, churches, the officers of his house, 
 deaconries, and hospitals. He regulated 
 the sums to be allotted to each at four 
 times of the year, an order which was 
 observed three hundred years after. A 
 great volume was kept in the palace of 
 the Lateran, containing the names of the 
 poor who were the objects of his libera- 
 lity, their age and circumstances, at 
 Rome, in Italy, and even in distant pro- 
 vinces. On every first day of the month, 
 he distributed to the necessities of the 
 poor, according to the season, various 
 articles of provision. Everyday he dis- 
 tributed alms to the sick and infirm; and 
 before he sat down to eat, he sent por- 
 tions from his table to some indigent peo- 
 ple, who were ashamed to appear. It 
 would be tedious to recount from his let- 
 iers§ the instances of his liberality. He 
 pressed his agents to inform him of ob- 
 
 • Ep. 7. t Ep. 17. 
 
 t Fleiiry, B. xxxv. C. xvi.. Vol. iv. 
 
 ^ B, L Ep. 18, 44, 23, 57, 65, 54, 30. « 
 
 jects, and loved to exceed the expecta- 
 tions of his petitioners. But wiiile he 
 abounded in benefactions, he would re- 
 ceive none himself. " We ouo-ht to re- 
 fuse," said he, writing to Felix bishop 
 of Messina, "presents which are expen- 
 sive to the churches. Send to the other 
 clergymen every year what is established 
 by usage. But as I love not presents, I 
 forbid you to send me any for the future. 
 I thank you for the palm-trees which yoa 
 sent me, but I have caused them to be 
 sold, and have sent you the price of 
 them." The unhappy wars of Italy 
 having caused great desolations of the 
 Churches, that the remaining inhabitants 
 might not be forsaken, he gave those 
 churches in chartje to the neisrhbourinor 
 bishops. If two of them did not contain, 
 singly, a sufficient number of persons to 
 constitute a diocese, he joined them toge- 
 ther under one bishop, insisting on equal 
 care being taken of that in which he did 
 not reside, as of that in which he did. 
 lie made no difficulty of obliging a bish- 
 op to leave a small church, where he was 
 little more than titular pastor, to govern 
 a more important one.* Having disco- 
 vered several abuses committed in the 
 management of the revenues in Sicily, he 
 took care to reform them. " We are 
 informed," says he,| " that corn is 
 bought of the peasants, under the market 
 price ; I direct that they be paid always 
 according to the current price, without 
 deducting the corn lost by shipwreck, 
 provided that you take care that tliey do 
 not transport it out of season. We for- 
 bid all base exactions; and, that after 
 my death the farmers may not be charged 
 anew, let a certificate be delivered to 
 them in writincr, containingf the sum 
 which each is obliged to pay. Take par- 
 ticular care, that false weights be not 
 made use of in receiving the payments, 
 as the deacon Servus Dei discovered, but 
 break them in pieces, and cause new 
 ones to be made. I have been informed 
 tliat farmers are distressed at the first 
 time of the payment of their rents ; for, 
 having not yet sold their fruits, they are 
 obliged to borrow at heavy interest. Sup- 
 ply them therefore out of the stock of the 
 church with what they may have borrow- 
 ed, and receive tiieir payments by de- 
 grees, lest you oblige them to sell their 
 
 * Ep. 42. He writes thus to Ptter his agent 
 in Sicily, 
 t B. I. Ep. 64, he. B. II. Ep. 20. 
 
504 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 commodities at an under price, to make 
 good their rents. In general, I will not 
 
 SUFFER THE CHURCH TO BE DEFILED BY 
 BASE GAINS." 
 
 This is a specimen of the uprightness 
 and attention of Gregory to those secular 
 concerns, under which his spirit so much 
 groaned. A pharisee would have found 
 a feast for his pride in so much henefi- 
 cence. But Gregory was humble, he 
 could not find rest to his soul in such ex- 
 ercises, however laudable ; and though 
 his heart and head seemed as well fitted 
 as any man's in any age for such work, 
 and though he went through it with much 
 ability and success, yet it were to be 
 wished that he had been allowed a larger 
 portion of time to pay attention to the 
 more spiritual duties of his station. This 
 short extract however (for the account 
 might have been swelled to a large size) 
 may deserve some attention from persons, 
 whether ecclesiastical or secular, whose 
 employments are of a similar nature. Let 
 them ask themselves, whether with 
 Gregory's care for the preservation of 
 their rights (and in that he was as firm 
 and strenuous as Christian charity al- 
 lows,) they are also like him upright, 
 disinterested, and merciful. And as hu- 
 man malignit}' has been abundantly gra- 
 tified in large details of the encroach 
 meats and oppressions of churchmen, it 
 falls within the plan of these memoirs, 
 to show that all churchmen have not been 
 thus iniquitous; that those who are hum- 
 ble and evangelically pious, are also, 
 above all men, upright, munificent, and 
 liberal. 
 
 Peter, bishop of Terraco in Spain, had 
 consented to a species of persecution of 
 the Jews in his diocese, by permitting 
 them to be molested in their festivities, 
 and to be more than once driven from the 
 place in which they celebrated them. Let 
 those, who have been led by fashionable 
 historians to annex the idea of persecution 
 to that of the priesthood, take notice, that 
 Gregory bishop of Rome wrote to Peter, 
 to condemn the practice, and to give his 
 decisive opinion, that the Jews should 
 not be in the least molested, that they 
 ought to be won over to the faith by the 
 SWEETNESS of Gospel-prcaching, and by 
 the denunciation of divine judgments 
 against infidelity, and that these were 
 christian arts and methods, while those of 
 a different nature tended only to harden 
 and disgust the human mind.* 
 
 * B. 1. Ep. 34. ~ 
 
 To Leander of Seville* he expresses 
 with tears the pressures of his mind under 
 loads of solicitude, and earnestly entreats 
 his prayers. He congratulates him also 
 on the conversion of king Recaredus of 
 Spain, and while he rejoices at the news 
 of that prince's piety and virtues, he ad- 
 monishes the bishop to watch over the 
 royal convert, that his life may corres- 
 pond to so hopeful a beginning. He 
 wrote sometime after to the same prince, 
 to recommend to him a strong guard over 
 anger, pride, and lust, vices more pecu- 
 liarly apt to infest princes. Of all the 
 princes of this time, he seems most to 
 have adorned the gospel. He was just, 
 munificent, and liberal. And before he 
 left the world, he publicly confessed his 
 sins, and appeared to have been possess- 
 ed of true piety, so far as we can judge. 
 He died about the close of this century. 
 
 To Virgilius and Theodorus, bishops 
 of Marseilles, he writes on occasion of the 
 persecuting methods made use of against 
 the Jews. He again bears testimony 
 against the compulsory practices; and 
 declares how sorry he is to find, that many 
 of that people had been brought, by vio- 
 lence rather than by preaching, to the 
 baptismal font. " If a Jew is brought 
 thither by necessity, not by the sweetness 
 of the word, returning to his former super- 
 stition, he dies in a worst state than that 
 from which he seemed to be regenerated. 
 Preach frequently to them, that they may 
 desire to be changed, through the love of 
 what they hear. Thus your desire cf 
 saving souls will be accomplished, and 
 the convert will not return like the dog 
 to his vomit. Preach, that their dark 
 minds may be illuminated, and that under 
 God they may be brought to real regene- 
 ration."]" 
 
 He wrote also to Pascasius, bishop of 
 Naples, complaining of the violence used 
 to the Jews in driving them from their 
 solemnities. He blames this method, 
 and exhorts to the same purpose as be- 
 fore.:}: It is well known wliat different 
 methods, since the time of Gregory, have 
 been supported by the Roman Popes. I 
 appropriate the term Pope to Antichrist, 
 who did not, accurately speaking, exist 
 as yet in the Western church. On the 
 other side, Gregory was zealous to sup- 
 press the attempts of Jews to seduce 
 Christians, and prohibited their purcha- 
 sing of Christians for slaves. § 
 
 * Ep. 41. 
 I B. II. Ep. 
 
 15. 
 
 t B. I. Ep. 45. 
 § B. U. Ep. 76. 
 
Ci 
 
 VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 505 
 
 The Lombards were a constant scourge 
 to Italy in the time of Gregory, and he 
 was aware of their intentions to invade 
 Sicily. Hence he wrote to all the bish- 
 ops of the island to sujjplicate the Lord 
 in litanies every fourth and sixth day of 
 the week, and exhorted them not only to 
 draw their flocks to this association of 
 prayer, but also to preach to them the 
 doctrine of repentance. " For if the gra- 
 cious Lord behold us loving his com- 
 mands, he is able to defend us from the 
 enemy, and to prepare eternal joys for 
 us."* 
 
 Natalis, bishop of Salonae, had written 
 to Gregory in defence of the entertain- 
 ments given by the clergy. The bishop 
 of Rome allows his assertions, but under 
 these important restrictions, " that no 
 absent persons be slandered at these 
 meetings, that none be made an ob- 
 ject of ridicule, that the empty discourse 
 of secular business be avoided, that the 
 word of God be read in them, that no 
 more meat and drink be used than is 
 needful for the refreshment of the bod}", 
 and to fit it for the discharge of duty. If 
 this be your practice, I confess you to 
 be masters of temperance."| But it 
 seems Gregory's animadversions on the 
 feasting of the Salonian clergy had given 
 offence, by that v/hich he adds : " You 
 take it ill to be reprehended by me, who, 
 thougli I am your superior in church dig- 
 nity (I do not mean as a man,) am will- 
 ing to be corrected and reproved by all. 
 I thank, indeed, that man as my friend, 
 through whose advice I am enabled to 
 wipe off the blemishes of my soul before 
 the appearance of the awful Judge." One 
 cannot form any great idea of the piety of 
 this Natalis, who had excused himself 
 from assiduous reading of the Scriptures, 
 partly on account of tlie pressure of tribu- 
 lations, partly by a mere cavil, because 
 our Lord had told his disciples, that it 
 should be given them in the same hour 
 what thej' should speak. Gregory in- 
 forms him, that tlie Scriptures were given 
 us, that we, through patience and comfort 
 of them, might have hope. How he an- 
 swers the cavil, it is not necessary to 
 say. " But we cannot be like you," 
 Natalis had said. The bishop of Rome 
 was not to be seduced by such evasive 
 flattery. " The encomiums you bestow 
 
 * B. IX. 45. Hence I apprehend llie origin 
 of the use of tlie Litany on Wednesdays and 
 Fridays in public worship. 
 
 t B". II. 3". 
 
 Vol. I. 2U 
 
 on me," said he, " seem to be spoken in 
 derision, because I cannot in truth find 
 them realized in my experience." We 
 see in all this, on one side, a zealous pas- 
 tor labouring to revive a sense and spirit 
 of godliness in his brethren; on the other, 
 a slothful and false-hearted minister, poor- 
 ly excusing himself by feigned apologies, 
 from doino- the Lord's work with vitrour 
 and sincerity. 
 
 After having given a beautiful descrip- 
 tion of charit}' in writing to Dominicus 
 bishop of Carthage, * he shows how 
 deeply his soul was penetrated with the 
 importance of the pastoral office. In their 
 views of this, many of the ancient Fathers, 
 whom we deride for their superstitions, 
 do far excel the generality of pastors in 
 our times. Let him who ha.5 entered on 
 this office with merely secular views, 
 read, and, if he can, blush and weep, after 
 he has considered, that no age since the 
 Apostles' days has ever seen one more in- 
 tently and sincerely laborious than Gre- 
 gory. " Weighty indeed is the office of 
 a Pastor. He must be an example to the 
 flock, and after this he must learn to 
 keep himself humble. He must ever be 
 intent on the ministry of the word, re- 
 membering who hath said, occupy till 
 I COME. This we then trulj-^ execute, 
 when by life and doctrine v;e gain the 
 souls of our neighbours, strengthen the 
 weak by setting before ihem the joys of 
 the heavenly kingdom, and bend the 
 proud by sounding aloud the punishments 
 of hell, when we spare none against truth, 
 and when given up to heavenly friend- 
 ships, we fear not human enmity. I trem- 
 ble at my own infirmity. How can I sus- 
 tain the last judgment, seeing so very lit- 
 tle fruit of my labours. Dearest brother, 
 I implore your prayers for me. By the 
 union of charity, we have a common in- 
 terest." 
 
 To Boniface, bishop of Rhegium, he 
 gives a handsome reproof for boasting of 
 the good deeds he had done. He owned 
 that he rejoiced to hear of his works of 
 mercy. But he was sorry to find, that 
 he himself had spoken of them to many 
 persons. He warns him to take care that 
 he did not mar the whole by ostentation. 
 " What are v/e, dust and ashes, that we 
 should covet the praise of men'? Him 
 you should seek to please, whose coming 
 we expect, and whose retributions will 
 know no end."t 
 
 p]vano-elus, a deacon of the church of 
 
 * B. ii. 3y. 
 
 t B. ii. 43. 
 
506 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 Sypontum, had complained to Gregory, 
 that his daughter had been defloured by 
 Felix, the grandson of the bishop of the 
 same name. The bishop of Rome, not 
 without some animadversion on the bisli- 
 op's careless education of his grandson, 
 ordered, on supposition of the truth of the 
 fact, that Felix should be obliged to marry 
 the young woman, or, in case of refusal, 
 be scourged and confined in a monastery, 
 excommunicated, and remain in a state of 
 penance, and not be suffered to go abroad 
 till farther orders were received from Gre- 
 gory.* It seemed proper to mention this 
 ancient precedent of the practice of spiri- 
 tual courts. Doubtless, they were, in their 
 origin, courts of censure on immoralities 
 not so easily cognizable in courts of com- 
 mon law. The necessities of society, and 
 the depravity of human nature, seem to 
 require the existence of such tribunals. 
 The Roman office of censor was of the 
 same kind. Nor would mankind be dis- 
 posed to depreciate them, were they na- 
 turally as sincere in their regard for the ho- 
 nour of God and for moral decorum, as they 
 are for the preservation of property. The 
 abuses of these courts among ourselves 
 are well known. But why persons of 
 rank and property in our country do not 
 labour to regulate them, or rather, do not 
 endeavour to institute a censorship of mo- 
 rals that shall be practicable and effec- 
 tual, — why they indiscriminately con- 
 demn the whole principle, while they per- 
 mit lewdness to be practised without any 
 restraint, — are questions not hard to be 
 determined. In the mean time, every 
 lover of equity and decency should prefer 
 a spiritual court, armed with some power 
 for the suppression of vice, before the 
 licentiousness, which, under the name of 
 liberty, threatens among ourselves to dc' 
 stroy all the barriers which our ancestors 
 erected against vice and immorality 
 Severe as Gregory's conduct may now 
 seem, it was wholesome, no doubt, and 
 society felt the good consequences. 
 
 In writing to Priscus, a patrician of 
 the East, he justly describes the mixed 
 state of human affairs, and the duties of 
 Christian faith and humility. The thought 
 is common to moralists in all ages ; but 
 Gregory ennobled it with real principles 
 of Christianity. 
 
 Gregory corresponded also with TheO' 
 dolinda, the queen of the Lombards 
 She was the widow of their kintr Autha^ 
 
 rit, a zealous Arian. After his death, she 
 married Aigilulfus, a Lombard, whom the 
 nation received as king. Beingf orthodox 
 herself, she brought over her husband, 
 and the whole nation, at length, to the 
 same persuasion. Gregory congratulated 
 her on the happy prospect of the progress 
 of Christianity among the Lombards. 
 What degree of real piety was in all this, 
 does not appear : the temporal benefit of 
 Gregory's labours was, however, evident 
 in the establishment of peace for some 
 time between the Lombards and the Ro- 
 man empire.* 
 
 Anastasius, bishop of Antioch, seems 
 ever to have been a special favourite 
 of Gregory. He had been ejected from 
 his See by the injustice of Justin, the 
 successor of Justinian, and had lived in 
 exile a number of years. He was at 
 length, however, restored to his situa- 
 tion,]" and Gregory wrote to him a letter 
 on the occasion, full of pious and tender 
 sentiments. In this letter, he endeavours 
 to solace the mind of the prelate with the 
 same scriptural views and promises, with 
 which his own had been refreshed under 
 a variety of afflictions. The hope of 
 glory hereafter to be revealed, it is evi- 
 dent, was the spring of joy to his own 
 soul, and enabled him to bear calamities 
 with patience.:): In another letter to him, 
 he writes, " you ought to keep in mind, as 
 you do, what is written : ' In the last days 
 perilous times shall come.' — And though 
 in old age you suffer much, remember 
 him, who told St. Peter, that when he was 
 old, another should gird him. Yet, in 
 saying this, I recollect that from youth 
 have laboured under many adver- 
 
 * B. IT. 79, 81. 
 
 you 
 
 Numbers rejoice at our sorrows, 
 
 write; but we know who hath 
 
 sities. 
 as you 
 
 said, ' Ye shall weep and lament, but the 
 world shall rejoice ; and ye shall be sor- 
 rowful, but your sorrow shall be turned 
 into joy.' We feel the performance of 
 the former part, let us expect the latter 
 part also. You say that some who ought 
 to relieve, add burdens to you ; I know 
 there are those who come in sheep's 
 clothing, but who inwardly are ravening 
 wolves. We are not disturbed on account 
 of their ambition in arrogating all honour 
 to themselves, because we trust in the 
 Almighty, whose law and rule is, that 
 those who covet what belongs to others, 
 are sooner on that account deprived of 
 
 B. XII. Ep. 7 
 
 I Evagrius, 
 
 t B. IV. 81. 
 B. VI. toward the end. 
 
Ceitt. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 507 
 
 their own. For we know who hath said, 
 ♦ He that exalteth himself shall be aba- 
 sed,' and, ' a haughty spirit before a fall.' 
 In these days, as I find, new heretical 
 wars arise, which would reduce to nothing- 
 the prophets, the gospel, and all the 
 fathers together. But while Anastasius 
 lives, we trust in the grace of our Protec- 
 tor; their swords will be broken in 
 pieces, striking against a rock. The 
 Church, in the mean time, by the sublilty 
 of heretics, is sharpened in her doctrine, 
 and learns the truth more accurately. 
 The heart of God approaches to us, and, 
 by temptations we are brought to feel 
 him more sensibly. What I suffer from 
 the swords of barbarians, and from the 
 perverseness of judges, I spare to relate, 
 that I may not increase the sorrow of him 
 whom I wish to console. But I weigh 
 those words, ' This is your hour, and the 
 power of darkness.' The power of light 
 then shall have its day afterwards; be- 
 cause the elect are the light of the world, 
 and it is written, ' the upright shall have 
 dominion over them in the morning :' 
 hence, all we suffer in the hour and power 
 of darkness is not to be regretted. You 
 wish, if it were possible, that we might 
 converse without pen and ink, and it is a 
 painful circumstance that we are almost 
 as distant from one another as East and 
 West. But truly we by grace are made 
 one. Why wish you for the wings of 
 the dove, which you have already 1 The 
 wings are the love of God and our neigh- 
 bour. By them the Church flies through 
 the earth : if you had not these wings, 
 you would not have come to me by your 
 epistles with so much affection.* As 
 your life is necessary to all good men, 
 may you, after a long time, arrive at the 
 joys of the heavenly country !" 
 
 I have only to add concerning Anas- 
 tasius, that he lived five years after his 
 restoration, and died about the end of the 
 century. W^e are much in the dark con- 
 cerning the trials of this great and good 
 man. Gregory's words however will 
 stand as proper to be addressed to the 
 suffering children of God in all ages. I 
 conceive the bishop of Antioch to have 
 been a luminary in the East, envied and 
 persecuted extremely, bearing testimony 
 to the faith of Christ in the decline of the 
 Eastern Church; and that his life and 
 transactions would be verj' instructive, if 
 they had been transmitted to posterity 
 
 •h>hu, the 
 l>ishop or 
 ]):itiiarch 
 of Con- 
 staruiiio- 
 ple, udnio- 
 iiislieil by 
 Gregory 
 for assu- 
 ming the 
 title'of 
 universal 
 bishop. 
 
 John, bishop of Constantinople, disturb- 
 ed in Gregory's time the peace of the 
 Ciuirch, by assuming to himself the title 
 of universal bishop.* The 
 pride and arrogance with 
 which he assumed it, was 
 only oriualled by the obsti- 
 nacy with which he perse- 
 vered. Gregory wrote with 
 much vehemence-|- against his 
 haughtiness, and on this oc- 
 casion, laid down some me- 
 morable rules of humility, 
 which severely condemned, 
 not himself, but his succes- 
 sors in the Roman See. In 
 what a state must the East have been, to 
 revere as a great saint, both living and 
 dying, so proud a man as John of 
 Constantinople ! But their godliness 
 was nearly expiring, and the Mahometan 
 scourge was at hand. 
 
 Gregory wrote to Dominicus an African 
 bishop, entreating his prayers, and thank- 
 ing him for his presents. By this letter 
 it appears that the spirit of true godliness 
 was not yet extinct in Africa.:^: There is 
 another letter to the same person, who, 
 it seems, was bishop of Carthage. It is 
 full of the spirit of charity and devo- 
 tion, though there is fnothing in it that 
 calls for any particular attention. § 
 
 Cyriacus succeeded John of Constan- 
 tinople, whose pride has been mentioned 
 already. At his solemn ordination the 
 people shouted, " This is the day which 
 the Lord hath made ; we will rejoice and 
 be glad in it."|| Superstition naturally 
 paved the way for the dominion of the 
 Clergy; and the bishops of the great 
 Sees were gradually increasing in secular 
 grandeur. The congratulation just men- 
 tion was calculated to encourage Cyriacus 
 to emulate the ambition of his predecessor^ 
 Gregory^ justly finds fault with it, in a 
 letter to the great men of Constantinople, 
 shows that the acclamation properly be- 
 longed to the stone ■v\1iich the Lord had 
 laid for a foundation in iiis Church,** and 
 observes that it was impious to ascribe 
 those praises to the creature, which be- 
 long to the Creator. Yet he is willing 
 to excuse the mistake as proceeding from 
 a charitable intention. Gregory, no 
 
 * B. YII. Ep. 5. 
 
 * Tliis bishop goes bv the name of John the 
 Fasler. He died A. D.' 595. 
 
 fB.lV. 82. |R. V. 119. 
 
 § Id. 162. II Ps. cxviii. 24. 
 
 *i B. VI. 171. « ♦ Ps. cxviii. 22. 
 
508 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 doubt, had himself too high views of the 
 dignity of his own See, and its supposed 
 relation to Saint Peter blinded his judg- 
 ment. The exaltation of Constantinople, 
 through the domineering pretensions of 
 the late bishop, excited his jealousy ; and^ 
 so subtle and intricate are the motions of i 
 the heart, that he himself might not at all 
 be aware of the selfishness which pro- 
 bably influenced his conduct. I doubt not, 
 however, from the unaffected humility of 
 his whole life, that he cordially detested 
 sacerdotal ambition. The excessive dig- 
 nity of the prelatical character would 
 have done little harm to Christendom, 
 had all prelates been like Gregory, But, 
 as this was not to be expected, tlie state 
 ought to have set bounds to ecclesiastical 
 encroachments before this period. 
 
 Gregoria, a lady of the bed-chamber 
 to Augusta the empress, in lier anxiety 
 for her soul, and in the height of her 
 admiration of Gregory, by letter requested 
 him to inform her, if he could, by revela- 
 tion, that her sins were forgiven her.* 
 Gregory assured her, " that certainty in 
 this matter was not attainable : we must 
 repent and mourn over our sins, and apply 
 for pardon continually." He declares 
 himself unworthy of having such a reve- 
 lation made to him, and gives her useful 
 and salutary advices, so far as he saw 
 into the system of divine truth. In regard 
 to the doctrine of justification, he seems 
 to have had the same sentiments which 
 Augustine had, and with the same con- 
 fusion of ideas. How superstition, ser- 
 vility, and darkness prevailed in the 
 Church at this time, is but too evident. 
 Yet Gregory was a luminary, compared 
 with most of his contemporaries. 
 
 To a person named Andrew, affecting 
 secular greatness, he writes with much 
 pathos on the vanity of sublunary things, 
 a subject which he touched with more 
 sensibility, because he was strongly im- 
 pressed with the idea of the world Ijeing 
 nearly at an end.")" 
 
 Serenus, bishop of Marseilles, observ- 
 ing that some of his people adored the 
 images which had been placed in church- 
 es, in his zeal brake them. 
 The wor- and by this conduct gave so 
 ship of much disgust, that many with- 
 
 Images. drew from his communion. 
 Gregory rebukes him on this 
 account, and wishes him to conciliate the 
 affections of the people, by permitting 
 
 B. VLEp. 186. 
 
 t B. VI. Ep. 190. 
 
 them to make use of images, as pieces 
 of history to instruct their minds in the 
 great facts of Christianity. He advises 
 him to allow them as books for the illite- 
 rate people, and at the same time to cau- 
 tion them seriously against paying any 
 adoration to them. — I have stated the 
 substance of the sentiments of both these 
 bishops.* It seems not probable, that 
 those who deserted Serenus on this ac- 
 count, had much Christianity to lose. 
 Gregory had not the opportunity of knov^-- 
 ing so well as we do the danger of his 
 advice. Thus far is evident, that image- 
 worship had not generally commenced in 
 Gregory's time, and that he seriously 
 reprobated the practice. From these 
 facts, however, the gradual approxima- 
 tion to idolatry may be traced, and the 
 danger of such a mode of teaching, as 
 that which Gregory recommends, has 
 been so abundantly proved since his 
 time, that no doubt remains but in this 
 instance the bishop of Marseilles judged 
 better than he. 
 
 The correspondence between Gregoiy 
 and Brunehalt, the queen of Austrasia or 
 Burgundy, a division of the French mo- 
 narchy, which took place amidst the 
 confusions of that country after the death 
 of Clovis, will deserve to be succinctly 
 stated.! ^^^ ^^^ ^" ambitious, disso- 
 lute woman; yet, in that age of super- 
 stition, she endeavoured to impose both 
 on herself and on the world by an ap- 
 pearance of piety. She attempted to ex- 
 tend her power while her young male 
 descendants were on the throne ; and per- 
 mitted, or rather encouraged, their vi- 
 cious conduct, that she might herself 
 keep the reins of government. Gregory, 
 though he commends her respectful at- 
 tention to the forms of religion, blames 
 her ecclesiastical proceedings in some 
 matters of great moment. He represents, 
 with much earnestness, the irregular and 
 even simoniacal ordinations of pastors in 
 France, and observes, with great energy, 
 the deplorable state of the flocks, and the 
 scandal of all godliness, which must 
 lensue from such conduct. Finding that 
 his remonstrances had little effect, he 
 urges her still more strongly on the same 
 subject, and observes the probability of 
 divine vengeance overtaking her family, 
 if she corrected not these enormities. It 
 is remarkable that this wicked woman 
 
 * B. VII. 190. B. IX. 9. 
 + B. VII. 113. B. IX. 57. 
 
 64. 
 
Cext. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 509 
 
 was afterwards put to a cruel death, and 
 that her descendants were slain or ex- 
 pelled. From some parts of the more 
 early correspondence between them, one 
 would think that Gregory thought highly 
 of her virtues. Time, however, unde- 
 ceived him, and it must be confessed, 
 that he treated her with the undissem- 
 bled plainness which becomes a Christian 
 pastor. 
 
 The bodily afflictions of Gregory, in 
 connection with the miseries of the times, 
 are forcibly described by him in a letter 
 toltalica, a patrician lady.* 
 
 " I can find nothing else to say of my- 
 self, than that as a just punishment of 
 my sins, I have been almost eleven 
 months confined to my bed. I am so 
 oppressed with the gout, that life is a 
 heavy punishment. I faint daily through 
 pain, and breathe after death as my re- 
 medy.f Among the clergy and people 
 of the city, scarcely a freeman or a slave 
 is exempt from fevers. Africa and the 
 East are also full of misery and desola- 
 tion. I see the end of all things ap- 
 proaching ; be therefore less solicitous 
 on account of your own calamities. Study 
 with alacrity that godliness, which has 
 the promise of the life that now is, as 
 well as of that which is to come." 
 
 In a letter to Eulogius,:j: bishop of 
 Alexandria, written the year after, he 
 says, " I have been near two years con- 
 fined to my bed, in constant pain. — Often 
 have I been forced to return to my bed, 
 when I scarcely had left it, by the vio- 
 lence of pain. — 'Thus I die daily, and yet 
 live. But I am a grievous criminal, and, 
 as such, deservedly shut up in so painful 
 a prison. I daily cry with the Psalmist, 
 Bring my soul out of prison, that I may 
 give thanks to thy name." While he 
 lived, he was frequently thus afflicted ; 
 
 » B. VII. 127. 
 
 + In another letter he speaks of a tlisordei- 
 different from the gout ; namely, u grievous 
 burning heat, that spread over all liis body, 
 and took away his spirits. By sncli severe 
 exercises was this good man trained for tiie 
 kingdom of heaven, and lie evidently grew in 
 humility, tender sympathy with others in 
 distress, and ardent breathings for the heaven- 
 ly country. 
 
 t This Eulogius, by preaching and writing, 
 strengthened the hands of the godly in the 
 East, and lessened the influence of heretics. 
 He seems, by Gregory's correspondence with 
 him, to have been a wise and pious pastor, 
 such as in Alexandria and the East were rare- 
 ly to be found. 
 
 2c2 
 
 but the vigour of his mind was unabated, 
 and his faculties were unclouded. 
 
 Another instance of his bodily suffer- 
 ings shall close this branch of his story. 
 Writing to his friend Venantius, who 
 was likewise afflicted with the gout, he 
 says, " what ought we to do, but to call 
 our sins to remembrance, and to thank 
 God, that he purifies us by afflicting our 
 flesh. — Let us take care, that we pass 
 not from one degree of torment to an- 
 other, and let us consider the goodness 
 of God, who threatens us with death, 
 that he may imprint in us an edifying 
 fear of his judgments. How many sin- 
 ners have continued immersed in sin 
 through life without a head-ach, and 
 have suddenly been cast into hell !" — I 
 rejoice to find in this great man the marks 
 of that deep humility, which is known 
 only to true converts, and of that wise 
 improvement of affliction, of which the- 
 orists may reason, but which saints only 
 feel. He concludes thus benevolently 
 and piously to his friend ; " May the Lord 
 infuse into your soul these words by the 
 inspiration of his Spirit, cleanse you 
 from your iniquities, give you here the 
 joy of his consolation, and eternal reward 
 hereafter."* 
 
 Gregory having been informed, that 
 Clementina, a woman of quality, had 
 harboured some suspicions against him, 
 wrote to her in a charitable spirit, and 
 with the intention of effacing the dis- 
 agreeable impressions. He at the same 
 time mildly reproved her for the want of 
 a placable and forgiving temper. He re- 
 minds her of the well-known petition 
 in the Lord's prayer, and delivered seve- 
 ral weighty sentiments adapted to the sub- 
 ject, j- 
 
 On no occasion was Gregory wanting 
 to impress on men's minds the care of the 
 soul. Two persons having requested his 
 assistance in their temporal difficulties, 
 after having said what the case required, 
 he exhorted them not to murmur at the 
 divine dispensations, nor to undertake 
 any thing unjust under the pretence of 
 necessity; but to fix their hope on the 
 mercy of their Redeemer, who forsaketh 
 not those who trust in him, to occupy 
 their minds with divine things, and to 
 repose on him who gives what we have 
 not, repairs what we have lost, and pre- 
 serves what he has repaired. ^ 
 
 The subdeacon was an officer of the 
 
 • B. IX. 25. 1 13. Vm. 16. t B. XI. 23. 
 
510 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 Church, who superintended, under the 
 bisliop of Rome, the distant bishoprics 
 and parishes which belonged to his juris- 
 diction.* Gregory wrote to Anthemius, 
 the siibdeacon of Campania, that he had 
 heard of Paschasius, a bishop, who was 
 so slothful, that he neglected every pas- 
 toral duty, admitted of no advice, and 
 gave himself up to the building of a ship. 
 It seems he used to go down to the sea 
 on this very unclerical employment with 
 one or two of his clergymen, and was 
 held in derision by all the country. Gre- 
 gory directs his subdeacon to reprimand 
 him in the presence of some presbyters, 
 or gentlemen of the neighbourhood, and 
 try by that method to reform him. Should 
 that prove ineffectual, he enjoins him to 
 send Paschasius to Rome, to answer for 
 himself before Gregory. 
 
 I know not th'^ result ; but it seemed 
 worth while to mention the case, as it 
 illustrates the state of the church disci- 
 pline of that day, as well as the vigilant 
 attention of Gregory. That so many 
 should nominally sustain the pastoral 
 character, whose taste and genius, as 
 well as disposition and sentiments, are 
 repugnant to it, and who seem qualified 
 to excel in any thing rather than what is 
 sacerdotal, is matter for lamentation. 
 The profane avarice of parents educating 
 their children for the ministry at all 
 events, is one great cause of it. 
 
 CHAPTER VI, 
 
 GREGORY S CONDUCT TOWARD THE EM- 
 PERORS MAURITIUS AND PHOCAS. 
 
 It is impossible for any impartial per- 
 son, who has attended to the spirit and 
 conduct of Gregory as exhibited in his 
 pastoral memoirs, not to feel a conviction 
 of the eminent piety, integrity, and hu- 
 mility of this bishop. Yet it has been 
 the fashion to arraign his character with 
 great severity, on account of his conduct 
 in the latter part of his life. He has been 
 accused of great ingratitude towards one 
 excellent and virtuous emperor, and of 
 egregious flattery towards another who 
 was profligate and tyrannical. The evi- 
 dence already adduced of his disposition 
 and temper should naturally dispose us to 
 receive with much caution such grievous 
 accusations. I shall throw totjether into 
 
 this chapter the facts on which our judg- 
 ment is to be founded.* 
 
 A series of events had given Gregory a 
 strong prejudice against the government 
 of Mauritius. Their opposition of senti- 
 ment had remarkably alienated their spi- 
 rits from one another, though they once 
 had the most sincere esteem for each 
 other's character. Gregory had been very 
 acceptable to Mauritius, who had strong- 
 ly favoured his promotion to the bishopric. 
 Nor is there any reason to doubt of the 
 sincerity of the bishop's professions of a 
 very high regard for the emperor, when 
 he made them. Changes of this sort are 
 common amongst mankind, and the de- 
 clarations which men make at different 
 times of the characters of the same per- 
 sons, however contradictory, are not to be 
 always charged to insincerity. 
 
 Mauritius made a law, to prohibit men, 
 who had held civil offices under the go- 
 vernment, from undertaking the adminis- 
 tration of the Church. Of this Gregory 
 approved ; but a clause in the same law, 
 which forbad military men to enter into 
 monasteries till the time of their service 
 was expired, or till they were disabled 
 for the profession, met not with the same 
 approbation. Gregory, too fond of mo- 
 nastic institutions, and conceiving them 
 necessary for the souls of some, though 
 not of all, expostulated with the emperor 
 on the impiety of the decree. He does 
 so, however, with all possible decency 
 and respect, and lays open his sentiments 
 with a frankness and modesty, which do 
 honour to his character. Doubtless he 
 was mistaken, and the mistake was com- 
 mon to him with the most pious of those 
 times. He promulged, however, the em- 
 peror's decree through Italy, and thus, as 
 he himself says, he was faithful to God, 
 at the same time obedient to his prince, j 
 In this transaction, in which it does 
 not appear that he succeeded with the 
 emperor, the zeal of Gregory was quick- 
 ened by the strong presentiments of the 
 near approach of the day of judgment, 
 which filled his mind. This mistaken no- 
 tion seems to have dwelt with Gregory; 
 nor was it in him a mere speculation. He 
 was practically serious in the expectation. 
 I find him pressing it in another letter to 
 the nobles and landholders of the island 
 of Sardinia, whom he reproved for suffer- 
 
 B. XI. 29. 
 
 * See Bower's History of the Popes, Vol- 
 ii. Greirorv. 
 tB.Xli. Ep. 100. 
 
Cent. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 511 
 
 iiiff their labourers to remain in a state of 
 idolatry. He justly observes, that they 
 were bound in conscience to take care of 
 the spiritual instruction of those who la- 
 boured for them in temporal things, and 
 he earnestly exhorts them to promote the 
 charitable work.* The selfishness and 
 insensibility, with which so many, in 
 modern times, can reap lucrative advan- 
 tages, from the labours of mariners, slaves, 
 and apprentices, with no more attention 
 to their best interests, than if they were 
 of the brute creation, here naturally forces 
 itself on our attention. Other letters of 
 the same kind, demonstrate the zeal of 
 Gregory for the propagation of Christian- 
 ity among idolaters and infidels. 
 
 Italy suffered extremely from the Lom- 
 bards, as has been observed, and we can 
 form no hopeful idea of the real conver- 
 sion of Aigilulph, the husband of TheO' 
 dolinda, since he still ravaged the Roman 
 territories, and filled them with misery 
 and desolation. These evils were a con- 
 stant source of affliction to the tender spi- 
 rit of Gregory, yet he failed not to im- 
 prove them IN HIS HOMILIES, TO THE IN- 
 STP.LX'TION OF HIS FLOCK. Willing tO put 
 
 a stop to the effusion of blood, and averse 
 to shedding even that of the Lombards by 
 nourishing intestine feuds among them, 
 as he might have done, he strove to make 
 peace wnih Aigilulph, and had even suc- 
 ceeded, when the Exarch of Ravenna, the 
 emperor's governor of Italy, perfidiously 
 brake the peace, and provoked the Lom- 
 bard king to renew his hostilities. The 
 Exarch himself, finding his own profit in 
 the continuance of the war, was for per- 
 severing in it at all events, and his heart 
 was hardened against the sufferings of 
 the people, which Gregory deplored. In- 
 volved as we find this holy bishop in po- 
 litical concerns far more than it were to 
 be wished, it is yet pleasing to see him 
 uniformly supporting the Christian cha- 
 racter. For now a severe trial came upon 
 him. Mauritius, induced by representa- 
 tions fro.m the Exarch, reproached him 
 severely with his conduct, and in effect 
 called him a foolish person. Gregory, 
 humble as he was, felt the indignity, of 
 all others the hardest to be borne by men 
 of understanding. Yet he checked his 
 spirit, and brake not the just bounds pre- 
 scribed to the Christian and to the subject 
 of an emperor. " While you reprove 
 
 • B. III. 23. 
 
 me," says he, " in sparing, you have not 
 spared me. While you politely tax me 
 with simplicity, you doubtless call me a 
 fool. I own the charge. Had 1 not been 
 so, I should not have come hither to this 
 episcopal scene, to endure what I suffer 
 amidst the Lombard wars. — Indeed if I 
 saw not the daily increase of the calami- 
 ties of the Romans, I should gladly be 
 silent with respect to personal contempt. 
 But this is my affliction; the same cause 
 which subjects me to the imputation of 
 folly, brings my countrymen under the 
 yoke of the Lombards. And while I am 
 not believed, the strength of the enemy 
 increases mightily. This I suggest to 
 my good Lord, that he may believe of me 
 what evils he pleases, only let him not 
 give his ears to any sort of persons con- 
 cerning the public good, but regard facts 
 more than words. — I know I am a sinner; 
 I daily offend, and am daily chastised. I 
 trust the chastisement of your displeasure 
 will work for my good at the last day. 
 But let me recount my grievances. First, 
 the peace ^ had made with Aigilulph, 
 with no loss to the state, is broken. In 
 the next place, soldiers are removed from 
 Rome, some to perish by the enemy, 
 others to defend Perusium, while Rome 
 is exposed to danger. Further, Aigihilph 
 appears with his forces ; with these eyes 
 I have seen Romans, like dogs, tied with 
 cords, and dragged to be sold as slaves 
 among the Franks. — As to myself, in the 
 integrity of my conscience I am not de- 
 jected with false accusations; I am pre- 
 pared to endure all, provided my soul's 
 salvation be not endangered. But it 
 grieves me to the heart, that Gregory and 
 Castorius, who did all that men could do, 
 while Rome was besieged, have fallen 
 under your displeasure on my account. 
 That you threaten me with an awful ac- 
 count at tlie day of judgment, will require 
 a few w^ords in answer. I beseech you 
 cease from this language. ' Judge no- 
 thing before the time,' says that excellent 
 preacher Paul. I oidy say this in brief, 
 that, unworthy sinner as I am, I rest more 
 on the mercy of Jesus than on your jus- 
 tice. Men are very ignorant of the mea- 
 sures of HIS judgment; perhaps what you 
 commend, he will blame; and wliat you 
 blame, he will commend. I leave uncer- 
 tain things ; I have recourse to prayers and 
 tears alone, begrsinor that the Lord would 
 rule our pious emperor with his hand, 
 and acquit him at that awful judgment; 
 at the same time that he would teach me 
 
512 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VI. 
 
 The pride 
 of John, 
 bishop of 
 Constan- 
 tinople. 
 
 SO to please men, that I lose not his eter- 
 nal grace."* 
 
 I have already mentioned the jealous 
 uneasiness of Gregory at the pride of 
 John, bishop of Constantinople. The 
 title of Universal Bishop, had 
 upon his own application been 
 conferred upon him in an 
 Eastern council, and the po- 
 licy of some former emperors 
 had induced them to compli- 
 ment the prelates of Constantinople with 
 it; because the honour and influence of 
 the imperial city were augmented by this 
 means. Gregory was the more vexed at 
 this, because the synod of Chalcedonj 
 had offered the same title to the Roman 
 bishops, and they had not accepted it. 
 He in his letters called himself the ser- 
 vant of the servants of God. Such hu- 
 mility might have been thought affected 
 in a person not eminent for this grace. 
 Doubtless it would have been more pru- 
 dent in him not to have assumed it. But 
 it continues to this day the title of his 
 successors, a standing mark of egregious 
 hypocrisy ! That which deceived Gre- 
 gory in this case was the erroneous no- 
 tion of the pre-eminence of his own See, 
 as belonging to St. Peter; yet I no way 
 doubt but he sincerely abhorred the pride 
 of the Eastern prelate. Had he himself, 
 however, been more completely humble 
 and less superstitious, he would liave suf- 
 fered the affair to pass with greater indif- 
 ference. While in one respect we behold 
 tliis good man acting the patriot and the 
 Christian, relieving the distressed, and 
 ransoming the captives with unbounded 
 liberality, nominally possessing great ec- 
 clesiastical wealth, but employing it all 
 to the most beneficent purposes, and 
 sparing no labour or fatigue ; in another 
 we see him writing and negotiating with 
 persevering vehemence concerning a title, 
 in which, though his cause was unques- 
 tionably just, his eagerness was unneces- 
 sarily sanguine. He solicited the ein- 
 peror Mauritius on the subject, but in vain. 
 And this was an additional cause of the 
 prejudices, which they imbibed against 
 each other. 
 
 Mauritius cannot be vindicated in sup- 
 porting the odious pride of John against 
 the just demands of Gregory. The evil, 
 by the countenance of the emperor, con- 
 
 gory had still more weighty causes of 
 complaint, and such as his episcopal duty 
 called on him to lay before the emperor. 
 This he did in a letter to Constantia, 
 the empress. " Knowing," says he, " that 
 there were many Gentiles* in Sardinia, 
 that they worshipped idols, and that the 
 clergy were remiss in preaching our re- 
 deemer to them, I sent a bishop from 
 Italy thither, who, the hand of the Lord 
 being with him, brought over many of 
 them to the faith. I am informed, that 
 those, who persevere in idolatry, give a 
 fee to the judge of the island, that they 
 may be allowed to do so with impunity. 
 Some, having been baptized, and ceasing 
 to worship idols, are still obliged to pay 
 the same fine to the judge :| who, when 
 the bishop blamed him, answered, that 
 he had paid so much money for the pur- 
 chase of his office, that he could not re- 
 cover his expenses but by such perqui- 
 sites. The island of Corsica also is op- 
 pressed with such exactions and griev- 
 ances, that the inhabitants are scarcely 
 able to pay the tributes even by the sale of 
 their children. Hence the number of pro- 
 prietors in the island, relinquishing the 
 Roman government, are reduced to put 
 themselves under the protection of the 
 Lombards. For what more grievous op- 
 pression can they suffer from the barba- 
 rians than to be obliged to sell their chil- 
 dren ] — I know that the emperor will say, 
 that the whole produce of the revenue in 
 these islands is applied to the support and 
 defence of Italy. Be it so; but a divine 
 blessing ought not to be expected to attend 
 the gains of sin." He wrote again to the 
 
 tinued, and John's successor assumed 
 the same Anti-Christian title. Bat Gre- 
 
 B. IV. Ep. 75. 
 
 t Ibid. 76. 
 
 * The term means idolaters in the language 
 of the fathers. B. lY. Ep. 77. 
 
 t Gregory was mucli afflicted to find, that al- 
 inostall the peasants of the island were still idola- 
 ters. Januarius, bishop of Cagliari, was indolent ; 
 tlie slaves belonging to his own church were 
 idolaters; the other bishops of the province were 
 equally negligent. Hospiton, the cliief of the 
 barbarians, liad, however, received ttie Gospel; 
 and to him Gregory recommended Ids missiona- 
 ries, cxliorting him to exert himself for tlie sal- 
 vation of his countrymen. Gregory rebuked 
 Januarius for his rieglectof discipline in general, 
 though he had exercised it severely in one in- 
 stance, in which he had met with a personal 
 atTront. The world is still the same; I could 
 wish that what has been nieniioned did not uive 
 just cause to the reader, to recollect not only the 
 state of religion in the West Indies, but nearer 
 at liome, in Ireland, in which, nuiwiihslanding 
 there are such a number of bishoprics and 
 churches, a superstitious and idolatrous religion 
 prevails to this day. 
 
Cent. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 513 
 
 empress, against the pride of John, and 
 speaks superstitiously on the merits of 
 St. Peter, while he laments his own un- 
 worthiness. Twenty-seven years, he ob- 
 serves, the Roman church had suffered 
 from the desolation of the Lombards ; and 
 its daily expenses, partly on account of 
 the war, and partly in the support of the 
 indigent, were incredibly great. 
 
 Gregory had also other just causes of 
 complaint against the emperor. Proper- 
 ty, he saw, was entirely fluctuating and 
 insecure on account of oppressive exac- 
 tions, insidious proceedings in wills, 
 and various artifices employed by the 
 emperor's ministers.* These evils were 
 constantly practised in Italy, and Gre- 
 gory had deplored them in vain. 
 
 Evagrius delivers a very pompous en- 
 comium on the character of Mauritius. f 
 But his praise is declamatory and vague, 
 and liable to the suspicion of flattery, as 
 Mauritius was then living. After all 
 due allowances made on account of the 
 emperor's distance from Italy, it is im- 
 possible to vindicate his conduct. He 
 wanted not military virtues, and had some 
 sense of religion. But avarice was the 
 predominant feature of his character ; and 
 how much this vice prevails to eclipse all 
 laudable qualities in a man, was never 
 more illustrated than in the conduct of 
 Mauritius. Chagan, king of the Avares, 
 a Scythian nation on the banks of the 
 Danube, offered, for a ransom, to liberate 
 some thousands of prisoners. He even 
 proposed to do it at a low price; but 
 Mauritius would not part with his money, 
 and the barbarian in a rage massacred all 
 his prisoners. Mauritius, though cove- 
 tous, was not inhuman : he was struck 
 with horror at the news, and besought 
 God, that his punishment might be in 
 this life, not in the next. His prayer 
 was answered in the former part of it 
 undoubtedly, and I hope also in the latter 
 As he had alienated the affections of his 
 soldiers by his refusal to supply their 
 wants, they elevated Phocas, a centurion, 
 to the Imperial throne. Mauritius fled, 
 but was seized, and inhumanly murdered 
 with his wife and family. Five of his 
 sons were slain in his sight before he 
 himself received the fatal stroke. The 
 little spark of divine grace, which for 
 years seems to have maintained a dubious 
 
 existence in a heart by nature extremely 
 
 • R. XI. F,p. 36. 
 
 + Toward the close of his history. 
 
 avaricious, was fanned into a flame by 
 the keen blast of wholesome affliction. 
 Mauritius bore the scene with silent re- 
 signation, repeating only, as each of his 
 children was butchered, "Righteous art 
 thou, O Lord, and true are thy judgments." 
 A nurse, who took care of his youngest 
 son, placed her own in its room : Mauri- 
 tius detecting the generous fraud, dis- 
 covered it to the executioners, and prevent- 
 ed its effect. — ^This is a transaction of 
 civil history, but it falls in with our plan. 
 The great faults of one, who had a latent 
 spark of grace within him, were punish- 
 ed in this life by the wickedness of the 
 monster Phocas, and the story deserves to 
 be remembered as a beacon to warn pro- 
 fessors of godliness against the love of 
 the world. Mauritius seems to have pro- 
 fited abundantly by the scourge, and to 
 have died in such a frame of mind as be- 
 longs only to Christian. We are not 
 apt to be aware of the advantages which 
 society receives from Christianity. Let 
 us suppose this emperor to have been 
 totally unacquainted with, or entirely 
 averse to Christian principles. How im- 
 mensely more pernicious his natural dis- 
 position would have been, unchecked 
 internally, as well as externally, can 
 scarcely be conceived. 
 
 The images of Phocus and of his wife 
 Leontia, were sent to Rome, and received 
 with much respect by the people, and by 
 Gregory himself. It cannot be supposed, 
 that the bishop of Rome could be ac- 
 quainted with the personal character of 
 Phocas, who was in truth a man of ex- 
 traordinary wickedness; and the late 
 transactions at Constantinople would na- 
 turally be misrepresented to him in the 
 accounts transmitted thence. Prejudiced 
 as he was against Mauritius, and willing 
 to hope better things from the new empe- 
 ror, he wrote him a congratulatory letter, 
 in which he studiously avoided saying 
 any, thing on the detail of circumstances, 
 of which he must have been very insuffi- 
 ciently informed, and dwelt on that which 
 was certain, namely, the adorable hand 
 of Divine Providence in changing the 
 times, and in transferring kingttoms, as 
 he pleases. He exults in the prospect 
 which he had too eagerly formed of a 
 wise, just and pious administration. He 
 modestly hints at the great abuses of the 
 late government, and exhorts Phocas to 
 redress them, reminding him, "that a 
 Roman emperor commands freemen, and 
 
514 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 not slaves."* Such is the substance of 
 his letter, in which I see nothing un- 
 worthy of the piety and patriotisnfi of 
 Gregory, but much of his wonted care 
 for the good of the church and the public. 
 
 Gregory wrote again to Phocas, to 
 apologize for the want of a deacon, who 
 should reside at Constantinople. Pho- 
 cas had complained to him of this, and 
 invited him to send one. The bishop 
 informed him, that the severity of the 
 late government had deterred all clergy- 
 men from going thither. But, as he now 
 hoped better things, he sent him a person, 
 whom he recommended to his protection. 
 He beseeches Phocas to listen to his re- 
 lation of facts, as he would thence learn 
 more distinctly the miseries which Italy 
 had sustained without redress, for thirty- 
 five years, from the Lombards.]" Is it 
 at all surprising, that this language should 
 be used by a man who sincerely loved 
 his country, and knew little of the new 
 emperor; who probably had received a 
 false account of his actions and character, 
 and who had so long been, on Christian 
 principles, both patient and loyal to an 
 oppressive government. 
 
 In another letter to Leontia he is not to 
 be excused from the charge of an unhappy 
 superstition. He talks of Peter the 
 Apostle, reminds her of the scripture- 
 text, on the perverted use of which hangs 
 the whole structure of the papacy, :f: and 
 of his intercession in heaven. He prays, 
 that she and her husband may be en- 
 dowed with princely virtues, and ex- 
 presses, I will not say with flattery, but 
 with an expectation much too sanguine, 
 his hopes of the blessings of the new 
 administration. 
 
 Phocas was displeased with Cyriacus, 
 the bishop of Constantinople, because he 
 had generously interested himself in fa- 
 vour of the remaining branches of Mauri- 
 tius's family ; and while he courted the 
 favour of Gregory and of the Romans at a 
 distance, he tyrannized at home in an un- 
 common manner. But Gregory died the 
 next year after Phocas's promotion, and 
 had not, probably, time enough to know 
 his genuine character, and was himself 
 also so bowed down with pains and 
 infirmities, that he was unable to answer 
 a letter of Theodolinda, queen of the 
 Lombards. He had promised to do it, 
 if his health was restored : but he grew 
 
 B. XI, Ep. 36. t lb. 43. 
 
 ^ Matt. xvi. 18. 
 
 less and less capable of business till he 
 died. Had health and opportunity per- 
 mitted, the vigour and piety of his cha- 
 racter give me no room to doubt, that he 
 would have rebuked the Roman tyrant 
 in such a manner, as to have quite silenced 
 the accusations, which, on this account, 
 have been thrown upon him. That he 
 should have opposed the usurpation of 
 Phocas, will not be expected from those 
 who consider the views of the primitive 
 Christians, who intermeddled not with 
 politics ; but he, who plainly rebuked 
 Mauritius, would certainly not have 
 spared his successor, whose conduct was 
 far more blameable.* 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Gregory's conduct with respect 
 to england. 
 
 This also has been a source of much 
 accusation against the Roman prelate. 
 Protestant writers, in their zeal against 
 popery, have censured his domineering- 
 spirit with acrimony, as if the British 
 Christians had been protestants, and the 
 Roman Christians papists, accurately 
 speaking. But Gregory v^as no pope, 
 nor had the Britons separated from the- 
 general Church, and formed a purer estab- 
 lishment of their own. Superstition and 
 ecclesiastical power, in the excess, ad- 
 hered indeed to the conduct of the Roraaa 
 prelate, as the fault of the age, not of his 
 temper; and if he had perfectly avoided 
 the fashionable evils of his time, he 
 would have been, I had almost said, more 
 than human. But the ideas, peculiarly 
 popish, were not yet matured in the 
 churches. Dissenting writers, I find, 
 have been seduced by the same sort of 
 prejudices as divines of the Church of 
 England, and it is curious to observe, 
 how different writers can find in the fea- 
 tures of the British Church, the very 
 fitrure of their own denomination. I 
 ought to profit by the mistakes of others ; 
 that is, to forget my own times and con- 
 
 * Pliocas took away the title of Universal 
 Bishop iVom the prelate of Constantinople, 
 and granted it to Boniface III. the next suo- 
 cessor but one to Gregory. After Phocas's 
 death the prelate of the East re-assumed the 
 title. The two bishops each preserved it, and 
 with equal ambition strove for the pre-emi- 
 nence. 
 
Gbjtt. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 515 
 
 nexions ; to transplant myself into the age 
 of which I write ; to make liberal allow- 
 ances for its customs and prejudices, and 
 to enable the reader, from facts them- 
 selves, to form his own judgment. 
 
 For near a century and a half the Gos- 
 pel of Christ had been declining in Britain, 
 and for the greatest part of that time had 
 been, as we have seen, confined to Wales 
 and Cornwall, or to the mountains of 
 Scotland. Ireland too still preserved 
 something of the light, while the Angles 
 or Saxons, our ancestors, destroyed every 
 evangelical appearance in the heart of 
 the island. No barbarians were ever 
 more ferocious, or more idolatrous ; and 
 the Britons, who escaped their ravages, 
 oppressed one another with civil broils. 
 Being favoured with some cessation from 
 their wars with the Saxons, they lost by 
 degrees all traces of former piety, though 
 the form of Christianity still remained. 
 One proof among others, which the old 
 historian Gildas gives of their entire want 
 of Christian zeal is, that they took not 
 the least pains for the conversion of the 
 Saxons. Seven Saxon kingdoms, called 
 the Heptarchy, were now formed, alto- 
 gether ignorant and idolatrous, while the 
 few British churches were inattentive to 
 the propagation of Christian truth in the 
 island. And the Saxons continued, some 
 of them for a century, others more than 
 two centuries, immersed in darkness.* 
 
 One cannot, from these circumstances, 
 form any agreeable idea either of the 
 piety or of the knowledge of the British 
 Christians. Nor are the excuses which 
 our protestant historians are inclined to 
 make for their want of zeal, at all satis- 
 factory. It has been said that, " The 
 hostilities of the Angles would cause 
 such attempts to be arduous ;" but let the 
 reader only reflect how such difficulties 
 were surmounted by zealous and chari- 
 table Christians in former ages.f I 
 cannot but therefore subscribe^ to the 
 testimony of our ancient historians, :j: 
 " that much worthier pastors were sent 
 by the divine goodness, through whom, 
 those, whom God had foreknown, might 
 believe to salvation.*' A testimony as 
 evangelical in its language, as it is solid 
 in fact. 
 
 It was about 150 years after the arrival 
 of the Saxons in Britain, that Gregory 
 
 • Bede. 
 
 t See Warner's Eccl. 
 ginning. 
 
 Hist. 
 
 towards the be- 
 t Bede. 
 
 Mission to 
 Britain. 
 
 sent his famous mission into onr island, 
 toward the close of the sixth 
 century. It was no sudden pj;egory's 
 thought, but the effect of 
 much deliberation. Even be- 
 fore his consecration at Rome, walking 
 one day in the forum, he saw some very 
 handsome youths exposed to sale. Ask- 
 ing of what country they were, he was 
 informed they were of the island of 
 Britain. " Are the inhabitants of that 
 island Christians or Pagans V They are 
 Pagans, was the reply. Alas ! said he, 
 deeply sighing, that the prince of dark- 
 ness should possess countenances so 
 luminous, and that so fair a front should 
 carry minds destitute of eternal grace. 
 What is the name of the nation 1 Angli, 
 it was said. In truth they have angelic 
 countenances, and it is a pity they should 
 not be coheirs with angels in heaven. 
 What is the province from which they 
 come ■? Deira, that is Northumberland, 
 he was told. It is well, said he, De ira, 
 snatched from the wrath of God, and call- 
 ed to the mercy of Christ. "What is 
 the name of their kingi" Ella, was the 
 answer. Playing upon the name, "Al- 
 leluia should be sung to God in those 
 regions."* Impressed with the import- 
 ance of the object, he earnestly entreated 
 the then Roman bishop to send a mission 
 to the island, offering himself as one 
 ready for the task. Nothing but the offi- 
 cious benevolence of the Roman citizens 
 prevented the work at that time. Gregory 
 was too much beloved at Rome to be 
 allowed to leave it. 
 
 It was the character of Gregory to 
 pursue with unwearied attention any plan 
 or scheme of piety or discipline, which he 
 had once conceived. After his consecration 
 in the j'ear 595, he directed a presbyter, 
 whom he had sent into France, to instruct 
 
 * I leave to fastidious sceptics, such as the 
 historian Hume, to sneer at Gregory's want of 
 taste in these sevei-al allusions. 'I'iie candid 
 reader will impute ihein to the times, not to 
 the man ; and the devout and chai-itable will 
 adore the gooilness of God, which was begin- 
 tiing to provide such precious benefits for our 
 country ; benefits, which call for ceaseless 
 j'ratitude to the Author of all good, and should 
 endear the memory of the Komari j)relate to 
 our latest posterity. An elegant ei)igram on 
 Milton, by a countryman of Gregory, turns on 
 the same conceit : 
 
 Ut mens, forma, decor, facies, mos, si pie- 
 tas sic, 
 
 Non Anglus, verura hercle, Angelus ipse 
 fores. 
 
516 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. VH. 
 
 some young Saxons of seventeen or 
 Missions to ^ighteen years of age, in 
 England, Christianity. He intended to 
 A D 59r prepare them for the mission 
 into our island ; and in the 
 year 597 he actually sent missionaries 
 hither. They were a number of monks, 
 at the head of whom was one named Au- 
 gustine. In obedience to Gregory's direc- 
 tions, they proceeded on their journey ; 
 but their hearts failed them, when they 
 reflected on the difficulties and dangers 
 to which they thought themselves likely 
 to be exposed. The faith and zeal and 
 simplicity of a Christian missionary were 
 at this time grown rare in the world ; 
 and Augustine was sent back by the rest, 
 to entreat Gregory to discharge them from 
 the service. The prelate wrote exhort- 
 atory letters, advising them to proceed in 
 confidence of Divine aid. He informed 
 them, that it had been better not to have 
 begun a good work, than to recede from 
 it afterwards. He entreated them not to 
 be deterred by the labour of the journey, 
 nor by the breath of malevolence. He 
 set before them the heavenly prospects, 
 and prayed that he himself might see the 
 fruit of their labour in the eternal country. 
 For though, says he, I cannot labour with 
 you, may lat the same time be found in the 
 joy of retribution, because I am willing 
 to labour ! Nor did he neglect any means 
 proper lo accommodate the missionaries : 
 he recommended them to the attention of 
 Etherius, bishop of Aries, and secured 
 them all the assistance in France, that 
 might expedite their passage into Britain, 
 and every convenience which they needed. 
 Thus animated, they arrived in Britain.* 
 There was, however, a remarkable 
 concurrence of providential circumstan- 
 ces which facilitated the work, and gave 
 it a more expeditious success than might 
 have been expected from appearances. It 
 is very observable, how much the Lord 
 has made use of women in the propagation 
 of the Gospel among idolaters. To former 
 instances of this sort, we must add, that 
 two queens were concerned in this work, 
 one of whom was the infamous Brunehout, 
 whose correspondence with Gregory has 
 been noticed. Desirous to cover her 
 vices by the appearance of religion, she 
 had, at Gregory's request, given the mis- 
 sionaries every possible assistance. The 
 other, a character on whom the mind will 
 dwell with pleasure, was Bertha, the 
 
 Bede, B. 1. 
 
 only daughter of Caribert, king of Paris, 
 a descendant of Clovis. Ethelbert, to 
 whom she had been married in his fa- 
 ther's lifetime, was now king of Kent, 
 and one of the most wise and powerful of 
 the Saxon princes. He had not been al- 
 lowed to marry the French princess but 
 on the express stipulation, that she should 
 be permitted to make free profession of 
 Christianity, in which she had been edu- 
 cated. She brought over with her a 
 French bishop to the court of Dorober- 
 nium, now Canterbury. Her principles 
 were firm and sound : her conduct was 
 worthy of the Christian name ; and her 
 influence over her husband was consider- 
 able. Her zealous piety was not inferior 
 to that of the queen Clovis, which had 
 been attended with such happy conse- 
 quences in France ; and every thing con- 
 spired to favour the missionaries. 
 
 Ethelbert assigned Augustine a habi- 
 tation in the isle of Thanet. Here he 
 remained at first with his associates, who 
 were nearly forty. By the direction of 
 Gregory, they had taken with them 
 French interpreters, by whose means 
 they informed the king, that they were 
 come from Rome,* and brought him the 
 best tidings in the world, eternal life to 
 those who received them, and the end- 
 less enjoyment of life with the living 
 and true God. After some days, Ethel- 
 bert paid them a visit ; but being appre- 
 hensive of enchantments, he took care^to 
 receive them in the open air, where he 
 thought he should be safer than in a 
 house. The missionaries met him, sing- 
 ing litanies for their own salvation, and 
 that of those for whose sake they came 
 hither.| Sitting down, by the king's 
 direction, they preached to him and his 
 attendants the word of life. I cannot 
 produce the smallest extract of the ser- 
 mon ; but that it explained the fundamen- 
 tals, at least, of the Gospel, there seems 
 no reason to doubt. One may form some 
 idea of it by the king's answer, which 
 was to this effect, " They are fine words 
 and promises, which ye bring, but be- 
 cause they are new and uncertain, I can- 
 not afford my assent to them, nor relin- 
 quish those religious practices which I 
 
 * Bede, B. I. Ep. 25, kc. 
 
 f As I write not the history of snptTstilion, 
 but of Christian religion, I lliiiik. not myself 
 obliged to copy all tlie accounts I meet with in 
 ancient records which relate to the termer. 
 Justice, in the extreme, has been done lo them 
 by other writers. 
 
Okst. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 517 
 
 myself, tog-ether -with all the English 
 nation, have for so lontr a time observed. 
 But as ye are come hither from a great 
 distance, and as I seem to discover that 
 ye are willing to communicate to us those 
 things, which ye believe to be true and 
 most excellent, we are not willing to dis- 
 turb you, but rather to receive you in a 
 friendly manner, and to afford you what 
 majf be necessary for your support ; nor 
 do we hinder you from uniting all, whom 
 ye can persuade by preaching, to the 
 faith of your religion." He gave them 
 a mansion in the royal city of Canterbury, 
 with all necessary accommodations, and 
 the license of preaching the word. As 
 they approached the city, they sang in 
 concert this litany ; We pray thee, 
 Lord, in all thy mercy, that thine anger 
 and thy fury may be removed from this 
 city, and from thy holy house, because 
 we have sinned. Alleluia. 
 
 Certainly the human mind was in a 
 debased and childish state at this time 
 throughout a great part of the world. It 
 had long been sinking in its powers and 
 taste. The heathen philosophers and 
 orators of these times appear no way su- 
 perior to Christian authors and pastors, 
 in the use and cultivation of the under- 
 standing. Such men as Gregory and his 
 missionaries should not be compared 
 with Cicero and Demosthenes, l)ut with 
 their own contemporaries ; and had this 
 been done by writers who treat them 
 with perfect contempt, the injustice of 
 that contempt would have appeared. It 
 must be expected that the work of divine 
 grace in different ages, will, in its effects 
 and manifestations, exhibit the com- 
 plexion and colour of the objects with 
 which it is surrounded. The snbtilty of 
 Satan will not fail to take every possible 
 advantage of this circumstance, and I can 
 believe that even more superstitions than 
 those recorded by Bede attended the la- 
 bours of the Roman missionaries. In our 
 own times of refinement, evils far more 
 plausible, but not less pernicious, ac- 
 company the same salutary work. I have 
 not, however, observed any thing idola- 
 trous, or otherwise directly subversive of 
 Christianity, to have yet prevailed in any 
 of the fashionable superstitions. These 
 things being premised, let us consider 
 what most probably was the doctrine 
 preached by Augustine ; I say probably, 
 since the wretched narratives from whicli 
 I draw my information have given no ac- 
 count. 1'hat eternal salvation and for- 
 VoL. I. 2 X 
 
 giveness of sin by the blood of the Lamb, 
 was his capital doctrine, seems evident 
 in a great measure from Kthelhert's ob- 
 servation of the good news which they 
 brought. I may still more confidently 
 say, that his sermon was not a system of 
 moral duties. For how could tliat he 
 called good news ? All the diiricully 
 with Ethelbert was, to believe what they 
 promised ; the very same difficulty which 
 strikes all unrenewed minds at the first 
 hearing of the Gospel. And Avhen to 
 this we add what we certainly know of 
 Gregory's sentiments, and consider Au- 
 gustine as preaching according to his 
 views, the evidence seems to rise even 
 beyond probability. Ethelbert, a pru- 
 dent and sensible prince, though, as yet 
 at least, by no means convinced of the 
 truth of Christianity, sees no suspicious 
 mark in the lanoruaore and conduct of tha 
 preachers. The air of genuine sincerity 
 is simple, and above the possibility of 
 imitation. Candid and intelligent minds 
 perceive it almost intuitively. The king 
 of Kent could see no selfish motive that 
 was likely to influence these men. They 
 spake with an earnestness that showed 
 their own conviction of the excellency of 
 their doctrine, and their desire of profit- 
 ing their fellow-creatures. Not an atom 
 of gain was to be acquired to the See of 
 Rome: the whole mission was disinter- 
 ested. Hence the candid prince was in- 
 duced to give them countenance; and 
 the Gospel appears to have been preach- 
 ed by these missionaries with plainness 
 and sincerity. 
 
 Their conduct at Canterbury was cor- 
 respondent to these beginnings. They 
 prayed, fasted, watched, preached the 
 word of life to all, as opportunity served : 
 they lived as men above the world : re- 
 ceived nothing from those whom they 
 taught, except necessaries : they ])rac- 
 tised what they taught, and showed a 
 readiness to suffer, or even to die, for the 
 truth which they preached. Some be- 
 lieved and were baptized, admiring their 
 innocent lives, and tasting the sweetness 
 of their doctrine. Near the city there 
 was an old church, built in the limes of 
 the Romans, in which queen Bertha was 
 wont to pray. In this the missionaries 
 first held their assemblies, sang, prayed, 
 preached, and baptized, till, the king 
 himself being converted to the faith,* 
 
 * I Iiope Bede's expression (B. I. Ep. 26,) is 
 true in the proper sense of the words. 
 
518 
 
 HISTORY OF TiUK CHUKUH: 
 
 [Chap. VII. 
 
 they obtained a larger license for preach 
 ing- every where, and of building or re 
 pairing churches. When he himself, 
 amonor others, delighted with the holi- 
 ness of their lives, and the preciousness 
 of Gospel promises, confirmed by many 
 miracles,* believed and was baptized, 
 numbers crowded to hear, and received 
 the word. The king, congratulating the 
 new converts, declared that he would 
 compel no man to become a Christian ; 
 however he embraced those who did so 
 with a more intimate affection as fellow- 
 heirs of the grace of life. For the mis- 
 sionaries had taught him, that the service 
 of Christ ought to be voluntary, not 
 com])ulsive. He now gave to them a 
 settlement in Canterbury, suited to their 
 station, with all necessary accommoda- 
 tions. 
 
 Aug-ustine returning into France, re- 
 ceived ordination, as the archbishop of 
 the English nation, from the bishop of 
 Aries, and returning into Bri- 
 Augustine tain, sent Laurentius the pres- 
 ordained byter, and Peter the monk, to 
 r'^of th acquaint Gregory with his 
 English success, and to receive an- 
 nution. swers to various questions. 
 
 To his inquiries concerning 
 the maintenance of the clergy, Gregory an- 
 swered, that the donations made to the 
 Church were, by the customs of the Ro- 
 man See, divided into four portions, one 
 for the bishop and his family to support 
 hospitality, a second to the clergy, a third 
 to the poor, a fourth to the reparation of 
 churches : that as the pastors were all 
 monks, they ought to live in common, 
 with a remarkable exception, which 
 proves that the absolute prohibition of 
 marriage, one of the marks of Antichrist,| 
 was not yet enjoined the clergy, namely, 
 that those of them who preferred the mar- 
 riage state, might be allowed to marry, 
 and receive their maintenance out of the 
 monastery. To another question, which 
 related 'to the diversity of customs and 
 liturgies in different churches, the answer 
 of Gregory was liberal ; namely, that the 
 new bishop was not bound to follow the 
 precedent of Rome, but that he might se- 
 
 * Wluit shall be said concerning; these mi- 
 racles ? The credulity of that age should not 
 lead one to den}' all that is said of them. It 
 was a new scene : Evangelists wei-e preaching 
 among pagans. Certain it is, that every one 
 concerned in those scenes believed their rea- 
 lity. 
 
 f 1 Tim. iv. 3. 
 
 lect whatever parts or rules appeared the 
 most eligible, and best adapted to pro- 
 mote the piety of the infant church of 
 England, and compose them into a sys- 
 tem for its use. A number of other ques- 
 tions and answers are recorded likewise, 
 too uninteresting to deserve a place here.* 
 Yet amidst the childish superstition of 
 the times, the enlightened mind of Gre- 
 gory appears; and his occasional com- 
 ment on St. Paul's words, concerning the 
 law in his members warring against the 
 law of his mind, in which the bishop un- 
 derstands the Apostle as describing him- 
 self to be free and enslaved at the same 
 time, with a double respect to his natural 
 and spiritual state, evinces the solidity of 
 his evangelical knowledge. 
 
 Augustine having intimated, that the 
 harvest was plenteous, but that the la- 
 bourers were few, Gregory sent him more 
 missionaries, and directed him to consti- 
 tute a bishop at York, who might have 
 other subordinate bishops; yet, in such a 
 manner, that Augustine of Canterbury 
 should be metropolitan of all England. 
 Such were the rudiments of the English 
 church. — Gregory has been censured for 
 excessive eagerness in settling a plan of 
 ecclesiastical government for places as 
 yet not in the least evangelized : and it 
 must be owned, that this extreme care of 
 subordination and uniformity does seem 
 premature; but the spirit of the times fa- 
 voured such hasty external institutions. 
 
 Gregory thought long and deeply of 
 this his favourite infant Church; and 
 wrote to Mellitus, one of the missionaries 
 going to Britain, an account of the fruits 
 of his meditations; which were,f that the 
 idol-temples being purged of their un- 
 cleanness, should be converted into 
 churches for the use of the natives, in 
 which they might worship God, accord- 
 ing to the Gospel. And reflecting that 
 they had been wont to sacrifice to dae- 
 mons, and in their sacrifices to indulge 
 themselves in feasts, he directs that, set- 
 ting apart all sacrifices, and whatever 
 was connected with idolatry, they might 
 be allowed on the day of the Church's 
 dedication, or on the martyrdom of Saints, 
 to make booths for themselves in the 
 neighbourhood of the churches, and enjoy 
 themselves intemperate banquets. This 
 latter direction appears dangerous ; the 
 reason he assigns for it is, that the Eng- 
 lish, if they found their usual entertain- 
 
 * Bede, B. I. C. 27. 
 
 t Ibid. 30. 
 
Cext. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 519 
 
 ments to be altogether prohibited, niii^ht 
 be induced to relapse into idolatry. I 
 cannot compare Gregory's compliances to 
 the Jesuitical artifices practised in after 
 ages among the Chinese, because it ap- 
 pears that idolatry was absolutely pro- 
 hibited, and the real Christian religion 
 
 the near prospect which he himself had 
 (if the end of the world, and of whicli he 
 failed not to inform the king of Kent:* 
 the latter reigned fifty years, 
 and died in 616. As a states- 
 man he was screat, as a Christian greater 
 still. And few princes in any age were 
 
 A. D. C16. 
 
 taught in Britain: but a man who knew i richer blessings to their subjects than 
 
 human nature so well as this bishop did, 
 might have foreseen the practical ex- 
 cesses which his licence would encour- 
 age, and should have committed to God 
 himself the success of his own cause 
 amontr the Encrlish. 
 
 Hearing from Augustine of his miracu- 
 lous powers, Gregory, who seems to have 
 entertained no doubt of their reality, cau- 
 tions him excellently against pride and 
 presumption on their account, informs 
 him that they were given him more for 
 the sake of the new converts than of him- 
 self, and teaches him the all-important 
 lesson of humilit3^ He wrote also to 
 Ethelbert, to congratulate, instruct, and 
 exhort him, setting before him the exam- 
 ple of the great Constantine, and pressing 
 him to extend the propagation of the Gos- 
 pel.* His zeal was much animated by 
 
 * Hume iChap. I. of his History of England) 
 represents this exhortation to extend the propa- 
 gation of tlie Gospel as inconsistent with the 
 conduct of Augustine, " who had thought proper, 
 in ihe commencement of his mission, to assume 
 the appearance of the greatest lenity." Thus it 
 is that men. more malignant than intelligent in 
 Christian history, pervert facts, and represent 
 pious men as hypocritical in their moderate con- 
 duct. The triilh is, neither Constaniine, nor 
 Theodosiiis, nor Gregory, nor any of the ancients, 
 ever compelled any man to become a Christian, 
 either in t!ie beginning or progress of religion. 
 Nor does :iny thing of the kind appear in Gre- 
 gory's lei'.f r to Ethelbert. But he. like Theorlo- 
 sius, directed that the worship of idols sliould be 
 destroyed. Men were allowed to remain aloot 
 all their davs from Christianity if they pleased. 
 Forced conversions, like those of popery in after 
 ages, were as yet unknown, and persecution, the 
 other mark of Antichrist, as yet existed not in 
 the Church. It is \ery possible that the indif- 
 ferent spirit of our times may be disgusted wilii 
 that part of the conduct of Theodosius and Gre- 
 gory, which related to the destruction of idols, 
 and call it persecution. Be it so: I have (in 
 Chap. XVI. Cent, iv.) examined this point with 
 as much exactness as I can. But let not men of 
 sincere piety and fervent charity for the good of 
 souls, be represented as if they were hypocriti- 
 cal in their moderation at first, and as if they 
 intended to establish tyraimy afterwards. Their 
 plan was, whether it be agreeable to present 
 reigning maxims or not, to compel no man to re- 
 ceive Christianity, and at the same rime to ren- 
 der the practice of idolatry impracticable. I 
 believe majiy, who have written against them 
 
 Ethelbert and Bertha. 
 
 But this fine gold was not without 
 some alloy! Before these events there 
 existed, in Wales particularly, a British 
 Church. Augustine willing to establish 
 a uniformity of discipline and customs in 
 the island, invited the Welsh bisho])3 to 
 a conference, and began to admonish them 
 to enter into Christian peace and concord, 
 that with hearts united they might join 
 in evangelizing the pagans. The Britons 
 observed Easter at a season different 
 from that of the Roman Church, and did 
 many other things contrary to her cus- 
 toms. The conference proved fruitless ; 
 the Britons would hearken to no prayers 
 or exhortations; and Augustine in the 
 close had recourse to a miraculous sign.j 
 A blind man was introduced to be healed. 
 We are told that the Britons had no suc- 
 cess; but that Augrustine's prayers were 
 heard, and his sight was restored. The 
 Britons were induced to confess, that Au- 
 gustine was sent of God, but pleaded the 
 obstinacy of their people, as a reason for 
 their non-compliance. — A second sytiod 
 was appointed, attended by seven British 
 bishops, and many of their learned men, 
 belonging to the famous monastery at 
 Bangor, of which Dinoth was at that time 
 the libbot. Before these came to the 
 synod, they asked the advice of a person 
 of reputed sanctity, whether they should 
 give up their own traditions on the au- 
 thority of Augustine or not. Let humilitj', 
 said he, be the test, and if you find, when 
 you come to the synod, that he rises up 
 to you at your approach, obey him ; it 
 not, let him be despised by you. On so 
 precarious an evidence, it seems, did he 
 rest the proof of humility. It happened, 
 that Augustine continued sitting on their 
 arrival, Vhich might easily have taken 
 place without any intentional insult: the 
 Britons were however incensed. 
 
 and 
 
 as persecutors, have not distinctly understood 
 this distinction. All I contend lor here is this, 
 thev acted consistentlv and uprightly. 
 
 ♦'Gresory had alreadv wriuen to queen Ber- 
 tha, and' stimulated her zeal to labour for the 
 conversicm of her husband. — Id. C. 32. 
 
 + Bed. B. II. C. 2. 
 
 Enr 
 
Q'Zi) 
 
 niciuni ur insii v^nuin^n; 
 
 [UHAP. Vll. 
 
 would hearken to no terms of reconcilia- 
 tion. Augustine proposed to them to 
 agree with him only in three things, 
 leaving other points of difference unde- 
 cided, namely, to observe Easter at the 
 same time with the rest of the Christian 
 world, to administer baptism after the 
 Roman manner, and to join with Augus- 
 tine in preaching the Gospel to the Eng- 
 lish. In all other things, says he, we 
 will bear you with patience. The Bri- 
 tons were inexorable, and refused to ac- 
 knowledge his authority. " If you will 
 not have peace with brethren, said the 
 archbishop of Canterbury , roused at length 
 into an unbecoming warmth, you will 
 have war with enemies ; and if you will 
 not preach to the English the way of life, 
 you will suffer death at their hands." It 
 happened afterwards, that, in an invasion 
 of the Pagan Saxons of the North, the 
 Bangorian monks were cruelly destroyed, 
 though long after the death of Augustine. 
 He died in peaceable possession of the 
 See of Canterbury, after having lived to 
 see the Gospel propagated with increas- 
 ing success. He ordained Mellitus and 
 Justus bishops ; London was brought into 
 the pale of the Church, and the southern 
 parts of the island found the benefit of 
 his labours, and of those of his auxiliaries. 
 
 I shall close the story of English af- 
 fairs with the death of Augustine, whicli 
 happened early in the 7th century. And 
 as the ground I am now upon has been 
 disputed, I am willing to lay open all the 
 information which antiquity can give us. 
 Let us hear some other accounts of these 
 transactions. 
 
 Writers, who have been studious of 
 the honour of our country, tell us, that 
 when Augustine came into England he 
 found seven bishops and an archbishop 
 supplied with godly governors and ab- 
 bots, and that the church was in goodly 
 order, at Bangor particularly: that Di- 
 noth the abbot showed Augustine that 
 they owed him no subjection : that their 
 bishops had been independent of Rome: 
 that the bishops of Rome had no more 
 right to their obedience than other Chris- 
 tians had, and that the bishop of Caer- 
 leon upon Usk was their proper superior ;* 
 and that in revenore for this honest asser- 
 tion of their independency, the Kentish 
 king procured the invasion and slaughter 
 of the British monks mentioned above. 
 
 * Galfridus Moiiometensis, B. IV. C. 12. 
 See Nicholls on the Common Prayer. 
 
 How Christianity was afterwards pro- 
 pagated in our island, and how the dis- 
 putes between the Roman and British 
 churches terminated, will properly fall 
 under our consideration hereafter. In 
 the mean time, the injustice of ascertain 
 writer* to the memory of Gregory, in ac- 
 cusing him of exercising tyranny over 
 the British Church is very glaring. We 
 have, by an early association of ideas, 
 been so habituated to condemn every 
 thing that is Roman in religion, that we 
 are not easily open to conviction on this 
 subject. It should, however, be remem- 
 bered, that not the least revenue could 
 accrue to Gregory from the conversion of 
 Britain; nor did he sugo-est or intimate 
 any lucrative plan, directly or indirectly. 
 If there were any improper steps taken, 
 they must not be charged to a selfish or 
 interested spirit, such as that which has 
 since animated the papacy. The doc- 
 trines avowedly and earnestly taught by 
 Gregory and his followers, were the doc- 
 trines of Grace; and though no account 
 of the faith of the Welsh monks is given 
 us, there is great reason on account of 
 the Pelagian leaven of our island, to fear 
 it was not so truly Christian as that of 
 Gregory. That they were uncharitable, 
 ajjpears incontestable from their neglect 
 of the Saxon pagans, and their obstinate 
 refusal to hearken to any advice on that 
 head. And the reader has already had a 
 view of their manners, very different from 
 the flattering account of Galfridus. The 
 extent of the British Church, before the 
 arrival of Augustine, was so inconsidera- 
 ble, that when Gregory planned the hier- 
 archy of this island, it is probable he 
 knew little of the very existence of such 
 a Church. The fault of ambitious en- 
 croachment must, therefore be laid to 
 Augustine. Seduced he undoubtedly was, 
 according to the common superstition of 
 the age, by an excessive zeal for uniform- 
 ity. And that admirable method of unit- 
 ing zeal for establishments with a spirit 
 of toleration, which was discovered to- 
 ward the close of the last century, was as 
 yet unknown. The Britons had been in- 
 dependent, and they had a right to con- 
 tinue so ; but I believe, from all appear- 
 ances, that Augustine's desire to make a 
 connexion with the Romans sprang from 
 charitable views. 
 
 What could be the meaning of his 
 wishing the Britons to baptize after the 
 
 * Bower's Lives of Popes, Vol.11. Gregory^ 
 
Cent. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 521 
 
 Roman manner ? Tliis question has ex- 
 ercised tlie critical talents of authors. 
 After all, as baptism by trinal immersion 
 was then the Roman mode, this seems to 
 give the most natural account of the cir 
 cumstance. 
 
 The charge of Galfridus, in accusing the 
 Romans of employing the pagans to mur 
 der the British, is too absurd to merit 
 any serious notice. Augustine died long- 
 before it happened. Gregory himself 
 was deceased before the controversies be- 
 tween Angustine and Dinoth took place. 
 He has been accused of extreme incon- 
 sistency, in being imperious toward here- 
 tics, and indulgent toward pagans* and 
 Jews. But a more exact acquaintance 
 with cases would enable men to form a 
 better judgment. Gregory, like all real 
 good men, was averse to use violent 
 methods in proselyting; he knew that 
 conversion, if sincere, must be voluntary. 
 But when men once have been received 
 into the Christian pale, the same zeal 
 which laboured for their conversion, is 
 studious for their uniform attachment to 
 Christian fundamentals. It was no breach 
 of charity in Gregory to attempt to hin 
 der the promotion of a Donatist in the 
 Christian church in Africa, and such an 
 attempt was very consistent with that 
 charity which forbad the persecution of 
 the Jews. 
 
 On the whole, Gregory's conduct with 
 respect to our island appears one of the 
 most shining efforts of Christian charity. 
 His missionaries, in general, acted lauda- 
 bly ; and tlie real establishment of Chris- 
 tianity was, under God, effected by their 
 means. There was a stain of rivalry and 
 jealousy, as we have seen, which appear- 
 ed in their conduct; but they were men. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE WORKS OF GREGORY. 
 
 This great prelate, worn out at 
 length with labours and diseases, slept 
 in Jesus in the year 604,f 
 after he had enjoyed, shall I 
 say — or endured, his bishop- 
 ric thirteen years and six 
 months. Xo man in any age ever gave 
 himself up more sincerely to the service 
 of God, and the benefit of his fellow- 
 
 Death of 
 
 Gregory, 
 
 A. D. 604. 
 
 * Bower. 
 
 fFleury, Vol. 
 2x2 
 
 iv. B. xxxvi.43. 
 
 creatures. Power in him was a volun- 
 tary servitude, undertaken not for himself, 
 but for all the world. Even the growth 
 of superstition, with which he was strong- 
 ly infected, wliile it secured to him the 
 cheerful obedience of the lait}', contribut- 
 ed nothing to his ease or secular emolu- 
 ment. The belief of the Roman bishops' 
 succession to Peter, which he found preva- 
 lent in Europe, was accidentally strength- 
 ened by his eminent piety and his labo- 
 rious virtues. 
 
 Had he even been disposed to extend 
 his authority to much greater lengths, all 
 the world would have been prone to sub- 
 mit to his decrees; so firmly was the 
 opinion of his integrity established among 
 men. His conscience, however, would 
 not suffer him to carry anything farther 
 than precedents had sanctioned ; and who, 
 especially in an age of superstitious cre- 
 dulity, could doubt the justice of his pre»- 
 tensions, while the pre-eminence was so 
 painful, so disinterested, and so bene- 
 ficially exerted 1 
 
 For I cannot persuade myself to call 
 him Pope. He pretended not to any- 
 thing like infallibility, nor did he ever 
 attempt any thing like a secular domina- 
 tion. The seeds of Antichrist were vigo- 
 rously shooting indeed; and the reputa- 
 tion of Gregory doubtless contributed 
 much to mature the poisonous plant. 
 But idolatry, spiritual tyranny, and the 
 doctrine of the merit of works, the three 
 discriminating marks of the papacy, had, 
 as yet, no settled establishment at Rome. 
 Had this man lived in our age, he would 
 doubtless have beheld, with astonish- 
 ment, on the one hand, the worldly spirit of 
 many Christian pastors so called, and on 
 the other the impiety of numerous infidels 
 who are continually railing against the 
 religious. His mind, naturally vigorous, 
 industrious and active, would doubtless 
 have shaken off the gloom and credulity 
 of superstition; but he would have been 
 amazed to hear the pompous pretences to 
 philosophy, in which every juvenile scio- 
 list indulges himself. He would have 
 examined the fruits, and have been at a 
 loss to conceive with what propriety the 
 term philosopher could be applied to 
 sceptics, blasphemers, atheists, levellers, 
 and sensualists. He would, as a bishop, 
 have tried what could be done to stem 
 the torrent, and have exerted in the way 
 of discipline, which was his peculiar 
 talent, his usual address, mildness and 
 resolution. He would have mourned over 
 
522 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. VIII. 
 
 his beloved England,* if he had seen her 
 so absurdly enslaved to ideas of mistaken 
 liberty, as to spurn at decent rules of 
 discipline, and to discountenance, as ty- 
 ranny, godly attempts to introduce and 
 support them. He would have been 
 ready to say, "this people are enemies 
 to their own good ;" he would have pitied 
 them, wept and consoled himself with 
 his usual refuge, the views of a better 
 world, and have done what good was still 
 in his power, by the example of a holy 
 life, by painful preaching, and by pious 
 writings. 
 
 Of these last we have many still extant. 
 He particularly excelled in devotional 
 composition. Litanies had 
 The Lita- j^gg^ ,iggj [^ ^j^g West before 
 ny com- j^jg time, in calamitous sea- 
 piled by i • i r 
 
 r..«.n-n,-V sons, as during plague or ta- 
 
 mme. ihese were collected, 
 and the choicest parts selected from them, 
 and compiled, through the care of Gre- 
 gory, into one large litany, not much dif- 
 ferent from that used by the Church of 
 England at this day. It was much cor- 
 rupted afterwards in the popish times, 
 was reformed by Hermanus, archbishop 
 of Cologne, in the days of Luther, and 
 afterwards improved by our reformers. 
 
 But the Church of England is not only 
 indebted to Gregory for the Litany. In 
 his Sacramentary he embodied the col- 
 lects of the ancient Church, and improved 
 old, or made new ones. Galasius, before 
 him, had appointed public prayers, com- 
 posed by himself or others. These were 
 all placed in the offices by Gregory. And 
 by a comparison of our Book of Common 
 Prayer with his Sacramentary, it is evi- 
 dent, that almost all the collects for Sun- 
 days, and the princijial festivals in the 
 Church of England, were taken out of the 
 latter. To me it appears to be an advan- 
 tage, that our reformers followed anti- 
 quity so much in the work. The purifi- 
 cation of the ancient services from the 
 corrupt and idolatrous mixtures of popery, 
 was as strong an indication of their judg- 
 ment as the composition of prayers alto- 
 gether new could have been, which, how- 
 ever, they scrupled not to introduce in 
 
 * The gratitude of Bede lias (B. II. C. 1. 
 Ecc. Hist. ) led him to apply to Gregory the 
 words of St. Paul in regard to the Corinthians. 
 As an Englishman who felt his obligations to 
 Gregory, he says, " the seal of his apostleship 
 are we in the Lord." The testimony of anti- 
 quity to Gregory's beneficent piety toward 
 this island is uniform. 
 
 various parts of the Liturgy. From the 
 brief account I have given,* it appears, 
 that the Service of our Church is far more 
 ancient than the Roman Missal, proper- 
 ly speaking. And whoever has attended 
 to the superlative simplicity, fervour, and 
 energy of the prayers, and of the collects 
 particularly, will have no hesitation in 
 concluding, that they must have been com- 
 posed in a time of true evangelical light 
 and godliness. It is impossible indeed 
 to say how early some parts of the Litur- 
 gy were written ; but doubtless they are 
 of very high antiquity. Many persons, in 
 dark times, and under the disadvantage 
 of slothful ignorant pastors, have been 
 enlightened and nourished through their 
 medium, and not a few, I trust, of my 
 readers can justly confess with me, how 
 much their devotion has been assisted by 
 the public use of them. Let any unpre- 
 judiced person compare with the Liturgy 
 several forms of prayer composed in mo- 
 dern times, and he will find an unction to 
 attend the former, of which the latter is 
 destitute. The present age is certainly 
 much tinctured, in general, with a scep- 
 tical, philosophic spirit, which in its na- 
 ture is not favourable to the production of 
 devotional compositions. 
 
 The historical evidence hence resulting 
 of the religious spirit of the times is great. 
 The Western Church was far from being 
 wholly corrupt in the close of the sixth 
 century.f The doctrines of grace revived 
 by Augustine were still predominant : 
 divine life was much cloo-ged indeed with 
 the asthma of superstition ; but its pulse 
 was yet vigorous. I close this digression, 
 if it may be called one, with remarking, 
 that the continued use of these liturgies 
 in the churches of the West, demonstrates 
 the concurrent testimony of antiquity in 
 favour of evangelical doctrine. 
 
 Of Gregory's epistles nothing more is 
 needful to be added to the numerous ex- 
 tracts from them, which have supplied 
 me with materials for his history. 
 
 His exposition of the book of Job is 
 very voluminous. In a letter to Leander 
 prefixed to it, he speaks of the tripartite 
 sense, according to the ideas , 
 
 of Augustine, with sufficient exS7on 
 justness and accuracy; yet of the book 
 through fondness for system of Job. 
 
 * Nicholls on B. of Com. Prayer. 
 
 f That beautiful and sublime ode, called 
 Te Deum, ascribed, though not with certainty, 
 to Ambrose, was incontestably used in the 
 Church before the middle of the sixth century. 
 
Cejtt. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 523 
 
 he carries his point too far, so as to 
 destroy sometimes the literal sense, after 
 the vicious mode of Origen. We may 
 believe him, when he describes the corres- 
 pondence of the subject to his own bodily 
 atflictions ; and he frankly owns his ne- 
 glect of language and style. Few read- 
 ers will be tempted to search the work 
 throughout, on account of the heaviness 
 of his manner, and the total want of ele- 
 gance. Yet piety and humility are every 
 where predominant ; and though it can by 
 no means be called a just commentary on 
 the book of Job, he in general avoids de- 
 viations from the analogy of faith, by the 
 evangelical purity of his frame and tem- 
 per, and he had, I doubt not, real com- 
 munion with God in the work. Let us 
 hear his humble confession at the close ; it 
 deserves the serious notice of authors, and 
 in that most salutary science of self-know- 
 ledge demonstrates a proficiency worthy 
 of a follower of Augustine. 
 
 " Having finished my work, I see I 
 must return to myself. The hunian mind 
 is frequently bewildered, even when it 
 attempts to speak correctly. For while 
 we study propriety of language, we are 
 drawn out of ourselves, and are apt to 
 lose simplicity. From speaking in pub- 
 lic let me return to the court of the heart ; 
 let me call my thoughts to a serious con- 
 sultation with a view to discern myself, 
 that I may observe whether I have spoken 
 evil inadvertently, or good in a wrong 
 spirit. For then only is real good spoken 
 in a right spirit, when we mean by it to 
 please him alone from whom we receive 
 it. I am not conscious of having said 
 evil; yet I will not maintain that I am 
 absolutely innocent in this respect. The 
 good which I have spoken I have receiv- 
 ed from above, and it is less good, through 
 my sinfulness. For, averting my con- 
 templation from words and sentences, the 
 leaves and branches, and narrowly in- 
 specting the root of my intention, I know 
 that I meant earnestly to please God : but 
 the desire of human praise inJ.ensibly 
 mixes with this intention. I discover this 
 slowly and afterwards, and find that the 
 execution corresponds not with the first 
 intention. While we really mean to 
 please God at first, the love of human 
 praise steals into the mind, and overtakes 
 and accompanies the pure design ; as in 
 eating, what was begun through necessity 
 and in innocence, terminates too often in 
 excess. If we are strictly examined by 
 the divine Judge, how can we escape 1 
 
 Our evils are our own without mixture, 
 and our good things are defiled with im- 
 purity. What I feel within, I lay open 
 to my reader. In expounding I have not 
 concealed what I think ; in confessino- 1 
 hide not what I suffer. — I beg every rea- 
 der to pray for me. If the value of his 
 prayers and of my exposition be compared, 
 he will have the advantage. He receives 
 from me only words ; but repays me with 
 tears of supplication." 
 
 His pastoral care is a monument of the 
 author's intense seriousness. I have al- 
 ready observed in many Christian pas- 
 tors, and in Gregory as emi- 
 nently as in most, a very "regory's 
 strong sense of the import- c^re"'^'' 
 ance of the clerical office, 
 which rebukes the presumption of mo- 
 derns more keenly than any words of 
 mine can do. With the ancients scarcely 
 any person, however qualified, seemed 
 adequate to the cure of souls ; with us 
 every stripling undertakes it without fear 
 or hesitation. The treatise itself deserves 
 to be read throughout by every candidate 
 for the pastoral ofiice. I know not how 
 to select any parts of it particularly, and 
 its brevity forbids and discourages all at- 
 tempts at abridgment.* 
 
 The exposition of the Canticles is wor- 
 thy of the godly spirit of Gregory. I 
 shall hazard a quotation or 
 two, which I doubt not will Gregory's 
 correspond with the sensa- exposition 
 tions 01 minds acquamted spi- tides, 
 ritually with Jesus Christ, 
 however the profane may ridicule, and 
 the phlegmatic may censure. It is worth 
 while to show, that a spirit of union with 
 Christ has ever been felt in his Church. 
 
 On the first verse of the Canticles he 
 says, " Let him whom I love above all, 
 nay alone, let him come to me, that he 
 may touch me with the sweetness of his 
 inspiration. For when I feel his influ- 
 ence, I leave myself by a sudden change, 
 and being melted am transformed into 
 his likeness. The holy mind is disgust- 
 ed with all things which it feels from the 
 
 * Should the young caiidi<late for the mi- 
 nistry object, as he justly may, the difficulty 
 of meeting with tliis woik of Gregory, let him 
 substiliUe in its place liislinp Burnet's treatise 
 on the same subject. It is to be lamented that 
 so valuable a book is so little read and known, 
 and that while the public taste has called for 
 repeated editions of inflammatory politics, this 
 treasure of pastoral information is dwindled 
 into an oblWioo little short of contempt. 
 
524 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IX. 
 
 body, and desires to become altogether 
 spiritual^; and while sensual objects mur- 
 mur around, it tlies into spiritual things, 
 and desires to hide itself in them. There- 
 fore it desires the loving kindness of the 
 Lord, because without that it feels no 
 power to approach him." 
 
 On the words, " draw me, we will run 
 after thee," he observes, " Divine grace 
 prevents us. He, who is drawn, runs, 
 because being strengthened by divine 
 love he passes over all obstacles." 
 
 The defective taste and learning of his 
 age forbid us to expect any very accurate 
 and solid exposition ofso difficult a prophet 
 as Ezekiel. In fact, it is in occasional 
 passages, independent of system, that 
 Gregory shines. 1 single out a passage 
 as an instance of this;* "Generally 
 those who most excel in divine contem- 
 plation, are most oppressed with temp- 
 tation. By the first the soul is lifted up 
 to God, by the second it is pressed down 
 into itself. Were it not for this the mind 
 would fall into pride. There is, by the 
 divine disposition, a wonderful tempe- 
 rature in tliis subject, that the saint may 
 neither rise too high nor sink too low." 
 
 Observe how divinely, in one of his 
 homilies on the Gospels, f he speaks con- 
 cerning the teaching of the Holy Spirit. 
 On the words in St. John's Gospel, he 
 (the Spirit) shall teach you all things, he 
 says, " Unless the Spirit be with the 
 heart of the hearer, the word of the teacher 
 is barren. Let no man attribute to the 
 teacher what he understands from his 
 mouth ; for, unless there be an internal 
 teacher, the tongue of the external one 
 labours in vain. Why is there such a 
 difference in the sensations of hearers, all 
 hearing the same words 1 It is to be 
 ascribed to this special teaching. John 
 himself in his epistle teaches the same, 
 ' the anointing teaches you of all things.' " 
 It is plain that the Spirit of the Lord was 
 not departed, as yet, from the Roman 
 churcli, while his internal instructions, 
 despised so fearlessly by the profane, and 
 scrutinized so malignantly by many or- 
 thodox professors in our days, were re- 
 garded with so much simplicity and re- 
 verence. 
 
 it will not be saying enough in his praise, 
 though it is a truth, that it would have 
 been to the advantage of the reputation of 
 the Roman Church if he had been the last 
 of that name. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 WRITERS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 His dialogues, if indeed they be his, 
 or be not much interpolated, dishonour 
 his memory by the excess of superstition. 
 
 Thus far of the first of the Greofories ; 
 
 * Toni.II. Homil. on Ezek. xiv. 
 t Tom. II. p. 451. 
 
 FcLGENTius adorned the beginning, 
 and Gregory the close of this century, 
 which produced no other authors of equal 
 merit. And the decay in learning and 
 knowledge was so great, that I shall de- 
 tain the reader a very little time on this 
 article. 
 
 Ennodious, bishop of Pavia, wrote 
 against those, who afiirmed, that man 
 could only choose evil. With gross igno- 
 rance of the connexion and scope of St. 
 Paul's argument, he quotes his words in 
 the Epistle to the Romans, ch. vii. as 
 favourable to his views, " For to will is 
 present with me, but how to perform that 
 which is good I find not :" thus ascribing 
 to man, as such, what the apostle evi- 
 dently speaks of as descriptive of the 
 regenerate. He maintains that man by 
 nature has power to turn himself to God, 
 and deduces from the contrary doctrine 
 the consequences which the advocates for 
 the doctrine of free-will in all ages have 
 done from the days of Cicero, who, it is 
 remarkable, reasons exactly in the same 
 manner. 
 
 On tlie other hand, John IMaxentius, a 
 Scythian monk, in company -with a num- 
 ber of monks, his brethren, strenuously 
 defended the doctrines of grace. In a 
 confession of their faith is this sentence : 
 " that free-will, since the entrance of sin, 
 has of itself no other power but that of 
 choosing some carnal good and pleasure,* 
 and that it can neither desire nor will, 
 nor do anything for eternal life, but by 
 the operation of the Holy Spirit." 
 
 So remarkable a confession would seem 
 to show some distinct knowledge of the 
 depravity of the heart. Maxentius and 
 his brethren were ill treated by Hormisdas, 
 bishop of Rome, a bold and dexterous 
 politician, of whose theological know- 
 ledge and practical piety I find no proofs. 
 He accused them of turbulence and self- 
 conceit, and after a year's attendance at 
 Rome they were expelled thence by his 
 
 *Du Pin, Cent. 6lh. 
 
Cbut. VI.] 
 
 GREGORY I. 
 
 525 
 
 order. I cannot find that Hormisdas gave 
 any decided opinion on the subject him- 
 self; probably he had never studied it; 
 but he acted imperiously and decisively. 
 Maxentius wrote with vigour in defence 
 of the doctrines of grace, and I wish I 
 could gratify the reader with a larger ac- 
 count of a man, who was counted worthy 
 to suffer shame for the faith of Christ. 
 The controversy between the defenders of 
 grace and of human powers was still 
 alive, and the Western Church continued 
 still divided upon it. 
 
 Facundus, bishop of Hermiana in Af- 
 rica, deserves to be mentioned for the 
 sake of one sentence: "The faithful, in 
 receiving the Sacrament of the body and 
 blood of Jesus Christ, receive his body 
 and his blood ; not that the bread is pro- 
 perly his body, and the cup his blood ; 
 but because they contain in them the 
 mystery of the body and blood of Jesus 
 Christ."* Though it makes no part of 
 our system to confute the particular points 
 of popery, I could not omit so clear a 
 testimony against transubstantiation. 
 
 The Western Church is indebted for 
 
 * Du Pin, Facundus. 
 
 The sec- 
 ond coun- 
 cil of 
 Ma scon, 
 
 A. D. 585. 
 
 historical information to Gregory of 
 Tours; the Eastern, to Eviga'rus. It 
 must be confessed that they are ineletmnt 
 and injudicious writers. They had the 
 literary taste of this century. 
 
 The truly evangelical second council 
 of Orange has been already reviewed. 
 The second council of of Mascon, held in 
 585, is worthy of notice. 
 They were very zealous for 
 the observation of Sunday. 
 Let none follow any business 
 on this day, say they; let 
 none yoke oxen, or prosecute 
 suits of law ; but let all the world apply 
 themselves to sing the praises of God. 
 They decree penalties against sabbath- 
 breakers. An advocate, who was guilty 
 of the crime, was to be driven from the 
 bar ; a peasant or a slave to receive some 
 stripes. They exhort Christians also to 
 spend the evening of Sunday in prayers. 
 They forbid bishops to keep birds and 
 dogs for game. They ordain the cele- 
 bration of a Synod every three years in a 
 place appointed by the bishop of Lyons 
 and king Gontranus. A proof may hence 
 be drawn that some spirit of genuine reli- 
 gion was still preserved in France. 
 
526 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY VII. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE ENGLISH CHURCH. 
 
 The diversity of circumstances in 
 different ages of the Ciiurch constantly 
 admonishes an historian, who loves 
 method and perspicuity, to vary the 
 arrangement of his materials. No ab- 
 stract rules, hut the circumstances of each 
 period, should direct him in this matter. 
 In the century before us, barren and un- 
 
 S'omising as it is for the most part, Great 
 ritain shone with distinguished lustre. 
 As she was a world within herself, her 
 ecclesiastical affairs were little connected 
 with those of the Continent. Hence the 
 propriety of reviewing them by them- 
 selves. — In this subject I shall closely 
 follow the venerable Bede, whose narra- 
 tion extends to the year 731. — Though 
 much of his history is fabulous and super- 
 stitious, it is still of the greatest value, 
 because it Is the only light which we 
 have concerning the progress of the 
 Gospel in our own country for several 
 generations; and some rays of truth, 
 piety, and good sense, now and then 
 break out in the historian amidst the 
 clouds of legendary romance. 
 
 After the death of Augustine, Lau- 
 rentius, the first archbishop of Canterbury, 
 whom he had ordained, succeeded to that 
 See. He trode* in the'steps of his pre- 
 decessor, and laboured to promote the 
 best interests of the English by frequent 
 preaching of the word, and by a diligent 
 and useful example. I doubt not the sin- 
 cerity of this prelate ; though seduced by 
 the charms of a nominal unity, he la- 
 boured, as the first missionary Augustine 
 had done, to bring the British Churches 
 to a conformity with the Church of 
 Rome. He was actuated by the same 
 subtile spirit of selfish ambition, of which 
 even the best men in all ages have not 
 been void ; it operates imperceptibly, 
 through the native energy of in-dwelUng 
 sin. The papist, the national churchman, 
 and the sectary, are each liable to its 
 influence, though in truly regenerate 
 
 * Bede, B. H. C. 4 
 
 spirits there exists, likewise, a divine 
 principle, by the operation of which the 
 sordid views of secular gain are entirely 
 excluded. In this manner I would appre- 
 ciate the characters of the Romish mis- 
 sionaries in England. Their disinterested 
 labours, just views of Christian doctrine, 
 and holy and unblemished lives, ought to 
 have exempted them from the intem- 
 perate censures of writers, who seem to 
 think an indiscriminate aversion to the 
 Church of Rome to be one of the principal 
 excellencies of a protestant historian.* 
 
 Laurentius, in conjunction with Melli- 
 tus, bishop of London, and Justus, bish- 
 op of Rochester, endeavoured to reduce 
 the " Scots, who inhabited Ireland"! to 
 a conformity with the English Church. 
 The three prelates wrote to them with 
 this view, and declared themselves to be 
 sent by the Roman See to propagate the 
 Gospel among the pagan nations. Lau- 
 rentius complained of the bigotry of a 
 certain Irish bishop, who, coming to 
 Canterbury, refused to eat at the same 
 table, or even in the same house with 
 him. The archbishop could not prevail 
 either with the Britons or with the Irish 
 to enter into his views. " Even the pre- 
 sent times, says our author, declare how 
 little success he had." At the period in 
 which Bede concludes his history, the 
 greatest part of the British churches re- 
 mained still distino-uished from the Eng- 
 lish. The bishops of Rome continued to 
 superintend the latter; and while Ethel- 
 bert lived, the Gospel flourished. This 
 prince died after a reign of fifty-six years, 
 twenty-one years after he had embraced 
 Christianity, and was buried by the side 
 of his deceased queen Bertha. Among 
 other benefits which the English derived 
 from him, there was a code of laws form- 
 
 * I advert, particularly, to Bower's Lives 
 of the Popes, and to Warner's Ecclesiastical 
 History oF our own country. Their laborious 
 collection of facts deserves commendation. 
 I avail myself of all the helps which offer, for 
 the supply of materials. — Hut,l mean to extol 
 the Churtli of Christ, wherever I can find her ; 
 nor should a Roman dress, when she appears 
 in it, convey any prejudice to my mind. 
 
 t Bede's own words, which demonstrate 
 that the Irish were anciently called Scots. 
 
Ce^tt. vn.] 
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH. 
 
 527 
 
 ed after the example of the Romans,* 
 which was still extant in Bede's time, 
 and was particularly calculated to pro- 
 tect the persons and property of the 
 Church. 
 
 His son and successor Eadbald not only 
 despised Christianity, but also lived in 
 incest with his father's wife. Whence 
 all, who had embraced the Gospel through 
 motives purely secular, were induced to 
 relapse into idolatrj-. Sabereth, king of 
 the East Saxons, who had followed the ex- 
 ample of Ethelbert who was his uncle, be- 
 ing deceased, his three sons became joint 
 heirs of his kingdom. Immediately they 
 resumed the idolatry, which they had 
 intermitted a little in their father's life- 
 time, and encouraged their subjects to do 
 the same. These princes observing the 
 bishop of London to distribute the bread 
 of the Eucharist in the church, asked 
 why he did not give it to them as he had 
 done to their father, and as he did at that 
 very time to the people. " If you will 
 be washed, replied Mellitus, in the same 
 laver of regeneration in which your fa- 
 ther was, you may partake of the same 
 sacred bread : but if ye despise the laver 
 of life, ye cannot partake of the bread of 
 life." We will not, said they, enter into 
 that fountain ; we do not know that we 
 need it, yet we choose to eat of that 
 bread. In vain did the upright pastor 
 seriously and diligently admonish them, 
 that it was not possible for any person 
 remaining uncleansed from sin to partake 
 of the communion : in a rage they de- 
 clared, " If you will not gratify us in so 
 small a matter, you shall not remain in 
 our province." They thereupon ordered 
 him to be o-one with his associates. 
 
 Mellitus, thus expelled, came into 
 Kent to consult with Laurentius and 
 Justus. The three bishops agreed to 
 leave the country, that they might serve 
 God with freedom elsewhere, rather than 
 remain among enemies without fruit. 
 Mellitus and Justus waiting the issue, 
 retired first into France. The three 
 princes not long after were slain in battle, 
 but their subjects remained still incorri- 
 gible. 
 
 Laurentius intending to follow the two 
 bishops, employed himself in prayer in 
 the church during the silent hours of the 
 night, with much agony and many tears, 
 entreating God to look upon the state of 
 the English Church, which, after such 
 
 » Bede, Id. C. 5. 
 
 promising beginnings, seemed now on 
 the eve of a total dissolution. Next 
 morning he paid a visit to the king, who 
 struck at last with horror for his crimes 
 and relenting, when he appeared in im- 
 minent danger of losing his Christian in- 
 structors for ever, forbad his dei)arture, 
 reformed his own life and manners, was 
 baptized, and from that time became a 
 zealous supporter of the faith.* 
 
 Eadbald was determined to show the 
 sincerity of his zeal. He recalled Melli- 
 tus and Justus from France, after a year's 
 exile. Justus was reinstated in Roches- 
 ter ; but Mellitus could not recover his 
 See. The Londoners preferred idolatry, 
 and Eadbald had not the same power 
 which his father had possessed in that 
 city to oblige them to receive him. So 
 far, however, as his influence extended, 
 he exerted it for the cause of Christ, and 
 from the time of his conversion, adorned 
 the Gospel, and propagated it among his 
 people. 
 
 Laurentius being deceased, Mellitus 
 was appointed the third archbishop of 
 Canterbury, while Justus still presided 
 at Rochester. These two bishops govern- 
 ed the English Church with much care 
 and labour.f Mellitus, after 
 having given the most un- Death of 
 doubted proofs of genuine Mellitus, 
 piet)% and presided over the A. D. 624. 
 diocese of Canterbury five 
 years, died in the year G24, and was suc- 
 ceeded by Justus. 
 
 England was still governed by the 
 Saxon Heptarchy. Seven kingdoms, 
 often at war with one another, and also 
 
 * Bede, C. 6. 
 
 I was unwilling to introduce into the narra- 
 tive the story of St. Peter's whipping of Lau- 
 rentius tliMt niglit in the cliurcii, and reprov- 
 ing of iiiin for liis cowardice ; whence he was 
 said to have heen induced to wait upon Ead- 
 bald next morning, who was struck, it seems, 
 with remorse at the sight of the stripes which 
 ihe Liisliop had received. Stoi-ies of this sort 
 \\{;yt: innuraerahle in those times. The steady 
 perseverance of Eadbald, and the entire 
 change both of his private and jiublic coiuhicl, 
 demonstrate the reality of his conversion. He 
 most probably retained an inward reverence 
 for the religion in which he had been instruct- 
 ed in his childhood, against which liis grand 
 objection seems to have been the love of a 
 dissolute life. The Lord honoured the pray- 
 ers of Laurentius with success, and recovered 
 the English ('hurch at the last extremity. The 
 substance of the narrative remains entire, ab- 
 stracted from the legend which disgraces it. 
 
 t Bede, C. 7. 
 
528 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I, 
 
 with the old native Britons, exhibited in 
 our island scenes of the most unpleasant 
 nature. Nor is any portion of our his- 
 tory in a secular view less interesting. 
 Nevertheless in this dull period it pleased 
 God to shovsr the power of his grace 
 among our ancestors. Hitherto Kent al- 
 most alone had been illuminated ; but the 
 Gospel was now introduced into the 
 North, where reigned Edwin, king of 
 the Northumbrians. And a woman v.'as 
 once more honoured as the instrument of 
 salvation to a king her husband, and to 
 many of his subjects. Edwin had sent 
 to Eadbald to desire his sister Ethelburg 
 or Tate* in marriage. The Kentish 
 prince, with that Christian sincerity 
 which had ever distinguished him since 
 his conversion, answered, that it was not 
 lawful to marry his sister to an infidel. 
 Edwin replied, that he would certainly 
 grant free liberty of conscience to the 
 princess and to her attendants, adding 
 that he himself would receive the same 
 religion if it appeared more worthy of 
 God. Upon this Eadbald consented, and 
 sent his sister into Northumberland, ]■ at- 
 tended by Paulinus, who was consecrat- 
 ed bishop of the North of 
 E norland by Justus in the 
 
 Paulinus 
 made 
 bishop of 
 the North 
 of Eng- 
 land, 
 
 year 
 
 625. 
 
 The reason 
 
 A. D. C25. 
 
 for 
 sending him was, that by 
 daily exhortations and admi- 
 nistration of the communion 
 he might guard tlie young 
 ])rincess and her attendants 
 from the infection of idolatry. 
 But Providence had a higher and more 
 extensive aim, and infused into the heart 
 of Paulinus:}: a strong desire to propagate 
 the Gospel in these regions. He labour- 
 ed much both to preserve Ethelburg and 
 her attendants in Christian simplicity, 
 and to draw over some of the Pagans to 
 the faith. But though he preached a 
 long time, " still, says Bede, the god of 
 this world blinded the minds of unbe- 
 lievers." After some time Edwin was 
 very near being murdered by an assassin 
 whom the king of the West Saxons sent 
 against him, and the same night his 
 queen was delivered of a daughter. 
 
 While the king was thanking his gods 
 for the birth of a daughter, Paulinus be- 
 gan to give thanks to the Lord Christ. 
 Edwin told him, that he himself would 
 worship Christ, and renounce all his 
 gods, if he would give him victory over 
 the king of the West Saxons, who had 
 attempted to murder him, and, for the 
 present, he gave the young infant to 
 Paulinus to be baptized. She was the 
 first Northumbrian who was admitted 
 into the visible Church by the ordinance 
 of baptism ; and twelve of the king's fa- 
 mily were baptized on that occasion. 
 Edwin collecting his forces vanquished 
 the West Saxons, and killed or reduced 
 into subjection all who had conspired 
 against him. Returning victorious, he 
 determined no longer to serve idols. He 
 was, however, in no hurry to be baptiz- 
 ed, but resolved to examine seriously the 
 grounds and reasons of Christianity. He 
 attended Paulinus's instructions, held 
 conferences with prudent and knowing 
 persons, and was himself observed fre- 
 quently to commune with his own heart, 
 in silence, and anxiously to inquire what 
 was true religion. All who use his me- 
 thods will not fail to know the truth. 
 
 Edwin was doubtless in good earnest, 
 
 and at length lield a consultation with his 
 
 intimate friends and counsellors, "What 
 
 says he, "this hitherto unheard of 
 
 * Bede, C. 9. 
 
 + This term meant in those times all that 
 part of England which lies to the north of tlie 
 Humber. 
 
 i He was one of the monks whom Gregory 
 had sent into England, and possessed much of 
 the pious and zealous spirit of that renowned 
 prelate. 
 
 IS, 
 
 doctrine, tliis new worship ]" Coifi, the 
 chief of the priests, answered, " See 
 you, king, what this is, which is late- 
 ly preached to us 1 I declare most frankly 
 what I have found to be true, that the re- 
 ligion we have hitherto followed is of no 
 value. If the gods could do any thing, 
 they would more particularly distinguish 
 me with their favours who have served 
 them so diligently. If the new doctrine 
 be really better, let us embrace it." An- 
 other of the nobles observed, that he had 
 taken notice of a swallow, which had 
 rapidly flown through the king's house, 
 entering by one door and going out at the 
 other. This happened, he said, when 
 the king was sitting at supper in the hall : 
 a fire burning in the midst, and the room 
 being heated, a tempest of rain or snow 
 raged without ; the poor swallow felt in- 
 deed a temporary warmth, and then es- 
 caped out of the room. " Such," says 
 he, " is the life of man ; but what goes 
 before, or comes after, is buried in pro- 
 found darkness. Our ignorance then, 
 upon such principles as hitherto we have 
 embraced, is confessed ; but if this new 
 
Cext. vir.] 
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH. 
 
 529 
 
 doctrine really teach us any thing more 
 certain, it will deserve to be followed." 
 These and similar* reflections were made 
 by the king's counsellors. Colli express- 
 ed also a dc'siro to boar Paulinus preach, 
 which, by the king's order, was compli- 
 ed with. The chief priest, having heard 
 the sermon, exclaimed, " I knew former- 
 ly, that what we worshipped was no- 
 thing; because the more studiously I 
 sought for truth, the less I found it. Now 
 I openl)'^ declare, that in this preaching 
 appears the truth, which is able to afford 
 us life, salvation, and eternal bliss. I 
 advise that we instantly destroy the tem- 
 ples and altars, which we have served in 
 vain." The king feeling the conviction 
 with no less strength, openly confessed 
 the faith of Christ, and asked Coifi, who 
 should be the first man that should pro- 
 fane the idolatrous places. "I ought to 
 do it," replied the priest, " I, who wor- 
 shipped them in folly, will give an ex- 
 ample to others in destroying them, by 
 the wisdom given me from the true God." 
 He immediately went to the temple and 
 profaned it, rejoicing in the knowledge 
 of the Most High, and ordered his com- 
 panions to burn the building with its en- 
 closures. The place was still shown in 
 our author's time, not far from York to 
 the east of the Derwent. 
 
 In the eleventh year of Edwin's refgn, 
 this prince, Avith all his nobles and very 
 many of the commonalty, was baptized, 
 one hundred and eig-hty years 
 after the arrival of the Saxons 
 in Britain, and in the year of 
 Christ G27. This was per- 
 formed at York in a wooden 
 oratory, in which Edwin had 
 been first proposed as a cate- 
 chumen for baptism. By the advice of 
 Paulinus he afterwards began to build on 
 the same spot a church of stone, which 
 however he did not live to finish, but it 
 was completed by Oswald, his successor. 
 Paulinus, first bishop of York, continued 
 for six years, till the death of Edwin, to 
 preach the Gospel ; and as many as were 
 ordained to eternal life believed. f Ed- 
 win's children were afterwards baptized ; 
 and so strong was the desire of his sub- 
 jects for Christianity, that Paulinus com- 
 ing with the king and queen to a royal 
 
 Edwin and 
 his nobles, 
 kc. bap- 
 tized, 
 
 A. D. 627. 
 
 * Bede, C. 13. 
 
 f Tlicy are Bede's words ; the scriptural 
 reader knows whence he borrowed them. Id. 
 C. 14. 
 
 Vol. I. 2 Y 
 
 villa, called Adregin, spent there thirty- 
 six days in teaching and baptizing from 
 morning till night. At another tune he 
 baptized, in the river Swale,* which 
 flows near Catterick, a number of per- 
 sons who resorted thither. Many of 
 these conversions may be supposed to 
 have been the result of mere complaisance 
 to the court. But there is every reason 
 to believe, that there was a real eH'usion 
 of the Spirit at this time. And, in the 
 present age, when men profess much to 
 think for themselves, it will not be easy 
 to find a person in high life attending 
 with a more cool and reasonable a spirit 
 to the nature and evidences of true reli- 
 gion, than Edwin and his nobles did at 
 a time which we call extremely liarba- 
 rous. They thought impartially, and they 
 had the indispensable qualification of be- 
 ing serious in their researches. 
 
 EdAvin induced also Carpwald, king of 
 the East Angles, to embrace the Gospel. 
 Redwald, the father of this prince, had 
 been baptized in Kent, but had been se- 
 duced by his wife into idolatry. Carp- 
 wald was succeeded by his brother Sibert, 
 a man of singular zeal and piety, whose 
 labours for the spiritual benefit of his 
 subjects were much assisted by Felix, a 
 Burgundian Christian. This person had 
 received a commission from Honorius, 
 the successor of Justus at Canterbur}^ to 
 preach among the East Angles, which he 
 did with great success, and lived and died 
 bishop of Diimmock.)" 
 
 The zealous Paulinus preached also in 
 Lincolnshire, the first province south of 
 the Humber,:): where the governor of 
 Lincoln§ with his house was converted 
 to God. Bede informs us that a friend 
 of his heard an old person make this de- 
 claration, " I was baptized, together with 
 a multitude of others, in the river Chanta(| 
 by Paulinus, in the presence of Edwin." 
 Wonderful things are told us of the per- 
 fect peace, order, and justice which pre- 
 vailed during the reign of the wise and . 
 pious king of Ncrthnmberland. 
 
 Attempts were made all this time by 
 the bishops of Rome, to induce the Irish 
 to unite themselves to the English 
 Church, but in vain. John the bishop of 
 Rome wrote letters also into Ireland against 
 
 qui vicum juxta Cataractara pr:e- 
 
 * Sualva 
 terfliiit. 
 t Now Dunwich in Suffolk 
 
 t Bede, C. 16. 
 II Now Trent. 
 
 § Lindecolina. 
 
530 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 the Pelagian heresy, which was reviving 
 there. 
 
 Edwin, after having six years served 
 the cause of Christ, was slain in a battle, 
 which he fought with Carduella, a Bri- 
 tish prince, a Christian by profession, 
 and with Penda, king of the Saxon prin- 
 cipality of Mercia, a professed Pagan. 
 It is remarkable that the British prince 
 used his victory with savage barbarity, 
 and our author complains that, to his 
 times, the British Christians looked on 
 the English only as Pagans. Paulinus, 
 after this mournful event, retired with 
 Edwin's queen into Kent, whence he 
 had brought her. There being a vacancy 
 at Rochester, he was by Eadbald, who 
 still reigned in Kent, fixed in that See, 
 which he held to his death. His deacon 
 James, whom he had left in Northumber- 
 land, preserved still some remains of 
 Christianity in a province now overrun 
 by Pagans. Such are the vicissitudes of 
 the Church in this world: her perfect 
 rest is above. 
 
 The situation of the North was, after 
 this, deplorable. Cedwalla, a British 
 king, tyrannized with the fiercest barba- 
 rity over the subjects of Edwin, till at 
 length Oswald, his nephew, vanquished 
 and slew him, and established himself in 
 
 of Easter, as all the Christians in the 
 British Isles were, except the Saxons. 
 To him Bede applies the expression, that 
 " he had a zeal for God, though not 
 FULLY* according to knowledge." Os- 
 wald, whom early education had rather 
 prejudiced in favour of the same schism, 
 gave him an episcopal See in the isle of 
 Lindisfarn.f But there was a great dif- 
 ficulty which attended his ministry ; 
 Aidan spake English very imperfectly. 
 Oswald himself, therefore, who tho- 
 roughly understood Irish, acted as his 
 interpreter. The zeal of this monarch 
 was indeed extraordinary, to induce him 
 to take such pains. Encouraged by his 
 protection, more Irish ministers came 
 into the North of England, and churches 
 wen; erected ; the Gospel was preached, 
 and Northumberland, by the zeal and 
 piety of the new missionaries, recovered 
 the ground which it had lost by the ex- 
 pulsion of Paulinus. Even to the year 
 HIGX the principles of evangelical piety 
 flourished in the Irish school ; at which 
 time this people were reduced to the Ro- 
 man communion. 
 
 Adrian himself was a shining example 
 of godliness. He laboured to convert 
 infidels and to strengthen the faithful. 
 He gave to the poor whatever presents he 
 
 the kingdom. He had. in his younger received from the great, and employed 
 days, lived an exile in Ireland, and had himself with his associates in the Scrip- 
 there been baptized. Desirous of evan-jtures continually. He strictly avoided 
 
 gelizing his people, he sent for a pastor 
 out of Ireland, who, after he had made 
 some fruitless attempts, returned into his 
 own country, complaining of the intract- 
 able disposition of the Northumbrians. 
 " It seems to me," said Aidan, a monk 
 who was present at his complaints, " that 
 your austere manners and conduct to 
 wards them, were unsuitable to their 
 state of extreme ignorance. They should 
 be treated like infants with milk, till 
 they become capable of stronger meat." 
 The consequence was, what probably 
 Aidan littlp expected; he was himself 
 deputed by an Irish council to enter on 
 the mission. 
 
 The character of this missionary* 
 would have done honour to the purest 
 times. We may more confidently de- 
 pend on the account given of 
 him, because he belonged not 
 to the Roman communion, to 
 which Bede was supersti- 
 tiously devoted, but was a 
 schismatic in the observation 
 
 everyt'ning luxurious, and every appear- 
 ance of secular avarice and ambition : 
 
 Character 
 of Aidan 
 the mis- 
 sionary. 
 
 * Btde, B. 111. C. 3, 4, 5. 
 
 * Non plene, Warner, by omitting the ex- 
 pression FUXLT, misrepresents our venerable 
 historian, as if he had looked on Aidan as 
 wrong in point of knowledge altogether. la 
 another place he invidiously compares the la- 
 boriousness and simplicity of the Irish mis- 
 sionary with the pomp of the Roman pastors 
 sent by Gregory. We have seen abundant 
 proof of the integrity and diligence of the lat- 
 ter. The iruthis, that though God is no re- 
 specter of persons, man is very apt to be so. 
 Wherever he sends pastors fitted and commis- 
 sioned by himself, genuine traces of their 
 work appear, and leave salutary li-uits behind 
 them. The Irish Saint Columban, and after 
 him Aidan, as well as the Roman missionaries 
 of the Gregorian school, influenced by the^ 
 same Holy Spirit, left wholesome vestiges of 
 their labours in the British Isles, which ex- 
 tended even to distant ages. Had the former 
 been Protestants, properly speaking, and the 
 latter Papists, the same estimate ought to have 
 been formed, though such a distinction in re- 
 gard to those ages is chimerical. 
 
 f Now called Holy Island, four miles from 
 Berwick. | Bede, C. 4. 
 
ClKT. VII.] 
 
 ENGLISH CHURCH. 
 
 531 
 
 he redeemed captives with the monej' 
 which was given him by the rich : Iio 
 instructed them afterwards; and lilted 
 them for the ministry. 
 
 The king was not inferior to the prelate 
 in his endeavours to promote godliness. 
 Uncorrupt and huml)le in tiie midst ol' 
 prosperity, he showed himself the bene- 
 factor of the poor and the needy, and 
 cheerfully encourasred every attempt to 
 spread the knowledge and practice of 
 godliness among men. 
 
 In the mean time Byrinus was sent 
 from Rome into Britain, who, arriving 
 among the West Saxons, and findinn- 
 
 The king 
 of Kent, 
 died, 
 
 A. D, 640. 
 
 His son 
 
 Eascoii- 
 bert de- 
 stroyed all 
 the idols in 
 his do- 
 minions. 
 
 them all pagans, laboured to instruct 
 theoi. Cynigilsus, their king, the father 
 in-law of Oswald, received baptism from 
 him. The two princes gave to Byrinus 
 the city of Dorcinca;* where he resided 
 as bishop, and the Gospel was propagated 
 with success through this branch of the 
 heptarchy. 
 
 In Kent Eadbald died in 
 the year 640, f and was suc- 
 ceeded by his son Eascon- 
 bert, who reigned twenty- 
 four years, was zealous in the 
 support of godliness, and was 
 the tirst Saxon king who to- 
 tallj' destroyed all the idols 
 in his dominions. 
 
 Oswald at length, in the 
 thirty-eighth year of his age, 
 was slain in battle by the same Penda, 
 king of Mercia, who was mentioned be- 
 fore. A memorable instance of the 
 unsearchable ways of Providence ! Two 
 kings, whose equals in piety and virtue 
 are not easily found in any age, both lose 
 their lives in battle with the same enemy, 
 a barbarian and a pagan ! But thry 
 served God not for worldly, but heavenly 
 blessings. 
 
 Providence was however preparing the 
 way for the propagation of the Gospel 
 through the whole heptarchy. Young 
 Penda, son of the tyrant of ^lercia, de- 
 siring in niarrianfe tlie daughter of Oswv. 
 brother and successor to Oswald, his 
 reception of Christianity was made the 
 condition ; and the young prince, we are 
 told, on hearing the doctrines of the Gos- 
 pel preached, was induced to declare, 
 that he would become a Christian, even 
 if Oswy's daughter were denied him. 
 Two years before the death of old Penda, 
 
 the son married the Northumbrian prin- 
 cess, and patronized Christianity in that 
 part of his father's dominions which was 
 committed to his government. But the 
 latter renewed hostilities against Oswy, 
 and at length was slain in battle.* Oswy, 
 now master of Mercia and Northum- 
 berland, applied himself to propagate 
 Christianity among his new sul)iects. 
 Through his influenee also the Gospel 
 was restored to the kingdom of the East 
 Saxons; and London, which had rejected 
 the ministr}^ of Mellitus, again embraced 
 the religion of Christ. 
 
 In this century, Kentigern, bishop of 
 Glasgow in Scotland, being expelled 
 from his See, founded a monastery, and a 
 bishopric on the banks of the river Elwy 
 in North Wales. Archbishop Usher, 
 quoting .lohn of Tininouth, says, there 
 was in the abbey 965 monks, one of 
 whom was named Asaph. Kentigern, 
 being called back to Glasgow, appointed 
 Asaph abbot and bishop of Llan-Elwy. 
 Of Asaph it is recorded that he was a 
 zealous preacher, and that he used to say, 
 "they envy the salvation of souls who 
 withstand the preaching of the Word." 
 The See has since borne his name ; and 
 he seems to have had a spirit superior to 
 the monastic superstition, in which he 
 was educated. f Marianus Scotus, in his 
 Chronicle, says, in regard to this century, 
 " Ireland was filled with Saints. Their 
 schools were renowned for ages.":}; 
 
 But it is time to bring die English 
 Church history of this century to a close. 
 That there was a real effusion of the Holy 
 Spirit on England, so that numbers were 
 turned from idols to the living God ; the 
 pastors, first of the Koman, and after- 
 wards of the British communion, laboured 
 in the work with simplicity and success, 
 has been evidenced. We have had also 
 several instances ofthe completion of that 
 prophecy, " Kings shall be thy nursing 
 fathers, and Queens thy nursing mo- 
 thers. "§ But the zeal and purity of the 
 Christian spirit seldom last much longer 
 than thirty or forty years in any place. 
 The native depravity of man gradually 
 quenches the Spirit of God. and the 
 power of godliness is soon buried, or at 
 least very^faintly subsists in the midst of 
 
 ♦ Now Dorchester, near Oxford, 
 t Bede, C. 8, 
 
 • The battle was fought between Oswy and 
 Penda, near Lnydcn, now Leeds, in York- 
 shire, at Winwidfield, on the river Winvaed, 
 now Aire. 
 
 t Alliitn Butler, Vol. V. | Idem. 
 
 § Isaiah, xlix. 23. 
 
532 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. U. 
 
 factious contentions and worldly lusts. 
 This I find to have been the case in the 
 latter part of the century in England. 
 Wilfrid, bishop of York, a very suspi- 
 cious character, in his exile laboured 
 indeed among the Frisians, and is said 
 to have been the first missionary who 
 taught that people. If he did any real 
 good among them, it was the most useful 
 pan of his life ; for in Britain he seems 
 to have fomented turbulence and con- 
 tention. However, he paved the way for 
 more upright missionaries, whose labours 
 in Friezeland shall be mentioned here- 
 after. The craft of Satan too commonly 
 succeeds in fomenting divisions, even 
 among those who with equal sincerity 
 are enffacred in the best of causes. 
 While such men as Paulinus and Aidan 
 lived, the diversity of sentiments produ- 
 ced no great mischief. Afterwards, as 
 depravity increased, and the spirit of 
 faith and love grew colder, very hurtful 
 disputes arose, to the scandal of the Gos- 
 pel. The Roman Church, however, 
 acquired more and more influence, though 
 it was very far from pervading the whole 
 of the British isles at the end of the cen- 
 tury. But nothing particularly pertinent 
 to the design of this history occurs. Let 
 it suffice us to say, that our ancestors saw 
 in this century a blessed time, the fruits 
 of which will abide forever. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL IN 
 GERMANY AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD. 
 
 The northern part of Europe had still 
 remained in the darkness of idolatry. In 
 this century they were visited by the 
 Mos-^, High. The Britons, Scots, and 
 Irish, were honoured as the principal 
 instruments in the work; and this cir- 
 cumstance affords an additional evidence 
 to the account already given of the genu- 
 ine spirit of godliness which prevailed 
 in the British isles. The French had 
 also their share in the blessed cause. I 
 shall throw together the very imperfect 
 hints which are preserved to us of these 
 important transactions. Though the first 
 instance more properly relates to France 
 than to Germany, it may with no great 
 impropriety be mentioned in this chapter. 
 Omer, bishop of Tarvanne, the old metro- 
 polis of the Morini in Artois, laboured 
 
 with success in the cultivation of a wil- 
 derness. Vice and idolatry were very 
 predominant in his diocese ; but bj^ the 
 assistance of Bertin, a vSwiss, his kins- 
 man, he was enabled to eradicate invete- 
 rate evils, and to civilize a race of 
 barbarians. 
 
 The erection of many convents in Ger- 
 many for the Scotch and Irish, some of 
 which are still extant, is to be accounted 
 for from the ecclesiastical connexions of 
 their ancestors. Many persons travelled 
 from Great Britain and Ireland with the 
 laudable purpose of preaching Christ in 
 Batavia, Belgium and Germany.* And 
 however superstition might tarnish their 
 labours, there must have been a nobler 
 principle to induce men to undergo so 
 much danger, with hardly any possible 
 prospect of lucre or fame. Mere philoso- 
 phers are generally but too liberal in 
 censure and raillery : we seldom, how- 
 ever, hear of them engaging in any work 
 of so disinterested a nature. Only the 
 love of God in Christ can support the 
 spirit of men in such enterprizes. 
 
 Columbian, an Irish monk, distin- 
 guished from him of the same name, 
 spoken of before, who was called " the 
 Ancient," toward the close of the fore- 
 going century had extirpated the remains 
 of expiring paganism in France. He 
 also passed the Rhine, and evangelized 
 the Suevi,t the Boii,^ and other German 
 nations. He laboured in the cause to his 
 death, which happened in the . ^ g. ^ 
 year 615. Gal, one of his 
 companions, laboured with much zeal 
 about the lakes of Zurich and Constance. 
 Near the latter lake, at a little distance 
 from Bregent, he erected a monastery, 
 which still bears his name. In fortitude 
 and laboriousness he was inferior to none 
 of the missionaries of this age. But we 
 find very little worthy of being recorded 
 concerning him. 
 
 The account of Kilian, another Irish 
 missionary, is somewhat more satisfac- 
 tory. He received a commission from 
 the bishop of Rome, toward the end of 
 the century, to preach to the infidels ; and 
 with some of his disciples he came to 
 Wirtzbourg upon the Mayne, where a 
 pagan duke called Gosbert was governor. 
 The duke received the Gospel, was bap- 
 
 * Mosheim, Cent. 7lh. C. 1. 
 f This people itihabited the places between 
 ihe UliiiieanJ the Elbe. 
 I Now Bavarians. 
 
Cext. VII.] 
 
 GERMAN CHURCH. 
 
 533 
 
 IMurder of 
 Kilian and 
 his com- 
 panions, 
 
 A. D. GS8. 
 
 tized, and many followed his example. 
 Bat he had married his brother's wife. 
 The missionary united discretion with 
 zeal, and deferred his admonitions on this 
 head, till he found that his pupil the duke 
 was firmly settled in the faith.* Kilian 
 at length ventured to act the part of John 
 the Baptist, and the event was in a great 
 measure similar. Gosbert promised to 
 obey, but delayed the execution of his 
 promise till he should return from an ex- 
 pedition. The mischief of procrastination 
 against the light of conscience was never 
 more strongly illustrated. In his absence 
 Geilana, for that was the name of the 
 German Herodias, procured 
 the murder of Kilian and his 
 companions. They were en- 
 gaged in devotional exercises, 
 and died with the patience of 
 martyrs in the year G8S. Fos- 
 bert was prevailed on by the artifices of 
 Geilana to sutfer the murderers to escape 
 with impunit)% But all the actors in this 
 tragedy, Gosbert among the rest, came to 
 an unhappy end ; and there is no doubt 
 but that in this case, as well as many 
 others, the blood of the martyrs became 
 the seed of the Church. Numbers of the 
 eastern Franks had embraced Christian- 
 ity, and sealed the ministry of Kilian. 
 Barbatus, born in the territory of Bene- 
 vento, in Italy, in the beginning of this 
 century, was also a great ornament to it. 
 I\Ieditation on the Scriptures was his 
 chief delight. He was acknowledged to 
 excel in preaching. He acted as curate 
 of Morcona near Benevento, and gave 
 great offence by his faithfulness. By the 
 malice of the people he was obliged to 
 retire to Benevento. This town was pos- 
 sessed by the Lombards, who were chiefly 
 Arians ; many of them were indeed idola- 
 ters, though some were of the general 
 Church, with their duke Arichis, a friend 
 of Gregory I. Barbatus labouring there 
 found the Christians, so called, very 
 idolatrous. They worshipped a golden 
 viper, and a tree on which the skin of a 
 wild beast was hung. He preached and 
 prayed a long time : at length the em- 
 peror Constans besieging Benevento, the 
 wicked inhabitants were intimidated so 
 far, as to repent of their idolatry. Bar- 
 batus was allowed to cut down the tree, 
 and to melt the golden viper, of which he 
 made a sacramental chalice. This man 
 
 was appointed bishop of Bene- 
 vento in 6G3, and destroyed 
 every vestige of idolatry in 
 the whole state. He lived 
 afterwards to bear a testi- 
 mony by his presence in the 
 council of Constantinople, 
 against the IMonothelite he- 
 
 resy, 
 
 and died in G82. See 
 
 Burl>atus 
 made 
 bisliop of 
 Beneven- 
 to, 
 
 A. D. 663. 
 
 Died, 
 A. D. 682. 
 
 English 
 mission- 
 aries ill- 
 treated in 
 Holland, 
 retired 
 iiUo Den- 
 mark, 
 
 A. D. 693. 
 
 Butler's Lives. 
 
 Toward the conclusion of the century, 
 Willibrod, an English missionary, and 
 eleven of his countrymen, crossed over 
 the sea into Holland, to la- 
 bour among the Friczeland- 
 ers. But being ill-treated by 
 the king of Friezeland, who 
 put one of their company to 
 death,* they retired into Den- 
 mark. Returning, however, 
 into Friezeland in the year 
 (J93, they propagated divine 
 truth with success. Willi- 
 brod was ordained bishop of Wilteburgf 
 by the Roman prelate, and laboured in his 
 diocese to his death; while his associates 
 spread the Gospel through Westphalia 
 and the neighbouring countries.:): 
 
 It was in this century, the former part 
 of it, according to the researches of one 
 author,§ the latter part, according to those 
 of another,l| that Bavaria received the 
 Gospel from the ministry of Rupert, or 
 Robert, bishop of Worms. He was in- 
 vited by Theodo, duke of Bavaria. His 
 ministry prospered, and he was appointed 
 bishop of Saltzburg. The increasing 
 harvest required more missionaries: he 
 therefore returned to his own country, 
 and brought twelve assistants : from that 
 time Christianity was established in Ba- 
 varia. Corbinian, another Frenchman, 
 watered where Rupert had planted. Duke 
 Theodo received him gladly. His son 
 and successor Grimoald was induced to 
 |)art with his wife, whom he had married 
 contrary to the Levitical laws of matri- 
 monial consanguinity ; and so far as can 
 be judged from very imperfect accounts. 
 
 Fleury, B. XL. 
 2 y2 
 
 37. 
 
 • Mosheim, Ceirt. V'lL C. 1. 
 
 f Now Utrecht. 
 
 I Disen, an Irish monk, taught the Gospel 
 in Ireland, France, and Germany. His labours 
 were most remarkably crowned with success 
 in the neighbourhood of Mentz. — Alb. Butler. 
 
 § Velserius Rerutn Boi< .irum, B. IV. 
 
 I Fleury,B. XLI. 31. If Fleury's chrono- 
 logy be right, the greatest part of the narra- 
 tive before us belongs to the next centurj-. 
 
534 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 Ihe Gospel was received with great sin- 
 cerity in this country.*^ 
 
 Some time after,f Emmeram, an Aqui- 
 tanian Frenchman, leaving his country 
 and his large possessions, travelled to 
 Ratisbon, to spread the Gospel. He was 
 well received by another Theodo, duke of 
 Bavaria. He observed, that the Bava- 
 rians were, many of them at least, still 
 addicted to idolatrous rites, which they 
 mixed with Christianity. The old inha- 
 bitants were particularly guilty of these 
 things. He laboured among them three 
 years, preaching in all the towns and vil- 
 lages, and reserved for himself only the 
 bare necessaries of life. His success 
 was great, and his end was worthy of his 
 profession. Lambert, a son of the duke, 
 murdered him at length with savage bar 
 harity. He had been offered a large reve 
 nue and a settlement at Ratisbon by 
 Theodo, which he had refused, declaring 
 that he only wished to preach Christ 
 crucified. 
 
 Marinue and Auian, two Egyptians, 
 came into Bavaria, and were very sue 
 cessful in the same cause. But the ex 
 cessive austerity which ihey brought with 
 them from the East must have been detri- 
 mental to their work. The former at 
 length was murdered by robbers; the lat- 
 ter died a natural death. EUo, bishop of 
 Noyon, carefully visited his large diocese, 
 especially the pagan parts of it, and was 
 very successful among the Flemings, the 
 Antwerpers, and the Frisons. At first he 
 found them fierce and exceedingly obsti- 
 nate. But God was with him both in 
 life and doctrine. Every Easter he bap- 
 tized great numbers, who had been 
 brought to the knowledge of God in tlie 
 preceding year. Very aged persons, 
 amidst crowds of children, came to be 
 baptized, and there is the fairest evidence 
 of his evangelical success. 
 
 This is all that I can find, with cer- 
 
 * This missionary was remarkable for pri- 
 vate devotion, as well as public labours. He 
 reserved to himself a considerable portion of 
 time every day for prayer and meditation. 
 But from Albau Butler's account I learn, that 
 Grimoald persecuted Corbinian on account of 
 his faithfulness; and that Biltrude, the relict 
 of Griraoald's broiher, hired assassins to mur- 
 der him. Both Grimoald and Biltrude perish- 
 ed miserably. If the former was induced to 
 repentance at all, he seems to have relapsed. 
 After the death of his persecutors, Coi-biiiian 
 returned to Frisengen, and laboured till his 
 death, which happened in the year 730. 
 
 t Velser. Id. 
 
 tainty, of the propagation of the Gospel 
 in the seventh century in Germany and 
 the neighbouring countries. The cen- 
 sures of Mosheim, as if the greatest part 
 of the missionaries were not sincere, or 
 as if many of the monks covered their 
 ambition with the cloak of mortification, 
 appear to me illiberal and unfounded,* 
 and would have been more worthy of a 
 modern sceptic. Superstition and an ex- 
 cessive attachment to the Roman See is 
 very visible among thein. But the little 
 account of facts, which we have, hears 
 testimony to their uprightness. Where 
 is that charity which hopeth all things, 
 if we are to suppose men to be wrong, 
 against all appearances ] If ecclesias- 
 tical historians had delighted as much in 
 recording good as they have in recording 
 evil, it is probable a more ample refuta- 
 tion of the inconsiderate aspersions of 
 this author might have been exhibited to 
 the reader. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 Phocas, the Greek einperor, was de- 
 posed and put to death by Heraclius in 
 the year 610. He was one of the most 
 vicious and profligate tyrants, and may 
 be compared with Caligula, 
 Nero, and Domitian. Since Phocas 
 the days of Constantine such P"' to 
 
 characters had been exceed- •l^athby 
 
 TTi 1 ,1 Heraclius, 
 
 ing rare, r or such was the ' 
 
 benign influence of the Gos- A. D. 610. 
 pel, that even amidst all the 
 corruptions and abuses of it, which were 
 now so numerous, a decency of character 
 and conduct, unknown to their Pagan 
 predecessors, was supported by the em- 
 perors in general. Heraclius, the suc- 
 cessor of Phocas, reigned thirty years. 
 In the beginning of his reign the Per- 
 sians desolated the eastern part of the 
 empire, and made themselves masters of 
 .Terusalein. While Asia groaned under 
 their cruelties and oppressions, and was 
 afflicted with scourge after scourge, for 
 her long abuse of the best gift of God, 
 an opportunity was given for the exercise 
 of Christian graces to a bishop of a 
 
 * Mosheim, Id. 1 find no just reason to sus- 
 pect any of them, except Wilfri<l, bishop of 
 York, mentioned in the last Chapter. 
 
CexXt. VII.] 
 
 GENERAL HISTORY, 
 
 535 
 
 Christian 
 coiuluct of 
 John the 
 Almoner, 
 hislioj) of 
 Alexan- 
 dria. 
 
 Church, which had long ceased to pro- 
 duce Christian fruit. 
 
 This was John, bishop of Alexandria, 
 called the Almoner, on account of his ex- 
 tensive liberality. He daily supplied 
 with necessaries those who flocked into 
 Egypt, after they had escap- 
 ed the Persian arms. lie 
 sent to* Jerusalem the most 
 ample relief for such as re- 
 mained there : he ransomed 
 captives ; placed the sick and 
 wounded in hospitals, and 
 visited them, in person, two 
 or three times a week. He even seems 
 to have interpreted too strictly the sacred 
 rule, " of givinor to him that asketh of 
 thee.' His spirit however was noble ; 
 " Should the whole world come to Alex- 
 andria," said he, "they could not ex- 
 haust the treasures of God." 
 
 The Nile not having risen to its 
 usual height, there was a barren season ; 
 provisions were scarce, and crowds of 
 refugees sliil poured into Alexandria 
 John continued, however, his liberal da 
 natives, till he had neither money, nor 
 credit. The prayer of faith was his re- 
 source, and he still persevered in hope. 
 He even refused a very tempting oiler of 
 a person, who would have bribed him 
 with a large present, that he might be 
 ordained deacon. " As to my brethren 
 the poor," said the holy prelate, " God, 
 who fed them, before you and I were 
 born, will take care to feed them now, 
 if we obey him." Soon afterward he 
 heard of tiie arrival of two large ships 
 which he had sent into Sicily for corn. 
 "I thank thee, Lord," cried tiic bishop 
 in a rapture of joy, " that thou hast kept 
 me from selling thy gift for money." 
 
 From the beginning of his bishopric 
 he supported 7,500 poor persons by daily 
 alms. He was accessible to them on all 
 occasions ; and what is most material, 
 divine faith seems to have influenced his 
 acts of love. " If God," said he, " al- 
 low us to enter his house at all times, and 
 if we wish him speedily to hear us, how 
 ought we to conduct ourselves toward 
 our brethren ■?" He constantly studied 
 the Scriptures, and, in his conversation, 
 was instructive and exemplary. Slander 
 and evil speaking he peculiarly disliked. 
 If any person in his presence was guilty 
 in this respect, he would give another 
 
 Fleury, B. xsxvii. 10. 
 
 turn to the discourse. If the person still 
 persisted, he would direct his servant not 
 to admit him any more. 
 
 The long course of heresy, licentious- 
 ness, and ambition, which had filled the 
 Alexandrian Church, supported by the 
 shameful examples of such pastors as 
 Theophilus and other profligate men, 
 must have reduced it to the lowest ebb ; 
 and I wonder not to find, that persons 
 behaved indecently, even in public wor- 
 ship. Joim, one day seeing several leave 
 the church after the reading of the Gos- 
 pel, went out also, and sat down among 
 them. " Children," said he, " the shep- 
 herd should be with his flock ; I could 
 pray at home, but I cannot preach at 
 home." By doing this twice, he reform- 
 ed the abuse. Let it be marked, as an 
 evidence of the zeal of this prelate, who, 
 like another Josiah, seems to have been 
 sent to reform a falling church, that the 
 preaching of the word engaged much of 
 ills heart. The contempt of preaching is 
 a certain token of extreme degeneracy. 
 
 A canon was made at Paris, in a coun- 
 cil, in the year G14, the same year in 
 which Jerusalem was taken, 
 which enjoins that he shall be 
 ordained to succeed a deceased 
 bishop, who shall be chosen 
 by the archbishop, together 
 with the bishops of the pro- 
 vince, the clergy and the j)eo- 
 ple, without any prospect of 
 gain : if the ordination be 
 conducted otherwise through 
 compulsion or neglect, the 
 election shall be void. The 
 intelligent reader will hence 
 judge of the state of ecclesi- 
 astical polity at that time. 
 
 In Gl() John the Almoner departed from 
 Alexandria, for fear of the 
 Persians, and died soon after 
 in Cyprus, in the same spirit 
 in which he had lived ; and 
 with him ends all that is 
 worth recording of the church of Alex- 
 andria. 
 
 In the same year the haughty Ghos- 
 roes, king of Persia, having conquered 
 Alexandria and Kgvpt, and taken Chal- 
 codon, Heraclius, who saw the ruin of 
 his empire approaching, begged for 
 peace. "That I will never consent to," 
 replied the tyrant, "till you renounce 
 him who v.-as crucified, whom you call 
 God, and with me adore the sun." It 
 lone compare Chosroes and Heraclius, 
 
 Rumai-k- 
 aljle Ca- 
 non made 
 in a Coun- 
 cil at 
 Paris, 
 
 A. D. 6U. 
 
 In the 
 same year 
 the Per- 
 sians take 
 Jerusa- 
 lem. 
 
 Death of 
 John about 
 
 A. n. 616. 
 
536 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 their personal characters will not appear 
 intrinsically ditferent. In one is seen a 
 daring blasphemer of Christ, in the other 
 a mere nominal professor of Christianity, 
 whose life brought neither honour nor 
 credit to the Gospel. Their ostensible 
 characters in the world were, however, 
 extremely diflFerent. The Lord, who is 
 a jealous God, has ever been used to 
 confound his open enemies in the view of 
 all mankind. Chosroes was a second 
 Sennacherib, and he was treated as such 
 by the Sovereign of the universe. The 
 spirit of Heraclius was roused, and God 
 gave him wonderful success : the Per- 
 sian king was repeatedly vanquished, 
 though he ceased not to persecute the 
 Christians, so long as he had power ; 
 and after he had lost the greatest part of 
 his dominions, he was murdered by his 
 own son, as was the case with Senna- 
 cherib, and in the year 628 the Persian 
 power ceased to be formidable to the Ro- 
 man empire.* 
 
 It is not without reason that St. Paul 
 exhorts us " to shun profane and vahi 
 babblings ; because their word will eat 
 like a canker."+ The Nestorian and 
 Eutychian heresies, opposite extremes, 
 the one dividing the person, the other 
 confounding the two natures of Jesus 
 Christ, though condemned by councils, 
 still flourished in great vigour in the east. 
 And the resistance of the orthodox had 
 little effect, for want of the:J: energy of 
 true spiritual life, which still subsisted 
 in a measure in the west. For there the 
 sound doctrine of grace, the guard of 
 true humility, was an ensign, around 
 which truly pious men were wont to rally 
 their strength from time to time. But, in 
 Asia and Egypt, religion was for the 
 
 most part heartless specula- 
 The Mo- tion. And about the year 630 
 iiothelite the Eutychian heresy produ- 
 heresy, ^^^ another, the Monothelite, 
 
 A. D. 630. which ascribed only one will 
 
 to Jesus Christ. This opi- 
 nion was the natural consequence of that, 
 which gave him only one nature. Theo- 
 dore, bishop of Pharan in Arabia, first 
 started this notion, which was also readi- 
 ly received by Sergius, bishop of Con- 
 stantinople, whose parents had been 
 Eutychians. Cyrus, who soon after was 
 made bishop of Alexandria, supported 
 
 * Fleurv, B. xxxvii. 34. 
 + 2Tinr. ii. 16, 17. 
 ^Fleury, B. xlvii. 41. 
 
 the same heresy. The ambiguous sub- 
 tilties of the party drew the emperor 
 Heraclius into the same net, and the 
 east was rapidly overspread with the 
 heresy. 
 
 In a council at Alexandria, Sophro- 
 nius, a man of sincerity and simplicity, 
 and formerly the disciple of John the 
 Almoner, with tears bewailed 
 and protested against the in- Sophro- 
 novation, but in vain. Hav- "'"s op- 
 ing been elected bishop of poses the 
 Jerusalem in 629, he after- "'"■^'^'' 
 wards in 633 exerted his au- A. D. 633. 
 thority against the growing 
 heresy, but with meekness of wisdom. 
 In a synodical letter he explained with 
 equal solidity and accuracy the divine and 
 human operations of Jesus Christ, and 
 gave pertinent instances of both.* 
 
 " When he thought fit, he gave his 
 human nature an opportunity to act or to 
 sutfer whatever belonged to it. His in- 
 carnation was no fancy, and he always 
 acted voluntarily. Jesus Christ, as God, 
 willingly took on himself human nature, 
 and he willingly suffered in his flesh to 
 save us, and, by his merits, to free us from 
 suffering. His body was subject to our na- 
 tural and innocent passions : he permitted 
 it to suffer, according to its nature, till his 
 resurrection ; then he freed himself from 
 all that is corruptible in our nature, that he 
 might deliver us from the same." vSo- 
 phronius recommends himself to the pray- 
 ers of Sergius, to whom he writes, and 
 adds, " pray for our emperors," he means 
 Heraclius and his son, " that God may 
 give them victory over all the barbarians ; 
 particularly, that he would humble the 
 pride of the Saracens, who for our sins 
 have suddenly risen upon us, and lay all 
 waste with fierce barbarity and impious 
 confidence." 
 
 Thus, in the lowest times of evangeli- 
 cal religion, God ever raised up men who 
 understood the truth, and knew how to 
 defend it by sound argument, a chari- 
 table spirit, and a holy life. This seems 
 to have been the case of Sophronius. In 
 the mean time the Monothelite heresy 
 spread wider and wider. Even Hono- 
 rius, bishop of Rome, was led into the 
 snare, owned but one will in .Tesus Christ, 
 and imposed silence on all the controver- 
 sialists. Heraclius himself, who lent his 
 imperial authority to the support of a spe- 
 culative phantom, while he imposed on 
 
 * Fleurv, B. sxxviii. 5. 
 
Cext. VII.] 
 
 GENERAL HISTORY. 
 
 537 
 
 his own heart by a specious show of the- 
 ological nicety, lived in the gross and 
 open wickedness of incest, by marrying 
 his own niece. 
 
 The danger from the Saracens, men- 
 tioned by Sophronius, was no other than 
 the victorious arms of Mahomet, the Ara- 
 
 ,, , ^ bian impostor. He had besfun 
 Mahomet, . , " „.,^, i i i" 
 A. D 60S ^" ^"® y^^^ ^^^ '■^ declare him- 
 self a prophet, and, by the 
 assistance of a Jew and a renegado Chris- 
 tian, had formed a farrao-o of doctrines 
 and rites, in which there was a mixture of 
 Paganism, Judaism, and Christianity, 
 whence he found means to draw over to 
 his party some of the various sorts of men 
 who inhabited Arabia. An age of exces- 
 sive ignorance favoured his schemes : at 
 this day so senseless and absurd a book 
 as the Koran could scarcely move the 
 mind of any person in Europe. But he 
 laid hold of the corrupt passions of man, 
 and by indulging his followers in sensu- 
 ality, ambition, and the love of booty, 
 and by promising them a carnal heaven 
 hereafter, he contrived a religion more 
 directly adapted to please mankind than 
 any other of which we have heard. At the 
 same time by declaring war against all who 
 did not receive him, he gave an undoubt- 
 ed right to all nations to attack a system 
 which could only thrive by the oppression 
 of others. But there are seasons of in- 
 fatuation, when, for the sins of men, em- 
 pires and kingdoms are permitted to slum- 
 ber, and no etfectual measures of resist- 
 ance are embraced, till invaders, at first 
 weak and contemptible, grow in time to 
 an enormous height. This was the case 
 with IMahometanisra. The time was come 
 when the Saracen locusts were about to 
 torment the Christian world, and the pro- 
 phecy of Rev. ix. (I — 1'2) was going to 
 be fulfilled. The Greeks were idly em- 
 plo3'ed in the new dispute : vice and 
 wickedness prevailed over the East in all 
 forms. A few indeed mourned over the 
 times, and adorned the truth by humility 
 and holiness, but scarcely any Christian 
 writers appeared to make a serious oppo- 
 sition to the doctrines of ]\Iahomet, and at 
 the time of his death, which 
 Mahomit happened in the year 631, he 
 AD 631* ha*^ conquered almost all 
 Arabia.* 
 
 Notwithstanding the impostor, the Ma- 
 hometan arms proceeded still with the 
 same rapidity. Damascus fell into the 
 hands of his successors; and Sophronius 
 exhorted his flock to take warnino" and 
 repent. Jerusalem however 
 was taken by the enemy in Jerusalem 
 the year 637, and Sophronius ^t\^^, ^'J 
 died soon after. Antioch and ^^^^^ 
 Alexandria successively sunk _\. jj. 53'. 
 under them. Persia itself was 
 subdued. Thus did God equally punish 
 the persecuting idolaters, and t!ie vicious 
 professors of Christianity in the east. 
 They were doomed to a long night of ser- 
 vitude under JMahometanism, which con- 
 tinues to this time. Heraclius himself 
 died in the year 641. God yx . r 
 
 had showed him great mer- „^^ ,f„„ 
 
 , . , . & ^ Heraclius, 
 
 cies, and given him very great ^_ jj_ (^i^ 
 
 encouragement to seek true re- 
 ligion, by the remarkable success of his 
 arms against the Persians in the middle 
 of his reign. But he lived wickedly and 
 speculated unscripturally. And a new 
 power was erected, which reaped the 
 fruits of all his Persian triumphs, and 
 tore from him the fairest provinces of the 
 east. 
 
 To what purpose should I run through 
 the mazes of the Monothelite controversy? 
 yet something must be said on the part 
 which Maximus acted in it. He was one 
 of the most learned men of the age, and 
 had been employed by Heraclius as his 
 secretary ; but I wonder not that a man, 
 who loved real godliness, as he did, 
 should have a strong aversion to a court 
 
 * It has pleased God to permit the ex- 
 istence of this odious and contenijjtiljle re- 
 ligion to this day. And it should he care- 
 fully observed that Mahomet, wicked and 
 
 deceitful as he doubtless was altosjether, did 
 not openly oppose God or his Christ. He 
 did not deny directly, tiiough he did con- 
 sequentially, tlie divine revelation either of 
 tlie Old or new Testament. He always 
 spake respectfully of tlie inspired prophe- 
 tical character of Moses and of Christ. He 
 received so much of Christianity as agrees 
 with Socinianism. Jehovaii was not therefore 
 openly despised by him as lie was iiy Julian, 
 Chosroes, and Sennacherib. On them was 
 fulfilled that Scripture, " he repayeth them 
 that hate him, to destroy them ; lie w ill not be 
 '.lack to him that hatclh him, he will repay 
 him to his face." Dent. vii. 10. A speedy 
 destruction of such avow ed enemies seems to 
 be menaced, that the divine character may be 
 vindicated. His covert enemiesj who yet treat 
 him with respectful decorum, are often per- 
 mitted long to exist, for the punishment of 
 false professors. For the truth and majesty 
 of God are not so sensibly ilishonoured by them 
 in the view of the whole viorld, as to call for 
 their immediate extirpation. 
 
538 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH ; 
 
 [Chip. HI. 
 
 like that of Heraclius. He entered into 
 the monastery of Chrysopolis near Chal- 
 cedon, and was at length elected abbot. 
 He it was, who succeeded Sophronius in 
 the defence of the primitive faith, and 
 ■with much labour confuted the heresi- 
 archs. Martin, bishop of Rome, was ex- 
 
 „ ... cited by the zeal of Maximiis 
 Council in *„ i i -i • i 
 
 the Late- assemble a council, m the 
 
 pan^ Lateran, of a hundred and 
 
 A, b. 649. five bishops, in G49. Con- 
 stans was at this time empe- 
 ror, and, by a decree, had forbidden any 
 side at all to be taken in the controversy. 
 Sergius, Pyrrhus, and Paul, three suc- 
 cessive bishops of Constantinople, had 
 supported the heresy. The controversy 
 had now lasted eighteen years. In this 
 way the active minds of men, destitute of 
 the truth, but eagerly embracing the form 
 of godliness, gratified the self-righteous 
 bias of the heart, and all the malevolent 
 passions in long-protracted controversies, 
 while practical religion was lost. Nor 
 could all the calamities of the times, and 
 the desolation of the eastern churches, 
 move them to the love of peace and truth. 
 _ In these circumstances, Martin in coun- 
 cil ventured to anathematize ihe support- 
 ers of the Monothelite heresy. I cannot 
 blame his disobedience to the emperor 
 Constans in refusing to observe silence 
 on a point of doctrine which appeared to 
 him important. Constans evidently for- 
 got his office when he required such 
 things. And it is a curious instance of 
 the power of prejudice in some Protestant 
 historians,* that they will so much sup- 
 port the conduct of a worthless tyrant as 
 Constans doubtless was, because his 
 speculative principles induced him to 
 treat a Roman bishop with cruelty. There 
 was a haughtiness, no doubt, and an as- 
 perity in the language and behaviour of 
 Martin, very unbecoming a Christian. 
 His cause however seems just ; nor does 
 it appear that he either meant or acted 
 treasonably : he defended that part of the 
 truth, which was opposed, with the mag- 
 nanimity, though not with the meekness, 
 that became a bishop. Constans ordered 
 him to be dragged into the east, and 
 treated him witli a long-protracted bar- 
 Martin barity of punishment. Martin 
 bishop of ■"'^s fir«i to the last. " As to 
 Rome, this wretched body," says he, 
 cruelly " the Lord will take care of 
 treated by it. He is at hand; why 
 
 • See Bower and Mosheira. 
 
 should I give myself any trou- Constans 
 ble ■? for I hope in his mercy, the lid; 
 that he will not prolono- my — '''^^ '^ 
 course/' He died in theVr rD."655. 
 055. His extreme sufferings 
 of imprisonment, hunger, fetters, brutal 
 treatment a thousand ways, call for com- 
 passion : his constancy demands respect; 
 and his firm adherence to the doctrines of 
 truth, though mixed with a very blame- 
 able ambition in maintaining the dignity 
 of the Roman See, deserves the admira- 
 tion of Christians. He is, in Romish 
 language, called St. Martin ; and I hope 
 he had a just title to the name in the best 
 sense of the word. 
 
 Maximus was also brought to Constan- 
 tinople, and, by the order of Constans, 
 underwent a number of examinations. 
 He was asked by an officer to sign the 
 type; — so the edict of Constance was 
 named. Only do this, said the officer, 
 believe what you please in your heart. 
 " It is not to the heart alone," replied 
 Maximus, " that God hath confined oiu 
 duty ; we are also obliged with the mouth 
 to confess Jesus Christ before men."* 
 It is astonishing! to observe what pains 
 were taken to engage him to own the 
 Monothelite party, nor can this be ac- 
 counted for in any other way than by the 
 opinion which all men had of his piety 
 and sincerity, and the expectation of tlie 
 influence which his example would have 
 on many. But the labour was lost: 
 Maximus, though seventy-five years old, 
 preserved all the vigour of understanding, 
 and confounded his examiners by the soli- 
 dity of his answers. He clearly proved, 
 " that to allow only one will or operation 
 in Jesus Christ, was in reality to allow 
 only one nature : that therefore the opinion 
 for which the emperor was so zealous, 
 was nothing more than Eutychianism 
 dressed up anew : that he had not so 
 properly condemned the emperor, as the 
 doctrine, by whomsoever it was held : 
 that it was contrary to the current of all 
 ecclesiastical antiquity : that our Saviour 
 was always allowed from the apostolical 
 times to be perfect God and perfect man, 
 and must therefore have the nature, 
 will, and operations dictinctly belong- 
 ing both to God and man : that tlie 
 new notion went to confound the idea 
 both of the Divinity and the humanity, 
 and to leave him no proper existence at 
 
 * See Builer, Vol. XII. 
 
 t Fleury, B. XXXIV. 12, &c. 
 
Cekt. VII.] 
 
 GENERAL HISTORY. 
 
 539 
 
 all : that the emperor was not a pastor, 
 and that it had never been practised by 
 Christian emperors, in the best times, to 
 impose silence on bishops : that it was 
 their duty not to disguise the truth by 
 ambiguous expressions, but to defend it 
 by clear and distinct terms adapted to 
 the sultjoct : that Arianism had always 
 endeavoured to support itself by such 
 artifices as those employed by the em- 
 peror, and that a peace obtained by such 
 methods in the Church was at the expense 
 of truth." I admire the good sense and 
 sincerity, which appear through the very 
 long account of his defence, of which I 
 have given a very brief summary. Were 
 it not, that God from age to age had 
 raised up such champions in his Church, 
 humanly speaking, not an atom of Chris- 
 tian truth by this time would have been 
 left in the world. For heretics have 
 uniformly acted on this plan ; viz. under 
 the pretence of the love of peace and union, 
 they have imposed silence on the ortho- 
 dox, whenever they had the power ; and 
 in the mean time propagated their own 
 tenets. The question before us was very 
 metaphysical and obscure ; yet, if the 
 emperor's side had prevailed, instead of 
 an insignificant party, called the Ma. 
 ronites, in the east, who still subsist, the 
 Monothelites might have filled half the 
 globe to this day. 
 
 The tyrant, enraged to find himself 
 disappointed, ordered Maximus to be 
 scourged, his tongue to be cut out, his 
 right hand to be cut off; and then direc- 
 ted the maimed abbot to be banished, and 
 doomed to imprisonment for the rest of 
 his life. The same punishment was 
 inflicted on two of his disciples, both of 
 the name of Anastasius. These three up- 
 right men were separated from each 
 other, and confined in three castles in ob- 
 scure retrions of the east. Their con- 
 demnation took place in 656 : 
 Barbarous Maximus died in 66'2 : one of 
 persecu- ^ Anastasius's in 66-1 : they 
 tions, 1,11 • 1 , -^ 
 
 by Con- "^'^'' h'^^ sustained the most 
 stans II. cruel indignities, and had 
 A D 656 been rendered incapable of 
 any consolations, except those 
 which undoubtedly belong to men who 
 suffer for righteousness sake. The other 
 Anastasius died in a castle at the foot of 
 Mount Caucasus in 666. 
 
 While such barbarous measures were 
 used by nominal Christians to support 
 unscriptural tenets, it is not to be won 
 dered at that Providence frowned on the 
 
 affairs of the empire. The Saracens now 
 
 ruled over Arabia, Persia, Mesopotamia, 
 
 Chaldea, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and 
 
 part of Africa. Even Europe suffered 
 
 from the depredations of the Arabians, 
 
 and part of Sicily was reduced to tlieir 
 
 subjection. 
 
 the unworthy emperor Constans 
 
 Constans murdered also his murders 
 
 own brother Theodosius, and hisbrother 
 
 continued to disgrace the Tl't-'odo- 
 
 Christian name by his fol- ,^'."^" ^' 
 
 lies, his vices, and his cruel- ""'^f^'f 
 .• TT L- li- J murdered, 
 
 ties. He was himself des- 
 
 patched at length in the ^- "■ ''^^• 
 
 twenty-seventh year of his reign, in 668. 
 
 In the year 680 a general council was 
 called at Constantinople: the emperor 
 Constantine ' Pogonatus presided : the 
 Monothelite heresy was ana- p ., , 
 thematized ; and its several Constin- 
 abettors were condemned, nople, 
 among whom was Honorius ^ y ggQ 
 a bishop of Rome. A certain 
 proof that infallibility was neither al- 
 lowed nor pretended to at that time by 
 the Italian prelate. For the legates of 
 Agathon, who was then bishop of Rome, 
 were at the council, nor do we find that 
 any opposition was made by them or their 
 master to the condemnation of Honorius.* 
 
 If we compare the East and the West, 
 during this century, we shall see a very 
 strikingdifferenee. In England true godli- 
 ness shone for a considerable part of it : 
 in France there was a good measure of 
 piety ; and from these two countries di- 
 vine truth made its way into Germany 
 and the north with glorious success. In 
 Italy, the Lombards were more and more 
 cleared of Arianism ; and though there 
 arose no bishop of Rome to be compared 
 at all to Gregory, yet, in point of theolo- 
 gical speculation, the purity of the faith 
 was preserved by them all, exce])t one. 
 And his condemnation, which we have 
 just seen, demonstrates that Antichrist 
 had not yet arrived at maturity. Infalli- 
 bility was not then thought of, as attached 
 to the person of the Roman prelate. His 
 power indeed was much too great ; so was 
 his pomp and influence. But it was the 
 same with the bishops of other great Sees : 
 and the bishop of Constantinople retains 
 the title of Universal Bishop to this day. 
 Nor had the bishop of Rome any temporal 
 
 * This was the Vltli general council held in 
 ihe 13th year of Constantine V. surnatned 
 Pogonatus, and the 3d year of Agathon. 
 
540 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 dominion, nor did he pretend to any. In 
 fine, the most decisive marks of Anti- 
 christ, idolatry and false doctrine, had not 
 yet appeared at Rome. Superstition and 
 vice Vfere lamentably on the increase in 
 the West, though a considerable degree 
 of true piety prevailed, and some gracious 
 effusions of the Spirit of God appeared. 
 
 In the East, the influences of divine 
 grace seem to have been withheld en- 
 tirely. Men had there filled up the 
 measure of their iniquities. Even from 
 Origen's days a decline of true doctrine, 
 and the spirit of sceptical philosophy, 
 ever hostile to that of grace, kept them 
 low in religion compared with their 
 western brethren. How precious must 
 the grace of the Gospel be, which, being 
 revived in Europe, in the time of Au- 
 gustine, ceased not to produce salutary 
 effects, and to extend true religion even 
 to the most savage nations ! Attempts 
 indeed to propagate, what they call 
 Christianity, were made in the East by 
 the Nestorians, who dwelt in Persia and 
 India, and by the Eutychians, who flour- 
 ished in Egypt. The former were parti 
 cularly successful in increasing their 
 numbers ; but I have nothing to produce 
 of real godliness as the result of the la- 
 bours of either party. Abyssinia, v^hich 
 from the days of Anthanasius, always 
 considered herself as a daughter of Alex- 
 andria, receives thence her pontiff to 
 this day : when Eutychianism prevailed 
 in Egypt, it did so of course in Abys- 
 sinia, and has been the prevalent form in 
 both countries, ever since the seventh 
 century. The Mahometan conquerers 
 reduced the ancient professors of ortho- 
 doxy into a state of extreme insigni- 
 ficancy ; and this was one of the scourges 
 of God by the Arabian imposture, namely, 
 that while the orthodox were crushed, 
 heretics were encouraged and protected 
 by those conquerors. Orthodox patri- 
 archs existed indeed in Egypt for some 
 time after the Saracen conquest: but 
 ignorance, superstition, and immorality, 
 still abounded, and have now continued 
 to abound for many centuries. The East, 
 whence the light first arose, has long sat 
 in darkness, with the exception of some 
 individuals from age to age, such as John 
 the Almoner, and a few others who have 
 been mentioned in this chapter. God 
 will have a church upon earth, and it 
 shall be carried to the most despised re- 
 gions, rather than extinguished entirely. 
 In these works of his providence there isl 
 
 a significant voice which speaks to Europe 
 in an awful tone. 
 
 Africa fell under the powers of the 
 Mahometans toward the close of this 
 century. It had long shared in the ge- 
 neral corruption, and it shared in the 
 general punishment. The region, which 
 has so often refreshed us with Evan- 
 gelical light and energy, where Cyprian 
 suffered, and where Augustine taught, 
 was consigned to Mahometan darkness, 
 and must henceforth be very nearly dis- 
 missed from these memoirs. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 AUTHORS OF THIS CENTURY.* 
 
 Isidore, of Sevil, flourished in the 
 former part of it: he governed the church 
 of Sevil for forty years, having succeeded 
 his brother Leander, of whom we have 
 made honourable mention already. This 
 writer was voluminous, and, with all due 
 allowance for the superstition of the age, 
 appears to have been : sincerely pious. 
 But perhaps the most useful part of his 
 works is his collection of sentences out 
 of Gregory. He seems to have been pro- 
 videntially given to Spain, in order to 
 preserve some of the ancient learning, 
 and to prevent men from sinking into total 
 ignorance and rusticity. 
 
 Columban must be mentioned also as 
 an author, though we have already cele- 
 brated him in the character in which he 
 shone far more, namely, of a missionary. 
 He was, no doubt, pious and fervent: he 
 wrote monastic rules, and while every 
 part of his writings is infected with the 
 servile genius of the times, and the spirit 
 of bondage, which had seized the Church, 
 one sentence retrieves his character, and 
 with it I shall dismiss him ; " We must 
 have recourse to Christ the fountain of 
 life." Sophronius of Jerusalem wrote a 
 synodal letter to confute the Monothelites. 
 His part in that controversy has been 
 stated already. He asserted, that we 
 shall rise with the same body, and that 
 the punishments of hell are eternal. The 
 most remarkable thing in him is the 
 soundness of his doctrine, which he 
 adorned with genuine piety and purity of 
 life. 
 
 Martin, bishop of Rome, whose suffer- 
 
 * Du Pin, Cent. VII. 
 
Cbjtt. VII.] 
 
 GENERAL HISTORY. 
 
 541 
 
 ings from the tyrant Constans have been 
 succinctly described, was one of the great- 
 est men of the age. Some of his letters 
 are extant, and they indicate both strength 
 of mind, and zeal in religion. Amandus, 
 bishop of Utrecht, in writing to him, de- 
 clared that he was so grieved to find 
 some clergymen to have lived lascivious- 
 ly after their ordination, that he was 
 tempted to quit his bishopric. Martin 
 dissuaded him; and at the same time ex- 
 horted him to exercise salutary discipline 
 on the offenders, declaring, that such 
 clergymen should be deposed entirely 
 from the sacerdotal function, that they 
 may repent in a private condition, and 
 may find mercy at the last day. He ex- 
 horts Amandus to undergo patiently all 
 trials for the salvation of the sheep, and 
 the service of God. This Roman prelate 
 
 doubtless was sincere, and he appears to 
 have defended evangelical truth with 
 much firmness. And it was for a branch 
 of scriptural doctrine that he suffered with 
 consistency and integrity. 
 
 I mention Maximus, his fellow-sufferer 
 in the same cause. His writings are too 
 scholastical to merit much attention, 
 though he was, doubtless, a very able 
 reasoner, and, what is infinitely better, a 
 pioQS and upright man. 
 
 I might swell the list, with the names 
 of writers little known, and of little use. 
 Learning was very low : the taste of the 
 age was barbarous : we have seen, how- 
 ever, that Christ had then a Church; and 
 the reader, if he pleases, may travel 
 through still darker scenes; yet I trust 
 some glimmerings of the presence of 
 Christ will appear. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 2 Z 
 
542 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY VIII. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 VENERABLE BEDE, THE ENGLISH PRES- 
 BVTER. 
 
 The Church-history of our Country, 
 written by this renowned father, was con- 
 tinued to the year 731. I have extracted 
 ■D 1 J- 1 from it that v/hich suited mv 
 
 I) 70- purpose. He is said to have 
 " ■ ■ •^^- died in 735. Of his age the 
 accounts are very contradictory. The 
 history of the Vlllth century will pro- 
 perly begin with a brief narrative of the 
 life and works of this Historian. 
 
 He was born near Durham, in a village 
 now called Farrow, near the mouth of the 
 Tyne. Losing both his parents at the 
 
 Born ^o® °^ seven years, he was, 
 
 , y. ' by the care of relations, placed 
 ""in the monastery of Were- 
 mouth, was there educated with much 
 strictness, and appears from his youth to 
 have been devoted to the service of God. 
 He was afterwards removed to the neigh- 
 bouring monastery of Jerrow, where he 
 ended his days. He was looked on as 
 the most learned man of his time. Prayer, 
 writing, and teaching, were his familiar 
 employments during his whole life.* He 
 was ordained deacon in ihe nineteenth, 
 and presbyter in the thirtieth, year of his 
 age. He gave himself wholly to the 
 study of the Scriptures, the instruction of 
 disciples, the oflices of public worship, 
 and the composition of religious and liter- 
 ary works. The life of such a person 
 can admit of little variety. It was not, 
 however, for want of opportunity that he 
 lived thus obscure. His character was 
 celebrated through the Western world: 
 the bishop of Rome invited him warmly 
 to the metropolis of the Church; but in 
 the eyes of Bede, the great world had no 
 charms. It does not appear that he ever 
 left England ; and, however infected with 
 the fashionable devotion to the Roman 
 See, he was evidently sincere and disin- 
 terested. 
 
 Constantly engaged in reading or writ- 
 ing, he made all his studies subservient 
 
 * Life of Bede, prefixed to his Works. Co- 
 logne edition. 
 
 to devotion. As he was sensible, that it 
 is by the grace of God, rather than by 
 natural faculties, that the most profitable 
 knowledge of the Scriptures is acquired, 
 he mixed prayer with his studies. He 
 never knew what it was to do nothing. 
 He wrote on all the branches of know- 
 ledge then cultivated in Europe. In 
 Greek and Hebrew he had a skill very 
 uncommon in that barbarous age; and, by 
 his instructions and example, he raised 
 up many scholars. Knowledge indeed in 
 those times was more familiar in the 
 British isles than in any part of Europe. 
 
 The catalogue of Bede's Avorks exhibits 
 the proofs of his amazing industry. His 
 Church-history is to us the most valua- 
 ble, because it is the only British monu- 
 ment of the Church which we have for 
 the seventh century. His expositions 
 and homilies, however, must in that 
 dearth of knowledge have been abundant- 
 ly useful. The ignorance of the times is 
 indeed but too visible in him ; and he fol- 
 lowed Augustine and other fathers so 
 closely, and collected so much from va- 
 rious authors, that his want of original 
 genius is more than problematical. Genu- 
 ine godliness, rather than taste and ge- 
 nius, appear on the face of his writings. 
 His labours in the sciences show a love 
 of learning; however inconsiderable his 
 acquisitions must appear, in comparison 
 with the attainments of the present age. 
 
 In his last sickness he was afflicted for 
 two weeks with a difficulty of breathing. 
 His mind was, however, serene and 
 cheerful, his affections were heavenly; 
 and amidst these infirmities he daily 
 taught his disciples. A great part of the 
 night was employed in prayer and thanks- 
 giving; and the first employment of the 
 morning was to ruminate on the Scrip- 
 tures, and to address his God in prayer. 
 " God scourgeth every son whom he re- 
 ceiveth," was frequently in his mouth. 
 
 Even amidst his bodily weakness he 
 was employed in writing two little trea- 
 tises. Perceiving his end to draw near, 
 he said, " If my Maker please, 
 I will go to him from the Accountof 
 flesh, who, when I was not, ^^Tiitde. 
 formed me out of nothing — 
 my soul desires to see Christ my king in 
 
Cext. VIII.] 
 
 VENERABLE BEDE. 
 
 543 
 
 his beauty." He santj glory to the 
 Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, 
 and expired with a sedateness, composure, 
 and devotion, which surprised all who 
 were present at this scene. 
 
 This is the account of his death by one 
 of his disciples ; and a very few quota- 
 tions from his expository writings will 
 show on wliat solid Gfrounds these re- 
 lisfious affections were founded. In ex- 
 pounding Acts ii. 28, " Thou hast made 
 known to me the ways of life; thou shalt 
 make me full of joj' with thy counte- 
 nance;" he says, "These things are not 
 only to be understood of our Lord, who 
 needed no other guide to overcome tlie 
 kingdom of death, but having received at 
 once the fulness of divine strength and 
 wisdom, was able to conquer death by 
 himself, rise ao-ain to life, and ascend to 
 his Father, but also of his elect, who, by 
 his gift, find the well of life, by which 
 they rise to the bliss which they lost in 
 Adam, and shall be filled with heavenly 
 joy. This shall be our perfect bliss, 
 when we shall see him face to face. 
 Philip knew this well, when he said, 
 ' Lord, show us the Father, and it suf- 
 ficeth us.' That pleasure of seeing the 
 face of God sufficeth : there shall be no- 
 thing more; nor is there a call for any- 
 thing more, when he is seen who is 
 above all."* 
 
 " Other innumerable methods of sav- 
 ing men being set aside, this was select- 
 ed by Infinite Wisdom, namely, that 
 w'thout any diminution of his divinity, 
 he assumed also humanity ; and in hu- 
 manity procured so much good to men. 
 that temporal death, thougrh not due from 
 him, was yet paid, to deliver them from 
 eternal death, which was due from them. 
 Such was the efficacy of that blood, that 
 the devil, who slew Christ by a tempo- 
 rary death which was not due, cannot 
 detain in eternal death any of those who 
 are clothed with Christ, though that eter- 
 nal death be due for their sins."| 
 
 Such were the Evangelical views, 
 which, in a night of superstition, burst 
 forth from the northern extremity of Eng- 
 land. But the doctrines revived by Au- 
 gustine flourished still in Europe in a 
 
 * Retractat on Acts of the Apostles. I can- 
 not prevail on myself to omit this passag:c, 
 though the expression of Philip he not so per- 
 tinent to the purpose of the author, as some 
 Other portions of Scripture might have been. 
 
 I On Rom. v. 
 
 good degree, though in no part more than 
 in the British isles. Indeed monastic 
 superstition grew among our fathers at 
 the same time excessively, and, in the 
 end, entirely corrupted the doctrines. 
 l?ut that was not yet the case : supersti- 
 tion itself, though deplorably childish 
 and absurd, was not incompatible with 
 sincerity and the fear of CJod. Tiie real 
 nature of the Gospel, and its practical 
 exercise in faith, humility, and true mor- 
 tification of sin, were understood and 
 felt by the Saxon presbyter, whose com- 
 ments on St. Paul's epistles are, in depth 
 of understanding and penetration into the 
 sacred sense, even with all the defects of 
 the times, greatly superior to several ad- 
 mired expositions of this, which calls 
 itself an enlightened age. 
 
 The seventh chapter to the Romans 
 maj' deser^'edly be called a touchstone of 
 spiritual understanding. Too many mo- 
 dern divines, by supposing that the Apos- 
 tle is only describing the conflict between 
 reason and passion, after the manner of 
 the ancient philosophers, have demon- 
 strated their own total ignorance of St. 
 Paul's argument. He only, who feels, 
 abhors, and sincerely struggles with in- 
 dwelling sin, who is conscious of its un- 
 utterable malignity, and is humbled under 
 this conviction, can understand the Apos- 
 tle aright, and prize the real grace of 
 God in Jesus Christ. Such was Bede : 
 the very best expositors in the most evan- 
 (jelical times do not much exceed him, in 
 clearness and solidity, in the exposition 
 of this chapter. I will not delay the 
 reader by quoting largely from his expli- 
 cation. Suffice it to give a hint or two. 
 He observes, from the Apostle, that the 
 desire of sinning itself is increased by 
 the prohibitions of the law, which tliere- 
 fore increases sin, without giving any 
 strength ; and the purport of this part of 
 the divine economy is, that men groaning 
 under the law might come to the Media- 
 tor. He strongly contends, that the 
 wretched carnal person, sold under sin, 
 in this chapter, was no personated cha- 
 racter, but Paul himself, and he confirms 
 this by observing, from the epistle to the 
 Philippians, that the Apostle confessed 
 " he was not perfect, and had not attain- 
 ed unto the resurrection of the dead ;" 
 and from another epistle, that he was 
 even buffeted by Satan, and had a thorn 
 in his flesh, lest he should be exalted 
 above measure. This inward warfare, 
 our author contends, must last through 
 
544 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 life. " In the resurrection, every thing," 
 says he, " shall be perfected. In the 
 mean time it is a great thing to keep the 
 field, and remain unconquered, though 
 not discharged from war." 
 
 But though he fully reached the scope 
 of Augustine, from whose labours he 
 profited abundantly, he seems never to 
 go beyond it. Indeed his expositions are 
 extracts and compilations from the fa- 
 thers, chiefly from Augustine. In this 
 sense they were his own, that he under- 
 stood and experienced their truth and 
 efficacy. But judgment and industry, 
 not genius and invention, were the talents 
 of this writer. Though the thought I 
 am going to mention is most probably 
 not his own, yet it gives so instructive a 
 view of the state of all mankind, ranked 
 in four classes, that I cannot prevail on 
 myself to withhold it from the reader. 
 Speaking of the conflict with in-dwelling 
 sin, described in Rom. vii. he observes, 
 " that there are those who fight not at all, 
 and are drawn away by their lusts ; 
 others who fight indeed, but are over- 
 come, because they fight without faith, 
 and in their own strength ; others who 
 fight, and are still in the field, not over- 
 come, which was the case with St. Paul 
 and all true Christians in this world ; and 
 lastly, others who have overcome, and 
 are at rest above." Bede, like Augus- 
 tine, allegorizes to excess, and is very 
 often desultory and vague in his com- 
 ments : his views of Solomon's Song are 
 solid, though in the explication too mi- 
 nute : still more faulty perhaps are his 
 expositions on the tabernacle and on So- 
 lomon's temple. His homilies, at the 
 time, must have been very edifying, not- 
 withstanding the puerile fancies with 
 Avhich they are discoloured. On the 
 whole I shall venture to observe, what, 
 hoAvever, no reader will be prepared to 
 receive, unless his mind has been sea- 
 soned with a degree of experimental re- 
 ligion, that the comments of Bede are 
 far more solid and judicious than those of 
 many modern, improperly called rational, 
 divines ; though in the former the errors 
 of fanciful allegory may abound, and in 
 the latter there may every where appear 
 an air of strict and accurate argumenta- 
 tion. The. reason is, because the former, 
 being possessed of the true meaning of 
 the Apostle on the whole, supports and 
 illustrates it throughout, though he fails 
 in detached passages, because of the de- 
 sultory ebullitions of a vicious taste, 
 
 which predominated in his time ; the lat- 
 ter with " semblance of worth, not sub- 
 stance," are accurate and just in many 
 particulars, but from their system of no- 
 tions, which is extremely opposite to that 
 of St. Paul, mislead their readers alto- 
 gether, in regard to the main drift of the 
 
 argument. 
 
 A year before our presbyter's death, he 
 wrote a letter to Egbert, archbishop of 
 York, which deserves to be immortalized, 
 for the solid sense which it exhibits, a 
 quality with which Bede was very emi- 
 nently endowed.* 
 
 " Above all things," says he, " avoid 
 useless discourse, and apply yourself to 
 the Holy Scriptures, especially the epis- 
 tles to Timothy and Titus ; to Gregory's 
 pastoral care, and his homilies on the 
 Gospel. — It is indecent for him, who is 
 dedicated to the service of the Church, 
 to give way to actions or discourse un- 
 suitable to his character. — Have always 
 those about you who may assist you in 
 temptation : be not like some bishops, 
 who delight to have those about them 
 who love good cheer, and divert them 
 with trifling and facetious conversation. 
 
 " Your diocese is too large to allow 
 you to go through the whole in one year; 
 therefore appoint presbyters, in each vil- 
 lage, to instruct and administer the sa- 
 craments ; and let them be studious, that 
 every one of them may learn, by heart, 
 the Creed and the Lord's prayer ; and 
 that if they do not understand Latin, they 
 may repeat them in their own tongue. I 
 have translated them into English, for 
 the benefit of ignorant presbyters. I am 
 told, that there are many villages in our 
 nation, in the mountainous parts, the in- 
 habitants of which have never seen a 
 bishop or a pastor ; and yet they are 
 obliged to pay their dues to the bishop. 
 
 " The best means to reform our Church, 
 is to increase the number of bishops. 
 Who sees not, how much more reasona- 
 ble it is for numbers to share this burden"? 
 Gregory therefore directed Augustine to 
 appoint twelve bishops to be under the 
 archbishop of York as their metropolitan. 
 I wish j^ou would fill up this number with 
 the assistance of the king of Northum- 
 berland."]" 
 
 * Bede's Works, Paris edit. p. 46. 
 
 •j- His name was Cedulph. Two years after 
 Bede's death, he gave up his crown, and lived 
 twenty-two years in a monastery. His mind 
 was most probably truly devout, though the 
 
Cest. VIII.] 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS. 
 
 545 
 
 " I know it is not easy to find an empty 
 place for the erection of a bishopric. 
 You may choose some monastery for the 
 purpose. In truth, there are many places 
 which liave the name of monasteries 
 without deserving it." — He goes on to 
 show how, for thirty years past, the 
 scandalous abuse of monasteries had pre- 
 vailed, and how useless many of them 
 were to church and state, as they pre- 
 served neither piety nor decency. He 
 directs Egbert to see that his flock be 
 instructed in Christian faith and practice, 
 and that they frequently attend the com- 
 munion. He finds fault with the exces- 
 sive multiplication of monks, and ex- 
 presses his fears, lest, in process of time, 
 the state should be destitute of soldiers 
 to repel an invasion. This last observa- 
 tion is of a piece with another at the close 
 of his history, that many Northumbrians 
 in his days, both nobles and private men, 
 employed themselves and their children 
 more in monastic vows than in the exer- 
 cise of arms. "What effect this will 
 have," says he, " the next generation 
 will bear witness." It is no common 
 instance of judgment in one who had al- 
 ways been a monk, to notice these evils.* 
 How they happened to be so very fash- 
 ionable in our island, it is not hard to ex- 
 plain. Our ancestors were, doubtless, 
 much indebted under God to the Roman 
 See. Christianity, before the missions 
 of Gregory, was very low in England. 
 A real spirit of godliness, the sincere 
 practice and true understanding of the 
 Gospel, had been, through the bishops 
 of Rome, introduced among barbarians. 
 Even the benefits thence resulting to so- 
 ciety must have been great. Gratitude 
 and affection would naturally lead our 
 ancestors, in those superstitious ages, to 
 monastic excesses. And if the evils of 
 which Bede complains, be strong proofs 
 of the superstitious taste, they are proofs 
 also of the spirit of piety which subsist- 
 ed among them. While Bede lived, in 
 no part of the world Avas godliness better 
 understood and practised tlian among our 
 ancestors. In a synod held by Cuthbert, 
 archbishop of Canterbury, about the 
 middle of this century, at Cloveshoo,| 
 
 spirit of the times led him into a degenerate 
 method of showing it. 
 
 * Even kings gave themselves up to retire- 
 ments of this kind ; and there want not in- 
 stances, among the Saxon princes, of pilgrim- 
 ages to Rome of a religious nature. 
 
 f Now Cliff, near Rochester. Warner. 
 3z2 
 
 there were twelve prelates, with Ethel- 
 bald, king of the Mercians. The canons 
 of this synod would have done honour to 
 the purest times, and they seem to have 
 been inspired by tho genius of Bede. 
 The clergy are directed to have fellow- 
 ship with one another, to serve God in 
 one spirit of faith, hope, and charity, to 
 pray for one another, to attend to tiie du- 
 ties of the Sabbath, and, in fine, the 
 same things are repeated, which are to 
 be found in Bede's letter to Egbert. 
 
 Let us not pride ourselves in a fancied 
 superiority to our forefathers : a vanity of 
 this sort seems to be the disease of the 
 present age ; — but men were not all with- 
 out understanding in those dark seasons. 
 — The indiscriminatiuff censures of Mos- 
 heim on whole centuries, seem to show 
 more contempt and ill-humour than dis- 
 cernment. Bede alone knew more of 
 true religion, both doctrinal and practical, 
 than numbers of ecclesiastics put together 
 at this day; which will clearly appear, 
 if we do but free him from superstitious 
 rubi)ish, and examine what he is inter- 
 nally. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS PARTICULARS. 
 
 A LITTLE after the beginning of this 
 
 centur}', Lambert, bishop of Maestricht, 
 was murdered. — He had succeeded The- 
 odard, under whom he had been educated, 
 and for forty years had adorned the Gos- 
 pel by a life of piety and charity. He 
 had been seven years deprived of his See, 
 amidst the civil confusions of France, 
 but had been re-established Lambert 
 about the year G81. This ,-Jstored 
 prelate had exerted himself ^ jj ^gj 
 with much zeal in his diocese, 
 and laboured with success in the conver- 
 sion of the Pao-ans, who were in his 
 neighbourhood. His patience as well as 
 his doctrine, had a salutary effect. It is 
 not, however, in the power of the wisest 
 and best of men to restrain the tempers 
 of their friends and relations. Two 
 brothers, Gallus and Riold, were intole- 
 rably violent in plundering the Church 
 of Maestricht, and infesting the neigh- 
 bourhood. Lambert's relations, particu- 
 larly two nephews, returned evil for evil, 
 and slew them, much against the will of 
 the bisliop. Doubtless, the brothers ought 
 
546 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 to have applied to the civil magistrate, 
 though justice was at that time very ill 
 administered in France. Dodo, a power- 
 ful baron of the neighbourhood, a relation 
 of the robbers, v*^as determined to revenge 
 their deaths upon the bishop himself; 
 and he attacked him with armed men at 
 Leodium* upon the Meuse. Lambert, 
 in his first agitation upon the news of 
 their approach, seized a sword, but re- 
 collecting himself, and lifting up his heart 
 to God in prayer, he laid aside the sword, 
 and composed himself to suffer. Tv/o 
 of his nephews began to make resistance. 
 " If you love me truly," said Lambert, 
 "love Jesus Christ also, and confess 
 your sins to him. As for me, it is time 
 for me to go to live with him." " Do 
 you not hear," said another nephew, 
 " how they call out to set fire to the house, 
 to burn us all alive?" Remember, re- 
 plied the bishop calmly, the guilt of the 
 murder is yours : submit and receive the 
 due recompense of your deeds. He con- 
 tinued in fervent prayer, and the armed 
 men put to the sword all whom they 
 found, and among the rest, Lambert him- 
 self. A man of a Christian spirit surely, 
 and worthy of a more enlightened age, in 
 which his humility, piety, and charity 
 might have shone with a brighter lustre I 
 
 Ceolfred, in the early part of this cen- 
 tury, governed the two monasteries of 
 "Weremouth and Jerrow, which had edu- 
 cated Bede. Througli his influence, the 
 Picts, who inhabited North Britain, were 
 brought over to the Roman mode of cele- 
 brating Easter, and of course to the Ro- 
 man communion.* But I can find no ac- 
 count of any progress in piety in the Bri- 
 tish isles. As the Roman church itself 
 grew more corrupt in this century, our 
 ancestors were infected with a larger por- 
 tion of its superstitions. 
 
 In the year 713, the Mahometans pass- 
 ed over from Africa into Spain, and put 
 an end to the Kingdom of the 
 Goths, which had lasted three 
 hundred years. The Christians were 
 there reduced to slavery ; and thus were 
 scourged those wicked professors of reli- 
 gion, who had long held the truth in un- 
 righteousness, called on the name of 
 Christ, while in works they denied him, 
 and buried his faith under an enormous 
 heap of superstitions. A remnant, how- 
 
 ever, preserved their independency in 
 the Austrian mountains, who chose Pe- 
 lagius, a person descended from the royal 
 family, for their king. He expressed his 
 hope, that after God had chastised them 
 for their sins, he would not give them up 
 wholly to the Mahometans. His confi- 
 dence in God was not disappointed. Un- 
 der circumstances extremely disadvanta- 
 geous, he defeated the enemy, repeopled 
 The cities, rebuilt the churches, and, by 
 the pious assistance of several pastors, 
 supported the Gospel in one district of 
 vSpain, while the greatest part of the 
 country was overrun by the Arabians. 
 But the successors of Pelagius, by de- 
 grees, recovered more cities from the 
 enemy. 
 
 Christendom at this time presented a 
 very grievous and mournful spectacle. 
 Idolatry itself was now spreading wide- 
 ly, both in Europe and in Asia, among 
 the professors of the Gospel:* men had 
 very commonly every where forsaken the 
 faith and the precepts of Jesus, in all 
 those countries which had been long 
 evangelized. The people, who served 
 the Lord in the greatest purity and since- 
 rity, seem to have been our ancestors,! 
 and the inhabitants of some other regions, 
 which had but lately received the Gospel. 
 So true is the observation, which our 
 history constantly gives us occasion to 
 make, namely, that there is a perpetual 
 tendency in human nature to degeneracy 
 and corruption. Such, however, was the 
 goodness of God, that he still exercised 
 much long suffering amidst the most pro- 
 voking enormities; and after he had 
 removed the candlestick from some 
 churches, he carried it to other places,:^: 
 so that the light of his Gospel was never 
 removed from the earth. The most mar- 
 vellous event in such cases is, that men 
 seem not at all conscious of their crimes, 
 nor perceive the avenging hand of God 
 
 A.D. 713. 
 
 * Now Liege. Fleurv, XLI. 16. 
 t Egbert, an Englishman, not long after, 
 tffeoted the same chansre amons: many of the 
 
 1 • w ' Q J 
 
 * This important event will be exiilained in 
 the next cliapler. 
 
 f Ireland, which Prideaux calls the prime 
 seat of learning in all Christendom, duiing the 
 reign of Cliarlemagne, was pecnliarly distin- 
 guished in this century. Usher has proved 
 tlie name of Scotia to have been appropi-iated 
 to Ireland at this time. Eginliard, the Secre- 
 tary of Charlemagne, calls Ireland Hibernia 
 Scotornm insula. Several of these Scots 
 (Irish) laboured in the vineyard in Charle- 
 magne's time, and were made bishops in Ger- 
 many. Holh sacred and pi'ofane learning 
 were taaght by them with success. 
 
 ^ This wiil'be illustrated in Cliap. lY. 
 
Ceitt. VIIL] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES, 
 
 547 
 
 Saracens 
 deft-att'd 
 by C.Mar- 
 tel, 
 
 A. D. 732. 
 
 upon them. For the nominal Christians 
 of the day were insensible of their condi- 
 tion ; and, though the Arabians were evi- 
 dently making large strides toward uni- 
 versal dominion, it was not till they had 
 advanced into the heart of France, and 
 ravaged that country in a dreadful man- 
 ner, Ihat any strong eflbrts were made to 
 withstand them. In the year 
 73-2, however, they were to- 
 tally defeated near Poictiers, 
 by the heroic Charles Martel. 
 An event memorable in histo- 
 ry, because by it the provi- 
 dence of God stopped the progress of the 
 Arabian locusts. It is astonishing, that 
 all the civilized nations had not long ago 
 united in a league, which would have 
 been equally just and prudent, to stem 
 the torrent which threatened the desola- 
 tion of mankind. Those who had, for 
 ages, trusted more in relics, altars, aus- 
 terities, pilgrimages, than in Christ cru- 
 cified, and had lived in deceit, avarice, 
 and uncleanness, were suffered to yield 
 themselves a prey to devouring invaders. 
 — Adored be that Providence, which, iu 
 the crisis, preserved Europe from com- 
 plete desolation, and, by saving France 
 from those barbarians, has still left a peo- 
 ple to serve God in these western re- 
 gions.* 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE 
 
 THE CONTROVERSY OX IMAGES. 
 MATURITY OF ANTICHRIST. 
 
 About the year 727, the Greek em- 
 peror began open hostility with the bishop 
 of Rome, and to use the words of tSigo- 
 nius,t Rome and the Roman 
 dukedom passed from the 
 Greek to the Roman bishop. 
 It would have been more ac- 
 curate to say, that a foundation was then 
 laid for the temporal power of that pre- 
 late, than that it was actually established. 
 
 Beginning 
 of tlie 
 Popedom. 
 
 * The plague of the locusts, Rev. ix. con- 
 tinued five months, that is, 150 years, a day 
 being reckoned for a year in in-nphetical lan- 
 guage. It may he difficult to reckon exactly 
 the time of the extension of the Arabian con- 
 quests, because of the inaccuracy and confu- 
 sion of the historians. i?ul divine truth was 
 exact, no douhl; and under every possihl 
 way of compulation, tlie jjcriod of about 
 years will properly limit the duration of 
 Saracen conquests. 
 
 f Sigon. Hist, de Regn. Italic, B. III. 
 
 150 
 the 
 
 However, as it was established a few 
 years after, and a rupture commenced at 
 the period just mentioned, I shall assume 
 this as the most proper date that I know 
 of, for the beginning of popedom, wiiich 
 from this time is to be regarded as Anti- 
 christ indeed ; for it set itself by temporal 
 power to support false doctrine, and par- 
 ticularly that, which deserves the name 
 of idolatry. 
 
 The marvellous propensity of all ages 
 to the sin of idolatry, which implies a de- 
 parture of the heart from the one living 
 and true God, must originate in some 
 steady principles existing in the nature of 
 fallen man. The true account of this ex- 
 traordinary and lamentable fact seems to 
 be as follows : — God is an immaterial, 
 self-existent Being, of infinite power and 
 goodness, and, as our ]Maker and Pre- 
 server, He has an unquestionable claim 
 to our supreme veneration and affectioo. 
 IMan, considered as a rational creature, is 
 endowed with faculties abundantly suffi- 
 cient for the discovery of this great and 
 perfect Being, so far as his own duties 
 and interests are concerned. This has 
 frequently been proved, by able moralists, 
 in the way of argument, and is expressly 
 affirmed to be the case by St. Paul, in the 
 first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, 
 where it is said, that " that which may 
 be known of God is manifest in them ; for 
 God hath shown it unto them. For the 
 invijiible things of Him from the creation 
 of the world, are clearly seen, being un- 
 derstood by the things that are made, 
 even his eternal power and Godhead ; — 
 so that they are without excuse." 
 
 In fact, however, fallen man has never, 
 by the mere use of his reason, found out 
 God to any good purpose, and worshipped 
 him accordingly; and even when God by 
 special revelation has condescended to 
 explain and manifest his true character to 
 a particular people, few of that people 
 have served him as they ought to have 
 done for any great length of time ; but 
 they soon corrupted tlie divine religion, 
 and were plunged iu idolatry. 
 
 Tlie Jehovah of the sacred writings, 
 and the Almighty and all-perfect God, 
 who may bo discovered by sound reason, 
 is an invisible ik'ing, and is to be honour- 
 ed, as a Spirit, with the heart, and the 
 understandinor, and without the interven- 
 tion of sensible objects, as stocks or 
 stones. " Thou shalt love the Lord thy 
 God with all thy heart, and with all thy 
 soul." But the history of our corrupted 
 
548 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH ; 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 nature shows, that images and other sen- 
 sible objects have, in all ages, offered 
 themselves to men's minds as guides and 
 helps to a conception of the Deity; and 
 if, in some instances, these absurd inven- 
 tions of gross idolatry have been rejected 
 by men of learning and refinement, it has 
 then generally happened, that intellectual 
 figments of philosophical vanity have 
 been substituted in their place, figments 
 still more atheistical in their nature, and 
 farther removed from the notion of a wise 
 and authoritative Governor of the Uni- 
 verse, who enjoins the submission and 
 dependence of his creatures, requires 
 their obedience, and dispenses justice 
 impartially. 
 
 The principles, which appear to ac- 
 count for this apostasy and opposition to 
 the divine Will, may be comprehended 
 under the terms pride, self-love, self- 
 righteousness, and desire of independ- 
 ence; or, indeed, under the single term 
 pride alone, if we use that expression ac- 
 cording to its most extensive application. 
 Fallen man is too proud, practically to 
 feel and confess his relative ignorance 
 and inanity, when compared with the Su- 
 preme Author of all things ; and the same 
 principle prevents him from placing his 
 supreme regard and esteem on God, 
 though reason dictates, and revelation 
 commands this duty. He loves himself 
 and his own gratifications too well. Then 
 it is easy to understand, that pride and 
 self-righteousness are nearly synonymous 
 expressions : a proud being will never 
 esteem his own "righteousness as filthy 
 rags," (Isaiah Ixiv. 6.) : will never cor- 
 dially beg for pardon of his sins : he has 
 too good an opinion of his own labours, 
 inventions, and performances ; in a word, 
 he is self-righteous; and, in a similar 
 way, it is plain, that the same being will 
 aim at independence, and be impatient of 
 control. In such a dangxrousand corrupt 
 state of human affections, the broad and 
 crowded road to idolatry, which is the 
 object we are seeking, is not difficult to 
 be traced. For, whether we consider 
 pride as a comprehensive principle, evolv- 
 ing itself, according to the explanation 
 just given, in various mischievous opera 
 tions ; or, whether we choose to confine 
 the meaning of the term, no one will 
 doubt, but that in fact, mankind in all 
 ages have been grievously wanting in hu 
 mility, have proudly set themselves up 
 against God, have been actuated by inor- 
 dinate self-love, and not submitting to 
 
 the righteousness of God, and impatient 
 of control, have endeavoured to establish 
 their own righteousness. The existence 
 of these principles and inclinations im- 
 plies an absolute departure of the heart 
 from the living God ; and when that has 
 once taken place through the action of 
 some steady cause, the progress to idola- 
 try, or to some species of atheism, nearly 
 allied to idolatry, is the next step. Man 
 has departed from the true God, and 
 there must be some device to quiet con- 
 science. Thus, in rude and barbarous 
 times, the proud, self-righteous devotee, 
 will naturally have recourse to the sottish 
 invention of the worship of wood, or 
 stone, or metals, and become a gross 
 idolater. He will burn part of the wood 
 with fire, and of the rest he will make a 
 god, and kneel before it. The discovery 
 mightily pleases him : he has found out a 
 god, exactly suited to his taste; a god, 
 who will easily pardon his vices, set a 
 high value on his imagined virtues, and 
 be constantly propitious to him; a god, 
 who is not a universal Governor or Bene- 
 factor, but who is particularly kind to 
 himself and his countrymen ; a god, whom 
 he can see and handle, and in whom he 
 may pride himself, as having contrived 
 and finished it with the tongs and ham- 
 mer, or with the plane and compass ; a 
 god, who is local and tutelar, and over 
 which he himself has considerable power: 
 he can place it in his temple, in his cham- 
 ber, or in the camp. 
 
 The ancient idolaters, by their images, 
 often represented deceased chiefs, or he- 
 roes, or kings, who were still supposed 
 to possess a superintending influence over 
 the affairs of men ; and, not unfrequently, 
 these departed beings appear to have 
 ranked among the most wicked of man- 
 kind. In more modern times, even Chris- 
 tianity itself has been disgraced with the 
 adoration of images, representations, and 
 relics of saints ; nor has the abominable 
 superstition always sufficiently taken 
 care, that the supposed saints themselves 
 should be reputable characters. 
 
 In ages of great learning and refine- 
 ment, the same principle of pride, which 
 in religious concerns, blinding the under- 
 standing and corrupting the affections, 
 effectually draws the heart from the liv- 
 ing and true God, induces men to profess 
 a reverence for abstruse and intellectual 
 figments, as nature, a principle of order, 
 or the soul of the universe. These notions 
 of God, which prevail in polished seasons 
 
Ceitt. VIII.] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES. 
 
 549 
 
 of the world, in one sense merit the im- 
 putation of idolatry, in another of atheism ; 
 and, in any possible interpretation, they 
 must be deemed equivocal, unintelliaible, 
 and pernicious. The species of idolatry 
 are exceedingly various; but they ditfer 
 not much either in their source or their 
 tendenc3^ In all circumstances, man is 
 miserable and blind, if he be not seeking 
 and worshipping the true God in spirit 
 and truth. If, in breach of the second 
 commandment, he represent the glory of 
 Jehovah by images, or if, in breach of the 
 first, he set up a divinity opposite to Je- 
 hovah, in both cases he forms a deceitful 
 basis for salvation and happiness, and di- 
 rectly affronts the perfections of God. 
 Such practices are, therefore, forbidden 
 throughout the Scripture, in the most 
 positive manner. 
 
 The guilt of idolatry, though no sin is 
 so much spoken against throughout the 
 Old Testament, is not so offensive to na- 
 tural conscience as that of crimes com- 
 mitted against our fellow-creatures. — 
 IMany persons are apt to wonder why the 
 Israelites were so prone to it; not con- 
 sidering nor knowing their own idolatry. 
 which works in a way more suited to 
 present times and circumstances. But 
 whoever understands, that idolatry im- 
 plies the departure of the heart from the 
 living God, and the fixing of it on some- 
 thing else; that to distrust his word, and 
 to put confidence in some sensible object, 
 by which we would represent him to our 
 minds, — still further, that to glory in our 
 own strength and righteousness, instead 
 of seeking salvation by grace through 
 faith only, proceeds from pride, and pours 
 all possible contempt on the Divine Ma- 
 jesty, will not wonder at God's indigna- 
 tion against this sin, will see how natural- 
 ly it operates on the human mind, and 
 how it affords a complete demonstration 
 of the apostasy of man. 
 
 The ancient Church of God were dis- 
 tinguished from the nations all around, 
 by the most express prohibition of this 
 sin. They were directed not to worship 
 any but the living God, nor even Jehovah 
 himself by any images whatever ; much 
 less were they allowed to worshij) any 
 creature by representations, which would 
 be to break the two first commandments 
 by the same act. He, who knows the 
 propensity of his own heart to distrust 
 the providence and grace of God, and 
 how eagerly we catch at any human re- 
 lief, instead of patiently waiting upon 
 
 God in trouble, will not wonder that the 
 Israelites worshipped the calf in the ab- 
 sence of Moses, nor think the sin small, 
 because they intended to honour Jehovah 
 by the symbol. 
 
 Under the Gospel dispensation the 
 prohibition of images continued, and, in 
 the purest times, there was little occasion 
 to dwell on the subject. God in Christ 
 was worshipped, in spirit and in truth, by 
 the primitive Christians: and while they 
 called on the Gentiles to turn from their 
 idols to the living God, idolatry itself, 
 in any of its forms, could scarcely find a 
 shadow of admission into the Christian 
 Church. 
 
 For, while men's hearts were filled 
 with peace and joy in believing, while 
 the doctrines of justification and regene- 
 ration were precious and all-important in 
 their eyes, and they lived by the faith of 
 Jesus, saw his glory, and felt in their 
 souls the transformino- power of his orrace, 
 the deceiUul aids of idolatry had no 
 ciiarms. It was not till the knowledge 
 of the Gospel itself was darkened and 
 adulterated, that the miserable spirits of 
 men had recourse to such vain refuges, 
 and that the mind, no longer under the 
 influence of the Holy Spirit, betook itself 
 to the arts of sculpture and painting, in 
 order to inflame its affections, and to 
 kindle a false fire of devotion. Christians 
 then worshipped the true God with the 
 understanding, and whoever was con- 
 verted to the faith, ceased from idolatry. 
 And, as we have seen. Christian empe- 
 rors, particularly Theodosius, destroyed 
 image-worship in their dominions. Gri- 
 gen, in his treatise against Celsus, ob- 
 serves, that it is not possible that any, by 
 worshipping images, should attain the 
 knowledge of God. Athanasius and 
 Lactantius* strongly inculcate the same 
 truth. Toward the end of the fourth cen- 
 tury, some approach toward this evil ap- 
 peared in the Church. Epiphanius, bishop 
 of Cyprus, observes,! that he found a 
 linen-cloth hanfring on the church-door 
 
 * III tlie three Homilies of the Cliurch of 
 England, against Peril of Idolatry, the con- 
 troversy is handled with much solidity and 
 historical inlbrniation. I have made some use 
 of tliem for my purpose. It seems proper 
 that every Protestant, Divine should acquaint 
 himself with the fundamentals of the contro- 
 versy, and be able satisfactorily to convince 
 himself, that popery is not, what it pretends 
 to be, founded on the precedents of Christian 
 antiquit)-. 
 
 t See Vol. U. p. 93. 
 
550 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 images 
 pervert 
 
 Augus- 
 tine's 
 judgment 
 respecting; 
 the use of 
 
 painted, and having in it the image of 
 Christ, or some saint. " Observing this," 
 says lie, " so contrary to the authority of 
 the Scriptures, I tore the cloth." The 
 famous Jerom published, in Latin, an 
 epistle of Epiphanius concerning this 
 subject, and added his own testimony on 
 the point. So evident is it, that at that 
 time images were absolutely prohibited 
 in the Church of Christ. 
 Augustine also gave his opinion against 
 " They are of more force to 
 the soul than to instruct it." 
 And "when images are once 
 placed in temples, and had in 
 honour, error creepeth in." 
 Men, however, who had been 
 lately turned from idols, be- 
 images. gan at length to paint or 
 
 carve images of Christ, the 
 Virgin Mary, and the Apostles. Jerom 
 observes, that the errors of images passed 
 to the Christians from the Gentiles ; and 
 Eusebius the historian, says, that images 
 of Peter and Paul, and of our Saviour 
 himself, were made in his time, which 
 he took " to be a heathenish custom." 
 They were not, however, worshipped, 
 nor publicly set up in churches. Pauli- 
 nus, who died bishop of Nola 
 in the year 431, caused the 
 walls of a temple to be 
 painted with stories taken 
 from the Old Testament, that 
 the people might thence re- 
 ceive instruction : the written word was 
 neglected, and these poor substitutes 
 were placed in its room. A strong sign 
 of the growing ignorance ! As the igno- 
 rance increased, these historical paintings 
 and images increased also. Serenus, 
 bishop of Marseilles, because of the 
 danger of idolatry, brake to pieces the 
 images then set up in the churches. I 
 have already noticed the imprudent con- 
 cession made by Gregory, bishop of 
 Rome, on this occasion, to the growing 
 superstition. Thus, six hundred years 
 after Christ, images had begun to appear 
 in churches, but still without idolatry. 
 The authority of Gregory, however, had 
 evil consequences : the spirit of idolatry 
 grew stronger, as real spiritual know- 
 ledge decayed ; and men having now, in 
 a great measure, lost the divine way of 
 applying to God through Christ, by faith, 
 for the relief of their consciences, became 
 still more prone to rely on idols. So 
 closely connected is the doctrine of justi- 
 fication with the purity of worship. In 
 
 this respect the Roman* church advanced 
 in corruption more rapidly that the 
 Eastern. And Grecian emperors em- 
 ployed themselves in destroying images, 
 and pictures, while in Italy they were 
 held in idolatrous admiration. The evil, 
 in truth, became incurable, because there 
 was no clear and effectual knowledge of 
 the Gospel, that might dissipate the 
 clouds of error. Yet were men's opinions 
 divided both in the east and the west ; 
 and, at length, the crisis arose, when the 
 Christian world was formally broken into 
 two parties on this question. 
 
 We are now advanced to the year 727, 
 when Leo, the Isaurian, the Greek empe- 
 ror,! began openly to oppose the worship 
 of images, and produced the 
 rupture with the Roman See, 
 before mentioned. — A Syrian, 
 born of Christian parents, 
 named Beser, who had been 
 taken by the Mahometans, 
 and afterwards returned to 
 the Romans, had imbibed an opinion of 
 the unlawfulness of the practice, having, 
 very probably, observed the advantage 
 which it had given to the infidels. He was 
 great favour with the emperor, and 
 
 Death of 
 Panlinns, 
 bishop of 
 Nola, 
 
 A. D. 431. 
 
 The Em- 
 peror op- 
 poses the 
 worsliip of 
 Images, 
 
 A. U. 727. 
 
 ui 
 
 convinced him by his arguments, that 
 image worship was idolatrous. But the 
 most eminent defender of the purity of 
 divine worship in this point, and whom 
 Fleury therefore, in his popish zeal, calls 
 the author of the heresy,:!: was Constan- 
 tine, bishop of Nacolia in Phrygia. 
 Convinced in his judgment, and zealous 
 to propagate what appeared to him to be 
 right, Leo assembled the people, and with 
 llie frankness and sincerity, which mark 
 his character, publicly avowed his con- 
 viction of the idolatry of the growing 
 practice, and declared that images ought 
 not to be erected for adoration. Such a 
 declaration in the sixth century would 
 have raised no ferment in Christendom; 
 but idolatry had been gradually advancing 
 as the simplicity and purity of Christian 
 taith had decayed. Men of no religious 
 solicitude naturally conformed them- 
 selves to the habits of the times : persons 
 who had some concern for the soul had 
 been so long trammelled in a variety of 
 superstitions for the relief of conscience, 
 
 * I say the Roman ; for in other parts of 
 the West, we shall see, that some opposition 
 was made to idolatry. 
 
 t He is surnamed Iconoraachus. He died of 
 a severe cholic, in 741. 
 
 I Fleury, B. XLII. 1. Vol. V. 
 
Cent. VIIT.] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES. 
 
 551 
 
 and the true relief of Chiist's atonement! ing;* and since the decease 
 was so little understood and relished, that of Gregorj' I. I have for the 
 
 Pope of 
 Rome. 
 
 the emperor was evidently in the minority 
 through the Christian world. As yet no 
 synods had given a sanction to image- 
 worship. Precedents of antiquity were 
 entirely against it. The word of God, 
 which oufflit to have influenced the minds 
 of men infinitely more than either, was in 
 full opposition to the practice : but so 
 deeply had error prevailed ; so con- 
 venient did wicked men find it to com- 
 mute for the indulgence of their crimes, 
 by a zealous attachment to the idolatrous 
 externals ; and so little was the Scripture 
 then read or studied, that the subjects of 
 Leo murmured against hira, as a tyrant 
 and a persecutor. Even Germanus, the 
 bishop of Constantinople, with equal zeal 
 and ignorance, asserted that images had 
 always been used in the Church, and de 
 
 most part been silent concerning the Ro- 
 man bishops, because very little of god- 
 liness appeared amontj them. The most 
 honourable part of their conduct related 
 to the encouragement of missions and the 
 propagation of the Gospel among the 
 Gentiles; in which, many who were ac- 
 tuated by the same spirit as those who 
 had been sent by Gregory I. were suc- 
 cessful in their provinces ; and pure re- 
 ligion, in the fundamentals, at least, was 
 extended into distant regions, while Rome 
 and Italy grew more and more corrupt. 
 The open avowal, however, of idolatry, 
 was reserved for Gregory II. and from 
 this time I look on the bishops of Rome 
 as Antichrist. 
 
 Rebellion trod on the heels of idolatry. 
 Greece and its neighbouring islands 
 
 clared his determination to oppose the opposed the emperor, and set up an 
 emperor at all events. It is not necessary 
 to give a detail of the paltry evasions 
 
 and frivolous arguments, with which he 
 endeavoured to support the idolatry. De- 
 sirous, however, of strengthening himself 
 against the emperor, he wrote to the bi- 
 shop of Rome, who warmly supported 
 the same cause, and by reasonings of the 
 same nature. Never was a more instruc- 
 tive lesson given to pastors, to teach the 
 word of God in simplicity and faith- 
 fulness. Conscience will be disquieted 
 at times in men not altogether given up 
 to a reprobate mind ; and, if peace by 
 Jesus Christ, througrh faith alone, be not 
 steadfastly preached, men distressed for 
 their sins will flee to idolatry with all 
 their might, which will give them a false 
 peace, and confirm them in sinful prac- 
 tices. By the knowledge of Christ cru- 
 cified alone can we be brought to a sound 
 peace of conscience, and be constrained 
 effectually to serve God and our neigh 
 hour in love. We have often, in the 
 course of this history, seen this connection 
 of sound doctrine and holy practice, and 
 we are now stating the reverse of the 
 picture. Nor can the spirit and principles 
 of those Christians, w-ho supported divine 
 truth in the world, be so clearly under- 
 stood without some knowledge of the 
 real grounds of popery. 
 
 He who filled the Roman See at this 
 time was Gregory the second, whom for 
 his open defence and support af idolatry, 
 I shall venture to call the first Pope of 
 Rome. Many superstitions 
 The first and abuses had been grow- 
 
 * One will deserve to be specified, as it 
 marks the decline from Evangelical purity c' 
 doctrine. It was not until the days of this 
 Gregory, that church-yards had a beginning. 
 The dead had been usually iiiterred near the 
 highways, according to the Roman laws, and 
 Christian congiegatioiis had followed the prac^ 
 tice ; at least, they had burial places remote 
 from the city. But, in Gregory's time, thfr 
 priests and monks began to offer prayers foi 
 the deceased, and received gifts from the rela 
 lions for the performance of these services ; 
 on which account these ecclesiastics requested 
 leave of Gregory, that the dead might be in- 
 terred near the'places of tlie monks' aljode, 
 or in tlie churches or monasteries, that the 
 relations might have a better opportunity of 
 joining in the funei-al devotions. Cuthbert, 
 arciibishop of Canterliury, introduced the cus- 
 tom into England in 750; hence the origin of 
 CHUuiu-TAitns in this island used as burial 
 '■•louiuls. Tiie practice itself is certainly in- 
 nocent ; though its first origin was extremely 
 superstitious. The attentive reader; will judge 
 hence of tiie progress of the doctrine of pur- 
 ;>-atory, and the "avarice of the ecclesiastics 
 connected with it ; above all, of men's depar- 
 ture from the article of justification ; w hich, 
 if it had remained in any degree of purity in 
 the Church, would have effectually excluded 
 these abominations. See Newcorabe's Hist, 
 of the Abbey of St. Albans, p. 109. While 
 men rested in Christ, and dared to behold 
 lliemselves complete in him, they had no temp- 
 tation to apply to the false refuge of prayers 
 for the <le])arted. In the article of death they 
 committeil their souls and bodies to their Sa- 
 viour. That hope of glory being lost, they 
 stiu^jgled, in vain, through life, with doubts 
 and I'ears.and departing in uncertainty, left to 
 the charity of friends to help out their sup- 
 posed defect of merit, and " found no end in 
 wandering mazes lost." 
 
552 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 usurper; so infatuated were men with 
 image-worship. But the rebels were 
 routed ; and the usurper was taken and 
 beheaded. 
 
 Leo, called also Leo IIL has been so 
 blackened by contemporary writers, that 
 it is not easy to form a just idea of his 
 character. The same observation may, 
 for similar reasons, be extended to his son 
 and successor. All that can be advanced 
 with certainty is, that his cause was just, 
 and his zeal sincere, though his temper 
 was too warm. He might be a pious 
 Christian; there is doubtless no proof to 
 the contrary. He not only condemned 
 the worshipping of images, but also re- 
 jected relics and the intercession of saints. 
 But there lived none at that time capable 
 of doing justice to the holiness of his mo- 
 tives, if indeed, as there is reason to hope, 
 they were holy. 
 
 In the year 730 he published an edict 
 
 against images, and after having in vain 
 
 endeavoured to bring over Germanus to 
 
 his views, he deposed him, 
 
 Leosedict ^^^ gg^ up Anastasius in his 
 
 Infa"es room, who supported the em- 
 
 A. D. 730. peror. There was a porch in 
 the palace of Constantinople, 
 in which was an image of Christ on the 
 cross. Leo, who saw that it had been 
 made an engine of idolatry, sent an officer 
 to pull it down. Some women, who 
 were there, intreatcd that it might be 
 spared, but in vain. The officer mounted 
 a ladder and struck three blows with a 
 hatchet on the face of the figure, when 
 the women threw him down by pulling 
 away the ladder, and murdered him on 
 the spot:* however, the image was pull- 
 ed down and burnt, and a plain cross was 
 set up in its room ; for Leo only objected 
 to the erection of a human figure. The 
 women afterwards insulted Anastasius, as 
 having profaned holy things. Leo put 
 several persons to death, who had been 
 concerned in the murder, and, such was 
 
 * This first instance of idolatrous zeal which 
 occnrs in Ciiristendom, shows tiiat the woi-- 
 shippers of images naturally connect the idea 
 of sanctity with the wood or stone, and there- 
 fore the charge of literally worshipping in- 
 animate matter, which the vScri[)tures make 
 against pagan idolaters, is just when applied 
 to popish idolaters. By an induction from 
 particulars, it were easy to prove, tliat the 
 cases are similar, and, that futile distinctions 
 and evasions may equally be applied to both, 
 to cover and soften what cannot be vindicated 
 in either. 
 
 the triumph of idolatry, that the murder- 
 ers are honoured as martyrs, by the 
 Greek Church, to this day ! More blood 
 was spilt on the occasion, partly through 
 the vehemence of the emperor, and partly 
 through the obstinacy of the idolaters. 
 
 The news flew to Rome, where the 
 same rage for idolatry prevailed, and the 
 emperor's statues were pulled down and 
 trodden under foot. Italy was thrown 
 into confusion. Serious attempts were 
 made to elect another emperor : and the 
 pope encouraged these attempts. He also 
 prohibited the Italians from paying tribute 
 to Leo any longer, say the Greek writers, 
 and some of the partizans of the Roman 
 See, while the French writers represent 
 him as endeavouring to quell the rebel- 
 lion. It is difficult to give a fair state- 
 ment of Gregory's conduct oir this occa- 
 sion; certain it is, that his obstinate de- 
 fence of idolatry actually fomented the 
 rebellion, and in the end, established the 
 temporal power of his successors on the 
 ruins of the imperial authority.* His 
 conduct was indirectly rebellious, if it 
 was not directly so; for he wrote to 
 Anastasius, that if he did not return to 
 the catholic faith, he should be deprived 
 of his dignity.| Gregory must have 
 known, that this was, in effect, to oppose 
 the emperor himself. This was one of the 
 last acts of the Roman prelate. He was 
 succeeded by Gregory III. who wrote to 
 the emperor in these arrogant terms : 
 " Because you are unlearned and igno- 
 rant, we are obliged to write to you rude 
 discourses, but full of sense and the word 
 of God. We conjure you to quit your 
 pride, and hear us with humility. — You 
 say that we adore stones, walls, and 
 boards. It is not so, my lord ; but those 
 syiubols make us recollect the persons 
 whose names they bear, and exalt our 
 grovelling minds. We do not look upon 
 them as gods ; — but if it be the iiuage of 
 Jesus, we say, "Lord, help us." If it 
 be the image of his mother, we say, 
 " Pray to your Son to save us." If it be 
 of a martyr, we say, " St. Stephen, pray 
 for us.":j: — We might, as having the 
 
 * See Mosheim, Cent. VIII. C. III. 
 
 t Fleury, C. XLII. 7. 
 
 I From these specimens the reader may 
 judge whether the pope or the emperor was 
 better acquainted with the Scripture. A pa- 
 gan philosopher would have defended gentile 
 idolatry much in the same manner ; and the 
 dependence, which both the pagan and the 
 
cest. vm.] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES. 
 
 653 
 
 Leo ex- 
 communi- 
 cated by 
 the Pope, 
 A. D. 732. 
 
 power of St. Peter, pronounce punish- 
 ments against you ; but as you have pro- 
 nounced the curse upon yourself, let it 
 stick to you. — You write to us to as- 
 semble a general council ; of which 
 there is no need. Do you cease to per- 
 secute images, and all will be quid. — 
 We fear not your threats; for if we go 
 a league from Rome, toward Campania, 
 we are secure." — Certainly this is the 
 language of Antichrist supporting idola- 
 try by pretences to infallibility, and de- 
 spising both civil magistrates and eccle- 
 siastical councils. 
 
 I cannot do justice to Leo because we 
 have not his answers to the pope. But 
 perhaps the language of Gre- 
 gory will enable the reader 
 for himself to vindicate the 
 emperor. It is not to be won- 
 dered at, that Leo refused to 
 have any further intercourse 
 with the Roman prelate. In 732, Gre- 
 gory, in a council, excommunicated all, 
 who should remove or speak contemptu- 
 ously of images. And Italy being now 
 in a state of rebellion, Leo fitted out a 
 fleet, which he sent thither; but it was 
 wrecked in the Adriatic. He continued, 
 however, to enforce his edict against 
 images in the east, while the patrons of 
 the fashionable idolatry supported it by 
 various sophisms. In all his conduct 
 Gregory now acted like a temporal prince: 
 he supported a rebellious duke against 
 Luitprand, king of the Lombards, his 
 master, and fearing the vengeance of the 
 latter, he applied to Charles Martel, 
 mayor of the palace in France,* offering 
 to withdraAv his obedience from the em- 
 peror, and give the consulship of Rome 
 
 Cli. Mar- 
 tel, Gre- 
 gory III. 
 and Leo, 
 die in the 
 same year, 
 
 A. D. -4L 
 
 papist place on the image, demonstrates, that 
 they imagine the power of the saint or demon 
 to be intimately connected with the image, 
 ■which represents, as it were, the body, of 
 •which the object of tlieir worship is the soul, 
 so justly do the Scriptures describe iilolaters 
 as literally worshipping the works of their 
 own hands, and the man of sin as worshipping 
 demons. (1 Tim. iv.) Sophistry may evade, 
 but it cannot confute. ^V'hen men cease to 
 hold the Head and to be satisfied willi Christ 
 as their all, they fall into these or similar 
 errors. The heart, which feels not the want 
 of the living God, as its proper nutriment, 
 will feed on the ashes of idolati'v. 
 
 * This is lie who had sto|)i)ed tlie progress 
 of the Saracen arms. Mayor of the palace, 
 was the tille of the prime minister in France, 
 who during the reigns of a succession of weak 
 princes, governed with sovereign power. 
 
 Vol. I. 3 A 
 
 to Charles, if he would take him under 
 his protection.* Charles, however, by 
 his wars with the Saracens, was prevent- 
 ed from complying with the pope's re- 
 quest. But he left his power and ambi- 
 tious views to his son and 
 successor Pepin. Charles, 
 Gregory, and Leo, all died 
 in the same year 741, and 
 left to their successors the 
 management of their res- 
 pective views and conten- 
 tions. 
 
 Constantine VI. surnamed Coprony- 
 mus, mherited his father Leo's zeal 
 against images: and, as both the east 
 and the west were precipitating them- 
 selves into idolatry, hence neither of these 
 princes have met with a fair and impar- 
 tial historian.-)- Meanwhile the Arabians 
 persecuted the Christians with unrelent- 
 ing barbarity in the East, while the real 
 Church of God was desolated on all sides, 
 and suffered equally from enemies with- 
 out and within her pale. Zachary was the 
 next pope after Gregory III. an aspiring 
 politician, who fomented discord among 
 the Lombards, and, by his intrigues, ob- 
 tained from their king Luitprand an ad- 
 dition to the patrimony of the Church. 
 The Roman prelates had ceased to wor- 
 ship God in spirit and in truth, and were 
 now become mere secular princes. 
 
 Zachary showed how well he merited 
 the title of a temporal governor. He had 
 the address to preserve still a nominal 
 subjection to the Greek emperor, while 
 he seized all the power of the Roman 
 dukedom for himself, and looked out for a 
 protector both against his lawful sove- 
 reign and against the Lombards. This 
 was Pepin, the son and successor of 
 Charles Martel in France, who sent a 
 case of conscience to be resolved by the 
 pope, namely, whether it would be just 
 in himself to depose his sovereign Chil- 
 deric III. and to reign in his 
 room 1:1^ Zachary was not 
 ashamed to answer in the af- 
 firmative: Pepin then threw 
 his master into a monastery. 
 
 Pope 
 
 Zachary 
 
 dies, 
 
 A. U. 752. 
 
 * This shows that the charg.- of rebellion 
 against the emperor is not unjustly made 
 against this pope. 
 
 + Tiieophanes relates some ridiculous things 
 of Copronymus, whici\ only jtrove the strength 
 of his own prejudices, p. 346. And Fleury 
 follows him as his guide. 
 
 I Fleury, XLIII. I. calls him a weak and 
 contemptible prince. So the French kings 
 
554 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH : 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 holds a 
 council of 
 338 bish- 
 
 and assumed the title of king. Zachary 
 died soon after, viz. in the year 752. 
 
 The Greek emperor was unable to cope 
 with the subtilty of the pope and the vio- 
 lence of the Lombards. Ravenna, the 
 capital of his dominions in Italy, was 
 taken by king Astulphus, vcho had suc- 
 ceeded Rachis, the successor of Luitprand. 
 This government, called the Exarchate, 
 had continued in Italy about a hundred 
 and fourscore years. Stephen, the suc- 
 cessor of Zachary, finding the superior 
 strength of the Lombards, now solicited 
 the aid of Constantine, who was too much 
 employed in the East, to send 
 Constan- any forces into Italy. In the 
 tine VII. year 754, the emperor held a 
 council of 338 bishops, to de- 
 cide the controversy concern- 
 ops, ing images. They express 
 A. b.754. themselves not improperly on 
 the nature of the heresy.* 
 , " Jesus Christ," say they, " haih delivered 
 us from idolatry, and hath taught us to 
 adore him in spirit and in truth. But the 
 devil not being able to endure the beauty 
 of the Church, hath insensibly brought 
 back idolatry under the appearance of 
 Christianity, persuading men to worship 
 the creature, and to take for God a work, 
 to which they give the name of Jesus 
 Christ." 
 
 Reinforced by the decrees of this coun- 
 cil against image-worship, Constantine 
 burnt the images, and demolished the 
 walls, which were painted with repre- 
 sentations of Christ or the saints; and 
 seemed determined to exterminate all the 
 vestiges of idolatry. In the mean time, 
 in Italy, Stephen, pressed by the victo- 
 rious arms of Astulphus, applied himself 
 to Pepin, and wrote to all the French 
 dukes, exhorting them to succour St. 
 Peter, and promising them the remission 
 of their sins, a hundred fold in this world, 
 and in the world to come life everlasting. 
 So rapidly advanced the popedom ! A 
 letter now was brought to the pope from 
 the emjieror, ordering him to go to Astul- 
 phus, and demand the restitution of Ra- 
 venna. Superstition was every where so 
 strong, that there was no danger incurred 
 
 by such a step ; and the weakness of the 
 emperor, and the distraction of his affairs, 
 allowed him not to give any other sort of 
 succour to Italy. Stephen sent to the 
 king of the Lombards, to demand a pass. 
 This was granted, and he set out from 
 Rome, to go to Astulphus. A short time 
 before he undertook this journey, messen- 
 gers had arrived to him from Pepin, en- 
 couraging him to go along with them 
 into France. Stephen arrived at Pavia, 
 the capital of Lombardy, and after an 
 ineffectual interview with the king, went 
 into France, where Pepin treated him 
 with all possible respect, and promised 
 to undertake an expedition into Italy to 
 relieve the Roman See. Stephen anoint- 
 ed with oil the king of the Franks ; and, 
 by the authority of St. Peter, forbad the 
 French lords, on pain of excommunica- 
 tion, to choose a king of another race. 
 
 Thus did these two ambitious men 
 support one another in their schemes of 
 rapacity and injustice. In the pope the 
 evil was aggravated by the pretence of 
 religion.* "It is you," says Stephen, 
 "whom God hath chosen for this pur- 
 pose by his prescience from all eternity. 
 For whom he hath predestinated, them 
 he also called ; and, whom he called, 
 them he also justified." It must be own- 
 ed, that Stephen was fitter to conduct a 
 negotiation, than to expound a text. 
 
 Pepin attacked Astulphus so vigor- 
 ously, that, in the end, he obliged him to 
 deliver the Exarchate, that is Ravenna, 
 and twenty-one cities besides, to the pope. 
 Constantine, alarmed at the danger of his 
 dominions, in Italy, sent an embassy to 
 king Pepin, to press him to deliver the 
 Exarchate to its rightful sovereign : but 
 in vain. In the issue, ihe pope became 
 the proprietor of Ravenna and its depen- 
 dencies, and added rapacity to his re- 
 bellion. 
 
 From this time he not only assumed 
 the tone of infallibility and spiritual do- 
 minion, but became literally a temporal 
 
 had been for some time. But Gregory I. 
 ■would have told Pepin, that the weakness of 
 the sovereign's faculties gave the servant no 
 right to usurp the master's authority. Gre- 
 gory feared God : whereas idolatry iiad h;u'il- 
 ened the hearts of these popes, and left tiiem 
 no law but tlieir own insatiable ambition. 
 * rieury, XUII. 7. 
 
 * Fleury, a much better divine than Ste- 
 phen, is struck with the absurdity of the allu- 
 sion, XLlll. 15. If I am somewhat more 
 secular in this narration tiian in general, the 
 importance of the subject, which is nothing 
 less than the establishment of the papal power, 
 and the vindication of faithful witnesses, who 
 from ago to age protested against it, may 
 afford a sufficient apology. Popery once es- 
 tablished, I siiall not so minutely attend her 
 steps, but seek the children of God, wherever 
 they are to be found. 
 
Cent. YIII.] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES. 
 
 555 
 
 prince. On the death of Astulphus, Dc- 
 siderius, duke of Tuscany, in order to 
 obtain the succession, promised vStephen, 
 to deliver to him some other cities, which 
 the Lombards had taken from the empe- 
 ror. Stephen embraced the ofler with- 
 out hesitation, assisted Desiderius in liis 
 views, and obtained for the popedom the 
 duchy of Ferrara, and two other fortress- 
 es. The injured emperor, in the mean 
 time, continued to exterminate idolatry 
 in the East; but, whether his motives 
 were pious or not, our ignorance of his 
 private character will not suffer us to as- 
 certain. The ambitious and 
 successful Stephen held the 
 popedom five years, and died 
 in 757. His successor Paul, 
 even before his appointment 
 to that dignity, had taken care to cultivate 
 the friendship and secure the protection 
 of Pepin. The maritime parts of Italy 
 still obeyed the emperor, and these, to- 
 gether with the Lombards, threatened the 
 
 Death of 
 Pope Ste- 
 phen III. 
 A.D.757. 
 
 pope, 
 
 from time to time ; whence he was 
 
 induced to write frequently to the king of 
 France for assistance.* 
 
 Constantine forbad every where the 
 addressing of prayers to the Virgin Mary, 
 or to other saints, and discountenanced 
 the monks through his dominions. He is 
 said to have treated the worshippers of 
 images with great barbarity, and to have 
 been profane and vicious in his own prac- 
 tice. But such censures were the natural 
 and obvious effect of his conduct. 
 
 In the year 768 died Pepin, the great sup- 
 porter of the popedom. Its grandeur was, 
 however, not yet arrived at 
 maturity. Adrian, who was 
 elected pope in 772, was not 
 inferior to his predecessors in 
 the arts of ambitious intrigue. 
 He received the homage of 
 Rieti and Spoleto, towns of 
 Lombardy, and allowed them 
 to choose a duke among themselves. 
 Partly by these means, and still more by 
 the powerful alliance of Charles, the son 
 and successor of Pepin, commonly called 
 Charlemagne, for his great exploits, he 
 strengthened himself against tha hostili- 
 ties of king Desiderius. He received 
 from the French king a confirmation of 
 Pepin's donative of the Exarchate, with 
 some considerable additions of territory. 
 
 Death of 
 Pepin, 
 
 A.D. 768. 
 
 Adrian I. 
 
 elected 
 
 pope, 
 
 A. D. 772. 
 
 * It is remarkable, that Fleury blames this 
 pope for representing his secular affairs as if 
 they were spiritual. 31. 
 
 The friendship of ambitious men is ce- 
 mented bj' views of interest. This was 
 exactly the case of Charles and Adrian. 
 In a superstitious age, the king derived 
 from the sacred character of the ])0]w the 
 most substantial addition to his reputa- 
 tion, and was enabled to expel Deside- 
 rius entirely from his dominions. In the 
 year 774, he assumed the 
 title of king of France and ^]!^J^^l' 
 Lombardy. The last king of assumes 
 the Lombards was sent into a tlu- liile of 
 monastery in France, where king; of 
 he ended" his days. In the France 
 next year, the emperor Con- ^",, . "*' 
 stantine died, after having vi- ^("ij '774 
 gorously opposed image-wor- 
 siiip all his reign. At the same time also 
 died the Mahometan Caliph Almansor, 
 the founder of Bagdad, which from that 
 time l)ecame the residence of the Saracen 
 monarchs ; whose empire then bega.ii {n 
 carry more tho appearance of a regular 
 government, and ceased to be so trouble- 
 some to the remains of the old Roman 
 empire, as it had formerly been. 
 
 Leo, the son and successor of Constan- 
 tine, trode in the steps of his father and 
 grandfather, and exercised severities on 
 the supporters of image-wor- 
 ship. 13ut, as he died in the Jr:^" ^^* 
 year 780,* his wife Irene as- j^ y --gQ 
 sumed the government in the 
 name of her son Constantine, who was 
 only ten years old. She openly and zea- 
 lously supported idolatry. The East was 
 so eagerly addicted to it, that there want- 
 ed only the authority of a sovereign to 
 render it triumphant. Images gained the 
 ascendancy ; and the monastic life, which 
 either the piety or the prudence of three 
 emperors, — for I cannot ascertain their 
 real character, — had much discouraged, 
 became again victorious in Greece and 
 Asia.| 
 
 In 784 Irene wrote to Adrian, desiring 
 his presence at a council to I)c held for 
 the support of image-worship ; at least 
 that he would send legates to it. Tara- 
 sius, bishop of Constantinople, just ap- 
 pointed, and perfectly harmonizing with 
 
 * Fleurr, XLIV. 10. 
 
 + If the plan, on which I have chosen to 
 write a Cliurcli-history, need liie authority of 
 any writer to support it, the words of Fleury 
 are very decisive, R. XLIV. 17. "The tem- 
 poral affairs of the Church, nay, of the Roman 
 Church, do not belong to an ecclesiastical 
 history." 
 
550 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 the views of the empress, wrote to the 
 same purport. Adrian's answer is wor- 
 thy of a pope. He expresses his joy 
 at the prospect of the establishment of 
 irnag-e-worship ; and, at the same time, 
 testifies his displeasure at the presump- 
 tion of Tarasius, in calling himself uni- 
 versal patriarch : he demands the resto- 
 ration of St. Peter's patrimony, which, 
 during- the schism, the emperors of Con- 
 stantinople had withheld; and sets be- 
 fore the empress the munificent pattern 
 of Charlemagne, who had given to tlic 
 Roman Church, to be enjoyed for ever, 
 provinces, cities, and castles, once in the 
 possession of the Lombards, but which of 
 right belonged to St. Peter. Ambition 
 and avarice were thus covered with the 
 thin veil of superstition. But this was 
 the age of clerical usurpations. Large 
 domains were now commonly annexed, 
 by superstitious princes, to the Church, 
 for the pardon of theif sins ; but the pope 
 was the greatest gainer by this traffic. 
 That, which is most to our purpose to 
 observe, is the awful departure, which 
 had commonly been made, throughout 
 Christendom, from the all-important arti- 
 cle of justification. While this is firmly 
 believed and reverenced, it is impossible 
 for men to think of commuting for tlicir 
 offences with Heaven; and it is itself the 
 surest defence against clerical encroach- 
 ments, superstition, idolatry and hypo- 
 crisy. But the pulpits were silent on 
 this doctrine : during this whole century 
 false religion grew without any check or 
 molestation ; and vices, both in public 
 and private life, increased in proportion. 
 
 In the year 787 the second council of 
 
 Nice was held under the empress : and 
 
 of such a council it is sufficient to say, 
 
 that it confirmed idolatrous 
 
 Irene calls worship.* Pope Adrian, hav- 
 a Council • ' . , ', ' , 
 
 at Nice ^"S' received the acts of the 
 A. D. 787. council, sent them to Charle- 
 magne, that he might procure 
 the approbation of the bishops of the 
 West. But here his expectations were 
 disappointed. United in politics by the 
 coincidence of interested views, they were 
 however found to disagree in religious 
 sentiments. Charlemagne, though illite- 
 rate himself, was one of the greatest pa- 
 trons of learning : and, if he may be sup- 
 posed to have been in earnest in any 
 
 * This was the seventh General Council ; 
 and the second of Nice. It besjan in Septem- 
 ber 787. ' 
 
 opinions, he would naturally be much 
 influenced by the famous Alcuin, an Eng- 
 lishman, whom he cherished and esteem- 
 ed. The customs and habits of the West 
 were far from universally favouring the 
 reigning idolatry. I am anxiously look- 
 ing for the features of the Church of 
 Christ in this very gloomy period, and I 
 conjecture that her existence was most 
 probably to be found in the Churches 
 lately planted, or, in those, which were 
 then in an infant state. Our own island 
 was decidedly, at that time, hostile to 
 idolatry. The British Churches execrat- 
 ed the second council of Nice;* and 
 some even of the Italian bishops protested 
 against the growing evil. Nor is it pro- 
 bable, that the churches of Germany, 
 now forming, were ar all disposed to re- 
 ceive it. Men, who first receive Chris- 
 tianity from zealous teachers, are simple 
 and sincere ; nor is it easy to convince an 
 ingenuous person, that idolatry, however 
 qualified or explained, is allowable on 
 the plan of the Scriptures, either of the 
 Old or New Testament. France itself 
 had, as yet, shown no disposition posi- 
 tively in favour of idolatry. The Roman 
 See, alone, in Europe, had in form sup- 
 ported and defended it. And experience 
 proves, that the greatest stages of dege- 
 neracy are to be found in the Churches 
 which have subsisted the longest. 
 
 Charlemagne could not but be struck 
 at the discordancy of the Nicene council 
 with the habits of the West; and was 
 therefore so far from receiving, with im- 
 plicit faith, the recommendation of it by 
 pope .Adrian, that he ordered the bishops, 
 of the West to examine the merits of the 
 question. The issue was, the publica- 
 tion of the Carolin books, in which the 
 famous Alcuin had at least a distinguish- 
 ed share. In these the authors find fault 
 with a former synod held in Greece, un- 
 der ConstanUne, which forbad the use of 
 images. For they held the dangerous opi- 
 nion of Gregory 1st, namely, that these 
 might be set up in churches, and serve 
 as books for the instruction of the people. 
 But they condemn, in very free terms, 
 the late Grecian synod, which enjoined 
 the worship of images. They find fault 
 with the flattering addresses made by the 
 Greek bishops to pope Adrian. They 
 
 * Hoveden Annal. pars prior, p. 232. Usher, 
 Annals, pp. 19, 20. 'i'he former of these wri- 
 ters tells us, that Alcuin composed the Caro- 
 lin books. 
 
Cext. VIII.] 
 
 CONTROVERSY ON IMAGES. 
 
 557 
 
 allow the primacy of St. Peter's See, but 
 are far from founding their faith on the 
 pope's decrees. They condemn the wor- 
 ship of images by scriptural arguments, 
 by no means impertinent or contemptible. 
 These, however, need not be repeated on 
 the present occasion.* 
 
 Engilbert, the ambassador of Charles, 
 presented these books to Adrian. This 
 ambitious politician, who subsisted by 
 the protection of Charlemagne, and who 
 was concerned to maintain the honour of 
 his See, replied with great prudence. It 
 is evident, from his whole conduct, that 
 his object was the temporal interests of the 
 popedom. Hence his answer to Charles 
 was tame and insipid, and his defence of 
 image-worship weak and inconclusive.f 
 Charles and the French Churches perse- 
 vered in their own middle practice : they 
 used images, but they abhorred the ado- 
 ration of them. In the year 
 A synod -94^ ^^ Frankfort upon the 
 V ' \r f Maine, a synod was held, con- 
 A. D. 794. sisting of 300 bishops, who 
 condemned the second council 
 of Nice, and the worship of images. In 
 this synod, Paulinus, bishop of Aquileia, 
 in Italy, bore some share. All his life, 
 however, Adrian continued on good terms 
 rj., with Charlemagne. He died 
 
 795 t'ermi- ^^ ^^^ course of the next year, 
 nated the ^^i was succeeded by Leo III. 
 life and the Political intrigue, and secular 
 popedom artifice, not theological study, 
 of Adrian -^yj^g i\iqxi the practice of Ro- 
 man bishops. The Irish, at 
 this time, particularly excelled in divi- 
 nity, travelled through various countries, 
 and became renowned for their learning ; 
 and the superior light, exhibited by Eng- 
 land and France, in the controversy of 
 images, seems to prove that these coun- 
 tries, in their knowledge of Scripture, and 
 also in their regard for its doctrines, far 
 exceeded Rome. Yet so strongly were 
 men prejudiced in favour of the dignity 
 of the Roman See, that it still remained 
 in the height of its power, and was en- 
 abled in process of time to communicate 
 its idolatrous abominations through Eu- 
 rope. In the East the worship of images 
 was triumphant, but as yet not universal.^: 
 
 • See Du Pin, Councils of 8th century. 
 
 t This is allowed by Du Pin. Councils of 
 8th century. 
 
 ^ Irene, toward the close of this century, 
 viz. about the year 797, dethroned her son 
 Constantine, and put out his eyes with such 
 3 a2 
 
 This chapter contains the narrative of 
 the most fatal events which the Church 
 had ever seen. The Arian heresy had 
 disfigured and deeply wounded her con- 
 stitution, but she had recovered, and con- 
 founded this adversarj'. The Pelagian 
 poison had operated for a time ; but its 
 detection and expulsion had even contri- 
 buted to recover her health, and to restore 
 her to a great degree of apostolical pu- 
 rity. Other heresies, which affected the 
 doctrine of the Trinity, had been success- 
 fully opposed : superstition, for a number 
 of centuries, had sullied her beauty, but 
 had left' her vitals untouched. Idolatry, 
 at length, aided by the same superstitious 
 propensity, prevailed to disunite her from 
 Christ, her living head. The reigning 
 powers, both in the east and the west, 
 were overgrown with false worship : even 
 those parts of the west, which as yet 
 were not disposed to receive idolatry, 
 were deeply prepared for the ro,,,.un. 
 gradual admission of it, partly (ions of 
 by the growing superstition, Christ's 
 and partly by the submission religion 
 of all the E uropean Churches had begua 
 to the domination of the Ro- *° ^^Tor' 
 man See. There the seat of • ■ - • 
 Antichrist was firmly fixed. Rebellion 
 against the lawful power of the magis- 
 trate, the most arrogant claims to infalli- 
 bility, and the support of image-worship, 
 conspired with the temporal dominion 
 lately obtaine.i by the bishop of Rome, 
 to render him the tyrant of the Church. 
 His dominions, indeed, were not large ; 
 but, in conjunction with the proud pre- 
 tensions of his ecclesiastical character 
 they gave him a superlative dignity in the 
 eyes of all Europe. It \\as evident that 
 the face of the whole Church was alter- 
 ed : from the year 727, to about the year 
 2000, we have the dominion of the 
 Beast ;f and the prophesying of the wit- 
 nesses in sackcloth, which was to conti- 
 nue 1260 days, or forty and two months, 
 that is, for 1260 years. We must now 
 look for the real Church, either in dis- 
 tinct individual saints, who, in the midst of 
 popery, were preserved by effectual grace 
 in vital union with the Son of God, or, in 
 
 violence, that he lost his life. This monster, 
 a worthy patroness of idolatry, then reigned 
 alone, and co-operated with the pope of Rome, 
 in the support of Satan's kingdom. She was 
 deposed and banished by Nicephorus, A. D, 
 802. 
 t Rev. xi. and xiii. 
 
558 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 associations of true Christians, formed 
 in different regions, which were in a 
 state of persecution and much aiiiiction. 
 Where then was the Cliurch in the eighth 
 century 1 She still subsisted ; and the 
 opposition made to idolatry by Charles 
 and the council of Frankfort, demon- 
 strates her existence. Nothing but the 
 influence of principles very opposite to 
 those which were fashionable at Rome, 
 can account for such events, at a time 
 when the dignity of the Roman See was 
 held in universal veneration. After all, 
 it is in the propagation of the Gospel 
 among the Pagans, that the real Church 
 is chiefly to be seen in this century. 
 Some real work of this kind was carry- 
 ing on, while the popedom was forming ; 
 and, by the adorable Providence of God, 
 pious missionaries, who entered not into 
 the recent controversies, but were engaged 
 in actions purely spiritual, were patron- 
 ized and supported in preaching Christ 
 among foreign nations by the same popes 
 of Rome, who were opposing his grace 
 in their own.* Their ambition led them 
 to cherish the zeal of the missionaries, 
 but with how diiferent a spirit ! To this 
 scene let us now direct our attention. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL IN 
 THIS CENTURY, INCLUDING THE LIFE 
 OF BONIFACE, ARCHBISHOP OF MENTZ. 
 
 WiLLiBROD,f with other English mis- 
 sionaries, continued to labour with suc- 
 cess in the conversion of the Frisons. 
 His episcopal seat was, as we have 
 seen,:J: at Utrecht; for fifty years he 
 preached, founded churches and monas- 
 teries, and appointed new bishops. The 
 
 * Should any persons startle that I call 
 itnage-worship b3' no better name tlian idola- 
 try, and rank pagan and papal practices in the 
 same class, I would refer such to the censure 
 of St. Paul on the Galatians iv. 8, 9. Idolatry 
 being with them merely mental, originated in 
 a self-righteous principle, and the Apostle 
 looks on theiTi as worshippers of false gods, 
 and informs them that they were returning 
 jigain to bondage. How much more justly 
 ipiay image-worship be called " tlje doing ser- 
 vice to them which by nature are no gods," 
 vhere the idolatry is both mental and ex- 
 ternal I 
 
 t Fleiiry, fifth Vol. XLI. 1. 
 
 ^ See page 533 of this volutme.. 
 
 consequence of his labours was, that ^ 
 orreat numbers of Pagans were received 
 within the pale of the Church. 
 
 The* great light of Germany in this 
 century was an Englishman named Win- 
 frid, born at Kirton in Devonshire, about 
 the year 680. He was brought up in the 
 monastic life from infancy. His resi- 
 dence was in the monastery of Nutcell, 
 in the diocese of Winchester, which was 
 afterwards destroyed by the Danes, and 
 was never rebuilt. Here he became ac- 
 quainted with the sacred and secular 
 learning of the times. At the age of 30, 
 he was ordained priest, on the recom- 
 mendation of his abbot, and laboured 
 with much zeal in preaching the word of 
 God. His spirit was ardent, and he 
 longed to be employed as a mission- 
 ary, in the conversion of Pagans. The 
 example of a nimiber of pious persons of 
 his own country might, no doubt, have 
 great influence with him ; for we have 
 seen already, that the zeal of spreading 
 the Gospel was peculiarly strong in the 
 British isles. He went over -iv-.-.f..;,! 
 with two monks into r rieze- ^p English 
 land about the year 716. He Mission- 
 proceeded to Utrecht, " to ary, 
 WATER, where Willibrod had a. D. 716. 
 planted;" but finding that 
 circumstances rendered it impracticable 
 at present to preach the Gospel there, he 
 returned into England with his compan- 
 ions, to his monastery. 
 
 On the death of the abbot of Nutcell, 
 the society would have elected Winfrid 
 in his room ; but the monk, steady to his 
 purpose, refused to accept the Presidency ; 
 and, with recommendatory letters from 
 the bishop of Winchester, went to Rome, 
 and presented himself to the pope, ex- 
 pressing a desire of being employed in 
 the conversion of infidels. Gregory H. 
 encouraged his zeal, and gave him a 
 commission of the most ample and unli- 
 mited nature in the year 719. 
 
 With this commission Winfrid went 
 into Bavaria and Thuringia. In the first 
 country he reformed the Churches, in the 
 second he was successful in the con- 
 version of infidels. Here also he ob- 
 served, how true religion, where it had 
 been planted, was almost destroyed by 
 false teachers : some pastors, indeed, 
 were zealous for the service of God, but 
 others were given up to scandalous vices : 
 
 * Fleury, XLI. 35, &c. Albaa Sutler, 
 Vol. 6. 
 
Cent. VIIL] 
 
 PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 559 
 
 the English missionary belield their state, 
 and the ill effects of it on the people with 
 sorrow ; and he laboured with all his 
 might, to recover them to true repentance. 
 It was with sincere delight that he 
 afterwards learned that the door, which 
 had been shut against his first attempts 
 in Friezeland, was now opened for 
 preaching the Gospel in that countrj'. 
 Rat-bod, king of the Prisons, who had 
 planted idolatry afresh among his sub- 
 jects, w'as dead, and the obstacles were 
 removed. Winfrid returned into Frieze- 
 land, and for three years co-operated with 
 Willibrod. The pale of the Church was 
 hence enlarged ; churches were erected ; 
 many received the word of God ; and 
 idolatry was more and more subdued. 
 
 Willibrod, declining in strength through 
 old age, chose Winfrid for his successor. 
 I have before observed, that the duration 
 of his pastoral labours, in his mission, 
 was no less than fifty years. The ex- 
 ample of this great and holy j)erson had 
 long before this stirred up others to la- 
 bour in the best of causes. Soon after 
 that he, with eleven companions in 090, 
 had began to preach the Gospel in 
 Friezeland, two brothers of 
 the English nation went over 
 into the country of the an- 
 cient Saxons, in order to 
 preach to the idolaters. They 
 were both called Ewald. 
 They arrived in this country about the 
 year C94, and meeting with a certain 
 steward, desired him to conduct them to 
 his lord. They were employed all the 
 way in prayer, in singing psalms and 
 hymns. The barbarians fearing lest 
 these men might draw their lord over to 
 Christianity, murdered both the brothers ; 
 and thus, toward the close of the fore- 
 going century, it pleased God to take to 
 himself two persons who had devoted 
 themselves to preach the Gospel of his 
 Son among the heathen. The time of 
 the more peculiar visitation of Germany 
 was reserved for the age which we are 
 now reviewing. 
 
 It must have been extremely delightful 
 to Willibrod, to have met with a coad- 
 jutor so zealous and sincere as Winfrid. 
 However, the latter declined the offer, 
 because the pope had enjoined him to 
 preach in the eastern parts of Germany ; 
 and he felt himself bound to perform his 
 promise. It is not possible, indeed, to 
 conceive such a man as Gregory to have 
 had any other views, than those of secu- 
 
 Two otiier 
 
 Mission- 
 aries, 
 
 A. D. 694. 
 
 lar ambition in exacting this promise 
 from Winfrid. But it seems also equally 
 apparent, that the motives of the latter 
 were holy and spiritual. Willibrod ac- 
 ([ulesced in Winfrid's desires, and dis- 
 missed him with his blessing. The 
 younger missionary departed immedi- 
 ately, and came into Hesse, to a place 
 called Omcnbourg, belonging to two 
 brothers, who w^ere nominal Christians, 
 but practical idolaters. Winfrid's labours 
 were successful, both on them and their 
 subjects : and, throughout Hesse, or at 
 least a very great part of it, even to the 
 confines of Saxony, he erected the stan- 
 dard of truth, and upheld it with much 
 zeal, to the confusion of the kingdom of 
 Satan. It ouglit not, however, to be con- 
 cealed, that Winfrid suffered great hard- 
 ships in a country so poor and unculti- 
 vated as the greater part of Germany 
 then was ; that he supported himself at 
 times by the labour of iiis hands, and was 
 exposed to imminent peril from the 
 rage of the obstinate Pagans. 
 
 After some time he returned to Rome, 
 was kindly received by Gregory II. and 
 was consecrated bishop of the new Ger- 
 man Churches, by the name of Boniface. 
 There seems, even in that little circum- 
 stance, something of the policy of the 
 Roman See. A Roman name was more 
 likely to procure from the German con- 
 verts respect to the pope, than an English 
 one. Gregory, moreover, solicitous to 
 preserve his dignity, exacted from the 
 new bishop an oath of subjection to the 
 papal authority, conceived in the strongest 
 terms ; a circumstance, remarkably pro- 
 ving both the ambition of Gregorj' and the 
 superstition of the times. Boniface armed 
 with letters from the pope, and what was 
 far better, encouraged by the addition of 
 fresh labourers from England, returned 
 to the scenes of his mission. Coming 
 into Hesse, he confirmed, by imposition 
 of hands, several* who had already been 
 baptized, and exerted himself with much 
 zeal against the idolatrous superstitions 
 of the Germans. An oak of prodigious 
 size had been an_in?.;trument of much 
 Pagan delusion : his sincerest converts 
 advised liini to cut it town; and he fol- 
 lowed their counsel. It ought to be ob- 
 served, that the famous Charles IVIartel 
 protected him with his civil authority; 
 for ihe tlominion of the French extended 
 a considerable way into Germany. It 
 
 • Fleury, B. XLI. 44, &c. 
 
560 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 The ad- 
 vice of 
 Boniface, 
 
 A. D. 723. 
 
 does not appear, however, that Boniface 
 made any other use of this circumstance, 
 than what the most conscientious eccle- 
 siastic may do, wherever the Christian 
 religion is established by the laws. 
 
 Daniel, bishop of Winchester, about 
 the year 723, wrote to Boniface con- 
 cerning the best method of dealing with 
 idolaters. " Do not contra- 
 dict," says he, " in a direct 
 manner their accounts of the 
 genealogy of their gods ; al- 
 low that they were born from 
 one another in the same way as mankind 
 are ; this concession will give you the 
 advantage of proving that there was a 
 time when they had no existence. — Ask 
 them who governed the world before the 
 birth of their gods — ask them, if these 
 gods have ceased to propagate. If they 
 have not, show them the consequence ; 
 namely, that the gods must be infinite in 
 number, and that no man can rationally 
 be at ease in worshipping any of them, 
 lest he should, by that means, offend one, 
 who is more powerful. — Argue thus with 
 them, not in the way of insult, but with 
 temper and moderation ; and take oppor- 
 tunities to contrast these absurdities with 
 the Christian doctrine ; let the Pagans be 
 rather ashamed than incensed by your 
 oblique mode of stating these subjects. — 
 Show them the insufhciency of their plea 
 of antiquity ; inform them that idolatry 
 did anciently prevail over the world, but 
 that Jesus Christ was manifested, in order 
 to reconcile men to God by his grace." 
 Piety and good sense appear to have pre- 
 dominated in these instructions, and we 
 have here proofs, in addition to those 
 already given, of the grace of God confer- 
 red on our ancestors during the heptarchy. 
 Boniface preserved a correspondence 
 with other friends in England, as well as 
 with Daniel. From his native country he 
 was supplied also, as we have seen, with 
 fellow-labourers. In Thuringia he con- 
 firmed the churches, delivered them from 
 heresies, and false brethren, and the work 
 still prospered in his hand. 
 
 In the mean time, like all upright and 
 conscientious men, he found himself often 
 involved in difficulties, and doubted in 
 what manner he should regulate his con- 
 duct in regard to scandalous priests, who 
 greatly obstructed his mission. He laid 
 his doubts before his old friend the bishop 
 of Winchester.* Should he avoid all 
 
 * Bonit. Ep. 3. Fleury, B. XLI. toward 
 the end. 
 
 communication with them, he might of- 
 fend the court of France, without whose 
 civil protection he could not proceed in 
 his mission. Should he preserve con- 
 nexion with them, he was afraid of 
 bringing guilt upon his conscience. Da- 
 niel advises him to endure, with patience, 
 what he could not amend : he counsels 
 him not to make a schism in the Church, 
 under pretence of purging it; and, at the 
 same time, exhorts him to exercise 
 church-discipline on notorious offenders. 
 
 Boniface desired Daniel also to send 
 him the book of the prophets, "which," 
 says he, " the abbot Winbert, formerly 
 my master, left at his death, written in 
 very distinct characters. A greater con- 
 solation in my old age I cannot receive ; 
 for I can find no book like it in this coun- 
 try; and, as my sight grows weak, I 
 cannot easily distinguish the small letters, 
 which are joined close together in the sa- 
 cred volumes which are at present in my 
 possession." Do these things seem to 
 belong to the character of an ambitious 
 and insidious ecclesiastic, or to that of 
 a simple and upright servant of Jesus 
 Christ? 
 
 The reputation of this Saint, — such I 
 shall venture to call him, from the evi- 
 dence of facts, — was spread through the 
 greatest part of Europe ; and many from 
 England poured into Germany to connect 
 themselves with him. These dispersed 
 themselves in the country, and preach- 
 ed in the villages of Hesse and Thu- 
 ringia. 
 
 In 732, Boniface received the title of 
 Archbishop,* from Gregory III. who 
 supported his mission with the same spi- 
 rit, with which Gregory II. 
 had done. Encouraged by a Boniface 
 letter sent to him from Rome, 
 he proceeded to erect new 
 churches, and to extend the 
 profession of the Gospel. At A. D. 732. 
 this time, he found the Bava- 
 rian churches disturbed by an heretic 
 called Eremvolf, who would have se- 
 duced the people into idolatry. Boniface 
 condemned-him according to the canons, 
 freed the country from his devices, and 
 restored the discipline of the Church. 
 
 About the year 732, Burchard and 
 Lullus were invited from England by 
 Boniface, who made the former bishop of 
 Wurtzburg, where Kilian had preached, 
 
 made an 
 archbish- 
 op, 
 
 * Boniface was the first archbishop of 
 Mentz. 
 
Cext. VIII.] 
 
 BONIFACE. 
 
 561 
 
 Curious 
 letter of 
 Boniface 
 to the 
 archbish- 
 op of 
 Canter- 
 bury. 
 
 Visits 
 Rome, 
 
 A. D. 738 
 
 and suffered martyrdom, about fifty years 
 before. He was abundantly successful 
 during- the labours of ten years, by which 
 his strentrth was exhausted : he gave up 
 his bishopric in 752, and died soon after. 
 Butler, Vol. X. 
 
 Some time after, Boniface w'rote to 
 Northelme, archbishop of Canterbury, in 
 a strain, which equally shows the chari- 
 ty and sincerity of his spirit, 
 and the superstition of the 
 times.* In 738, he again vi- 
 sited Rome, being far ad- 
 vanced in life ; and, after 
 some stay, he induced seve- 
 ral Englishmen, who resided 
 there, to join with him in his 
 German mission. — Returning 
 into Bavaria, by the desire of 
 duke Odilo, he restored the 
 purity of the faith, and pre- 
 vailed against the artifices of 
 some seducers, who had done much mis- 
 chief both by false doctrine and flagitious 
 example. He established three new 
 bishoprics in the country, at Saltzburg, 
 Frisinghen, and Ratisbon. That of Pas- 
 saw had been fixed before. It must, 
 however, be observed, that the suc- 
 cesses and conquests of the Carlovingian 
 princes much facilitated his labours in 
 Germany. 
 
 In writing to Cuthbert, archbishop of 
 Canterbury, t — after testifying his zealous 
 adherence to the See of Rome, and his 
 submission to its authority, he exhorts 
 him to discharge his duty faithfully, not- 
 withstanding the difficulties to which 
 good pastors were exposed. " Let us 
 fight," says he, " for the Lord : for we 
 live in days of aflliction and anguish. 
 Let us die, if God so please, for the laws 
 of our fathers, that with them we may 
 obtain the heavenly inheritance. Let us 
 not be as dumb dogs, sleepy watchmen, 
 or selfish hirelings, but as careful and 
 vigilant pastors, preaching to all ranks, 
 as°far as God shall enable us, in season 
 and out of season, as Gregory writes in 
 his pastoral." 
 
 Adalbert,:): a Frenchman, a proud en- 
 thusiast, and Clement, a Scotchman, 
 pretended that Christ, by his descent 
 into hell, delivered the souls of the damn- 
 ed. The former was deceived by the 
 
 52. 
 
 • Ep. B. V. See Fleurv, XLII. 22. 
 
 + Bonif. Ep. 103. Fleury, XLI[. 37. 
 
 i Butler's Lives, Boniface. Fleury, XLII. 
 
 most absurd and extravagant delusions, 
 and the latter was infamous in life and 
 conversation. Gevilieb also, a German 
 bishop, who associated with them, had 
 actually committed murder; but so ig- 
 norant and depraved were the rulers of 
 the German Christians, that he was still 
 allowed to continue a bishop without in- 
 famy. Boniface, who saw the evil of 
 these things more deeply than others, de- 
 sired that Adalbert and Clement might 
 be imprisoned by the authority of duke 
 Carloman, and be secluded from society, 
 that they might not corrupt others by 
 their poisonous sentiments, and that 
 Gevilieb might be deposed from his bish- 
 opric. He gained his point in the con- 
 demnation and imprisonment of the two 
 former, and in the deposition of the lat- 
 ter. He, who has no charity for souls, 
 and no prospects beyond those of this 
 life, may harshly condemn the mission- 
 ary ; but every serious and candid mind 
 will applaud the sincerity and uprightness 
 of his intentions, and will wish for the 
 exercise of discipline, though in a man- 
 ner somewhat irregular, provided sub- 
 stantial justice be done, rather than that 
 men should be allowed to corrupt their 
 fellow-creatures, without mercy and with- 
 out control. Of the guilt of these three 
 inen, there is abundance of evidence. 
 
 Boniface, at length, was fixed at Mentz, 
 and he is commonly called archbishop of 
 that city. The increase of his dignity- 
 does not, however, seem to have dimi- 
 nished his zeal and laboriousness. His 
 connexion with England was constantly 
 preserved ; and, it is in the epistolary 
 correspondence with his own country, 
 that the most striking evidence of his 
 pious views appears. In one of his epis- 
 tles,* he mentions his sufferings from 
 pagans, false Christians, and immoral 
 pastors : he feels, as a man, these hard- 
 ships, but intimates his desire of the 
 honour of dying for the love of Him, who 
 died for us. He often begged for books 
 from England, especially those of Bede, 
 whom he styles the lamp of the Church. 
 He wrote also a circular letter to the 
 bishops and people of England, entreat- 
 ing their prayers for the success of his 
 missions. 
 
 Many persons, while in obscure life, 
 have professed much zeal for the service 
 of God, but have declined in earnestness, 
 as they advanced in years, particularly if 
 
 • 16 Ep. Alban Butler. 
 
562 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 they acquired honour and dignity in the 
 world. This was not the case with Bo- 
 niface. Though oppressed witli age and 
 infirmities, and greatly revered in the 
 whole Christian world, he determined to 
 return into Friezeland. Before his de- 
 parture, he acted in all things as if he 
 had a strong presentiment of what was 
 to happen. He appointed Lullus, an 
 Englishman, his successor, as archbishop 
 of Mentz, and wrote to the abbot of St. 
 Denys, desiring him to acquaint the king, 
 Pepin, that he and his friends believed 
 he had not long to live. He begged, that 
 the king would show kindness to the 
 missionaries whom he should leave be- 
 hind him. " Some of them," said he,* 
 " are priests dispersed into divers parts, 
 for the good of the Church : others are 
 monks, settled in small monasteries, 
 where they instruct the children. There 
 are aged men with me, who have long 
 assisted me in my labours. I fear, lest 
 after my death, they should be dispersed, 
 P.nd the disciples, who are near the pagan 
 frontiers, should lose the faith of Jesus 
 Christ. I beg that my son Lullus may 
 be confirmed in the episcopal office, and 
 that he may teach the priests, the monks, 
 and the people. I hope that he will per- 
 form these duties. That, which most 
 afflicts me, is, that the priests, who are 
 on the pagan frontiers, are very indigent. 
 They can obtain bread, but no clothes, 
 unless they be assisted, as they have 
 been by me. Let me know your answer, 
 that I may live or die with more cheer- 
 fulness." 
 
 It is most probable that he received an 
 answer agreeable to his benevolent spirit, 
 as, before his departure, he ordained 
 Lullus his successor, with the consent of 
 king Pepin. f He went by the Rhine into 
 Friezeland, where, assisted by Eoban, 
 whom he had ordained bishop of Utrecht, 
 after the deatb of Willibrod, he brought 
 great numbers of pagans within the pale 
 of the Church. He had appointed a day 
 to confirm those whom he had baptized. 
 In waiting for them he encamped with 
 his followers on the banks of the Bordne, 
 a river which then divided East and 
 West Friezeland. His intention was to 
 confirm, by imposition of hands, the 
 converts in the plains of Dockum. On 
 the appointed day, he beheld, in the 
 morning, not the new converts, whom he 
 expected, but a troop of angry pagans. 
 
 armed with shields and lances. The ser- 
 vants went out to resist, but Boniface, 
 with calm intrepidity, said to his follow- 
 ers, "Children, forbear to fight; the 
 Scripture forbids us to render evil for 
 evil. The day, which I have long wait- 
 ed for, is come ; hope in God, and he 
 will save your souls." Thus did he pre- 
 pare the priests and the rest of his com- 
 panions for martyrdom. The pagans 
 attacked them furiously, and 
 slew the whole company, fifty- Boniface 
 two in number, besides Boni- killed, 
 face himself. This happened A. D. 755. 
 in the year 755, in the fortieth 
 year after his arrival in Germany, and in 
 the 75th of his age. The manner in 
 which his death was resented by the 
 Christian Germans, shows the high ve- 
 neration in which he was held through 
 the country, and sufficiently confutes the 
 notion, which some have held, of his im- 
 perious and fraudulent conduct. They 
 collected a great army, attacked the pa- 
 gans, slew many of them, pillaged their 
 country, and carried oiT their wives and 
 children. Those, who remained pagans 
 in Friezeland, were glad to obtain peace 
 by submitting to Christian rites. Such a 
 method of showing regard for Boniface, 
 might be expected from a rude and ill- 
 informed multitude. But, rude as they 
 were, they had the gift of common sense, 
 and could judge whether the Apostle of 
 the Germans was their sincere friend 
 or not; and their judgment is with me 
 decisive. 
 
 A collection of Boniface's letters has 
 been preserved, some of which have al- 
 ready been mentioned. That the reform- 
 ation of the clergy, and the conversion of 
 infidels, were the objects of his zeal, ap- 
 pears from his literary correspondence, 
 no less than from the whole tenour of his 
 life.* In the first letter to Nithardus, in 
 which he takes the name Of Winfrid, he 
 exhorts him to contemn the things of 
 time and sense, and to devote himself to 
 the study of the Scriptures, which he 
 recommends as the highest wisdom. 
 'Nothing," says he, "can you search 
 after more honourably in youth, or enjoy 
 more comfortably in old age, than the 
 knowledge of Holy Scripture." 
 
 In another letter, he exhorts the priest 
 Herefrede, in his own name, and in that 
 of eight bishops, who were with him, to 
 show the memoir, which they sent him, 
 
 Ep. 92. 
 
 t Fleury, XLU. 20. 
 
 * Du Pin, 8th Cent. Bonif. 
 
Cest. VIII.] 
 
 BONIFACE. 
 
 563 
 
 to the king of the Mercians. The pur- 
 port of- it was to implore that prince to 
 check the debaucheries and disorders of 
 his kinsfdom. 
 
 Excessively attached as he was, both 
 to the Roman See and to monastic insti- 
 tutions, he knew how to subdue these 
 attachments, and make them obedient to 
 a stronger passion, viz. for genuine piety 
 and virtue. He wrote to Cuthbert, arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury, desiring him to 
 restrain the women of England from go- 
 ing in such numbers to Rome : " the great- 
 est part of them," says he, " live in lewd- 
 ness, and scandalize the Church; as there 
 is scarcely a city in Lombardy and France, 
 where there are not some English wo- 
 men of flagitious life and manners." 
 
 That association of ideas, which Mr. 
 Locke describes, and which has been in 
 all ages a powerful source of error and 
 absurdity, both in principles and practice, 
 accounts for the accrimoniiis expressions 
 with which Protestant writers have too 
 often indulged themselves in the relation 
 of matters connected with the See of 
 Rome. — The INIacrdeburijensian Centu- 
 riators seem, by their treatment of the 
 character of Boniface, to have largely im- 
 bibed this prejudice. I was surprised to 
 find them giving sanction to the account 
 of an old Chronicle,* which describes 
 Boniface as raising soldiers to invade 
 the Thuringians, absolving them from 
 the payment of taxes to their civil gover- 
 nors, and justifying this extraordinary 
 conduct by the recital of a divine vision. 
 
 looks like an instance of great partiality 
 to call such men "good persons," who 
 were convicted of scandalous wickedness. 
 But it would be tedious to particularize 
 the charges which these writers have 
 formed against Boniface, supported chief- 
 ly by mere suspicions and conjectures. 
 
 That Mosheim should invei<Th afainst 
 this missionary, is what might be expect- 
 ed from his prejudices. But he should 
 have written with consistency. He speaks 
 of the pious labours of Boniface, of his 
 finishing with glory the task he had un- 
 dertaken, and of the assistance which he 
 received from a number of pious men, 
 who repaired to him from England and 
 France.* " His piety," he adds, " was 
 ill rewarded by that barbarous people by 
 whom he was murdered. If we consi- 
 der the eminent services he rendered to 
 Christianity, the honourable title of the 
 Apostle of the Germans will appear to 
 have been not undeservedly bestowed." 
 Who could imagine that this pious 
 pastor should, by the same writer, be 
 accused, without warrant, of often " era- 
 ploying violence and terror, and some- 
 times artifice and fraud, in order to mul- 
 tiply the number of Christians." He 
 ascribes to him also "an imperious and 
 arrogant temper, and a cunning and in- 
 sidious turn of mind." 
 
 Which of these two accounts shall we 
 believe? for, it is as equally impossible 
 that both should be true, as that piety 
 should be consistent with a 
 spirit of violence, arrogance, 
 and fraud. But, it is thus, 
 
 Character 
 of Boiii-j 
 face. 
 
 The manners of the eighth century cer 
 
 tainly did not allow such an union of the I that men zealous to propagate 
 military and sacerdotal character: more-i divine truth in the earth, are often de- 
 over, the circumstances of Boniface's pro- scribed by those, who arrogate to them- 
 ceedings, as attested by history, and, [selves the whole praise of judgment and 
 above all, the unquestionable memorials', candour. There has seldom existed an 
 of his evangelical labours, forbid me to! eminent and useful missionary, who has 
 entertain such sentiments of the Apostle not, in this way, been aspersed. In the 
 
 of Germany. If he had had soldiers at 
 his devotion, he surely might have avoid- 
 ed those hardships which he endured. 
 
 mean time, I am sensible, that the found- 
 ation of the strong prejudices against 
 Boniface, is his attachment to the Roman 
 
 and have prevented the murder of himself, j See. I cannot observe, however, that he 
 
 and of his companians in the plains of 
 Dockum. The account seems to have 
 been forged, in order to justify the con- 
 duct of military prelates, and of papal 
 tyranny in after-ages. The censures also, 
 
 either practised idolatry, or taught false 
 doctrine. Removed from the scene of 
 controversy, he seems to have taken no 
 part in tlie debate concerning images : he 
 was ever invariable in opposing idolatry 
 
 which Boniface passed upon Adalbert and and immorality: he lived amidst many 
 Clement, seem to have been arraigned by I dangers and sufl'erings ; and he appears to 
 the Centuriators, without foundation. It have supported, for many years, an uni- 
 form tenour of zeal, to which he sacri- 
 
 • Cent. 8ih. 
 Bonifacio. 
 
 De propagatione Ecelesise, De 
 
 Mosheim, Cent. VIII. 
 
564 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 ficed all worldly conveniences, and, in 
 fine, to have finished his course in mar- 
 tyrdom, and in the patience and meek- 
 ness of a disciple of Christ. I shall leave 
 it to the reader's judgment, what esti- 
 mate ought to be formed of him, after 
 having observed, that God made large 
 use of his labours by extending, in the 
 north of Europe, the bounds of the Church, 
 at the same time that they were so much 
 contracted in Asia and Africa. 
 
 Winebald, the son of a royal English 
 Saxon, shared with Boniface in his la- 
 inT- I 1^ hours in Germany; his life 
 ^igg was preserved, though m im- 
 
 A T» Tfin minent danger from idolaters, 
 A. u. /Du. ^^^ ^^^ blessed his work 
 
 among the heathen : he died in 760. 
 
 In Friezeland, the Church of Utrecht 
 was governed by Gregory, who from the 
 fifteenth year of his age, had been a fol- 
 lower of Boniface. Two of his brothers 
 having been murdered in a wood, the 
 barons, whose vassals they were, deliver- 
 ed the murderers bound into his hands. 
 Gregory, after he had treated them kind- 
 ly, bad them depart in peace, saying, 
 Sin no more, lest a worse thing befal 
 you. He was assisted in his ministerial 
 labours by several disciples of various 
 nations ; some were of his own nation, 
 the French, others were English, Frisons, 
 newly-nonverted Saxons, and Bavarians. 
 Scarcely a day passed, but early in the 
 morning he gave them spiritual instruc- 
 tion. This man aflected no singularity 
 either in habit or diet. That he was not 
 carried away by the torrent of popular 
 superstition, is a strong proof either of 
 p great understanding, or of em- 
 
 Slwu i"en^ pie^y' •^\°f '^°*V .^"^ 
 
 an excel- l^e recommended sobriety 
 lent char- among his disciples : was not 
 acter dies, to be moved from the path of 
 A. D. 776. duty by slander, and was 
 boundlesss in his liberality 
 to the poor. He died about the year 776. 
 Liefuvyn, an Englishman, one of his 
 disciples, was distinguished by his la- 
 bours among the missionaries of Germany. 
 He ventured even to appear before the 
 assembly of tlie Saxons held upon the 
 Weser ; and, while they were sacrificing 
 to their idols, he exhorted them with a 
 loud voice to turn from those vanities to 
 the living God. As an ambassador from 
 Jehovah, he offered them promises of sal- 
 vation. And here his zeal seemed likely 
 to have cost him his life : but he was at 
 leno-th suffered to depart, on the remon- 
 
 strances* of Buto, one of their chiefs, 
 who expostulated with them on the un- 
 reasonableness of treating an ambassador 
 of the great God with less respect than 
 they did one from any of the neighbour- 
 ing nations. f In the mean time, the 
 arms of Charlemagne prevailed over the 
 Saxons, and eventually, at least, facilitat- 
 ed the labours of Liefuvyn, who continu- 
 ed to preach among this people till his 
 death. 
 
 Villehad, an English priest, born in 
 Northumberland, was abundantly suc- 
 cessful in the conversion of the Saxons. 
 It is true, that he taught under the pro- 
 tection and auspices of Charlemagne. 
 But whatever may be thought of the mo- 
 tives of the latter, the views of the mis- 
 sionary might be, and probably were, 
 upright and spiritual. Certainly he un- 
 derwent great hazards, ij: overcame the 
 ferocious spirits of the infidels by his 
 meekness, and spread among them the 
 knowledge of the Gospel. A persecution 
 drove him once out of the country ; but, 
 by the power of the emperor, he again 
 returned and prosecuted his labours. Af- 
 ter various contests, the Saxons were 
 obliged to submit to Charlemagne, and to 
 become nominal Christians in general. 
 But that this was universally the case, or 
 even nearly so, the pious labours of a 
 number of missionaries render very im- 
 probable. 
 
 Villehad was bishop of Bremen, and 
 was called the Apostle of Saxony. He 
 
 * Fleury XLIV, U. 
 
 t Bulo seems, ni part at least, to have felt the 
 power ol'lhe divine word commending itself to 
 his conscience in the sight of God ; and to have 
 reported that Cod was of a truth wilh real Chris- 
 tian pastors, 1 Cor. xiv. 25. Effects of the kind, 
 mentioned by the Apostle, have, in all ages, been 
 very common, wherever the realCospel is plain- 
 ly and fiiilhfully delivered. The message from 
 God convinces and overawes the serious hearer, 
 and, by its internal excellence, makes itself a 
 way into the conscience. If Liefuvyn had 
 preached mere morals, I should no more have 
 expected such consequences from his harangues, 
 Ihan from the lectures of the Greek philoso- 
 phers. 
 
 ^ Once when he was in danger of being put 
 to death by the pagan Frisons, some of them, 
 struck witii his innocence and probity, and 
 doubling whether the religion whicii he preached 
 might not be divine, said '" Let us cast lots 
 whether we shall put him to dealh, or dismiss 
 him." It was done so, and the lot decided in his 
 favour. Fleury, XLV. 15. The custom of decid- 
 ing cases of this nature by lot, was remarkably 
 German. The classical reader may recollect a 
 similar instance in Caesar's Coinm. toward the 
 ondofLib.l.De Bell. Gall. 
 
Cest.VIIL] 
 
 AUTHORS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 565 
 
 had begun his mission in Dockum, where 
 
 n L c Boniface was murdered. He 
 Death ot ^^ n j. ■ ■ i 
 
 Villehad "^^^ *^® ^'"®* missionary who 
 in Frieze- passed the Elbe. His atten- 
 land. tion to the Scriptures appears 
 
 from his copying the epistles 
 of St. Paul. He died in Friezeland, after 
 he had laboured 35 years, and had been 
 bishop of Bremen upwards of two years.* 
 To his weeping friends, he said in his 
 dying moments, " Withhold me not from 
 going to God : these sheep I recommend 
 to Him, who intrusted them to me, and 
 whose mercy is able to protect them." 
 See Alban Butler, Vol. XI. 
 
 This was an age of missionaries : their 
 character and their success form, indeed, 
 almost the only shining picture in this 
 century. Firmin, a Frenchman, preached 
 the Gospel under various difficulties,* in 
 Alsace, Bavaria, and Switzerland, and 
 inspected a number of monasteries. Af- 
 ter all, the arms of Charlemagne contri- 
 buted more than any thing else to the 
 external reception of Christianity ; and 
 Alcum, his favourite, laments, that more 
 pains were taken to exact from the 
 Saxons the payment of tithes, than to in- 
 form them of the nature of true religion. 
 Teachers, who Avere merely secular, 
 drenched in the vices of human nature and 
 of the times, would doubtless act in this 
 manner. But I have attempted, from very 
 confused and imperfect memoirs, to pre- 
 sent to the reader, those, who, in the 
 north of Europe were indeed sent of God, 
 and laboured in demonstration of the 
 Spirit. 
 
 Rumold, a native either of England or 
 of Ireland, should be added to the list. 
 He travelled into Lower Germany, went 
 
 into Brabant, diffused much 
 Rumold, a jj^-ht jjj jj^g neighbourhood of 
 
 mission- ivfechlin, and was made an 
 ary in . . . i • • 
 
 Lower Itinerant episcopal mission- 
 
 Germany, ary. In 775, he was mur- 
 niurdered, dered by two persons, one of 
 A D 775 whom he had reproved for 
 adultery, t 
 Silvin, of Auchy, born in Toulouse,:}: 
 was first a courtier, then a religious per- 
 son, and afterwards appointed bishop 
 among the infidels. His labours were, 
 chiefly, in Terouanne, the north of France, 
 which was, in this century, full of pagans 
 and merely nominal Christians 
 
 thered in a large harvest, having preached 
 for many years. He died at Auchy, in 
 the country of Artois. 
 
 Virgilius, an Irishman, was appointed 
 bishop of Saltzburg, by king Pepin. Du- 
 ring two years, his modesty ])revented 
 him from entering upon the office ; but 
 he was at length prevailed upon to re- 
 ceive consecration. He followed the 
 steps of Boniface in rooting 
 out the remains of idolatry in 
 his diocese, and died in the 
 year 780.* 
 
 He ga- 
 
 * Mosh. cent. VIIF. 
 
 + A. Butler, Vol. VII. 
 
 i See Alban Butler's Lives of Saints. 
 
 Vol. I. 3 B 
 
 Virgilius 
 dies, 
 
 A. U. 780. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 AUTHORS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The most learned writer of this cen- 
 tury, if we may except our countryman 
 Bede, seems to have been .John of Da- 
 mascus. He was one of the first, who 
 mingled the Aristotelian or Peripatetic 
 philosophy with the Christian religion. f 
 This philosophy was gradually sup- 
 planting the authority of the Platonic. 
 It makes no part of my subject, to explain 
 the difference of the systems of Plato 
 and Aristotle. Suffice it to say, that they 
 were both very foreign tu Christianity, 
 
 * A misunderstanding had once taken place 
 between this niis.sionary and Boniface. The lat- 
 ter accused him to the See of Rome.of teacliing 
 "that there was another world, and other men 
 under the earth, or another sun and i;ioon.' 
 Bonif. Ep. 10. To the pious spirit of Boniface a 
 difliculty of solving the question arose, on this 
 view-of the tenets of Virgilius, liow sucli ideas 
 were compatible with the Mosaic account of tlie 
 origin of all mankind from Adam, and of the re- 
 demption of the whole species by Jesus Christ. 
 After all, it appears that Boniface was mistaken, 
 and that Virgilius being beUer acquainted with 
 the true figure of the earth, than most of his con- 
 temporaries in that ignorant age, only held the 
 opinion of the Antipodes, a notion as sound in 
 philosophy, as it is innocent in regard to Chris- 
 tianity- As Virgilius was afterwards made bishop 
 of Saltzburg, he continued to labour in the same 
 cause wirii Boniface, and to tread in his steps. 
 It is more than probable, that both Boniface and 
 the pope were satisfied ol" his soundness in llie 
 faith, and dismissed the accusation. It seemed 
 worth while to slate this matter in a true light, 
 from the evidence of Boniface's letter. It ap- 
 pears, ilial Virgilius was not condemned for hold- 
 ing ihc doctrine of the Antiiiodes, and that the 
 clrirgi! of Bower asjainst Boniface, is as malici- 
 ous as it is ill founded. See Hist, of the Popes 
 (Zachary)— where the historian, without war- 
 rant, accuses Boniface of bearing a secret grudge 
 to Virgilius, and of being actuated by a spirit oi 
 revenge. 
 
 t Fleur. XLII. 44. 
 
666 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 and each, in their turn, corrupted it ex- 
 tremely. John was a voluminous writer, 
 and became, among the Greeks, what 
 Thomas Aquinas afterwards was among 
 the Latins. He seems to have defended 
 the system, commonly called the Armi- 
 nian notion of free-will, in opposition to 
 the doctrine of effectual grace. This* 
 was a natural consequence of his philoso- 
 phizing spirit. For, all the philosophers 
 of antiquity, amidst their endless dis- 
 cordances, agreed in teaching man to rely 
 altogether on himself. This is the 
 dangerous philosophy, which St. Paul 
 warns us to beware of. It hitherto wore, 
 chiefly, the garb of Plato : it was now 
 assuming that of Aristotle. In both these 
 dresses, it was still " the wisdom of this 
 world, which is foolishness with God." 
 And even at this day, among all who lean 
 to their own understanding, to the dis- 
 paragement of revelation, its nature is 
 the same, however varnished with the 
 polish of Christian phraseology. 
 
 In the doctrine of the Trinity, John ap- 
 pears to have been orthodox : in other re- 
 spects, he was one of the most powerful 
 supporters of error. He was an advocate 
 for the practice of praying for the dead, 
 which he regarded as effectual for the re- 
 mission of sins. This was a deplorable 
 article of superstition, which bad been 
 growing in the Church, and wanted the 
 sanction of a genius like that of John to 
 give it lasting celebrity. I can find no 
 evidences of his real knowledge or prac- 
 tice of godliness. And the reader will 
 think he has been detained sufficiently by 
 this Grecian author, after he has learned, 
 that his eloquent and learned pen de- 
 fended the detestable doctrine of image- 
 worship, and contributed more than that of 
 any other author, to establish the practice 
 of it in the east. In the mean time there 
 arose no evangelical luminary, who might 
 combat his arguments with sufficient 
 ability. The Scripture itself, indeed, was 
 more than half buried under the load of 
 superstitions. The learning of this east- 
 ern father, was probably more accurate 
 and refined than that of Bede. In the 
 latter, however, we have seen the fullest 
 evidence of Christian light and humility : 
 in the former, as far as respects true 
 wisdom, all is dark and dreary ; and the 
 baleful influence of his unscriptural opin- 
 ions, however respectable he might be 
 in a literary view, has seldom been ex- 
 
 ceeded by that of any other writer in 
 the history of the church. 
 
 I have already taken notice of the op- 
 position made in the west, to the progress 
 of image-worship, by the authority of 
 Charlemagne. The Carolin books, pub- 
 lished in his name, were powerful checks 
 against the growing evil ; and it is more 
 probable, that such a prince as Charle- 
 magne was carried along by the current 
 of the times, than that he directed the 
 sentiments of the western Churches by 
 his own theological studies. Political 
 and secular reasons unhappily retained 
 these Churches in the Roman commu- 
 nion, and, in process of time, the abomi- 
 nations of idolatry overspread them all. 
 It is, however, a pleasing circumstance, 
 that the labours of missionaries in the 
 north of Europe, which form the most 
 shining part of Christian history in this 
 century, were all conducted by Christians 
 of the west, and particularly by those 
 who were the most remote from idolatry, 
 those of our own country especially. 
 There is, therefore, good reason to be- 
 lieve, that the new Churches in the north 
 were taught to worship the living God, 
 through the one Mediator Christ. For 
 the British Churches expressed the most 
 marked detestation of the second council 
 of Nice.* And Alcuin, the preceptor of 
 Charlemagne, disproved its decrees in a 
 letter, by express authorities of Scripture. 
 It is too true, that our ancestors, like the 
 rest of Europe, learned at length to wor- 
 ship idols. For religious movements 
 among churches are generally retrograde. 
 Entirely distinct from human institutions 
 of science, Christian views aie most per- 
 fect at first, as beino- derived from the 
 divme word, and impressed on the hearts 
 of men by divine grace : the wisdom of 
 this world, aided by the natural propensi- 
 ties of mankind, corrupts them afterwards 
 by degrees, and too often leaves them at 
 length, neither root nor branch of evange- 
 lical light and purity. 
 
 Alcuin, who has been just mentioned, 
 was born in England ;f and was a deacon 
 ofthe Church of York. He was ^icuin an 
 sent ambassador to France by Enelish- 
 Offa, king of the Mercians, man, goes 
 in the year 790. On this oc- as ambas- 
 casion he gained the esteem sadoi- to 
 of Charlemagne, and persuad- ^*^Jl'^%f, 
 ed that monarch to found the " ' ' 
 universities of Paris and Pavia. He was 
 
 * Du Pin, 8lh cent. Joha of Damascus. 
 
 * Collier's Ecc. Hist. B. 2. t Du Pin. 
 
Cext. VIII.] 
 
 AUTHORS OF THIS CENTURY. 
 
 567 
 
 Dies, 
 A. D. 804 
 
 looked upon as one of the wisest and most 
 learned men of his time. He read public 
 lectures in the emperor's palace, and in 
 other places. He wrote, in an orthodox 
 manner, on the Trinity, and, in particu- 
 lar, confuted the notions of Felix, bi- 
 shop of Urgel, of whom it is sufficient to 
 say, that he revived something like the 
 Nestorian heresy, by separating the hu- 
 manity from the divinity of the Son of 
 God. Alcuin showed himself a master 
 of his subject, and wrote in a 
 candid and moderate spirit. 
 He died in 804. 
 Even Italy itself was not disposed 
 altogether to obey the pope, in regard to 
 image-worship. Some Italian bishops 
 assisted at the council of Frankfort, be- 
 fore mentioned ; and Paulinus, of Aqui- 
 leia, bore a distinguished part in it. This 
 prelate wrote, also, against the error of 
 Felix, and seems to have been one of the 
 best bishops of his time. Let us try, 
 from the scanty materials before us, if 
 we can collect his views and spirit on 
 subjects peculiarly Christian. 
 
 This bishop successfully opposed the 
 error of Felix, concerning the person of 
 Jesus Christ, and wrote a book of whole- 
 some instructions, which for a long time 
 was supposed to be the work 
 of Augustine.* It is remark- 
 able, that he and some other 
 Italian bishops, in the year 
 787,"!" agreed to condemn the 
 decrees of the second council 
 of Nice, as idolatrous, though 
 pope Adrian had assisted at that council 
 by his legates, and used his utmost en- 
 deavours to maintain its authority. In 
 the council of Frankfort also, the presence 
 of two papal legates hindered not the 
 firm agreement of Paulinus and other 
 Italian bishops, with the decrees of the 
 said council. These are clear proofs, 
 that the despotism of Antichrist was, as 
 yet, so far from being universal, that it 
 was not owned throughout Italy itself; 
 and, that in some parts of that country, 
 as well as in England and France, the 
 purity of Christian worship was still 
 maintained. The city of Rome, indeed, 
 and its environs, seem to have been, at 
 this period, the most corrupt part of Chris- 
 tendom in Europe, nor do I remember a 
 single missionary in these times to have 
 been an Italian. 
 
 Firmness 
 of Pauli- 
 nus at the 
 Second 
 Council of 
 Nice. 
 
 Paulinus, in his book against Felix, 
 affirms that the Eucharist is a morsel 
 and bit of bread.* He maintains, that it 
 is spiritual life or death in the eater, as 
 he either hath faith or hath not ; which 
 seems to be a just and evangelical view ' 
 of that divine ordinance, not only free 
 from the absurdity of transubstantiation, 
 but also expressive of the Christian arti- 
 cle of justification, of which the reader 
 hears very little in these cloudy times. 
 Still more express testimonies to the es- 
 sentials of salvation are not wanting in 
 this author. He protests that the blood 
 of those, who have themselves been re- 
 deemed, cannot blot out the least sin; 
 that the expiation of iniquity is the ex- 
 elusive privilege of the blood of Christ 
 alone. He| defines the properties of the 
 divine and human nature, as anited in 
 the person of Jesus Christ, with great 
 precision ; and so careful is he to describe 
 the latter as circumscribed and limited by 
 the bounds of body, as to form, at least, 
 a strong consequential argument against 
 the notion of transubstantiation. Hear 
 how he comments on our Lord's well- 
 known description of eating his flesh and 
 drinking his blood in the 6th chap, of St. 
 John's Gospel. "The flesh and blood is 
 to be referred to his human, not to his di- 
 vine nature. — Yet, if he were not the 
 true God, his flesh and blood could by no 
 means give eternal life to those who feed 
 upon him. Whence also John says, the 
 blood of his Son cleanseth us from all 
 sin." Hear also how he speaks of the 
 intercession of Christ. "Paul is not a 
 mediator; he is an ambassador for Christ. 
 The advocate is He, who being also the 
 Redeemer, exhibits to God the Father 
 the human nature in the unity of the per- 
 son of God and man. John intercedes 
 not, but declares that this mediator is the 
 propitiation for our sins." Once more : 
 "The Son of God Almighty, our Al- 
 mighty Lord, because He redeemed us 
 wiUi the price of his blood, is justly call- 
 ed the true Redeemer, by the confession 
 of all who are redeemed. He himself 
 was not redeemed; He had never been 
 captive : we have been redeemed, because 
 we were captives, sold under sin,:)^ bound 
 by the hand-writing which was against 
 us, which he took away, nailing it to his 
 cross, blotting it out by his blood, tri- 
 
 • Du Pin. 
 
 + See Dr. AUix, on the ancient Churches of 
 Piedmont. 
 
 * Buccella et particula panis, in his dedica- 
 tion to Charlemagne. 
 I Allix. 1 Rom. vii. 
 
568 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V- 
 
 umphing openly over it in himself, hav-j 
 ing finished a work, which the blood of; 
 no other Redeemer could do."* Such is : 
 the language of this evangelical bishop, | 
 while he is opposing the Nestorian here- 
 sy revived by Felix. And here, at least, 
 we see a due respect paid to Holy Scrip-! 
 lure. Paulinus quotes, understands, | 
 and builds his faith upon it ; and is : 
 equally remote from dependence on mere j 
 human reasonings, on the authority of 
 the Church of Rome, or on any tradi- 
 tions. 
 
 This bishop was born about the year 
 726, near Friuli, was promoted to Aqui- 
 
 . leia in 776, was highly fa- 
 
 co'iint of' "toured by Charlemagne, and 
 
 Paulinus preached the Gospel to the 
 
 pagans of Carinthia and Sty- 
 
 ria, and to the Avaras, a nation of Huns. 
 
 * Coloss. ii. 
 
 One of his maxims was, "Pride is that, 
 without which no sin is or will be com- 
 mitted: it is the beginning, the end, and 
 the cause of all sin." I wonder not, that 
 he, who in an age of dulness could see 
 the nature of sin with so penetrating an 
 eye was confounded with the bishop of 
 Hippo. He died in 804.* jj^ ^jg^ 
 In a letter to Charlemagne, . -j, ' . 
 he complained of the want of " " 
 residence in bishops, and of their attend- 
 ing the court. He cites a canon of the 
 council of Sardica, in the fourth century, 
 which forbade the absence of bishops 
 from their dioceses, for a longer space than 
 three weeks. 
 
 * I have been obliged to Alban Bntler for 
 some of the fore.^oiug particulars. But it is 
 remarkable that he omits his testimony against 
 image-worship. The reader should remem- 
 ber that Butler is a zealous Roman Catholic. 
 
Ceitt. IX.] 
 
 STATE OF RELIGION. 
 
 569 
 
 CENTURY IX. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A GENERAL VIEW OF THE STATE OF 
 RELIGION' IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 We are penetrating into the regions of 
 darkness, and a " land of deserts and pits, 
 a land of drought, and of the shadow of 
 death;"* and are carried, by every step, 
 into scenes still more gloomy than the 
 former. Here and there, indeed, a glim- 
 mering ray of the Sun of Righteousness 
 appears ; but it is in vain to look for any 
 steady lustre of evangelical truth and 
 holiness. In such a situation, to pursue 
 the chronological course of events, would 
 be as tedious as it is unprofitable. The 
 plan of history for each century should 
 be modified by the existing circum- 
 stances. And there seem to be four dis- 
 tinct phenomena of Christian light in 
 this period, which deserve to be illus- 
 trated in so many chapters ; namely, in 
 the 2d, 3d, 4th, and 5th. — It shall be the 
 business of this first chapter, to premise 
 some general observations, which may 
 enable the reader more clearly to under- 
 stand those phenomena. 
 
 Several circumstances attended the 
 thick darkness which pervaded this cen- 
 tury ; and they appear to be reducible to 
 the following heads : — the preference 
 given to human writings above the Scrip- 
 tures, — the domination of the popedom, 
 — the accumulation of ceremonies, — and 
 the oppression of the godly.f 
 
 It was now fashionable to explain 
 Scripture entirely by the writings of the 
 fathers. No man was permitted, with 
 impunity, to vary in the least from their 
 decisions. The great apostolical rule of 
 interpretation, namely, to compare spiri- 
 tual things with spiritual,:}: was in a 
 manner lost. It was deemed suflacient 
 that such a renowned doctor had given 
 such an interpretation. Hence, men of 
 learning and industry paid more attention 
 
 • Jereni. ii. 6. 
 
 t Ceniuriat. See their preface to the 9th 
 century. I liave availed myself of some of 
 the ihoughts ; the whole is ingenious and spi- 
 rited. 
 
 1 1 Cor. ii. 
 
 3b2 
 
 to the fathers, than to the sacred volume, 
 which, through long disuse and neglect, 
 was looked on as obscure and perplexed, 
 and quite unfit for popular reading. Even 
 divine truths seemed to derive their au- 
 thority more from the word of man than 
 of God; and the writings and decrees of 
 men were no longer treated as witnesses, 
 but usurped the office of judges of divine 
 truth. 
 
 The popedom also grew stronger and 
 stronger. Ignorance and superstition 
 were so predominant, that whoever dared 
 to oppose the bishop of Rome, drew upon 
 himself a host of enemies. All, who 
 looked for advancement in the Church, 
 attached themselves to Antichrist. It is 
 in this way only, that I can account for 
 the very little resistance made to image- 
 worship. We have seen, how a large 
 part of the West rejected it. But most 
 persons contented themselves with a sim- 
 ple exposition of their creed. Idolatry, 
 in the mean time, was practically sup- 
 ported by the whole power and influence 
 of the popedom. 
 
 The great accumulation of ceremonies, 
 the observance of which was looked upon 
 as absolutely necessary to salvation, drew 
 off the attention of men from Christian 
 piety. The all-important article of jus- 
 tification was nearly smothered in the 
 rubbish : and pastors were so much taken 
 up with externals, that they were almost 
 entirely diverted from intellectual im- 
 provement. 
 
 Men of eminence, both in church and 
 state, partly through superstition, and 
 partly through secular views, suppressed 
 in the bud every attempt to inform man- 
 kind. There were, however, a few, who 
 groaned under these evils, and worship- 
 ped God in spirit and truth. 
 
 In Asia, Mahometaiiisni still reigned ; 
 and, the case of the Paulicians except- 
 ed,* scarcely a vestige of real godliness 
 appeared in the Eastern Church, though 
 we ought not to doubt but the Lord had 
 HIS SECRET oxES. Imagc-worship was 
 still a subject of debate ; but, at length, 
 under the superstitious empress Theodora, 
 
 • See Chap. II. 
 
670 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 it effectually triumphed in the East 
 There was not an emperor or bishop of 
 Constantinople, in all this period, who 
 seems to have deserved particular notice 
 on account of vital Christian knowledge, 
 or practical piety.* The same judgment 
 may be formed of the Roman popes. In 
 this dark season, Pascasius 
 Tenets of Radbert introduced the absurd 
 ■ transub- tenet of transubstantiation, 
 stantia.- which was opposed by John 
 tion. Scotus Erigina, and Raba- 
 
 nus, archbishop of Mentz, 
 two of the most learned men of that age. 
 But their learning seems to have had lit- 
 tle connexion with godliness, however 
 they might successfully plead the cause 
 of common sense in the controversy just 
 mentioned. For, they joined in opposing 
 the doctrine of grace, concerning which 
 a controversy of some importance was 
 raised in this century, | 
 
 In France, the views of divine grace, 
 revived by Augustine, were more and 
 more darkened ; and we shall presently 
 find, that a zealous advocate for them 
 could not be heard with candour. Ado, 
 archbishop of Vienne, was, however, an 
 eminent exception to this account. He 
 was indefatigable in pressing the great 
 truths of salvation. He usually began 
 his sermons with these, or the like words : 
 " Hear the eternal truth, which speaks to 
 you in the Gospel ;" or, " Hear Jesus 
 Christ, who saith to you." He took par- 
 ticular care of the examination of candi- 
 dates for orders ; and was a very diligent 
 disciplinarian. He permitted none, who 
 were ignorant of Christian principles, to 
 be sponsors to the baptized, or to be join- 
 ed in matrimony, or to be admitted to the 
 Lord's Supper, till they were better in- 
 structed. He was inflexibly vigilant 
 against vice ; and, while his own exam- 
 ple was an honour to his profession, he 
 enjoined his clergy to apprize him, if they 
 should disqover any slip in his conduct. 
 Nor did king Lothaire find him obse- 
 quious to his lusts ; for through Ado's 
 vigorous remonstrances, he was obliged 
 to desist from a design of divorcing his 
 queen. He sympathized, however, with 
 sincere penitents, and was a real friend 
 
 * I Sciy vital ; for I am aware that Photiiis, 
 bishop of Constantinople, flourished in this 
 century ; a person equally infamous for hypo- 
 crisy and ambition, and renowned for genius 
 and ecclesiastical learning. What melancho- 
 ly instances of contradiction does the history 
 of mankind afford ! f See Chap. IV. 
 
 to the poor, both in a spiritual and tem- 
 poral sense ; and was the founder of many 
 hospitals for their reception.* 
 
 In England, the decline of godliness 
 was grievous,f and as:|: Huntingdon re- 
 inarks. Divine Providence punished the 
 Saxons by the invasion of the Danes, the 
 most lawless and the most savage of all 
 mortals. The great Alfred was indeed 
 raised up to defend his country against 
 them. And, one of his speeches, deli- 
 vered to the soldiers, before a battle, dis- 
 plays, at once, much good sense and a 
 spirit of religion. He told his people, 
 that their sins had given their enemies 
 the advantage : that they ought to reform 
 their own manners, in order to engage 
 the favour of God on their side ; that in 
 other respects they had the superiorit}^. 
 Christians were fighting against heathens, 
 and honest men against robbers ; that 
 theirs was not a war of ambition or con- 
 quest, but of necessary self-defence. In 
 the battle which followed, he entirely de- 
 feated the Danes. 
 
 In§ the preface to Gregory's Pastoral, 
 a book translated into English, by this 
 prince, for the benefit of his subjects, he 
 observes, that when he came to the 
 Crown, there were very few, south of 
 the Humber,|| who understood the com- 
 mon prayers in English, or, who could 
 translate a passage of Latin into the lan- 
 guage of their own country. He sent 
 copies of Gregory's Pastoral into every 
 diocese, for the benefit of the clergy: 
 with the same beneficent design, he trans- 
 lated also Bede's ecclesiastical history : 
 he himself constantly attended public 
 worship ; and, from his youth, he was 
 wont to pray for grace, and to use se- 
 rious methods to subdue his passions, 
 life he appears to have main- 
 
 Thrcugrh 
 
 * Alban Butler, XII. 
 
 t There is reason, however, to believe, that 
 a devotional and, probably, an evangelical 
 spirit prevailed in some parts of the British 
 isles. For monks, in Ireland and Scotland, 
 wlio gave themselves to prayer, preaching, 
 and teaching in the middle ages, were called 
 Culdees, that is, Cultores Uei. They were 
 first known in this century by that name at St. 
 Andrew's particularly ; but were never settled 
 in England, except at St. Peter's in York. 
 A. Butler, Vol. V. 
 
 + Collier's Ecc. Hist. 
 
 § Alfred invited John Scotus, not the fa- 
 mous John Scotus Erigina, from Old Saxony 
 into England ; and founded tiie University of 
 Oxford. That of Cambridge was of a date 
 somewhat later. 
 
 11 Collier, Vol. I. B. 3d. 
 
Cekt. IX.] 
 
 THE PAULICIANS. 
 
 571 
 
 tained a beautiful consistency of charac- 
 ter. He endeavoured to promote the 
 knowledge of the English tongue among 
 all persons of tolerable rank ; and ex- 
 pressed his opinion, that those, who meant 
 to attain eminence in the state, should 
 also know the Latin language. It is 
 pleasant to see the ebullitions of genius 
 and of strong sense in an iron age, like 
 this before us. Alfred would, doubtless, 
 in more auspicious times, have 'appeared 
 among the first of mankind. There seems 
 no reason to doubt the sincerity of his 
 piety. A religious spirit had this advan- 
 tage in a rude age, that it was not 
 thought to reflect disgrace on the powers 
 of the understanding. But, this glorious 
 sun, after it had shone a little time 
 through an atmosphere enveloped with 
 vapours, and had in some degree dispers- 
 ed them, was not able to illumine the 
 region in which it appeared : The mist 
 prevailed again, and England was cover- 
 ed with darkness. 
 
 It may be proper to remind the reader, 
 
 that about the beginning of this centur}^, 
 
 Egbert became king of Wes- 
 
 •"'^'^'■ sex: that in 8;37, he became 
 
 made KinfJ , • r ^^ n i 1 ^^^ 
 
 ofall Ei)<'- ^"S' 01 all England, near 400 
 land ° years after the first arrival of 
 A D 827 ^'^® Saxons ; and that Alfred 
 
 was his grandson. 
 Charlemagne of France, who had flou- 
 rished in the last century, died in the 
 former part of this, aged 72, in the year 
 
 814. It is scarcely worth 
 Death of -while to recount the splendid 
 ma'^ne ^'""^"^ '^' ^"'^ emperor, smce his 
 
 A D 814 sanjruinary ambition and his 
 
 habitual lewdness, too plainly 
 evince his want of Christian principle. 
 He revived the western empire in Ger- 
 many, which continues to this day. He 
 was a great instrument of Providence, no 
 doubt, in extending the pale of the 
 Church; and, at the same time, he fixed 
 the power of the popedom on the strongest 
 foundations. His labours to revive learn- 
 ing were very great; but, like those of 
 Alfred, they failed of success. His reli- 
 gious and moral character bears no com- 
 parison with that of the English monarch. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE PAULICIANS. 
 
 About the year 660, a new sect arose 
 in the East, the accounts of which are 
 far more scanty than a writer of real 
 
 Church-history would wish.* 
 Constantino, a person who Sect of 
 dwelt in Mananalis, an ob- ^*"^'" 
 scure town in the neighbour- . n'ffin 
 hood of Samosata, entertained ' 
 a deacon, who having been a prisoner 
 among the Mahometans, had returned 
 from captivity, and received from the 
 same deacon, the gift of the New Testa- 
 ment in the original language. So early 
 had the laity begun to think themselves 
 excluded from the reading of the sacred 
 volume; and the clergy, both in the East 
 and the West, encouraged this apprehen- 
 sion. The growing ignorance rendered 
 by far the greatest part of the laity inca- 
 pable of reading the Scriptures. I do not 
 find any ecclesiastical prohibitory decree 
 in these times, nor was there much occa- 
 sion for it. But Constantine made the 
 best use of the deacon's present. He 
 studied the sacred oracles, and exercised 
 his own understanding upon them. He 
 formed to himself a plan of divinity from 
 the New Testament ; and, as St. Paul is 
 the most systematical of all the Apostles, 
 Constantine very properly attached him- 
 self to his writings with peculiar atten- 
 tion, as indeed every serious theologian 
 must do. He will find, no doubt, the 
 same truths interspersed through the rest 
 of the sacred volume, and a wonderful 
 unity of design and spirit breathing 
 through the whole; but, as it pleased 
 God to employ one person more learned 
 than the rest, it is highly proper, that the 
 student should avail himself of this ad- 
 vantage. That Constantine was in pos- 
 session of the genuine text, was acknow- 
 ledged universally. A remarkable cir- 
 cumstance! which shows the watchful 
 providence of God over the Scriptures! — 
 Amidst a thousand frauds and sophisms 
 of the times, no adulteration of them was 
 ever permitted to take place. 
 
 The enemies of the Paulicians give 
 them the name from some unknown 
 
 * Photius, B. 1. contra Manichffios,et Peter 
 Siculiis Hist. Maiiiclueor. These are the two 
 niiginal sources, from which Mosheitn and 
 Gibhon have drawn their information concern- 
 ing the Paulicians. Photius and Peter have 
 not falleti into my hands ; and their prejudice 
 and passion were so great, that my reader will 
 very probably be no great loser by the circum- 
 stance. By the assistance of the two modera 
 authors, I shall state the few facts which are 
 known, and give as impartial a judgment con- 
 cerning the sects in question as I can. The 
 candour of Gibbon is remarkable in this part 
 of his history. O si sic omnia ! — Mosheim 
 Eccl. Hist IX. Cent.— Gibbon, Vol. V. C. 54. 
 
572 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap.H. 
 
 teacher ; but there seems scarcely a doubt, 
 that they took the name from St. Paul 
 himself. For Constantine gave himself 
 the name of Sylvanus ; his disciples were 
 called, Titus, Timothy, Tychicus, the 
 names of the Apostle's fellow-labourers; 
 and the names of the Apostolic Churches 
 were given to the congregations formed 
 by their labours in Armenia and Cappa- 
 docia. — Their enemies called them Gnos- 
 tics or Manichees ; and confounded them 
 with those ancient sectaries, of whom it 
 is probable that there were then scarcely 
 any remains. It has been too customary 
 to connect different and independent sects 
 into one; and to suppose, that every new 
 phenomenon in religion is nothing more 
 than the revival of some former party. 
 This is frequently the case, but not al- 
 ways. In the present instance, I see rea- 
 son to suppose the Paulicians to have 
 been perfect originals, in regard to any 
 other denomination of Christians. The 
 little, that has already been mentioned 
 concerning them, carries entirely this ap- 
 pearance ; and, I hope, it may shortly be 
 evident, that they originated from a hea- 
 venly influence, teaching and converting 
 them ; and that, in them, we have one of 
 those extraordinary effusions of the Di- 
 vine Spirit, by which the knowledge of 
 Christ and the practice of godliness is 
 kept alive in the world. 
 
 The Paulicians are said to have reject- 
 ed the two epistles of St. Peter. We 
 know nothing of these men, but from the 
 pens of their enemies. Their writings, 
 and the lives of their eminent teachers, 
 are totally lost. In this case, common 
 justice requires us to suspend our belief; 
 and, if internal evidence militate in their 
 favour, a strong presumption is formed 
 against the credibility of a report, raised 
 to their disadvantage. This is the case 
 in the present instance : for, there is no- 
 thing in St. Peter's writings that could 
 naturally prejudice against those writings, 
 persons who cordially received the epistles 
 of St. Paul. There is, on the other hand, 
 the most perfect coincidence of sentiment 
 and spirit between the two Apostles; and, 
 in the latter epistle of St. Peter, toward the 
 end, there is a very remarkable testimony 
 to the inspired character and divine wis- 
 dom of St. Paul. That this sect also de- 
 spised the whole of the Old Testament, 
 is asserted, but on grounds, which seem 
 utterly unwarrantable. For, they are said 
 to have done this as Gnostics and Mani- 
 chees, though they steadily condemned 
 
 the Manichees, and complained of the in- 
 justice which branded them with that 
 odious name. They are also charged 
 with holding the eternity of matter, and 
 the existence of two independent princi- 
 ples; and with denying the real sufferings 
 and real flesh of Christ, It seems no way 
 was found so convenient to disgrace them 
 as by the charge of Manicheism. But I 
 cannot believe that they held these tenets ; 
 not only because they themselves denied 
 the charge, but also because they unques- 
 tionably held things perfectly inconsistent 
 with such notions. Is it possible, that 
 rational creatures, men endued with com- 
 mon understanding, could agree to revere 
 the writings of St. Paul, and to consider 
 them as divinely inspired, and at the 
 same time to condemn those of the Old 
 Testament? 
 
 The pious, intelligent, reader, who is 
 moderately versed in Scripture, does not 
 need to be told, that the Apostle is con- 
 tinually quoting the Old Testament, ex- 
 pounding and illustrating, and building 
 his doctrines upon it: in short, that the 
 New Testament is so indissolubly con- 
 nected with the Old, that he, who despises 
 the latter, cannot really, whatever he may 
 pretend, respect the former as divine ; and 
 that this observation holds good in regard 
 to all the writers of the New Testament, 
 and to St. Paul more particularly. It is 
 allowed also, that the Paulicians held the 
 common orthodox doctrine of the Trinity, 
 with the confession and use of which the 
 whole apparatus of the Manichean fable 
 seems incompatible. Let the reader re- 
 flect only on the light in which Mani- 
 cheism appeared to Augustine of Hippo, 
 al\er he became acquainted with St. Paul, 
 and he will probably form a just estimate 
 of this whole subject. 
 
 This people also were perfectly free 
 from the image-worship, which more and 
 more pervaded the East. They were 
 simply scriptural in the use of the sacra- 
 ments : they disregarded relics, and all 
 the fashionable equipage of superstition; 
 they knew no other Mediator but the 
 Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 Sylvanus preached with great success. 
 Pontus and Cappadocia, regions once re- 
 nowned for Christian piety, were again 
 enlightened through his labours. He and 
 his associates were distinguished from 
 the clergy of that day, by their scriptural 
 names, modest titles, zeal, knowledge, 
 activity and holiness. Their congrega- 
 tions were diffused over the provinces of 
 
Cest. IX.] 
 
 THE PAULICIANS. 
 
 573 
 
 Asia Minor : six of the principal churches 
 were called by the names of those to 
 whom St. Paul addressed his epistles; 
 and Sylvanus resided in the neig-hbour- 
 hood of Colonia in Pontus. Roused by 
 the growing importance of the sect, the 
 Greek emperors began to persecute the 
 Paulicians with the most sanguinary se- 
 verity; and, under Christian forms and 
 names, they reacted the scenes of Gale- 
 rius and Maximin. "To their other ex- 
 cellent deeds," says the bigoted Peter, 
 the Sicilian, " the divine and orthodox 
 emperors added this virtue, that they or- 
 dered the Montanists and Manicheans* 
 to be capitally punished; and ther books, 
 wherever found, to be committed to the 
 flames: also, that if any person was 
 found to have secreted them, he was to 
 be put to death, and his goods to be con- 
 fiscated." False religion, in all ages, 
 hates the light, and supports herself by 
 persecution, not by instruction ; while the 
 real truth as it is in Jesus always comes 
 TO THE LIGHT of Scripturc, and exhibits 
 that light plainly to the world by reading 
 and expounding the sacred volume, 
 whence alone she derives her authority. 
 
 A Greek officer, named Simeon, armed 
 with imperial authority, came to Colonia 
 and apprehended Sylvanus and a number 
 of his disciples. Stones were 
 Paulicians p,jt i^to the hands of these 
 ^^l^T last, and they were required 
 
 *^" ^ ' to kill their pastor, as the 
 
 price of their forgiveness. A person 
 named Justus, was the only one of the 
 number who obeyed ; and he stoned to 
 death the father of the Paulicians, who 
 had laboured twenty-seven years. Justus 
 signalized himself still more by betraying 
 his brethren ; while Simeon, struck, no 
 doubt, with the evidences of divine grace 
 apparent in the sufferers, embraced, at 
 length, the faith which he came to de- 
 stroy, gave up the world, preached the 
 Gospel, and died a martyr. For a hun- 
 dred and fifty years these servants of 
 Christ underwent the horrors of per- 
 secution, with Christian patience and 
 meekness ; and if the acts of their mar- 
 tyrdom, their preaching, and their lives, 
 were distinctly recorded, there seems no 
 doubt, but this people would appear to 
 
 • Such, I suppose, were the opprobrious 
 names given to the Paulicians. The real 
 Montanists had originated in the second cen- 
 tury, and had probably now no existence. We 
 see here a further proof of the vague and de- 
 lusory modes of criminating the Paulicians. 
 
 have resembled those, whom the Church 
 justly reveres as having suffered in the 
 behalf of Christ during the three first 
 centuries. Durinfj all this time the 
 power of the Spirit of God was with 
 them ; and they practised the precepts of 
 the 13th chapter to the Romans, as well 
 as believed and felt the precious truths 
 contained in the doctrinal chapters of the 
 same epistle. The blood of the martyrs 
 was, in this case, as formerly, the seed of 
 the Church : a succession of teachers and 
 congregations arose, and a person named 
 Sergius, who laboured among them thirty- 
 three years, is confessed by the bigoted 
 historians to have been a man of extraor- 
 dinary virtue. The persecu- 
 
 tion had, however, some in- T ■° '^^' 
 • • i.-ii i 1 ♦u during the 
 
 termissions, till at length, niinority 
 
 Theodora, the same Empress, of her son 
 
 who fully established image- Michael 
 
 worship, exerted herself be- III. ruled 
 
 yond any of her predecessors asEm- 
 
 against them. Her inquis- P'',*;^^'^"^ 
 .= 1 J xu 1 fully estab- 
 
 itors ransacked the lesser jighed 
 
 Asia, in search of these sec- ima^-e- 
 taries ; and she is computed worship, 
 to have killed by the gibbet, 
 by fire, and by sword, a hundred thou- 
 sand persons. 
 
 We have brought down the scanty his- 
 tory of this people to about the year 845. 
 To undergo a constant scene of perse- 
 cution with Christian meek- guchisthe 
 nes)5, and to render both to history of 
 God and to Caesar their the Pauli- 
 dueS all the time, at once cians to 
 require and evidence the j^ -q §^5^ 
 strength xjf real grace. Of 
 this the Paulicians seem to have beeri 
 possessed till the period just mentioned. 
 They remembered the injunction of Rev. 
 xiii. 10: "He that killeth with the 
 sword, must be killed with the sword : 
 here is the faith and patience of the 
 Saints." Let Christians believe, rejoice 
 in God, patiently suffer, return good 
 for evil, and still obey those whom God 
 hath set over them. These weapons have 
 ever been found too hard for Satan : the 
 Church has grown exceedingly, wherever 
 they were faithfully handled ; and the 
 power of the Gospel has prevailed. This 
 was the case very eminently with the 
 Church, in the era of Dioclesian's perse- 
 cution. She not only outlived the storm, 
 but also, under the conduct of Providence, 
 became externally as well as internally, 
 superior to her enemies. If the Pauli- 
 cians had continued to act thus, similar 
 
574 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH : 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 Declen- 
 sion of the 
 Paulicians 
 
 A. D. 845. 
 
 Nicolas 
 
 made 
 
 Pope, 
 
 A. D. 858, 
 Holy See. 
 
 consequences might have 
 heen rationally expected. But 
 faith and patience failed at 
 length. We are ignorant of 
 the steps by which they were 
 gradually betrayed into a secular spirit. 
 About the year 845, they murdered two 
 persecutors, a governor and a bishop : 
 and a soldier called Carbeas, who com- 
 manded the guards in the imperial armies, 
 that he might revenge his father's death, 
 who had been slain by the inquisitors, 
 formed a band of Paulicians, who re- 
 nounced their allegiance to the emperor, 
 negotiated with the Mahometan powers, 
 and, by their assistance, endeavoured to 
 establish the independency of their sect. 
 Theodora was succeeded by her son 
 Michael.* Her cruelties and super- 
 stitions deserved the applause of Nicolas, 
 who became pope of Rome 
 in 858. In a letter he highly 
 approved her conduct, and 
 admired her on account of 
 her implicit obedience to the 
 We learn from the biogra- 
 pher of the emperor Michael what Theo- 
 dora had done to call forth the encomiums 
 of this pontiff. "She resolved," says 
 he, " to bring the Paulicians to the true 
 faith, or cut them all off root and branch." 
 — A resolution worthy of a truly Catholic 
 princess ! — " Pursuant to that resolution, 
 she sent some noblemen and magis- 
 trates," not preachers or missionaries, — 
 " into the different provinces of the em- 
 pire ; and by them some of those unhappy 
 wretches were crucified, some put to the 
 sword, and some thrown into the sea and 
 drowned." Thus were they slaughtered 
 to the number of one hundred thousand, 
 and their goods and estates confiscated.! 
 The pope alluded to this bloody mas- 
 sacre, when he commends Theodora in 
 the same letter for the manly vigour she 
 exerted, the Lord co-operating,^ as he 
 blasphemously adds, against obstinate and 
 incorrigible heretics. Nicolas at the same 
 time observes, that the heretics experien- 
 cing in her all the resolution and vigour of 
 a man, could scarcely believe her to be a 
 ■woman. Indeed zeal for religion had 
 changed in Theodora, as it did in our Queen 
 Mary, the tender and compassionate heart 
 
 * This is Michael III. and is surnamed the 
 Sot, or tlie Drunkard. He was the son of the 
 emperor Theophilus, and came to the throne 
 A. D. 842, under the tuition and regency of his 
 mother Theodora. 
 
 + Porphyrog. ^ Domino cooperante. 
 
 of a woman into that of a merciless and 
 blood-thirsty tyrant. And here I am not 
 disposed to suppress, that from the pope's 
 own words, it appears, that the Apostolic 
 See had its share in the glorious exploit 
 just mentioned ; for the pope, after tell- 
 ing her that the heretics dreaded, and at 
 the same time admired, her resolution 
 and steadiness in maintaining the purity 
 of the Catholic faith adds, "«««? why so, 
 but because you followed the directions of 
 the Jposfolic See .?"* 
 
 So truly was Antichristian tyranny now 
 established at Rome ! ! 
 
 Michael, the son of Theodora, fled be- 
 fore the arms of Carbeas ; whose suc- 
 cessor Chrysocheir, in conjunction with 
 the Mahometans, penetrated into the 
 heart of Asia, and desolated the fairest 
 provinces of the Greeks. In the issue, 
 however, Chrysocheir was slain, the 
 Paulician fortress Tephrice was reduced, 
 and the power of the rebels was broken, 
 though a number of them in the moun- 
 tains, by the assistance of the Arabs, 
 preserved an uncomfortable independence. 
 The ferocious actions of the later Pau- 
 licians show, that they had lost the spirit 
 of true religion : their schemes of worldly 
 ambition were likewise frustrated. And 
 similar consequences, in more recent ages, 
 may be found to have resulted from po- 
 litical methods of supporting the Gospel. 
 
 A number of this sect, about the middle 
 of the eighth century, had been trans- 
 planted into Thrace, and subsisted there 
 for ages, sometimes tolerated, at other 
 times persecuted, by the reigning pow- 
 ers. Even to the end of the seventeenth 
 century they still existed about the val- 
 leys of Mount Haemus. Of their reli- 
 gious history, during this period, I can 
 find nothing : and, in our days, they seem 
 to have nothing more of the Paulician 
 sect than the name. I cannot follow the 
 learned author, to whom I owe much for 
 this account,! in his conjectures con- 
 cerning this people's dispersion through 
 the European provinces. Nor does there 
 seem any good evidence of the Wal- 
 denses owing their origin to the Pau- 
 licians. Such speculations are too doubt- 
 ful to satisfy the minds of those who prefer 
 the solid evidence of facts to the conjec- 
 tural ebullitions of a warm imagination. 
 On the whole, we have seen, in general, 
 satisfactory proof of the work of divine 
 
 * Concil. Lab. 
 t Gibbon. 
 
 Nic, Ep. xiv. 
 
CZSTT. IX.] 
 
 OPPOSITION TO POPERY. 
 
 575 
 
 grace in Asia Minor, commencing in the 
 latter end of the seventh century, and 
 extended to the former part of the ninth 
 century. But, where secular politics 
 begin, there the life and simplicity of 
 vital godliness end. 
 cians begran to rebe 
 lished government; 
 evil ; to mingle amojjg 
 
 When the Pauli- 
 against the estab- 
 to return evil for 
 
 THE HEATHEN,* 
 
 the Mahometans ; and to defend their own 
 religion by arms, negociations, and alli- 
 ances, ihey ceased to become the light 
 OF THE WORLD, and the salt of the earth. 
 Such they had been for more than a hun- 
 dred and eighty j-ears, adorning and ex- 
 emplifying the real Gospel, by a life of 
 faith, hope, and charity, and by the pre- 
 servation of the truth in a patient course 
 of suffering, looking for true riches and 
 honour in the world to come ; and, no 
 doubt, they are not frustrated of their 
 hope. But, when secular maxims began 
 to prevail among them, they shone, for a 
 time, as heroes and patriots, in the false 
 glare of human praise ; but they lost the 
 solidity of true honour, as all have done 
 in all ages, who have descended from the 
 grandeur of the passive spirit of confor- 
 mity to Christ, and have preferred to that 
 spirit the low ambition of earthly great- 
 ness. f 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE OPPOSITION MADE 
 RLTPTIOXS OF POPERY 
 TURY, PARTICULARLY 
 BISHOP OF TURIN. 
 
 TO THE COR- 
 IN THIS CEN- 
 BY CLAUDIUS 
 
 We have seen the light of divine truth 
 shedding its kindly influence in the East; 
 let us now behold the reviving power of 
 
 Council at 
 Paris, 
 
 A. D. 824. 
 
 • Psalm cvi. ver. 35. 
 
 ■j- Natalis Alexander, a voluminous French 
 historian, and more vehemently attached to tlie 
 popedom than Frenchmen conmionly are, 
 couples the Paulicians and also Claudius of 
 Turin, of whom the reader will hear in the 
 next Chapter, with Wickliffites, Lutherans, 
 and Calvinists. He brands them as enemies 
 to the adoration of the Cross of Christ, which, 
 he says, the true Church always adored, " not 
 only the genuine Cross, but an effigy of it, as 
 soon as the Church obtaineil liberty unde 
 Christian princes." Tom. V. p. 636 — 63S. 
 This deserves to be considered as the testi- 
 mony of a learned adversary to the evangelical 
 character of the Paulicians, and of Claudius of 
 Turin. 
 
 its beams in the West. We must not 
 expect to observe it generally illuminat- 
 ing either of those two great divisions of 
 the Christian world, but onlj' shining ia 
 some particular districts. The absolute 
 power of the pope, the worship of images, 
 and the invocation of Saints and Angels, 
 were opposed, as in the last century, by 
 several princes and ecclesi- 
 astics. A council at Paris, 
 held in the year 824, agreed 
 with the council of Frankfort 
 in the rejection of the decrees of the 
 second council of Nice, and in the prohi- 
 bition of image-worship. Agobard, arch- 
 bishop of Lyons, wrote a book against 
 the abuse of pictures and images ; in 
 which he maintained, that we ought not 
 to worship any image of God, except that 
 which is God himself, his eternal Son; 
 and, that there is no other Mediator be- 
 tween God and man, except Jesus Christ, 
 both God and man. I have already ob- 
 served, that the novel notion of transub- 
 stantiation was vigorously opposed by 
 Rahanus and Scotus Erigena, the two 
 most learned men of the West, in this 
 century ; nor was that doctrine, as yet, 
 established in the kingdom of"Antichrist. 
 Rahanus treats it as an upstart opinion ; 
 it may be proper to add, that Bertram, a 
 monk of Corbie, being asked whether the 
 same body, which was crucified, was re- 
 ceived in the mouth of the faithful, in 
 the sacrament, answered, that " the dif- 
 ference is as great as between the pledge, 
 and the thing for which the pledge is de- 
 livered : as great as between the repre- 
 sentation and the reality." No Protest- 
 ant, at this day, could speak more ex- 
 plicitly the sense of the Primitive Church. 
 In Italy itself, Angilbertus, bishop of Mi- 
 lan, refused to own the pope's supremacy, 
 nor did the church of Milan submit to the 
 Roman See till two hundred years after- 
 wards.* 
 
 But these are only distant and remote 
 evidences, that God had not forsaken his 
 Church in Europe. There want not, 
 however, more evident demonstrations of 
 the same thing in the'life and writings of 
 Claudius, bishop of Turin, a character 
 worthy to be held in high estimation by 
 
 * I have thus far, in this chapter, availed 
 myself of the labours of Bishop Newton on 
 the Prophecies, 3d Vol. 151, &c. In the 
 sequel of the chapter, I make use of the re- 
 marks of Allix on the Churches of Piedmont, 
 of the Centuriators, and of Fleury, though a 
 ' Roman Catholic. 
 
576 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI 
 
 all, who fear God : but so little justice, 
 in our times, is done to godliness, that 
 while the names of statesmen, heroes, and 
 philosophers are in every one's mouth, 
 the name of this great reformer, has, 
 probably, been not so much as heard of, 
 by the generality of my readers. To me 
 he seems to stand the first in the order 
 of time among the Reformers. Let us 
 collect the little information which we 
 have been able to obtain concerning him. 
 Claudius was born in Spain. In his 
 early years he was a chaplain in the 
 court of Lewis the meek : he was reputed 
 to have great knowledge in the Scrip- 
 tures ;* insomuch that Lewis perceiving 
 the ignorance of a great part of Italy, in 
 regard to the doctrines of the Gospel, 
 says Fleur}', and willing to provide the 
 churches of Piedmont with one, who 
 might stem the growing torrent of image- 
 
 . worship, promoted Claudius 
 
 Claudius ^Q ^jjg ggg Qf -p,jj.ij, ^^^^^ ti^p 
 
 made _,„ ^, ,. ' 
 
 bishop of y^^'' ^^^* Claudius answer- 
 Turin, ed the expectations of the em- 
 A D 817 peror : by his writings, he co- 
 piously expounded the Scrip- 
 tures : by his preaching, he laboriously 
 instructed the people : "in truth," says 
 Fleury, " he began to preach and instruct 
 with great application." The calumnies, 
 with which his principles were aspersed, 
 are abundantly confuted by his comment- 
 aries on various parts of tlie Old and 
 New Testament, still extant in manu- 
 scripts, in various French libraries. A 
 comment on the Epistle to the Galatians, 
 is his only work which was committed 
 to the press. In it he every where as- 
 serts the equality of all the Apostles with 
 St. Peter. And, indeed, he always de- 
 clares Jesus Christ to be the only proper 
 head of the Church. He is severe against 
 the doctrine of human merits, and of the 
 exaltation of traditions to a height of cre- 
 dibility equal to that of the Divine Word. 
 He maintains that we are to be saved 
 by faith only ; holds the fallibility of the 
 Church, exposes the futility of praying 
 for the dead, and the sinfulness of the 
 idolatrous practices' then supported by 
 the Roman See. Such are the sentiments 
 found in his commentary on the Epistle 
 to the Galatians. 
 
 In his commentary on St. Matthew, be- 
 
 * Fleurj', Vol. V. B. 47. In this, and some 
 other matters, the testimony of a Roman Ca- 
 tholic to the tharacter of tiie first Protestant 
 Reformer, is of great weiglit. 
 
 sides an explication of the Sacrament, 
 very different from that of Paschasius, 
 who defended transubstantiation, about 
 sixteen years after, we meet with some 
 pious sentiments worth transcribing. The 
 words, " I will no more drink of the fruit 
 of the vine, till that day that I drink it 
 new with you in my Father's kingdom," 
 he paraphrases thus : " no longer will I 
 delight in the carnal ceremonies of the 
 synagogue, among which the Paschal 
 Lamb was most distinguished; for the 
 time of my resurrection is at hand ; that 
 day will come, when, placed in the king- 
 dom of God, exalted to the glory of im- 
 mortal life, I shall be filled with a new 
 joy, together with you, on account of the 
 salvation of the people born again from 
 the fountain of the same spiritual grace. 
 What else does he mean by new wine, 
 but the immortality of renewed bodies 1 
 By saying ' with you,' he promises them 
 the resurrection of their bodies, that they 
 might put on immortality. The expres- 
 sion ' with you,' must not be referred to 
 the same time, but to the same event of 
 the renewal of the body. The Apostle 
 declares that we are risen with Christ, 
 that by the expectation of the future he 
 might bring present joy."* 
 
 In the end of his commentary on Levi- 
 ticus, dedicated to the Abbot Theodemir, 
 he writes some things, which may exhi- 
 bit and illustrate his cares and labours in 
 the support of real godliness. 
 
 "The beauty of the Eternal Truth and 
 Wisdom doth not exclude those who 
 come to her. God grant I may always 
 have a constant will to enjoy her, for the 
 love of whom I have undertaken this 
 work ! From the ends of the earth she 
 is near to all who seek her : she instructs 
 within, and converts those who behold 
 her. No man can judge of her; no man 
 can judge well without her. We arc not 
 commanded to go to the creature, that we 
 may be happy, but to the Creator, who 
 alone can fill us with bliss. The will 
 fastenincr itself on the unchangeable good, 
 obtains happiness. But when the will 
 separates itself from the unchangeable 
 good, and seeks her own good exclu- 
 sively, or directs herself to inferior or 
 external good, she falls from God." — 
 These truths, conceived in the very taste 
 
 * This can hardly be allowed to be the 
 whole of St. Paul's meaning, in the expression 
 "risen with Christ:" nevertheless, the ideas 
 of Claudius are good, so far as he goes. 
 
Cent. IX.] 
 
 OPPOSITION TO POPERY. 
 
 577 
 
 of the bishop of Hippo, are followed by 
 a long quotation from that father, which 
 expressly forbids the worship of Saints ; 
 the substance of which is thus expressed : 
 " We must honour them, because they 
 deserve to be imitated, not worship them 
 with an act of religion. We envy not 
 their bliss in the uninterrupted enjoy- 
 ment of God, but we love them the more, 
 because we hope for something corres- 
 pondent to these their excellencies, from 
 him who is our God as well as theirs." 
 These things, says Claudius, are the 
 strongest mysteries of our faith. In de- 
 fending this truth, I am become a re- 
 proach to my neighbours ; those, who 
 see me, scoff at me, and point at me to 
 one another. But the Father of mercies 
 and the God of all consolations, has com- 
 forted me in my tribulations,* that I may 
 be able to comfort others, who are op- 
 pressed with sorrow and affliction. I rely 
 on the protection of him, who has armed 
 me with the armour of righteousness and 
 of faith, the tried shield for my eternal 
 salvation. 
 
 Complaints had, it seems, been made 
 against Claudius, at the court of Lewis, 
 for having broken down images through 
 his diocese, and for having written against 
 the worship of them. Being reproached 
 by Theodemir for his conduct, Claudius 
 wrote an apology, of which the following 
 is an extract. I " Being obliged to accept 
 the bishopric, when I came to Turin, I 
 found all the churches full of abominations 
 and images; and because I began to destroy 
 what every one adored, ever}^ one began to 
 open his mouth against me. — They sa}^, 
 we do not believe that there is any thing 
 divine in the image ; we only reverence it 
 in honour of the person whom it repre- 
 sents. I answer, if they, who have 
 quitted the worship of devils, honour the 
 images of saints, they have not forsaken 
 idols ; thej'^ have only changed the names. 
 For whether you paint upon a wall the 
 pictures of St. Peter or St. Paul, or those 
 of Jupiter, Saturn, or Mercury, they are 
 all dead, and are therefore now neither 
 gods, nor apostles, nor men. If you 
 worship Peter or Paul, you may have 
 changed the name, but the error conti- 
 nues the same. If men must be adored, 
 there would be less absurdity in adoring 
 thera when alive, while they are the 
 image of God, than after they are dead, 
 when they only resemble stocks and 
 
 stones. And if we are not allowed to 
 adore the works of God, much less are 
 we allowed to adore the works of men.— 
 If the Cross of Christ ought to be ador- 
 ed, because he was nailed to it, for the 
 same reason we ought to adore mangers, 
 because he was laid in one ; and swad- 
 dling-clothes, because he was wrapped 
 in them." He goes on to mention other 
 similar instances, and adds, " we have 
 not been commanded to adore the cross, 
 but to bear it, and to deny ourselves. — 
 As to your assertion, that I speak against 
 the going to Rome by way of penance, it 
 is not true ; I neither approve nor disap- 
 prove such pilgrimages ; to some they 
 are not useful, to others they are not pre- 
 judicial. It is a great perversion of the 
 words, 'thou art Peter,' &c. to infer from 
 them, that eternal life is to be gained by 
 a journey to Rome, and by the interces- 
 sion of St. Peter. — The Apostolic, that 
 is, the Pope, is not he, who fills the See 
 of the Apostle, but he, who discharges 
 its duties." 
 
 Such, says Fleury, were the errors of 
 Claudius of Turin. He then tells us, 
 that they were refuted by a recluse called 
 Dungal. He gives us a few extracts from 
 this writer, which it will be perfectly 
 needless to recite ; for, as Fleury owns, 
 Dungal scarcely makes use of any argu- 
 ments ; and " in truth," continues he, 
 "the main proofs in this matter-have al- 
 ways been the tradition and constant 
 usage of the Church." In the judgment 
 of men who determine controversies, 
 which enter into the essence of Chris- 
 tianity by the Scriptures alone, the vic- 
 tory of Claudius in this dispute is deci- 
 sive. 
 
 We are obliged, however, to Dungal, 
 for the preservation of the extracts of the 
 apology. In addition to the argumenta- 
 tive parts, there are also some pathetic 
 exhortations interspersed in the work, 
 which show the ardour of the bishop's 
 mind, and the charitable zeal for divine 
 truth and the salvation of souls, with 
 which he was endowed. I shall present 
 the reader with a few sentences.* " All 
 these thitigs are ridiculous, rather worthy 
 of lamentation than of grave discussion ; 
 but we are obliged to describe them, in 
 opposition to fools, and to declaim against 
 those hearts of stone, whom the arrows 
 and sentences of the Divine Word can- 
 not pierce, and therefore we are under a 
 
 * 2Cor. i. 
 Vol. I. 
 
 3 C 
 
 f Fleury. 
 
 AUix. 
 
578 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 necessity to assault them in this manner. 
 Come to yourselves again, ye wretched 
 transgressors : why are ye gone astray 
 from the truth, and fallen in love with 
 vanity 1 Why do you make the souls of 
 multitudes the associates of devils, by 
 the worship of idols, estranging them 
 from their Creator, and precipitating them 
 into everlasting damnation ] — Return, ye 
 blind, to your light. — Shall we not be- 
 lieve God, when he swears, that neither 
 Noah, nor Daniel, nor Job* shall deliver 
 son or daughter by their righteousness ] 
 For this end he makes the declaration, 
 that none might put confidence in the in- 
 tercession of saints. — Ye fools, who run 
 to Rome, to seek there for the interces- 
 sion of an Apostle, when will ye be 
 wise 1 What would St. Augustine say 
 of you, whom we have so often quoted ?" 
 If the works of this great and good 
 man had been published as faithfully as 
 those of his adversaries, 1 doubt not but 
 he would appear to us in a much more 
 striking light than he can do from a few 
 imperfect quotations. But his writings 
 were either suppressed or secreted. The 
 reign of idolatry had taken place, and the 
 world worshipped the " beast." The 
 labours, however, of Claudius, were not 
 in vain. In his own diocese, at least, he 
 checked the growing evil ; and Romish 
 writers have owned, that the valleys of 
 Piedmont, which belonged to his bishop- 
 ric, preserved his opinions in the ninth 
 and tenth centuries. Whence it is pro- 
 bable, that the Churches of the Wal- 
 denses were either derived, or at least re- 
 ceived much increase and confirmation 
 from his labours. 
 
 If we look, in an evangelical view, at 
 the subject-matter of this bishop's preach- 
 ing and expositions, it will appear that 
 the controversy between him and his ad- 
 versaries was, whether man shall be 
 justified before God by jesus christ 
 THROUGH FAITH ALONE, or whether he 
 shall betake himself to other refuges 
 for the peace of his disquieted conscience. 
 What those other refuges may be, will 
 much depend on the customs and habits 
 of the times in which a man lives. In 
 ^n age, like our own, of great civiliza- 
 tion and refinement, they will, chiefly, 
 be acts of humanity and kindness to the 
 needy : in an age of superstition, they 
 will be ceremonial observances, and the 
 whole apparatus of will-worship. j — 
 
 Against the false reliefs of a burdened 
 conscience, which the popedom exhibit- 
 ed, this first Protestant reformer militat- 
 ed in much Christian zeal, and pointed 
 out to his hearers and his readers the me- 
 diation of Jesus Christ, as the sole and 
 all-sufficient object of dependence. With 
 what success this was done among his 
 people, we have no account; but, doubts 
 less, so great a light was not set up in 
 vain ; 
 
 and could I recite the effects of his 
 labours in Piedmont, the account would 
 in all probability be both pleasing and 
 profitable to evangelical minds. Let us 
 see what further discoveries we can make 
 of his spirit and views, from the extracts 
 of his writings drawn from another of his 
 adversaries. 
 
 This* was Jonas, bishop of Orleans. 
 He wrote three books against Claudius, 
 filled with invectives. He mentions, 
 however, such reasonings made use of by 
 his adversary, as it was not in his power 
 to overturn, particularly the authority of 
 the second commandment, on which 
 hinge, indeed, the whole controversy 
 turns, so far as it relates to the worship 
 of images. In regard to pilgrimages to 
 Rome, Claudius observes, that the great- 
 er part, in consequence of them, become 
 worse men than they were before. In 
 opposing the popedom, he observes, that 
 men, void of all spiritual understanding, 
 misapplying those words of our Lord, 
 " I will give unto thee the keys," &c.t 
 ignorant men, setting aside all spiritual 
 understanding, hope to obtain eternal life 
 by making pilgrimages to Rome. Hence 
 we see, that the power of the popedom 
 was much founded on the misguided con- 
 sciences of men. Persons distressed, on 
 account of their sins, naturally catch_ at 
 every support, which oflTers them relief. 
 And the true light of the Gospel of peace 
 no longer shining, they availed them- 
 selves of the delusory consolations offer- 
 ed by the popedom ; and thus, at once, 
 gained a false peace, hardened them- 
 selves in real wickedness, and supported 
 the grandeur of Antichrist. What a bless- 
 ing is the real Gospel ! It both consoles 
 and sanctifies the sinner, and removes the 
 most powerful incitements to supersti- 
 tion. But, to proceed with the words of 
 Claudius. " It is not said, ' whatsoever 
 thou shall bind in heaven, shall be bound 
 on earth.' — By this we should know, that 
 
 * Ezek. xiv. 
 
 t See Coloss. ii. 
 
 * Centuriat. Magd 
 t Matt. xvi. 19. 
 
 Cent. IX. 
 
Cent, IX.] 
 
 GOTTESCHALCUS. 
 
 579 
 
 Claudius, 
 for sixteen 
 years, 
 writes 
 against the 
 prevailing 
 supersti- 
 tions. 
 
 Dies, 
 A. D. 839. 
 
 in its full 
 opposers 
 
 the ministry of the bishops of the Church 
 continue only so long as they remain 
 upon earth. After they have left this 
 world, it ceases ; St. Peter has no longer 
 any influence in the government of the 
 Church militant; and his successors ex- 
 ercise the office, so long as they live in- 
 deed, but no longer.* From the year 
 823, Claudius wrote against the prevail- 
 ing superstition, and lived to 
 the year 839. That he was 
 not put to death for confessing 
 the real faith of Christ, seems 
 to have been, under Provi- 
 dence, owing to the protection 
 of the French court. The 
 cause, which he espoused, 
 was still, in part, supported 
 in the western churches; and 
 the Roman hierarchy was not 
 yet able to establish idolatry 
 extent, and to punish all its 
 It is proper to add, that even 
 the adversaries of Claudius did not insist 
 on the worship of images ; they only as- 
 serted that they were innocent and useful. 
 So far were the decrees of the papacy 
 from being owned as decisive, through 
 Europe. At the same time, it must be 
 confessed, that the middle path, which 
 first had the sanction of Gregory, and 
 was afterwards confirmed by the Carolin 
 books and the council of Frankfort, na- 
 turally paved the way for the gradual es- 
 tablishment of idolatry. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE CASE OF GOTTESCHALCUS. 
 
 The subject of predestination and grace 
 had been formerly controverted in the 
 churches of France, with a considerable 
 degree of acuteness and ingenuity, and 
 what is still more pleasing to a Christian 
 mind, with seriousness, candour, and 
 
 charity.* We have seen with what zeal 
 the doctrine of divine grace had been de- 
 fended and illustrated by the followers of 
 Augustine, and what a salutary influence 
 had attended that doctrine on the knowr 
 ledge, the spirit, and the lives of Chris- 
 tians. It has appeared also, that many 
 who, partly through an ill-grounded fear 
 of pernicious consequences, and partly 
 through a misunderstanding of the nature 
 of the subject, were averse to the senti- 
 ments of Augustine, did still sincerely 
 abhor Pelagianism, and with a happy in- 
 consistency, lived humbly dependent on 
 divine grace alone, though in words they 
 maintained Semi-Pelagianism. But, as 
 superstition, idolatry, and ignorance in- 
 creased, the truly evangelical views of 
 Augustine were more and more thrown 
 into the shade, and the case of Gottes- 
 chalcus showed, that it was now no 
 longer permitted to a divine to promulge 
 the" sentiments of the bishop of Hippo 
 with impunity. 
 
 Gotteschalcus was born in Germany ; 
 from early life he had been a monk; and 
 had devoted himself to theological inqui- 
 ries. He was peculiarly fond of the 
 writings of Augustine, and entered with 
 much zeal into his sentiments. f That 
 he really held the doctrines of that father, 
 seems evident from the account which is 
 transmitted to us, though it is but scanty. 
 He expressly owned, that the wicked 
 were condemned for their own demerits. 
 If he was charged with making God the 
 author of sin, it was no more than what 
 befel the bishop of Hippo; and FJeury 
 himself owns, that he was misrepresent- 
 ed by his adversaries. The most culpa- 
 ble thing, which I find in him, if indeed 
 a certairT confession of faith, ascribed to 
 him, be genuine, is this, that he offered 
 to undergo a trial by fire, on this condi- 
 tion, that if be was preserved unhurt, 
 his doctrine should be allowed to be di- 
 vine. If he was really guilty of this 
 
 * I have added a word or two explanatory of 
 the meaning, which, on account of the imper- 
 fection of the quotation, is sufficiently em- 
 barrassed. I apprehend, he is inferring fi'om 
 the real words of our Lord, " whatsoever thou 
 shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven," 
 that St. Peter's episcopal acts terminated with 
 his life ; whereas, if it had been said, whatso- 
 ever thou shalt bind in heaven, shall be bound 
 on earth, some countenance might seem to be 
 given to the idea of the continuance of his 
 power on earth, in the persons of his succes- 
 sors. Cent. Magd. Cent. IX. 118. 
 
 * See p. 485. 
 
 + 1 iiave extracted the best account of this 
 person which I could from Fleury and Dupin, 
 both Roman Catholic writers : 1 have availed 
 myself also of the remarks of Mosheim. From 
 the writings of the Magdeburgensian Centu- 
 riators, where I might have expected the most 
 equitable and the most just account, I could 
 collect nothing. They handle the subject brief- 
 ly and confusedly, and join with the enemies 
 of Gotteschalcus in condemning him, without 
 affording their readers any proper matsrials, 
 on which they might form a judgment for 
 themselves. 
 
580 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 Gottes- 
 chalciis 
 travels in- 
 to Dalma- 
 tia and 
 Pannonia, 
 
 A. D. 846. 
 
 enthusiastic presumption, the issue of the 
 persecution which he afterwards under- 
 went, was calculated to humble him, and 
 cause him to learn more practically than 
 he had ever done, the real power of 
 those doctrines for which he honestly 
 suffered. 
 
 About the year 84G, he left his monas- 
 tery, and went into Dalmatia and Panno- 
 nia, where he spread the doctrines of 
 Augustine, under a pretence, 
 it was said by his enemies, 
 of preaching the Gospel to 
 the infidels. At his return, 
 he remained some time in 
 Lombardy, and in 847, he 
 held a conference with No- 
 tingus, bishop of Vienne, con- 
 cerning predestination. His 
 zeal gave offence to the bishop, who pre- 
 vailed on Rabanus, the archbishop of 
 Mentz, to undertake the confutation of 
 the novel heresy, as it was now decreed. 
 Rabanus calumniated Gotteschalcus with 
 those monstrous and licentious conse- 
 quences, with which the doctrines of 
 divine grace liave in all ages been as 
 persed, and from which St. Paul himself 
 was not exempted : and having dressed 
 the sentiments of his adversary in the 
 most odious colours, he found it no hard 
 task to expose iiim to infamy. Tbe learn- 
 ed monk undertook to defend himself in 
 writing, and proposed the subject to the 
 consideration of the most able men of his 
 time; and, against the great credit and 
 authority of his adversary, he opposed 
 the renowned name of Augustine. But 
 no cause ever appeared with more disad- 
 vantage in our times than that of Gottes- 
 chalcus. For we have not his treatise, 
 composed against Rabanus ; only some 
 fragments of it have been preserved to 
 us, by Hincmar, archbishop of Rheims, 
 who, the reader will soon be convinced, 
 was not a man fit to be trusted with the 
 care of his reputation. In a 
 synod held at Mentz, Gottes- 
 chalcus was condemned ; and 
 Rabanus, observing that he 
 was of the diocese of Sois- 
 sons, which was subject to 
 the archbishop of Rheims, 
 sent him to Hincmar, calling 
 him a vagabond, and declar- 
 ing that he had seduced several persons 
 who were become less careful of their 
 salvation, since they had learned from 
 Gotteschalcus to say, Why should I la- 
 hour for my salvation 1 — If I am predes- 
 
 Gottes- 
 chalcns 
 condemn- 
 ed in the 
 synod of 
 Mentz, 
 
 A. D. 848. 
 
 tinated to damnation, I cannot avoid it ; 
 and, on the contrary, if I am predesti- 
 nated to salvation, whatever sins I am 
 guilty of, I shall certainly be saved.* 
 
 Hincmar entered fully into the views 
 of Rabanus ; and, in a council of bishops, 
 examined Gotteschalcus, who still main- 
 tained his doctrine with firmness. On 
 this account he was condemned as a he- 
 retic, degraded from the priesthood, and 
 ordered to be beaten with rods and im- 
 pri^soned. As nothing, however, was 
 proved against him, except his adherence 
 to the sentiments of Augustine, which 
 were still held in estimation in the Church, 
 this shows, says Du Pin, that he was an 
 injured man. 
 
 And now the presumptuous boasts of 
 Gotteschalcus, if they were his boasts 
 indeed, met with a humiliating check. 
 For, while he was whipped in the pre- 
 sence of the Emperor Charles and the 
 bishops with great severity, and was 
 given to understand that he must cast 
 into the fire with his own hand a writing, 
 in which he had made a collection of 
 Scripturej-texts, in order to prove his opi- 
 nion, he, at length, overpowered by his 
 sufferings, dropped the book into the 
 flames ; after which he was kept close 
 prisoner by Hincmar, in a monastery. 
 This method of convincing a heretic of 
 his error, seems, however, to have been 
 by no means satisfactory to him who had 
 made use of it. For Hincmar still took 
 pains to persuade Gotteschalcus to retract 
 his sentiments, but in vain. 
 The injured pastor maintain- 
 ed, with his last breath, the 
 doctrine for which he suffer- 
 ed, and died in prison in the 
 year 870.t 
 
 Hincmar hearing that he lay at the point 
 of death, sent him a formulary, which 
 he was to subscribe, in order to his be- 
 ing received into the communion of the 
 Church. Gotteschalcus rejected the offer 
 with indignation. He refused to retract 
 
 Gottes- 
 chalcus 
 dies in 
 prison, 
 A. D. 870. 
 
 easnning as this, 
 
 be alletred 
 
 * It is evident, that such 
 might, «ith equal idausibilily, 
 against the doctrine of the nintii cliapter to 
 the Romans. Whoever would ser this subject 
 siCte<l to ihe bottom, may consult Edwardes's 
 admirfdjle treatise on Freewill, where he will 
 find the vulgar objections proved, I think, 
 irrefragably to he fallacious. In the Analogy 
 of Bishop Butler also (Chap. VI. Part I. of 
 the Opinion of Necessity) he will meet with 
 some excellent observations. 
 
 t Cave. 
 
CiNT. IX.] 
 
 CYRIL. 
 
 581 
 
 to the last; and was denied Christian 
 burial, by the orders of Hincmar. 
 
 This is all that I can find material con- 
 cerning Gotteschalcus. That he was a 
 humble and sincere follower of Christ in 
 the main, will scarce be doubted by those 
 who make a fair estimate of his constan- 
 cy in suffering, and at the same time re- 
 flect, that no moral turpitude is affixed to 
 his memory. E)ven in that age there 
 wanted not men, who remonstrated loudly 
 against the barbarity with which he had 
 been treated. Remigius, archbishop of 
 
 Lyons, distinguished himself 
 Gottes- among these ; and, in a coun- 
 chalcus's cil held at Valence, in Dau- 
 opinioiis phiny, in the year 855, both 
 atthe'"' Gotteschalcus and his doc- 
 
 council of trine were vindicated and de- 
 Valence, fended. Two subsequent 
 A. D. 855. councils confirmed the decrees 
 
 of this council. The Churches 
 of Lyons, Vienne, and Aries, formerly 
 renowned for piety, vigorously supported 
 the sentiments of Gotteschalcus ; and it 
 was apparent, that all relish for the doc- 
 trines of grace was not lost in the Church. 
 It is very extraordinary, that the cause of 
 Gotteschalcus should prove, in the end, 
 victorious, while he himself remained 
 under the power of persecution. But 
 the great secular influence of Hincmar, 
 who for near forty years presided at 
 Rheims, and made himself highly useful 
 to kings and princes, seems to account 
 for this. 
 
 It would be uninteresting to detail an 
 account of the writings on both sides, 
 which were published on the occasion of 
 this controversy. One lesson the case 
 before us is peculiarly calculated to teach, 
 namely, not to condemn any person for 
 consequences which others may draw 
 from his doctrine, and which he himself 
 both speculatively and practically disa- 
 vows.* This injustice was never more 
 flagrantly committed, than in the transac- 
 tions which we have briefly reviewed. 
 Of Hincmar, much information indeed is 
 left us in ecclesiastical story ; but I do 
 not seem to have any inore employment 
 for him in this work, than I have for the 
 princes of France and Germany of that 
 period. It is not hard to form, on the 
 whole, soine estimate of the state of reli- 
 gion at that time in France. The spirit 
 
 * See Burnet's Exposition of XXXIX Ar- 
 ticles, Prefoce, p. 8, 9. — And Article 17. p. 
 106. Fol. Edit. 
 
 3c2 
 
 of Christianity was much decayed; but 
 there were, doubtless, a number of per- 
 sons, to whom Christ and his grace were 
 precious : and the influence of evangelical 
 truth was still so strong, that all the cru- 
 elty, activity, and artifice of Hincmar, 
 one of the most subtile politicians of that 
 age, were not able to extirpate it. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL IN 
 THIS CENTURY. 
 
 In this century the churches of the 
 East and West, through the pride and am- 
 bition of the pontiff's of Rome and Con- 
 stantinople, began to be separated from 
 one another. Of such a division, which 
 makes a great noise, in what is commonly 
 called ecclesiastical history, it is suffi- 
 cient for a historian of the Church of 
 Christ to say, that the wound, after re- 
 peated attempts, was never healed. Both 
 the East and the W^est, indeed, were full 
 of idolatry and darkness, and seemed to 
 vie with each other in supporting the 
 kingdom of Satan. Providence, how- 
 ever, made use of the ambitious spirit of 
 the prelates for the still more extensive 
 [)ro])agation of the Gospel. In this chap- 
 ter I shall collect the information upon 
 this subject, which may be extracted from 
 an enormous mass of ecclesiastical rub- 
 bish ; and, at the same time, shall lay 
 before my readers some evidences of the 
 progress of the good work, among the 
 nations, which had been, in part, evange- 
 lized in the two last centuries. 
 
 Constantine, afterwards called Cyril, 
 was born at Thessalonica, of a Roman 
 family, and was educated at Constanti- 
 nople. In 846, the famous pi^f^tjug 
 Photius, who, by much ini- disputes 
 quity, at length obtained the with Igna- 
 bishopric of Constantinople, tins, the 
 envying Ignatius, at that time l*atriarch 
 bishop, contended, in opposi- o''^o"- 
 tion to him, that every man * 
 
 had two souls. Beingrepro- ^' • ^*"* 
 ved by Cyril, he said, that he meant not to 
 hurt any one, but only to try the logical 
 abilities of Ignatius. " You have thrown 
 your darts into the crowd," said Cyril, 
 " yet pretend that none will be hurt. 
 How keen soever the eyes of your wisdom 
 be, they are blinded by the smoke of 
 avarice and envy. Your passion against 
 
582 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 Ignatius has deceived you." Cyril in- 
 deed seems to have been as much supe- 
 rior to Photius* in piety, as he vi^as his 
 inferior in learnincf: he became one of 
 the most active and useful missionaries 
 of this century ; and Providence opened 
 to him a door of solid utility among the 
 idolatrous nations. f 
 
 The Bulgarians were a barbarous and 
 savage people, whose neighbourhood 
 had long been troublesome to the Greek 
 emperors. The sister of their king Bo- 
 goris, having been taken captive in a 
 military incursion, was brought to Con- 
 stantinople, and there adopted Christi- 
 anity. Upon her redemption and return 
 to her own country, she gave a strong 
 evidence, that her change of religion 
 had been merely nominal. She was 
 struck with grief and compassion, to see 
 the king, her brother, enslaved to idola- 
 try, and she used the most cogent argu- 
 ments in her power, in order to convince 
 him of the vanity of his worsliip. Bo- 
 goris was affected with her arguments ; 
 but was not prevailed upon to receive the 
 Gospel, till, a famine and a plague ap- 
 pearing in Bulgaria, she persuaded him 
 to pray to the God of the Christians. He 
 did so, and the plague ceased. There 
 was something so remarkable in the 
 event, that Bogoris was induced to send 
 for missionaries to Constantinople ; and 
 at length received baptism, together with 
 many of his people. :j: Cyril and his 
 devout brother Methodius, were the 
 instruments of these blessings to the 
 Bulgarians. Bogoris had desired Me- 
 thodius to draw him a picture. Metho- 
 dius chose for his subject the last jndg- 
 Boo-oris is '^6'^'^' 3"*^1 explained it. This 
 baptized, '^ supposed to have induced 
 A D 861 ^^^ king to receive baptism. 
 The event happened about 
 the year 861. § That same pope Nicolas, 
 who so warmly applauded the sanguinary 
 exploits of the empress Theodora against 
 the Paulicians, rejoiced at the oppor- 
 tunity, which this religious change among 
 the Bulgarians afforded him, of extending 
 his influence. He sent bishops, who 
 preached and baptized throughout the 
 country : and Bogoris sent his son to 
 Rome, with many Lords : he consulted 
 
 * Photius himself became patriarch of Con- 
 stantinople about A. D. 857. 
 t See Alban Butler, Vol. XII. 
 t Porphyrogennetus. 
 § See Alban Butler, Vol. XII. 
 
 the pope on a variety of subjects, and 
 entreated him to send pastors into Bul- 
 garia. Nicolas rejoiced, says Fleury,* 
 not only on account of the conversion of 
 the Bulgarians, but the more, because 
 they came so far to seek instruction from 
 the Holy See. They had, however, 
 though attended with many superstitions, 
 the word of God, and the name of Christ 
 introduced among them. The Saviour, 
 in some sense, was preached, notwith- 
 standing that pride and sinister motives 
 predominated altogether in the Roman 
 See; and St. Paul, in such a case, would 
 
 have said, " I therein do re- o 
 
 ',.,,..,,, huccesses 
 joice, yea, and will rejoice.' f ofthe mis- 
 
 Nor is there any reason to be- sionaries, 
 lieve, that all the mission- ^_ j) 8G6, 
 aries would be no less corrupt 
 than tVie pope : on the contrary, we can- 
 not doubt but the word was not preached 
 altogether in vain. These transactions 
 took place about the year 860. 
 
 About the same time Cyril, and his 
 brother Methodius, missionaries among 
 the Bulgarians, laboured also among the 
 Sclavonians and the Chazari.:|: These 
 people lived on the banks of the Danube, 
 and begged the emperor Michael HI. and 
 his mother Theodora to send them some 
 instructors. Cyril and his brother Metho- 
 dius were sent to preach to them. The 
 Cham and his whole nation were bap- 
 tized : and Cyril gave a noble proof of his 
 disinterestedness in refusing those pre- 
 sents, which the munificence of the prince 
 would have heaped upon him.§ 
 
 Cyril arriving at Chersona, continued 
 there some time, to learn the language of 
 the Chazari; which is supposed to have 
 been the Sclavonian tono-ue, because it is 
 certain that Constantine translated the 
 sacred Books into that language. And 
 as the people had not then the use of 
 letters, he invented an alphabet for their 
 use, and was very successful in teaching 
 Christianity among the Chazari. He 
 made the greater impression on their 
 minds, because of the unquestionable 
 proofs which he gave them of his disin- 
 terestedness. After this, Bartilas, prince 
 of Moravia, understanding what had been 
 done among the Chazari, desired the Greek 
 emperor Michael to send some mission- 
 aries to instruct his people likewise in 
 Christianity. Michael sent the same Con- 
 
 * Fleury, B. L. 49. 
 
 + Philipp. i. 18. t Fleury, B. L. 54. 
 
 § Alban Butler, Vol. XU. 
 
CBirr. IX.] 
 
 CYRIL— FREDERIC. 
 
 583 
 
 stantine and Methodius, who carried with 
 them the same Sclavonian Gospel, taught 
 the children the letters, which they had in- 
 vented, laboured in their mission, and in- 
 sructed the people four years and a half. 
 
 The king of Moravia was baptized with 
 many of his subjects. Cyril died a monk : 
 Methodius was consecrated bishop of 
 Moravia. The Sclavonian tongue, said 
 to have been invented by these two mis- 
 sionaries, is, to this day, used in the 
 liturgy of the Moravians. Complaint 
 was made to Pope John VIII. of the no- 
 velty of worshipping in a barbarous 
 tono-ue ; but he condescended to own 
 himself satisfied with the reasons as- 
 sio-ned by the missionaries. Bogoris, 
 king of Bulgaria, gave up his 
 Bogoris crown about the year 880, 
 resigns his and retired into a monastery. 
 crown, Methodius, after a long course 
 
 A. D. 880. of labours, died in an ad- 
 vanced age.* 
 These were noble works, and some di- 
 vine unction, amidst all the superstitions, 
 no doubt, attended them. In the mean 
 time, Nicolas of Rome, and Photius of 
 Constantinople, two of the proudest men 
 of any age, were acrimoniously inveigh- 
 inor asrainst one another, and striving each 
 to secure to himself the obedience of the 
 new converts. There is reason to hope, 
 that the missionaries themselves were of 
 a better spirit; and if I had materials of 
 their transactions before me, I would with 
 pleasure present them to the reader; but 
 the squabbles of the prelates themselves 
 for ecclesiastical dominion, and the effects 
 of those squabbles, are scarcely worth his 
 attention. 
 
 It appears from one of the invectives 
 of Photius, against Nicolas, that the Rus- 
 sians, hitherto barbarous and savage, had 
 received a Christian bishop, 
 and were then under instruc- 
 tions. Also, about the year 
 8G7, certain provinces of Dal- 
 anes, matia sent an embassy to Con- 
 
 A. D 86". stantinople, imploring the em- 
 peror Basilius to supply them 
 with Christian teachers. Their request 
 was granted, and the pale of the Church 
 was extended throughout those pro- 
 vinces. f 
 
 If we turn onr eyes toward the coun- 
 tries which had been evangelized in the 
 
 Provinces 
 of Dalma- 
 ti;'. solicit 
 mission- 
 
 • Alb. But. Vol. XII. 
 
 + Perphyrogcn. See Mosheira, Chap. I. 
 Cent. IX. 
 
 last century, we may discern some traces 
 of the spirit of godliness still remaining 
 among them. Length of time, under the 
 influence of natural depravity, had not, 
 as yet, destroyed all the seeds of that 
 divine simplicity, w'hich, as we have had 
 repeated occasion to observe, is always 
 the most pure in the infancy of religion. 
 Frederick of Devonshire, nephew to Bo- 
 niface, the Apostle of Germany, so re- 
 nowned in the last century, was appoint- 
 ed bishop of Utrecht; and dining with 
 the emperor, Lewis the Meek, was ex- 
 horted by him to discharge his office with 
 faithfulness and integrity. The bishop, 
 pointing to a fish on the table, asked 
 whether it was proper to take hold of it 
 by the head or by the tail. " By the 
 head, to be sure," replied the emperor. 
 " Then I must begin my career of faith- 
 fulness," answered Frederic, "with your 
 majesty." He proceeded to rebuke the 
 emperor for an incestuous connexion, 
 which he openly maintained with .Tudith 
 the empress; and, in the spirit of John 
 the Baptist, told him, " that it was not 
 lawful for him to have her." Lewis had 
 not expected this rebuke ; and, like He- 
 rod, was not disposed to give up his He- 
 rodias. No sooner did the einpress hear 
 of this rebuke, than, in the true temper 
 of an incensed adulteress, she began to 
 plot the destruction of Frederic ; and, by 
 the help of assassins, she at length effect- 
 ed it. Frederic being mortally wounded, 
 insisted, however, that no blood should 
 be shed on his account; and died in a 
 spirit of martyrdom worthy of the rela- 
 tion of Boniface. In him the Hollanders 
 
 lost a faithful prelate ; but , , , - 
 , . 1 ,, 1 , ^ , Murder of 
 
 his death would preach a sa- j],|. i,isi,oD 
 
 lutary doctrine among them. ofUtrecht 
 Frederic was murdered about ^ ^ g^q 
 the year 833.* 
 
 Haymo, a monk of Fulda, a scholar of 
 Alcuin,| was chosen bishop of Halber- 
 stadt in Saxony, in the year 841. He 
 was by descent an English- 
 man, a relation of Bcde, and i^^T"? 
 took much pains m preaching i^ishop gf 
 to the people. His writings Haiber- 
 are voluminous, but the mat- stadt, 
 ter of them is chiefly extract- ^_ jy 34^^ 
 ed from the fathers. He as- 
 sisted in the condemnation of Gotteschal- 
 cus at Mentz ; nor is it hard to conceive, 
 that a pious person might be deceived by 
 
 * Iiigulph's Hist. See Collier's Ecc. Hist. 
 1 Vol. t Du Pin, Cent. IX. 
 
584 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 the elaborate representations of Rabanus. 
 though I should think it very improba- 
 ble, that Haymo would be at all con- 
 cerned in the barbarities afterwards exer- 
 cised on the supposed heretic at Rheims. 
 For Haymo seems to have thought and 
 written on the doctrines of grace with 
 more unction and vigour than most of 
 his contemporaries. He composed com- 
 ments on many parts of the Holy Scrip- 
 tures. A few specimens may serve to 
 show what sort of doctrine was then 
 preached to the recent Churches of Ger- 
 many. 
 
 " By* the book of life, we ought to 
 understand the divine predestination, as 
 it is written, the Lord knoweth them that 
 are his." 
 
 " Man of himself departing from God 
 returns not of himself to God. God 
 works all in all ; by which words human 
 arrogance is removed, since without the 
 Holy Spirit our weakness can effect no 
 real good, whether great or small. "f 
 
 " We are not only unable to perfect any 
 good, without divine grace and mercy, 
 preceding and following us, but not even 
 to think any. For the grace of God pre- 
 vents us, that we may be willing, and 
 follows us, that we may be able. Every 
 good thing that we have, the good will, 
 and the good work, is not from ourselves, 
 but from God." 
 
 His views of the distinction between the 
 law and the Gospel, a subject in his time 
 very little understood, have a consider- 
 able degree of perspicuity. "In the law, 
 no room is reserved for repentance, but 
 its language is, the soul that sinneth shall 
 die. The Gospel saith, I will not the 
 death of a sinner. — The Law is not of 
 faith. :J: It is the province of faith to be- 
 lieve and to hope things invisible. The 
 law therefore is not fulfilled by faith, but 
 by works. But the Gospel is fulfilled 
 by faith rather than by works ; for faitli 
 alone saves !"§ Precious sentiments ! 
 well understood by serious and humble 
 spirits, coming to Christ for rest, who 
 find themselves by the law debarred of 
 all hope of salvation, because of their con- 
 sciousness of entire depravity. It is not 
 necessary to give distinct quotations, in 
 order to prove that Haymo had the same 
 imperfect and inaccurate views of justi- 
 fication which we have observed in Au- 
 gustine. 
 
 * Magd. Cent. IX. p. 52, 
 ^ Galatians, iii. 12. 
 
 t Id. p. CO. 
 § Magd. 64. 
 
 "The faith, by which we believe ib 
 God, is given by the Father, the Son, 
 and the Holy Spirit : it is not in man 
 naturally, it is given by God ; for, if it 
 were in us, by nature, all would have 
 it. — Faith, remission of sins, and all the 
 gifts of God, are freely given to be- 
 lievers."* 
 
 Does it not appear a cruel thing to dis- 
 figure such lovely pictures of evangelical 
 truth] But historical veracity is a stubborn 
 thing. The same Haymo, who knew so 
 much of Christ, was so infected with the 
 growth of idolatrous superstition, that, in 
 an homily concerning virgins, he says, 
 " it is highly fitting that we supplicate 
 her," — he means some virgin, whose fes- 
 tival he was then celebrating, — "with 
 devout prayers, that she may make us 
 comfortable in this life by her merits and 
 prayers, and in the next acceptable to 
 God."! How inconsistent are these sen- 
 timents with his avowed faith in the Me- 
 diator ! But such was the torrent of the 
 times ! — I see Germany, which had been 
 happily tutored in the infant simplicity 
 of Christian faith, gradually perverted by 
 the idolatry which derived its strength 
 from the papal dominion. Haymo, how- 
 ever, most probably did not mean what 
 he said, in the full import of his own 
 words ; and he seems to have felt so sin- 
 cerely the spirit of Gospel-truth, that I 
 am tempted to suppose, that his homilies 
 were interpolated by what are called pious 
 FRAUDS, the introduction of which became 
 a common practice in the dark ages. 
 
 Haymo continued bishop of Halber- 
 
 stadt for twelve years, and tt„ 
 
 died in 853. A rare light, ^]\^^ 
 which shone in the midst of ■ r! _,, 
 arkness ! 
 
 We have seen some evidences of the 
 power of Christian truth, in this century, 
 among the recent Churches of Germany 
 and Holland. Let us now look to the 
 north of Europe, and see by what grada- 
 tions Divine Providence paved the way 
 for the propagation of the Gospel in the 
 frozen regions of Scandinavia,:}: and on 
 the shores of the Baltic, which had hi- 
 therto been enveloped in the most deplora- 
 ble darkness of Paganism. 
 
 Adelard, cousin-german to Charle- 
 magne, was a bright luminary in the 
 Christian world at the beginning of this 
 
 * Magd. p. 67. _+ Maj^d. p. 111. 
 
 i Tliis terra coramonly includes the three 
 kingdoms of Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. 
 
Cbxt. IX.] 
 
 ADELARD. 
 
 585 
 
 Adelard, 
 a Monk of 
 Corbie, in 
 Picai'dy, a 
 shining; 
 character. . 
 
 century. He had been invited 
 to the court in his youth : but 
 fearing the infection of such 
 a mode of life, he had retired ; 
 and, at the age of twenty 
 years became a monk of Cor- 
 bie, in Picardy,* and was at 
 length chosen abbot of the monastery. 
 His imperial relation, however, forced 
 him again to attend the court, where he 
 still preserved the dispositions of a re- 
 cluse, and took every opportunity, which 
 business allowed, for private prayer and 
 meditation. After the death of Charle- 
 magne he was, on unjust suspicions, ba- 
 nished by Lewis the Meek, to a monas- 
 tery on the coast of Aquitain, in the isle 
 of Hiere. After a banishment of five 
 years, Lewis, sensible at length of his 
 own injustice, recalled Adelard, and heap- 
 ed on him the highest honours. The 
 
 „ . monk was. however, the same 
 
 Heretiiriis . -^ j ■ i 
 
 to Corbie, in^" 1" prosperity and in ad- 
 A n S''-^ versity, and in 8'23 obtained 
 ■ ■ "'' leave to return to his Corbie. 
 Every week he addressed each of the 
 monks in particular : he exhorted them 
 in pathetic discourses ; and laboured for 
 the spiritual good of the country around 
 his monastery. His liberality seems to 
 have bordered on excess : his humility 
 induced him to receive advice from the 
 meanest monk : when he was desired to 
 live less austerely, he would frequently 
 say, I will take care of your servant, that 
 he may be enabled to attend on you the 
 longer. Another Adelard, who had go- 
 verned the monastery during his banish- 
 ment, by the direction of the first Ade- 
 lard, prepared the foundation of a distinct 
 monastery, called new Corbie, near Pa- 
 derborn, beside the Weser, as a nursery 
 for evangelical labourers, who should 
 instruct the northern nations. The first 
 Adelard completed the scheme : went 
 himself to new Corbie twice; and settled 
 its discipline. The success of this truly 
 charitable project was great : many learn- 
 ed and zealous missionaries were fur- 
 nished from the new seminary: and it 
 became a light to the north of Europe. 
 Adelard promoted learning in his monas- 
 teries : instructed the people both in La- 
 tin and French; and, after his second 
 return from Germany to old 
 Dies, Corbie, he died in 827, aged 
 A. D. 827. 73. Such is the account gi- 
 ven us of Adelard, a charac- 
 
 Expulsion 
 of Harold, 
 kiiig of 
 Denmark, 
 
 A. D. 814. 
 
 ter, there is reason to believe, of eminent 
 piety. The fruits of his fiithful labours 
 appear to have been still greater after his 
 death than during his life. To convert 
 monasteries into seminaries of pastoral 
 education was a thoucrht far above the 
 taste of the age in which he lived ; and 
 tended to emancipate those superstitious 
 institutions from the unprofitable and illi- 
 beral bondao-e in which they had subsist- 
 fl for many generations. 
 
 In* the year 814, Harold, king of Den- 
 mark, being expelled from his dominions, 
 implored the protection of the 
 emperor Lewis, the son and 
 successor of Charlemagne. 
 That prince persuaded him to 
 receive Christian baptism ; 
 and foreseeing that Harold's 
 reception of Christianity would increase 
 the difficulty of his restoration, he gave 
 him a district in Friezeland for his pre- 
 sent maintenance. Lewis, dismissing 
 Harold to his own country, inquired after 
 some pious person, who might accom- 
 pany him, and confirm both the king and 
 his attendants in the Christian religion. 
 But it was not easy to find a man dispos- 
 ed to undertake such a journey. At length 
 Vala, abbot of old Corbie, who had suc- 
 ceeded his brother Adelard, whose histo- 
 ry we have just considered, said to the^ 
 emperor, " 1 have, in my monastery, a 
 monk, who earnestly wishes to suffer for 
 the sake of Christ; a man of understand- 
 ing and integrity, and peculiarly fitted 
 for such a work. But I cannot promise, 
 that he will undertake the journey." The 
 emperor ordered him to send for the man ; 
 Anscarius was his name. When the 
 nature of the employment was opened to 
 the monk, he professed his readiness to 
 go. " I by no means command you, said 
 Vala, to enter on so difficult and danger- 
 ous a service; I leave it to your option." 
 Anscarius, however, persisted in his re- 
 solution: it was matter of surprise to 
 many, that he should choose to expose 
 himself among strangers, barbarians, and 
 pagans; much pains were taken by many 
 to dissuade him ; but in vain : while pre- 
 parations were making for his departure, 
 he gave himself up to reading and prayer. 
 
 * A. Butler, Vol. I. 
 
 * I have extracted the subsequent account 
 of Anscarius from various parts of Fleury, iti 
 iiis history of the 9th century ; not without an 
 attention also to the iiistory of the same mis- 
 sionary in Alban Butler, and in the Centur. 
 Magd. 
 
586 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 This excellent monk had been employed 
 as a teacher, both in old and new Corbie, 
 and had distinguished himself by his ta- 
 lents and virtues. Aubert, a monk of no- 
 ble birth, a great confidant of Vala, and 
 steward of his house, offered himself as a 
 companion to Anscarius. Harold, with the 
 two strangers, proceeded on his journey ; 
 but neither he nor his attendants, rude and 
 barbarous in their manners, were at all 
 solicitous for the accommodation of the 
 missionaries, who therefore suffered much 
 in the beginning of their journey. When 
 the company arrived at Cologne, Hade- 
 bald the archbishop, commiserating the 
 two strangers, gave them a bark, in which 
 they might convey their effects. Har- 
 old, struck with the convenience of the 
 accommodation, entered into the vessel 
 with the missionaries; and they went 
 down the Rhine into the sea, and came 
 to the frontiers of Denmark. But Har 
 old finding access to his dominions im- 
 possible, because of the power of those 
 who had usurped the sovereignty, remain- 
 ed in Friezeland, in the district assigned 
 to him by the emperor. 
 
 This king of Denmark seems to have 
 been appointed by Divine Providence, 
 only as an instrument to introduce Ansca- 
 rius into the mission. For we hear little 
 more of him afterwards. The two French 
 monks laboured with zeal and success in 
 ^!:u2zel'=;nd; uoth amonof Christians and 
 raofans. H.":-oM sent some of his own 
 slaves to be ti.,ight by them; and in a 
 little time they had above twelve children 
 iu their school. Above two years they 
 laboured, and were made instruments of 
 good to souls : after this Aubert ended 
 his days by a disease. 
 
 About the year 829, many Swedes 
 having expressed a desire to be instruct- 
 ed in Christianity, Anscarius 
 Anscarius received a commission from 
 sioned to "^ emperor Lewis to visit 
 visit Swe- Sweden. Another monk of 
 den, old Corbie, Vitmar by name, 
 
 A. D, 829. 'was assigned as his compa- 
 nion; and a pastor was left to 
 attend on king Harold, in the room of 
 Anscarius. In the passage, the two mis- 
 sionaries were met by pirates, who took 
 the ship and all its effects. On this oc- 
 casion, Anscarius lost the emperor's pre- 
 sents, and forty volumes, which he had 
 collected for the use of the ministry. 
 But his mind was still determined : and 
 he and his partner having with difficulty 
 got to land, they gave themselves up to 
 
 the direction of Providence, and walked 
 on foot a long way, now and then cross- 
 ing some arms of the sea in boats. Such 
 are the triumphs of Christian faith and 
 love. They arrived at Birca, from the 
 ruins of which Stockholm took its rise, 
 though built at some distance from it.* 
 The kinor of Sweden received them fa- 
 
 a 
 
 vourably ; and his council unanimously 
 agreed to permit them to remain in the 
 country, and to preach the Gospel. Suc- 
 cess attended their pious efforts. Many 
 Christian captives in Sweden rejoiced at 
 the opportunity of the communion of 
 Saints which was now restored to them; 
 and, among others, Herigarius, governor 
 of the city, was baptized. This man 
 erected a church on his own estate, and 
 persevered in the profession and support 
 of the Gospel. 
 
 After six months, the two missionaries 
 returned with letters written by the king's 
 own hand, into France, and informed 
 Lewis of their success. The conse- 
 quence was, that Anscarius was appoints 
 ed archbishop of Hamburg. This great 
 city, being in the neigbourhood of Den- 
 mark, was henceforth looked on as the 
 metropolis of all the countries north of 
 the Elbe which should embrace Chris- 
 tianity. The mission into Denmark, was 
 at the same time attended to ; and Gaus- 
 bert, a relation of Ebbo, archbishop of 
 Rheims, who, as well as Anscarius, was 
 concerned in these missions, was sent to 
 reside as a bishop in Sweden : there the 
 number of Christians increased. But 
 perhaps the reader has anticipated the 
 observation ; namely, that it was the ge- 
 nius of these dark ages to provide for 
 the hierarchy prematurely ; and to con- 
 stitute bishops and dioceses over large 
 districts in which scarcely any Christians 
 were to be found. 
 
 Anscarius — such was the ecclesiastical 
 discipline of the times, — by the order of 
 the emperoi' Lewis, went to 
 Rome, that he might receive Fu>'iber 
 the confirmation of the new ^^.^^"J].-^' 
 archbishopric of Hamburg, .j,^,] ^f ^j,g' 
 Returning to the diocese, he taking of 
 gained over many Pagans, Hamburg, 
 brought up children in the a.. D. 845. 
 Christian faith, and redeemed 
 captives, whom he instructed and employ- 
 ed in the ministry. In the year 845, his 
 faith was tried by a severe affliction. 
 Hamburg was besieged, taken, and pil- 
 
 * Puffendorff's Hist, of Sweden. 
 
CllfT. IX.] 
 
 ANSCARIUS. 
 
 587 
 
 laged by the Normans, and he himself 
 escaped with difficulty. On this occasion 
 he lost all his effects : but his mind was 
 so serene, that he was not heard to com- 
 plain : " The Lord gave," said he, " and 
 the Lord hath taken away." It was no 
 inconsiderable addition to his sufTerings, 
 to hear, that Gausbert, whom he had 
 sent into Sweden, was banished through 
 a popular insurrection ; in consequence of 
 which, the work of the ministry was for 
 some years at a stand in that country. 
 Anscarius, reduced to great poverty, and 
 deserted by many of his followers, per- 
 sisted still with unweared patience in the 
 exercise of his mission in the north of 
 Europe, till the bishopric of Bremen was 
 conferred upon him. Hamburg and Bre- 
 men were from that time considered as 
 united in one diocese. It was not till 
 some pains were taken to overcome his 
 scruples, that he could be prevailed on 
 to accept of this provision for his wants. 
 About the year 852, Ansca- 
 
 rius sent a priest, called 
 
 Anscarius 
 
 sends a ... 
 
 Christian Ardgarms, into Sweden, to 
 teacher in- Strengthen the faith of the 
 to Sweden, few Christians, who remained 
 A. D. 85'2. there. Among these, was He- 
 rigarius, who had supported 
 the cause of Christ, while it was in the 
 most feeble and afflicted state. 
 
 Though Anscarius had made no great 
 impression on Sweden, he was not dis 
 couraged in his views of propagating the 
 faith in the north. He still had his eye 
 on Denmark, which had been his first ob- 
 ject: and having gained the friendship of 
 Eric, who reigned there, he was enabled 
 to gain a footing in that country ; and to 
 plant the Gospel with some success at 
 Sleswick, a port then much frequented by 
 merchants. Many persons, who had been 
 baptized at Hamburg, resided there ; and 
 a number of Pagans were induced to 
 countenance Christianity in some degree. 
 Anscarius, through the friendship of Eric, 
 found means also to visit Sweden once 
 more. A recommendatory letter from 
 that prince to Olaus, king of vSweden, in- 
 sured him a favourable reception in the 
 last-mentioned country. The zealous 
 bishop arrived at Birca, where a Pagan, 
 who pretended to intimacy with the gods, 
 opposed his designs with arguments 
 adapted to the superstitious notions of the 
 people. Olaus himself informed Ansca^ 
 rius, that it must be decided by lot, whe- 
 ther he should be permitted to preach 
 Christianity in Sweden. The missionary 
 
 prayed, and the lot decided in favour of 
 his designs. The profession of the Gos- 
 pel was established at Birca, and Chris- 
 tianity made a great progress in Sweden. 
 Anscarius returned into Denmark, and la- 
 boured there with success. The mission- 
 aries, whom he employed, were directed 
 by him to follow the example of St. Paul, 
 by labouring with their own hands for 
 bread ; a very necessary practice in those 
 poor countries. 
 
 In the year 865, this Apostle of the 
 north was called to his rest. He had 
 lived six years after the union of the dio- 
 ceses of Hamburg and Bre- 
 men, and had applied himself "^ ^^" 
 to the duties of his office, both Anscarius 
 as a governor and a preacher dies 
 of the Church, with indefati- ^^ jy ggj 
 gable assiduity. A terror to 
 the proud, and a comfort to the humble, 
 he knew how to divide the word of truth, 
 and to give each of the flock his portion 
 in due season. In all good works, and 
 particularly in his care of redeeming cap- 
 tives, he was eminently distinguished. 
 He erected a hospital at Bremen, in which 
 passengers were relieved, and the sick 
 were taken care of, which, in that rude 
 age, was an uncommon instance of liber- 
 ality and compassion. His example and 
 authority had great influence even among 
 those who sold captives to Pagans, or 
 kept them in slavery. They were induced 
 by his exhortations to set the prisoners at 
 liberty. He is said to have had the gift 
 of miracles ; and though I cannot give full 
 credit even to the most plausible stories 
 of this nature, which are related of him, 
 because of the superstitious credulity and 
 fraudulent inventions of the times, I must 
 confess with Fleury, that if ever the gift 
 of miracles may be supposed to have ex- 
 isted after the first ages of Christianity, 
 it may be believed, most probably, to 
 have been vouchsafed to those, who were 
 concerned in the first plantation of 
 Churches.* And it should be remem- 
 
 * Nelson is of the same opinion. " Q. Does 
 it seem probable, that if the conversion of in- 
 fidels were attempted by men of honest and 
 sincere minds, God ■would extraordinarily 
 countenance sucii a design ? A. 'Tis agreea- 
 ble to reason to think he would, and in no way 
 conti'ary to Scripture. For, as the wisdom of 
 God is never found to be prodigal in multiply- 
 ing th6 effects of his Almighty power, so it is 
 never wanting to afford all necessary evidences 
 and motives of cooversion." Nelson's Festi- 
 vals, p. 259. 
 
588 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 bered, that Sweden and Denmark were, 
 under God, indebted to Anscarius for the 
 first light of the Gospel. This extraor- 
 dinary person, however, was by no means 
 disposed to value himself on miraculous 
 powers ; as he appears to have been ac- 
 quainted with a holy influence of a more 
 excellent nature, 1 Cor. chap. xii. last 
 verse. " If I had found favourwith God," 
 said he, one day, when he heard his mira- 
 cles extolled, " I should beseech him to 
 grant me one single miracle, even his 
 grace to sanctify my nature." It is re- 
 marked of him, that he never did any 
 thing without recommending himself first 
 to God by prayer. A short fragment of 
 an epistle to the bishops is the whole of 
 his writings which I can find to be ex- 
 tant.* " I beg your earnest prayers to 
 God for the growth and fruitfulness of 
 this mission among the Pagans. For, by 
 the grace of God, the Church of Christ is 
 now founded both in Denmark and Swe- 
 den; and the pastors discharge their of- 
 fice without molestation. May God Al- 
 mighty make you all partakers of this 
 work of godly charity, and joint heirs 
 with Christ in heavenly glory !" The 
 Centuriators have charged him with idola- 
 try ; but the only proof, which they give, 
 is his superstitious attachment to relics : 
 an evil so general, I had almost said uni- 
 versal, at that time, that it cannot fix any 
 particular blot on the character of Ansca- 
 rius. I see no proof of his having prac- 
 tised or encouraged image-worship. It is 
 true, that he was devoted to the See of 
 Rome. And, in those days, how few 
 were not so ! The Centuriators in their 
 own attachment to the prejudices of the 
 age, in which they lived, might have 
 found a charitable apology for those of 
 the northern Apostle. If candour be not 
 exercised in such circumstances, we shall 
 scarcely be able to see, for many ages, 
 even the existence of a Church of Christ. 
 A Luther, firmly and decidedly resisting, 
 and even despising the current maxims 
 of his own age, is a rare phenomenon. 
 
 I have the satisfaction to observe, that 
 Mosheim is, in the case of Anscarius, 
 more candid than the Centuriators. He 
 allows, that the labours of that mission- 
 ary, and in general of the other mission- 
 aries in this century, deserve the highest 
 commendations. If it were possible to 
 exhibit a circumstantial account of Arfsca- 
 
 rius, most probably the justice of Mo- 
 sheim's encomium on his character would 
 be ascertained beyond the reach of contra- 
 diction. What else but the genuine love 
 of God in Christ could have furnished 
 the mind with such faith in Providence, 
 perseverance in hardships, and active 
 charity for souls'? 
 
 Rembert, his confidant, was appointed 
 bishop of Bremen, by the dying v/ords of 
 the Apostle. He wrote the life of his 
 predecessor, a treatise which 
 seems to have furnished his- R<^mbert 
 torians with the greatest part '^ ^ 
 
 n , ■ • ^° '. shop Ot 
 
 ot their materials concerning Bremen. 
 
 Anscarius. Rembert himself 
 
 presided over the Church of the north, for 
 
 twenty-three years, and established their 
 
 discipline and ecclesiastical consistence. 
 
 He was not unworthy of the confidence 
 
 of his predecessor, and lived and died an 
 
 example of piety. He began to preach 
 
 among the people of Brandenburg, who 
 
 hitherto had been altogether pagan, and 
 
 made some progress toward 
 
 their conversion. He died in , ^ 
 
 A. D. 
 
 * Crantzius. See Cent. Magd. Cent. IX. p. 
 324. 
 
 Dies, 
 
 Jeron, an English Presby- jeron an 
 tcr went over to Holland, in English 
 this century, and preached the mission- 
 Gospel there : and, so far as ^^'Tj niar- 
 appears, with faithfulness. I-VT,'^ '". 
 He was crowned with mar- ^ Iv" ' 
 tyrdom about the year 849.* ^- ^- ^*^' 
 
 Patto, a Scotch abbot, was appointed 
 bishop of Verden, by Charlemagne. The 
 Centuriators only tell us, that he strenu- 
 ously supported popish corruptions and 
 human traditions. But Crantzius, from 
 whom they collected this account, would 
 have informed them also of better things. | 
 Patto, it appears, had great success among 
 the infidels, but was grieved to see Chris- 
 tian professors disgracing the 
 faith by their vices. He faith- Patto, a 
 fully rebuked them ; and for Scotcli ab- 
 his honest zeal in preaching I'of. mur- 
 against the sins of nominal "'^'■^'1, 
 Christians, was murdered A. D. 815. 
 about the year 815. 
 
 Tanes, who had succeeded Patto in the 
 Scotch abbey, after a time left his situa- 
 tion, and followed his countryman into 
 Germany, not so much with a desire of 
 martyrdom, say the Centuriators, as of 
 obtaining a richer benefice. Uncharitable 
 surmise ! There is too much of this 
 leaven to be found in a Avork, which, ia 
 
 Cent. Magd. f See A. Butler, Vol. II. 
 
Uest. IX.] 
 
 ANSCARIUS— REMBERT. 
 
 589 
 
 Crant- 
 zius's ac 
 count of 
 Tanes. 
 
 Other respects, abounds in 
 piety and industry. The 
 same Crantzius informs us, 
 that Tanes, in fact, laboured 
 in conjunction with Patto, 
 and, after a while, was appointed his 
 successor to the See of Verden. The 
 considerate reader will judge, whether 
 the sufferings and hardships which Tanes 
 and Patto had sustained among barbarians 
 were likely to render the bishopric of 
 Verden an enviable object of ambition] 
 I know no other ground on which the 
 
 propagation of the Gospel may be disco- 
 vered in this century. The accounts of 
 the labours of Spanish pastors among the 
 Mahometans, or of the sufferings of the 
 Christians under the persecutions of the 
 Moors, are not sufficiently authenti- 
 cated. 
 
 The reader, however, has seen, in this 
 dark century, a clear demonstration, that 
 the Church of Christ still existed. He 
 may now, if he please, descend with me 
 to the ultimate point of Christian de- 
 pression. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 3 D 
 
588 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 bered, that Sweden and Denmark were, 
 under God, indebted to Anscarius for the 
 first light of the Gospel, This extraor- 
 dinary person, however, was by no means 
 disposed to value himself on miraculous 
 powers ; as he appears to have been ac- 
 quainted with a holy influence of a more 
 excellent nature, 1 Cor. chap. xii. last 
 verse. " If I had found favour with God," 
 said he, one day, when he heard his mira- 
 cles extolled, " I should beseech him to 
 grant me one single miracle, even his 
 grace to sanctify my nature." It is re- 
 marked of him, that he never did any 
 thing without recommending himself first 
 to God by prayer. A short fragment of 
 an epistle to the bishops is the whole of 
 his writings which I can find to be ex- 
 tant.* " I beg your earnest prayers to 
 God for the growth and fruitfulness of 
 this mission among the Pagans. For, by 
 the grace of God, the Church of Christ is 
 now founded both in Denmark and Swe- 
 den; and the pastors discharge their of- 
 fice without molestation. May God Al- 
 mighty make you all partakers of this 
 work of godly charity, and joint heirs 
 with Christ in heavenly glory !" The 
 Centuriatorshave charged him with idola- 
 try ; but the only proof, which they give, 
 is his superstitious attachment to relics : 
 an evil so general, I had almost said uni- 
 versal, at that time, that it cannot fix any 
 particular blot on the character of Ansca- 
 rius. I see no proof of his having prac- 
 tised or encouraged image-worship. It is 
 true, that he was devoted to the See of 
 Rome. And, in those days, how few 
 were not so ! The Centuriators in their 
 own attachment to the prejudices of the 
 age, in which they lived, might have 
 found a charitable apology for those of 
 the northern Apostle. If candour be not 
 exercised in such circumstances, we shall 
 scarcely be able to see, for many ages, 
 even the existence of a Church of Christ. 
 A Luther, firmly and decidedly resisting, 
 and even despising the current maxims 
 of his own age, is a rare phenomenon. 
 
 I have the satisfaction to observe, that 
 Mosheim is, in the case of Anscarius, 
 more candid than the Centuriators. He 
 allows, that the labours of that mission- 
 ary, and in general of the other mission- 
 aries in this century, deserve the highest 
 commendations. If it were possible to 
 exhibit a circumstantial account of Ailsca- 
 
 * Crantzius. See Cent. Magd. Cent. IX. p. 
 324. 
 
 rius, most probably the justice of Mo- 
 sheim's encomium on his character would 
 be ascertained beyond the reach of contra- 
 diction. What else but the genuine love 
 of God in Christ could have furnished 
 the mind with such faith in Providence, 
 perseverance in hardships, and active 
 charity for souls ? 
 
 Rembert, his confidant, was appointed 
 bishop of Bremen, by the dying v/ords of 
 the Apostle. He wrote the life of his 
 predecessor, a treatise which 
 
 seems to have furnished his- Rt^n^b^rt 
 i • -ii ii 1 i .. made bi- 
 
 torians with the greatest part ^^ ^^• 
 
 of their materials concerning Bremen. 
 
 Anscarius. Rembert himself 
 
 presided over the Church of the north, for 
 
 twenty-three years, and established their 
 
 discipline and ecclesiastical consistence. 
 
 He was not unworthy of the confidence 
 
 of his predecessor, and lived and died an 
 
 example of piety. He began to preach 
 
 among the people of Brandenburg, who 
 
 hitherto had been altogether pagan, and 
 
 made some progress toward -pj^g 
 
 their conversion. He died in , ^ ' 
 
 A. D. 888. 
 
 Jeron, an English Presby- jeron an 
 ter went over to Holland, in English 
 this century, and preached the mission- 
 Gospel there: and, so far as ary, mar- 
 
 appears, with faithfulness. !-\'T, '", 
 TT J -.1 Hollarul, 
 
 He was crowned witli mar- „ ' 
 
 tyrdom about the year 849.* ' " 
 
 Patto, a Scotch abbot, was appointed 
 bishop of Verden, by Charlemagne. The 
 Centuriators only tell us, that he strenu- 
 ously supported popish corruptions and 
 human traditions. But Crantzius, from 
 whom they collected this account, would 
 have informed them also of better things. ■)■ 
 Patto, it appears, had great success among 
 the infidels, but was grieved to see Chris- 
 tian professors disgracing the 
 faith by their vices. He faith- Paito, a 
 fully rebuked them ; and for Scotcli ab- 
 his honest zeal in preaching bot' "j""'- 
 against the sins of nominal "^'■'^"' 
 Christians, was murdered ^- D. 815. 
 about the year 815. 
 
 Tanes, who had succeeded Patto in the 
 Scotch abbey, after a time left his situa- 
 tion, and followed his countryman into 
 Germany, not so much with a desire of 
 martyrdom, say the Centuriators, as of 
 obtaining a richer benefice. Uncharitable 
 surmise ! There is too much of this 
 leaven to be found in a work, which, in 
 
 * Cent. Magd. f See A. Butler, Vol. II. 
 
Uest. IX.] 
 
 ANSCARIUS— REMBERT. 
 
 589 
 
 Crant- 
 zius's ac 
 count of 
 Tanes. 
 
 other respects, abounds in 
 piety and industry. The 
 same Crantzius informs us, 
 that Tanes, in fact, laboured 
 in conjunction with Patto, 
 and, after a while, was appointed his 
 successor to the See of Verden. The 
 considerate reader will judge, whether 
 the sufferings and hardships which Tanes 
 and Patto had sustained among barbarians 
 were likely to render the bishopric of 
 Verden an enviable object of ambition 1 
 I know no other ground on which the 
 
 propagation of the Gospel may be disco- 
 vered in this century. The accounts of 
 the labours of Spanish pastors among the 
 Mahometans, or of the sufferings of the 
 Christians under the persecutions of the 
 Moors, are not sufficiently authenti- 
 cated. 
 
 The reader, however, has seen, in this 
 dark century, a clear demonstration, that 
 the Church of Christ still existed. He 
 may now, if he please, descend with me 
 to the ultimate point of Christian de- 
 pression. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 3 D 
 
590 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 CENTURY X. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A GENERAL VIEW OF THE CHURCH IN 
 THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The famous Annalist of the Ronrian 
 Church, whose partiality to the See of 
 Rome is notorious, has, however, the 
 candour to own, that this was an iron 
 age, barren of all goodness; a leaden 
 age, abounding in all wickedness ; and 
 a dark age, remarkable above all others 
 for the scarcity of writers, and men of 
 learning.* " Christ was then, as it ap- 
 pears, in a very deep sleep, when the 
 ship was covered with waves ; and what 
 seemed worse, when the Lord was thus 
 asleep, there were no disciples, who by 
 theircries, mightawakenhim,beingthem- 
 selves all fast asleep." Under an allusion 
 by no means incongruous with the oriental 
 and scriptural taste, this writer represents 
 the Divine Head of the Church as having 
 given up the Church, for its wickedness, 
 to a judicial impenitency, which conti- 
 nued the longer, because there was 
 scarcely any zealous spirits who had the 
 charity to pray for the cause of God upon 
 earth. I give this serious and devotional 
 sense to Baronius, because the words 
 will bear it without the least violence, 
 and the phraseology is perfectly scriptu- 
 ral.! 
 
 Infidel malice has with pleasure record- 
 ed the vices and the crimes of the popes 
 of this century. Nor is it my intention 
 to attempt to palliate the account of their 
 wickedness. It was as deep and as atro- 
 cious as language can paint ; nor can a 
 reasonable man desire more authentic evi- 
 dence of history, than that, which the 
 records both of civil and ecclesiastical 
 history afford, concerning the corruption 
 of the whole church. One pleasing cir- 
 cumstance, however, occurs to the mind 
 of a genuine Christian ; which is, that 
 all this was predicted. The Book of the 
 Revelation may justly be called a prophe- 
 tic history of these transactions, and the 
 truth of Scripture is vindicated by events 
 
 * Baron. Annal. 
 
 t As for instance, Aw&ke, why sleepest 
 thou, Lord ? Ps. xliv. 23. 
 
 of all others the most disagreeable to a 
 pious mind. 
 
 What materials then appear for the his- 
 tory of the real Church ■? The propaga- 
 tion of the Gospel among the Pagan 
 nations, and the review of some writers 
 of this century, form the principal mate- 
 rials, and shall be the subjects of two 
 distinct chapters. But the general de- 
 scription of the situation of the Church, 
 can be little else than a very succinct 
 enumeration of the means made use of to 
 oppose the progress of popery. 
 
 The decrees of the council of Frank- 
 fort against image-worship had still some 
 influence in Germany, France, and Eng- 
 land. In the year 909, a coun- 
 cil was held at Trosle, a vil- A council 
 lage near Soissons in France, ^' Frank- 
 in which they expressed their "''' 
 sentiments of Christian faith A. D. 909. 
 and practice, without any mix- 
 ture of doctrine that was peculiarly pope- 
 ish. Many Churches still had the Scrip- 
 tures in the vulgar tongue. The monks 
 took much pains in our island to erect an 
 independent dominion on the ruin of the 
 secular clergy. This scheme, equally 
 destructive of civil and clerical authority, 
 met, however, with a vigorous, and, in 
 a great measure, a successful resistance ; 
 and the celibacy of the clergy was strong- 
 ly opposed. Even the doctrine of tran- 
 substantiation itself, the favourite child 
 of Pascasius Radbert, was still denied 
 by many, and could not as yet gain a 
 firm and legal establishment in Europe. 
 Alfric, in England, whose homily for 
 Easter used to be read in the Churches, 
 undertook to prove, that the elements 
 were the body and blood of Christ, not 
 corporeally, but spiritually. In an epis- 
 tle heasserts, that this sacrifice is not 
 made his body, in which he suffered for 
 us, nor his blood, which he shed for us, 
 but is spiritually made his body and 
 blood, as was the case with the manna 
 which rained from heaven, and with the 
 water which flowed from the rock. Op- 
 position was also made by kings and 
 councils to the authority of tlie pope. 
 One of the most remarkable instances of 
 this kind took place in the council of 
 
Cent. X.] 
 
 A GENERAL VIEW 
 
 591 
 
 Rheims, which deposed a bishop without 
 the consent of the pope. The story is 
 tedious and uninteresting-. I have looked 
 over the acts of the synod, which are 
 circumstantially detailed by the Oentu- 
 riators in their history of this century; 
 and a few words of tlie discourses of 
 Arnulph, bishop .of Orleans, the presi- 
 dent, may deserve to be distinctly quot- 
 ed.* " O deplorable Rome, who in the 
 days of our forefathers producedst so 
 many burning and shining lights, thou 
 had brought forth, in our times, only 
 dismal darkness, worthy of the detesta- 
 tion of posterity : What shall we do, or 
 what council shall we take "? The Gos- 
 pel tells us of a barren fig-tree, and of 
 the divine patience exercised toward it. 
 Let us bear with our primates as long as 
 we can ; and, in the mean time, seek for 
 spiritual food, where it is to be found. 
 Certainly there are some in this holy as- 
 sembly, who can testify, that in Belgium 
 and Germany, both which are near us, 
 there may be found real pastors and emi- 
 nent men in religion. Far better would 
 it be, if the animosities of kings did not 
 prevent that we should seek, in those 
 parts, for the judgment of bishops, than 
 in that vefial city, which weighs all de- 
 crees by the quantity of money. — What 
 think you, reverend fathers, of this man, 
 the pope, placed on a lofty throne, shin- 
 ing in purple and gold 1 whom do you 
 account him ? If destitute of love, and 
 putTed up with the pride of knowledge 
 only, he is Antichrist sitting in the tem- 
 ple of God."t 
 
 It is always a pleasing speculation to 
 a thinking mind, to observe the ebulli- 
 tions of good sense, and a vigorous un- 
 derstanding, exerted in disadvantageous 
 circumstances. It should be still more 
 pleasing to observe them, when they are 
 under the conduct of humble piety, as it 
 may be presumed was the case in this in- 
 stance of Arnulphus. We see here even 
 Luther and Cranmer in embryo. This 
 zealous and intelligent Frenchman la- 
 ments, that the kings of the earth were 
 committing fornication with the Roman 
 harlot, and giving their power to support 
 
 • Bishop Newton, in his 3d Vol. p. 161, on 
 the Prophecies, of whom I have made some 
 use in a few foregoing sentences, assigns the 
 •words to Gerbert, of Rheims. The acts of 
 the synod which I have mentioned sliow his 
 mistake 5 they expressly ascribe them to Ar- 
 nulphus. 
 
 f 2 Thess, ii. 
 
 her grandeur. He cast his e5'es toward 
 the Netherlands and Germany, which ap- 
 pear to have bad, at that time, a degree 
 of liglit and purity unknown at Rome : 
 he eagerly wishes to oppose this light 
 and purity to the darkness and the profli- 
 gacy of Rome. Like Liither, he is fear- 
 ful of throwing all things into confusion 
 by hasty and precipitate methods : and, 
 like Cranmer, in the case of Henry VIII. 's 
 divorce, he wishes to appeal to the un- 
 prejudiced judgment of men more learned 
 and more virtuous, than any to be found 
 at Rome, against the scandalous oppres- 
 sions of that venal city. That which 
 Arnulphus conceived so judiciously, in an 
 age the most unfavourable to reformation, 
 Luther in Germany, and Cranmer in. 
 England, afterward effected. It is not, 
 however, to be supposed, that even those 
 magnanimous struggles for Christian 
 light and liberty were in vain. The Spi- 
 rit of God was evidently still with the 
 recent churches of Germany and the 
 North ; and France itself was by no 
 means destitute of men who feared God, 
 and served him in the Gospel of his 
 Son. 
 
 There is an ultimate point of depres- 
 sion in morals, below which the common 
 sense of mankind and the interests of 
 society will not permit the scandalous 
 protligac}^ of governors, whether secular 
 or ecclesiastic, to descend. The Church 
 of Rome had sunk to this point in the 
 present century. Not only moral virtue 
 itself, but even the appearance of it, was 
 lost in the metropolis : and the Church, 
 now trampled on by the most worthless 
 prelates, and immersed in profaneness, 
 sensuality, and lewdness, called for the 
 healing aid of the civil magistrate. Otho 
 I. emperor of Germany, came to Rome : 
 and, by the united powers of the civil 
 and the military sword, reduced that ca- 
 pital into some degree of order and deco- 
 rum. He put an end to the irregular and 
 infamous customs of intruding into the 
 popedom, and confirmed to himself and 
 his successors the right of choosing the 
 supreme pontiff in future. The conse- 
 quence was, that a greater degree of moral 
 decorum began to prevail in the papacy, 
 though matter of fact, evinces but too plain- 
 ly, that religious principle was still as 
 much wanting as ever. The effect of Orho'3 
 regulations was, that the popes exchang- 
 ed the vices of the rake and the de- 
 bauchee, for those of the ambitious poli- 
 tician and the hypocrite ; and gradually 
 
593 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. I. 
 
 recovered, by a prudent conduct, the do- 
 aiineering ascendency, which had been 
 lost by vicious excesses. But this did 
 not begin to take place till the latter end 
 of the eleventh century. If a very mo- 
 derate degree of Christian knowledge 
 had obtained, during Otho's time, in the 
 Christian world, the farce of St. Peter's 
 dominion at Rome by his successors, 
 would have been at an end. But there 
 arose no Claudius of Turin in this cen- 
 tury. The little specimen of the elo- 
 quence of Arnulphus, which has been 
 mentioned, was the only effort I can find, 
 which was made to stem the torrent of 
 Roman tyranny. The whole western 
 world, with Otho at its head, an emperor 
 of upright intentions, and of shining en- 
 dowments, agreed to reverence that See 
 as supreme, which had laboured as it 
 were, by the most infamous practices, to 
 degrade itself, and to convince mankind, 
 that it could not possibly be of divine 
 appointment. The popes were rebuked, 
 condemned, and punished ; but the pope- 
 dom was reverenced as much as ever. 
 God had put in the hearts of princes to 
 fulfil his will ; and to agree, and give 
 their kingdom unto the " Beast," until 
 the words of God should be fulfilled.' 
 The Roman prelates, convinced of the 
 necessity of more caution and decorum in 
 the use of their power, recovered by po- 
 litical artifice what they had lost, and 
 became, in the issue, more terrible and 
 more pernicious in the exercise of their 
 power than ever. The neglect of so fa- 
 vourable an opportunity for emancipating 
 the Church from religious slavery, is the 
 highest proof of the extreme ignorance 
 of these times, and deserved to be no- 
 ticed. 
 
 This was an age of great political re- 
 gulations. The choice of the German 
 emperor was restricted to certain elec- 
 tors, with whom it continues to the 
 present time. The empire had, indeed, 
 been entirely separated from the French 
 monarchy, in the latter end of the fore- 
 going century. But, in this, the great 
 Otho more firmly fixed the imperial 
 crown, in the name and nation of Ger- 
 many. He himself was sprung from 
 the dukes of Saxony ; and deserved much 
 of all Europe for liis memorable victory 
 over the Turks, by which the same re- 
 straint was laid on their inroads into Ger- 
 many, as had been laid in France on the 
 
 * Rev. xvii, 11 
 
 inroads of the Saracens into that king- 
 dom, by the victorious arms of Charles 
 Martel, the grandfather of Charlemagne. 
 The Turks were a fierce and valiant na- 
 tion, who inhabited the coast of the Cas- 
 pian sea, and who were let loose on man- 
 kind as a just providential scourge, on 
 account of the contempt of divine truth, 
 and the overflowing torrent of iniquity 
 which had pervaded Christendom. They 
 gradually superseded the Saracens, and 
 seized their power and empire ; but no 
 great alteration took place in the civil si- 
 tu'ation of the East or the West on that 
 account. For the Turks universally em- 
 braced Mahometanism, the religion of 
 the vanquished ; and with that the hatred 
 of the Saracens to the Christian name ; 
 nor have they to this day acquired either 
 politeness or science to such a degree as 
 might mitigate their ferocity. 
 
 In all this disastrous period, I find 
 scarcely any prince, except Otho, actuat- 
 ed with a spirit of religious zeal : indeed, 
 his two successors of the same name, in- 
 herited some portion of his talents and 
 virtues. The efforts of Otho to purify 
 the Church, to promote learning, to erect 
 bishoprics, to endow churches, and to 
 propagate the Gospel among the barba- 
 rous nations, were highly laudable. And 
 so steady and sincere were his exertions 
 of this nature, and so amiable was his 
 private life, that I cannot but hope, that 
 he was himself a real Christian. His 
 empress, Adelaide, was no less remark- 
 able for her zeal and liberality. But I 
 scarcely need to say, that the reigning 
 ignorance, superstition, and wickedness, 
 defeated, or abused their well-meant de- 
 signs ; those alone excepted, which re- 
 garded the propagation of the Gospel 
 among the Pagans. 
 
 In the west the Normans, in the east 
 the Turks, committed the most dreadful 
 outrages on the Church. In our own 
 island I find nothing, in all this period, 
 but ignorance, superstition, and the ra- 
 vages of northern barbarians. The state 
 of France was not much different: the 
 latter king-s of ihe house of Charlemagne 
 were dwindled into ciphers ; and, toward 
 the close of the century, the third race of 
 French kings began in the person of Hugh 
 Capet. This prince was himself by no 
 means so renowned as Clovis and Char- 
 lemagne, the heads of the first and se- 
 cond race ; but his posterity remained on 
 the throne for a much longer series of 
 years than that of the two former, though 
 
Ce XT. X.] 
 
 PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 593 
 
 the name of Capet was almost forgotten 
 in the world. It has, however, been 
 rendered familiar to our ears of late, by 
 a series of transactions, which have is- 
 sued in the ruin of that house, and in the 
 exhibition of scenes, which have equally 
 outraged every principle of religion, ho 
 nour, and humanity. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL IN 
 THIS CENTURV. 
 
 - The Hungarians had received some 
 ideas of Christianity in the time of Char- 
 lemagne. But, on his decease, they re- 
 lapsed into the idolatries of their fathers, 
 and the Christian name was almost ex- 
 tinguished among them. Nor is it pro- 
 bable, that they had ever been much in- 
 structed in the real Gospel of Christ. 
 But toward the middle of this century, 
 two Hungarian chiefs, whose govern- 
 ments lay on the banks of the Danube, 
 made profession of Christianity; and 
 were baptized at Constantinople. These 
 two leaders were called Bologudes and 
 Gylas. The former soon apostatized : 
 the latter persevered ; received instruc- 
 tion from Hierotheus, a bishop, who had 
 accompanied him from Constantinople; 
 and encouraged the labours of the same 
 bishop among his subjects. The eii'eets 
 proved salutary to the Hungarian nation: 
 Sarolta, the daughter of Gylas, was 
 given in marriage to Geysa, the chief 
 prince of Hungary. She prevailed on 
 her husband to receive Christianity, and 
 the Gospel was once more introduced 
 into a country through the zealous piety 
 of a woman. Geysa, however, still re- 
 tained much inclination to the idolatry of 
 his fathers, though his conversations 
 with Christian captives and missionaries 
 made a strong impression on his mind : 
 but he was prevented from apostatizing, 
 by the zeal and authority of Adalbert, 
 archbishop of Prague, who visited Hun- 
 gary toward the conclusion of this cen- 
 tury. Whether the king's conversion 
 was real or nominal, the most salutary 
 consequences attended the reception of 
 the Gospel by his subjects. Humanity, 
 peace and civilization began to flourish 
 among a people hitherto fierce and bar- 
 barous in the extreme. vStephen, the son 
 of Geysa, was baptized by Adalbert ; 
 3d2 
 
 Adalbert 
 born, 
 
 A. D. 956. 
 
 and became a more decisive defender of 
 the faith than his father had been. Under 
 Stephen, Hungary was almost wholly 
 evano-elized ; and nothino- was omitted 
 by this zealous prince to establish Chris- 
 tianity throughout his dominions. There 
 is every reason to believe that many real 
 conversions took place, though I can give 
 no particular account of them. 
 
 But Adalbert has been mentioned ; and 
 it will be proper to give the reader a 
 short sketch of the life of that extraordi- 
 nary personage.* He was born 
 in 956, and ordained by Dieth- 
 mar, archbishop of Prague. 
 He beheld this same archbish- 
 op dying in terrible agonies of 
 conscience, on account of his neglect of 
 pastoral duty, and his secular avarice. 
 Adalbert was appointed his successor ; 
 but with so little satisfaction to himself, 
 that he was never seen to smile after- 
 wards. Beino- asked the reason, he said, 
 " It is an easy thing to wear a mitre and 
 a cross, but an awful thing to give an 
 account of a bishopric before the Judge 
 of quick and dead." Bohemia, the scene 
 of his diocese, was covered with idola- 
 try : there were Christians, indeed, in 
 that country, but chiefl)^ nominal ones. 
 In vain did the pious archbishop endea- 
 vour to reform the evils and abuses. The 
 people undesignedly gave the noblest tes- 
 timony to his sincerity, when the)' ob- 
 served, that it was impossible for him 
 and them to have communion with each 
 other, because of the perfect opposition 
 of life and conversation. Adalbert sigh- 
 ing over the wretched objects of his 
 charge, and still willing to labour in the 
 best of causes, travelled as a missionary 
 into Poland, and planted the Gospel in 
 Dantzic. Here his labours seem to have 
 been crowned with good success. In vi- 
 siting a small island he was knocked 
 down with the oar of a boat : however, 
 recovering himself, he made his escape, 
 rejoicing that he was counted worth)' to 
 suffer for the name of Christ, and with 
 his fellow-labourers quitted the place. 
 Indeed he was forced to :flee for his life : 
 and, at length, was murdered by barba- 
 rians in Lithuania ; or, as 
 some think, in Prussia, about 
 the year 997. Siggo, a pagan 
 priest, was the principal in- 
 strument of his death. He is 
 commonly styled the apostle 
 
 Murdered 
 by barba- 
 rians, 
 
 A. D. 997. 
 
 * Alban Butler's Saints Lives, Vol. IV. 
 
594 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 of Prussia,* though he only evangelized , time took care, so far as it lay in his 
 the city of Dantzic, which is in the neigh-; power, that they should apply themselves 
 bourhood of that country. Such was to devotion. That he would be very 
 Adalbert: — and so small is the account; earnest in these pious efforts will admit 
 transmitted to us, of one of the wisest of no doubt, if it be true, that he de- 
 and best of men, whom God had raised' clared, that he found more delight in 
 up for the instruction of the species, — a | heavenly exercises during one moment, 
 man willing to labour and to suffer for than a worldly soul finds in worldly plea- 
 
 Christ ! 
 
 Wolfang, bishop of Ratisbon, may pro- 
 perly accompany Adalbert, who had 
 received his bishopric of Prague, in cou- 
 
 Wolfang 
 bishop of 
 Ratisbon, 
 
 sures for a thousand years.* 
 
 If we look into Scandinavia, we find that 
 
 the Avork of God, which had begun so 
 
 prosperously in the last century, by the 
 
 sequence of Wolfang's having' labours of Anscarius, had met with a se- 
 
 vacated part of his diocesejvere check in Denmark, whose king. 
 
 The latter j Gormo the 3d,| laboured to extirpate the 
 
 of Suabia,] Gospel there entirely. His queen Tyra, 
 
 a school in however, openly professed it, and gave 
 
 for that purpose, 
 was a native 
 brousrht up at 
 
 and was 
 
 Wurtzburg. His experience gave him ^ it all the support which she was enabled 
 an opportunity of seeing, that professors: to do, under great disadvantages. But 
 of wisdom may even be greater slaves to' the power and influence of the king pre- 
 pride and envy than the illiterate. Wea-i vailed, and most of his subjects returned 
 ried with the view of scholastic strifes,! to idolatry. At length Henry I. called 
 he sighed for solitude, but was engaged j the Fowler, the predecessor of the great 
 to attend Henry, his friend, to Triers,! Otho, led an army into Denmark; and, 
 who was there chosen archbishop. Wol-' through the terror of his arms, obliged 
 fang there taught children, and was dean I Gormo to promise submission to the 
 
 of a community of ecclesiastics. lu 972, 
 he went to preach in Hungary, 
 but had no great success. He 
 was afterwards appointed bi- 
 shop of Ratisbon: there he 
 reformed the clergy, and was 
 
 indefatigable in preaching twenty-two 
 
 years. Henry, duke of Bavaria, placed; Gormo, however, received the word with 
 
 Preaches 
 in Hun- 
 gary, 
 
 A. D. 972, 
 
 commands of the emperor. Under the 
 protection of this last prince, Unni, thea 
 archbishop of Hamburg, with some faith- 
 ful labourers, came into Denmark, and 
 brought over many to the profession 
 of Divine truth ; but Gormo himself re 
 mained inflexible. Harald, the son of 
 
 under him his four children, Henry, after 
 wards emperor, — Gisela, queen of Hun- 
 gary, — Bruno, bishop of Augsburg, — and 
 
 respect : for his mother Tyra by her in- 
 structions had, at least, removed all pre- 
 judice from his mind, Unni, with the 
 
 Dies, 
 A. D. 904. 
 
 Brigit, abbess of Ratisbon, consent of Gormo, visited the islands, 
 
 Wol- 
 
 all eminent characters 
 fang died in 994. | 
 The plantation of the Gospel in Bran- 
 denburg was begun by the 
 zeal and victorious arms of 
 Charlemagne; but was not 
 completed, in a national 
 sense, till the year 928, under 
 Henry the Fowler, the pre- 
 decessor of Otho I.:j: 
 The labours of Gerajrd, bishop of Toul 
 
 in Germany, also deserve to be mentioned. 
 
 He was himself an eminent preacher ; 
 and often commissioned zeal- 
 ous pastors to preach in 
 country parishes. He culti- 
 vated learning^ amonsr his 
 disciples ; but at the same 
 
 The Gos- 
 pel plant- 
 ed in 
 Branden- 
 burg, 
 
 A. D. 928. 
 
 Gerard of 
 Toul la- 
 hours in 
 Germany. 
 
 * Moslieim, Cent. XI. chap. I. 
 t Butler, X. 
 if Memoii-s of the House of Brandenburg, 
 by the late king of Prussia. 
 
 and fornned Christian churches 
 them. The king liimself was allowed by 
 his conqueror Henry, to choose, whether 
 he would receive Christianity, or reject 
 it ; but was prohibited from persecuting 
 the faith, in his dominions : and thus, by 
 a singular concurrence of circumstances, 
 a sovereign prince was, by a foreiga 
 power, prevented from committing that 
 evil among his subjects, to which hii3 
 own inclination would have led him. I 
 cannot vindicate the imperious pro- 
 ceedings of Henry ; the labours of Unni 
 were, however, highly laudable, and 
 Providence smiled on his benevolent 
 views in propagating truth and holiness. 
 Unni, animated with success, deter- 
 mined to follow the pattern of Anscarius, 
 and to visit the kingdom of Sweden. He 
 
 * Butler, IV. 
 f Centuriat. cent. 
 
 X. Mosheim, cent. x. c. 1. 
 
Uest.X.] 
 
 PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 595 
 
 entered the Baltic, and arrived at Birca : 
 there he found that the Gospel had been 
 extinct : for seventy years, no bishop had 
 appeared among them, except Rembert, 
 the successor of Anscarius. There pro- 
 bly were, however, some souls then alive, 
 who had heard the Gospel with joy in 
 former times ; and it pleased God to give 
 large sucess to the ministry of Unni. He 
 fixed the Gospel in Sweden, 
 and planted it even in the re- 
 moter parts of that northern 
 reo-ion. At length, he fin- 
 
 Unn i, 
 Archbi- 
 sliop of 
 Hamburg, 
 fixed the 
 Gospel in 
 Sweden ; 
 and (lies, 
 
 A. D. 936. 
 
 ished his glorious course at 
 --" The 
 
 Birca, in the year 936 
 savage disposition of the 
 princes, and the confusion of 
 the times, had tended to obli- 
 terate the traces of Anscarius's labours: 
 but, at length, Eric, the eighth king of 
 Sweden, and still more his son and suc- 
 cessor, Olaus the second, favoured the 
 propagation of the Gospel. 
 
 The former of these princes requested 
 the archbishop of Bremen to supply his 
 kingdom with missionaries. The arch- 
 bishop sent him two persons of know- 
 ledge, piety, and integrity, Adalvard and 
 Stephen. They laboured with much suc- 
 cess for a time ; but the natural enmity 
 of depraved mankind will exert itself 
 against true piety, whatever be the form 
 of government under which men live. 
 The nobles of Sweden were enraged to 
 find their licentiousness of manners so 
 restrained ; and they commenced a reli- 
 gious persecution against both the mis- 
 sionaries and the king. The former were 
 beaten with rods, and expelled from Up- 
 sal : the latter was murdered on account 
 of his piety. His son and successor 
 Olaus was not discouraged from che- 
 rishing Christianity; and his zeal and 
 piety were crowned with success.* 
 
 Thus were Sweden and Denmark, after 
 a variety of changes, reduced into sub- 
 jection to the form, and, no doubt, many 
 individuals to the power of the Gospel. 
 In the latter country, after the death of 
 
 whose name had been Sueno; and, in 
 honour of the emperor he was now called 
 Suen-Otho. Harald, during his whole 
 life, took every wise and salutary method 
 to propagate divine truth among his sub- 
 jects, and to restrain vice and immorality. 
 Nor is it much to be doubted, that he 
 would instruct his son Suen-Otho to act 
 in the same manner ; and labour to im- 
 press on his mind the power of that di- 
 vine religion, which he himself seems to 
 have felt. Be that as it may, Suen-Otho 
 formed a junction with the chiefs of the 
 country, who were otTended at the pious 
 zeal of Harald : in consequence of which, 
 the latter was murdered : and Suen-Otho, 
 renouncing even the name, which had 
 been imposed upon him, persecuted the 
 Christians with great cruelty ; and, for a 
 time, gave a predominancy to the Pagan 
 interest in his dominions. It is remark- 
 able, however, that, like another ]\la- 
 nasseh, in his affliction he knew that the 
 Lord was God. Being expelled from his 
 throne, and forced to live in exile among 
 the Scots, he was induced to remember 
 the lessons of his childhood : he repented 
 of his crimes ; and, being restored to his 
 throne, like the same TSlanasseh he la- 
 boured to destroy the idolatry which he 
 had supported, and, in the latter part of 
 his life, trode in the steps of his father. 
 
 In this century, the light of the Gos- 
 pel penetrated into Norway.* About the 
 year 912, an English missionary, named 
 Bernard, attempted to plant rphp Gos- 
 the doctrine of Christ in this 
 barbarous region. Olaus, the 
 iking, listened to his dis- 
 I courses, and professed him- 
 self to be a convert; but he 
 still attended to omens and 
 Gentile superstitions. All 
 the arguments of Bernard were ineffectual 
 to cure him of his inveterate propensities ; 
 whence he was more a disgrace than an 
 ornament to las profession. 
 About the year 933, another 
 
 pel carried 
 into Nor- 
 way by aa 
 English 
 mission- 
 ary, 
 
 A. D. 912. 
 
 Other mis- 
 sionaries, 
 
 A. D. 933. 
 
 king, called Hagen, who had 
 Henry I. the inhabitants refused to pay been educated among the 
 tribute to Otho the Great, his successor. English, employed certain missionaries 
 This monarch obliged them to submit; of that nation to instruct his subjects, 
 andrequiredHarald, the son and successor But the Norwegians persisted in their 
 of Gormo, to receive Christian baptism, idolatry ; and his successor Graufeldt. 
 
 pursued the same plan but without effect. 
 
 Several successive princes laboured in 
 
 the same cause, with the same ill success. 
 
 All that we know of this prince, inclines 
 me to believe, that there was no reluc- 
 tance on his part. He was baptized, 
 together with his wife and little son, 
 
 The form of a government established in 
 
 * Cent. Magd. cent. x. 
 
 1 * Centuriat. cent. s. Mosheim, cent. x. ch. i. 
 
596 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH; 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 any country, seems from experience tr 
 have been of no capital moment, in regard 
 to the success of Christian missions. 
 Despotism, limited monarchy, and repub- 
 licanism, have each been serviceable or 
 detrimental in the cause ; and to asso- 
 ciate strongl}'' any one of these forms 
 with the progress of the Gospel, is per- 
 haps, forming an imagination of an alli- 
 ance between Church and state that has 
 no solid foundation in nature. We see, in 
 the case before us, that a republican form 
 vf'ould have proved destructive to the best 
 of causes. It is to the effusion of the 
 Holy Spirit, directing subordinate causes, 
 and, independently of mere human poli- 
 tics, that the success of the Gospel is 
 ever to be ascribed. At length, Haco, 
 king of Norway, being driven from his 
 throne, on account of his tyrannical go- 
 vernment, having himself also persecuted 
 the Christians in Norway, and having put 
 himself under the protection of that same 
 Harald of Denmark, whom we have 
 already celebrated, became a patron of 
 Christianity among his people. For Ha- 
 rald both instructed him in the nature of 
 Christianity, and restored him to his do- 
 minions. Haco, humbled and enlightened, 
 recommended the Gospel in an assembly 
 A n Q45 *^^ ^^^ people, in the year 945. 
 His zeal and solemnity were 
 very striking; but the fierce and bar- 
 barous people were not much moved ; 
 and the remembrance of his former ill 
 conduct would naturally prejudice their 
 minds against his arguments. Olaus, 
 who reigned sometime after, was the most 
 successful of all the Norwegian princes in 
 recommending Christianity. At length, 
 Swein, king of Denmark, having made 
 himself master of Norway, obliged Ids 
 subjects universally to renounce their 
 gods, and profess the Gospel. Doubtless 
 many compulsory methods were used by 
 several, probably by all these princes, by 
 no means agreeable to the genius of the 
 Gospel. Their intentions, however, seem 
 laudable ; and at least the aealous la- 
 bours of the missionaries deserve to be 
 noticed. Among these, Guthebald, an 
 English pastor, was most eminent. The 
 idol Thor was dragged from its place, 
 and publicly burnt in the sight of its 
 worshippers. In fact, Norway, in the 
 form of its religion, became Christian 
 throughout. The Orkney islands, then 
 subject to the Norwegian crown, received 
 the light of the Gospel, which, in some 
 degree, penetrated also into Iceland, and 
 
 Labours of 
 Adalbert. 
 
 Greenland ; and, in this century, the 
 triumph of Christianity was complete 
 throughout all Scandinavia. 
 
 The labours of Adelbert, the first arch- 
 bishop of Magdeburg, deserve to be men- 
 tioned in this place. The Rugi, about 
 the year 960, entreated the 
 emperor Otho I. to send them 
 a Christian bishop. This peo- 
 ple lived in Pomerania, between the Oder 
 and the Wipper, and in the isle of Rugen 
 in the Baltic. The town of Rugenwald 
 still bears their name. They were a re- 
 markably savage race, and had a famous 
 temple in Rugen. Certain monks of the 
 mission-seminary of new Corbie, had for- 
 merly laboured with success, in various 
 provinces of the Sclavi or Sclavonians, 
 and in the whole isle of Rugen, the Rugi 
 being a tribe of the Sclavi. An oratory 
 was erected in the isle, in honour of 
 Christ, and in memory of St. Vitus, pa- 
 tron of new Corbie. But the savage peo- 
 ple soon relapsed ; and making Vitus the 
 chief of their gods, erected to him a tem- 
 ple and idol with sacrifices, permitting no 
 merchant to buy or sell there who did not 
 first give some offering for their sacrifices, 
 or for the temple of their god, whom they 
 now called Swantewith. " Thus," says 
 Helmodus, " the man whom we confess 
 a martyr and servant of Christ, they adore 
 as god, a creature for the Creator ; nor is 
 there any nation, who so much abhors 
 Christians, especially pastors." A me- 
 morable caution for teachers to beware 
 est their instructions of the heathen may 
 only lead them from one species of idola- 
 try to another. However, at their desire, 
 Otho I. sent Adelbert to the isle. But 
 the people were hardened : several of his 
 fellow-preachers were murdered, though 
 he himself escaped. This 
 fruitless mission was in 961. Mission, 
 Adelbert was afterwards, in A. D. 961. 
 i)70, a])pointed archbishop of 
 Magdeburg, where Adelaide the empress, 
 and widow of Otho I. passed the greatest 
 part of her time, and gave herself up very 
 much to his directions : she had gone 
 through a great variety of prosperity and 
 adversity, and was very pious and exem- 
 plary. Adelbert was an instrument of 
 converting great numbers of the Sclavi : 
 he supplied his diocese with able pastors 
 for the new converts, and died 
 in 982, having very laudably 
 ruled the Church for twelve 
 
 years.* 
 
 Adelbert 
 dies, 
 
 A. D. 983. 
 
 * Butler, XII. 
 
Cext. X.] 
 
 ULRIC. 
 
 597 
 
 Rollo pro- 
 fesses tlie 
 Christian 
 religion, 
 
 A. D. 912. 
 
 In the preceding century, Rollo, a Nor- 
 wegian pirate, at the head of a valiant 
 and lawless band of soldiers, who are 
 commonly called Xormans, invaded and 
 ravaged France. But in the 
 year 91-2, Charles the Simple, 
 a monarch ill calculated to 
 withstand so powerful an ene- 
 my, purchased a peace, by in- 
 vesting Rollo with the duke- 
 dom of Normandy, and by giving him 
 his daughter Gisela in marriage, on con- 
 dition that he should embrace Chris- 
 tianity. All religions were equally in- 
 different to Rollo and his followers : they 
 therefore professed the Gospel without 
 the least hesitation. It seemed proper to 
 notice this event, as introducing the fa- 
 mous line of Norman dukes into France, 
 ■whose history, in process of time, in- 
 volves so much both of French and Eng- 
 lish history. As for the rest, I know of 
 no evidence of an effusion of the Divine 
 Spirit which attended their reception of 
 Christianity. The Normans, however, 
 gradually became better members of so- 
 ciety ; and at length began to patronize, 
 in some form or other, something that 
 ' bore the appearance of more serious reli- 
 gion. _ 
 
 While the nations, who had long en- 
 joyed the forms of true religion, were 
 slumbering in superstitions, or wallowing 
 in gross wickedness, the Head of the 
 Church, in his providence, still reserved 
 to himself a godly seed; and, by their 
 labours, extended the pale of the Gos- 
 pel. Poland had hitherto remained in the 
 thickest nijrht of igrnorance, and both an 
 inland situation and a barbarous neigh- 
 bourhood seemed to exclude it from the 
 light of divine truth. Some Poles, how- 
 ever, travelling into Bohemia* and Mo- 
 ravia, on account of business, were struck 
 "with what they heard concerning Chris- 
 tianity : they listened to the ministry of 
 the Word of God, and received it gladly. 
 Returning home, they every where re- 
 commended to their countrymen the grace 
 of the Gospel. ^loreover, foreigners of- 
 ten visiting Poland, on accpunt of trade, 
 preached Christ as they were able, to the 
 Poles. Something divinely excellent ap- 
 peared to be in Christianity ; and the hap- 
 py infection spread from heart to heart. 
 It reached, at length, Micislaus, the king 
 or duke of Poland ; who divorced his 
 seven wives, with whom he had coha- 
 
 » Cent. Ma"d. 
 
 bited, and married Dambrouca, the daugh- 
 ter of Boleslaus, the duke of Bohemia. 
 He was baptized in the year —. , . 
 965 ; and, by the pious and ^j- Poijjnj 
 charitable instructions of his bapiized, 
 new spouse, was induced to j^ jj ggj^ 
 exert his authority in the pro- 
 pagation of the Gospel through his domi- 
 nions : in line, Poland became a Chris- 
 tian nation ; nor is it probable that this 
 was a mere outward profession : that it 
 was so in certain respects, there is no 
 doubt ; but nevertheless, the circumstan- 
 ces of the narrative carry the appearance 
 of something truly divine. Nor is that 
 true, which Mosheim* asserts, that an 
 inward change of affections and princi- 
 ples was far from being an object of atten- 
 tion in this barbarous age. It seems most 
 probable, that it was an object of atten- 
 tion in the missionaries, and in those who 
 zealously received them. We have seen, 
 in several instances, an evidence of zeal 
 in preaching, and a constancy in suffer- 
 ing, which can scarcely be explained on 
 any other principle than that of godly 
 sincerity. And we have lived to see a 
 refined age as indifferent concerning an 
 inward change as any barbarous period 
 whatever. 
 
 In the year. 955, Olga, the queen of 
 Russia, sailed from Kiow to Constanti- 
 nople, and received baptism, together 
 with her attendants. On her xhe queen 
 return, she persevered in the of Russia 
 Christian religion, but could sails to 
 not prevail on her family and C^onstan- 
 subjects, to receive the same : tinople, 
 the Greek missionaries, how- ^P 'V 
 ever, laboured still, and gra- ^j^ej 
 dually succeeded. f At length . ^ g.^ 
 Wolodomir, her grandson, in 
 the year 961, married Anna, sister of the 
 emperor Basil, W'ho, by her zealous im- 
 portunity, prevailed on her spouse to re- 
 ceive Christianity. He was „ 
 1 .• 1 • 1 «-^« J Kussia 
 
 baptized in the year 98/ ; and becomes 
 
 from that time, Russia receiv- Christian, 
 ed a Christian establishment, j^ jj gg^ 
 and has ever since consider- 
 ed herself as a daughter of the Greek 
 Church. 
 
 Ulric, son of Count Hucbald, born in 
 893, was placed at Augsburg under the 
 care of Adalberon, bishop of that city. 
 He was made, at length, bi- xjlrie bi- 
 shop of Augsburg, by the gi,op of 
 emperor, Henry the Fowler. Augsburg, 
 
 Chap. I. Cent. X. + Gibbon, Vol. Y, 
 
598 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 laboured 
 in his dio- 
 cese for 50 
 years : 
 dies, 
 
 A. D. 9-3. 
 
 He comforted his people, who 
 had been plundered by the 
 Hungarians : he avoided the 
 court: he kept close to his 
 flock, and was equally re- 
 nowned for devotion, and for 
 pastoral labours. He died about 973. 
 
 Thus, in an age of proverbial darkness, 
 that illustrious prophecy continued to 
 receive its accomplishment; "Kings, 
 shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens 
 th)" nursing mothers.'"* The regular and 
 civilized governments in the world sus- 
 tained such dreadful calamities from the 
 irruption of Pagan nations, on flU sides, 
 that their encouragement of Christian 
 missions was equally humane and pru- 
 dential. The precepts of the Gospel 
 only were found effectual to meliorate 
 the dispositions of barbarians ; and under 
 the influence of the Holy vSpirit, no doubt, 
 this was the happy effect on the minds 
 of many. — But, it will still be said, "the 
 conversion of a great number was only 
 nominal, and compulsory methods were 
 employed, which are by no means adapt- 
 ed to the genius of the Gospel." It must 
 be allowed, that the latter of these asser- 
 tions is strictly true, and the former, in 
 many instances, but by no means in all. 
 The efforts of the tenth of the three pre- 
 ceding centuries, to extend Christianity, 
 had their blemishes, which have been 
 malignantly insisted on, and even exag- 
 gerated by modern writers. Defective, 
 however, as these efforts were, they form 
 the principal glory of those times; and, 
 partly by evident proofs and a detail of 
 circumstances, and partly by analog}^ and 
 the nature of things, they appear to have 
 been attended with the effusion of the Di- 
 vine Spirit, the genuine conversion of 
 numbers, and the improvement of human 
 society. The virtues of many at least, 
 of the missionaries, are above any enco- 
 mium which I can give ; though they 
 were born in rude ages, and are consign- 
 ed to contempt and oblivion by polite 
 historians, who lavish all their praises on 
 heroes and politicians. If, however, the 
 labours of an obscure individual may at- 
 tract the attention of the public, the names 
 of Boniface, Anscarius, Adelbert, tlnni, 
 and others of the same class, shall be 
 honoured among men, and the work of 
 propagating the Gospel shall appear lau- 
 dable in an extreme degree. It must 
 appear so to all, who desire that the name 
 
 of Jesus should be honoured through the 
 earth, and that the power of his grace 
 should be felt in every place, and in every 
 heart. But to what lengths will not 
 scepticism proceed? It has even been 
 advanced, that the attempt to propagate 
 Christianity, without the consent of the 
 government established in every country, 
 is unlawful in its nature. A position so 
 injurious to the character of many of the 
 best and wisest men, whom it behooves 
 us to celebrate in this history, and so 
 conveniently favourable to the selfish, 
 avaricious, indolent spirit of nominal 
 Christians, will deserve to be investi- 
 gated and exposed in its genuine colours. 
 
 * Isaiah xlix. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 AN APOLOGY FOR CHRISTIAN MISSIONS, 
 
 The commission which our Saviour 
 gave to his Apostles, a little before his 
 ascension, forms of itself the strongest 
 apology for the practice of Christian 
 missionaries in all ages. " Go ye, and 
 teach all nations, baptizing them in the 
 name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost : teaching them to ob- 
 serve all things, whatsoever I have com- 
 manded you : and lo I am with you al- 
 way, even unto the end of the world."* 
 
 It cannot be justly said, that this com- 
 mission of evangelizing all nations is re- 
 stricted to the Apostles, because He, 
 who gave these directions, declares, He 
 will always be with those who obey 
 them to the end of the world. The com- 
 mission is then as much in force at this 
 day, as it was at the first age of Chris- 
 tianity; and will continue in force till 
 time shall be no more. The promise of 
 divine support, to encourage the mission- 
 aries in the prosecution of a work so 
 arduous and so difficult, extends to all 
 ages, and would be perfectly inapplica- 
 ble to those ages, if any such there were, 
 which should have no right to propagate 
 the Gospel. 
 
 " Is every person then, calling himself 
 a Christian, authorized to preach the 
 Gospel among the heathen nations ]" 
 Not so : nor is every person 
 called a Christian authorized Q^^eshons 
 
 , . ^, . ,- concern- 
 
 to preach m Christian conn- jj^^. j^^;g_ 
 
 tries. Certain Qualifications sions. 
 and endowments, and above 
 
 * Matthew xxviii. 19, 20. 
 
Cewt. X.] 
 
 CHRISTIAN MISSIONS. 
 
 599 
 
 all, the real and genuine influence of the 
 Holy Spirit, are necessary for this pur- 
 pose. To define and to ascertain these 
 in particular cases, enter not into the 
 subject before us. Suffice it to say, that, 
 however in point of prudence and expe- 
 diency, it be proper to procure, is practi- 
 cable, the consent and concurrence of the 
 government of the country, which is the 
 object of the mission, such consent and 
 concurrence is not necessary as a legiti- 
 mate qualification of a missionary, who 
 should undertake to evang-elize pagan 
 countries. Our Lord well knew that 
 such consent was not attainable in any 
 country under heaven at the time in 
 which he gave this commission. He 
 mentions no such condition, nor did the 
 Apostles conceive the necessity of such 
 a license. It is well known, on the con- 
 trary, that they persisted in the mission, 
 not only without, but also against the 
 express prohibitions of all governments, 
 whether Jewish or Gentile. The nature 
 and reasonableness of Christianity itself 
 is such, that, wherever it is fairly exhi- 
 bited, in connexion with its proper proofs 
 and evidence?, those, who hear it, are 
 bound in conscience to obey it, magi- 
 strates as well as others ; and, as we 
 have seen, the magistrate himself not 
 only may, but ought to promote it, for 
 the good of society.* 
 
 " But the Apostles wrought miracles ; 
 and therefore, though they had a right to 
 propagate Christianity, others who do not 
 so, have no right to preach, except with 
 the consent of the government." It does 
 not appear, that the evidence .of their 
 commission rested wholly on miracles, 
 thoug-h it must be confessed these formed 
 a striking part of it, and were afforded 
 by Divine Providence, in order to facili- 
 tate the progress of the then infant reli- 
 gion. But if, what no serious Christian 
 will deny, there is an internal evidence 
 in the Gospel itself, which ought to 
 weiffh with every reasonable mind, ab- 
 stracted from any thing miraculous, it 
 will be the dutj' of every one to receive 
 it, when fairly proposed ; and the obe- 
 dience due to divine revelation is binding 
 not only on those who hear it from one who 
 works miracles, but also on those who hear 
 it from one who brings unexceptionable tes- 
 timonies of miracles having been wrought 
 by others in attestation of Christianitv. 
 Whoever attentively reads the history of 
 
 * See Chap. X^^I. p. 343 of this Yol. 
 
 the Acts of the Apostles, and the historical 
 parts of the Epistles, Avill find, that all 
 ministers, regularly ordained, — for the 
 case of self-ordained ministers I do not here 
 consider, — thought it their duty to preach 
 the word every where, whether they 
 could work miracles or not. The mira- 
 culous powers were an adventitious cir- 
 cumstance; of great importance, indeed, 
 in the opening of Christianity; but if the 
 stress of an evangelical commission to 
 the heathen had ever been meant to he 
 laid upon it, it is surprising that this con- 
 dition should never be mentioned in the 
 sacred volume : it is not to be conceived, 
 that the numberless missionaries in the 
 apostolic ages should all have been igno- 
 rant of it. Besides, with the cessation 
 of miracles, the work of promulgation 
 must have probably ceased; whereas, it 
 appears, that in the succeeding centuries, 
 even to the tenth, missionaries still la- 
 boured ; and, in a greater or less degree, 
 the work prospered in their hand. 
 
 If the reflections have any weight, 
 they show that it has been inconsiderate- 
 ly asserted, that civil governments alone 
 have a right to determine, whether Chris- 
 tian missionaries shall preach the Gospel 
 or not within their dominions. I have 
 proved, I think, that they have a right to 
 establish Christianity; but it does not 
 follow that they have a right to exclude 
 it. Right and wrong, in this case, have 
 a higher foundation than human politics. 
 Trajan might think himself justified in 
 persecuting Christians, because they 
 transgressed the Roman laws, which for- 
 bade the introduction of foreign religions. 
 But Trajan ought to have known, that 
 there is an authority in religion superior 
 to any human constitutions whatever. 
 
 Though the authority of Scripture, the 
 practice of the apostolic age, and the la- 
 bours of the best and wisest of their suc- 
 cessors, from age to age, seem, taken to- 
 gether, to form a sufficient apology for 
 Christian missions at this day, yet we 
 need not fear, in this cause, to appeal to 
 the common sense of mankind. If a whole 
 nation were afflicted with a pestilential 
 disease, and a foreigner were in posses- 
 sion of a medicine, that might probably 
 save many of their lives, it might be pru- 
 dent, no doubt, for that foreigner to ob- 
 tain an express license, if practicable, 
 from the government, for aflTording medi- 
 cal aid to its subjects. But will any 
 
 man say, that it would be wrong in him 
 to endeavour to heal the diseased, if he 
 
600 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 had an opportunity, and had the benevo- 
 lence to attempt it though he had no for- 
 mal sanction from the magistrate'? To 
 promote the welfare of our neighbours, is 
 next to our duty to God, the most essen- 
 tial ingredient in the character of a good 
 man. Is the express consent of the legis- 
 lature necessary, antecedently to every 
 office of mercy and humanity 1 — It is not 
 necessary to say that the propagation of 
 the Gospel is the most salutary and the 
 most important of all works of charity. 
 What then ought to be thought of him 
 who would leave to the discretion of the 
 magistrate the great ofEce of labouring 
 to win souls; and would charge with 
 sin and employment of all others the 
 most beneficent to mankind 1 
 
 " Is not this to teach rebellion against 
 lawful authority, and to countenance an 
 undue interference with foreign govern- 
 ments 1" Could this be proved, I should 
 not know how to apologize for mission- 
 aries. For I scarcely know any thing 
 more diametrically opposed to the genius 
 of the Gospel than such a conduct. Let 
 it be carefully observed, that our argu- 
 ment goes no farther than to justify a 
 PACIFIC attempt to teach Christianity 
 throughout the Globe. " If they perse- 
 cute you in one city, flee ye into an- 
 other," is the rule of the Divine Author 
 of Christianity. A missionary must be 
 prepared to endure, not to inflict evil : he 
 may expect opposition, and even death 
 itself. He must patiently sustain his 
 lot : he must forego not only all violence mark, a poor impotent government, com 
 
 lous to every Christian sensation, as de- 
 liberately to condemn all missions con- 
 ducted in the true spirit of the Gospel. 
 
 Do we expect that, according to nume- 
 rous prophecies, the kingdom of Christ 
 shall spread through all nations 1 And 
 are no means to be employed to promote 
 itl — Shall we complain of the want of 
 universality in the best religion, and dis- 
 courage every attempt to effect that uni- 
 versality ■? With what an ill grace do 
 objectors to the propagation of the Gos- 
 pel make such complaints 1 Are humaa 
 efforts concerned in all other works of 
 Divine Providence, and are they in this, 
 the most important of all, to be excluded? 
 Are ws to sit still, and expect some 
 sudden and miraculous providential in- 
 terposition, and is this the only in- 
 stance, in which Socinians, and men who 
 call themselves rational Christians, will 
 use no rational methods, in order to pro- 
 duce the most desirable effects ? Or have 
 we learned to despise the importance of 
 Christianity itself, and do we think that 
 the present comfort and future felicity of 
 mankind are no way connected with the 
 subject before us "? 
 
 I propose these few questions, leaving 
 the resolution of them to the consciences 
 of those, who have had it in their power 
 to encourage Christian missions in our 
 times, and who have opposed them. To 
 have been particularly active in extend- 
 insf the Redeemer's kinofdom forms no 
 part of the glory of this country. Den- 
 
 in attempting to propagate Christianity, 
 but also all artifice and secular intrigues : 
 he must not only forbear to disturb the 
 government of the country, and to weaken 
 
 pared with ours, has, it is well known, 
 effected in this way what may cause Bri- 
 tons to blush, and what should stir us up 
 to virtuous emulation. With every advan- 
 
 men's attachment to it, but he must do Stage in our hands, for the propagation of 
 
 more : he must teach obedience to it, as 
 an essential branch of Christianity itself, 
 and an obedience too, " not only for 
 
 the Gospel, we have done very little in- 
 deed, and the annals of the several dark 
 ages we have reviewed, have exhibited a 
 
 wrath, but also for conscience sake." If i spirit of adventurous charity unknown to 
 
 his word is not received in one place, he 
 must make experiment of another, in 
 dependence on Divine Providence and 
 grace. Meekness, patience, submission 
 to civil authority must attend him in 
 every step. Such were the apostolic 
 missionaries ; such in a good degree were 
 the missionaries of the dark ages, which 
 we are reviewing. And I am apt to 
 think, that those, who object to missions 
 in general, have had their eye on the po- 
 litical craft of the Jesuits, or the furious 
 factions of enthusiasts. For I can scarce- 
 ly believe we are grown so totally cal- 
 
 those, who now boast themselves as the 
 most enlightened and the most philoso- 
 phic of mankind. 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 WRITERS AND 
 
 EMINENT 
 CENTURY. 
 
 MEN IN THIS 
 
 In a dearth so excessive, there are 
 few, who deserve to be noticed either for 
 knowledge or for piety ; and fewer still 
 
Cext. X.] 
 
 WRITERS IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 601 
 
 Character 
 of Bruno. 
 
 for both. My chief view, in this chap- 
 ter, is to give the reader an idea of the 
 state of true religion in these times ; nor 
 will the picture here exhibited be mate- 
 rially erroneous, though it could be prov- 
 ed, that Theophylact, one of the authors 
 whom I shall quote, belonged to the next 
 century, as Mosheim thinks. For the 
 spirit and taste of the tenth and eleventh 
 centuries are so similar, that what illus- 
 trates the one will illustrate the other. 
 The very toleration of the Roman pope- 
 dom itself, after the detection of its flagi- 
 tiousness before all the world, evinces 
 the uncommonly low condition of Chris- 
 tian knowledge in this age ; proofs, how- 
 ever, will appear, that the Spirit of God 
 had not forsaken the Church, and that 
 there were those who reverenced and felt 
 the power of her doctrines. 
 
 It is not in Rome, but in the more re- 
 cent Churches, that this power appears. 
 Whether it was practically exemplified 
 by Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, in Ger- 
 many, is not very evident. But, in know- 
 ledge and learning, he was 
 very eminent. He was bro- 
 ther to Otho I. and by the de- 
 sire of the people of Cologne, was fixed 
 by that great prince in the archbishopric. 
 We must not expect much regard to ec- 
 clesiastical discipline in these times ; and 
 therefore are not to be surprised, that a 
 prince so religious as Otho was, should 
 invest his relation also with the civil 
 power of a dukedom. Bruno is remark- 
 ed, however, to have been among the first 
 who united offices so discordant in the 
 same person.* This was to secularize 
 the Church, and Cologne continunes in a 
 similar state to this day. Bruno was 
 nevertheless an assiduous promoter of re- 
 lio-ion. Normans, Danes, and various 
 others, who travelled in his provmce, he 
 brought over to the profession of Chris- 
 tianity. He restrained the luxury both 
 of clergy and people : and was 
 His death, himself a shining example of 
 A. D. 965. modest and frugal manners. 
 He died about the year 965. 
 Unni, a far more decided character, has 
 been alread}^ celebrated. As archbishop 
 of Hamburg, he acted with a vigour and 
 a piety worthj^ the importance of that See. 
 He was highly reverenced by the German 
 emperors of his time ; and that a person 
 80 opulent should choose to labour as a 
 
 missionary in such countries d^^^^ q[ 
 as Denmaik and Sweden, ar- x;„ni, 
 gues a zeal of no common de- . ^ g^g^ 
 5ree. He died at Stockholm 
 I'n 936.* 
 
 By the advice of Adolvard, bishop of 
 Verden, Adeldagus, who had discharged 
 some petty office in the Church, was sent 
 for to court by Otho the Great, and made 
 his chancellor. On the death of Unni, 
 he was appointed archbishop of Ham- 
 burg, but was so acceptable, by his ta- 
 lents and industry, to the emperor, that 
 he still continued in the same secular em- 
 ployments. Adeldagus sent a 
 number of pastors into Den- T^'-'efac- 
 mark, and was present with '^°"J'j,j^_ 
 Otho at Rome when the pope- ^^.^ . '^^^^ 
 dom was reformed. His flock f,ishop 53 
 at Hamburg complained, and years ; 
 not without reason, of his ab- died, 
 sence from them. The em- A. D. 938. 
 peror at length gave him li- 
 berty to return home. His care of the 
 poor, and many rather princely than pas- 
 toral virtues, were remarkable. But I 
 can form no great idea of the spirituality 
 of a man, who neglects residence among 
 his flock, and continues to act in a secu- 
 lar capacity under three successive prin- 
 ces, while he holds a bishopric. He 
 served Otho 11. and HI. with the same 
 success and ability with which he had 
 done Otho I. and after he had held his 
 bishopric 53 years, he died under Otho 
 III. in the year 988. f 
 
 Libentius, an Italian, by the desire of 
 Adeldagus, was appointed his successor. 
 Much i's said in praise of this prelate. 
 He often visited the Vandals, a barba- 
 rous people in Poland, ab'out the Vistula, 
 and taught them the way of 
 salvation. He sent pastors to ^ shi"in"J' 
 distant nations, and was a cluu-acte!-, 
 shining exemplar of piety and dies, 
 beneficence. He died in ^ p jgiS. 
 1013.:$: 
 
 Adolvard, bishop of Verden, who, as 
 we have mentioned, recommended Adel- 
 dagus to the patronage of Otho I. was 
 himself an excellent pattern of piety and 
 probity. He discharged the oflrce of a 
 faithful pastor in his diocese, and took 
 pains to instruct the ignorant Vandals i.i 
 the way of salvation. § 
 
 Of Adalbert, archbishop of Prague, I 
 can find no more than has been already 
 
 • Cent Magd. Cent. X. Vol. HI. 
 Vol. I. 3 E 
 
 • Cent, 
 t Ibid. 
 
 Magd. cent. X. 
 ^ Ibid. 
 
 Vol. 
 
 III. 
 
 § Ibid. 
 
604 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 quickening Spirit. — From God, beyond 
 question, arises the beginning of salva- 
 tion, never from us, nor with us. But 
 the consent and the work, though not 
 originating from us, is, however, not 
 without us."* Of the work of grace, and 
 of the duty of man in sanctification, he 
 seems to speak with evangelical accuracy. 
 The only error is, that by speaking of 
 justification, as effected through the 
 quickening Spirit, he seems to confound 
 justification with sanctification. A com- 
 mon mistake ! — The great luminary of 
 Africa fell into it; and, by his authority, 
 gave it a sanction throughout the western 
 Church. In another passage, Giselbert, 
 by speaking of a variety of justifications, 
 which he multiplies to seven, and, with 
 equal reason, he might have multiplied 
 them to seventy times seven, f tarnishes 
 the precious doctrine of salvation ex- 
 ceedingly, and leaves no distinct ground 
 for the afilicted conscience to seek peace 
 with God. " The first remission is bap- 
 tism ; the seventh is by tears and confes- 
 sion." Whenever men are Ijrought to 
 feel what sin is, — what their own sin is, — 
 they should learn the Scripture-doctrine 
 of justification, which is, from first to 
 last, by grace alone through Jesus Christ, 
 and by the iiistnimentality of faith. 
 Careless and self-righteous spirits may 
 trifle at their ease with other views of 
 doctrine; the contrite spirit cannot rest 
 but in Christ alone; and by the truth as 
 it is in Jesus, the conscience finds peace, 
 ' and the heart is set at liberty to serve 
 God in love. However, a serious inves- 
 tigation of the doctrine of Christian 
 righteousness, argues some just concern 
 for the salvation of the soul, and often 
 leads to the most salutary consequences. 
 The worst state of the Church is, when a 
 deep silence is preserved concerning 
 justification in any mode or sense, how- 
 ever men's minds may be amused or 
 agitated with a variety of religious specu- 
 lations or controversies. In that case, 
 religion lives only in the brain, and has 
 forsaken the conscience altogether. 
 
 But no writer of this age pierces more 
 deeply into the spirit of divine truth, than 
 the monk Radulph, who certainly flou- 
 rished about the tenth century, :f: though 
 very little is known concerning him. — 
 " Since," says he, " in every good work, 
 divine mercy prevents us, if a man seek 
 
 * Cunt. Magd. Id. p. 78. f Id. 139. 
 
 t Id. 363. 
 
 what recompense he may render to the 
 Lord, he finds it not unless he receive it 
 also from God. Divine grace, therefore, 
 obliges us by its beneficence, and helps 
 us when thus obliged, by many repeti- 
 tions of the same grace, that we may not 
 remain ungrateful." — " Since all are by 
 nature children of wrath, and born under 
 the yoke of diabolical slavery, there is no 
 ground to expect that any persons, ex- 
 cept those whom celestial clemency de- 
 livers, should of themselves choose to 
 come out of the general mass of depra- 
 vity. For it is not of him that willeth, 
 nor of him that runneth, but of God that 
 showeth mercy."* And he adds more to 
 the same purport, speaking very fully 
 concerning the "election of grace,"f and 
 connecting that doctrine with practical 
 views of humility and gratitude. 
 
 Nilus, of Greek extraction, was born 
 in the year 910, in Calabria. He was 
 allowed to have lived in a state of emi- 
 nent sanctity, though a married man; a 
 singular circumstance for those times. 
 After his wife's death he re- j^-,]^,^ ^.g. 
 tired about the year 910 into jippg i,^to 
 a convent. In 97G, the bishop a convent, 
 of Calabria, and a lord of the j^ jy g^g^ 
 territor}', named Leo, with 
 many priests, went to visit him, rather 
 with a view to try his skill than to derive 
 any benefit from his instructions. Nilus 
 treated them civilly, prayed with them a 
 short time, and then put into Leo's hands 
 a book of maxims concerning the small 
 number of the saved. The company 
 expressed their dissatisfaction at the 
 harshness of the doctrine. This induced 
 Nilus to undertake the proof of it from 
 the writings of the fathers, from St. Paul, 
 and from the Gospels. "These maxims 
 seem terrible," says he, "but the only 
 reason why they do so, is this, they con- 
 demn your practice. Unless you be sin- 
 cerely holy, you cannot escape ever- 
 lasting torments." They sighed, and 
 trembled. He had, however, said no 
 more than what the whole pu^tijer 
 New Testament inculcates account of 
 continually. And the con- Nijus, 
 duct of these men, and of inen a_ d. 975. 
 like these, who abound in 
 every age, shows how little the Scripture 
 is really believed. One of the company, 
 whom Nilus knew to live in open sin, 
 asked the monk, whether Solomon was 
 saved or not 1 What is it to us, answered 
 
 * Cent. Magd. p. 65. 
 
 + Rom. xi. 5. 
 
ClKT. X.] 
 
 WRITERS IN THIS CENTURY. 
 
 605 
 
 the uprig-ht Nilus, whether Solomon be 
 saved or not] It is sufficient for you to 
 know, that Christ pronounces damnation 
 against all workers of iniquity. I should 
 think it a more interesting object of in- 
 quiry for you, to consider whether you 
 shall be saved or not. As for Solomon, 
 the Scripture mentions not his repentance, 
 as it does that of Manasseh. — What ef- 
 fect this discourse had upon his visitors, 
 we know not. But it deserved to be re- 
 corded, both to show how dangerously 
 men exercise their ingenuity in furnishing 
 themselves with excuses to live in sin, 
 and also to give a sample of plain dealing 
 in those who undertake to instruct man- 
 kind. 
 
 Euphraxus, a haughty nobleman, was 
 governor of Calabria under the Greek 
 emperor. For the eastern part of Italy 
 remained subject to that monarch a con- 
 siderable time after the establishment of 
 the popedom. Euphraxus sought every 
 occasion of mortifying Nilus, because he 
 gave him no presents, as other abbots 
 did. Falling sick, however, he sent for 
 him, and begged of him the monafstic 
 habit. Your baptismal vows suffice, said 
 Nilus. Repentance requires no new vows, 
 but a change of heart and life. This sen- 
 timent of Nilus was somewhat extraor- 
 dinary for the tenth century. But 
 Euphraxus, who sought to pacify his 
 conscience at the easiest rate, with mise- 
 rable ignorance importuned the abbot to 
 invest him with the habit, to which he at 
 length consented. Euphraxus died three 
 days after. Infidelity may smile, but if 
 ever the conscience become thoroughly 
 alarmed, even in the most hardened 
 sceptics and sensualists, it will quickly 
 find, that the best of our moral works are 
 no covering to the soul from the justice 
 of a holy God ; and therefore, unless 
 the real doctrine of salvation be under- 
 
 stood, men in their distress will betake 
 themselves to such paltry refuges as this 
 of Euphraxus. A licentious Charles II. 
 anxiously flying to popish ceremonies, in 
 his dying hours, is not a singular case. 
 Others, who, like him, in health, despi- 
 sed the doctrines of grace, have done the 
 same. 
 
 Nilus refused the offer of the bishopric 
 of Capua: nor could the most flattering 
 invitations induce him to go to Constan- 
 tinople. He seemed likely 
 to enjoy tranquil retirement ]/""* ^^- 
 to his death, m his convent, bishopric 
 But Providence ordered it 
 otherwise. The Saracens invaded Cala- 
 bria, of which they afterwards gained 
 possession. Nilus was driven from his 
 home, and lived a long time in other con- 
 vents. Otho III. upon a visit, pressed 
 him to accept some situation in his do- 
 minions, wherever he should choose. Ni- 
 lus thanked the emperor, but said, our Di- 
 vine Master will not forsake my brethren, 
 if they be true monks, after I am gone. 
 Ask what you please, said the emperor, 
 I will give it you with pleasure. " The 
 only thing I ask you," replied Nilus, 
 "is, that you would save your soul. For 
 you must give an account to God as well 
 as other men." This good 
 abbotdied atTuscnlum, in an Dies, 
 extreme old age in the year A.D. 1005 
 1005.* 
 
 Such was the light, scattered here and 
 there, in the darkness of the times, by 
 which the God of grace and mercy call- 
 ed, nourished, and sanctified his Church, 
 and preserved to himself a godly seed 
 in the earth, who should serve him in the 
 Gospel of his Son, and prevent the cruel 
 tyranny of the prince of darkness from 
 completely overspreading the world. 
 
 *A. Butler. 
 
 3e2 
 
60S 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 Chap. I.] 
 
 CENTURY XI. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A GENERAL VIEW OF THE CHURCH IN 
 THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The genuine Church of Christ, under 
 the protection and influence of her Su- 
 preme Head, existed indeed in this cen- 
 tury; but it would be in vain to attempt 
 a regular and systematical history of her 
 progress. . Some particular circumstances 
 in different parts of the Christian world, 
 some pious and successful endeavours to 
 propagate the Gospel in pagan countries, 
 some degrees of ojiposition to the reign- 
 ing idolatry and superstition, and the 
 writings of some pious and evangelical 
 Theologians, demonstrated that the Spirit 
 of God had not forsaken the earth alto- 
 gether. 
 
 Indei^d, if this century may be said, in 
 some deoree, to have excelled the last, 
 the superiority must be ascribed to the 
 improvements of learning. For the arts 
 and sciences revived, in a measure, among 
 the clercry and the monks, thous:h not cul- 
 tivated* by any other set of men. 1 
 speak in regard to the western Church; 
 for the eastern, enfeebled and oppressed 
 by the Turks and Saracens from without, 
 and by civil broils and factions from 
 within, with difficulty preserved that de- 
 gree of knowledge, which in those de- 
 generate days still remained among the 
 Greeks. I scarcely find any vestiges of 
 Christian piety among the eastern Chris- 
 tians at this time : indeed, the attentive 
 reader must have observed how barren of 
 that sort of events, which relate to Chris- 
 tian history, Asia in general had been for 
 some ages. So fatal was the influence of 
 Mahometanism, and so judicially harden- 
 ed were the descendants of those, who 
 first had honoured the religion of Jesus. 
 Constantinople was still called a Chris- 
 tian city, and, in learning and politeness, 
 was superior to any part of the West : 
 but it is in Europe we are to look for the 
 emanations of piety, France and Italy 
 excelled particularly in the cultivation of 
 learning. Robert, king of France, the 
 
 * Mosheini, Cent. xi. 479. 
 
 son and successor of Hugh Capet, who 
 began to reign in 996, and died in 1031, dis- 
 tinguished himself as the friend of science. 
 Even the ferocious Normans, whose wars 
 and devastations were so terrible in Italy, 
 France, and England, after they had esta- 
 blished their respective governments, ap- 
 plied themselves to the cultivation of the 
 human mind, and diffused some light 
 among the people whom they had sub- 
 dued. This was particularly the case 
 with the southern parts of Italy, and with 
 our own island. William the Conqueror, 
 savage and imperious as he was, restored 
 letters to England, which, amidst the 
 Danish depredations, had been almost 
 extinguished. And we shall see, at least, 
 one learned foreigner at the head of the 
 English Church, who, uniting piety to 
 knowledge, was not unworthy of the 
 Christian name. The learning itself, in- 
 deed, was not philosophical, but consisted 
 chiefly of grammar, rhetoric, and logic. 
 It was, however, connected with divinity : 
 the Scriptures were held in high reputa- 
 tion : the hardy presumption of subtile 
 theory, and the supercilious negligence 
 concerning piety and public worship, 
 which have marked the character of mo- 
 dern times, were then but little known 
 among men. In such circumstances, to 
 have learned to read, to have attended to 
 the meanino- of words, and to have em- 
 ployed the powers of the human mind, in 
 any manner, on the sacred writings, were 
 blessings to mankind. In Italy and 
 France also there were some witnesses of 
 divine truth, who -opposed the abomina- 
 tions of the popedom. 
 
 The great scenes of political contention 
 in this age, were, in the east, the Cru- 
 sades ; in the west, the disputes between 
 the popes and the emperors. Civil, and 
 even, what is called ecclesiastical, his- 
 tory, is full of these subjects.* To my 
 
 * The em])eroi- of Germany, Henry III. 
 surnanud the Black, hcRring of ihe scanda- 
 lous lives of llie popes and the clergy, called 
 tlie Vllllh General Council at Sutri, A. D. 
 1046 ; when the three pretenders to the pope- 
 dom were deposed : Gregory VI. for Simony, 
 Benedict IX. and Silvester 111. for the same, 
 and wicked I'ves in general. See Bower V. 
 
Cbkt. XI.] 
 
 OPPOSITION TO POPERY, 
 
 607 
 
 Popery 
 triiim])fi- 
 ant : coun- 
 cil of Plu- 
 centia, 
 
 A.D. 1O05. 
 
 province they bear scarcely any relation. 
 The former were attended with dreadful 
 evils, and much augmented with the in- 
 fluence of that pernicious superstition, 
 which commutes for offences, and taught 
 men to indulge themselves in the worst 
 of vices, through the hope of finding their 
 way to heaven by the merit of a Crusade. 
 I shall, however, examine a little, here- 
 after, the grounds of the justice or injus- 
 tice of these expeditions, because the cha- 
 racter of some pious men of great emi- 
 nence is connected with the question. 
 The disputes between the popes and tlie 
 emperors seem entirely barren of instruc- 
 tive incidents in religion. They confirm, 
 nevertheless, the Christian in the belief 
 of those scriptures which so accurately 
 mark the character of Antichrist.* Gre- 
 gory VII. commonly called Hildebrand, 
 began the scheme, which fifty years after 
 was completely accomplished, namely, of 
 rescuing the election of the popes from 
 the emperors, and of fixing it entirely in 
 the college of Cardinals, in which it still 
 continues. The celibacy of the clergy, 
 and the doctrine of transub- 
 stantiation, were established 
 by the council of Placentia in 
 1095. Popery, in short, reign- 
 ed triumphant, and no public 
 profession of the Gospel, 
 which professed independ- 
 ence of the Romish domination, could be 
 endured in Europe. 
 
 It will be proper to close this general 
 view of the century with a circumstance 
 or two concerning Africa. That once 
 fruitful mother of the Churches, who glo- 
 ried in her Cyprians and Augustines, had 
 now only two bishops. The Saracens, 
 masters of the countr}'^, persecuted the 
 Christians there with great bitterness : 
 3'et so infatuated were the African Chris- 
 tians with the love of sin, that they quar- 
 relled among themselves, and betrayed 
 their bishop Cyriacus into the hands of 
 the infidels, who much abused him. Gre 
 gory VII. wrote to the good bishop, to 
 comfort him in his distresses. A friendly 
 letter, abounding with trulj'^ Christian 
 sentiments, even from so imfierious and 
 unchristian a character as Hildebrand's, 
 might conve)' consolation to the mind of 
 Cyriacus. f Piety united with distress 
 
 stands aloof from politics, and thankfully 
 embraces truth as sent from her God, 
 whatever be the instrument. 
 
 He, who seriously reflects in what 
 glory the religion of Christ once shone in 
 Asia and Africa; how dark, and idola- 
 trous, and, at the same time, how insen- 
 sible of their spiritual misery the inhabit- 
 ants of those two quarters of the globe 
 were, in this century, and continue even 
 to the present times, will see with what 
 reverential care the jewel of the Gospel 
 should be cherished, while in our pos- 
 session, lest we not only lose our own 
 souls, but entail a curse on ages yet un- 
 born. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE OPPOSITION MADE TO THE ERRORS 
 OF POPERY. 
 
 In the year 1017, certain persons, real 
 or supposed heretics, were discovered in 
 France, who were said to hold, " that 
 they did not believe — that 
 Jesus Christ was born of the 
 Virgin IMary : — that he died 
 for the salvation of mankind ; 
 — that he was buried and rose 
 again; — that l)aptism pro- 
 cured the remission of sins ; — that the 
 consecration by the priest constituted the 
 Sacrament of the body and blood of 
 Christ; — and that it was profitable to 
 pray to the martyrs and confessors." 
 Other practical matters of a detestable 
 nature were ascribed to them. On their 
 refusing to recant before a council held at 
 Orleans, thirteen of them were burnt 
 alive.* It is not easy to say what was 
 the true character of these men. It is 
 certain that they opposed the then reign- 
 ing superstitions, and that they were 
 willing to suffer for the doctrines which 
 they espoused. The crimes alleged are 
 so monstrous and incredible, as to render 
 the charofes adduced ao-ainst their doc- 
 trines very suspicious. That the}', how- 
 ever, were truly evangelical Christians, 
 is what I dare not affirm. 
 
 Some time after there appeared, in 
 Flanders, another sect, which was con- 
 demned in a synod held at Arras, in the 
 
 Heretics, 
 real, or 
 supposed, 
 in France, 
 
 A.D. 1017. 
 
 • See particularly 2Thes. ii. 1 Tim. iv. 
 t Du Phi, 1st edit. Vol. IV. Cent. XI. p. 
 
 55. 
 
 • Du Pin, 1st Ed. Vol. IV. Cent. XI. p. 
 110. 
 
608 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. H. 
 
 Disciples 
 of Gun- 
 dulphus 
 condemn- 
 ed, 
 A.D. 1025. 
 
 year 1025, by Gerard, bishop 
 of Cambray and Arras. They 
 had come from Italy, being 
 the disciples of Gundulphus, 
 who taught there several sup- 
 posed heretical doctrines. 
 Gerard himself, in a letter 
 which he wrote on the subject, observes, 
 that the disciples of Gundulphus travelled 
 up and down to multiply converts, and 
 that they had withdrawn many from the 
 belief of the real presence in the Sacra- 
 ment; that they owned themselves to be 
 the scholars of Gundulphus, who had in- 
 structed them in the evangelical and apos- 
 tolical doctrine. " This," said they, " is 
 our doctrine, to renounce the world, to 
 bricJle the lusts of the flesh, to maintain 
 ourselves by the labour of our own hands, 
 to do violence to no man, to love the 
 brethren. If this plan of righteousness 
 be observed, there is no need of baptism; 
 if it be neglected, baptism is of no avail." 
 They particularly objected to the baptism 
 of infants, because they were altogether 
 incapable of understanding or confessing 
 the truth. They denied the real presence of 
 Christ's body in the Lord's Supper: they 
 rejected the consecration of Churches: 
 they opposed various reigning supersti- 
 tions, particularly the doctrine of purga- 
 tory and the practices connected with it. 
 They likewise refused to worship the 
 cross, or any images whatever. The 
 bishop of Arras, having examined their 
 supposed errors, and, in his own opinion, 
 confuted them, drew up a confession of 
 faith, contrary to those errors, which he 
 required the hereiics to sign. As they 
 did not well understand the Latin tongue, 
 he caused the confession to be explained 
 to them in the vulgar tongue by an inter- 
 preter; then, according to this account, 
 they approved and signed the instrument, 
 and were dismissed in peace by the 
 bishop. 
 
 It is very diificult to judge a cause by 
 hearing only one side, and that side 
 prejudiced to an extreme. If we are 
 tempted to look on the doctrines of Gun- 
 dulphus in a favourable light, whatever 
 we may think of the characters of these 
 his timorous disciples, from this short 
 narrative of his enemies, how much more 
 excellent might they appear, if we had 
 his writings and sermons'? As he did 
 not deny the use of the Lord's supper, 
 but only the doctrine of the real presence, 
 it is probable that he held baptism also in 
 a similar manner. If, however, he abso- 
 
 lutely rejected the baptism of infants, 
 the people who call themselves Baptists 
 at this day may seem with justice to 
 claim Gundulphus as belonging to their 
 sect. The nature of mankind, ever prone 
 to run from one extreme to another, will 
 easily account for this circumstance of 
 the rejection of infant-baptism. The 
 practice had long been sullied with su- 
 perstitious fooleries : the transition to its 
 total rejection was natural. Yet we 
 shall afterward see reason to doubt, 
 whether this people did deny the abso- 
 lute unlawfulness of infant-baptism, when 
 we come to consider the religious views 
 of the Waldenses; for the probability is 
 strong, that generally those called here- 
 tics in France, Flanders, and Italy, in 
 these middle ages, were similar to each 
 other in doctrines and customs. And 
 certainly we see in them a noble testimo- 
 ny to the existence of evangelical truth, a 
 body of men in Italy before the year 1026, 
 in doctrine and practice directly opposite 
 to the church of Rome, spreading purity 
 of Christian worship through the world 
 with all their might, and distinguishing 
 themselves from the general mass of 
 Christians in the West. I cannot be- 
 lieve that they held marriage 
 as unlawful, though they were 
 charged with this sentiment 
 by their enemies : and not- 
 withstanding some errors and 
 blemishes, it is not to be 
 doubted but that on the whole they were 
 of the true Church of Christ. Faithfully 
 to withstand idolatry and the reigning 
 corruptions, required-a light and strength 
 far above nature, and I have only to re- 
 gret, that, after a careful search, this is 
 all the account I can find of them. 
 
 Not long after the supposed heretics 
 of Orleans, arose the famous Berenga- 
 rius of Tours, who wrote against the 
 doctrine of the real presence. His 
 writings called forth the most learn- 
 ed Romanists to defend the tenets of 
 Paschasius Radbertus; and Berengarius 
 was compelled to renounce, and to burn 
 his writings. But he recanted again and 
 again, and returned, says a contempora- 
 ry popish author,* like the dog to his 
 
 They op- 
 posed the 
 lloinish 
 corrup- 
 tions. 
 
 * Bei-tola, Presbyter of Constantia. See 
 Bishop Newton's 3d vol. of the Prohecies, p. 
 164. I liave examined Du Pin, Natalis Alex- 
 ander, A. Duller, and Mosheim, on this sub- 
 ject ; and find the whole mass of information 
 so very uninteresting, though prolix beyond 
 
Cz:rT. XL] 
 
 GERARD.— OTHINGAR. 
 
 609 
 
 vomit. Whether he died in the same 
 sentiments, is strongly contested between 
 the papists and the protestants. The 
 former quote William of Malmsbury, 
 who says, he did trembling-. " This 
 day," said he, "will my Lord Jesus 
 Christ appear to me, either to glorify his 
 mercy in my repentance, or, as I fear, to 
 punish me for the mischief I have done 
 by my example." The sentiment wheth- 
 er founded on fact or not, is strongly 
 expressive of the genius of the then 
 reigning religion, which excluded the 
 spirit of adoption and filial confidence in 
 God through Christ, and supported the 
 spirit of bondage and anxiety. And the 
 effect was, in this case, proportional to 
 the cause. Men had lost the Christian 
 article of justification through faith alone ; 
 and believing salvation to be suspended 
 on the merit of human works, they found 
 it impossible for Berengarius, even on 
 the most sincere repentance for his sup- 
 posed heresy, to countervail the mis- 
 chiefs which he had done by misleading 
 others. Whether then we suppose the 
 confession of Berengarius to be a forgery, 
 or a real fact, it was delivered in the 
 spirit of those who weighed human me- 
 rits and demerits in opposite scales, and 
 found no other method of determining 
 the question of a man's salvation or de- 
 struction, than that which should result 
 from the comparison of his good actions 
 •with his crimes. How impossible is it 
 by such a procedure to give solid peace 
 of conscience to a sinner ! Joy, love, and 
 cheerful activity in the Christian life, 
 can have no existence on such a plan : 
 but such was the general spirit of the re- 
 ligion of the times we are reviewing. It 
 is not easy to decide whether the papists 
 or the protestants were in the right, in 
 the determination of the question. In what 
 sentiments did Berengarius die] The 
 former have the advantage of positive 
 testimony in their favour. The question 
 is, however, perfectly immaterial. The 
 doctrine of the real presence depends not 
 on the character of Berengarius for its 
 decision. I know no marks of his Chris- 
 tian piety; and his repeated dissimula- 
 tions render him no honour to either 
 party. It is, however, of some moment 
 to observe, that he was the instrument of 
 calling forth a degree of salutary opposi 
 
 tion to the errors of the times. He call- 
 ed the Church of Rome a church of ma- 
 ignants, the council of vanity, and the 
 seat of Satan. He corrupted, say some 
 old historians, almost all the French, 
 Italians, and English, with his depravi- 
 ties. The expressions are much too 
 strong; but, no doubt, a salutary check 
 was given to the growing superstitions : 
 the opposition to the popedom, though it 
 did not lay hold of the central truths of 
 the Gospel, might yet pave the way for 
 still more effective exertions ; and served 
 at least to inform mankind, that the court 
 of Rome was not infallible. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL IN 
 THIS CENTURY. 
 
 The* work of Christian piety, which 
 had been successfully carried on in Hun- 
 gary, was now crowned with still greater 
 
 Stephen 
 
 king of 
 
 Hungary 
 
 born, 
 
 A. D. 997. 
 
 prosperity. Stephen the king, 
 who had been baptized by 
 Adalbert bishop of Prague, 
 and who began to reign in the 
 year 997, showed himself a 
 zealous patron of the Gospel. 
 Under his auspices, Astricus came into 
 Hungary, opened a school, and educated 
 ministers, while Boniface, one of his 
 disciples, preached the word in Lower 
 Hungary. The zeal of Stephen, indeed, 
 was much stimulated by his pious queen, 
 Gisla, daughter of the emperor Henry II. 
 He often accompanied the preachers, and 
 pathetically exhorted his subjects. He 
 suppressed barbarous customs, and re- 
 strained blasphemy, theft, adultery and 
 murder. His kindness to the poor, and, 
 indeed his whole moral conduct, was ad- 
 mirable. His excellent code of laws are 
 to this day the basis of the laws of Hun- 
 o-ary. It is inscribed to his son Emerie, 
 whom he exhorts to cultivate sincere 
 humility, the true glory of a king. He 
 forbids in it all impiety, the violation ot 
 the Sabbath, and irreverent behaviour in 
 the house of God. This monarch de- 
 feated the prince of Transilvania, who 
 had invaded his dominions, and took him 
 prisoner; but restored him to liberty, 
 on condition that he should allow the 
 
 measure, Uiat the few sentences in the text 
 seem to me all that is needful to be observed 
 on the Berengarian controversy. 
 
 • Cent. Magd. Cent. xi. 
 
610 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 Stephen 
 •was the 
 first Chris- 
 tian mon- 
 ai-ch of 
 Huno;ai-y. 
 He died, 
 A.D. 1038 
 
 Brief ac- 
 count of 
 his succes- 
 sor, Peter. 
 
 Gospel to be preached to the 
 Transilvanians, without mo- 
 lestation. Stephen was a 
 prosperous monarch, but found 
 afflictions at home in the loss 
 of all his children. His mind 
 was, however, improved in 
 divine things by his sufferings. 
 He laboured three years under a compli- 
 cation of diseases, and died in the year 
 1038.* He had lived to see all Hungary 
 become externally Christian, thougli 
 Christianity existed there, adulterated, 
 or clouded at least by papal domination, 
 and by the fashionable superstitions. 
 
 Gerard, a Venetian, had been mucb 
 employed by king Stephen, as bishop of 
 Choriad, ^ diocese of which two thirds 
 of the inhabitants were idolaters. In less 
 than a year, they, in general, had receiv- 
 ed the forms of Christianity from the 
 pious labours of Gerard. The power of 
 Stephen had seconded the views of the 
 bishop; but the prospect changed on the 
 king's decease. His nephew 
 and successor Peter, perse- 
 cuted Gerard : he was, how- 
 ever, expelled by his subjects 
 in 1042, and Abas, a noble- 
 man, was made king of Hungary, who 
 being slain after two years, Peter was 
 recalled, but was once more banished. 
 Andrew, the son of Ladislaus, the cousin 
 of king Stephen, was appointed king, on 
 the condition of restoring idolatry. Ge- 
 rard and three other bishops endeavoured 
 to divert him from the design. But they 
 were assaulted on the road by duke Va- 
 thas, a zealous pagan. Andrew himself 
 came up to the spot, and rescued one of 
 the bishops : the other three, of whom 
 Gerard was one, had fallen by the arm 
 of the barbarian. It is probable, how- 
 ever, that Divine Providence permitted 
 their atrocious villany for the good of the 
 Church. The heart of Andrew was rhov- 
 ed : he had seen of what idolatry was 
 capable : he examined Christianity, re- 
 ceived it, repressed idolatry, and reigned 
 successfully. After the Hungarians had 
 seen such a prince as Stephen, and had 
 felt the good effects on society resulting 
 from the establishment of Christianity, 
 that they could still prefer idolatry is a 
 deplorable proof of the native power of 
 human depravity. What long-continued 
 exertions are necessary to establish genu- 
 ine goodness in a country ! 
 
 * Alban Butler. 
 
 In* Denmark, Othingar, a bishop of 
 that country, extended the pale of the 
 Church by his labours ; and Unwan, the 
 bishop of Hamburg, under the patronage 
 of the emperor Henry II. cut down the 
 idolatrous groves, which the people of his 
 diocese frequented, and erected churches 
 in their stead. 
 
 Godeschalcus,f duke of the Vandals, 
 revived among his subjects the regard for 
 the Gospel, which they had once em- 
 braced, and which they had afterwards 
 neglected. It is not easy to know pre- 
 cisely what were the limits of his domi- 
 nions. But I find Lubeck, Mecklenburg, 
 and Sclavonia mentioned as belonging to, 
 or as, at least, contigruous to his dukedom. 
 
 Much has been said in praise of this 
 prince, and of the success of his labours.:}: 
 He is reported to have, in person, exhort- 
 ed his people with much affection in the 
 public assemblies; and John, a Scotch- 
 man, the bishop of Mecklenburg, bap- 
 tized great numbers of the Sclavonians. 
 Yet this last people, together with the 
 Obotriti, Avhose capital town was Meck- 
 lenburg, the Venedi, who dwelt on the 
 banks of the Vistula, and the Prussians, 
 continued pagans, in a great measure, 
 throughout this century. Boleslaus, king 
 of Poland, attempted to force these na- 
 tions into a profession of Christianity; 
 and some of his attendants used methods 
 to evangelize them, which were better 
 adapted to the nature of the Gospel. 
 Boniface, in particular,§ and eighteen 
 other persons, set out from Germany, to 
 labour among the Prussians, and were 
 massacred by that barbarous people. 
 They seem to have been among the last 
 of the European nations who submitted 
 to the yoke of Christ. In the zealous at- 
 tempts made for their conversion, though 
 unsuccessful, we see abundant proofs, 
 that the spirit of propagating the Gospel, 
 which was the brightest gem of these 
 dark ages, still existed. 
 
 Nor had the zeal of our own ancestors 
 evaporated in this century. In the year 
 1001, at the desire of Olaus II, king of 
 Sweden, some English priests 
 were sent over into the north 
 by king Ethelred. Of these 
 Sigefrid, archdeacon of York, 
 was one. His labours were 
 very successful, and he was 
 
 English 
 mission- 
 ary to 
 Sweden, 
 
 A.D. 1001. 
 
 * Cent. Magd. Cent. XI. 
 X Crantzius in Vandalia. 
 § Mosheini, Cent. XI. Chap. I. 
 
 t Ibid, 
 
Ce:^t. XI.] 
 
 SIGIFRID.—ULFRID.— CANUTE. 
 
 611 
 
 appointed bishop of Wexia, in Enst-Golh- 
 land. Having established the churches 
 there, he preached to the infidels in 
 West-Gothland, leaving his nephews to 
 govern his diocese while he was absent. 
 But they were murdered by the pagan 
 nobility of the country. A melancholy 
 proof, how strong the spirit of idolatry 
 still remained in these norihern regions ! 
 The same kind of family pride, which, at 
 this day, preserves the remnants of po- 
 pery in protestant countries, preserved 
 the existence of paganism in Sweden. 
 Sigefrid, however, returned into his dio- 
 cese, died there a. natural death, and was 
 buried at Wexia. 
 
 This man is said to have finished his 
 course about the year 1002; an account 
 inconsistent, as to the order of time, with 
 that which has been already given. But 
 not to trouble ihe reader with such nice- 
 ties of chronology, as at this distance of 
 time are impossible to be adjusted, it is 
 more material to observe that he appears 
 to have been an apostolic person ; that on 
 his first arrival in Sweden, he was ob- 
 liged, chiefly, to preach by interpreters ; 
 that he prevailed on the king to spare 
 the murderers of his nephews : and, that 
 though he was very poor, he refused to 
 touch the fine which had been exacted on 
 those murderers, and which had been 
 offered to him as a present by the Swe- 
 dish monarch.* Gotebald, another Eng- 
 . , lish missionary, was appoint- 
 
 Norwav. ^^ bishop in Norway, and 
 preached in Schonen. 
 Ulfrid, a learned and virtuous Eno-- 
 lishman, preached the faith, first in Ger- 
 many, afterward in Sweden under the 
 patronage of king Olaus ; where he was 
 an instrument of converting 
 many, till, in the year 1028, 
 preachincr ao-ainst the idol 
 Thor, and hewing it down 
 with a hatchet, he was slain 
 by the pagans. See Adam of 
 Bremen, who wrote his History of the 
 Church in 1080. 
 
 Canute, kinff of Denmark, natural son 
 of Swein H. whose great uncle Canute 
 had reigned in England, was carefully 
 educated by his father, who had no legi- 
 timate issue. He became king of Den- 
 mark by election, warred against the tur- 
 bulent barbarians his neighbours, and 
 planted the profession of Christianity in 
 
 CanutelV. 
 surnamed 
 the Saint, 
 mnrdcred 
 aboutl086. 
 
 the 
 
 iElnoth, a 
 monk of 
 Canter- 
 bury, 
 wrote his 
 life. 
 
 Ulfrid 
 slain by 
 the pagans 
 in Sweden, 
 
 A.D. 1028. 
 
 Courland, Samogitia, and Li- 
 vonia. His zeal for the main- 
 tenance of the clergy having 
 disgusted his subjects, he was 
 deserted and murdered. His 
 brother Olaus succeeded, 
 whose successor Eric III. restored 
 authority of the clergy. The 
 Life of Canute was written 
 by YElnoth, a monk of Can- 
 terbury, who lived twenty- 
 four years in Denmark, and 
 who wrote in 1105. He tells 
 us. that the first preachers of 
 the faith in Denmark, Sweden, and Nor- 
 way, were English priests; that the 
 Danes embraced the Gospel with zeal, 
 but that the Swedes, obstinate in their 
 idolatry, murdered an Englishman, nam- 
 ed Eschil, while he was preaching Christ 
 to some savage tribes. That Sweden, 
 however, was chiefly evangelized by 
 Anglo-Saxon missionaries, is the remark 
 of Stiernman, in his treatise on the state 
 of learning among the ancient Swedes.* 
 
 Olaus, king of Norwaj% assisted the 
 Danes against Ethelred of England, and, 
 in his return from England, carried over 
 several priests ; one of whom, named 
 Grimkele, was appointed bishop of Dron- 
 theim, the capital of king Olaus. This 
 prince abolished idolatrous 
 customs in Norway, Orkney, 
 and Iceland. He used to tra- 
 vel with zealous preachers, 
 exhorting his subjects, and 
 destroying temples. The pa- 
 gans, at length, aided by Ca- 
 nute of England, defeated and 
 slew him in the year 1030. 
 Magnus was called home from Russia, 
 and became king of Norway in 1039. | 
 
 The triumphs of the Gospel in Den- 
 mark were, upon the whole, very conspi- 
 cuous in this century. Hear the account 
 of Adam of Bremen, who wrote concern- 
 ing the situation of this country in the 
 year 1080. "Look," says he, "at that 
 very ferocious nation of the Danes — For 
 a long time they have been accustomed, 
 in the praises of God, to resound Alleluia. 
 Look at that piratical people. They are 
 now content with the fruits of their own 
 country. Look at that horrid region, 
 formerly altogether inaccessible on ac- 
 count of idolatry; they now eagerly 
 admit the preachers of the word. "4^ 
 
 Olaus H. 
 king of 
 Norway, 
 slain by 
 Canute of 
 England, 
 
 A.U. 1030. 
 
 His 
 
 son 
 
 • Olaus Macrn. B. 17. C. 20. 
 Hist. Alban Builer, Col. II. 
 
 Collier's Etc. 
 
 * Rutl. Vol II. t Ibid. VII. 
 
 i Gibbon, Vol. V'. C. 55. 
 
612 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. HI. 
 
 From this very imperfect account, for 
 which I am obliged to Gibbon, and which 
 he candidly admits to be true, we may 
 collect, what a blessed work it is to pro- 
 pagate the Gospel of Christ ; that no men 
 deserve better of mankind than faithful 
 missionaries ; and, that the allegorical 
 descriptions of the effects of real Chris- 
 tianity, which we meet with in the pro- 
 phets, have a deep and solid meaning.* 
 To see Danes and Englishmen enjoying 
 together, in mutual confidence and cha- 
 rity, the blessings of true religion, must 
 have been surprising to those, who bad 
 known with what savage barbarity the 
 former had desolated the habitations of 
 the latter. In truth, that religion which 
 could molify, transform, and rectify the 
 heart of an ancient Dane, must indeed 
 be divine. These are the triumphs cf 
 the Gospel. It was the preaching of the 
 Cross, attended with the energy of the 
 Holy Spirit, which effected this salutary 
 change of manners in the north of Eu- 
 rope. Denmark had inflicted much evil 
 on her southern neighbours, and they 
 requited her with spiritual blessings. It 
 is remarkable, that, to this day, no nation 
 has exceeded the Danes in labours for the 
 propagation of the Gospel, in proportion 
 to their abilities and opportunities. And 
 it must be confessed, that they owe much 
 to mankind on the score of gratitude, for 
 the favours of the same kind which their 
 ancestors received. 
 
 For want of materials, I cannot dwell 
 on the particulars of the conversion of this 
 people.")" But the durable change of their 
 manners intimates, that their country 
 must have been blessed with one of those 
 gracious effusions of the Holy Spirit, 
 
 * Isaiah xi. The wolf also shall dwell with 
 the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with 
 the kid. 
 
 f One instance, however, is recorded, that 
 deserves to be mentioned. William, an Eng- 
 lish priest, attended Canute tiie Great, in one 
 of his voyages from England to Denmark. 
 Moved with pity on account of the idolatry 
 of the Danes, he desired to be left as a mis- 
 sionary. His labours were successful, and 
 he was appointed bishop of Roschild in Zea- 
 land. King Swein having put to death some 
 persons witiiout a legal trial, William forbad 
 his entrance into the church. Several eourtiers 
 drawing their swords, the bishop offered them 
 his neck. Swein submitted, conformed to the 
 rules of penance imposed by William, and 
 ever after concurred with his views. The bi- 
 shop of Roschild died in the year 1067. Al 
 ban Butler. 
 
 the consequences of which are commonly 
 felt for ages after. Toward the close of 
 this century, the northern nations ceased 
 to invade the southern entirely. The 
 last attempt was made by Magnus, king 
 of Norway, on the isle of Anglesea; but 
 he was repulsed by Hugh earl of Shrews- 
 bury,* in the eleventh year of William 
 Rufus. " That restless people seem 
 about this time to have learned the use 
 of tillage, which thenceforth kept them 
 at home, and freed the other nations of 
 Europe from the devastations spread over 
 them by those piratical invaders^ This 
 pi-oved one great cause of the subsequent 
 settlen\pnt and improvement of the 
 southern nations." 
 
 I quote the woids of Hume, which re- 
 present in a very perspicuous manner the 
 advantages resulting from the civilization 
 of the north, not only to the Danes, Nor- 
 wegians, and Swedes, but also to the 
 south of Europe. It is in assigning the 
 cause of this happy change, that I am 
 obliged to dissent from that elegant his- 
 torian. He thinks that the effect is 
 sufHciently accounted for by these north- 
 ern people having learned the use of til- 
 age. But, besides that he has no histo- 
 rical evidence of this fact, and supports it 
 by mere conjecture, it is fair to ask, How 
 came they to be so docile and tractable, 
 as to submit to the arts of agriculture] 
 Does a nation, habituated to arms and to 
 idleness, easily give itself up to industry, 
 and the arts of peace 1 If we can answer 
 this question aright, we shall know to 
 what is to be ascribed the happy trans- 
 formation of the north. Scanty as my 
 materials have been, I have yet shown, 
 that the Gospel had now been for three 
 centuries preached in Scandinavia. To 
 this, doubtless as the principal cause, we 
 must attribute the happy alteration of 
 manners in those barbarous recrions. 
 Christian godliness has the promise of 
 the life that now is, as well as of that 
 which is to come. While it conducts 
 enslaved souls into liberty, and, turning 
 them from the power of Satan to God, 
 invests them with the garments of salva- 
 tion, it also meliorates their condition in 
 this life, and difluses through the world 
 the most salutary precepts of peace, order, 
 and tranquillity. Let not men expect the 
 general civilization of the globe by any 
 other methods. When the earth shall 
 be full of the knowledge of the Lord, then 
 
 Hume, vol. i. c. v. 
 
Cbbtt. XL] 
 
 CHURCH IN ENGLAND. 
 
 613 
 
 will the nations learn war no more. We 
 enjoy at this day, the advantages of so- 
 ciet)' derived to Europe, from tlie propa- 
 gation of the Gospel, while we unorrate- 
 fuUy depreciate the labours of those 
 Christian Missionaries, through which, 
 under God, those advantages were con- 
 veyed to us. Our Saviour has directed 
 us to pray to the Lord of the harvest that 
 he would send forth labourers into his 
 harvest : and every one, who breathes 
 the genuine spirit of the Gospel, will de- 
 voutly obey the precept. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE STATE OF THE CHURCH IN 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 As the importance of our own country 
 began to be displayed in this century, it 
 will be proper to take some notice of the 
 appearance of religion in an island, which, 
 we have seen, had so distinguished a 
 share in diffusing divine truth through the 
 northern parts of Europe. Even the very 
 little of evangelical religion which we may 
 discover, may deserve our attention. 
 
 In the reign of Ethelred, a very cruel 
 massacre of the Danes was, by royal 
 order, made throughout his dominions. 
 The rage of the populace, excited by so 
 many injuries, was extreme, and made no 
 distinction between the innocent and the 
 guilty. Swein, king of Denmark, amply 
 revenged these cruelties, by repeated de- 
 vastations : and the unwarlike Ethelred 
 fled into Normandy to save his life, while 
 his subjects felt all the miseries which 
 might be expected from incensed and vic- 
 torious barbarians. Among other instances 
 of their hostilities, they levied a contri- 
 bution on the county of Kent, and murder- 
 ed the archbishop of Canterbury, who had 
 refused to countenance the exaction.* 
 
 The author, whose short account I have 
 followed, does not deign to give us the 
 name of this archbishop, nor to relate a 
 single circumstance of his murder. I 
 cannot but think, however, that he would 
 have enlarged on the subject if it would 
 have gratified his dislike of religion. But 
 thus a conduct, at once the most magna- 
 nimous and patriotic, is buried in obscu- 
 rity, because the hero was an ecclesiastic. 
 Let it, however, receive the justice which 
 is due to it from these memoirs. 
 
 The]" Danes were besieging Canter- 
 bury, when Al phage, the archbishop, was 
 * Hume, V. I. p. 144. f Collier's Ecc. Hist. 
 
 Vol. L 3 F 
 
 entreated by his friends to save his own 
 life. " God forbid," said Alphage, " that 
 I should tarnish my character by so in- 
 glorious a conduct ; and should be afraid 
 of going to heaven, because a violent 
 death lies across the passage. I have 
 been the instrument of drawing over sev- 
 eral considerable persons among these 
 Danes to the Gospel : if this be a fault, 
 I shall be happy in suffering for it. I 
 have ransomed some of my countrymen, 
 and supported others when in captivity. 
 If Danes be angry, because I have re- 
 proved their sins, it behoves me to re- 
 member him who hath said, ' if thou give 
 not the wicked warning, his blood will 
 I require at thine hand.' It is the character 
 of a hireling to leave the sheep when he 
 seeth the wolf coming. I mean, there- 
 fore, to stand the shock, and submit to 
 the order of Divine Providence."* 
 
 The archbishop, influenced by these 
 motives, remained in Canterbury, and 
 exhorted the people, as a Christian pas- 
 tor : but the Danes entered the city by 
 violence, and exercised the most horrid 
 barbarities, particularly on ladies of 
 quality, whom they dragged to the stake 
 and burnt to death, nor did they spare 
 even infants. Alphage, moved at these 
 hideous scenes, had the boldness to ex- 
 postulate with them. " The cradle," 
 says he, " can afford no triumphs for 
 soldiers. It would be better for you to 
 exercise your vengeance on me, whose 
 death may give some celebrity to your 
 names. Remember some of your troops 
 have, through my means, been brought 
 over to the faith of Christ, and I have 
 frequently rebuked you for your acts of 
 injustice." The Danes, exasperated at 
 his words, seized, and bound the arch- 
 bishop, and kept him prisoner for seven 
 months. His liberty, however, was of- 
 fered to him on condition of immense 
 payments to be made by himself, and by 
 Ethelred the kino-. He told them that 
 the sums were too large to be raised by 
 any exactions, and he firmly refused to 
 drain the treasures of the Church for the 
 sake of saving his life; accounting it 
 wrong to give to Pagans those sums 
 which had been devoted to the honour of 
 religion, and to the relief' of the poor. 
 The merciless Danes enraged beyond 
 measure, threw him down and stoned 
 him, while he prayed for his enemies and 
 for the Church ; and, at length, a certain 
 Dane, lately become a Christian, dis- 
 
 * Osbern de Vit. Elphegi. Hovedeu'a Ano. 
 
614 
 
 HISTOKY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. IV. 
 
 patched him, in order to free him from 
 his pain. — One of his successors, the fa- 
 mous Lanfranc, doubted whether Alphage 
 ought to be looked on as a martyr, be- 
 cause he had not died explicitly for the 
 Christian faith. But Ansel m, a still 
 more famous personage, told Lanfranc, 
 that Alphage was a real martyr, who died 
 rather than commit an unjust thing. Nor 
 is it easy to conceive that 
 
 •I bi^*^' ^"y spirit, less than that of a 
 shon of Christian, could have con- 
 
 Canter- ducted him through such a 
 bury, scene, and supported him with 
 
 murdered, so much fortitude and cha- 
 A.D. 1013. rity. — Alphage was murdered 
 in the year 1013. 
 
 A preceding archbishop, probably his 
 immediate predecessor, Elfric, in the 
 year 1006, had directed in one of the 
 canons published at a council,* in which 
 he presided, that every parish-priest 
 should be obliged, on Sundays and on 
 other holidays, to explain the Lord's 
 Prayer, the Creed, and the Gospel for 
 the day, before the people, in the English 
 tongue. While historians enlarge on the 
 quarrels between the papacy and the civil 
 power, and descant, with tedious prolixi- 
 ty, on the superstitions, which were in 
 vogue during the dark ages, they are too 
 apt to pass over in a slight and cursory 
 maimer such facts as these, which appear 
 too important to be overlooked. Let the 
 reader who has seriously considered the 
 importance and excellency of evangelical 
 truth, reflect on the preciousness of the 
 doctrines, which the Lord's Prayer, the 
 Creed, and some of the plainest and most 
 practical passages of the New Testament 
 do either exhibit or imply; and he will 
 be convinced, that if the canon of Elfric 
 had been obeyed with any tolerable de- 
 gree of spirit and exactness in a number 
 of parishes ire England, the ignorance 
 and darkness could not have been so 
 complete nor so universal, as we are gen- 
 erally taught to believe it was. ISuch 
 bishops as Elfric and Alphage must have 
 been useful lights in those times. The 
 Gospels read in the Churches, I suppose, 
 were either the same as, or similar to, 
 those which are read at this day ; nor is 
 it to be imagined, that a familiar exposi- 
 tion of them, in conjunction with the Creed 
 and Lord's Prayer would be in vain ; be- 
 cause, in every age, the preaching of Chris- 
 tian fundamentals is accompanied with a 
 divine energy, and the word returns not 
 
 void to its Divine Author, but prospers 
 in the thing whereto he sends it.* The 
 mixture of superstitious inventions might 
 adulterate, but could not altogether de- 
 stroy, the eflrcacy of the word of God. Nor 
 can I doubt but many at this day, who 
 boast of their exemptions from papal ig- 
 norance, and who call themselves en- 
 lightened, l)ecause they have been refined 
 by philosophical and political knowledge, 
 are themselves much inferior, in Chris- 
 tian light and spirit, to many who lived 
 in the dark times of the eleventh century, 
 under the benefit of such advantages of 
 mstruction as the canon before us afford- 
 ed. For that elementary knowledge, 
 which is the object of the canon, is ever 
 more salutary in its influence, than the 
 most ingenious subtilties of literary re- 
 finement in religion. These, like the 
 spider's web, are intricate, and are often 
 found to be flimsy and void of any sub- 
 stantial advantage to mankind. Armed 
 with catechetical knowledge, I conceive 
 that serious minds would in that ao-e find 
 rest and food to their souls ; and the love of 
 God being, by this means, shed abroad in 
 the heart, would constrain the missionaries 
 of that period to diffuse the Gospel in the 
 northern regions with ability and success. 
 
 The facts, on which these reflections 
 are founded, may show us, that God had 
 not forsaken this island during the disas- 
 trous reign of Ethelred, though the po- 
 litical hemisphere was gloomj^ beyond 
 expression. Ethelred himself, had re- 
 turned into his kingdom, yet was he 
 never able to make head against the 
 Danes, who at length, in the year 1017, 
 brought the English into total subjection. 
 Their king Canute, and his two sons in 
 succession, governed England, which, 
 however, recovered itself from the Dan- 
 ish yoke, and received Edward the Con- 
 fessor, the son of Ethelred, as its mon- 
 arch, in the year 1041. But the Saxon 
 line, though restored, was unable to main- 
 tain itself on the throne, and 
 soon sunk under the power Conquest 
 of William the Norman, who °' ^yYj. 
 in lOtiG, beheld himself so- jj^j^, j^jj^^ 
 vereign of England, which ofNor- 
 continues under the govern- mandy, 
 ment of his posterity to this j^j)_ io66. 
 day. 
 
 lUnder William,! named the Conqueror, 
 
 * Collier. 
 
 * Isaiali Iv. 
 
 f Osmund, a Norman, privy counsellor to 
 William the Conqueror, ai'lurwards bishop of 
 Salisbury, corrected die Liturgy used in his 
 
Cext. XI.] 
 
 CHUKCH IN ENGLAND. 
 
 615 
 
 the papal power, which hitherto had by 
 no means been so absolute in Entrland 
 as in the soiuhern countries, began to be 
 felt more strongly, and soon reached the 
 same heicrht wliich it had obtained in 
 France and Italy. Tiie tyrant found it 
 
 double it, and said to the tyrant, — " if I 
 am used according to my station, all I 
 have is at your service ; if 1 am treated as a 
 slave, I shall keep my property to myself." 
 And undoubtedly tlie rapacity and pro- 
 faneness of the Norman princes, particu- 
 
 a convenient engine for the support of Marly of William Rutus, in the seizure 
 
 his own despotic authority: and while 
 he took care that every one of his sub- 
 jects should, in ecclesiastical matters, 
 bow under the yoke of the bishop of 
 Rome, he reserved to himself the supreme 
 dominion in civil aifairs, and exercised 
 it with the most unqualified rigour. Lan- 
 franc, whom he appointed archbishop of 
 Canterbury, zealousl}^ supported the pow- 
 er of Rome, and confirmed the absurd 
 doctrine of transubstantiation by his in- 
 fluence and authority. His successor, 
 Anselm, was no less devoted to the pope, 
 and maintained several famous contests 
 with his sovereign William Rufus. the 
 son and successor of the Conqueror. This 
 archbishop contributed much, by his in- 
 fluence, to settle the celibacy of the cler- 
 gy in England ; and it must be confessed, 
 that even the virtues of this great man, 
 through the peculiar infelicity of the 
 times, were attended with great disadvan- 
 tages to the state of society. For it 
 ought to be observed, that if we except 
 his attachment to the authority of the 
 pope, and his passion for the fashionable 
 superstitions, his conduct was pious and 
 exemplary; his zeal against the luxury, 
 simony, and vices of the great, was lau- 
 dable : and, above all, his defence of 
 evangelical truth, adorned by an upright 
 course of life and conversation, preserved 
 under God some genuine remains of god- 
 hness in the nation. Nor ought we to 
 follow implicitly the ideas of our protes- 
 tant historians, who, in every debate be 
 
 and alienation of ecclesiastical benefices, 
 were justly opposed by the bishops of 
 those times. It is only to be wished, 
 that ihey had conducted their opposition 
 on the grounds of Scripture, and the pre- 
 cedents of the primitive Church, not on 
 the authority of the court of Rome. 
 
 Nothing else worthy of a place in these 
 memoirs seems to have occurred, in the 
 general history of our island, during the 
 course of this century, except what re- 
 lates to the personal character of Marga- 
 ret queen of Scotland ; a woman of th'e 
 rarest piety, and of a character fitted to 
 throw a lustre on the purest ages. She 
 was sister to Edgar Atheling, the grandson 
 of Edmund Ironside, who was the son 
 and successor of Ethelred. Edgar was 
 a peculiar favourite of the English, be- 
 cause he was the last of the Saxon line 
 of princes. In the reign of William the 
 Norman, he and his sister found a safe* 
 retreat in Scotland, under the protection 
 of Malcolm, who by the assistance of 
 Edward the Confessor, had recovered 
 the throne of vScotland from the usurper 
 Macbeth. Malcolm married the Eng- 
 lish princess. Wonderful things are 
 related of her piety, liberality, and hu- 
 mility. Through her influence, the fe- 
 rocious spirit of her husband received a 
 happy tincture of humanity. She was 
 enabled to reform the kingdom of Scots 
 land in a great degree, and to introduce 
 a more serious regard to the duties of 
 the Lord's day, than had been knovi-n in 
 
 tween the king and the Church, are sure | that country. She had by ^Malcolm six 
 
 to decide against the latter. What could 
 be more arbitrary, for instance, than the 
 demand of a thousand pounds which 
 William Rufus made upon Anselm] And 
 what more warrantable than the conduct 
 of the latter?* He offered the king five 
 hundred pounds, which were refused in 
 disgust. Anselm gave the sum io the 
 poor, rather than rack his tenants to 
 
 diocese. And he was thought to have done tlie 
 work so judiciously, that the Service " In Usum 
 Sarnum," was received in other dioceses, and 
 became common througliout England. For, 
 before this time, every diocese had its appro- 
 priate Liturgy. Collier's Eccles. History. 
 • Collier. 
 
 sons and two daughters. Three of her sons 
 reigned successively, and were esteem- 
 ed excellent monarchs. Her daughter 
 Matilda was wife to Henry I. of England, 
 and was looked on as a pious Christian. 
 Margaret had taken uncommon care .of 
 her children's education, and the fruits of 
 her labours appeared in their lives. The- 
 odoric, her confessor, observes that she 
 was remarkably attentive in public pray- 
 er. "x\.nd," says he, "she would dis- 
 course with me concerning the sweetness 
 of everlasting life, in such a manner as 
 to draw tears from my eyes." This 
 same Theodoric, a monk of Durham, 
 * Alban Butler, Vol. V. 
 
616 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V- 
 
 Malcolm 
 III. sur- 
 named 
 Canmore, 
 slain, 
 
 A.D. 1093. 
 
 wrote her Life. She was afflicted with 
 sickness at the very time 
 in which her husband Mal- 
 colm was slain at Alnwick 
 in Northumberland, in the 
 time of William Rufus, in 
 1093. The bitter news was 
 brought to her ears : her reflec- 
 tion upon it was truly Christian: "I 
 thank thee, O Lord, that this great afllic- 
 tion is evidently sent to purify me from 
 my sins. O Lord Jesus Christ, who by 
 thy death hast given life to the world, 
 deliver me from evil." She survived 
 this event only a few days. A princess 
 of such accomplishments could not have 
 shone in vain in Scotland ; but, most pro- 
 bably, must have led many, in a rude and 
 ignorant age, to think that there was some- 
 thing real in godliness. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ANSELM. 
 
 That good men frequently appear to 
 more advantage in private life than in 
 public, is a remark which was perhaps 
 never better exemplified than in this pre- 
 late, of whom all that is known by the 
 generality of readers is, that he was a 
 strenuous supporter of the papal dominion 
 in England. I can easily conceive that 
 he might be influenced by the purest mo- 
 tives in this part of his conduct, when I 
 reflect on the shameless and profane man- 
 ners of the Norman princes. But his 
 private life was purely his own, originat- 
 ing more directly from the honest and 
 good heart, with which, through grace, 
 he was eminently endowed. As a divine 
 and a Christian, he was the first of cha- 
 racters in this century, and is, therefore, 
 deserving of some attention. 
 
 He was born at Aoust in Piedmont.* 
 From early life his religious cast of mind 
 was so prevalent that, at the age of fif- 
 teen, he olfered himself to a monastery, 
 but was refused, lest his father should 
 have been displeased. He afterwards 
 became entangled in the vanities of the 
 world; and, to his death, he bewailed 
 the sins of his youth. Becoming a scho- 
 lar of Lanfranc, his predecessor in the 
 See of Canterbury, at that time a monk 
 at Bee, in Normandy, he 
 commenced monk in the year 
 1060, at the age of twenty- 
 seven. He afterwards became 
 * Butler, Vol. IV. 
 
 Anselm 
 becomes a 
 monk, 
 
 Lanfranc 
 Archbish- 
 op ot Can- 
 terbury 
 dies, 
 
 A.D. 1089. 
 
 William 
 Rufus ap- 
 points An- 
 selm his 
 successor. 
 
 the prior of the monastery. . j^ .^g^ 
 His progress in religious 
 knowledge was great : but mildness and 
 charity seem to have predominated in all 
 his views of piety. The book, common- 
 ly called Augustine's Meditations, was 
 chiefly abstracted from the writings of 
 Anselm . At the age of forty- 
 five he became abbot of Bee. 
 Lanfranc dying in 1089, Wil- 
 liam Rufus usurped the reve- 
 nues of the See of Canterbu- 
 ry, and treated the monks of 
 the place in a barbarous man- 
 ner. For several years this 
 profane tyrant declared, that none should 
 have the See while he lived ; but a fit of 
 sickness overawed his spirit; and con- 
 science, the voice of God, which often 
 speaks even in the proudest and the most 
 insensible, severely reproved his wicked- 
 ness; insomuch that he nominated Anselm 
 to be the successor of Lan- 
 franc. That Anselm should 
 have accepted the oflnce with 
 much reluctance, under such 
 a prince, is by no means to 
 be wondered at : and, the 
 more upright and conscientious men are, 
 the more wary and reluctant will they 
 always be found in accepting oflSces of so 
 sacred a nature; though it is natural for 
 men of a secular spirit to judge of others 
 by themselves, and to suppose the " nolo 
 episcopari," to be, without any excep- 
 tions, the language of hypocrisy. 
 
 Anselm pressed the king to allow the 
 calling of councils, in order to institute 
 an inquiry into crimes and abuses ; and 
 also to fill the vacant abbeys, the reve- 
 nues of which William had reserved to 
 himself with sacrilegious avarice. No- 
 thing but the conviction of conscience, 
 and the ascendency which real upright- 
 ness maintains over wickedness and pro- 
 fligacy, could have induced such a per- 
 son as William Rufus to promote Anselm 
 to the See, though he must have fore- 
 seen how improbable it was, that the 
 abbot would ever become the tame in- 
 strument of his tyranny and oppression. 
 In fact, Anselm, finding the Church over- 
 borne by the iniquities of the tyrant, re- 
 tired to the continent with two monks, one 
 of whom, named Eadmer, wrote his Life. 
 Living a retired life in Calabria, he 
 gave employment to his active mind in 
 writing a treatise on the reasons why God 
 should become man, and on Anselm 
 the doctrine of the Trinity retired 
 
Cent. XI.] 
 
 ANSELM. 
 
 617 
 
 and the Incarnation : a work 
 
 Calabria ^* ^^'^'' ^^"^® useful to the 
 Church of Christ, as he re- 
 futed the sentiments of Roscelin, who 
 had puhlished erroneous views con- 
 cerning the Trinity. P'or, after a sleep 
 of many ages, the genius of Arianism or 
 Sociuianism, or both, had awakened, and 
 taken advantage of the general ignorance, 
 to corrupt the fundamental doctrines of 
 Christianity. Anselm knew how to rea- 
 son closely and systematically, after the 
 manner of the famous Peter Lombard, 
 master of the sentences, and bishop of 
 Paris ; and he was properly the first of 
 the scholastic divines. The method of 
 ratiocination then used, was,' no doubt, 
 tedious, verbose, and subtile, and, in 
 process of time, grew more and more 
 perplexed. It was, however, preferable 
 to the dissipation and inanity, which, in 
 many publications of our times, pretend 
 to the honour of good sense and sound 
 wisdom, thouorh devoid of learnino- and 
 industry. Moreover, the furniture of the 
 schools, in the hands of a fine genius 
 like Anselm, adorned- with solid piety, 
 and under the control of a good under- 
 standing, stemmed the torrent of profane 
 infidelity, and ably supported the cause 
 of godliness in the world. Roscelin was 
 confuted, and the common orthodox doc- 
 trine of the Trinity upheld itself in the 
 Church. What were the precise views 
 of Roscelin will be better understood, 
 when we come to introduce one of his 
 scholars, the famous Peter Abelard, to 
 the reader's notice. 
 
 Anselm, weary of an empty title of 
 dignitv, and seeing no probability of be- 
 ing able to serve the Church in the arch- 
 bishopric, entreated the pope to give him 
 leave to resign it, hut in vain. Nor does 
 he seem to have been justly chargeable 
 with the disi)lay of an '■ ostentatious hu- 
 mility," wlien he had first refused the 
 promotion.* The integrity with which 
 he had acted, ever since that promotion 
 had taken place, ought to have rescued 
 him from the illiberal censure. " Rufus 
 had detained in prison several persons, 
 whom he had ordered to be freed during 
 the time of his penitence ; he still preyed 
 upon the ecclesiastical benefices ; the sale 
 of spiritual dig-nities continued as open 
 as ever ; and he kept possession of a con- 
 siderable part of the revenues belonging 
 to the See of Canterbury." Was it a 
 crime, or was it an instance of laudable 
 
 * See Hume 
 
 o 
 O 
 
 Vol. I. 
 F 2 
 
 302. 
 
 integrity in Anselm, to remonstrate 
 against such proceedings ? I suppose 
 the candour and good sense of the author, 
 to whom I allude, would have inclined 
 him to praise that upright conduct for 
 which Anselm was obliged to retire to 
 the continent, had not this same Anselm 
 been a priest, and a priest too of sincere 
 zeal and fervour. In justice to Anselm, 
 it should, moreover, be observed, that one 
 reason why he wished to resign his arch- 
 bishopric was, that he believed he mio-ht 
 be of more service to the souls of men in 
 a merely clerical character, which was 
 more obscure. And he was naturally led 
 to assign this reason to the pope, from 
 the observation whicii he made of tiie effect 
 of his preaching on audiences in Italy. 
 
 Men of superior talents, however, are 
 frequently born to drudge in business or 
 in arts, whether they be in prosperous or 
 in adverse circumstances. For mankind 
 feel the need of such men ; and they 
 themselves are not apt to bury their 
 powers in indolence. A council was 
 called at Bari by pope Urban, to settle 
 with the Greeks the dispute which had 
 long separated the Eastern and Western 
 Churches, concerning the procession of 
 the Holy Ghost. For the Greek Church, 
 it should seem, without any spiritual 
 reason, had denied the procession of the 
 Holy Ghost from the Son ; and had, there- 
 fore, thrust the words and the son* out of 
 the Nicene Creed. While the disputants 
 were engaged, the pope called on Anselm, 
 as his father and master, for his reply. 
 The archbishop arose, and by his powers 
 of argumentation silenced the Greeks. 
 
 At Lyons, he wrote on the conception 
 of the Virgin, and on original sin ; and 
 thus he employed himself in religious^ 
 not in secular cares, during the whole of 
 his exile. A strong proof of his exemp- 
 tion from that domineering ambition, of 
 which he has been accused. In the year 
 1100 he heard of the death of 
 his royal persecutor, which he Rafus 
 is said to have seriously la- •'''^s> 
 mented, and returned into A.D. 1100. 
 England by the invitation of Anselm 
 Henry I. To finish, at once, returns to 
 the account of his unpleasant Eng-land. 
 contests with the Norman 
 princes, he, at length, was enabled to 
 comproinise thein. The great object of 
 controversy was the same in England as 
 in the other countries of Europe, namely, 
 " Whether the investiture of bishoprics 
 
 * '• I'rocecdiug from the ir'atlier and llic Soiu"" 
 
618 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap.V. 
 
 should be received from the king or from 
 the pope." Anselm, moved undoubtedly 
 by a conscientious zeal, because all the 
 world bore witness to his integrity, was 
 decisive for the latter; and the egregious 
 iniquities, and shameless violations of 
 all justice and decorum, practised by 
 princes in that age, would naturally 
 strengthen the prejudices of Anselm's 
 education. To receive investiture from 
 the pope for the spiritual jurisdiction, and, 
 at the same time, to do homage to the 
 king for the temporalities, was the only 
 medium, which in those times could be 
 found, between the pretensions of the 
 civil and ecclesiastical dominion ; and 
 matters were settled, on this plan, both 
 in England and in Germany. 
 
 If Anselm then contributed to the de- 
 pression of the civil power, and the con- 
 firmation of the papal, he was unhappily 
 carried away by a popular torrent, which 
 few minds had power to resist. It seems 
 certain, however, that ambition formed 
 no part of this man's character. " While 
 I am with you," he would often say to 
 his friends, '" I am like a bird in her nest 
 amidst her young, and enjoy the sweets 
 of retirement and social affections. But 
 when I am thrown into the world, I am 
 like the same bird hunted and harassed 
 by ravens or other fowls of prey : the in- 
 cursions of various cares distract me : 
 and secular employments, which I love 
 no^, vex my soul." He, who spent a 
 great part of his life in retirement, who 
 thought, spake, and wrote so much of 
 vital godliness ; and whose moral charac- 
 ter was allowed, even by his enemies, to 
 have ever been without a blot, deserves 
 to be believed in these declarations.* 
 
 Let us then attend to those traits of 
 character, which were more personal, and 
 in which the heart of the man more plain- 
 ly appears. He practised that, which all 
 godly persons have ever found salutary, 
 and even necessary, namely, retired and 
 devotional meditation, and even watched 
 long in the night for the same purpose. 
 One day, a hare, pursued by the hounds, 
 ran under his horse for refuge as he was 
 riding. , The object bringing at once to 
 his recollection a most awful scene, he 
 stopped, and said weeping, " This hare 
 reminds me of a sinner just dying, sur- 
 rounded with devils, waiting for their 
 prey." It was in this manner that he 
 used to spiritualize every object, a prac- 
 tice ever derided by profane minds, whe- 
 * See his Life, written by Eadmer. 
 
 ther performed injudiciously or not ; but to 
 which, in some degree, every devout and 
 pious spirit on earth has been addicted. 
 
 In a national synod, held at St. Peter's, 
 Westminster, he forbad men to be sold as 
 cattle, which had till then been practised. 
 For the true reliefs and mitigations of 
 human misery lay entirely, at that time, 
 in the influence of Christianity ; and small 
 as that influence then was, lire ferocity of 
 the age was tempered by it ; and human 
 life was thence prevented from being en- 
 tirely degraded to a level with that of the 
 beasts which perish. 
 
 Anselm died in the sixteenth year of 
 his archbishopric, and in the seventy- 
 sixth year of his age. Toward the end 
 of his life, he wrote on the 
 Will, Predestination, and ^."^^'"^ . 
 Grace, much in Augustine's ^^^^s, age 
 manner. In prayers, medita- 
 tions, and hymns, he seems to have had 
 a peculiar delight, Eadmer says, that 
 he used to say, "If he saw hell open, and 
 sin before him, he would leap into the 
 former, to avoid the latter." I am sorry 
 to see this sentiment, which, stripped of 
 figure, means no more than what all good 
 men allow, that he feared sin more than 
 punishment, aspersed by so good a divine 
 as Fox the martyrologist.*" But Anselm 
 was a papist, and the best protestants 
 have not been without their prejudices. 
 
 But it is time to let Anselm speak for 
 himself. We shall hear from him some- 
 thing by no means unworthy the atten- 
 tion of the most intelligent Christians. 
 A direction for the visitation of the sick 
 was composed by Anselm ;| the sub- 
 stance of which is as follows. Two pre- 
 vious questions were to be asked by the 
 minister: the first was, Dost thou believe 
 that thou deservest damnation] The se- 
 cond was. Dost thou intend to lead a new 
 life? When the sick man had returned 
 an answer in the aflirmative to these 
 questions, he was further asked, Dost 
 thou believe, that thou canst not be saved 
 but by the death of Christ?— The sick 
 man answered, I do so believe. Then 
 the minister says to him. See then, while 
 life remains in thee, that thou repose thy 
 confidence only in the death of Christ; 
 trust in nothing else; commit thyself 
 wholly to this death; cover thyself wholly 
 with this alone; mix thyself wholly with 
 this death ; involve thyself wholly in this 
 death. And, if the Lord will judge thee, 
 say. Lord, I cast the death of our Lord 
 ~* A^s and Monuments, v. I. t Ans. Op. 
 
Cewt. XL] 
 
 ANSELM. 
 
 619 
 
 Jesus Christ between myself and thy 
 judgment; otherwise I will not engage in 
 judgment with thee. And if he shall 
 say to thee, thai thou art a sinner, say, I 
 place the death of our Lord Jesus Christ 
 between me and my sins. If he shall say 
 to thee, that thou hast deserved damna- 
 tion, say, Lord, I cast the death of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ between me and my 
 evil deserts, and I offer his merits for 
 that merit which I ought to have had, 
 and have not. If he shall say that he is 
 angry with thee, say. Lord, I cast the 
 death of the Lord Jesus Christ between 
 me and thy displeasure." 
 
 It cannot be doubted, but all this pro- 
 cess would be mere formality in the 
 hands of many persons, both pastors and 
 people. But so, even at this day, are 
 several the most spiritual catechisms, and 
 the most evangelical exhortations. While 
 the world is, as it is, depraved and sen- 
 sual, the very best means of grace will 
 be lost on many. But it is not easy to 
 conceive, that he who composed these 
 directions could himself have been a mere 
 formalist. They breathe the spirit of 
 one who seems to have felt what it is to 
 appear before the Majesty of God; and 
 also how unclean and defiled with sin 
 both his nature and practice had been ; 
 and how unsafe it is to rest on any thing 
 but Christ crucified. The jewel of the 
 Gospel, peace by the blood of Christ 
 alone, which is the doctrine that gives 
 law and being, order and efficacy, to all 
 the other doctrines of Christianity, is 
 contained in this plain catechism; and 
 the variety and repetition, which the au- 
 thor indulges, offensive as they are in the 
 light of criticism, demonstrate the au- 
 thor's sincerity and zeal, and are the 
 natural effect of the impression which 
 had been felt in his own conscience. For 
 those alone whose hearts have been 
 ploughed deep; who have been truly se- 
 rious for eternity ; have been well prac- 
 tised in self-examination; and are be- 
 come well acquainted with their own 
 demerits, are disposed to relish the pe- 
 culiarities and the essentials of the Gos- 
 pel. Let a man once know himself a 
 sinner deserving destruction, and be truly 
 desirous to become a new creature, and 
 he will find that the Gospel of Christ is 
 the only cordial that can console him. 
 This cordial is here administered : and as 
 it belongs to true penitents only, to the 
 humble and the contrite, so is it adminis- 
 tered by the skilful divine before us : or, 
 
 in ether words, that doctrine, which is 
 " most wholesome and very full of com- 
 fort," namely, the doctrine of justifica- 
 tion " before God, only for the merit of 
 our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, by 
 faith, and not for our own works or de- 
 servings,"* is preached by a bishop of 
 the eleventh century. So strong was the 
 provision made by the God of all grace 
 for the preservation of evangelical truth 
 in the darkest times. With happy in- 
 consistency, Anselm, in seeking peace to 
 his conscience, and in preaching peace to 
 others, sees none of the manifold super- 
 stitious methods with which the papacy 
 abounded, and which he himself pro- 
 fessed. I suppose he would give some 
 lower meaning to the doctrine of the 
 merits of Saints and the efficacy of pil- 
 grimages ; some meaning, which should 
 not interfere with a simple application to 
 Jesus Christ. And this was the method 
 of many other pious spirits in those ages. 
 The reader is desired to observe, how- 
 ever, that we have found the essential 
 and leading doctrine of real Christianity 
 in the possession of Anselm : and hence 
 we are at no loss to account for the supe- 
 rior piety and virtue which rendered him 
 the ornament of the times in which he 
 lived, though they exempted him not 
 from the common frailty of being seduced 
 by the prejudices of education. The in- 
 estimable benefit of readinor, and medi- 
 tating on the divine word with prayer, 
 may, from this example, be inferred. 
 Such reading and meditation were the de- 
 light and employment of Anselm through 
 life ; and he found the word of God a 
 light to his feet, and a lantern to his paths. 
 Hence also it is not to be wondered at 
 that he should so seriously oppose the 
 anti-trinitarian refinements of Roscelin, 
 He, who finds relief to his own mind in 
 the death of Christ, can never behold 
 with indifference the attacks made on the 
 dignity of Christ's person. And though, 
 in that rude age, men had not, so com- 
 monly as in our times, learned to express 
 a contempt for the Scriptures, yet there 
 were those who ridiculed and pretended 
 to argue against their divine inspiration. 
 The zeal of Anselm, who lived for eter- 
 nitj% by fiiith in Christ, was induced to 
 oppose these attempts, in a work entitled 
 "The Fool refuted."! The ingenuity 
 
 * See 11th Article of Religion. 
 
 t Liber ttdversus iiicipientein. See Mac's 
 
 transl. of Mosheiiu, Vol. I. Cent. XI. p. 530. 
 Quarto edition. 
 
620 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 and acuteness of the archbishop were dis- 
 played with good effect in this treatise. 
 It is proper to observe, also, that this 
 great man was the real inventor of the ar- 
 gument, erroneously attributed to Des- 
 cartes, which undertakes to prove the 
 existence of God from the idea of infinite 
 
 his race. That Adam himself could satisfy 
 was impossible."* 
 
 He thus expresses his admiration, 
 while he meditates on the power of the 
 cross. f " hidden fortitude ! that a man 
 hanging on the cross should suspend eter- 
 nal death, which oppressed mankind ! 
 
 perfection, which is to be found, without [That a man, nailed to the cross, should 
 exception, in every man's mind.* | overcome the world, and punish its wicked 
 
 Thus did Anselm employ himself in: powers with everlasting destruction. O se- 
 the defence of divine truth and serious j cret powers ! that a man, condemned with 
 religion. His knowledge of the Scrip- robbers, should save men condemned 
 tures was, I am persuaded, so sound, and i with devils ; that a man extended on a 
 his love of them so sincere, that if he had : cross should draw all things to himself ! 
 met with direct opposition, on these infi- , O secret virtue ! that one, expiring in 
 nitely momentous subjects, from the agony, should draw innumerable souls 
 court of Rome, he would have sooner] from hell; that man should undertake 
 pronounced the pope to be Antichrist, ' the death of the body, and destroy the 
 than have parted with his evang-elical i death of souls !" 
 
 sentiments and profession. But the course 
 of events threw him into such circum- 
 stances, that it became the temporal 
 interest of the court of Rome to cherish 
 and honour the archbishop. 
 
 Hear with what seriousness he ex- 
 presses his views concerning his own 
 justification before God. "1 am con- 
 scious that I deserve damnation, and my 
 repentance suffices not for satisfaction ; 
 but certain it is that thy mercy abounds 
 above all offences." f 
 
 The works of this great prelate are 
 partly scholastical, partly devotional. 
 
 .Speaking of the humiliation of Christ,:j: 
 he observes, " He assumed poverty, yet 
 lost not his riches ; rich within, poor 
 without. God was latent in riches ; man 
 was apparent in poverty. — By that blood 
 we have lost the rags of iniquity, that we 
 might be clothed with tlie garment of 
 immortality. Lest we should not dare 
 with our poverty to approach him, who 
 has all riches in his hand, he exhibited 
 himself poor ; that is, God condescended 
 to take upon him our nature. That man 
 might return to internal, spiritual riches, 
 God condescended to appear outwardly 
 
 Taken together, they demonstrate him to ! poor. We should have wanted at least one 
 
 have been eminently endowed with ge- 
 nius and piety. Like Augustine, whom 
 he seems to have followed as his model, 
 he abounds both in profound argumen- 
 tation on the most abstruse and dilficult 
 subjects, and in devout and fervent medi- 
 tations on practical godliness. But it 
 will not be so much adapted to the pur- 
 pose of this history to analyze his tracts, 
 as to give some detached passages 
 matters of real Chrisiian importance. 
 
 In his treatise on the reason why God 
 became man,:j: he says, " I see that the 
 man whom we seek as qualified to he our 
 Meditator must be of thi* description ; he 
 must not die of necessity, because he 
 must be omnipotent; nor of debt, because 
 he^must not be a sinner ; and yet he must 
 die voluntarily, because it was necessary 
 tliat he should do so, as Mediator." — 
 " As it is necessary that man should 
 satisfy for the sin of man, therefore none 
 could make satisfaction, but he who was 
 properly man, Adam, himself, or one of 
 
 proof of his tender love to us, unless he 
 had taken upon him our poverty, and he 
 himself had sustained, for a time, that 
 indigence, from which he delivers us." 
 
 The reader, from these specimens, may 
 form some idea of the felicity of thought, 
 which enabled this prelate to unite prac- 
 tical devotion with scholastic theology, 
 and to educe the most cogent motives to 
 on gratitude and pious affections from those 
 mysterious doctrines, which have ever 
 been esteemed, by wise and holy men, 
 the special glory of Christianity. 
 
 The following thought tseems to throw 
 no small light on some of the most sub- 
 lime ideas of Scripture : He has his eye 
 on the first chapter to the Ephesians. 
 " In the revelation of the mystery of our 
 
 * See Id. \>. 4S.'5. t Anselm's Mcditaiions. 
 i Cur Deus homo, Lib. 2. c. 11. 
 
 Lord's incarnation, the angels themselves 
 received an advancement of dignity. 
 Even their joy was increased, when they 
 began to receive men into their fellow- 
 ship. Christ indeed died not for angels ; 
 nevertheless, the fruits of his redemption 
 
 Idem. c. 8. f De Medit. red. hum. c. 1. 
 On 2 Cor. viii. 
 
Ckxt. XL] 
 
 ANSELM. 
 
 621 
 
 tend to their benefit. The enmity which 
 sin had caused between the angelic and 
 human nature, is done away ; and even 
 from the redemption of men the loss of 
 the ancient ang-elic ruin is repaired. Thus 
 heavenly and earthly things are renewed : 
 those, however, only, who were in Christ 
 elected and predestinated before the foun- 
 dation of the world, obtain this benefit. 
 For in him they always were and are, 
 whom God hath chosen from eiernity." 
 
 His views of the virtue and efficacy of 
 the sacrifice of Christ he thus expresses :* 
 " Christ was made sin for us, that is, a 
 sacrifice for sin. For, in the law, the 
 sacrifices which are offered for sins, are 
 called sins. Hence Christ is called sin, 
 because he was offered for sin. — He hath 
 blotted out all sin, original and actual ; 
 hath fulfilled all righteousness, and opened 
 the kingdom of heaven. — By one offering 
 he perfects forever :j" for to the end of the 
 world, that victim will be sufficient for 
 the cleansing of all his people. If they 
 sin a thousand times, they need no other 
 Saviour, because this suffices for all 
 things, and cleanses every conscience 
 from sin." I need not say of a man so 
 holy and upright, that he meant not to 
 encourage sin, while he magnifies the sa- 
 vour of divine peace, through the blood 
 of Christ, which his own conscience had 
 experienced. 
 
 " Thoughrj: all who were to be saved 
 could not be present when Christ made 
 that redemption, yet so great was the 
 virtue of that death, that its effects are 
 extended to those who are absent or re- 
 mote, in regard to place and time." 
 
 Hear how divinely he speaks of the 
 Holy Spirit and his operations. " The 
 Holy Spirit is evidently declared to be 
 God,§ because, unless he were God, he 
 would not have a temple. He breathed 
 on them, and said unto them, receive ye 
 the Holy Ghost." II As if he had said: 
 As ye perceive this breath, — by which I 
 intimate to you the Holy Spirit, as spi- 
 ritual objects are intimated by sensible 
 things, — to proceed from my body, so 
 know that the Holy Spirit proceeds from 
 my Person, even from the secret of my 
 Deity." An interpretation worthy of him, 
 who confuted the Greeks in the article of 
 the procession of the Holy Spirit from 
 the Son. Indeed every precious funda- 
 mental of Christianity appears in his wri- 
 
 • On 2 Cor. v. f Heb. x. 
 
 i B. II. Cur Deus homo, c. 16. 
 
 4 On 1 Cor. vi. || De processu Spiritus, 
 
 tings. Remove the rubbish of super- 
 stition, and view the inward man; and 
 you see in Anselm all that is vital and 
 essential in godliness. Nor is he content 
 with orthodoxy of sentiment : let us hear 
 how he pants after God, and learn from 
 him to ^apply, by prayer, for the power 
 of the doctrine which we profess.* 
 " Draw me. Lord, into thy love. As thy 
 creature I am thine altogether ; make me 
 to be so in love. See, Lord, before thee 
 is my heart ; it struggles ; but, of itself, 
 it can effect nothing. Do thou what it 
 cannot do. Admit me into the secret 
 chamber of thy love. I ask, I seek, I 
 knock. Thou, who causest me to ask, 
 cause me to receive. Thou givest me to 
 seek, give me to find. Thou teachest me 
 to knock, open to me knocking. To 
 whom dost thou give, if thou deniest him 
 who askest? Who finds, if he that 
 seeks is disappointed "? To whom dost 
 thou open, if thou shuttest to him that 
 knocks ] What dost thou give to him, 
 who prays not, if thou deniest thy love to 
 him who prays 1 From thee I have the 
 desire : O, may I have the frnition f 
 Stick close to him; stick close, importu- 
 nately, my soul." Let this suffice as a 
 specimen of those groanings which can- 
 not be uttered, f of which the breast of 
 Anselm was conscious, and which, ia 
 every age of the Church, have beea 
 known by the real people of God. These 
 groaninCTS are too much neo-lected eveu 
 where they are not altogether contemned 
 amongfmen; but they are deliirhtful ia 
 the ears of the heavenly host, and inferior 
 only in harmony to the praises of just 
 men made perfect. 
 
 This holy personage appears, from his 
 comments on the 5th, 6th, and 7th Chap- 
 ters to the Romans, to have understood 
 the right use of the Law and the Gospel; 
 the power and pollution of indwelling 
 sin ; its augmentation in the heart from 
 the irritation of the law which forbids 
 evil ; and the real and solid relief from 
 guilt, by the grace of Jesus Christ. 
 These subjects are well understood, that 
 is, sufficiently for all practical purposes, 
 even by persons who have no pretensions 
 to skill in languages or criticism; provided 
 they have felt the lost condition of fallen 
 man, and have been taught by the Spirit 
 of God, in an effectual manner, to apply 
 the medicine of the Gospel : whereas 
 they are altogether hidden from the wise 
 
 * De Meditat cap. 7. f Romans viJi. 26. 
 
622 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH: 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 and prudent of this world ;* from men, 
 who may possess much learning and 
 acuteness, and who trust in the strength 
 of their own knowledge and acquire- 
 ments ; but whose hearts have never been 
 truly humbled, or opened]" to the recep- 
 tion of spiritual knowledge. The Apos- 
 tle of the Gentiles was divinely commis- 
 sioned to explain the important points ; 
 and I find Anselm to have known tbem 
 experimentally ; but, let it suffice just to 
 have mentioned these things in this place. 
 They have been copiously illustrated l)y 
 many writers since the Reformation. So 
 various, however, and so abundant was 
 the knowledge of Anselm in the divine 
 life, that he wrote with no less precision 
 on practical, than on mysterious sub- 
 jects. Observe, for instance, how justly 
 he describes the evil of rash judgment.| 
 " There are two cases in which we ought 
 to guard against rash judgment, first, 
 when the intention of him, whom we are 
 disposed to blame, is uncertain ; second 
 
 which subject it may suffice to produce a 
 single quotation from one of his systema- 
 tical treatises.* " If, as it is evident, 
 the heavenly city must receive its com- 
 plete number from the human race in ad- 
 dition to the angels who fell not, and if 
 this be impossible without a satisfaction 
 made to the divine Justice, if Clod alone 
 can make this satisfaction, if man is 
 bound in justice to make it, it follows 
 that the Saviour must be God-man." So 
 clearly were the essentials of salvation 
 discerned, in one of the darkest periods 
 of the Church : and there is net an hum- 
 ble soul, in any age, who seeks out the 
 works of the Lord with admiration and 
 delight, but he will join with the pious 
 archbishop in his meditation. " The 
 wicked sins, and the just is punished ; 
 the impious offends, and the pious is con- 
 demned ; what the servant perpetrates, 
 the master compensates ; in fine, the evil 
 which man commits, of that evil Christ 
 endures the punishment."-)- It would 
 
 ly, when it is uncertain how the person [carry me too far to transcribe all his de- 
 will turn out in the end, who is the pre-jvout reflections and meditations on these 
 sent object of censure. A person, for [subjects. One remark, however, which 
 instance, refuses to fast, complaining of' glances at the great corruption of doc- 
 
 his bodily infirmities ; if you, disbelieving 
 him, impute his refusal to a spirit of in- 
 temperance, you are guilty of the sin of 
 rash judgment. Moreover, though his 
 gluttony be unquestionaljly evident, yet 
 if you censure him, as if his recovery to 
 holiness were impossible, you are guilty 
 of censoriousness. Let us not then cen- 
 
 trine, that originated from the mistaken 
 philosophy of free-will,:t: should not be 
 omitted. " If natural possibility by free- 
 will, as the wise of this world say, be 
 sufficient unto salvation, both for know- 
 ledge and for practice, then Christ is 
 dead in vain, and his cross is of none 
 effect. But so surely as human salvation 
 
 sure things which are dubious, as if they j depends on the cross, so surely is that 
 were certain; nor reprehend even mani-i secular wisdom convicted of folly, which 
 FEST evils in such a manner, as to repre- 
 sent them absolutelj' incurable. Of un- 
 certain things, those are most prone to 
 judge rashly who take more delight in 
 inveio-liino- asfainst what is amiss than in 
 and the vice of censorious- 
 
 correcting It 
 
 iiess itself may be traced up either to 
 
 pride or to envy." 
 
 On the awful subject of predestination 
 his views are similar to those of Augus- 
 tine. Suffice it to quote a single sen- 
 tence. "It cannot be investigated why| 
 God comes to this man in the way ofl 
 mercy, to that in the way of justice. Fori 
 no creature can decide why he hath mercy j 
 on this person, rather than on that."§ j 
 
 In his comments on the fifth Chapter 
 of the Epistle to the Romans, he beauti- 
 fully illustrates the all-important doctrine 
 of justification by faith in Christ; on 
 
 1 Coi'iii. i. 19. 
 On Rom. xiv. 
 
 + Acts xvi. 
 § Idem. xi. 
 
 14. 
 
 knows not the virtue of the cross, and 
 substitutes a phantom of human merit 
 and ability in its room."§ 
 
 " We sjjeak the wisdom of God in a 
 mystery," says St. Paul. The real doc- 
 trine of salvation needs, therefore, a 
 stronger light than the world, weak and 
 distempered in discernment as it is by 
 
 * Cur Deus hnmo, B. 2. C. 6. + B. Meditat. 
 
 ^ I have used llio term free-will in this, 
 and in soine other places, in compliance with 
 custom, tlioU!j;h tiie expression leads to a con- 
 fusion of ideas on the subject. It is as absurd 
 to talk, of the freedom of the will, as of the 
 freedom of lilierty ; for, we can have no other 
 rational idea of freedom in men's actions, but 
 that of their being TOLrNTAiiT. If men act 
 voluntaril)', lliey act freely ; responsibility is 
 attached to what is voluntaut, provided the 
 subject be of sound understanding. Whea 
 men do as they please, they are answerable 
 for their conduct. This is a simple state of 
 the case. — See Locke's Essay on Hum. Under, 
 and Edwards on Free-will. § On 1 Cor. i. 
 
Cext. XL] 
 
 ANSELM. 
 
 623 
 
 sin, can endure. Hence it always ap- 
 pears foolish to the natural man. Arc 
 we to wonder, therefore, that men of se- 
 cular wisdom should despise it? That 
 they shoiild call the ideas of 8t. Paul, 
 which Anselm illustrates, jejune, syste- 
 matical, abstruse, unintelligible] That 
 they should pronounce the Christian ex- 
 perience, which has those ideas for its 
 illusory, fanatical, and visionary 1 
 
 basis 
 
 There have not been wanting, however, 
 men of sound intellect and of solid learn- 
 ing, in every age, who have found the 
 Gospel of Christ to be the power of God 
 to salvation. Anselm was one of these. 
 Amidst the gloom of superstition with 
 which he was surrounded, he was yet en- 
 abled to describe, and vindicate ever}^ fun- 
 damental of evangelical doctrine: though 
 a papist, he appeals to the Scriptures : 
 he expounds them, by opening the plain, 
 grammatical sense of St. Paul ; and it 
 behoves men, who call themselves Pro- 
 testant?, or who boast of the superior 
 light of this age, to confute his argu- 
 ments, or at least to own that they do not 
 believe the Scriptures to be divine. If 
 original sin be a true doctrine, it is to be 
 expected, that men leaning to their own 
 understanding would reject the doctrine 
 of the remedy for a disease which they 
 do not feel. If the fever of pride have 
 caused men to lose all sense of their 
 fallen condition, ought their reasonincrs 
 to be regarded by those who feel what 
 that condition is, and to what a state of 
 misery sin has reduced them ? If human 
 powers, by the natural exertion of the 
 will, exclusively of grace, be indeed suf- 
 ficient to guide men into the way of sal- 
 vation, then the principle of effectual 
 grace through the mediation of Christ, 
 and by the influence of the Holy Spirit, 
 is doubtless unnecessary. Let experience 
 therefore decide by the fruits. Schemes 
 and theories of doctrine, either wholly or 
 partly subversive of all ideas of grace, 
 have long been patronized by persons of 
 great celebrity in the Christian world. 
 "What have these schemes and theories 
 done for mankind 1 Who, among these 
 philosophers, can be compared, I will not 
 say with many Protestant divines, but 
 even with Anselm, who lived, under a 
 cloud of superstitious disadvantages, in 
 humility, sincerity, piety, charity, and 
 heavenly-mindednessl It is allowed, 
 even by his enemies, that his life was in 
 the right: and all the true holiness of 
 practice which has appeared in the world, 
 
 has ever originated from such doctrines 
 as he professed. What has been the con- 
 sequence of doctrines grafted on human 
 merit and ability, but an inundation of 
 vice and wickedness? We have lived, 
 indeed, to see this consequence exhibited 
 in full perfection in France. Since Chris- 
 tian ideas were almost exploded there, 
 that country has been one vast theatre of 
 all that is execrable among men. Even 
 the military success of those infidels has 
 only propagated misery ; and their tri- 
 umphs, like those of Satan, while they 
 multiply the calamities of others, add 
 only a fresh accumulation to their own. 
 Is it the same thing to forbid crimes, as to 
 prevent them, ye innovators without dis- 
 cernment ?* Is it the same thing to despise 
 the wisdom of antiquity, as to understand 
 it, ye philosophers without learning 1 
 
 To those then who will not lend a 
 patient ear to Christian doctrine, we say 
 it is divine; it has proved itself so to be 
 in every age; the proofs of it lie open be- 
 fore you, examine and confute if you 
 can. And among these proofs we adduce 
 one of no mean importance, namely, that 
 the Gospel stands recommended as the 
 medicine of our nature by its holy effects. 
 However you may dislike in its princi- 
 ples, you must own, if at all attentive to 
 matter of fact, that it teaches men in real 
 practice to live soberly, righteously, and 
 godly; and that the farther men remove 
 from its system in their views of reli- 
 gion, the more rampant do they grow in 
 wickedness and immorality. 
 
 Reflections of this sort should teach 
 men to inquire, with serious and humble 
 reverence, both into the nature and evi- 
 dences of Christianity; and persons who 
 feel at all the force of these, or similar 
 observations, will find it their duty to 
 pray devoutly for the divine influences. 
 In this spirit of devotion Anselm excell- 
 ed ; and a few quotations tending to illus- 
 trate it shall close this article. There 
 were some others in the eleventh century 
 
 * The innovators here alluded to were con- 
 tinually, IX AvoKDs, foiljidding crimes, and 
 exhorting citizens lo be orderly, he. ; while, 
 TV FACT, iliey taught them to hate and despise 
 the true preventives of crimes, viz. an effective 
 government, a strong police, and, above all, 
 Uie doctrine of the eternal punishments of the 
 wicked. All this time the multiplication of 
 the most flagitious enorniilies was forming a 
 sea without a shore, which at length swallowed 
 up the preachers themselves. Such are the 
 effects of chimerical philosophy, and of the 
 contempt of ajtcient wisdom .' 
 
624 
 
 HISTORY OF THE CHURCH. 
 
 [Chap. V. 
 
 who lived and who wrote in a similar 
 taste; but his eminent superiority over 
 them all will justify me in omitting the 
 account of their works.* 
 
 He, who in the following' manner, 
 breathes out his soul in prayer, through 
 the Intercessor and Mediator between God 
 and man, and so seriously rejects the 
 hope of any other advocate than the Son 
 of God, could not really confide in the 
 Virgin Mary, or any saint or angel, but 
 must have rested in Christ alone, how- 
 ever difficult it may be to explain the 
 consistency of his sentiments with the 
 fashionable superstitions of the times, the 
 infection of which he by no means escap- 
 ed entirely. 
 
 "Thus, Father Almighty, I implore 
 thee by the love of thy Almighty Son ; 
 bring my soul out of prison, that I may 
 give thanks to thy name : Free me from 
 the bonds of sin ; I ask this of thee by 
 the only co-eternal Son : and by the in- 
 tercession of thy dearly beloved Son who 
 sitteth at thy right hand, graciously re- 
 store to life a wretch, over whom, through 
 his own demerits, the sentence of death 
 impends. To what other intercessor I 
 can have recourse, I know not, except 
 to Him who is the propitiation for our 
 sins.-j" That the only begotten Son should 
 undertake to intercede for me with the 
 eternal Father, demonstrates him to be 
 man; and that he should succeed in his 
 intercession, shows that the human na- 
 ture is taken into union with the Majesty 
 of the Deity.":]: 
 
 * It may, perhaps, be not improper to men- 
 tion Bruno, the founder of the severe order 
 of Carthusians. He was born at Cologne, was 
 chancellor of the diocese of Rheims, and doc- 
 tor of divinity there. He with two other ca- 
 nons prosecuted Manasses, archbishop of Co- 
 logne, for simony, in 1077. Manasses, in a 
 rage, brake open and plundered the houses of 
 the canons, and sold tiieir prebends. He was, 
 however, legally deposed. Bruno was offered 
 the vacant archbishopric, but preferred a state 
 of solitude. He is said, also, to have refused 
 the archbishopric of Reggio. Notwithstand- 
 ing the uncommon austerities of the order, 
 ■which he instituted, he was obliged to attend 
 Pope Urban II. formerly his scholar at 
 Rheims. He was learned in Greek and He- 
 brew, and in the writings of the fathers, par- 
 ticularly Ambrose and Augustine; he follow- 
 ed the system of the latter concerning grace ; 
 ■wrote on the Psalter and St. Paul's Epistles; 
 and seems to have been unquestionably ])ious 
 and heavenly-minded. See Butler, Vol. X. 
 
 t De Vestiraent. ^ Rom. eh. viii. 
 
 He addresses the Son of God as " the 
 Redeemer of captives, the Saviour of the 
 lost, the hope of exiles, the strength of the 
 distressed, the enlarger of the enslaved 
 spirit, the sweet solace and refreshment 
 of the mournful soul, the crown of con- 
 querors, the only reward and joy of all 
 the citizens of heaven, the copious source 
 of all grace."* 
 
 The Holy Spirit he thus addresses in 
 the same treatise. " Thee, Holy Spirit, I 
 implore, if through my weakness I have 
 a very imperfect understanding of the 
 truth of thy Majesty, and if through the 
 concupiscence of sinful nature, I have 
 neglected to obey the Lord's precepts 
 when understood, that thou wouldst 
 condescend to enlighten me with thy visi- 
 tation, that through thee, whom I have 
 called upon as my succour, in the danger- 
 ous ocean of life, I may, without ship- 
 wreck, arrive at the shore of a blessed im- 
 mortality." 
 
 Could the pious spirit, who believes 
 and longs for the rest which remains for 
 the people of God, express its most ar- 
 dent breathings in language more adapted 
 to her frame than the following '{ " Hasten 
 the time, my Saviour and my God, when 
 what I now believe I may see with eyes 
 uncovered; what I now hope and reve- 
 rence at a distance, I may apprehend ; 
 what I now desire, according to the mea- 
 sure of my strength, I may affectionately 
 embrace in the arms of my soul, and that 
 I may be wholly absorbed in the abyss 
 
 of thy 
 
 love 
 
 I" 
 
 t 
 
 After having uttered many petitions,:): 
 he says, " I have asked inany good things, 
 my Creator, though I have deserved 
 many evils. Not only I have no claim 
 on thee for these good things, but I have 
 merited exquisite punishments. But the 
 case of publicans, harlots, and robbers, 
 in a moment snatched from the jaws of 
 the enemy, and received in the bosom of 
 the Shepherd, animates my soul with a 
 cheering hope." 
 
 With so intuitive a glance of Christian 
 faith does he console his soul ! — It is in 
 the same way that divine mercy is appre- 
 hended by all humble and penitent spi- 
 rits. The person of Christ, and the doc- 
 trine of justification by him alone, are 
 the objects and supports of confidence in 
 God. 
 
 * Spec. Sermo Evang. C. 19. 
 
 t Spec. Sermo Evang. C. 18. t B. Medit. 
 
 END OF VOL I. 
 

 e?^' 
 
 
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 
 
 O 
 
 
 UJ 
 
 0025998315 
 
 «*. 
 
 £ 
 
 f«^ 
 
 ■•^ewf 
 
 ^'(! 
 
 *a^- ^nm-i \^M^- •'. >■ 
 
 
.. Vl*.-'.-*.--^. 
 
 
 
 •"':.;■;;•' i'l',.-:'i- '■■^■"■■\' -•. '"■ ^i-"''; v^'- 
 *• •-■• .■•■.•■': .-' -'".'1 ■,?.-:■' '.y?-".,,'--<^;