► 
 
 LECTURES 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 
 
 FIRST AND SECOND CENTURIES. 
 
PRINTED BY R. CLAY, LONDON; 
 
 FOR 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO. CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 HotlDoil: GEORGE BELL, 18C, FLEET STREET. 
 ©Ulllfn: HODGES AND SMITH. 
 ©Bfnfiurgt): EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS, 
 ©lasptl): JAMES MACLEHOSE. 
 ©JfOtfl: J. H. PARKER. 
 
/col.colO 
 
 LECTURES 1JRRARY . 
 
 «™ L K.VORK.y 
 
 ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY" 
 
 FIRST AND SECOND CENTIMES. 
 
 " If then it appears so hard and so little knowne how to govern a house well, 
 which is thought of so easie discharge and for every man's undertaking, what skill of 
 man, what wisdome, what parts can be sufficient to give lawes and ordinances to the 
 elect household of God ? If we could imagine that He had left it at randome without 
 His provident and gracious ordering, who is he so arrogant, so presumptuous, that 
 durst dispose and guide the living arke of the Holy Ghost, though he should finde 
 it wandering in the field of Bethshemesh, without the conscious warrant of some 
 high calling?" — Milton. 
 
 FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE, M.A. 
 
 CHAPLAIN OF LINCOLN'S INN. 
 
 ©amfrri&ge : 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 1854. 
 

TO THE 
 
 EEV. JOHN EEEWEE, M.A. 
 
 My dear Brewer, 
 
 I hope that neither you nor any one 
 else will suppose that I wish to make you 
 responsible for the sentiments of this book, 
 because I have claimed the privilege, without 
 asking your leave, of inscribing it to you. 
 Though you know nothing of the contents of 
 it as it now stands, it would never have seen 
 the light but for your encouragement. I do 
 not know whether I ought to number that 
 among the many kind acts for which I owe 
 you my warmest gratitude; but I certainly 
 thank you more for what I have learnt from 
 you, and for your uniform and disinterested 
 
 21SI7 
 
vi DEDICATION. 
 
 friendship, than for tempting me to the 
 publication of one more book. I only hope 
 that it may prove one half as useful now 
 that it has been written with some care, as 
 you dreamed that it might be if it were taken 
 directly from the notes of my former pupils. 
 
 Believe me, 
 Sincerely and affectionately yours, 
 F. D. Maurice. 
 
PKEFACE. 
 
 These Lectures have never been delivered any- 
 where. When my connexion with King's College 
 ceased, I was asked by a kind friend to authorize 
 the publication of the notes which some of the 
 students had taken down from my lips. He was 
 aware that my Lectures were extempore, and that 
 I had no reports of my own by which I could correct 
 theirs. Nevertheless, he fancied that he should be able 
 to trace my meaning, and to present it in an intel- 
 ligible form to the reader : he even insisted that 
 I should leave the matter wholly in his hands; an 
 arrangement to which, except for his sake, I willingly 
 consented. 
 
 But I soon found that he had imposed upon himself 
 a task which it would be on many accounts painful 
 for him to perform. If he had corrected the Lectures 
 according to his own judgment, he might have made 
 
Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 them much more valuable than they ever were ; 
 but he was too conscientious and modest to take 
 this course ; he was therefore obliged to leave the 
 notes just as he found them, and the very best notes 
 — as those who have taken notes and read them 
 know — convey oftentimes an impression as different 
 as possible from that which the speaker intended 
 to convey. The very preservation of his words and 
 phrases is often fatal to his sense, because the rela- 
 tion of them to each other has, very likely through 
 his fault, not been apprehended. 
 
 As I adhered to my promise, I was not aware 
 how far the intention of my kind friend had suc- 
 ceeded till some sheets of the Reports were in the 
 press. My Publisher was dissatisfied with them, 
 and urged me to cancel them. I could then do 
 nothing less, in justice to him, than recast the whole 
 work from the beginning. It would be a falsehood, 
 I saw, to pretend that I was reproducing my old 
 Lectures ; I had not the means of doing that. All 
 I could do was, to try to produce Lectures something 
 in the tone and spirit of those I originally delivered, 
 but with the narratives and thoughts expanded or 
 condensed as I judged might be best for the con- 
 venience of the reader, and for the elucidation of 
 the subject, after I had reflected on the method 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 which I had followed with my pupils, and the errors 
 and defects of it. 
 
 I will only add, that I have not attempted to 
 exchange the familiarity of the lecture-room for the 
 solemnity of an historical style. The latter might 
 be more agreeable and respectful to the reader, but 
 the former is more natural to me. I have been too 
 long in the habit of addressing young men to be 
 able to divest myself of the feeling that I am still 
 speaking to them when I am writing down words 
 for some unknown reader. Nor can I pretend that 
 I wish to lose these associations, or any by which 
 we are bound to those from whom we are separated 
 on earth. The responsibilities which we have incurred 
 by our intercourse with them we cannot cast off; 
 may it not help us, to think that they are still 
 listening to us? 
 
 May IS///, 1854. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 The Jewish Calling 1 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 The Other Nations 13 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 The Sect Age of the Jewish Commonwealth 34 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 The Kingdom of Heaven 46 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 The New Society in Jerusalem 55 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 Samaria and Syria 69 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 The Churches in Gentile Cities 80 
 
 LECTURE VIII. 
 St. James, St. Peter, and St. Paul 95 
 
 LECTURE IX. 
 St. John 115 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 The Apocalypse 136 
 
xii CONTENTS. 
 
 gtafami mt tlit Standi Curing. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 The Different Churches in the Second Century: Jupyea, 
 
 Samaria, Syria 163 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 (the same surject contikued.) 
 Churches in Asia Minor 184 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 
 (the same subject continued.) 
 Churches in Greece and Egypt 205 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 (the same subject continued.) 
 
 Churches in Italy and Gaul 240 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 (the same subject continued.) 
 
 The African Church 269 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 The Church and the Gods 289 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 (the same subject continued.) 
 The Failures of the Church in the Battle with the Gods . 313 
 
 LECTURE VIII. 
 The Church and the Emperors 342 
 
 LECTURE IX. 
 The Church and the Philosophers 363 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 The Church and the Sects 385 
 
/ f'OL.COLL. \ 
 LECTURE I. i UBKARY .| 
 
 THE JEWISH CALLING,. J\ "YQ K.K. 
 
 I am going to give you lectures upon Ecclesiastical Lect. i. 
 
 History. I would rather say ' Church ' History than Chwchamd 
 Ecclesiastical, because the word is a shorter one ; but [The or'di- 
 I am not sure about the origin of the word Church. nar ? deH ' 
 
 ° ' vahon of 
 
 and I could not explain it as well from the Bible, church 
 The word Ecclesia is a New Testament word. Its K^pLh 
 derivation is obvious. The whole history, both of the dts ^ uted ^ 
 Old and New Testament, is a commentary upon it. 
 
 As the New Testament is written in Greek, we, of Classical 
 course, wish to know what the Greeks generally meant eHZ. 
 by this word. The question is easily answered. An 
 Ecclesia was an assembly called together by a herald. 
 But when you are interpreting New Testament words, 
 you must not think only or chiefly of Greek usages. 
 You must remember that the New Testament writers 
 were Jews. Even when they used classical words, 
 they used them in a Jewish sense. It often happens Etymoiogi- 
 that their Jewish feeling led them to give a Greek ZoZ^T' 9 
 word a meaning more exactly answering to its etvmo- P ortant M 
 
 . . .... the New 
 
 logy than the ordinary one did. So it is in this Testament. 
 instance. Ecclesia, if you strictly adhered to the verb 
 and the preposition from which it comes, would suggest 
 
 B 
 
2 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. the thought of calling out, rather than of calling 
 together. Well, and that thought explains, I believe, 
 the use of the word by the Apostles in the New 
 Testament, because it is one which possessed the 
 Prophets in the Old Testament. 
 Character- I hope you will never forget that the Bible is the 
 
 istic Of (7l6 
 
 Bible. history of God's acts to men, not of men's thoughts 
 about God. It begins from Him. He is acting and 
 speaking in it throughout. The first chapters of 
 Genesis speak of His creating the order of the world, 
 and of His creating man in His own image ; of His 
 breathing into a man the breath of life ; of His giving 
 him a helpmeet ; of His putting him under a law ; of 
 His teaching him to give names to the creatures. 
 This itself is the history of a calling. God is calling- 
 all creatures into distinct existence, and calling out 
 Man to rule them, and to be like Him. 
 
 The first man did not believe in this calling. He 
 
 distrusted his Maker, and tried to be independent of 
 
 Him ; so he made himself dependent on his wife, and 
 
 on the creatures he was to govern. But God's order, 
 
 the Scripture teaches us, was not lost because men 
 
 fell into disorder. That which He had established 
 
 must remain, however many or however few knew 
 
 Prominence His purpose or entered into it. The whole Bible after 
 
 ald'l cai- this is the history of a calling out. It is not, mind 
 
 ling of men. V0Uj that q oc [ ca n s an y men j n £ a s ^ e different from 
 
 that which He has made for men. He calls them 
 into that very state ; and they show their rebellion 
 and their fallen nature, by not liking that state, but 
 preferring some other to it. 
 
THE JEWISH CALLING. 3 
 
 If you run over the history of the Old Testa- Lect. 1. 
 merit in your minds, you will see that I am not Calling im- 
 talking at random, when I say that it is all a com- lotion. 
 mentary on this word ' Ecclesia.' First you have 
 God calling out a man, Abram; sending him forth 
 into another country; promising him that his de- 
 scendants shoidd possess it ; establishing a covenant 
 with him; causing him to wait for a son; making 
 that son the heir of the covenant. This calling is 
 grounded upon a Revelation. God reveals or unveils 
 Himself to Abraham. Now and then we hear of 
 visions that were presented to the bodily eye of Abra- 
 ham. But even where these were granted, they were 
 for the sake of raising him above what he saw with 
 his eyes. The real revelation was to Abraham's heart. 
 God made him feel that he had a righteous Ruler 
 over him. He believed Him, and trusted Him, and so 
 became a righteous and true man. He was called out 
 to witness of this Lord of his spirit, this righteous 
 Being whom he could trust. 
 
 So was his son Isaac, and his grandson Jacob, The Cove- 
 and the twelve Patriarchs. All these had the siim 
 of the covenant, the sign that they were separated 
 to an unseen Being. Circumcision witnessed that 
 they were not to follow their flesh, but to serve 
 the God who was drawing them away from it. Those 
 Patriarchs did, as you know, follow their own inclina- 
 tions ; they were most of them self-willed bad men. 
 They were not the less, men called out. Their sin was 
 that they did not believe in their calling. The cove- 
 nant was nothing to them. Joseph, who did believe 
 
 b 2 
 
j, ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. i. it, who acted as a called man, claimed the calling for 
 
 his brethren as well as for himself. 
 
 TiieNation. So far, we have had the calling out of a man 
 and the calling out of a family. Not of a family 
 that was better and purer than all other families, 
 but of one which could bear witness to all others, 
 that God is the Author of families, — that He has 
 established the order of husband and wife, of father 
 and child, of brother and sister; and that these 
 ordinances would go to wrack and ruin if men were 
 left to themselves, and He did not watch over His 
 own handiwork. Now, if you recollect what you 
 have read in the book of Exodus, you will see how a 
 Nation was called out, just as a man had been, just 
 as a Family had been. Do not fancy that you know 
 what that word ' Nation ' means. It is often on your 
 lips. You yourselves, thank God, belong to a nation. 
 But it takes a long while to learn what that privilege 
 is ; still longer, to know how we may use it rightly. 
 I believe the book of Exodus is a great help in dis- 
 covering the secret. No book teaches us what a 
 nation is like that book. It says that God spoke to 
 Moses in the bush, and told him that He remembered 
 His covenant with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, 
 and that His Name was the I AM, and that He cared 
 for the poor slaves who were bondsmen in Egypt, and 
 that Moses was to command the king of Egypt, in 
 His name, to let His people go. That Name, the I 
 
 The Law; AM, was the ground of the existence of the Jewish 
 nation. In that Name the law was proclaimed from 
 Sinai. In that Name all the ordinances of the people 
 
 Idolatry. 
 
THE JEWISH CALLING. [ 
 
 stood. They were a nation because He was their Lect. i. 
 God. And they were called out, to testify to all the 
 nations of the earth, that this Lord is the God ; that 
 the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, whom 
 they trusted, and in whom their children might trust, 
 was He, from whom all the commandments came. 
 He had called them out and chosen them ; therefore 
 they were not to fancy Him in the likeness of any 
 thing in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in 
 the waters under the earth. They were not to have 
 gods whom they made, or whom they coidcl see, but a 
 God who had created them, whom they could believe, 
 and in whom they could put their trust. 
 
 The Passover, which w T as to remind all their de- The Pass- 
 scendants of their deliverance from Pharaoh, was to 
 remind them also, that they were called by God ; that 
 they were the witnesses of Him as a Deliverer, whilst 
 the greater part of men, — the Egyptians as much as 
 any, — thought their gods were tyrants, like the 
 Pharaohs. This Passover was a feast for the whole 
 people. Each family was to partake of it. Each 
 family was to understand that it was called out by 
 God, dedicated to Him. The blood on the door- 
 posts was a sign that their Deliverer had marked 
 them out for His. When they ate the lamb, they 
 were taught that they were united to Him, and that 
 this was the secret of their union to each other. 
 
 You will recollect, again, that it was not only the The Officers 
 nation, as a body, that was called out and con- ^J^S 
 secrated to God. Every officer in the nation was men - 
 also a called man. Aaron was called out to be 
 
Q ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. the high priest ; his sons were called to be" priests ; 
 Bezaleel and Aholiab were called out to make the 
 curtains of the tabernacle. All these people are said 
 to be set apart to God for a special work. Then they 
 are endued by Him with powers for that work. 
 You will observe that order which the Bible points 
 out to us. I shall often have occasion to recal it to 
 your minds, in my future lectures. 
 
 The Priest. My great object at present, is to bring this fact of 
 a calling before your minds, and so to make you 
 understand the word Ecclesia. I am not therefore 
 so careful to dwell at this time upon the particular 
 offices to which either Aaron or other men were called. 
 Still I must say a word to you on that point too ; 
 otherwise you will not know what the called nation 
 meant, or what its business was. The Priests, you 
 will recollect, were first of all to offer Sacrifices. 
 That was the office of a priest everywhere, among the 
 Egyptians as much as among the Israelites. All 
 people everywhere, or almost all, felt that there were 
 powers over them, which might do them good or do 
 them harm. They felt that they had offended these 
 powers. They felt that they must do something to 
 make peace with them. The wisest men among 
 them were those who must tell them what they were 
 to do. They must tell them what sacrifices they 
 
 Heathen ought to offer. When a people became governed 
 and civilized, as the Egyptians were, these priests, or 
 wise men, became an organized body ; the sacrifices 
 and worship which they prescribed, became, in a 
 measure, sacrifices and worship for the whole people. 
 
THE JEWISH CALLING. 7 
 
 I use the words "in a measure," because you must lect. i. 
 not suppose that the worship of all Egypt was the 
 same. There was a difference between the worship 
 of Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt, for there was a 
 difference in the condition of the two regions ; and 
 so the powers that seemed to make them fertile or 
 barren were thought to be different, and the ways of 
 conciliating them different. Moreover, there were dif- 
 ferences between the classes of the people, which also 
 affected then* services. The worship of the priests 
 themselves was more refined than the worship of the 
 kings whom they advised, and of the people whom 
 they kept down. 
 
 You will see how much the Bible doctrine of iheuvo 
 
 „ i . rpq compared. 
 
 priests and sacrifices must difter trom this, lne ; 
 living God, it says, Himself called out the nation to 
 be His nation. He chose the priests to be His mini- 
 sters, and the ministers of the people. He appointed 
 the sacrifices. He was not a power which the people 
 were to make friendly by offering Him something, 
 or giving up something to Him. He was their 
 Friend. He had revealed Himself to Abraham as Duties of 
 his Friend; He was revealing Himself to them as 
 their Deliverer. He was revealing Himself by His law, 
 and by all His acts, as a Righteous Being, whose mind 
 and purposes are the same always ; not as a capri- 
 cious power, who may purpose one thing to-day, and 
 be persuaded to do another to-morrow. His priests, 
 therefore, could never be merely clever men, who 
 were to find out the things which would please Him 
 or pacify Him. He declared His will; He appointed 
 
5 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. the Priests to be witnesses of it. They were to bless 
 
 the people in His Name. They were to set forth 
 
 His righteousness, His holiness, to them. They were 
 
 to watch over the bodies of the people as well as their 
 
 spirits, to show that He cared for their health, and 
 
 Witness of was the healer of their sicknesses. But the more 
 
 nass de ° US ' they testified of God's righteousness, and of God's 
 
 desire that the people should be righteous, the more 
 
 they made the people feel that there was something 
 
 wrong in them, something which needed to be taken 
 
 Sense of away. The more they said, ' God is your Ruler and 
 
 evil, 
 
 you are His people, the more they felt that they had 
 been rebellious, and were not acting as if they were 
 a people, but were quarrelling with each other. The 
 more they heard that He cared for their health, the 
 more they felt that the sicknesses and diseases which 
 were among them proved that there was something 
 in them and in the world which was at strife with 
 His will. They wanted to be at peace with Him 
 then, not less, but more than other people did. They 
 needed to give up something, that they might be at 
 peace with Him, as much as any other people did. 
 But what they had to give up in order to be reconciled 
 to a righteous Being, was their wrong, their disobedi- 
 ence. He bade them confess the acts which they 
 Sacrifices, knew had been contrary to His law. He appointed 
 the sacrifice, — not something specially precious, but a 
 sheep or an ox, — which signified that they were sub- 
 mitting to His will. He Himself called it a peace- 
 offering, a trespass-offering, or a sin-offering. He 
 promised them forgiveness and remission. 
 
THE JEWISH CALLING. 9 
 
 You will see by-and-by why I have said so much lect. i. 
 on this point. We shall find how much it has to ThePrifst - 
 
 . . I'J Family. 
 
 do with ecclesiastical history. What I would have 
 you take notice of now is, that the priest was not 
 only called himself, but that his family was called 
 also. It was an hereditary office. The same duties, 
 the same sacrifices, which were appointed for one 
 generation, were also for the next, and the next, and 
 the next. Observe too, that the priest, though he had 
 such high functions in the Jewish commonwealth, was 
 not the highest person in it. Moses was before Aaron. 
 The guide and the lawgiver of the people was called 
 to his office in as distinct and marked a manner as 
 he who offered the sacrifices. Joshua was called to The Law- 
 lead the people into the promised land. Every judge /^ e . a " c 
 was called out in some special emergency to deliver 
 the people from oppressors, and to pronounce what 
 was right and wrong between man and man. These 
 offices, you know, were not hereditary. But there came The King. 
 a time when the people desired a king and obtained 
 one : first, a king who was self-willed, and ruled them 
 after his own pleasure; next, one who was said to be 
 after God's own heart, and who ruled them prudently 
 with all his power. The difference between them was, 
 that one felt he had a power which belonged to him, 
 the other, that he was called to his office, and was to 
 be a witness of God's righteous dominion. With 
 him, we are told, God made a covenant that his seed 
 should reign after him. All were to reign as called 
 men, to bear witness of a kingdom which was over 
 them and over their subjects. 
 
jq ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. You will recollect that neither the nation at large, 
 Loss of the nor most of the priests, nor most of the kings did 
 miilig tie righteous acts, or exhibited a righteous character. 
 sin of You will recollect also what we are told was the cause 
 
 Kings, 
 
 Priests and of their sin. They forgot the covenant of their God ; 
 eop e ' they did not believe that they were a people, or priests, 
 or kings, called out by an invisible God. The people 
 murmured in the wilderness ; for they did not trust 
 God. They set up idols when they came into the pro- 
 mised land ; for they did not trust God. Their priests 
 became sottish, selfish, ministers of idolatry ; for they 
 did not trust God. Their kings became arbitrary, 
 unrighteous, imitators of foreign habits and worship ; 
 for they did not trust God. This is the Bible account 
 of the matter, and we shall not be able to find or 
 make a better. I am anxious that you should not 
 try, and that when we advance further in our history, 
 we should be ready to adopt the Scripture explanation 
 of the facts which present themselves to us, not one of 
 our own. 
 The Pro- I have spoken to you of the calling out of the 
 p iet ' priests and the kings ; I must now allude to the call- 
 
 ing out of the prophet. You will understand what it 
 was, by the remarks I have just made. The kings, 
 and the priests, and the people, forgot their calling; 
 he was called out to remind them of it, and to tell 
 them what doings of theirs were inconsistent with it. 
 Since that was his function, he had need to be sure 
 that God was actually speaking to men, actually 
 speaking to him. That was the ground of his work. 
 
 The Word l ° . . . 
 
 of the Lord. The Word of the Lord, it is said, came to him. The 
 
THE JEWISH CALLING. 11 
 
 Word of the Lord spake to him, and made him Lect. i. 
 enter into the meaning and truth of things. The 
 Word of the Lord made him see that there was a 
 right order which God had established for his country- 
 men, and that there was a wrong order which they 
 were creating for themselves. The Word of the Lord 
 made him perceive how all events that were happening 
 in his nation, plagues, pestilences, wars, were witnesses 
 for God's true order, and for their departure from 
 it. The Word of the Lord made the prophet see that 
 every transgression of this order must bring its own 
 punishment upon the priests, the kings, and the peo- 
 ple, and that it woidd prevail and assert itself whether 
 men fought against it or not. The Word of the Lord 
 made him see that this order of God was not only 
 over the chosen people who were the witnesses of it, 
 but that the God of Abraham was the God of the 
 whole earth, that His righteousness was the law for the 
 armies of heaven and the dwellers among men. The 
 Word of the Lord made him see that there was One 
 who was higher than all kings and priests and prophets, 
 an elect One in whom God's soul delighted, who was one 
 with Him, in whom He could behold the nation amidst 
 all its errors and wanderings, who would some day be 
 revealed to it as the Lord of it, and of all the nations. 
 
 There were lying prophets as there were false kings False Pro- 
 and idolatrous priests. The sin of all was the same. p lc 
 The false prophets did not believe in the righteous God 
 who had called them and their nation. They did not 
 tremble at His Name. They spoke a lie out of their 
 own hearts, and said, The Lord hath said it. They 
 
12 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. fancied He was a God of power and not a God of 
 
 truth and righteousness. They conspired with the 
 
 kings to draw the people into the worship of false 
 
 gods, the works of their own hands ; they puffed them 
 
 up with vain hopes ; they helped to hasten on that 
 
 captivity which the true prophets told them would be 
 
 the effect of their transgressions. 
 
 Reasons for You know all these things that I have been telling 
 
 tiZTihe y° u perfectly well. You will hear them in other 
 
 Old Testa- lecture-rooms, illustrated and enforced in connexion 
 
 ment. . . 
 
 with the Old Testament history. It is not my busi- 
 ness to speak directly of that ; but I could not fulfil 
 my own proper task without bringing these facts 
 rapidly before you. I want you to know what the 
 word ' Ecclesia ' signifies in the New Testament, and I 
 could not help you to that knowledge without this 
 preparation. In the next lecture I shall have to speak 
 to you about the other Nations of the old world, and 
 to inquire what they had to do with the called, or 
 chosen Nation. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 THE OTHER NATIONS. 
 
 You remember the promise to Abraham was, " In lkct. ii. 
 thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth Promise to 
 
 ipi Abraham. 
 
 be blessed. That, then, was the end 01 the separa- 
 tion of Abraham, and of the separation of his family. 
 If we believe the Bible, we shall not pnt in any other 
 reason, in place of this ; least of all shall we imagine 
 one that is contrary to this. 
 
 The history of the Bible explains the words of it, iiowper- 
 Joseph was a blessing to Egypt. He taught its king 
 of God's government, and how he was to act in con- 
 formity with it in his treatment of his people. Joseph's 
 seed would have been a blessing to the Egyptians, if 
 they had not forgotten their covenant, and if the 
 Pharaohs had not forgotten the lessons of Joseph. 
 The words of Moses were lessons of wisdom and 
 truth to the Egyptians as well as to the Israelites. 
 When he acted as God's deliverer of His people, he 
 was a witness of that which God wishes for all people. 
 Tyranny is worse for the tyrants than for the slaves. 
 Moses proclaimed the true God of the Egyptians as 
 well as of the Jews. He showed what was the true 
 power which the magicians and enchanters who 
 deceived them were mimicking and turning to mis- 
 
14 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Le ct- h. chief. He declared the commandments which were 
 
 good for the Israelites because they were good for all 
 
 human beings. 
 
 Separation Perhaps it will strike you that the Israelites w T ere 
 
 radites; told not to make marriages with the other nations, 
 
 whether in- j^ ^ Q ^ a j 0Q £ f VQm t nem anc [ that fliis IS inCOn- 
 
 consistent x 
 
 with the sistent with what I was saying. Not the least. The 
 
 promise. , . , . . .. n 
 
 history shows us how consistent it is. When they 
 became like the nations round about, they could not 
 be a blessing to them. Those nations became a curse 
 to the Jews, — hindered them from bearing witness of 
 the true and living and righteous God, the God of the 
 whole earth. They sunk into low, brutal, grovelling 
 idolaters ; they ceased to care for anybody but them- 
 selves. Their own vile appetites were their masters ; 
 they were helpless slaves, not kings and teachers of 
 the world. 
 David and When David reigned as the man after God's own 
 
 Solomon. -, . -, ^ . . -, • o , 
 
 heart, he began to set an example, — a very imperiect 
 one indeed, as the Scriptures tell us, one mixed with 
 many failures and sins, — but still an example of right 
 and true government, to the nations around him. He 
 did not decline intercourse and fellowship with them. 
 He glorified the Lord God of Israel; but you will 
 recollect how often he says in the Psalms, that He 
 was the God in whom the Gentiles might trust. His 
 son Solomon, the wise king, felt that it was a part of 
 his calling to be the friend and teacher of other lands. 
 Nor did this turn to his mischief, till he became proud 
 of his wisdom and a tyrant over his own people. 
 While he sought the friendship of the nations that he 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 1 5 
 
 might be a blessing to them, he fulfilled the hopes Lect. it. 
 and prophecies of his father. When he sought them 
 to gratify his own vanity and lust, they turned him 
 into an idolater and a fool. 
 
 The prophets who arose after the division of the The Pro- 
 two kingdoms, speak to both Israel and Judah of the ihey ' spe ak 
 danger they were in of following Syrian or Phoenician °f iheNaf - 
 fancies, and of going down to Egypt for help. But 
 they cared much more for Syria and Phoenicia than 
 Ahab or Ahaz did, who borrowed from them. They 
 cared much more for all that went on in Egypt, than 
 the cowardly counsellors of Hezekiah, who wished him 
 to depend upon it. You will find, all through these 
 prophets, continual allusions to the history of the 
 surrounding nations. It is assumed, that God is 
 interested in their doings, as He is in those of the 
 chosen people ; that His judgments for one are judg- 
 ments for the other ; that the same everlasting laws 
 belong to both ; that the sins of both are of the same 
 kind ; that Gentiles have consciences which could be 
 spoken to, as much as Jews ; that God called them to 
 repentance, and that they could obey the call. 
 
 When the Jews were taken into Babylon, we are Jewish Na- 
 told that God was using His servant Nebuchadnezzar ^'l^Za 
 for the punishment of an hypocritical people, and that Babylonian 
 He was permitting him to establish a great despotism 
 over the peoples of the earth. At the same time 
 we are taught that the Jewish nation was called out to 
 be the witness against such despotisms as these ; to 
 testify of a King who ruled in righteousness, not by 
 power and self-will j to testify that a kingdom would 
 
16 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ii. be established on the earth, in which One would reign 
 who did not set Himself up above the stars of heaven 
 to be like God, but who, though His name was Won- 
 derful, Counsellor, the mighty God, would not cry or 
 make His voice to be heard in the streets, — would not 
 break the bruised reed, or quench the smoking flax, 
 — would be a refuge to the poor and needy, — and 
 would assuredly bring forth judgment unto victory. 
 The Jews in the captivity appear to have understood, 
 by what they saw of the tyranny and of the idolatry 
 of Babylon, that this was their calling. Their misery 
 in the land of idols had made them perceive the 
 sinfulness and madness of the idolatry which their 
 fathers had practised, and how it had destroyed their 
 Jews under very existence as a people. They longed for the home 
 of their fathers, to be again among their sepulchres, to 
 see the Temple rise out of its ruins. When this great 
 gift was granted them, they were most careful to pre- 
 serve their national distinctions, to separate themselves 
 from people of mixed blood, to abstain from mar- 
 riages with the surrounding race. They gathered 
 together the books of their law and the inspired words 
 of their prophets. They brought out in their harmony 
 the divine annals of their kings ; they made the people 
 understand that these treasures of divine wisdom and 
 human experience were for them and for their chil- 
 dren. This was especially the work of the age of 
 Ezra and Nehemiah. After that, we begin to lose 
 sight of the Old Testament records. We leave the 
 people subjects of the great Medo-Persic monarchy, 
 yet with all the old signs of being a distinct nation, 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 17 
 
 except that they had no longer a visible king reigning Lect. ii. 
 over them. 
 
 Now as there are 500 years between the time of What is 
 Cyrus, who gave the decree for the return of the people j- ane His . 
 to their own land, and the birth of our Lord — about tonJ - 
 400, so far as we can tell, between the last of those 
 whom we call prophets and the appearance of John 
 the Baptist — we must inquire how these years were 
 filled up, and how that which happened in them 
 is related to the Old Testament records or the New. 
 This is the busiest and most important time of all 
 in what we call profane history, the time of the great 
 deeds of Persians and Greeks, of Romans and Car- 
 thaginians. Do you think we have a right to call 
 this profane history ? Do you think what is written 
 in it has to do with man and not with God? Do 
 you think that we can read the wonderful events 
 that are recorded in it and say, This is very well, 
 but this concerns us as secular beings, not as religious 
 beings, — the world, and not the Church ? I am sure 
 we cannot say this if we read the Jewish records 
 with faith. I am sure Ave cannot say it, unless we 
 shut our eyes to the plainest statements in the Acts 
 and Letters of our Lord's Apostles. 
 
 As the Lord is said in Scripture to have given a Nehwhad- 
 dominion to Nebuchadnezzar, so he is said in like ^ flM 
 manner to have given a dominion to Cyrus the Per- 
 sian. A Jew, of course, was bound to believe this. 
 Rut the Scripture intimates, and all facts would lead 
 us to believe, that Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus them- 
 selves in a manner owned it too. The Rabylonian 
 
 c 
 
18 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ii. had very false notions concerning God ; notions that 
 converted Him into an arbitrary being, that divided 
 Him into different forms, represented by the fierce 
 lion or the swift eagle. But under these confu- 
 sions he acknowledged a Lord of the earth; he felt 
 that he was His minister; he had a sense of right- 
 eousness, to which we are told in the Book of Daniel 
 that the Hebrew seer was able to appeal ; nay, we 
 are told in the same book that after he had suffered 
 severe discipline he bowed himself to the Righteous 
 Lord, and confessed that He was the true Ruler of 
 
 Cyrus, b.c. all. Everything seems to show that Cyrus the Per- 
 sian, who became the great Asiatic monarch after the 
 Chaldsean empire was put clown for its pride and its 
 crimes, held this faith in a righteous Being still more 
 
 Medes and strongly. He ruled over two races. His own, the 
 Persian, was an agricultural people, with great re- 
 verence for their kings, and the acknowledgment of 
 an invisible King or Judge, to whom they owed 
 homage. The other, the Median, was a more cul- 
 tivated race, but a less brave and honest one, in 
 which the Priest or the soothsayer was powerful 
 above all other men. With them there was a belief 
 which springs up very naturally in all human beings, 
 
 Ormuzd a belief in two Creators, one good and one evil, and 
 
 man , that the evil being has most to do with this world. 
 
 Hence they were led to offer worship and sacrifice to 
 the evil power as well as to the good, and gradually 
 more to the evil than to the good. It is not certain 
 
 Cambyses, w h a t faith Cambvses, the son of Cyrus, had about 
 
 b. c. 529— J J ■> 
 
 521. this matter. He was a wild frantic man, who had 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. jg 
 
 a vehement hatred of the priests, and who, when Lect. ii. 
 he invaded Egypt, treated the priests he found there Darius, 
 without mercy. After him the Median or priestly 
 power got the upper hand for a short time. But 
 it was put down by Darius Hystaspes, who, as we 
 know from inscriptions lately decyphered by Major 
 Rawlinson, proclaimed himself the worshipper of 
 Ormuzd, or the good Being, and in his name went 
 forth to his battles. You must attend to these facts, 
 and remember them; they have much to do with 
 Ecclesiastical history. 
 
 These Persian kings, however, though they had Persian 
 this faith, aspired to be, like the Chaldaeans, despots 
 over the world, and to put out the life of all particular 
 nations. That is what the Scripture teaches us to 
 contemplate as such a wicked and godless experiment, 
 though God permits it for a while for higher ends, and 
 that He may stir up men's hearts against it. There- 
 fore, the next step in the world's history is full of 
 interest for those who read it by the light of God's 
 word. The Persian kino; finds a number of cities in The Greek 
 
 7 
 
 his empire on the borders of the iEgasan Sea, in which Asiat 
 men are dwelling; of a different race from his. Thev 
 
 "O 
 
 are trading with wonderful success ; though they are 
 few in numbers, they are more than a match for 
 the Persians, because they are wiser. Their cities 
 are governed by clever sagacious men, who have 
 raised themselves to power. They are very restless, 
 sometimes they are treacherous. But they have one 
 great good in them, — love for their ancestors, attach- 
 ment to the soil from whence they have sprung. 
 
 c 2 
 
20 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 Greeks in 
 Europe. 
 
 B.C. 491, 
 Darius 
 sends to 
 Greece to 
 demand 
 earth and 
 water. 
 Marathon, 
 B.C. 490. 
 Invasion of 
 Xerxes, 
 B.C. 480. 
 
 The Greeks 
 witnesses 
 for God. 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 This binds them together in fellowship with each 
 other, in spite of their partial interests and tendencies 
 to disagreement. They have the sense of a God of 
 light and wisdom who presides over them, who keeps 
 them together, who directs their counsels. They are 
 full of strange thoughts and questionings about the 
 world around them, and themselves, and God. There 
 are in them all kinds of evil tendencies ; but there is 
 a struggle after what is true and what is good, which 
 can have come to them from no one but the good and 
 true God. 
 
 These Greek colonists the Persian king tries to put 
 down. He finds that they are connected with two 
 cities in Europe, Athens, and Sparta, to which they 
 look up, and from which they hope for succour. He 
 determines in the* pride of his heart that he will put 
 these cities down, he will make Europe his slave as well 
 as Asia. You have read the stories of Marathon and 
 Thermopylae as boys at school. Read them again now 
 that you are men, now you are called to be citizens 
 of England, and ministers of God's Church, with 
 ten times as much interest as you did then. It was 
 a battle for right, and truth, and God, that was fought 
 in those places. God was preserving Europe from 
 a hateful self-willed tyranny. He was teaching the 
 Spartans and Athenians to care for their homes and 
 hearths, and the sepulchres of their fathers. It was 
 not by false gods, but by the true God, however much 
 they might be mistaken about His nature, that they 
 were stirred to do brave acts which all brave men 
 like to think of. 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 21 
 
 And God gave them the victory. The great hosts Lect. ii. 
 of the world did not prevail over the handful of 
 weak men, as He has promised that they shall not 
 when men refuse to bow down to force, which 
 is not their Lord. It was the belief that there 
 is something stronger than force, — that the spirit in 
 man is stronger than all mere brute power, — which 
 made these Greeks what you have always been told Meaning of 
 they were, some of the greatest thinkers and the torym 
 greatest artists the world has had. The same truth 
 which enabled them to conquer the Persians, helped 
 them to conquer the sea in ships, and to put beautiful 
 forms into stone and marble. But this truth might 
 be turned into a lie. Men may become proud of the 
 powers of their own spirits, till they pass first into 
 cunning plotters and traders, then into tyrants, then 
 into mere restless fighters, then at last, into slaves of 
 the very things they were meant to rule. All this 
 happened to the Greeks. All this shows, not that 
 they were wrong in their belief about man's spirit, 
 and the victory it is to have over that Avhich is earthly 
 and fleshly, but that they could not maintain their 
 own faith, because they were worshipping themselves 
 more than God, and because that worship of themselves 
 led them to worship the very wood and stone which 
 God had given them power to mould and to make 
 beautiful. 
 
 The truth which is brought out in God's word Macedo- 
 
 . ■, nian Em- 
 
 respecting the Jews, proves itsell over again in the ^ Ve 
 history of the Greeks, in their courage, in their wis- 
 dom, in their sensuality, in their fall. But after the 
 
22 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 b.c. 334, 
 Alexander 
 begins the 
 war 
 against 
 Persia. 
 B.C. 323, 
 He dies. 
 
 Syria and 
 
 Egypt. 
 
 Ptolemy in 
 
 Egypt, 
 
 B.C. 324. 
 uEra of the 
 Seleucidee 
 begins, 
 B.C. 312. 
 
 Their rela- 
 tions with 
 Palestine. 
 The Septua- 
 gint. 
 
 fall of the greatest city in Greece from its high estate, 
 there rose up a young Macedonian who felt that a 
 wise people was still meant to subdue mere numbers 
 and armies, and that he might revenge upon the 
 Asiatics the wrongs which they had tried to do in 
 former centuries to Europe. Alexander went forth 
 and subdued the Persian Empire. At thirty-two 
 years of age, after laying the foundations, as he sup- 
 posed, of one of those empires which the Scripture call 
 Babylonian, he died at Babylon. But his empire was 
 not to . be like those which went before him. His 
 generals quarrelled for it : it fell to pieces in their 
 hands. Two kingdoms grew out of it in which we 
 have a special interest. One is the kingdom of the 
 Ptolemies, in Egypt ; the other, that of the Seleucidee, 
 in Syria. The city of Alexandria, of which you will 
 hear a great deal in Church history, became the capi- 
 tal of one; the city of Antioch, which is so nearly 
 connected with the name of Christian, of the other. 
 You remember how Palestine is situated with reference 
 to Egypt and Syria ; you will not wonder that it 
 should often have been a battle-field between them. 
 The Ptolemies were clever and accomplished Greek 
 monarchs ; they encouraged settlements of the Jews 
 among them, they were interested in the curious 
 customs of a people so unlike themselves. They 
 wished to know what was written in their sacred 
 books. The Septuagint translation of the Old Testa- 
 ment into Greek, was made, according to Josephus, 
 at the instance of Ptolemy Philadelphus, and was 
 added to the library of Alexandria. In that same 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 23 
 
 city, Jews also heard Greek teachers lecturing on the lect. ii. 
 Greek philosophy, and began to compare what they 
 heard with their own divine oracles. 
 
 A different kind of relation existed between the The Syrian 
 Jews and some of the monarchs of Antioch. They tion< 
 too were Greeks. But they were bent, not upon ac- 
 quainting themselves with the worship of other people, 
 but on establishing their own. Antiochus Epiphanes Antiochus 
 did not merely care to enslave the Jews ; he was temple, 
 determined to make them idolators, and to establish B - c - 17 °- 
 idol- worship in their temple. There were traitors in 
 the camp, priests who were willing to work with him, The Macca- 
 to help him in setting up the abomination of desola- 
 tion in the holy place, and in defacing the holy books. 
 But God put it into the heart of one noble family to 
 stand up for the covenant and the law, and to resist 
 the tyrant to the death. There are few finer histories 
 in the world than that in the Book of Maccabees. It 
 belongs to Avhat is called profane history, as much as 
 the history of the Greek Republics does. That is to 
 say, the record of it is not contained in a canonical book. 
 But if you believe the canonical books, and understand 
 what is written in them, you must regard that as well 
 as the Greek narrative, as containing a history of God's 
 doings, of the way in which He awakens the hearts 
 of men and puts into them invincible might to defy 
 the proud of the earth and the oppressor. And 
 though these Jews lived after what is termed the Their 
 prophetical period of Jewish history, they as much \ n ^i^f 
 believed that they were called by God, and were in °f thetr 
 
 J J ... calling. 
 
 covenant with God as David and Hezekiah did. In 
 
24 
 
 ON CEURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - H- that belief lay all their strength. By that, they were 
 
 able to establish a native government in Palestine; 
 
 From a kind of priestly government ; for the Maccabsean 
 
 Judas 
 
 Maccabcew family did not become kings till the better part of 
 
 to Herod, 
 B.C. 167— 
 35. 
 
 TJie Jews 
 hearing 
 of the 
 Romans. 
 
 Their cha- 
 racter and 
 deeds as 
 reported to 
 Judas Mac- 
 cabceus. 
 
 them had died out, and till a very degenerate and 
 corrupt race had succeeded. 
 
 I said that the strength of the Maccabees lay in 
 their faith in the strength of God's covenant. They 
 did also many weak and evil acts, which may all be 
 traced to their forgetfulness of it. I think it was 
 this which led Judas Maccabseus to desire the alliance 
 of a great people, whose fame first reached him when 
 he was fighting the battles of his country. What he 
 heard of them, we are told in a curious and interesting 
 passage in the Book of Maccabees, which I will read 
 to you : — 
 
 " Now Judas had heard of the fame of the Romans, that they were 
 mighty and valiant men, and such as would lovingly accept all that 
 joined themselves unto them, and make a league of amity with all that 
 came unto them ; and that they were men of great valour. It was 
 told him also of their wars and noble acts which they had done among 
 the Galatians, and how they had conquered them, and brought them 
 under tribute; and what they had done in the country of Spain, for the 
 winning of the mines of the silver and gold which is there ; and that 
 by their policy and patience they had conquered all the place, though it 
 were very far from them ; and the kings also that came against them 
 from the uttermost part of the earth, till they had discomfited them, 
 and given them a great overthrow, so that the rest did give them 
 tribute every year: beside this, how they had discomfited in battle 
 Philip, and Perseus, king of the Citims, with others that lifted up 
 themselves against them, and had overcome them : how also Antiochus 
 the great king of Asia, that came against them in battle, having an 
 hundred and twenty elephants, with horsemen, and chariots, and a very 
 great army, was discomfited by them ; and how they took him alive, 
 and covenanted that he and such as reigned after him should pay a great 
 tribute, and give hostages, and that which was agreed upon, and the 
 country of India, and Media, and Lydia, and of the goodliest countries, 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 
 
 25 
 
 which they took of him, and gave to king Eumenes : moreover how the 
 Grecians had determined to come and destroy them; and that they, 
 having knowledge thereof, sent against them a certain captain, and 
 fighting with them slew many of them, and carried away captives their 
 wives and their children, and spoiled them, and took possession of their 
 lands, and pulled down their strongholds, and brought them to be their 
 servants unto this day : it was told him besides, how they destroyed and 
 brought under their dominion all other kingdoms and isles that at any 
 time resisted them; but with their friends and such as relied upon 
 them they kept amity; and that they had conquered kingdoms both far 
 and nigh, insomuch as all that heard of their name were afraid of them : 
 also that, whom they would help to a kingdom, those reign; and whom 
 again they would, they displace : finally, that they were greatly exalted : 
 yet for all this none of them wore a crown, or was clothed in purple, to 
 be magnified thereby : moreover how they had made for themselves a 
 senate house, wherein three hundred and twenty men sat in council 
 daily, consulting alway for the people, to the end- they might be well 
 ordered : and that they committed their government to one man every 
 year, who ruled over all their country, and that all were obedient to 
 that one, and that there was neither envy nor emulation among them. 
 In consideration of these things, Judas chose Eupolemus the son of 
 John, the son of Accos, and Jason the son of Eleazar, and sent them to 
 Rome, to make a league of amity and confederacy with them, and to 
 intreat them that they would take the yoke from them ; for they saw 
 that the kingdom of the Grecians did oppress Israel with servitude. 
 They went therefore to Rome, which was a very great journey, and came 
 into the senate, where they spake and said, Judas Maccabeus with his 
 brethren, and the people of the Jews, have sent us unto you, to make 
 a confederacy and peace with you, and that we might be registered your 
 confederates and friends. So that matter pleased the Romans well. 
 And this is the copy of the epistle which the senate wrote back again in 
 tables of brass, and sent to Jerusalem, that there they might have by 
 them a memorial of peace and confederacy : Good success be to the 
 Romans, and to the people of the Jews, by sea and by land for ever : 
 the sword also and enemy be far from them. If there come first any 
 war upon the Romans, or any of their confederates throughout all their 
 dominion, the people of the Jews shall help them, as the time shall be 
 appointed, with all their heart : neither shall they give any thing unto 
 them that make war upon them, or aid them with victuals, weapons, 
 money, or ships, as it hath seemed good unto the Romans ; but they 
 shall keep their covenants without taking any thing therefore. In the 
 same manner also, if war come first upon the nation of the Jews, the 
 Romans shall help them with all their heart, according as the time shall 
 be appointed them : neither shall victuals be given to them that take 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 Pyrrhus 
 invades 
 Italy, 
 B.C. 281. 
 
 Defeat of 
 Philip in 
 the Battle 
 of Cynosce- 
 phalce, 
 B.C. 197. 
 
 War with 
 Antiochus, 
 B.C. 191. 
 
 War with 
 Perseus, 
 B.C. 171— 
 167. 
 
26 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. II. part against them, or weapons, or money, or ships, as it Lath seemed 
 good to the Romans ; but they shall keep their covenants, and that 
 without deceit. According to these articles did the Romans make 
 a covenant with the people of the Jews. Howbeit if hereafter the one 
 party or the other shall think meet to add or diminish any thing, they 
 may do it at their pleasures, and whatsoever they shall add or take 
 away shall be ratified. And as touching the evils that Demetrius doeth 
 to the Jews, we have written unto him saying, Wherefore hast thou 
 made thy yoke heavy upon our friends and confederates the Jews ? If 
 therefore they complain any more against thee, we will do them justice, 
 and fight with thee by sea and by land." 
 
 I have given you the whole of this chapter, because 
 I know no better way of introducing you to a people 
 of whom our history hereafter will be full, and because 
 there is something very ominous and prophetical in 
 this first league between them and the Jews. You 
 will easily suppose that there were some mistakes in 
 the information which a hard-working Jewish soldier 
 got, of a people who were living in Italy. By the 
 Corrections Galatians, he means the Gauls in Europe ; though he 
 port. 610 ' perhaps was not sure whether he was not speaking of 
 the people of the same kindred in Asia Minor. He 
 had heard something of the conquests of the Romans 
 in Spain; but he seems only to have received an 
 imperfect story about their triumph over their old 
 rival in Carthage. He knew more of the conquests 
 which they had begun to make in Asia, and was, 
 of course, more interested in them. In what he 
 says about the Grecians, he brings together the 
 invasion of Italy by King Pyrrhus, and the victory 
 of the Romans in Greece ; though these events were 
 separated by a long interval. He is not right in 
 Cause of saying that Rome was ruled by one man. These 
 
 Roman . l i 1 i 
 
 triumphs, mistakes were very natural ones, and, on the whole, 
 
27 
 
 THE OTHER NATIONS. 
 
 Judas had a very clear impression of a vigorous, Lect.ii. 
 energetic, triumphant people, who were gradually 
 forcing other people to accept their government, Their 
 because they had first learnt to be governed them- nes L s . 
 selves. That was the secret of the Roman success. 
 God gave them their power, as He gives all men then- 
 power. But He gave them what is much better than 
 power, and is the beginning of it, — a sense of right, 
 and order, and obedience, of the reverence which the 
 child owes to the father, and of the authority which 
 the father has over the child. These principles which 
 lay at the root of their minds, had brought forth the 
 discipline of their armies. At home there had been 
 many fights between the different classes of which the 
 state was composed ; but through these their society 
 had been made stronger, and they had learnt more Timrjaifh. 
 how one class of men in a nation must depend upon 
 another. They had committed a great many wicked 
 and tyrannical acts in winning their dominion, every 
 one of which was to have its due recompense of 
 reward afterwards. Their evil acts had mingled with 
 the false notions which they had of the powers above 
 them, and had made them falser ; but they did con- 
 fess a God of righteousness and order, who kept 
 men in order, and required men to be righteous, 
 though they might very often set this faith at naught 
 in their practice. Be sure you remember these 
 things. I cannot tell you how much they will help 
 you in understanding God's government of the 
 world in the later times as well as in those I am 
 speaking of. 
 
28 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.ii. Well, -this Roman empire, then, was destined to 
 Extent of swa U w up much of those which preceded it, and to 
 
 their con- m m 
 
 quests. have a dominion which did not belong to them. It 
 did not conquer all the old Persian empire. There its 
 power was disputed by the Parthians, a mountain 
 tribe, which subdued some of the fairest provinces of 
 
 Asia. Asia, and which adopted many of the Greek customs 
 
 and the Greek worship. The Romans conquered the 
 countries in which Alexander's successors had been 
 established, and set up Roman laws and Roman 
 magistrates in the midst of them. But they did not 
 drive out the Greek language, or establish the Latin 
 in them. In many places they themselves learnt the 
 older language, and the ablest men of Rome came 
 to the Greek cities and learnt under Greek teachers. 
 You must not think, then, of the Eastern world or 
 of the Greek, as Roman, though they were under the 
 Romans. 
 
 Afrka. In Africa the case was different. Egypt, in its 
 
 chief city, had been made thoroughly Greek by the 
 Ptolemies, and there the Roman language scarcely 
 penetrated at all : in the country districts the old 
 tongue of the people was still spoken. But, in the 
 part of Africa of which Carthage had been the centre, 
 after that city was destroyed and a new Carthage 
 built, the Latin language, the Latin institutions, and 
 all the Latin modes of thinking, spread most rapidly. 
 The city which bore the name of Rome's great 
 rival, was thoroughly Romanised : only in the rural 
 districts the Punic, or Carthaginian language, still 
 for a long time lingered. These are points which ycu 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 29 
 
 will have need to recollect; they have much to do with Lect. ii. 
 our subject. 
 
 But there is another part of the world which is Western 
 
 Europe. 
 
 more interesting to ns than these. It was called 
 into existence, I might almost say, by the Roman 
 conquests, the Roman government, and the Roman 
 language. Judas Maccabasus has told us of the Roman 
 triumphs in Spain and Gaul. Those countries were 
 to become, by degrees, almost Latin nations. We 
 shall hear, by-and-by, of great changes which they 
 underwent — of different tribes which subdued them. 
 But, amidst all these, they have never lost the effect 
 of their Roman discipline. Rome found them mere 
 tribes, and organized them and civilized them. She 
 made them cultivated provinces of her great empire. 
 Another power was needed to make them nations 
 in the true sense of the word. What that was, we 
 shall hear by-and-by. But this was the appointed 
 preparation for it. 
 
 What was the case with Britain ? I cannot give Britain. 
 you the whole answer to that question at once. The 
 history must give it you by degrees. But I must tell 
 you here, that Britain was, in one sense, more in- 
 debted to Rome than even Spain and Gaul. The 
 Phoenicians came to our island to look for tin ; — the 
 Greeks had a dream of such a place. In after times, 
 when Britain had undergone many changes, our 
 ancestors had wild fancies about Trojan colonies 
 which had settled here, and races of kings that dwelt 
 here. These legends are worth actually nothing. 
 Julius Csesar really discovered our island, and brought 
 
30 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ii. it into the history of the world, fifty-five years 
 before the birth of Christ. He found, indeed, a 
 people with many strange practices, — with sacri- 
 fices and a priesthood, of the same tribe with the 
 majority of the inhabitants of Gaul, connected with 
 
 Priesthood them by their worship. These priests must have had 
 
 higherwit a higher knowledge once. They had the relics of it. 
 
 dom - But they had not imparted it to the people. They 
 
 kept them low and brutal. And so their own worship 
 became more and more savage and brutal; — it became 
 the worship of evil powers and not of good. That is 
 a necessary law. It goes on in all countries where 
 the priests do not feel that they have a calling of God 
 to raise and educate the people. Julius Csesar was 
 the appointed deliverer of Britain from this condition. 
 He was the ablest Roman of this time. He under- 
 stood, better than any man, what Rome could do to 
 civilize and organize people. He scorned the vulgar 
 ambition of his rival, Pompey, to enrich himself by 
 conquering the old, worn-out monarchies of the East. 
 He aspired to call a new world into existence in 
 
 Benefits of the West, and God used him to do that work. 
 
 vemment. He did not know what all the strange thoughts 
 meant that were working in the minds of the British 
 priests, or of other priests. He had no good news for 
 the people about an unseen world. But he could put 
 them in the way of subduing the outward world, as 
 God meant them to subdue it ; instead of crouching 
 to it, as their priests taught them to do. He could 
 teach them to make roads, and punish crimes, and 
 submit to laws. That was a great lesson, for which 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 31 
 
 we have to be grateful to him. And the reason I Lect. ii. 
 have stopped to tell you this, is not merely out of love 
 to my own land, but because Britain is as good a 
 specimen as one can find, of what Rome did for the 
 world, and of what it could not do ; and because 
 Britain, more than any country in Europe, comes into 
 existence just at the very time when the New Testa- 
 ment history begins. 
 
 There was one country in western Europe which Germany. 
 the Romans knew of, but which they could not con- 
 quer. That country is Germany. I shall not say 
 anything of it to you now, but I shall have a great 
 deal to say hereafter of its influence upon Gaul and 
 Britain, as well as upon the whole of Christendom. 
 I wish you only to recollect that when one speaks of 
 the Roman or Latin world, you are not to think of 
 that country as included in it. It was not an undis- 
 covered region, as Norway, and Sweden, and the 
 greater part of Russia was. Roman armies fought in 
 it, and sometimes perished in it. But it was a collec- 
 tion of tribes, out of which a kind of power quite 
 different from that which Rome exercised was in due 
 time to come forth. Nations were to be formed out 
 of those tribes ; and Rome, as I have said, could not 
 form nations, — it was itself ceasing to be one. 
 
 That is the last point I shall speak of in this lecture. Nations 
 
 . , and Em- 
 
 I have told you that Judaea was a distinct and sepa- pires . 
 rate nation, and that it was a witness against those 
 great empires which tried to be universal and to 
 swallow up all nations in themselves. Rome, as it is 
 described to us by Judas Maccabaeus, was a nation, 
 
32 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lkct.ii. standing upon an acknowledgment of a righteous 
 Being, though it was continually confounding Him 
 with the works of His hands ; confessing a law by 
 which individuals and nations are bound, though it 
 was very frequently violating that law in its own acts ; 
 reverencing the bonds of the family, though those 
 Rome sink- bonds were always liable to become loose. But the 
 ^Empire. false worship, the violations of right, the breaches 
 of domestic discipline, were now becoming stronger 
 than all which restrained them. The factions of 
 leaders, the divisions of classes, made mockery of 
 the law to which they all appealed. Money was 
 mighty over the order of the State, and the con- 
 sciences of men. The ablest citizens might, in such 
 Tiie Gene- a time, become the subverters of the commonwealth. 
 After a wretched civil war, Julius Caesar, the beloved 
 of the people, became Dictator. Men who dreamed 
 that they could restore the old Roman Republic con- 
 spired against him and slew him. That act hastened 
 its fall, and threw it into the hands of a much worse 
 chief. Octavius Caesar became the ruler of the world 
 which Rome had subdued, and was hailed as a deli- 
 verer from its anarchy. He was called the Imperator 
 or General of the Republic. All its civil offices and 
 institutions gathered round him who bore this military 
 name. The most civilized part of the universe did 
 homage to one whose title and whose glory was that 
 he was the chief of the army. But he was not only 
 called a general: he was also called a God. The 
 Tiu Man- union of names expresses the inmost feeling of the 
 people of that age. Mere power, the power which 
 
THE OTHER NATIONS. 33 
 
 comes forth in hosts, was their god. He who governed lect. ii. 
 them was really in their minds the King of kings and 
 Lord of lords. They might worship a multitude of 
 powers, as they had done before; they might have 
 abundance of religion, and be full of fears about the 
 future and the unseen world. But this was the per- The Man- 
 son to whom they looked up ; this Man-god was he 
 to whom priests and peoples bowed down. 
 
 D 
 
va.s-.s-. 
 
 LECTUBE III. 
 
 THE SECT AGE OE THE JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 
 
 Lect. hi. The Jewish nation, we have seen, was especially 
 character called out to bear witness against that kind of society 
 Jewish wit- which I described at the end of my last Lecture. I do 
 not mean that it was to declare war upon any great 
 empire of the world ; I do not mean, even, that it 
 was always to resist any great tyrant of the earth avIio 
 made war upon it. Hezekiah fought against Senna- 
 cherib, and was delivered out of his hands. But 
 Jeremiah told the inhabitants of Jerusalem, in the 
 days of Nebuchadnezzar, that their duty was to yield. 
 In fact, Nebuchadnezzar was an instrument of God 
 for delivering them from their miserable and godless 
 native rulers, from the corruption, brutality, anarchy, 
 into which they had fallen. Nevertheless, in the one 
 case as much as in the other, every true Jew who 
 understood the calling of his country was a witness 
 against these governments of mere power, these go- 
 vernments which destroyed old land-marks, a witness 
 for a King who reigned in righteousness, and who 
 ordered the bounds of men's habitations. He was a 
 witness against kings who set themselves up like 
 Lucifer, and called themselves gods. He was a wit- 
 
SECT AGE OF JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 35 
 
 ness for One who was rilling over men in meekness lect. hi. 
 and equity, who was stooping to men, who was caring 
 for the poor and the needy. This witness was borne 
 by the true Jew in his lowest estate, as well as in his 
 most prosperous. Perhaps it was never borne more 
 faithfully or with greater effect than by those who 
 were captives in Babylon. 
 
 We may ask, then, what sort of witness was the Jew in (he 
 Jewish people bearing in the days of Augustus Caesar, Augustus. 
 concerning the sort of dominion which he had set up, 
 one which was so like the tyrannies of the Asiatic 
 monarchs, only that it had grown out of a better 
 state of things, not yet altogether subverted. I will 
 endeavour to give you the answer. There had been, Decay of 
 as I said, a series of native princes in Judaea, the ^ 
 Asmonaean princes they were called, who owed their 
 power to the great Maecabaean struggle, but who 
 had none of the spirit of then ancestors, being low, 
 plotting, bad men. It was clear that there was not 
 more of morality or godliness among the Jews than 
 there was among the other people who submitted to 
 the Roman yoke. They fell under it just as naturally 
 as any others did. As far as the body of the people 
 were concerned, it made little difference ; they were 
 probably, on the whole, subject to a juster rule than 
 they had been. There was more order in their 
 exactions, though they were imposed by a foreigner. 
 Cneius Pompey had entered their temple ; but it was 
 not the manner of the Romans to interfere with the 
 religious rites of the people they conquered. The 
 priests continued as they had been before ; sacrifices 
 
 d 2 
 
36 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. hi. were offered according to the rules of the law; the 
 Heathen governors were less likely to interfere with 
 such matters than the native. 
 
 The hu- According to the custom of the Romans in many 
 
 mcean king . -._.__ 
 
 reigning countries, a king was set over their Jewish sub- 
 Tomc jects, who of course was answerable to the ruling 
 state, and might be removed at its pleasure ; though 
 it was quite as likely that his son would be per- 
 mitted to reign after him. The man they appointed 
 was not a Jew but an Idumaean, Herod, who, though 
 he was first promoted by Mark Antony, was clever 
 and supple enough to keep his kingdom under Mark 
 Antony's rival and conqueror, Octavius Caesar. So 
 when Octavius became Augustus and the emperor of 
 the Roman world, Herod reigned over Judaea, and 
 contrived to get himself called " Great," either while 
 he ruled, or after his death. He was great according 
 to the notions of greatness which men had in that 
 little age. He knew how to get power, and to keep it 
 when he had got it. He was as bad a husband, and 
 father, and prince as there well could be. But the 
 men he governed were worse than himself; they 
 were the kind of men whose motives a man like him 
 could see through, and whose tricks and plots he 
 could overreach by his own. 
 wherein It is no new thing for us to hear of the chosen 
 
 the jell was people being stiff-necked and corrupt. Moses and 
 l Uke™httde- ^ ie P ro P nets are telling us that of them, in every page 
 scribed in of the Old Testament. They were essentially now 
 tament. wna t their fathers had been ; but there were many 
 outside differences which are of very great importance 
 
SECT AGE OE JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 37 
 
 in themselves, and which led them to think that Lect. in. 
 they would never have done the evils which were 
 charged on former generations. There was no 
 worship of Roman gods now, as there had been of 
 Phoenician or Egyptian gods, in the days gone by. 
 The people hated idolaters, and believed that they 
 hated idols. There was no indifference abont the 
 books of the law; they were copied out with the 
 greatest diligence, and commented upon with great 
 learning. The Scribes, the copiers and teachers of Scribes, El 
 
 , 1 ders, Syna- 
 
 the law, were as much venerated as any men m the goguam 
 community. Not only the law itself was honoured, 
 but all the sayings of wise men that had been handed 
 down about it, were honoured also. The services 
 which had been so often neglected by their forefathers 
 were acknowledged as divine, and scrupulously ob- 
 served. Besides the Temple at Jerusalem, syna- 
 gogues had been established in the different towns of 
 the land, where the divine books were read and 
 expounded. 
 
 During the Maccabaean period there had risen up Pharisees. 
 a class of men who felt the importance of adhering 
 strictly to the commands and ordinances of the law 
 themselves, and who were careful in enforcing the 
 observance of them upon others, fearing, no doubt, 
 lest the same bad consequences should come from 
 the indifference to them which the prophets told of. 
 These men, called Pharisees, were now the prevail- 
 ing and popular teachers of the land. They were 
 more numerous than any other sect, and had far 
 more influence. They were looked upon as the reli- 
 
38 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. in. gious men of the age, the standard of religion to 
 all others, though very few might hope to reach 
 their standard. Besides their reputation, many of 
 them derived influence from their wealth. The 
 people thought that God had given them money, as 
 
 Their doc- He gave Abraham flocks and herds ; that it was a 
 
 life. sign of His approbation, a pledge of better things 
 
 which He would give them hereafter. The Pharisees 
 exhorted them earnestly to strive for those things, 
 that were to come to them in a future world. They 
 said there would be a resurrection of the just and 
 of the unjust ; rewards for the one, punishments for 
 the other. They pointed out what was the likeliest 
 way of obtaining the first and avoiding the second. 
 But they did not neglect that which was going on 
 in the world around them. Josephus, the Jewish 
 historian, shows us that they were busy in all the 
 intrigues of Herod's court, sometimes plotting against 
 him with members of his own family, sometimes 
 ready to work with him when he was willing to pro- 
 mote their objects. 
 
 Herodians. Of course he did not trust these Pharisees. He 
 tried to make their religious views and their secular 
 views serve his ends. He had about him friends 
 who were devoted to his interests. In the days 
 of his descendants, and probably in his own, these 
 were called Herodians. Their main object was, to 
 watch over the interests of the Iclumsean family, to 
 prevent the Romans from setting it aside, and to 
 prevent the Jews from favouring any native prince 
 who should be a rival to it. Por they had reason to 
 
SECT AGE OE JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 39 
 
 dread this danger. It seemed a very strange and Lect. iti . 
 monstrous thing to Jews, that they should be under 
 a foreign yoke at all ; that they should have to pay 
 taxes to the Romans ; that the faces of men who were 
 collecting customs and tributes should be meeting 
 them at the turn of every street. That sight was most 
 painful to the richer people ; — they probably cared 
 more about throwing off the yoke of the Roman 
 Caesars. The poor and the ignorant, I suppose, felt the 
 nearer tyranny most. They would have liked, above Cries for a 
 all things, to get rid of Herod and his family. They j nsur rec- 
 knew enough of the words of the prophets, either tw,ls - 
 by common fame or by the teaching of the scribes, to 
 be aware how much they spoke of a Son of David, 
 who should one day set up His throne in their land, 
 and who should be a Helper and Friend of the poor. 
 No wonder that such words stirred their heart's blood, 
 and that they were ready to listen to agitators and 
 brigands who told them that they were sent from 
 God. to deliver His people from their chains, and 
 make them greater than all the people of the earth. 
 Such men arose, it would seem, especially in Galilee, 
 where the people were most ignorant and most tram- 
 pled upon as an inferior race. They drew their 
 followers into the wilderness, committed many crimes, 
 and made their condition worse than it was before. 
 
 There was another body, different in their objects Sadducees. 
 from both the Pharisees and the Herodians — cer- 
 tainly with far fewer disciples than the former. 
 These were the Sadducees. Almost from the time 
 the Pharisees began to exist, these had been their 
 
40 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. in. opposers. They thought their strict observances and 
 regard for traditions unnecessary and mischievous. 
 " The law," they said, " enjoined plain duties ; — sound 
 morality was more important than religious ceremo- 
 nies. These might be of use to keep vulgar men in 
 order, — the higher and wiser did not want them. Nor 
 were they better for thinking about a future state, or 
 dreaming of communications from invisible powers; — 
 they could keep themselves just and merciful without 
 such helps : and was not that what God required?" The 
 people did not heed these teachers ; — their doctrine did 
 not speak to them in the least. They found it very 
 hard to be just and merciful ; and the Sadducees did 
 not tell them how they were to become so, and how 
 others might become so to them. The Pharisees 
 spoke to fears that were in them ; now and then to 
 hopes that were in them also. The Sadducees treated 
 them as if they had neither. 
 
 Essmes. Another class I may just mention to you, for the 
 
 Jewish historian speaks of them, though the Scrip- 
 ture does not. Those whom he calls Essenes were 
 men of earnest minds, who were disgusted with the 
 quarrelling of these sects, and with the corruption 
 in the Jewish cities, and who thought that they might 
 establish a more healthy and pure community, some- 
 thing more like the kingdom the prophets spoke of, 
 in the rural districts of Judaea. One cannot tell how 
 many of these communities were formed, and how much 
 of good or evil there was in them. They pointed out a 
 want that was in the hearts of the people, a want which 
 was nourished in the best of them as they prayed and 
 
SECT AGE OF JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 41 
 
 read the Old Scriptures. A number of such men there lect. tii. 
 were, who might, or might not, join the Essenes. 
 They are described in the Gospels as men and women 
 who were waiting for the kingdom of God. 
 
 You will see, then, that there w T as very little sense 27« sense of 
 indeed in the minds of the Jews, that they were a 
 people called out by God, to do a work for men. In 
 truth, they did not feel themselves a people at all. 
 Some of them thought it was a great honour to be 
 Pharisees ; some, to be Sadducees ; some, to be Hero- 
 dians. But what was the honour of being Israelites ? 
 The great men did not like to be confounded with the 
 vulgar, irreligious, or ignorant herd who bore that 
 name. They therefore rejoiced in it only in as far as 
 it separated them from the Heathens, as it denoted 
 them not to be a portion of the world which God had 
 cursed. For that was their view of the promise to 
 Abraham, — all the families of the earth were cursed 
 for their sakes. What followed from this notion? 
 They no longer looked upon God as the righteous BdigUmU 
 God. They did not glory in this, that they were to for ^ 
 know Him who executed righteousness in the earth. 
 He was the God of the Jews, just as Apollo w r as the 
 god of the Greeks. They regarded Him as more 
 selfish, more partial, than the gods of the Heathen 
 were. The only meaning which they put upon the 
 words, that He was not made in the likeness of any 
 thing in heaven or on earth, was, that He was re- 
 moved from all sympathy with men ; that He made 
 decrees for them, but that He did not care for them. 
 This was the belief of men who pretended to worship 
 
42 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. III. 
 
 Inward 
 idolatry 
 and slavery 
 of the 
 chosen 
 people. 
 
 Mammon 
 worship. 
 
 Relation to 
 Roman des- 
 potism. 
 
 the God of Abraham — the God who had said to Moses, 
 " I called you out of the land of Egypt, out of the 
 house of bondage," — the God whose Word came to 
 the prophets, that they might testify to Israelites, and 
 to all nations, against injustice and falsehood. He had 
 revealed Himself to their fathers. They read, studied, 
 almost worshipped the books that contained the reve- 
 lation. But, instead of accepting it or believing it, 
 they made up another being out of their own conceits, 
 — a being who was like their own cruel, covetous 
 selves ; — they made him the object of their prayers and 
 their sacrifices. The sin which the prophets had 
 charged upon their fathers, was their sin. They were 
 given up to covetousness, — that is, to self-seeking. 
 They worshipped themselves, and God only as the 
 image of themselves. In a very little time they were 
 incapable of thinking of any thing as really worthy of 
 pursuit or admiration, except money, and what money 
 could buy. 
 
 Do you think that these men conld testify against 
 the Man-god who reigned over the Roman world? 
 Do you think they could say, " This is not the King 
 of all the earth ; there is another altogether different 
 King, who has kept the universe together, and will 
 show Himself in it, and will compel the rulers of it to 
 feel His might?" Conld they bear any such mes- 
 sage as this to mankind ? — They, who had the very 
 heart of all the Roman idolatries and corruptions in 
 them, — they who were just as much setting up 
 idols as the Romans were, — they who had not half 
 so much sense of righteousness and justice as was 
 
SECT AGE OP JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 43 
 
 still left in their masters, — they whom Isaiah and Lect. iit. 
 Jeremiah would have denounced as infinitely more 
 Godless and heartless than the worshippers of Jupiter ? 
 And yet, if there was no one to bring this message, 
 the promise to Abraham meant nothing ; the Jewish 
 calling meant nothing ; the whole of the Old Testa- 
 ment history was a cunningly devised fable. 
 
 A voice was heard crying in the wilderness, "Repent, John the 
 for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." The last words 
 responded to many dreams which all classes of the 
 Jews, at times, were visited by. They hoped for a 
 Jewish king ; they believed that such a king must be 
 sent to them from Heaven ; they believed that, in 
 some way or other, a true Israelitish kingdom must 
 be a kingdom of God, or a kingdom of Heaven. He 
 who spoke the words was in the deserts of Israel, 
 whither many leaders of insurrections had gone before. 
 But he had none of the tokens of a leader of insurrec- 
 tion, or of a leader at all. Every thing about him was The King- 
 rough, stern, terrible. The word with which he began Repentance. 
 his preaching was altogether unlike the usual summons 
 to the people to assert their rights, and break loose from 
 the yoke of their oppressors. It seemed to tell them 
 that they were wrong, — that a change must take place 
 in themselves, before they could look for any in the 
 world about them. And presently the preacher spoke 
 to the most religious men in Judaea, the most admired 
 religious leaders of the people, calling them a genera- 
 tion of vipers ; asking them who had bidden them 
 flee from the wrath to come ; telling them not to say 
 within themselves that they had Abraham to their 
 
44 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Effect of 
 (he procla 
 mation. 
 
 lect. hi. father, for that God was able of the stones to raise 
 up children to Abraham. 
 
 This message, harsh as it sounded, nevertheless 
 drew all Jerusalem and Judaea and the county about 
 Jordan to listen to it. That summons to repent was 
 felt by the hearts and consciences of thousands as 
 a call to them from God Himself, the God of their 
 spirits, the God who had made a covenant with 
 their fathers. From whatever lips the message to 
 their outward ear came, this word to their inward ear 
 must come from Him who knew what was within 
 them, to awaken them to the recollection of bad deeds 
 that they had done and bad thoughts that they had 
 thought. It told them that there was something in 
 themselves that had need to be sent away, that they 
 might be true men, true Israelites. For the first 
 time the meaning of God's covenant, the end and 
 intention of circumcision, became manifest to them. 
 They felt that there were fleshly lusts and desires in 
 them which had degraded them, and were degrading 
 the Nation, and which only God coidd deliver them 
 from. The Baptism for the remission of sins was 
 accepted as a pledge, that He gave them this emanci- 
 pation. The words which said that the axe was laid 
 to the roots of the trees, that whatever did not bear 
 good fruit would be hewn down and cast into the 
 fire, told them that a sifting judgment was preparing 
 for their own land, and that each one of them must 
 pass through that judgment, and must seek to have 
 his dross burnt up, if he would not be consumed with 
 it. They said at the same time that the reformation 
 
 Remission 
 of sins. 
 
SECT AGE OF JEWISH COMMONWEALTH. 45 
 
 must be a re-formation indeed ; that there must be Lect. hi. 
 another and better root for their lives than that upon Baptism 
 which they had grown hitherto, if any good was to «!>#/ 
 spring out of them. But John said further, " There is 
 One standing among you whom you know not ; He 
 shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire." 
 That was the message to men craving to find out this 
 new root of their lives, craving to be planted upon it ; 
 that the real King and Lord of their hearts was at 
 hand and was about to be revealed; that He was 
 coming to work that change in them and in their 
 nation, perhaps also in those stones out of which God 
 could make children, which they could not work for 
 themselves. 
 
 And presently One came to John to be baptized, The Son of 
 to whom he said : " I have need to be baptized of 
 Thee, andcomest Thou to me?" and when Jesus, who 
 had gone down into the water, was rising up from it, 
 the Spirit was seen to descend in a bodily shape and 
 to light upon Him, and a voice from Heaven said, 
 " This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well 
 pleased." 
 
LECTURE IV. 
 
 THE KINGDOM OE HEAVEN. 
 Lect. iv. We have seen that the Jews had been taught to 
 
 The sorrows regard themselves as a called nation; that the kings, 
 pM 6 '°~ * ne P r i es ts, the prophets, were taught to believe that 
 they were called out to be servants of the nation. 
 The true prophet had to perceive and mourn that the 
 great majority of the nation thought nothing of their 
 calling, that they were not witnesses for God but 
 against Him. Nevertheless, he did not suppose for a 
 moment, when he was in his right mind, when he was 
 under divine teaching, that he was taken out of his 
 nation to have blessings which did not belong to it. 
 He felt that his greatest blessing was to be a member 
 of it, that he must suffer as an Israelite and rejoice 
 as an Israelite; that he could not separate himself 
 from any sorrows that came upon his people ; that he 
 could not have any joys which they were not, one and 
 all, entitled to share with him. How could he keep 
 these thoughts in his mind, when he saw his people 
 torn asunder by strifes and hatreds ; when each one 
 had a different object from the other; when they were 
 setting up idols each for himself to worship ? It was 
 the hardest thing possible to do this. The struggles 
 
THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. 47 
 
 which the prophets tell us of, in their own minds, lect.iv. 
 show us how hard it was. And yet, unless they 
 could do this, they could not really believe in one 
 God and worship Him. The belief in His unity 
 was not a hard dogma that there are not a great 
 many Gods ; it was a belief in a Person who was their 
 God, the God of their fathers, the God of the whole * 
 earth. If they did not understand that they were 
 one nation, one Israel, they could not hold this faith 
 practically, they could not live by it and act upon it. 
 
 But God enabled them to keep it in spite of all Bis conso- 
 that they saw and heard and felt, which was threaten- 
 ing to destroy it. For as I showed you in my first 
 Lecture, He gradually revealed to them an Elect One, 
 in whom His soul delighted ; a King, who was seated 
 on the holy hill of Sion, however the visible kings 
 whonvere reigning in Jerusalem might be forgetting 
 their calling and their covenant ; a Priest who ■ was 
 really uniting men to God, however little the visible 
 priests might understand what w-as meant by the 
 sacrifices they were offering, the words that were 
 inscribed upon their foreheads, the blessing that 
 they were to pronounce upon the people ; a true 
 Prophet, a Divine Word who understood and uttered 
 the full mind of God, however partially true prophets 
 might understand it, however shamefully false prophets 
 might misrepresent it ; that there was in one w T orcl a 
 Son of God who stood in the most wonderful relation 
 to Men, who was the Ruler of their thoughts, the Light 
 of then consciences, the Awakener of their impulses, 
 the Object of then hopes, who made some aware of 
 
48 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IV. 
 
 The same 
 Person seen 
 under dif- 
 ferent 
 aspects. 
 
 As Priest, 
 King, the 
 
 Jjivine 
 Word, the 
 Divine Son. 
 
 The seed of 
 A braham 
 and David. 
 
 His presence that they might testify of Him as the 
 Lord of all. 
 
 The vision of this Person came out in different 
 forms and measures, to different inspired men. One 
 side of His character and nature presented itself to 
 this man, another to that. It came to them in horns 
 of oppression and sorrow, when their hearts were 
 overwhelmed, and they felt themselves sinking in 
 deep mire where no ground was. The troubles, deso- 
 lation, captivity of their nation, which mixed with all 
 their individual sorrows, and could not be separated 
 from them, taught them to feel the necessity of such 
 a Person, and to perceive that in Him which answered 
 to their wants. As they compared what they had 
 been taught with thoughts of quite a different kind, 
 sometimes almost of an opposite kind, which had come 
 to other men in other circumstances, they understood 
 that all were pointing to the same Person, that they 
 could only be brought together and fulfilled in Him. 
 By degrees it became more and more clear to them 
 that this King, this Prophet, this Priest, this Word 
 of God, this Son of God would one day be fully 
 declared and manifested to men, that by some means 
 or other it would be shown how it was that He was 
 so closely and intimately related to Him whom the 
 Heaven of Heavens could not contain, and yet was 
 also so nearly related to the sufferers and sinners of 
 earth. 
 
 Whenever such a Person appeared, they felt that he 
 must be in some manner that Seed of Abraham, in 
 whom all the families of the earth were to be blessed, 
 
TILE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. 49 
 
 that Son of David who was to rule over the nations, lect.iv. 
 How this could be they could not tell. Somehow it 
 must be. Tor as they became more acquainted with The King 
 the other people of the earth, as they understood the °^ t \ e m 
 strange thoughts that had been stirring in them, they more - 
 saw that they too wanted a Friend and Deliverer, that 
 they too needed a Man who shoidd unite them to God. 
 The dreams of such a deliverer had taken various 
 forms. The needs of men's bodies and of men's 
 spirits in different places had created different objects 
 who were to satisfy them. All of these were imper- 
 fect, as those who conceived them were imperfect ; 
 they were full of evil, for they were made in the like- 
 ness of men who had evil in themselves, and who 
 wished to think that the gods could sympathise in 
 their evil. But they all implied a feeling after One The King 
 who was above man, a standard and judge of men's a ^ r /0 ~ 
 acts, and yet who felt with them and cared for them. 
 They implied that there was One who was not tied 
 down by local circumstances, as they were, and yet 
 who coidd feel with those who dwelt on particular 
 spots, who could care for a country and for the indi- 
 vidual men who dwelt upon it ; who could be, in one 
 word, a Brother of man as well as a Lord of man, the 
 Brother of each and the Lord of each, as well as the 
 Brother and Lord of the whole race. This was the 
 desire of Nations. Unless this desire could be satis- 
 fied, all the deepest feelings in men's hearts pointed 
 to nothing. 
 
 Now you will not understand what the records TU$uiief 
 mean which are contained in the four Gospels, unless 
 
 E 
 
50 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - iv - you suppose that those who wrote them believed that 
 theexpiana- Jesus Christ, of whom they speak, was the Person in 
 Evangelists, whom all these anticipations of Jews and of human 
 beings were fulfilled. You will not understand why 
 they record with such emphasis His baptism and the 
 Voice which declared Him to be the Son of God. 
 You will not understand why we are told that He was 
 anointed with the Spirit, with which He was after- 
 wards to baptize those who believed on Him. You 
 will not understand why we are told that He was 
 tempted by the evil spirit, and overcame him. You 
 The Con- will not understand why He is said, in the power of 
 the Evil the Spirit, to have preached the good news of deliver- 
 Sptnt. ance £ Q ca ptj ves> anc [ ti ie opening of sight to the blind ; 
 why, in the power of the same Spirit, He is said to 
 Signs and have delivered men from evil spirits, from the diseases 
 which afflicted their bodies, and the madness or un- 
 cleanness which possessed their hearts. You will not 
 understand why we are told, that He claimed dominion 
 over the winds and waves, and fed the multitudes 
 with the loaves and fishes. You will not understand 
 why we are told of His raising the dead. You will 
 not understand why He is speaking continually of a 
 kingdom of Heaven or of God. You will not under- 
 lie Para- stand why, in all His parables, He is bringing out the 
 Kingdom, mysteries of His kingdom over the hearts and minds 
 of men, in connexion with the planting and growth of 
 seeds and all the mysteries of the kingdom of nature, 
 in connexion with husbandmen and servants, with 
 kings and subjects, with fathers and children, with all 
 the common life of men. You will not understand 
 
THE KINGDOM-OF HEAVEN. 51 
 
 why He was transfigured, and His face did shine as lect. iv. 
 the sun. You will understand still less, why He began The Trans- 
 
 figuration. 
 
 straightway to tell His disciples that He should suffer 
 many things, and be rejected of the priests and the 
 elders, and be crucified. You will not understand War with 
 
 , the Sects. 
 
 the indignation of the Pharisees against Him, or why 
 it was that the different sects that had never agreed 
 before, felt Him to be then common enemy. You 
 will not understand why He told the Pharisees to 
 render to Caesar that which bore his image, and 
 to God that which had His; or why He told the 
 Sadducees, who denied the Resurrection, that God 
 was not the God of the dead, but of the living. Y r ou 
 will not understand why He called out twelve Apostles The Minis- 
 
 iers of His 
 
 to be heralds of His kingdom while He was upon Kingdom. 
 earth; why He told them that they would be able 
 to be heralds of it in a more wonderful sense after 
 He had left the earth; why He said that if they 
 would be chief of all, they must be servants of all. 
 You will not understand, why He should have entered 
 into Jerusalem, and the crowd should have hailed Him 
 as the King, the Son of David. You will not under- 
 stand why He should have desired to eat the Passover 
 with His disciples before He suffered, or why, at that 
 Passover, He should have taken bread and blessed it, The Bread 
 
 . -i'-ij-i-- an d Wine. 
 
 and said, " Take, eat, tins is my body ; drmk, this is 
 my blood." You will not understand why He should 
 have cried, " Father, if this cup may not pass from The Agony. 
 Me except I drink it, Thy will be done." Y'ou will 
 not understand why the Sanhedrim should have con- 
 demned Him as a blasphemer, for making Himself 
 
 e .2 
 
5:2 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IV. 
 
 Tlie Pas- 
 sion. 
 
 The Resur- 
 rection. 
 
 The final 
 words. 
 
 The Ascen- 
 sion. 
 
 The day of 
 Pentecost. 
 
 the Son of God ; or why they should have presented 
 Him to Pilate as a rebel, for making Himself a King. 
 You will not be able to enter into the mystery of the 
 Cross and Passion ; into the cry, " Father, forgive 
 them ;" or into the cry, " My God, why hast Thou 
 forsaken me ? " You will not understand the hour of 
 darkness after the crucifixion. You will not under- 
 stand the calmness and assurance, and yet the wonder, 
 with which the Evangelists recal the words, " He is 
 not here, He is risen." You will not understand why 
 they record so carefully, and yet so briefly, His appear- 
 ances after the Resurrection. You will not understand 
 why He stood among them on the mountain in Galilee, 
 and said, "All power is given unto Me in heaven 
 and earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost. And, lo, I am with 
 you always, even unto the end of the world." You 
 will not understand why the Evangelists seem to think 
 it a natural thing, that He should ascend up on high, 
 out of the sight of His disciples. You will not under- 
 stand how all these events are connected with that 
 feast of Pentecost at which the Apostles were met, 
 when the sound of the rushing mighty wind was 
 heard, and the Spirit descended in the likeness of 
 cloven tongues, and sat upon each of them. You will 
 not understand, what was signified by their speaking 
 with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance; 
 or how the great message which they had to deliver 
 to the whole body of the Jews was, " This Jesus, 
 whom ye crucified, is both Lord and Christ ;" how 
 
THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. 53 
 
 they could bid them repent and be baptized; how Lect. iv. 
 they could say to them, " The promise of this Spirit 
 is to you and to your children, and to as many as the 
 Lord our God shall call." 
 
 All this history, which sounds to us at once so ne ground 
 familiar and so marvellous, is told, as you know, with °{/^fj e 
 exceeding simplicity, in no fine language, with no ground of 
 
 £dCCt€StClS" 
 
 starts of astonishment. It is all consistent, if we sup- tkai im- 
 pose this to be the manifestation of the Person of 0UJ ' 
 whom the Jewish nation had been called out to bear 
 witness, of that Root and Centre of human society 
 from whom all its life and order comes, of Him who 
 binds men together, of Him who is the Mediator be- 
 tween God and man. No record is equally reasonable, 
 if such a Person was to be revealed to men, and if a 
 society of men was to be called out for the purpose of 
 revealing Him. All His acts of power, all His words 
 of righteousness, are then so many testimonies that the 
 Lord of man is the Deliverer of man from all the 
 plagues that have come to him for the punishment of 
 his evil, and from the evil itself. All the signs that 
 He gave that He was a Son, and that He came to do 
 His Father's will, are then witnesses what that will is, 
 and what is striving against it, and how that is to be 
 overcome. The Spirit which descended on Him is 
 then felt to be that which unites Him to the Father ; 
 the Spirit which He bestowed upon those who were 
 baptized into His name is then perceived to be that 
 which brings men into a fatherly kingdom, and makes 
 them sons of God, and brethren of each other. I do 
 not pretend to explain the history if it does not mean 
 
54 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. this. If this is not the sense of it, I cannot find any 
 connexion in its parts. I do not see how, as a whole, 
 we can call it God's revelation of Himself, or receive 
 it as a Gospel to the world. Finally, if this is not the 
 sense of it, I cannot lecture to you on Church history, 
 for I do not know what the Church is. 
 
LECTURE V. 
 
 THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. 
 
 Those three thousand who were baptized on the Lect. v. 
 day of Pentecost, are often said to be the beginning strictly 
 of the Christian Church, or Ecclesia. In a very im- rac terof 
 portant sense, this assertion is true ; I shall hope to ^2S 
 show you, presently, in what sense. But I do not mJermar 
 use this mode of speech, because I believe it might 
 mislead you. The society which appeared in the 
 world, on the day of Pentecost, was not one which 
 had dropped from the clouds. It belonged to the 
 Jewish nation ; you can only understand what it was, 
 by understanding what that nation was. And though 
 its appearance was a great event in the history of that 
 nation and of the world — as great an event as one 
 can think of — the Scriptures do not speak of it as 
 marking the beginning of a period, but the end of The day of 
 one. St. Peter told his countrymen that the mighty ™ e ^ at * n 
 powers which were bestowed on him and his fellow M the end 
 
 A of the Age. 
 
 apostles, were to prepare them and then countrymen 
 for a great day of the Lord. John the Baptist had 
 spoken of that day ; of a wrath that was coming ; of 
 Christ as having a fan in His hand, with which He 
 would throughly purge His floor. Our Lord Himself 
 
56 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 The suhject 
 of the A cts 
 of the Apo- 
 stles. 
 
 Who were 
 met at the 
 Feast. 
 
 Character 
 of the 
 Feast. 
 
 had spoken of that day as one which would come in 
 that generation. The minds of the Apostles, you 
 will find, were filled with the thoughts of it. They 
 were sure that the end of an age or dispensation of 
 the world was at hand. But the end had not 
 arrived. The book of the Acts of the Apostles tells 
 us of the gradual unfolding of a Universal Society, 
 out of the Jewish Society. The principles of it are 
 laid open to us in the narrative of the day of Pen- 
 tecost. As these principles worked themselves out 
 more and more, the new Ecclesia began to make 
 itself apparent ; the shell that had contained it began 
 to drop off. When that shell was quite broken, our 
 History properly commences. But if we are not to 
 make the greatest mistakes respecting the world that 
 was to come, we must carefully attend to the divine 
 narrative of the process by which it was brought out 
 of the world that had been. 
 
 Observe, then, that the people who were gathered 
 at the feast of Pentecost, though they came from a 
 number of different countries, were all either Jews by 
 birth, or men who had joined themselves to the Jews, 
 and acknowledged the God of Abraham to be their 
 God. They were come to a festival which had been 
 appointed in the wilderness. It was not indeed, like 
 the Passover or the Tabernacles, a feast that com- 
 memorated some blessing which had been bestowed 
 specially on the Israelites. It gave thanks for the 
 blessing of corn and the fruits of the earth ; it 
 reminded them that the living power which caused 
 the seeds in the ground to bring forth, was from God. 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. 57 
 
 But it was Jewish still. Jerusalem was the place for lect. v. 
 holding it. All who came to it, testified that that 
 was their capital and their home. 
 
 It Avas an old national meeting, then, a testimony a National 
 to the Jews that they were a people called out and 
 made one, by the unseen God, the God of their 
 fathers. Thither came all the members of the tribes ; 
 it was not a gathering of Pharisees, or Sadducees, or 
 Herodians, but of Israelites. When St. Peter ex- 
 plained to them the meaning of the sign which they 
 had witnessed, this is the tone in which he spoke. 
 He told them that the God of their fathers had St. Peters 
 exalted Jesus, whom they crucified, to be both Lord 
 and Christ ; therefore He had shed forth that Spirit 
 upon them. He spoke of David and of David's 
 sepulchre, of Christ as the heir of David's throne, of 
 His resurrection as the witness that He was indeed 
 their King. It was such a sign of kingship as they 
 might not have looked for ; but no other woidd have 
 been sufficient. Only a Conqueror of death coidd be 
 the complete Conqueror of whom prophets had spoken. 
 Only One who could bestow a Spirit upon men, to 
 quicken their thoughts, to inspire their words, could 
 exercise the powers which prophets had said He 
 would exercise. Whatever more there might be in 
 this sign, of the Apostles speaking to men in their Meaning of 
 own tongues the wonderful works of God, there was T J£?^ 
 certainly this in it. It testified that all Jews, however 
 dispersed, had still a bond of real inward union. 
 The God of their fathers was announcing to them 
 the living Head of their nation, was bidding them be 
 
58 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. one people in Him. The Spirit who enabled St. Peter 
 to testify of Him could bind them together in Him ; 
 if they did not confess Him, they would find an ever- 
 increasing separation of heart and mind from each 
 other, till they utterly ceased to be a Nation. 
 
 You see then what it was that pricked the hearts 
 
 of those Jews who said, " Men and brethren, what 
 
 The Convcr- shall we do ? " They felt that the voice which spoke 
 
 three thou- to them was not inviting them to take up a new faith, 
 
 sand; what a new re hVion, but to believe in the God of Abraham 
 
 ivas implied ° 
 
 in it. whom they had disbelieved, whose calling they had 
 
 utterly misunderstood ; who, they supposed, was gone 
 far away from them, and whose favour was to be won 
 by services and offerings of theirs. At once the truth 
 burst upon them, that He was caring for them, and 
 seeking for them, and that they had revolted from 
 Him ; that He must reveal to them their King and 
 Deliverer ; that He must make them right and true 
 within. The words of the old books started to life 
 in their minds. Here was the explanation of them. 
 They had never yet claimed the privilege of their 
 Covenant. They had never yet known what it was 
 to be children of Israel. If God was indeed claiming 
 them to be His children ; if He would give them and 
 their sons and daughters His Spirit, the Covenant was 
 fulfilled to them; they might be Israelites indeed. 
 
 If you read the history of the baptized community 
 
 at Jerusalem, in the chapters from the second to the 
 
 eighth of the Acts of the Apostles, you will see how 
 
 The Fellow- this belief was carried out and expressed. We are 
 
 itpkl fDiS ' told tnat tlie baptized continued in the Apostles' 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. 59 
 
 doctrine and fellowship, that they ate their bread Lect. v. 
 
 with joy and singleness of heart, that no one said that 
 
 which he had was his own, but that they had all 
 
 things common, that they praised God, and were 
 
 daily with one accord in the temple. We have here Community 
 
 the picture of a united family in the midst of a city 
 
 of sects, a family which pays a quiet, dutiful, free 
 
 homage to its visible heads and fathers, but which 
 
 owns a higher relationship to the Father who has 
 
 chosen them to be His witnesses. The sense of His 
 
 free undeserved love makes them simple and glad in 
 
 receiving all common daily blessings. These blessings 
 
 they do not claim as separate possessions ; their 
 
 privilege is to share them with their brethren. Their 
 
 spiritual treasures are common, they woidd make 
 
 their earthly treasures common too. But all this is The Temple 
 
 connected in their minds with the Temple. That is t kZ?a2n. 
 
 the witness of their sonship to God, and their brother- ever - 
 
 hood with each other. When they praise God there, 
 
 they feel that they are citizens of a kingdom of 
 
 Heaven, and that they have strength for their w r ork 
 
 upon earth. It is not therefore that they do not 
 
 cease to be Jews because they have believed that 
 
 Jesus is the Christ. It is that faith which makes 
 
 them Jews. They cannot see any higher blessedness 
 
 than that of being so, in the fullest sense of the 
 
 words. 
 
 It was at the Beautiful gate of the Temple that the The Apo- 
 Apostles Peter and John, who had no silver or gold p ov:ers f 
 for a lame beggar that w r as lying there, gave him IIealin, J- 
 instead, the power to rise up and w r alk. So they 
 
6 q ON CHU-RCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. declared to the people that the healing power which 
 What these Jesus nad exercised upon earth had not passed away, 
 powers t ^ at jj e was rea lly living and an actual King then ; 
 
 denoted. ,i r^ 1 n 
 
 that He was the Prince of Life ; that the God ot 
 Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, had owned Him 
 and glorified Him as His Son. As children of the 
 prophets and of the covenant which God made with 
 their fathers, they bade their countrymen confess 
 Him whom God had raised up to bless them, and 
 turn them away every one of them from their 
 iniquities. 
 Persecu- The Saclducean sect was now uppermost in the 
 
 chiefly sad- Sanhedrim ; the high-priest apparently belonged to 
 ducean. ^ rp Q t ^ at gec ^ ^e proclamation of invisible powers 
 and of a resurrection was more galling than to the 
 Pharisees. The notion of ignorant Galileans claiming 
 a right to speak on such matters, was intolerable. 
 They must be put down. The new strength of those 
 cowards who had fled from their Master, when He 
 was taken before this same Sanhedrim, of the Apostle 
 who had denied Him to a maid-servant, is manifested. 
 The private and unlettered men can look the scribes 
 and rulers in the face, before whose very names they 
 had trembled. They are sure that they have been 
 called out by One who is higher than all these wise 
 men, to testify that Jesus Christ of Nazareth is the 
 stone that was set at nought by the builders, and is 
 Confidence become the head of the corner. Therefore they coidd 
 ItefeA. sa y> "Whether it be right in the sight of God to 
 Kiwjof hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye." 
 
 David's i • p • 
 
 House. The confidence which they felt before the clnet priests 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. 6 [ 
 
 and elders, was the same which they had when they Lect. v. 
 returned to their own company. In public they had 
 spoken of the Stone upon which Isaiah said the 
 Jewish nation stood. In private they lifted up their Their 
 voice to God with one accord, and said, " Lord, Thou 
 art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the 
 sea, and all that in them is : who by the mouth of 
 Thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen 
 rage, and the people imagine vain things? The 
 kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were 
 gathered together against the Lord, and against His 
 Christ. For of a truth against Thy holy child Jesus, 
 whom Thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius 
 Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, 
 were gathered together, for to do whatsoever Thy 
 hand and Thy counsel determined before to be done. 
 And now, Lord, behold their threatenings : and grant 
 unto Thy servants, that with all boldness they may 
 speak Thy word, by stretching forth Thine hand to 
 heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by 
 the name of Thy holy child Jesus. And when they 
 had prayed, the place was shaken where they were 
 assembled together ; and they were all filled with the 
 Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with 
 boldness." You see how the belief that Jesus was 
 the actual King of the Jews, is involved in all their 
 acts, their prayers, their unity. 
 
 But was this only a faith or belief of theirs ? Did TheCaiimg 
 they thi?ik they were called by God, or ivere they not to i est 
 called ? This is a very important question indeed for °2^ m " n 
 us to ask ourselves. I must answer once for all, — If feelings. 
 
Q2 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. I did not think they were called, if I supposed their 
 calling depended upon their faith, and not their faith 
 upon their calling, I should not be here to lecture to 
 you at all ; I do not know what I should have to 
 lecture about. But this is St. Luke's answer, which 
 me Lie to is a better one than mine. Ananias and Sapphira 
 Ghost°. V were members of the community which ate their 
 bread with joy and singleness of heart. They may 
 have had these feelings as much as the rest. We are 
 not told that they had not. We are told that the 
 Holy Spirit was as much given to them as to their 
 brethren, for St. Peter says they lied to that Holy 
 Spirit. They pretended to have done a thing which 
 its Punish- they had not done. When that lie was brought home 
 to their consciences, we are told that they fell dead at 
 St. Peter's feet. This lying is the first crime we 
 hear of after the descent of the Spirit. It is of this 
 we shall have to hear at every step, as we proceed in 
 the history. If you expect that I am going to 
 describe a set of men who were eminently truthful, 
 Often you will be grievously disappointed. I shall have to 
 'toChw-ch ^ell you of lies uttered by bad men and by good men, 
 History. \[ es which have brought more terrible consequences 
 upon those who spoke them, and upon the Church, 
 and upon the world, than the punishment which 
 befel Ananias and Sapphira. You will have to learn 
 the meaning of these mighty and terrible, and yet 
 most consolatory words, " God is true, though every 
 man be a liar ; " you will have to see that the called 
 body after the Incarnation and Ascension of Christ 
 proves its identity with the Israelitish nation, by 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. (33 
 
 testifying of God as much through its falsehoods and Lect.v. 
 
 » 
 
 its sms, as through its truth and its virtues. 
 
 Nor must you suppose that this was only the extra- 
 ordinary crime of two individuals, and that the body 
 of the disciples retained all the unity and gladness 
 which are attributed to them at the outset. The TheMur- 
 chapter which follows the one respecting Ananias and mimists^ 
 Sapphira, speaks to us of murmurings of the Greeks 
 against the Hebrews, because their widows were neg- 
 lected in the daily ministration. Do not imagine from 
 the use of the word ' Greeks ' that there was any infu- 
 sion of a new element, which the Jews would have 
 rejected, into the baptized community of Jerusalem. 
 These Hellenists had already been made proselytes, 
 and had been admitted to the temple worship. 
 Nevertheless, it is needful to notice this strife between 
 people whose origin and whose education were unlike, 
 at this early time, because we shall hear so much 
 of it afterwards. The gift of the Spirit was the sign 
 of a union between those whom customs and language 
 had made different. But men may fight with the 
 Spirit, who seeks to make them one, as Ananias fought 
 with the Spirit, who sought to make him true. The 
 story is important, secondly, as marking out one of 
 the most familiar occasions of strife which call forth 
 these animosities of tribe and race. The Hellenists 
 thought their poor people were not as much regarded 
 as the people of pure and native blood. And, thirdly, Orgamm- 
 as the case of Ananias made necessary the first instance 
 of discipline in the baptized community of Jerusalem, 
 so this strife was the means of improving its organiza- 
 
64 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 Order of 
 
 Deacons. 
 Natural 
 account of 
 its origin. 
 
 The 
 
 Deacons 
 probably 
 Hellenists. 
 
 Hon. The Apostles were the only officers of this 
 family hitherto. They had that kind of domestic 
 paternal character which I have spoken of, which was 
 not defined, and was not disputed. Now they bade 
 the community to choose a set of men to whom part 
 of their work might be given, that part of it about 
 which the dispute had been. " Set over you," they 
 said, " men full of faith and the Holy Ghost, who may 
 see to this business. We will give ourselves to the 
 word of God and to prayer." You remember, in how 
 natural a manner, we are told, in the book of Exodus, 
 the institution of Elders in the Jewish commonwealth 
 began. Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, who had 
 lately come to the camp, saw that he was over-worked. 
 He told him that he was doing what was not wise, 
 and that he should choose men to help him. Moses 
 accepted his counsel. He showed that he was a 
 divine legislator by doing so. He recognised* God's 
 voice in circumstances, and events, and human ad- 
 visers. So did the Apostles and the community at 
 Jerusalem, in the appointment of Deacons. 
 
 I cannot say positively, but it seems most likely, 
 that these Deacons were chosen from among that body 
 which had complained ; I mean that all, or the greater 
 part of them, were Hellenists, and not pure Jews. 
 Therefore it has appeared to many writers, and I think 
 they are right, that this is a step forward in the his- 
 tory, one which we shall presently understand better. 
 The Hellenists, who were men of heathen descent, if 
 they were not actually born heathens, are a link 
 between the Jews and the other people of the earth. 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. (35 
 
 One might expect them to see, sooner than the native lect. v. 
 Jews, that the Gospel, if it had begun in Judaea, could 
 not be confined to Judaea, — that it was meant for all 
 the families of the earth. The sign at Pentecost of 
 the Apostles speaking with different tongues, would 
 put thoughts into their minds which the regular 
 Israelites would hardly venture to dwell upon. Above The comer 
 all, the words of our Lord respecting the destruction quence - 
 of the Temple, and a redemption that was to come 
 from that destruction, would impress themselves 
 deeply on them ; they would perhaps venture to utter 
 them with a boldness, from which the Apostles, to 
 whom the Temple had become now more than ever 
 dear and venerable, would have shrunk. 
 
 However that may be, we find that Stephen the The accusa- 
 eacon was the nrst teacher m the Jerusalem commu- Stephen. 
 nity, who was directly accused of speaking blasphemous 
 words against the holy place and the law, — of saying 
 that Jesus of Nazareth would destroy that place, and 
 change the customs which Moses had delivered. 
 Different synagogues are mentioned, as bringing this 
 charge against him before the high-priest. One of 
 them is the synagogue of the Alexandrians. It is not 
 unlikely that these Alexandrians had been suspected 
 by the Pharisees, of being themselves not as strict 
 Jews as they ought to be. The Jews in Alexandria, The Syna- 
 as I told you, mixed much with Greek philosophers, Alexandria, 
 and had learnt something from them as well as im- 
 parted something to them. They might be desirous 
 to divert these charges from themselves, by showing 
 their zeal against Stephen. And besides, no men 
 
 F 
 
QQ ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. v. would have more disliked his teaching than they ; 
 for no men were more averse from the thought, that 
 the King of the world and the Lord of men's hearts, 
 could have taken flesh and dwelt among the peasants 
 of Galilee. 
 
 It is said by St. Luke, that the witnesses against 
 Stephen were false witnesses. And certainly, if they 
 charged him with undervaluing the law of Moses, or 
 Historical the temple of Solomon, they must have been. The de- 
 stephen's fence which he made before the high-priest thoroughly 
 defence. dears him of that accusation. It is altogether drawn 
 from Jewish history. No one had studied it more, or 
 had felt the whole purpose and connexion of it more. 
 But then he saw that it was not a history merely of a 
 Covenant, or a Law, or a Temple, but the history of 
 the revelations of the God who made a covenant with 
 their fathers, who gave the law, who dwelt in the 
 temple. It was the promise of a more complete reve- 
 lation of Him, — of a revelation in that righteous One 
 of whom they had been the betrayers and murderers. 
 And it was the history of the resistance of the chosen 
 people in all ages, to the divine power which had been 
 speaking and working in lawgivers and prophets, — 
 a resistance which had now reached the highest point 
 that it could reach. " Ye do always resist the Holy 
 Ghost. As your fathers did, so do ye." 
 Ground of These words sounded in Jewish ears as undoubted 
 natlTfoT P roofs of Stephen's guilt. He did believe that the 
 blasphemy. re eds on which they were leaning were broken reeds ; 
 he did believe that they were trusting in the law and 
 the temple, and were Atheists all the while. Their 
 
THE NEW SOCIETY IN JERUSALEM. (J 7 
 
 own consciences told them the same truth. They Lect. v. 
 were cut to the heart, and gnashed upon him with 
 their teeth. He declared that he saw the heavens His sup- 
 opened and the Son of Man standing on the right po ' ' 
 hand of God. He was not fighting for an opinion ; 
 nor was he upheld by an opinion. He believed in 
 an actual Person, in whom men were united to God. 
 That was the blasphemy for which the high-priest had 
 condemned Christ. And now " they cried out with a 
 loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon 
 Stephen with one accord, and cast him out of the 
 city, and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down 
 their clothes at a young man's feet whose name w T as 
 Saul." " Stephen cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay 
 not this sin to their charge ; and when he had so 
 said, he fell asleep." 
 
 With the account of his death, the history of the His death, 
 Jerusalem community may be said to end. We shall erent i n a e 
 hear of it again, from time to time, in connexion with Hutor y- 
 other topics. In a future Lecture, I shall have to 
 speak of the man who, either at this time, or shortly 
 after, presided over it. But here the narrative begins 
 to expand. My object has been to show you how 
 thoroughly Jewish this first baptized community 
 was ; how expressly it was a witness to the Jew, 
 of the intent, and sacredness, and glory of his own 
 calling. It was a witness to him, just as strongly, 
 that he had utterly misunderstood his calling ; that 
 he did not know the object and worth of his own 
 institutions. Those who had realized their worth 
 
 f2 
 
68 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. would be able, in due time, to fulfil the purpose of 
 the original calling much more effectually than they 
 had yet done. They would be able to show that 
 He who was the glory of His people Israel, must, 
 therefore, be a light to lighten the Gentiles. 
 
LECTUEE VI. 
 
 SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 
 
 The death of Stephen may have been the effect of lect. vi. 
 mere mob violence. But, if it was, the Sanhedrim Philip the 
 was so well inclined to favour that violence, that they what se ^ e 
 commenced a general persecution against those whom 
 
 a successor 
 of Stephen. 
 
 they called the Nazarenes. The Apostles remained 
 in Jerusalem, the other disciples dispersed themselves 
 abroad. Perhaps it is in favour of the opinion to 
 which I alluded in my last Lecture, respecting the 
 class from which the Deacons were chosen, that Philip 
 the Deacon went down to Samaria and preached 
 Christ there. If he was a Hellenist, he mav have had 
 less prejudice against a race with which the pure Jews 
 had no dealings. It is true, that the people of Judaea 
 despised also the Galileans, among whom so many of 
 the Apostles were reckoned. But they looked upon 
 the Galileans as uncouth, inferior men ; — upon the 
 Samaritans, as deserters from the true faith. 
 
 You remember what we hear of the Samaritans in Soman- 
 the Gospels. All our Lord's allusions to them would character 
 lead us to suppose, that their minds were more open as ded y ced 
 than those of the Jews to sympathy and kindness ; — Gospeu. 
 that, if they knew less, they were more trustful and 
 
70 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vi. grateful. They were feeling their want of a teacher, 
 as the woman showed who met our Lord at the well. 
 They were more liable to be deluded by false teachers 
 than a more hard and suspicious people ; but they 
 were also more prepared to welcome a true one. 
 There were many sects among them ; but they were 
 not exactly like those we have read of in Judaea. 
 They were craving for some power to come from the 
 unseen world and act upon them. How it should 
 come — how it should act — was the question which 
 led to their controversies. 
 
 puiips We are told that Philip caused great joy in the city, 
 
 to which he preached of Christ. He told them the 
 thing they were wanting to hear; that there was a 
 mighty King over them ; that He had subdued the 
 powers of evil; that He had overcome death; that 
 He baptized men with His Spirit. These words, 
 which sounded so ridiculous and monstrous to the 
 Sadducees, found their way to the hearts of the Sama- 
 ritans. But Philip had a rival. The Roman empire 
 at that time was teeming with magicians and en- 
 chanters. Adapting themselves to the different 
 tendencies of the people among whom they came, 
 they were all alike in this, that they spoke of wonder- 
 ful agencies in the earth and air, to which men were 
 subject ; that they exhibited portents and miracles ; 
 
 The that they turned their exhibitions to profit. Simon, 
 
 J'*ihC/tCt77/tC7 t 
 
 probably, mixed many Heathen notions with his 
 teaching, for the Samaritans had much Heathenism in 
 their own creed. Still he must have been a believer 
 in the Hebrew Scriptures — most likely a circumcised 
 
SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 7 1 
 
 man. The message which Philip brought, mingled Lect.vi. 
 with his previous dreams and notions. Christ seemed 
 to him, not One who had come to make men 
 righteous, but only a great Power out of the unseen 
 world. In that character he believed in Him and was 
 baptized. 
 
 The people of Samaria had received a message a Society 
 which had done them good : but they were not yet t j LC spirit. 
 a community. The Apostles Peter and John came 
 down from Jerusalem. Then that gift was bestowed 
 upon them, which had bound the disciples at Jerusa- 
 lem into a body. The Apostles were the instruments 
 of conferring the gift. They may have wondered 
 themselves, in spite of all the preparation their Lord 
 had given them, that the Spirit should descend upon 
 Samaritans. As might have been expected, the signs Simon's no- 
 sad powers which accompanied this gift, not the gift ^SLd 
 itself, seemed wonderful to Simon. He had been i> 0l ' :crs - 
 always a trader in spiritual charms. This was a 
 higher kind of charm, which might, he thought, be 
 purchased with money. St. Peter said, " Thy money 
 perish with thee. Thou art in the gall of bitterness 
 and the bond of iniquity." The traditions of the 
 early Church represent Simon as the first of a class 
 of men who looked upon Christ as an emanation 
 from God, or one of the Powers which had descended 
 from a mysterious world into this. On that ground 
 they call him the first of Christian heretics. With Tkedif- 
 these traditions are mixed others, which represent koldadn-' 
 him as continuing to put forth himself as another ******** 
 
 . the name of 
 
 great power and emanation from God, and as working Simon. 
 
72 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vi. enchantments along with a woman who was his mis- 
 tress. Later ages connect his name with the crime of 
 treating spiritual powers and functions as subjects 
 for bargain and sale. The reports respecting him are 
 uncertain ; some of them are evidently fabulous. 
 The story in the Acts of the Apostles contains the 
 substance and the meaning of them. If you meditate 
 well upon that, you will have a key to many dark 
 passages in the records of after times. 
 Ethiopia. Before we part with Philip the Deacon, we have a 
 
 glimpse of the way in which the news that had 
 cheered the Samaritans and bewildered Simon, may 
 have found its way into another country. The mini- 
 ster of Canclace, the Queen of the Ethiopians, a 
 Jewish proselyte, and a reader of the prophets, is 
 taught by the Deacon, of a Son of God who fulfilled 
 the vision of Isaiah. He is baptized into the Name 
 of that Son of God, and goes away rejoicing. But 
 we hear no more of him, or of his country, or of his 
 teacher. The story passes to the life of a young man 
 who was to be the means of breaking down barriers 
 between that country and all countries, which Philip 
 had only begun to shake. 
 Saul the Saul of Tarsus had had a Greek education in Asia 
 
 Bolum * Minor. His father, for some cause or other, had been 
 Citizen, the mac i e a Roman citizen . But he was a Hebrew of the 
 
 JFehvew of 
 
 theiiehrews. Hebrews. Every other honour that belonged to him 
 looked contemptible in his eyes, in comparison with 
 that. To perfect himself in the law of his fathers 
 and the traditions of the elders, he came up to Jeru- 
 salem and studied under Gamaliel, the most learned 
 
SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 73 
 
 of the doctors there, the most profound and sagacious lect. vl 
 
 of the Pharisaical school. Whether he had heard the Grounds of 
 
 preaching of any of the Apostles, does not appear. Jl?^ 
 
 At all events, he had heard Stephen, and believed the a ^ alnst tlic 
 
 disciples. 
 
 charge against him. The sect to which he belonged, 
 he thought, was certainly bent upon destroying the 
 customs which Moses had delivered, and the sacred- 
 ness of the Temple. It must be put down. Saul was 
 not at ease in his own mind. The law told him that 
 he ought to be a righteous man. He tried to be 
 righteous, and found that he was sinful. That 
 struggle in himself made him fiercer against those 
 who, he supposed, were despising the law. If he 
 fought against them, he might win the peace for 
 himself which he had not been worthy to receive 
 yet. He was not mistaken. He did obtain it in 
 that way. 
 
 The history of him brings us acquainted with a Syria. 
 country which we have met with already in the Jewish 
 records, and of which we shall hear much more. The 
 sect which he wished to exterminate had reached 
 Syria. The synagogues of Damascus were infected 
 with the new doctrine. The power of the high-priest, 
 which had been tried in Jerusalem, and had at last 
 succeeded in bringing about the death of Stephen, 
 might crush the evil seed there. Those who called s<mVa 
 on the name of Jesus might be stoned for blasphemy, ^L"ascwl 
 in compliance with the Jewish law. If they fled for 
 help to the tribunals of the city, they might be 
 accused of sedition. A man who is thoroughly in 
 earnest, may do much to put down men and women 
 
74 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vi. who hold a truth, if he cannot put down the truth 
 Christ itself. You will find plentiful proofs of that hereafter. 
 
 revealed in -p. , , i ,-, • -i , i n 7 
 
 him that he But then there is a danger m the case 01 such a man, 
 might that the truth wiU put him down. It was so with 
 
 preach Him L 
 
 among the Saul. You have read the story of his conversion 
 often and often ; no account of it can be so good as 
 that which St. Luke gives us, and that which he him- 
 self gave to the Jews and to Agrippa. He describes 
 Jesus Christ as revealing Himself to him, — as saying, 
 " I am He whom thou persecutest," — as telling him 
 that it was hard to kick against the pricks. There 
 was a blaze of outward glory around him, — a bright- 
 ness which blinded his eyes, and made him know 
 that it was no phantom he was fighting with, but a 
 Person, a King, One who had taken a human body 
 and had glorified it. Still it was the revelation which 
 was made of Christ to his conscience — the witness 
 which was borne to him, that a righteous Being was 
 striving with him there, and that he had been fighting 
 with Him there, which subdued him then, and held 
 him captive afterwards. It was this, he says, which 
 fitted him to preach Christ among the Gentiles. 
 a Preacher He was not called to that work at present. When 
 XL.° he was baptized, and the scales fell from his eyes, he 
 preached in the synagogues and convinced the Jews, 
 and that publicly, that Jesus was the Christ. Like 
 the Apostles at Jerusalem, his message was, that the 
 Son of David had come ; though he had learnt that 
 that Son of David must be the Son of God, — that His 
 highest throne must be over the spirits and hearts of 
 men, — that other chains must be broken from his 
 
SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 7 5 
 
 Nation than any with which Rome could bind it. lect. vi. 
 These thoughts were apparently deepened in his 
 mind, not only by his disputations in the synagogues, 
 but by a period of solitude in Arabia ; perhaps, also, 
 by the humiliation of discovering that the disciples of 
 Jesus in Jerusalem were very slow to recognise him 
 as a brother. 
 
 Meantime, the man in that Jerusalem society who St. Peter at 
 had first proclaimed to his countrymen at Pentecost, m>a " 
 that He whom they had crucified was Lord and 
 Christ, had to learn, by a humiliating process also, 
 that he had reckoned men unclean whom God had 
 cleansed. You will not wonder, after what I have 
 told you, that St. Peter had become even a stricter 
 Jew since the descent of the Spirit, than he was 
 before, because he learnt then first to understand 
 what his Jewish calling meant. Therefore it was Sis vision. 
 most natural for him, when he had a vision of a 
 number of unclean animals, which he was bidden to 
 eat, to say, " Not so, Lord ; for I have never eaten 
 any thing that is common or unclean." All the 
 precepts and exclusions of the law were sacred in his 
 eyes. And yet everything had been leading him to 
 think more and more of Christ, as the Friend of 
 man, and the Deliverer of man. It would have 
 been horrible to doubt that He had taken the 
 nature of man, and died the death of man ; horrible 
 to think of Him as merely one of the Jewish race. 
 A man — you will find this out by-and-by for your- 
 selves — may have two thoughts in his mind which he 
 does not the least know how to reconcile ; though he 
 
76 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VI. 
 
 The vision 
 fulfilled. 
 
 New 
 discovery. 
 
 The bap- 
 tism of the 
 Spirit and 
 of water. 
 
 Antioch ; 
 its place in 
 the New 
 Testament 
 History. 
 
 cannot part with either, and though they often dis- 
 tract his practice. If he is a faithful man, God will 
 reconcile them for him, in some way or other. When 
 the doubts are thickening in him, and some light has 
 been let in upon them, there will be an event which calls 
 upon him to act. When he does the thing which he 
 has to do, the knots in his mind become disentangled. 
 Three men came to Peter, asking him to go to a 
 Centurion of the Italian band. He went, as he says, 
 without gainsaying, understanding it to be the import 
 of his vision that he was to go. He explained very 
 simply, that God had shown him what he never knew 
 before, — that in every nation he that served Him and 
 worked righteousness was accepted of Him. He per- 
 ceived that the Deliverer and the King, whom he had 
 proclaimed to his own countrymen, was He of whom 
 Cornelius and his friends had need to hear. They did 
 hear his message concerning Him. The same sign 
 which had testified that the Spirit was with the 
 Apostles, testified that He was with these Roman 
 soldiers. St. Peter said, " Who can forbid water, 
 that these should not be baptized who have received 
 the Holy Ghost as well as we ?" 
 
 We are told that the community in Jerusalem was 
 startled, as we may well suppose it would be, by what 
 St. Peter had done. He justified himself. And they 
 began to perceive that repentance might be granted to 
 the uncircumcised also. Still there was no thought, 
 that Gentiles could be added to their society. A band 
 of disciples in Jerusalem must still testify of the glory 
 of the Temple worship, of the Covenant, of the 
 
SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 77 
 
 Sacrifice. There was, however, another city in which lect. vi. 
 the Jews had a powerful colony, and which was closely TheAntiock 
 connected with all their past history ; but which had soday. 
 no temple and no holy associations. The city to 
 which Paid was travelling, when he was stopped by 
 the vision was not, you will remember, the capital 
 city of Syria. That, I have told you, was Antioch. 
 There dwelt a rich, luxurious, rather clever, particu- 
 larly frivolous, Gentile population. It was a great 
 commercial city of the empire, as corrupt, perhaps, as 
 any I could name. Tor many centuries, we shall be 
 hearing of it. We are glad, therefore, to be intro- 
 duced to it, by the divine historian. It holds a very The impress 
 memorable place indeed in his narrative : for there s '° 7 ** 
 
 1 ' makes on 
 
 first we see a communitv growing up, in which there the Heathm 
 
 „ population. 
 
 are both Jews and Gentiles, and not merely or exclu- 
 sively Gentiles that had been already Jewish prose- 
 lytes. The Heathen inhabitants appear to have 
 perceived, that it was not one of those Societies to 
 which they had been used. If it was a new Jewish 
 sect, it was a sect entirely different from any that had 
 been among them before. For there was a readiness 
 to meet and embrace Gentiles, to associate with them, 
 even to eat with them, which was at variance with all 
 they had known of Jews hitherto. One cannot tell 
 how many Gentiles there may have been in this An- 
 tioch society. Most likely, they were few in comparison Difficulties 
 with the Jews. But they must have been admitted "TT 9 °f 
 
 •1 of the mix- 
 
 without being circumcised, and the distinction between ture °f 
 them and the Jewish believers in Jesus must have been it. 
 gradually wearing away. Perhaps very gradually, for 
 
78 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vi. it must have taken a long time to convince any 
 Peter at Jew that he could safely break through precepts that 
 were so venerable and divine. A vision irom heaven 
 had made Peter see, that there was another law higher 
 than these, to which they must give way. And when 
 he came to Antioch, it would appear that he was ready 
 for awhile to act upon this revelation, — to mix freely 
 with those who had not been circumcised. After- 
 wards, we learn from the Epistle to the Galatians, — ■ 
 for I believe we ought to refer the narrative in the 
 2d chapter of that epistle, to this period, — certain 
 came down from James at Jerusalem, who tempted 
 Hishesita- Peter to stand aloof and to " dissemble." There was 
 
 t ion and in- lni t p r-i -r» 
 
 consistency, another good and brave man, a Jew ot Cyprus, Barna- 
 bas, the son of consolation, who had seen with ex- 
 ceeding delight the growth of the mixed community 
 at Antioch and the accession of Greeks to the faith of 
 Christ. Yet he could not resist the authority of 
 Peter ; he was carried away for a while, by the same 
 dissimulation. But he had brought with him out of 
 Arabia a man who had been learning a different lesson. 
 The pupil of Gamaliel, the young Jew of Tarsus, the 
 Hebrew of the Hebrews, who had persecuted the dis- 
 ciples to the death expressly as levellers, now resisted 
 Peter to the face because he was to be blamed. Every 
 thing in the Gospel of Christ which he was to preach, 
 depended upon the question whether He was the 
 Lord of man or only the Lord of the Jews ; whether 
 He had redeemed and reconciled men or only a cer- 
 
 Thc new tain class of men. LI ere then is another great epoch 
 in the Apostolical history. The disciples, we are told, 
 
SAMARIA AND SYRIA. 79 
 
 were called Christians first at Antioch. It was lect.vi. 
 not a name, which they chose for themselves. The 
 Heathen population of the city, who were celebrated 
 for their nicknames, probably bestowed it upon them. 
 But it expressed the memorable fact that a community Another 
 consisting primarily of Jews, and directed exclusively ^* n ^ a 
 by them, could not be denoted by that name or by 
 the name of any sect among them. New sects might 
 indeed spring up in this community. This name, 
 Christian, might itself be made the symbol of one. 
 But to the disciples it signified that they were wit- 
 nesses for a King, and a King whom all nations would 
 in due time be brought to acknowledge. 
 
LECTUBE VII. 
 
 THE CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 
 
 lect. vii. You may have wondered sometimes at that passage 
 
 St. Peter's in the history of St. Peter, to which I alluded at the 
 
 oiTof°the en d °f mv l as t Lecture. What I said then may 
 
 profoundest diminish your wonder. It was not only the most 
 
 truth. J m J 
 
 natural thing in the world, that St. Peter should cling 
 earnestly and passionately, to his Jewish habits. It 
 was the effect of his divine teaching that he clung to 
 them ; if he had not prized them, he would have denied 
 Christ. It was true that he had no right to refuse to 
 eat with the Gentiles at Antioch. That, as St. Paul 
 told him, and as his own vision had told him before, 
 was, in another way, to deny Christ. But he was 
 tempted into this error by the conviction which was 
 the strongest and deepest one in his heart. St. Paul 
 would not have wished him to part with that. If he 
 had, St. Paul's own witness would have been an 
 ineffectual witness. He would not have been able to 
 tell the Gentiles that Gocl was calling them, that they 
 were to form parts of an Ecclesia. 
 TheMission I want you to understand this, because I am now 
 of Paul com i 11S r to St. Paul's interpretation of this word. It 
 
 and Bar- ° x 
 
 nabas. could not be learnt in Jerusalem. It was only 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 81 
 
 beginning to be learnt at Antioch. Its force was to Lect. vii. 
 
 come out when the Holy Ghost said to the disciples, 
 who were gathered together in that city, " Separate 
 rne Saul and Barnabas for the work whereunto I have 
 called them." 
 
 You see how strictly the language respecting idea of « 
 a calling, which we have traced through the Scrip- ZereAost 
 tures, is preserved here, and how surely Paul and s ^ ht °f- 
 Barnabas felt, and those from whom they went forth 
 felt, that they were not sent on their errand by men, 
 though men might be the instruments and agents in 
 sending them, but by the Spirit of God Himself. 
 You remember in St. Paul's Epistles how vehemently 
 he asserts his title to be an Apostle, — when many 
 wished to deny him the name, because he was not 
 one of the twelve whom our Lord first chose ; how PauVsHght 
 
 ...,.,. . . i . to the name 
 
 certain he is that his designation is as true as theirs, Apostle. 
 that he was as much selected by Christ Himself for 
 his office as they were. And this he maintained, not 
 for his own sake or his own glory, but because if he 
 had not maintained it, he would have admitted that 
 his Lord's work was bounded by the years in which 
 He was visibly walking on earth ; he would have 
 denied that He had ascended up to reign and to fill 
 all things ; he would have destroyed the foundation 
 upon which the Church in all ages afterwards was to 
 stand. Never fancy then that St. Paul, because he 
 w r ould not limit God's calling to the Jewish nation, 
 made light of that calling. His whole business on 
 earth was to magnify it, to prove the reality of it : 
 
 G 
 
8.2 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Paul and 
 Barnabas 
 
 in the Syna- 
 gogues. 
 
 lect. vii. first of all to show what it behoved a Hebrew of the 
 Hebrews to do in order to carry it out ; then to show 
 that there can be no true society established upon 
 earth which has not God's calling for its ground- 
 work, — that no society can subsist upon earth, each 
 member of which is not called into it by Him. 
 
 You have often heard that the journey which Paul 
 and Barnabas now took, was a missionary journey to 
 different Gentile countries. That statement is true ; 
 nevertheless, I would beg you to notice that into 
 whatsoever place St. Paid went, he first sought out the 
 Jewish synagogue. He never thought of delivering 
 a message to other men, till he had first delivered it 
 to those who worshipped there. So it was when they 
 went to Cyprus. " At Salamis," it is said, " they 
 preached the word of God in the synagogue of the 
 Jews." In that island the first conspicuous Gentile 
 convert joined them, — Sergius Paulus, the deputy or 
 governor of the country. He is a specimen of the 
 kind of influence which Heathens were often receiving 
 from Jews who turned then knowledge of the spiritual 
 world into a trade. Elymas the sorcerer, we are 
 told, was a Jew, — one who abused his own light to 
 make other men's minds dark, and who was smitten 
 with bodily blindness as a retribution for that greatest 
 of all crimes. It was a time, as I told you before, 
 when the belief in spiritual powers was prevailing- 
 more than it had ever prevailed before, though the 
 belief in righteousness had never been so weak. It 
 was the calling of St. Paul, as it had been the calling 
 
 Sergius 
 Paulus and 
 
 Elymas. 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. S3 
 
 of Moses, to show everywhere that power is from the lect. vii. 
 righteous God, and that when it is dedicated to the 
 service of evil, it will be confounded. 
 
 Again we find the two Apostles at Antioch in Antiochm 
 Pisidia, going into the synagogue. If you read St. 
 Paul's speech there you will see how entirely it is 
 addressed to the men of Israel ; how the glad tidings 
 which he declared to them were, that " the promise 
 which was made unto their fathers, God had fulfilled 
 the same unto them, their children, in that he had 
 raised up Jesus again ; as it is also written in the 
 second Psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I 
 begotten thee." But then he added, "By Him all St. Paul 
 
 .„-. n -, • n -i ■ i the Jew and 
 
 that believe are justified irom all things, trom winch the witness 
 ye coidd not be justified by the law of Moses." And jgjJL 
 he warned them who heard him to beware lest that 
 should come upon them which was spoken by the 
 prophet: "Behold, ye despisers, wonder and perish; 
 for I will work a work in your days which ye will 
 not believe, though a man declare it unto you." Just 
 because St. Paul prized the covenant and law which 
 had been given to his countrymen,- he was sure that 
 they wanted something which the covenant and the 
 law coidd not do for them, — that they needed a Person 
 to justify them and make them righteous men. But m Gm- 
 when he spoke of Christ having justified them by His cove) , tke 
 resurrection, it was clear that his words could not be ~f l0 
 confined to those to whom they were addressed. The them. 
 Gentiles asked that these words might be spoken to 
 them, and the next sabbath-day nearly all the city 
 came together to hear Paid. The barrier had been 
 
 g2 
 
84 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VII. 
 
 The reli- 
 gious Jews 
 scanda- 
 tized. 
 
 Lycaonia. 
 
 broken down. A Gospel was proclaimed to mankind. 
 This is marked by St. Luke as a critical moment in 
 tlie work of the two Apostles. Not only the worst 
 part of the Jews, but devout and honourable men 
 and women, were offended at the boldness with which 
 they declared that it was necessary first to give their 
 message to the Jews, but that since they judged 
 themselves unworthy of eternal life, lo ! they turned 
 to the Gentiles. A persecution was raised against the 
 Apostles, of which the Jews were the instigators, but 
 in which they could easily persuade Heathens to take 
 part. They fled from that city, and presently we find 
 them in a purely Heathen population, among the rude 
 men of Lycaonia, who hailed them as gods come down 
 in the likeness of men, and who wished to ofFer them 
 sacrifices. To them they speak of the God who had 
 made the world and all things in it, and who had not 
 left Himself without witness, giving them rain from 
 heaven and fruitful seasons, filling their hearts with 
 food and gladness, and who was now bidding them 
 turn from their vanities to serve the living God. 
 The Gospd You see how thoroughly St. Paul was fulfilling the 
 work of the function of a Jew, while he was bearing this protest 
 Law. against idolatry. But mark how the protest differed 
 
 from that which the other Jews were bearing. The 
 words contained a message of glad tidings to all the 
 people of the earth. The living God was calling them 
 out of idolatry, was claiming them to be His people. 
 Wherever the sun had been shining, wherever the rain 
 had been falling, there were tokens of His loving-kind- 
 ness. And the men who had received these blessings 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 85 
 
 were those whom Pie was now claiming in His Son as lect. vii. 
 
 members of His own family. It is in this way that Relation of 
 
 tiiC 1V07*(2s 
 
 the word Gospel, or glad tidings, which is one of the Gospel, 
 favourite words in St. Paul's epistles, is connected with j^ 1 ^ 011 ' 
 the word Revelation, or unveiling, which is another, to each 
 
 other. 
 
 and with the word Ecclesia, which is a third. The 
 good news is, that God has revealed Himself to man- 
 kind in His Son, and that He is calling them out by 
 His Spirit to be no longer worshippers of a multitude 
 of things, to be no longer creatures of sense, to be no 
 longer separated from each other, by the different 
 objects which they pursued, and the different impulses 
 which governed them. 
 
 It is just at this point of the history, then, that we St, Paul, a 
 
 • • TJvccicJi&i* Or 
 
 hear of an Ecclesia rising up in each of the cities m God> not 
 which Paid had preached, and of his ordaining Elders the P r °P a - 
 
 1 ° gator of a 
 
 over it. That was the name which each of these Religion. 
 societies took. Any other would have been incon- 
 sistent with the lessons which St. Paul had been learn- 
 ing all his life, and with the message which he was 
 now delivering. He was not preaching to them a 
 new religion, he was not forming a sect. He was 
 bidding them cast away religions and sects, that they 
 might own the Father who was binding them all in 
 one, the Lord who had been speaking to them in their 
 consciences, and from whom all the light had come 
 which had shown them what was right and what was 
 wrong, and the Spirit wdio was working in them to 
 make them choose the right and reject the wrong. offence 
 But we cannot be surprised that the sight of such 9 iven hl J the 
 
 L _ name 
 
 bodies rising up in the cities where synagogues were Ecclesia. 
 
86 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. already established, and including those whom the 
 synagogue looked upon as unclean, should have greatly 
 startled the Jews. Little as they had understood their 
 calling, much as they had sunk into mere religious 
 sects or mere traders, they still gloried in the name of 
 the called and chosen nation. How dared any one 
 take that from them and bestow it upon people coming- 
 out of any tribe or kindred of the earth ? And this 
 feeling could not be confined to the Jews who rejected 
 
 Thcbap- our Lord. Those who acknowledged Him, as w r e 
 
 1 1 zed nxst '")'' 
 
 torsofdr- nave seen, had been awakened to a new feeling of the 
 cumasion. dignity of their Jewish calling. Was not this a very 
 rude assault upon that feeling ? Teachers told the 
 Gentiles in these churches that except they were 
 circumcised and kept the law of Moses, they could 
 not be saved. Their baptism no doubt brought them 
 a certain way, as of old it had brought Heathens to 
 the outer court of the Temple ; but unless, over and 
 above this, they received the sign of the old covenant, 
 they never could have the truest and the highest 
 privileges of the chosen people. Such words were 
 heard elsewhere ; of course they would soon reach 
 TJiemeetinff Jerusalem, and be especially listened to there. The 
 saiem. Apostles and Elders came together to consider of this 
 matter. We have seen how strong the inclination of 
 Peter was to magnify circumcision, how hard it was 
 for him to mix with Gentiles. The feeling must have 
 been stronger still in James. Yet when they were 
 thus met together, and the whole question came 
 before them, both perceived that they should be 
 giving up their faith in Jesus Christ, even their faith 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. §7 
 
 in Him as the Son of David, if they enforced the Lect.vii. 
 practices of the law and the sign of the Jewish cove- 
 nant upon the Gentile people. They acknowledged 
 the genuineness of the work in which Paul and 
 Barnabas had been engaged. 
 
 James proposed the decision to which they should Ground 
 come. He asserted the worth of the synagogues, in st. e j an ts 
 which Moses of old times had been preached in the Gen- c " ul SL 
 tile cities. He felt how important it was for the Gentiles 
 to abstain from those acts which would give serious 
 offence to their Jewish brethren, and what danger there 
 was, if they fancied themselves free from all legal obli- 
 gations, of their falling into the practices which had 
 been so much connected with idolatrous feasts and 
 worship. He would therefore write to the Gentiles Tiie Letter; 
 that they should abstain from pollutions of idols, and 
 from fornication, and from things strangled, and from 
 blood ; the union of the more serious precepts with 
 the other two being justified by the fact, which St. 
 Paul afterwards asserted most strongly in his letter to 
 the Corinthians, that it is a sin in the member of 
 a Church to offend and injure the conscience of his 
 brother, in things which are themselves indifferent. 
 
 These precepts, with the positive denunciation of 
 all attempts to put any other yoke upon them, were 
 addressed in letters to " the brethren which are of the 
 Gentiles in Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia." The lis a* 
 letters assume an authority ; " It has seemed good to 
 the Holy Ghost and to us." This authority is not 
 said to be based upon any privileges peculiar to that 
 age. The Apostles and Elders had met in the faith 
 
88 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lkct.vii. of Christ's assurance, that where two or three were 
 gathered together, He was in the midst of them, 
 to bind together men in His 
 
 were 
 
 seeking 
 
 The rules 
 adapted to 
 an exi- 
 gency. 
 
 They 
 
 Name, to remove the obstacles to brotherhood. They 
 were sure that the Holy Ghost was with them in this 
 work ; they had no doubt that He was guiding them 
 to what was the best decision for that emergency, 
 though after circumstances, ordained by God, might 
 make those rules inapplicable. Why should not they 
 think so, seeing that their decree went upon the 
 ground that the rules which they believed that God 
 Himself had laid clown for the chosen body in other 
 generations, were not intended for that generation, 
 and ought to be dispensed with, because they inter- 
 fered with principles which were unchangeable ? You 
 will have occasion to remember what I have said on 
 this point hereafter. 1 
 
 I shall now go rapidly through the remaining chap- 
 ters of the Acts of the Apostles, chiefly for the purpose 
 of pointing out to you the Churches of which I shall 
 have most to speak in future lectures. In the Cth 
 Phrygia verse of the 16th chapter, it is said, "When they had 
 tin; Bithy- g one throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, 
 ma. anc [ were forbidden by the Holy Ghost to preach the 
 
 word in Asia, after they had come to Mysia, they 
 
 1 The two events, of John Mark's return to Jerusalem, iu the course 
 of the Apostolic tour, and of St. Paul's dispute with Barnabas respect- 
 ing him, have both reference to this crisis in the history. They probably 
 denote great suspicion in the first, some in the second, respecting the 
 intentions of St. Paul, — whether he might not be possessed with a zeal 
 for Gentile conversion, which would make him forget the covenant of his 
 fathers. The circumcision of Timothv, mentioned in the beeinuino- of 
 the sixteenth chapter, was probably designed to correct these impressions. 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 89 
 
 essayed to go into Bithyiiia, but the Spirit suffered Lect.vil 
 them not." These words bring before us a number 
 of countries in Asia Minor, some of which you meet 
 with also in the superscription to St. Peter's Epistle, 
 one of which is connected with a most memorable 
 Epistle of St. Paul. When it is said that the Apostle 
 was not allowed to preach the Gospel in Asia, the 
 meaning is, that he could not then go to Ephesus, or 
 visit the Greek colonies on the coast of the Archipe- 
 lago. He was summoned to another work, one which 
 brought him, probably for the first time in his life, 
 into Europe. 
 
 Macedonia was a field into which St. Paul had Macedonia. 
 perhaps not thought of entering when he left Antioch. 
 He goes first to Philippi, thence to Amphipolis and 
 Apollonia, thence to Thessalonica, thence to Bercea. 
 The condition of the Chinches in this country is 
 brought very livingly before us in the Epistle to the 
 Philippians, and in the two to the Thessalonians. 
 You will remark, if you read them carefully, how very 
 different their circumstances were from those of the 
 Galatians, and of the Churches in Asia generally, 
 though they were exposed to a number of the same 
 influences — especially from Jews. In Philippi there PhtifepL 
 is no mention made of a synagogue ; but there were 
 Jews who went out of the city by a river- side to offer 
 prayers. A woman seems to have been the first Lydia. 
 European convert of St. Paul. Another woman was The En- 
 the cause of his imprisonment. That was not owing 
 to any dread which the Roman authorities had of the 
 disciples of Jesus. They did not distinguish them 
 
90 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. from other Jews. But the traders in enchantments, 
 whose gains were disturbed by the Apostle, had 
 influence with the magistrates to procure the punish- 
 ment of him and of Silas. The opening of the prison 
 doors was a witness that a God of Bighteousness — a 
 Deliverer — was mightier than the powers before which 
 the Philippians were trembling. The jailer, when, in his 
 fear and terror, he asked what he might do to save 
 himself from the power he dreaded, was told of a 
 Saviour in whom he might trust. In His name the 
 seller of purple, the enchantress, the keeper of the 
 
 ThcChurch, prison, were bidden to rejoice together. A Church 
 
 hoiv formed /> i • i ji p ±i i j_ 
 
 there. grew up, ot winch these were some ot the elements. 
 
 The Apostle of this European Church bore out his 
 witness for the true King, by asserting the sanctity of 
 civil order. He maintained his own dignity and 
 position as a Roman citizen ; he would not leave the 
 prison till the magistrates came and fetched him out. 
 
 T/iessar In Thessalonica and Bercea, the influence of the Jews 
 
 lomca. wag niuc ] 1 stronger than in Philippi, though they 
 could not injure the Apostle except by appealing to the 
 fears and prejudices of the Heathen population. "The 
 men who have turned the world upside down pro- 
 claim another King, one Jesus," was the argument by 
 which they stirred up the people. 
 
 Athens. Such an argument would have been quite ineffec- 
 
 tual at Athens, the city to which Paul was conveyed 
 from Bercea. He found Jews living in that city — • 
 trading in it — probably as little affected by any of its 
 beauties, as they were moved by its idolatries. The 
 spirit of the true Hebrew of the Hebrews was com- 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 91 
 
 pletely overwhelmed by these. Yet no one entered Lect.vii. 
 more thoroughly into all that was best and truest 
 in the minds of the idolaters — no one perceived so 
 thoroughly what a witness there was in their poetry, 
 their philosophy, their very worship, against the cor- 
 ruptions to which they had yielded. Their poets had 
 said, " We also are His offspring ; " their philosophers 
 had believed that there was a God near them and 
 about them, whom they were seeking to grasp. 
 Amidst all their worship of demons and idols, there 
 was an " unknown God " to whom they were bowing 
 down. He came to declare to them that unknown St. Paul's 
 
 xt- -i j-i v • appeal to 
 
 God ; to make known Him m whom they were living, G)re] . 
 and moving, and having then being ; to tell them how Faiih - 
 they were His offspring ; — thus to recal them from 
 the worship of things made by art and man's device ; 
 thus to bring them into that spiritual world of which 
 they had dreamed. These words were wonderfully 
 adapted to all that had been deepest in the hearts of 
 their fathers. But Paul spoke of a living Judge, and 
 of One who had risen from the dead. This was a 
 demand upon actual faith. He called upon them to 
 be right, and not merely to talk of right — to hate 
 wrong, and not merely to speculate about it. The 
 Athenians had passed into frivolous gossips and de- 
 baters. A disputation was dear to them, a gospel 
 was lost upon them. 
 
 In Corinth, many of the same habits of mind were Corinth. 
 found which had resisted the Apostle's preaching at 
 Athens. But there St. Paul found the Jewish element 
 more strong ; for Corinth was a great trading city. 
 
92 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VII. 
 
 Character 
 of the 
 Church 
 there. 
 
 Ephesus. 
 
 Character 
 of the city. 
 
 He reasoned in the synagogue. Then, as at Antioch, 
 when the Jews rejected him, he turned to the Gentiles. 
 He was not, however, without Jewish converts. The 
 ruler of the synagogue was baptized. The Jews 
 sought in vain to move the Proconsul against him. 
 Gallio was a philosopher — a friend of Seneca : the 
 disputes of Jews about their law were nothing to 
 him. In the Church which grew up in this city 
 were prejudiced Jews, Gentiles who scorned Hebrew 
 formalities, and a third class, who had received an 
 influence from Alexandria, I shall have to say more 
 to you of these parties hereafter. I mention them 
 here, that you may see how various were the spirits 
 with which the Apostle had to deal, and how re- 
 markably the Churches received the character of the 
 countries to which they belonged. 
 
 There is one more which I shall speak of. In some 
 respects it is the most important of all, after Jeru- 
 salem. This is Ephesus, a city which had almost as 
 Greek a character as Corinth, and yet which belonged 
 to Asia. It was one of the great commercial empo- 
 riums of the world; strangers came to it from all 
 quarters. There was the temple of the great goddess 
 Diana, in whom men had once believed, and whom 
 they still worshipped. Thither resorted the magicians 
 and diviners, in whom they believed still — so far as 
 they believed in anything. There St. Paul encoun- 
 tered the greatest opposition he had ever yet encoun- 
 tered from idolaters — that is to say, from the men 
 who profited by idolatry — the craftsmen who made 
 silver shrines to Diana. It is in the Epistle which he 
 
CHURCHES IN GENTILE CITIES. 93 
 
 wrote to this Church, that he brings out more fully, I Lect. vii. 
 think, than anv where else, the meaning- of his work The^pkik 
 
 *" '-'to the 
 
 as an Apostle to the Gentiles — the revelation which Ephedams. 
 had been made to him of all being fellow-heirs in 
 Christ — the truth that there was an older calling than 
 that of the Jew, "because," as the Apostle says, 
 " God hath chosen us out in Christ before the worlds 
 were, to be holy, and without blame before Him in 
 love." 
 
 The parting with the elders of this Church, which St. Paul 
 is recorded in the 20th chapter of the Acts of the j erusa i ei]U 
 Apostles, is not only solemn for its own sake, and 
 solemn for all people and ministers who read it in 
 this day ; it also marks the conclusion of a stage in 
 the Apostle's labours and in his life. He was then 
 on his way to Jerusalem, to keep the feast of Pente- 
 cost. When he came there, James and the elders 
 exhorted him to do an act which would prove his 
 reverence for the law of Moses, and confute the 
 charges which they had heard against him, that he 
 did not live as an Israelite. He followed their advice. 
 But while he was purifying himself in the Temple, a Tiie Jewish 
 tumult was raised against him. The chief Roman 
 officer in the city came down to quell it. St. Paul 
 w r as permitted to address the people. They listened 
 to him till he spoke of being sent to the Gentiles ; 
 then a new tumult was raised, and his life w T as in 
 danger. The chief captain again interfered. He 
 called together the priests and the Sanhedrim. St. 
 Paul was brought before them. The Jewish sects 
 were now becoming more violently divided than ever 
 
94 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.vii. against each other. The Pharisees were inclined to 
 favour Paul, through opposition to the Sadducees, 
 who were more bent upon destroying him when they 
 understood that he had been bred up by their oppo- 
 nents. A body of zealots conspired to murder him 
 
 Paul at privately. He was saved from them and sent to the 
 governor of the province, who now dwelt at Csesarea. 
 There he lay in prison for two years, waiting the 
 judgment of two successive governors. Finally he 
 appealed to the Emperor, from the provincial ruler. 
 After he had been heard before King Agrippa, and 
 had desired that his judges might be both almost and 
 altogether such as he was, except his bonds, he set 
 
 Rome. out for Rome. He was saved from shipwreck at 
 Melita. St. Luke's narrative closes when he enters 
 as a prisoner into the capital of the world. You will 
 see hereafter why there could not have been a fitter 
 termination to a book which sets forth the beginnings 
 of the Church upon earth. 
 
LECTURE VIII. 
 
 ST. JAMES, ST. PETER, AND ST. PAUL. 
 
 You will remember that St. James, St. Peter, and Lect.vhl 
 
 St. John are called Apostles of the Circumcision, and, The Catho- 
 lic Epistles. 
 
 as such, are distinguished from St. Paul, who is called why they 
 the Apostle of the Gentiles. You will remember ar o eca 
 also that their Epistles are called Catholic, and, as 
 such, are distinguished from those of St. Paul, which 
 are addressed to the Church of Rome, the Church of 
 Corinth, the Churches of Galatia, &c. To understand 
 what one of these differences has to do with the 
 other, — why the Jewish Apostles should have this 
 name Catholic or Universal, which one would have 
 thought was not applicable to them, — you must turn 
 to their letters. It is not my business to explain them 
 to you ; but I must glance at them, that I may 
 enable you to appreciate the positions which the 
 writers occupied in the first age, and that you may 
 judge better of what I shall have to tell you respecting 
 the effect of their teachings in subsequent ages. 
 
 1. If you open the Epistle of St. James you will The Epistle 
 see that it is addressed to the Twelve Tribes. I dare f ^ he a 
 say this superscription has sometimes puzzled you. ™ re 
 You have said, Did not St. James then write to the 
 
96 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. Church — to Christians? Have we not been told that 
 
 he was the first Overseer or Bishop of the Church in 
 
 Jerusalem, the mother Church of the world ? I think 
 
 if you read what I said to you about the Society 
 
 which arose in Jerusalem after the day of Pentecost, 
 
 Title ex- you will find the answer to these questions. That 
 
 2 the office of Society existed, we have seen, to testify that God had 
 
 Jerusalem Cii \\ ec \ ou t the Jewish nation to declare His Kighteous- 
 
 community. ° 
 
 ness and Unity and Government. You can only do 
 this, it said, if you acknowledge your King ; Him 
 in whom God's Righteousness has been manifested, 
 in whom we are a united people, who is the Lord over 
 our hearts and spirits. This Society failed in its 
 witness, if it led the Jews to suppose it was a new 
 sect. Of course they would call it so ; but the 
 disciples were, by all their acts and words, to refute 
 the charge. No one, I apprehend, understood this 
 calling of the Jerusalem fellowship better than St. 
 James. When the other Apostles had gone forth in 
 different ways to execute the commands of the Master, 
 Relation of he probably remained in the capital. If he was, as 
 
 James to <i ■ j , n , i i 
 
 the Com- there is good reason to suppose lie was, the man who 
 wvmity. j s ca hed in the Gospel the brother of our Lord, he 
 had another claim on the affections of baptized Jews 
 besides his divine calling ; another claim upon the 
 respect of all the Jews, for he would be of the house 
 of David. The reverence which would be paid to 
 him by the disciples of Jesus would be that which 
 children pay to a father ; he would preside over the 
 Christian community by no express election, but by 
 a right which no one would think of disputing, 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 97 
 
 because it would be seen that he was only chief of Lbci.vi ii. 
 all by being servant of all. He appears to have Hisrepwta- 
 
 J D .... p tiov in the 
 
 succeeded wonderfully in convincing the citizens of c ;t>/. 
 Jerusalem, that he had a righteousness which exceeded 
 that of the Scribes and Pharisees. He showed more 
 respect for the ordinances which they worshipped 
 than they did ; yet the testimony of his life and of 
 his letter was that the true service and lindefiled 
 before God and the Father was to visit the fatherless 
 and the widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself 
 unspotted from the world. You have wondered His run 
 sometimes, perhaps, that he does not introduce the the name 
 name of Christ oftener into his Epistle. I think the j£J^J* 
 more you study it, the more you will see that he plained. 
 preaches Christ by that very silence. He sets forth 
 a kingdom over the heart and tongue; he tells his 
 disciples that God had begotten them by the word of 
 truth to be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures ; he 
 tells them of one who binds rich and poor together ; 
 he shows them that they might believe there was 
 one God, and yet only tremble like devils, whereas 
 the true God was one in whom they were to trust, 
 the Father of Lights, in whom was no variableness, 
 neither shadow of a turning. He was thus leading 
 his countrymen to perceive that One had come who 
 fulfilled the promises made to their fathers, by 
 revealing the God who had spoken to them, and 
 whom they longed to know better. In proportion 
 as the Jerusalem believers in Jesus entered into the 
 meaning of their teacher, they really represented the 
 
 H 
 
98 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.VIII. 
 
 The Chris- 
 tian body 
 represent- 
 ing the 
 Twelve 
 Tribes. 
 
 The called 
 body, One. 
 
 St. Peters 
 
 First 
 
 Epistle. 
 
 To whom 
 written. 
 
 Twelve Tribes. They showed that the called body 
 was still doing its work on the earth. 
 
 The great work of St. James then, I conceive, was 
 to preserve this all-important truth, that the divine 
 Society would still go on living, that it was immortal 
 as the Prophets had declared it must be. No one 
 saw more clearly than St. James that a tremendous 
 convulsion was coming on his city and his land. But 
 he can preach patience because he is certain that the 
 great Husbandman is patient ; that He watches over 
 the seed which He has put into the ground ; and 
 that whatever changes it may undergo, whatever 
 death it may pass through, it will spring up at last, 
 and bring forth its intended fruit. St. James's 
 Epistle teaches us that the called body, the Church, 
 was one nation originally, though it consisted of twelve 
 tribes, and that it must be one always, of however 
 many tribes it may consist. And this is a testimony 
 which gives his Epistle the best right possible to the 
 name of Catholic. 
 
 2. If you turn next to the Eirst Epistle of St. 
 Peter you will perceive that it also is not addressed to 
 a Church. The name Ecclesia does not once occur 
 in it. But the dispersed in Pontus, Galatia, Cappa- 
 docia, Asia, and Bithynia, are described as elect, 
 according to the foreknowledge of God the Eather, 
 through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience 
 and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. That 
 name which occurs so rarely in the Epistle of St. 
 James comes before us at every moment, in the letter 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 99 
 
 of this Apostle. And Christ is presented to us espe- Lect.viii: 
 cially as the Corner Stone of a Spiritual Temple, the 
 Head of a Royal Priesthood, the Shepherd of Souls. 
 This language, drawn from the records of the chosen 
 people, was wonderfully suitable to tell the Jews, who 
 were scattered through all countries of the world, and 
 were suffering hardships and contempt from all around 
 them, that they were still one people, when they 
 owned the one Lord, who had always been the true 
 and only bond of their union, and who had now been 
 revealed, that they might feel and claim their fellow- 
 ship in Him. 
 
 I do not mean at all to say that this language is Language 
 restricted to circumcised men. The position of St. toJews * 
 Peter was very different from that of St. James. He 
 was not tied to Jerusalem ; he was a Missionary to 
 the outcasts of Israel. He had been taught that the But as- 
 Gentiles, among whom they dwelt, were Christ's Jewigh mC( 
 subjects, and that he was to claim them for Him. « tIie 
 
 « ' nucleus of 
 
 But he, as much as St. James, looked upon the any divme 
 Israelites as still the called and chosen body, to which 
 converts from the Gentiles were to be added. When 
 they were added, they formed one body, or family, 
 scattered throughout the nations ; bound together in 
 one invisible Head. The distinctions of tribes and 
 races were lost for him in this great Unity. By no 
 one writer of the New Testament are we so continually 
 reminded that the Unity can subsist only in Christ ; 
 that on the rock of His divine humanity the Church 
 must stand, if the gates of Hell are not to prevail 
 against it. No one has borne so strong a protest, by 
 
 h 2 
 
100 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. anticipation, against any attempt to put him or any 
 Unity in man i n place of the Son of God ; hut it is not to 
 
 Christ, but ... 1 . 
 
 norecogni- him We lUHSt lOOK to tell llOW 111 tlllS 0116 fellowship 
 
 Tcuims there may he a Church of Italy, a Church of France, 
 a Church of England. 
 
 St. Peter's At the same time, St. Peter proclaims even more 
 
 of anew distinctly than St. James that a tremendous crash and 
 overthrow was coming in his own day upon all 
 society, and especially upon that divine Society, which 
 he believed would, in some wonderful manner, be 
 brought through the fires. He had listened to his 
 Master's words, when he stood by the Temple, and 
 the disciples marked the goodly stones of it. How 
 could he doubt that those words would be fulfilled, as 
 He who could not lie had declared they would, in that 
 generation ? I cannot read the words in his second 
 Epistle, without being sure that he believed events 
 were now at hand which coidd be described as nothing 
 less than the extinction and conflagration of an old 
 world and the birth of a new. And I cannot help 
 feeling that this expectation, though it may also point 
 to something still to come, had its accomplishment 
 then ; and that if it had not, Modern History would 
 be a maze without a plan. 
 
 St. Paul. 3. You will now perceive, I think, in what especial 
 
 sense St. Paul was an Apostle of the Gentiles, and 
 why, being such, he was obliged to give his letters 
 a form altogether different from that which St. James 
 and St. Peter gave to theirs. I have shown you that 
 he did not prize his Jewish birth and covenant less 
 than they did ; that he addressed the Gospel first to 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 101 
 
 his own countrymen; to the Gentiles, as he says in Lect.viii. 
 the Epistle to the Romans, that he might provoke sishvefor 
 
 • tt lii ^ iS nation. 
 
 them to jealousy. He who would have been accursed 
 
 from Christ for the sake of his kinsmen after the 
 
 flesh, cannot have been estranged from them by any 
 
 persecutions which he suffered at their hands. But 
 
 he was led to perceive that the Jewish calling, though 
 
 a most true and holy one, was not a foundation deep 
 
 enough for a Jew himself to stand upon. He was 
 
 called to testify of the Deliverer of man ; he was to 
 
 say to Greeks and Romans, " You too have a calling 
 
 in Christ. You do not acquire it when you become 
 
 one with us. We must become one with you in 
 
 order that we may realize the blessing which God 
 
 intends for us." The consequence was that St. Paid Becomes the 
 
 had to speak to men just as he found them, to Se««ra? 
 
 become, as he expresses it, all things to all men. ne ^°faii 
 
 national 
 
 " God," this was the principle which he asserted in distinc- 
 his speech at Athens, " hath ordered the times before 
 appointed, and the bounds of their habitation, that 
 they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel 
 after Him and find Him, though He be not far from 
 any one of us." The history then, the languages, the 
 geographical position, the peculiar temperament and 
 character of every people on the earth, had for him 
 the most divine meaning. They were indications of 
 the method which God was pursuing with them, 
 signs, however they might be disregarded, of the 
 steps by which he had been revealing Himself to 
 them, and had been and was drawing them to 
 Himself. 
 
102 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. Thus the Epistle to the Romans is marvellously 
 HisEpistUs adapted to the mind of a people which had grown 
 Romans great by reverence for Law and for Righteousness, 
 and Covin- and which had now set up mere Power and Will 
 
 thtans. L 
 
 against both. The Epistle to the Corinthians is 
 addressed to the peculiar habits of the Greek cha- 
 racter, to the Greek passion for wisdom, and to 
 all the evils that had grown up beside that noble 
 passion ; to the Greek skill in detecting subtle dis- 
 tinctions, and to the party spirit which was the 
 abuse of it. Christ, as manifesting God's righte- 
 ousness to all who believe, and as justifying men's 
 consciences which the Law accused, is presented to 
 the one. Christ, as revealing the wisdom of God 
 in the weakness of man, as the Head of a body con- 
 sisting of many members, to the other. If the 
 Roman Church and the Greek Church received his 
 lessons, they would be the means of raising their 
 countrymen out of their corruptions, and of enabling 
 them to exercise the good and glorious gifts which 
 God had bestowed upon them; if not, they might 
 exhibit a worse example than the Heathens had done 
 of their evil tendencies, and of the abuse of God's 
 treasures. 
 Epistle to Some people have said, Since St. Paul was the 
 thcHebrews. Apostle of the Gentiles, he cannot have written the 
 
 Epistle to the Hebrews. Others have said, That 
 Epistle is utterly unlike the rest of his Epistles in 
 style and manner. I cannot admit the force of either 
 argument. I believe his office of Apostle to the 
 Gentiles made him more, not less, able to understand 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. j()3 
 
 the peculiarities of his own nation- more, not less, Lect.viii. 
 interested in explaining to his baptized countrymen Form of it. 
 what their calling was, and how they must fulfil it. 
 If he did this work effectually he must make his 
 letter to them entirely different in its whole tone and 
 form, from every other which he wrote. And cer- 
 tainly the writer of this Epistle, whoever he was, has 
 done his work most effectually. 
 
 If you want to understand the real meaning of the 
 existence of that people, what was involved in all its 
 institutions, and what was to come out of them when 
 they perished, you should read that Epistle continually. 
 What I was saying to you in my first Lecture, about 
 the kings, and prophets, and priests, and sacrifices, 
 which God appointed for the children of Abraham, 
 finds its interpretation there. All these are shown to 
 involve the existence of One, who is the Brightness of 
 the Father's glory, the express Image of His Person ; 
 in whom He had constituted all spiritual powers, Object of it. 
 ages, worlds ; who upheld all things by the word 
 of His power ; who in the fulness of time had taken 
 flesh, and humbled Himself to death, that He might 
 overcome him who had the power of death ; who is 
 the Mediator of a new covenant, the filial King and 
 Priest ; who had offered up the perfect sacrifice which 
 could alone take away sins ; who had entered into the 
 holy place, the presence of God, for us. The words, 
 " He hath gone up on high, having obtained eternal 
 redemption for us," and the words, " By which Will 
 we are sanctified through the offering of the body of 
 Christ once for all," seem as if they were meant to 
 
1Q4 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. sum up the dispensation of the old world, and to 
 
 introduce the new. 
 importance I have spoken of this book, not for its exceeding 
 tccllias- worth, — for you will learn that better from others, — 
 ticai His- k u j. because there is no book in the New Testament 
 
 tory. 
 
 which so much explains the hints that we have derived 
 from various parts of it, respecting the great crisis, 
 which ever since the days of John the Baptist had 
 been said to be at hand. You must not forget, that 
 considerably less than forty years had elapsed since 
 he began to preach. Take away the conception and 
 birth of our Lord, and all the events in the four 
 Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles of 
 St. James, St. Peter, and St. Paul, are included within 
 no greater term of years than that which elapsed 
 between the Duke of Wellington's return from the 
 Peninsula, and the day of his death. During that 
 The Raman period, the evil principle of the Roman Empire was 
 Empire more m ^^ y exhibiting itself, than it ever did in 
 
 under the i «/ ° 
 
 firdCcesars. after centuries, even under the worst princes. The 
 restraints on mere will and the reverence for old law 
 which Augustus permitted,— the refinement and litera- 
 ture which he encouraged, — softened, almost glorified 
 his despotism. Under Tiberius it became hateful. A 
 Tiberias, man of ability, and at one time of courage, sank more 
 A.D.H— 37. an d more m to the miserable slave of his own suspi- 
 cions and his own lusts ; first raised up a minister to 
 be the oppressor of his people, then cast him down, to 
 become their worse and more malignant oppressor in 
 his own person. The world sung triumphant paeans 
 at his death, and hailed his successor, the son of a 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 1Q5 
 
 beloved general, as its champion and deliverer. 1 He lect.viii. 
 became the most ridiculous of riders, yet not the less Caligula, 
 the plague of his subjects, because he was the object AD - 37_ 41 - 
 of their contempt. The most wretched female domi- 
 nation appeared in the palace, and was fostered by 
 the weakness of, Claudius. Bright days were pro- Claudius, 
 mised by the accession of Nero, who had been bred A ' D Ar 1— 5L 
 under a philosopher. Before the earth was rid of a -d-54— 68. 
 him, his name had grown into a by-word, a word of 
 terror and disgust to all ages. Anarchy soon fol- 
 lowed ; Galba was too honest to please the legions, Gaiba, 
 too feeble to rule them. The effeminate Otho pre- ^esto 
 vailed aerainst him so far as to win the purple for J an - A - D - 69 - 
 
 . . . Otho, 
 
 a moment ; Vitellius gathered up in his own person Jan. to 
 the wickedness and brutality of all his predecessors. ^" 9 
 In his days Rome was set on fire ; the Capitol was vitellius, 
 destroyed ; after a period of frightful revolution, law A . D . 69 
 and government were restored by Vespasian. 2 It Vespasian, 
 was believed by the Roman world, that prophecies 
 had pointed him out as the inaugurator of a new 
 order of things. 
 
 The picture which the Roman historians have drawn Jewish His- 
 of the crimes of the Roman world generally, and of the ^^ ' 
 capital particularly, during this period, is sufficiently than 
 
 Roman. 
 
 appalling ; yet it is far less dark than that which the 
 Jewish historian offers us of his own countrymen. 
 Their plots, seditions, brigandism, murders, were all 
 
 1 See the opening of Philo's history of his embassy to Caligula. 
 
 2 " Titus Flavius Vespasianus, with all his faults, was the true 
 restorer of the State, a fact which has never yet been sufficiently 
 acknowledged." — Niebuhr, History of Rome, from the Punic War to 
 Gonstantme, vol. ii. (Ed. 1st) p. 231. 
 
106 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. made more terrible by the religious motives which 
 were not only put forward as pleas for them, but 
 which, in very many cases, prompted the commission 
 of them. It is evident that the faith of the Jew in 
 his Covenant and Law was not extinct. At times it 
 could awaken a courageous resistance to direct out- 
 rages of the Imperial power ; as for instance, when 
 
 josepims, Caius Caligula wished that his image should be set 
 
 lib.Lcio. U P m the Temple, and that sacrifices should be offered 
 to it. But this faith was itself turned into a lie, the 
 most malignant of all lies ; for the God of Abraham 
 became to the darkened minds of the children of 
 Abraham, a concentration of the evil qualities which 
 were scattered through all the Gods of the heathen 
 world. It is impossible not to feel, as one reads 
 the accounts of Jerusalem and Palestine in those last 
 days, that the villany of the rest of the world, 
 and all that was most devilish in the religions of 
 the world, was represented in its rulers and teachers. 
 It was the same wickedness, the same exaltation 
 of the Evil Spirit into the place of the God of 
 Righteousness and Truth, which one sees elsewhere ; 
 but in Jerusalem it seems as if wickedness were 
 chosen deliberately and in preference, as if its citizens 
 bowed to the Prince of Darkness, not for any bribes 
 he offered them, but for his own sake. It is a hor- 
 rible story, yet we ought not to shrink from read- 
 
 Moraiofit. ing it. We learn from it what a called people 
 must become, when they cease to believe in their 
 calling, when they become haters of the world which 
 they are sent to bless ; when they think they are 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 1Q7 
 
 possessors of the blessings of which they are the Lect.viii. 
 stewards. Such a body cannot throw off its trust ; 
 but it serves as an example of the portentous crimes 
 against which it was appointed to protest, and of the 
 eternal truth, that in the punishment of those crimes, 
 God is no respecter of persons. 
 
 The Festus before whom St. Paul pleaded, had Festm. 
 redressed some of the evils which the administration 
 of his predecessor had augmented. In the interval 
 between him and his successor Albinus, the priests in AMnus. 
 Jerusalem showed how much worse crimes might be 
 committed by natives, than by the worst Roman 
 rulers. The high priest was then a Sadducee. To Death of 
 him Josephus attributes (in a passage generally ad- fJ^Su, 
 mitted to be genuine) the death of James, who had lih - xx - c - 9 - 
 earned the name of the Just, or Righteous, in spite 
 of the prejudice against him as a Nazarene. Hege- EmeUus, 
 sippus, as quoted by Eusebius, says, that he was m ^ ^23. 
 thrown from a pinnacle of the Temple by Pharisees, 
 who professed the greatest respect for him person- 
 ally, and who had brought him to that place with 
 the hope of inducing him to undeceive the people 
 about Jesus. The story, as he tells it, is a confused 
 one, and Josephus must be the better authority. 
 But the substantial parts of the two narratives may be 
 reconciled, by supposing that the object of the Phari- 
 sees was to obtain an acknowledgment from St. James, 
 that he did not look upon Jesus in the way in which 
 Saul of Tarsus looked upon him. They could have 
 no dream of making St. James renounce Jesus ; they 
 might have half persuaded themselves that he held the 
 
108 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.VIII. 
 
 Tliis I sup- 
 pose is the 
 meaning of 
 the ivords 
 dTTa.yya.Kou 
 rifxlv tIs ij 
 6vpa tov 
 'Itjo'oO. 
 
 Neander 
 (Geschichte 
 der Pflan- 
 zuny, Band 
 2, p. 442, 
 Note) dis- 
 misses it 
 xviih entire 
 contempt. 
 
 Gessius 
 Florus. 
 
 Bell. Jud. 
 lib. ii. c. 1 6. 
 
 Vespasian. 
 
 faith of Him in some sense, which was compatible 
 with not thinking of him as the one ' door ' into the 
 sheepfold. But St. James declared that the Son of 
 Man was sitting on the right hand of the Majesty on 
 High, and would come in clouds ; thus accepting what 
 they considered the blasphemy of Stephen and Paul. 
 Probably they gave him up to their opponents to be 
 stoned; so the statement of Josephus would be sus- 
 tained, and the story would be in keeping with the 
 proceedings of the two sects on many other occasions. 
 Hegesippus has introduced some evidently legendary 
 matter into his narrative, but I think it is entitled to 
 more attention than it has of late received. This was 
 at all events an act of purely Jewish fury. Albinus, 
 though an evil ruler, was in no way a party to it. The 
 more intolerable government of his successor Gessius 
 Florus, was felt by the Jews to be a requital for it. 
 
 Florus evidently sought to provoke the Jews into a 
 war with Rome. The fanatics among them were eager 
 for it. King Agrippa, before whom St. Paul spoke, who 
 was in favour at Rome, and who was attached to the 
 people, pointed out to them in an eloquent speech, if 
 we may trust Josephus, the madness of the attempt. 
 At length Cestius, the governor of Syria, besieged 
 Jerusalem. To the extreme surprise of the Jews, 
 and of his own army, he withdrew just when the city 
 was ready to fall into his hands. Nero sent Vespa- 
 sian to conduct the war. He had subdued most of 
 the cities in Galilee and Samaria, and was on his 
 march to Jerusalem, when the news of the commotions 
 in Italy that followed the death of Nero reached him. 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. 109 
 
 Either in Judaea or Egypt he was first proclaimed lect.viii. 
 Emperor by the legions. The care of the siege was 
 left to Titus. 
 
 There was, then, both an outward and an inward me bap- 
 connexion between the events which were precipitating 
 the judgment on Roman tyranny, and those which 
 were filling up the measure of Jewish iniquities, and 
 the wrath that was in store for them. What, in the 
 meanwhile, was the condition of the baptized com- 
 munity ? I cannot read the Second Epistle of Peter, 
 the Epistle of Jude, the Epistle to the Thessalonians, 
 but, above all, the Epistle to the Hebrews, without 
 perceiving that the Apostles saw in the condition of 
 their own disciples, the signs of a coming Apostasy, Apostasy. 
 which the events that were passing in the Roman 
 world, and in the Jewish world, would develope and 
 bring out into full manifestation. It is usual, I 
 know, to suppose that these intimations belong to 
 a much later period ; perhaps to one that has not yet 
 arrived. They may belong to times of which we 
 shall hear in future Lectures ; and to times which are 
 at hand; I would express, with trembling, my con- 
 viction that they do. But I cannot explain away Passages 
 distinct and positive words which declare that it was ZuT' 
 impending, and which point out the perils of it to 
 those whom the Apostles were exhorting at that time. 
 Above all, I cannot explain away the whole of that 
 great Epistle, which is addressed expressly to Jewish 
 believers. 1 
 
 ' In some Lectures on the Epistle to the Hebrews, delivered at 
 Lincoln's Inn in 1846 (Parker), I have spoken somewhat more at 
 large on this approaching Apostasy, and the signs of it. 
 
110 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.VIII. 
 
 Folloivers 
 of St. 
 James. 
 
 Ebionites, 
 
 Eusebius, 
 booh iii. 
 c. 27. 
 
 Bearing of 
 the Epistle 
 to the 
 
 Hebrews on 
 them. 
 
 I will tell you what I think the writer of it feared 
 for them. A good and great man may leave a set of 
 followers, who turn all that was in him the most 
 precious truth, into falsehood. St. James, we have 
 seen, asserted the dignity of the Jewish calling. 
 Disciples of St. James might make that calling an 
 excuse for declining all fellowship with Gentiles. St. 
 James had spoken of Jesus as bearing witness to the 
 Jewish nation of their God and Father. Disciples of 
 St. James might say that he was a very high witness 
 of God indeed, perhaps a great prophet, perhaps even 
 an angelic person, but that He was not actually the Son 
 of God. We know that there were such disciples of 
 St. James ; that a set of men, called Ebionites, or poor 
 men, 1 existed in this century and survived into the 
 next, who maintained the greatest exclusiveness 
 towards Gentiles, preferring a circumcised disbeliever 
 in Jesus to an uncircumcised man who confessed 
 Him. We know also that some of these Ebionites 
 regarded Jesus as merely of the Jewish race, some as 
 having a certain divinity, because he was miraculously 
 conceived by the Virgin, some as having an angelic 
 nature, which was neither human properly, nor pro- 
 perly divine. You will see, as you read the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews, how much the writer sets himself 
 from the first to establish both sides of the truth, 
 which these teachers were denying. But you will see 
 
 1 Eusebius says, tovtovs otKeias eTre(j)rifii£ov ol irpatroi 7rra>^c5? Kal 
 raireivas to. 7T(p\ tov Xpiarov 8o£d£ovTas. " These the early Christians 
 aptly described (by the name Ebionites) as holding poor and mean notions 
 in reference to Christ." Probably they dwelt on Him with extreme 
 delight as the poor man, the friend of the poor, till every other notion of 
 Him was lost in that. 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. m 
 
 also what fear he had that those who had no stronger Lect.viii. 
 faith concerning Christ than this, would be unable to 
 bear the shock of the coming time, which woidd 
 certainly overthrow the institutions in which they 
 were trusting, and would leave nothing behind, if 
 Christ were not indeed the ground, and root, and 
 centre, and corner-stone of the whole universe, if all 
 men and all society were not upheld by Him. 
 
 The traditions of the Jerusalem Church, after the 
 death of James, became very vague indeed. Symeon 
 is said to have been chosen his successor as overseer 
 of the Church ; chiefly, it would seem, because he too Susebim, 
 was supposed to have some relation to our Lord, l ([ ' 1U * 
 according to the flesh. 1 
 
 I have observed already, that we have no account of 
 any election of St. James to be the overseer in the Jeru- 
 salem society, and that it is not probable there was any. 
 If we are to assume the report respecting Symeon as 
 authentic, it would indicate that offices in the Com- 
 munity were now beginning to be sought after. There 
 is an obscure story of one Thebuthis, who was a rival 
 candidate to Symeon, and who seems to have coveted 
 the government from motives of personal ambition. 
 Eusebius, speaking afterwards of the election of Justus Book in. 
 to succeed Symeon, reports him as " one of the tens c " 8o " 
 of thousands of the circumcision that had believed in 
 
 1 The importance attached to this circumstance in the Jerusalem 
 community, ought by no means to be overlooked. The chapter in 
 Eusebius, from which I have quoted, should be compared with the 
 twentieth of the same book, where he quotes from Hegesippus the story 
 of the relations of our Lord who were called before Domitian. It 
 should be remembered that the Origenian tendencies of Eusebius would 
 incline him not to dwell on a circumstance of this kind. 
 
11 2 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. Christ ; " a phrase which conveys the impression that 
 
 the Christians in Jerusalem acquired numbers and 
 
 reputation, as they lost purity. With these imperfect 
 
 records is joined the express assertion, that the Church 
 
 continued pure till the death of the Apostles, but that 
 
 afterwards it became full of all strange opinions and 
 
 EuseMus, heresies, and utterly corrupted. These words are 
 
 Hi c. 32. drawn from some old author ; they must apply to the 
 
 But a far fa^ century. Some would restrict them to the 
 
 more impor- J 
 
 tantpas- Church of Jerusalem. I have no doubt that they 
 TnlooT^. a pply fi rs t to that, as the Epistle to the Hebrews in 
 c \ 22 ' , all probability does. But as that Epistle bears also 
 
 where the * d 
 
 quotation upon the condition of the whole body of Jewish 
 l^ectiy believers in Jesus, I cannot doubt that the mighty 
 from Hege- convu i s i on which destroyed all the outward signs 
 
 sippus, and ^ 
 
 where there that separated them from the Gentile world, caused 
 sion to the love of numbers to wax cold, some sinking into 
 Thebutins ac £ ua } idolatry, some into that recklessness of all 
 
 and to the J 
 
 sects. moral law, of which St. Jude and St. Peter speak, 
 
 some into declared atheism. 
 
 Cerimhus. Nor was the feebleness of the Ebionitic faith the 
 
 SaT onl y ground for fearing such a result. The Hebrews 
 
 c - 28 - to whom St. Peter had spoken of Christ as the Head 
 
 of a divine kingdom, might, when Jerusalem perished, 
 
 expect Him to create another Society on a more 
 
 glorious scale, which should outrival the splendours 
 
 of Rome itself. We see from the Gospels how much 
 
 the Jews had connected a thought of this kind with 
 
 See Gieseier the appearance of the Christ ; it was too plausible a 
 
 Period 1 notion, — too much akin to all the tendencies of the 
 
 ^&s.i,§35. unregenerate heart, not to be reproduced again and 
 
THE THREE APOSTLES, AND THE LATTER DAYS. H3 
 
 again in the Church. It is connected in the first lect.viu. 
 century with the name of Cerinthus. To whatever 
 place he belonged, it seems clear that he was a Jew, 
 and that there were many who dreamed his dream, 
 of a visible throne on which Jesus should sit, while 
 His ministers and subjects should be free to enjoy 
 themselves, and to trample upon other men. 
 
 It would be an error to suppose that though this Pauline 
 
 (JJt'liVcJtCS 
 
 opinion had a Jewish origin, and a Jewish character, 
 the Churches which St. Paul had founded in Gentile 
 cities may not have been infected with it. They had 
 also their own temptations, to which, at a crisis like 
 this, they were especially likely to yield. The Ebion- 
 ites were disposed to shrink from the thought of 
 Christ's divinity; yet some of them, as I have told 
 you, also lost sight of His actual humanity. The 
 Churches which had learnt from St. Paul, — which had 
 heard him say, " That he would know no man after 
 the flesh, yea, that though they had known Christ 
 after the flesh, now henceforth they knew Him no 
 more,"— might easily pervert his doctrine to the denial Abuse of 
 that the Son of God had taken flesh. They might ^'octrileby 
 even think it a low, grovelling conception, that them - 
 so pure a Being coidd come into contact with our 
 earthly nature. I need not tell you how far such a 
 doctrine was from St. Paul's meaning ; and that 
 though he apprehended Christ with his spirit, not with 
 his flesh, no one would have been more ready to die 
 for the truth that He took an actual body, brought 
 it from the tomb, and ascended with it on high. 
 But it is needful to show you, thus early in our course, 
 
 i 
 
114 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 General 
 conclusion 
 
 lect.viii. how the doctrines of Apostles, as well as of inferior 
 doctors, may be corrupted and inverted by those who 
 profess to take one or another of them as their guide. 
 When once the party or sect spirit possesses men, 
 they must turn sacred portions of truth to the denial 
 of other portions of it, which are as sacred and as 
 needful for mankind. 
 
 On the whole, I can use no other language con- 
 cerning this period than that which Christ and His 
 Apostles used. They speak of events in the nations 
 generally, in the Jewish nation particularly, and in 
 the Churches of baptized men, which would be signs 
 of the coining of the Son of Man as a Judge. The 
 events I have reported, which were accompanied with 
 a number of physical portents such as our Lord 
 hinted at, seem to me such signs. But I could not 
 interpret them, or understand the issues of them, or 
 how the kingdom of the Son of God and the Son 
 of Man was to be manifested by means of them, if 
 we had not the help of another divine Teacher, of 
 whose person and whose writings I hope to speak in 
 the next Lecture. 
 
 Christ's 
 words ful- 
 filled 
 literally. 
 
 Transition 
 to S. John. 
 
LECTURE IX. 
 
 ST. JOHN. 
 
 St. Luke does not tell us in what directions the lect. ix. 
 majority of the twelve Apostles went to fulfil their Traditions 
 Master's command. The traditions which report to r t ^ e ^ g 
 what countries they travelled are, some more, some stles - 
 less, probable. Those which concern the East are 
 many of them worthy of credit, and are confirmed by 
 later investigations. Since the first business of the 
 Apostles was to gather Jews into the fold, they would 
 be likely to go wherever their countrymen had settled. 
 It is not proved that they had many colonies in 
 Western Europe ; we need not, therefore, be surprised 
 if we find that the notions which the different Churches 
 in Gaul, or Spain, or Britain have cherished that their [St. Pauls 
 origin was apostolical, may be commonly traced to T^^ t0 
 some mistakes in names, overlooked and favoured s P ai ^^n- 
 
 . tionid in 
 
 by national vanity. If you wonder that we have not the Epistle 
 New Testament information on this subject, you must ^ mi e ans 
 learn once for all, that the New Testament is not was P re - 
 
 vented by 
 
 written to tell us about the doings of men, but about Us impri- 
 the great purposes of God to the world, and how, by sonment •■! 
 this agent or that, He has accomplished them. St. 
 Luke has made occasional allusions to St. James the 
 
 i 2 
 
116 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. Less ; he has spoken much of St. Peter ; he has given 
 us a continuous narrative of St. Paul's labours up to 
 st. Lute* a certain point. But he says nothing of St. James's 
 silence ' death,— of St. Peter's journeyings, or how they termi- 
 nated, — of the issue of St. Paul's imprisonment : upon 
 all these points we must get such tidings as we can ; 
 when not supplied by the Epistles, they are very 
 doubtful. St. Luke has given us such a view of the 
 principles and development of the kingdom, which 
 John the Baptist said was at hand, as we can find 
 nowhere else. It is well that we should understand 
 how precious that knowledge is ; of how little worth, 
 except for the satisfaction of curiosity, the other 
 would be. 
 
 If you want a proof of the difference between the 
 sacred historian and the later ecclesiastical historians, 
 St. Luke as take this instance. There is scarcely any Apostle 
 "™t. tyro ~ who is spoken of more frequently in the Gospels than 
 that James, who was with our Lord on Tabor and in 
 Gethsemane, whose mother desired that he and his 
 brother John might sit, one on the right hand, and 
 one on the left, in their Lord's kingdom. He was the 
 first Apostle who died for the faith of Christ. What 
 an opportunity for a long and eloquent discourse, 
 for an accurate description of sufferings, for records 
 of divine and mysterious succours afforded to the 
 martyr ! St. Luke says, " And Herod slew James 
 the brother of John with the sioord." That is all. He 
 fell fighting in the ranks where he was set to fight : 
 what more could be said of him? But there is an 
 omission which may seem to you more surprising 
 
ST. JOHN. 117 
 
 still. What has become of the other son of thunder? Lect. ix . 
 of him who leaned on Christ's breast at the last Thera J e :. 
 
 71/ CSS OT fltS 
 
 supper ? of him who is called the beloved disciple ? allusions to 
 We hear of him as joined with Peter in the first fc 
 miracle of healing, after the day of Pentecost. He 
 stands with Peter before the Sanhedrim. He goes 
 with Peter to Samaria. Then he vanishes out of the 
 narrative ; we have no more news of him. Pie is 
 called, in the letter to the Galatians, an Apostle of the 
 circumcision. But we are not told how he worked 
 for the circumcision, or whether he had any connexion 
 with the Apostle of the Gentiles. 
 
 I believe that the failure of information in the How it is 
 
 , to be ac- 
 
 sacred historian on this subject, is not merely owing cownte dfor. 
 to the general cause which I have assigned for his 
 silence. St. John, it seems to me, could have no 
 conspicuous place in St. Luke's narrative ; his work 
 belongs to a later time. We could not understand 
 what it was, and why it was needed, if we had not 
 that narrative; if we had not the Epistles of St. James, 
 St. Peter and St. Paul ; nay, if we had not those 
 notices which general history supplies us with of the 
 convulsions in the Roman empire, and its progress 
 to perdition, till the time of Vespasian, — of the strifes 
 and crimes by which the Jewish nation was hastening 
 to a still deeper ruin, — of the way in which the Church 
 in Jerusalem, and the baptized Jews generally, were 
 shaken by the catastrophe which their guides and 
 teachers had predicted. 
 
 The traditions which have come down to us re- Notices of 
 
 . St. John by 
 
 specting St. John are even more uncertain, and have 
 
118 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IX. 
 
 Ecclesiasti- 
 cal Histo- 
 rians. 
 
 Eusebius, 
 Book iii. c. 
 27, and 
 Booh iv. 
 c. 14. 
 
 See Lampe's 
 criticism on 
 the story, in 
 the Prole- 
 gomena to 
 his Com- 
 mentary, 
 lib. i. c. 5. 
 
 Eustbius, 
 Book iii. c. 
 31, in the 
 extract of 
 a letter of 
 Polycrates 
 of Ephesus 
 to Victor of 
 Rome. 
 
 more the air of fables, than those respecting the other 
 Apostles. I am thankful, for my own part, that it is so. 
 The more Christians are driven, by the unsatisfactory 
 character of other documents, to study the books of 
 the New Testament, and to derive their knowledge of 
 the Apostles from them, the more, I believe, they will 
 understand this period, and the more light will fall 
 from it upon the history of later periods. Still a story 
 is not worthless, because we do not accept it as a state- 
 ment of facts. It may indicate some current belief, 
 which more consistent records will test, and either 
 confirm or reject. There is a tale of St. John rushing 
 out of a bath in which Cerinthus was, lest the roof 
 should fall on a heretic. The details of this story are 
 very confused, and it rests on very weak authority. 
 Eusebius, in two places, quotes Irenaeus as quoting 
 Polycarp in support of it. Epiphanius, writing in 
 the fourth century, puts Ebion (who probably never 
 existed) in place of Cerinthus, and tells the story with 
 many additions. On such evidence one cannot believe 
 a story, which is so like a hundred that happened, or 
 were invented, in later times. But the very incon- 
 sistencies in it serve to show, that St. John was 
 regarded as in some sense an especial protestant 
 against Cerinthus, and also against the Ebionites. It 
 is said that St. John wore the insignia of the high- 
 priest. It is quite incredible that he did so ; but I 
 believe we may perceive in the story the indications 
 of a very important truth, viz., that St. John lived in 
 the transition period between the passing away of 
 the Jewish dispensation, and the coming in of the 
 
ST. JOHN. 119 
 
 Christian ; and that it was he who, when the Jewish Lect - ix - 
 priesthood had ceased, showed how the substance and 
 principle of it still survived. He is said to have been 
 taken to Rome in the time of Domitian, to have been 
 thrown into a cauldron ; of boiling oil, and to have 
 come out unhurt. The story rests upon a most sus- TertuiUan, 
 picious authority, that of Tertullian 1 in the end of the t iJ^ ?P 
 second century; it is adopted by no one before Jerome c - xxxvi - 
 in the fourth. There is no probability that St. John Jerome ad- 
 ever saw Rome. Nevertheless the existence of such a story ^ Com . 
 story confirms the opinion, which we derive from a 7> ^ nL on 
 better source and from internal evidence, that the 23) with 
 Roman emperor had an undefined dread of St. John, si legamus 
 as of one who was still speaking of a kingdom which hls * onas . 
 might interfere with the monarchy of the Caesars, cas in qui- 
 after it was supposed that such hopes were buried in to prove 
 the ruins of Jerusalem. ?f SL 77 
 
 John realty 
 
 I cannot venture to give you any decision about drank our 
 the exact chronology of the books which are attributed 
 
 to St. John. 2 There have been long disputes about Thewri- 
 
 it, which you may study hereafter, if you have time. j k n . 
 
 1 " Felix. Ecclesia (Romana) cui totam doctrinam Apostoli cum Sanguine 
 suo profuderunt ; ubi Petrus passioni dominicse adsequatur ; ubi Paulus 
 Johannis (Baptistce) exitu coronatur; ubi Apostolus Johannes postea 
 quam in oleum igneum demersus, nihil passus est, iu insulam relegatur." 
 This is actually the warrant for a story, upon which some have been 
 bold enough to rest the credibility of a Gospel, by which the very life of 
 Christendom has been sustained for 1800 years ! 
 
 2 I have omitted any allusion to the celebrated story of the youth 
 whom St. John recovered, and to many of the other tales respecting 
 him, the chief value of which consists, I think, in the impression which 
 they leave on our minds of the vague dignity which was attached to its 
 person and position. To ascertain whence their real dignity arose, — what 
 St. John's historical importance is, — we must turn to his own writings. 
 
120 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. I do not feel the question, whether they were all, or 
 any of them, written after or before the destruction of 
 Jerusalem, to be very important. What I do feel is, 
 that they explain, as no books not contemporaneous, 
 and not written by a divine teacher, could explain, 
 the condition of a period which is otherwise most 
 obscure, the period between the reign of Vespasian 
 and the close of the first century. When I speak 
 thus, I do not mean that the Gospel, the Epistles, or 
 Apocalypse of St. John, are chiefly valuable because 
 Their reia- they interpret to us a little fragment of history. I 
 times not believe they interpret the deepest mysteries concern- 
 
 affected, by j n g man an( J Q Q fi ft m ^ ^hey revea ] to US the Very 
 
 'investing ° " J 
 
 them with a ground of theology ; that they show us the principles 
 portance in of all history. But I do not think they woidd accom- 
 rdatwn to pligjj these purposes if they did not, first of all, apply 
 to a particular crisis in God's government of the 
 world ; to a crisis in which, I believe, the question was 
 tried, whether mankind was to sink into utter atheism, 
 or whether Christ's kingdom was to be manifested, 
 as it had never been manifested before. This is my 
 reason for speaking of them. I have no wish to give 
 you a commentary upon them ; that is not my office. 
 I shall not set forth any theory about that which is 
 in opposition to other theories. Hereafter you may, 
 perhaps, find that it is possible to do justice to all the 
 theories of good and learned men about the prophetical 
 books of Scripture, and to perceive that their different 
 expectations have had a fulfilment, and may have a 
 fulfilment, in the history of the Church and the world. 
 But that you may do this, you should first try to 
 
ST. JOHN. 121 
 
 follow the letter of those books. You should strictly lect. ix. 
 believe the writers, when they say that they are 
 speaking of things that are, or of things that are very 
 shortly to be ; then you will understand how truly 
 they foretel what God would accomplish in other 
 circumstances and distant generations. 
 
 The Apocalypse has seemed to many to be so differ- TUori^ 
 ent in its character from the Gospel and the Epistles "^Gospel 
 of St. John, that they have thought it could not pro- " nd A P° ca - 
 ceed from the same. writer. Eusebius hints that it 
 may have been written by John, a presbyter, of whom 
 Papias makes mention as living in Asia about the 
 time of St. John's death ; but he does not offer the 
 least argument in support of the hypothesis. Some 
 later writers have taken just the opposite view. 
 They have said the Apocalypse belongs to the first 
 century, and has all the characteristics which one 
 would expect from St. John, an Apostle of the circum- 
 cision; but that the Gospel evidently belongs to a 
 later time, when Judaism was at an end, when people 
 had been much in the habit of talking of Christ as 
 the Word of God, and when the simple faith in Him 
 had given place to a refined theology. I think that the 
 hypothesis upon which both these opposite opinions 
 rest is a false one; that the Apocalypse and the Gos- 
 pel have the same object, and are in all essentials of 
 the same character; that one as much as the other 
 has clear marks of belonging to the end of the first 
 century, and could belong to no other time. 
 
 You remember that the Gospel opens with the words, Opening 0/ 
 " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was ' J ° spe ' 
 
122 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ix. with God, and the Word was God. The same was also in 
 the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, 
 and without Him toas not anything made that was made. 
 In Him ivas Life, and the Life was the Light of men. 
 And the Light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness 
 hath not comprehended it." These words evidently 
 
 John the give the character to the Gosrjel. They led the Church 
 
 Theologian. -i-n 
 
 to call St. John, above the other Apostles and Evan- 
 gelists, The Theologian. They afford the excuse for 
 saying that he must have belonged to the second 
 century, when the earlier belief in Jesus had given 
 way to theories and speculations about His divine 
 and mysterious nature. I quite admit that the words 
 I have quoted do lead us into the very heart of 
 theology ; that we shall never be theologians if we do 
 not think of them, study them, live upon them. But 
 those who say, that therefore they must have been 
 written in the second century, and not in the first, 
 overlook one or two facts, with which, as they are 
 learned men, they must be perfectly familiar. 
 
 The Logos. The first is, that there never had been more dis- 
 courses respecting the Logos, or the Word of God, 
 than there were in the early part of the first century. 
 
 PMio. I have mentioned the name of Philo, the Alexandrian 
 Jew. I did not dwell upon his writings, because the 
 time was not come when I could make you under- 
 stand how important they are to ecclesiastical history. 
 Nor shall I speak of them in any detail now, because 
 they would keep me from a still more pressing topic. 
 
 His central But I must tell you that Philo, being a deep student 
 of the Old Testament, discovered in every part of 
 
ST. JOHN. 123 
 
 it, in the History, the Law, in the Psalms, the lect. ix. 
 Proverbs, but above all in the Prophets, continual 
 allusions to One by whom God had spoken to men, 
 in whom He was marvellously united to the creatures 
 whom He had formed in His own likeness. All that 
 is most interesting in Philo — all that is most practical 
 — bears directly upon this subject ; it is the key 
 to every one of his thoughts. He desires to know 
 how this Divine Person is related to God ; how he is 
 related to man. He sees that all light must have 
 come into men's hearts from Him. He cannot doubt 
 that the Gentiles must have been instructed by Him 
 as well as the Jews, else how could they have known 
 anything, or ever have turned away from vain things, 
 to seek after what is substantial and good? Philo m s school, 
 built a number of allegories and conceits upon this ^sedTo the 
 belief. He made the apprehension of this Divine GospeL 
 Teacher the test of the wise man, and he was much 
 inclined to despise all people who were not wise. Pie 
 could, therefore, have very little sympathy with those 
 who came preaching of a Lord who had spoken to 
 publicans and harlots while He was upon earth, and 
 who was drawing the most ignorant and the most 
 sinful to Him, after He had ascended on high. The 
 thought of a crucified King and Son of God was, 
 I suppose, more offensive to the Jews of Philo's 
 school than even to the Pharisees. I have hinted 
 already, that they had probably a chief part in 
 Stephen's death. 
 
 Yet this class of men at last supplied as many Christian 
 disciples, and as many teachers of the Cross, as any fl^Z* 
 
124 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ix. class in the Jewish or the Roman world. Apollos is 
 a specimen. When you read the First Epistle to 
 the Corinthians attentively, you will find what kind 
 of effect he produced on that Church, and how 
 thoroughly St. Paul recognised the truths which he 
 taught; though he saw how they were likely to be 
 perverted, and were perverted, by the self-conceit and 
 the party spirit of the Greeks, and how needful it was 
 that he should declare to them that in Jesus Christ, 
 and Him crucified, God had manifested His Wisdom 
 and Power. To connect these two truths together, 
 the glory of Christ and His humiliation, — the truth 
 that all God's righteousness and wisdom had been 
 Ax>oiiosand revealed in Him, but that they were revealed in His 
 weakness, poverty, and death ; to show the Corinthians 
 how impossible it was for them to form a united body 
 except in Christ, — here we have the aim of St. Paul's 
 teaching. The necessity for such teaching became 
 more and more apparent afterwards. I have told 
 you already, that the disciples of the Apostles were 
 inclined to rend asunder the truths which they had 
 been appointed to proclaim, and to set them in con- 
 Ch-eatcon- flict with each other. These strifes took various 
 llllime iovms in various places ; Cephas, Apollos, Paul, were 
 the Shibboleths at Corinth; James and Paul else- 
 where. But this cardinal difference lay at the root of 
 them all : one set of men were inclined to contemplate 
 Christ as divine, and to deny that He had taken 
 flesh ; the other were inclined to contemplate Him as 
 merely the great human Teacher, who had come at 
 a certain time on a certain mission into the world, 
 
ST. JOHN. 125 
 
 and had no eternal relation to the Lord God, whom Lect. ix. 
 eye had not seen, nor ear heard. We have seen how 
 this kind of feeling was at work, especially among 
 the Hebrew Christians, and how the only way to 
 prepare them for the crisis that was at hand was to 
 lead them to a deeper foundation, — to the acknow- 
 ledgment of Christ as the express image of the 
 Father, in whom alone God could look upon them 
 as children, who, because the children were par- 
 takers of flesh and blood, Himself also took part 
 of the same. And it was, I conceive, that men How the 
 might pass safely through this crisis that St. John, aeMebrews 
 in language more broad, simple, and distinct than lsrd ^ tedt0 
 that of the Epistle to the Hebrews, proclaims his of John. 
 theology. 
 
 For this is the other fact which I alluded to as 
 being overlooked by the learned men, who will throw 
 St. John's Gospel into the second century. They 
 first assume that he could not have talked as he does 
 of a Word of God in the first century, though no 
 language was so familiar and widely diffused as that 
 was in this very century ; they next assume that he 
 is not as simple as the other writers of the New 
 Testament. Here they are at issue, not with history, 
 but with the heart and the common sense of humble 
 readers. They feel and express the conviction, in 
 a number of ways, that St. John is the most simple, st. John the 
 the most childlike of all the writers in the New JJJJjgJJ^r 
 Testament — the one who brings our Lord, as a man 9 eUsts - 
 in his acts and sympathies, the most thoroughly before 
 them. Instead of writing like a man who, in a dis- 
 
120 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. tant day, was looking back and speculating about His 
 nature, he writes like one who had seen His acts on 
 earth, and had stored them in his heart ; who had felt 
 the meaning of them a little at the time, and who had 
 entered into the whole sense of them afterwards, as 
 being the manifestation of the only-begotten of the 
 Father, full of grace and truth. 
 Depth and If you have a fancy, any of you, that these two 
 simplicity. q Ua ]ities are inconsistent with each other, — that a man 
 must give up his simplicity if he is to be a deep 
 theologian, or must be a shallow theologian that he 
 may be simple — no one will clear your minds of it like 
 St. John. And, be assured, you have need to clear 
 your minds of it, You will have to work among 
 very ignorant people. You ought to be thoroughly 
 direct, and straightforward, and childlike in your ad- 
 dresses to them. But if you are childish instead of 
 childlike ; if you pour out froth to them, or give them 
 empty, wordy truisms, when you should open to them 
 divine truths, you will be utterly useless, and God 
 Deep theo- will call you to account for such trifling. The poorest, 
 logy needed s t U pidest, wickedest man you can meet with, seeing 
 poor. l ie is a man, wants to know what he is himself, and 
 
 what God is, and how he is related to Him. If you 
 tell him less than that, he will never be satisfied, and 
 you have not fulfilled your commission. If you tell 
 him that, you must go down to the very root of 
 theology. Superficial thoughts may do for lazy, 
 comfortable people, who want a religion to set them 
 at ease with their consciences, and to enable them to 
 go on worshipping God and Mammon together ; they 
 
ST. JOHN. 127 
 
 will not do for suffering people, with whom it is lect. ix. 
 a question of life and death, whether there is any one 
 in whom they may believe, and how they may find 
 Him, and what He has done for them. 
 
 Do you want some interpreter of St. John's Gospel? wkenSt. 
 I believe the more you know of your own hearts, the pe i becomes 
 more you know of human beings, the more you will mtelh 9 lole - 
 find that you want St. John's Gospel to interpret 
 them. Those first words that I repeated to you, so 
 distinct, decisive, authoritative, how they meet the 
 hearts and consciences of human beings! how they 
 tell them of the very Guide and Teacher, they have The Word, 
 been feeling after, and trying to find, whom they 
 confess every day, and deny every day, whose light 
 comes to them, and whose light they try to hide in 
 their darkness ! Do you want to convince them that 
 this Person is God, and with God ? Tell it them as 
 St. John tells it them : try whether they do not per- 
 ceive more of what you mean through God's own 
 teaching, than by all your arguments. But they do 
 want to hear whether this Person, their Lord and 
 King, has always been hidden, or whether He has 
 come forth and manifested Himself as He is. And The Word 
 if you will go on with this first chapter, you will see ma ' 
 how St. John says, in the same simple, decisive man- 
 ner as before, " And the Word was made flesh and 
 die el t among us ; and we beheld His glory, the glory as 
 of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and 
 truth" It is not, you see, that he is unfolding to us 
 a great theory; he is telling us of a living Being whom 
 he saw, with whom he conversed. Then, in all the 
 
128 0N CHUUCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. Gospel afterwards, you will find him showing by what 
 acts and words, to what different classes of persons, 
 He made His light and glory manifest, never for 
 a moment being less an actual, suffering, sympathis- 
 ing Man, that He might display His divine might 
 and character, but making the one visible through the 
 The mar- other. At the marriage-feast of Galilee, where He is 
 riage-feast. ^-^ ^ e same f QQ( [ ^^ jj- g disciples, sharing the 
 
 same joy, He manifests forth His glory, and they 
 believe on Him. In the Temple, where He manifests 
 that zeal for God's house which all the old prophets 
 had felt, they discern that it is from Him all had 
 received that grace. And though the disciples did 
 not understand at first what He meant by saying 
 that if they destroyed that temple, He would raise it 
 again in three days, yet, after the resurrection, they 
 
 The Temple, perceived that His body was the true temple in 
 which God dwelt. In this way, as St. John explains 
 it to us, the conviction of what He was, some- 
 times flashed into their minds at the moment, some- 
 times awoke up afterwards when events explained 
 His dark sayings. So likewise the Pharisee Nicode- 
 mus, who came in secret, puzzled by Christ's miracles, 
 to question Him about the kingdom of which He 
 spoke, heard words to which at first he could affix but 
 
 The birth very little meaning, — about a birth from above, and 
 
 from above. ^^ ^ ^ g^ ^ ^ g Qn Qf M{m being m&d 
 
 up, and the Son of Man having come down from 
 heaven, and being in heaven; but by degrees, as 
 he sought for light, and came to it that his deeds 
 might be made manifest, these things interpreted what 
 
ST. JOHN. 129 
 
 he had been studying before, and teaching others as a Lect. ix. 
 Master in Israel. So He makes the Samaritan woman The mil of 
 understand, as He sits by the well, that He knows all 
 that ever she did, and that she needs a spring of 
 living water, which He alone can call forth in her. So 
 by healing a man on the sabbath, at the pool of Beth- 
 esda, He leads the Pharisee to questions and com- 
 plaints, which bring out the assertion, that He works, 
 as a Son, His Father's work ; that it is His voice The Son and 
 
 ••tti i the Father. 
 
 which quickens the dead, and that it is He by whom 
 
 all will be judged. So the feeding the multitude brings 
 
 out the lesson that He is the Bread of Life, that He 
 
 came down from Heaven to give life to the world; 
 
 that His flesh is meat, and His blood drink indeed. 
 
 So at the feast of Tabernacles, while the women were 
 
 carrying the pitchers of water to celebrate the striking 
 
 of the rock in the Wilderness, He speaks of the well of 
 
 water which He would open, of the Spirit which those The Sj,h-;/. 
 
 who believed on Him should receive. So the assertion 
 
 of the Jews, near the same time, that they were never 
 
 in bondage to any man, leads to His teaching, that 
 
 those who had committed sin were the servants of sin, slavery and 
 
 and that only the Son could make them free. So the 
 
 giving light to the eyes of a man who had been blind 
 
 from his birth, leads to a revelation of Him to the 
 
 heart of this man, as the Son of God ; and to a new 
 
 declaration of the reason why the Pharisees were 
 
 blind, because they thought they had light, and The Blind. 
 
 did not come to the light, that it might show 
 
 them their darkness. So the pride and selfishness of 
 
 these shepherds leads Him to speak of the true 
 
130 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IX. 
 
 The true 
 and false 
 Shepherd. 
 
 TJte Resur- 
 rection and 
 IAfe. 
 
 The corn of 
 wheat. 
 
 Tlie dis- 
 courses at 
 the Feast. 
 
 The Vine 
 and the 
 Branches. 
 
 Shepherd, and of the test of His character, that He gives 
 His life for the sheep ; so this test leads to the asser- 
 tion of His own oneness with the Father, who knows 
 Him as He knows the sheep. So the death of Lazarus 
 leads to the manifestation of Him as the Resurrection 
 and the Life. So the coming up of a few Greeks to 
 the feast, who desired to see Christ — the first-fruits of 
 the Greeks that should afterwards be called in — leads 
 to a foretaste of His sufferings, and to the deep saying, 
 which after times were to expound, that, if a corn of 
 wheat fell into the ground and died, it would bear 
 much fruit ; that Sacrifice and Death must always be 
 the root from which life comes. 
 
 I have run hastily over those chapters which con- 
 tain St. John's account of our Lord's public ministry, 
 that you may see how livingly they exhibit the Son of 
 God in all the different aspectsof His character, through 
 the Son of Man. Then if you proceed to the latter 
 chapters, which contain His discourses with His own 
 disciples, (between the 12th and 18th,) you will see 
 how, in the like living manner, they bring forth the 
 name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. 
 There is no doctrine formally enunciated; but the 
 disciples are led, in their sorrow and approaching 
 desolation, to feel that He, from whom they are going 
 to part, will be with them still; that they are attached 
 to Him as the branches are attached to the vine ; 
 that He is going to the Father with whom He is one, 
 and who is watching over them; that a Comforter 
 will be sent from Him to testify of Him and the 
 Father, that they also may be able to bear witness ; 
 
ST. JOHN. 131 
 
 which witness will expose them to hatred and death, lect. ix. 
 the shepherd being first smitten, the sheep afterwards. The Com- 
 Finally, that when our Lord prayed to His Father, He • /bWen 
 could not separate Himself from them, or from those 
 who should come after ; that what He had asked for ThePrayer. 
 them, and asked then, and would ask for ever, was, 
 that, " as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in Thee, so 
 they may be one in us." This prayer, and the dis- 
 course which has introduced it, you must never sepa- 
 rate from the history of the Betrayal, and Trial, and 
 Crucifixion, and Resurrection. Those events express 
 the sense of all that has gone before. There we see 
 the Sacrifice, without which the prayer would have TheSam- 
 had no reality. The record of them, so St. John 
 concludes, was written, that all who read might know 
 that Jesus is the Son of God, and that, believing, they 
 might have Life through His name. 
 
 If you pass with these words on your minds to the Thc Etcr - 
 
 nal Life 
 
 first Epistle of St. John, which begins thus : " That mani- 
 whicli was from the beginning, which we have heard, ***' 
 which ice have seen with our eyes, and which our 
 hands have handled, of the Word of Life ; for the Life 
 was manifested, and ice have seen it, and we declare 
 to you that Eternal Life which was with the Father, 
 and has been manifested to us ; " you will have a 
 sense of the connexion between these two documents, 
 and a perception of the thought with which the writer 
 of them was occupied, such as no arguments of mine, 
 or of any one else, could give you. But you must st, John's 
 also consider that Epistle in relation to the Epistles jnM 
 of the other Apostles, to whom I referred in my last 
 
 k 2 
 
132 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lkct. IX. 
 
 Cause of 
 Division. 
 
 Truths 
 
 inverted. 
 
 Return to 
 the Divine 
 ground. 
 
 Lecture. You heard how the disciples of St. James, 
 St. Peter, and St. Paul, were attempting to set up the 
 doctrine of one against that of the other; how the 
 honest preference which they felt for him who had 
 been their own guide in the path of righteousness, 
 made them dividers of the Truth, and therefore per- 
 verters of what he had told them. All such divisions 
 arose from their magnifying some thought or feeling 
 of theirs about God into the place of His Revelation 
 of Himself; from their notion that they were choosing 
 Him, not He them ; from the dream, that their faith, 
 or good works, or knowledge, or graciousness, or 
 love, was the ground upon which they were to build. 
 Then when they had once assumed this false starting 
 point, Christ's appearing and His acts became them- 
 selves the pleas for fresh disputings. ' He had come 
 to confirm the Law, or to set aside the Law. He 
 had merely asserted the old Covenant against those 
 who were forgetting it, and setting it aside, or He 
 had come to introduce a new Covenant, which was to 
 abolish the old.' Each side in those controversies felt 
 it had hold of something, which the other was re- 
 fusing to acknowledge. Each became more impatient 
 of its adversary's conviction for that very reason. 
 Each was making Christ Himself the author of strife. 
 Now St. John did not undertake to reconcile these 
 quarrels by conceding a little to one of the parties, 
 and a little to the other. He went to the root of the 
 matter. Leaving the notions of men, he returned to 
 the revelation of God. He affirmed boldly that He 
 whom they had heard, and seen, and handled, had 
 
ST. JOHN. 133 
 
 manifested forth God as He is, had shown Him to Lect. ix. 
 be the Light, with which no darkness at all is 
 mingled ; the Love in which there is no one element 
 that is contrary to Love. Painters have had silly, The Apostle 
 childish, mischievous notions, that because St. John £ove n0 
 speaks of Love more than the other Apostles, he had 8 ^ ien ' 
 a soft, feminine, sentimental countenance, without the 
 wrinkles of age ; betraying no conflict; capable of no 
 indignation or sternness. Do not believe them. Every 
 word in this Epistle refutes such a fancy. There is 
 as much severity in this letter as in any in the New 
 Testament. He calls those who pretend that they 
 love God and hate their brother, liars and mur- 
 derers. He says that they abide in death. He 
 says that those who commit sin are of the Devil. Bis 
 These are broad, plain words, and instead of being 
 qualifications of those which went before, they arise 
 out of them. God is absolutely good ; God reveals 
 Himself to us in His Son, that we may have fellowship 
 in Him. God sends His Spirit into our hearts, that 
 we may be His children, and have His likeness, and 
 acknowledge His features in our fellow-men. To be 
 separate from this God, to have a will at war with 
 His, must be misery, must be death. 
 
 Observe what follows from this method of the 
 Apostle. He is able to reconcile that strife of the 
 Old and the New, which, at this time especially, was z*« oh 
 becoming so violent. That which I tell you, he says, New. 
 is what you have heard from the beginning. I am 
 proclaiming the same God who gave your fathers the 
 Covenant and the Commandments ; the law of Love 
 
134 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ix. was always the law of His being. It was this law 
 which was implied in all His dealings with His crea- 
 tures, in all that He demanded of them. But now 
 this is true in Him and in you. This Law has been 
 kept. The Word of God, who was from the beginning 
 with God, has taken flesh and fulfilled it. For you 
 then it is a new Law, a new Commandment. It is 
 revealed to you in a Person. It has become in Him a 
 power enabling you to act rightly, not only a decree 
 which makes you feel that you have acted wrongly. 
 In this way St. John realizes His calling as an Apostle 
 The Apostle of the Circumcision. He vindicates the ground on 
 % the which his fathers stood. He says that their revelation 
 
 Lire a nl- ^ 
 
 vision ex- f Q 0( [ was altogether a true revelation. But in this 
 
 plains the . . . 
 
 ground of way he also fulfils his calling as the herald ol a new 
 ct!trh 0UG a g e tliat was to supersede the old. He shows that 
 the old must pass away ; because it has done its work 
 so thoroughly. St. John's Epistle is Catholic, as St. 
 James's and St. Peter's are Catholic. It assumes 
 the calling of the Jews to be the ground of the 
 divine Ecclesia. But he is Catholic in another sense. 
 He does not speak of Twelve Tribes. He speaks of 
 that body into which the Twelve Tribes had been 
 expanded. He speaks to those who were united in 
 The Du-ine the Name which his Gospel and Epistle alike are 
 setting forth, the name of the Father, of the Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost. 1 
 
 1 I do not mean, of course, the slightest allusion to the verse upon 
 which there has been so much valuable criticism expended, and which 
 defenders of the Trinity were, for awhile, so foolishly set upon support- 
 ing. I believe the effect of the whole Epistle, as a declaration of the 
 Divine Name, is weakened, not strengthened, by the passage in which 
 
 Name. 
 
ST. JOHN. 135 
 
 If you have understood me so far, you will be Lect. ix. 
 prepared to follow me in what I have to say of the 
 Apocalypse, which I reserve for the final Lecture of 
 this Introductory Course. 
 
 some marginal amiotator, probably with the most innocent intention, 
 endeavours to sum up the doctrine of it. 
 
LECTURE X. 
 
 THE APOCALYPSE. 
 
 lect. x. The book ' of which I am to speak opens with the 
 The words : The Apocalypse or unveiling of Jesus Christ, 
 
 ing Vision. w ^i c ^ God gave to Him; to show unto His servants 
 things which must shortly come to pass : and He sent 
 and signified it by His Angel to His servant John; 
 who bore record of the JFord of God and of the testi- 
 mony of Jesus Christ, and of all things which he saw. 
 The writer immediately explains his title. On the 
 island of Patmos he had a vision of the Son of Man 
 
 1 Dionysius, the Bishop of Alexandria, according to Eusebius, consi- 
 dered the style of the Apocalypse evidence against its proceeding from 
 the same writer as the Gospel. The force of his objection may be felt 
 more strongly by those who read the text of Lachmann, than even by 
 those who follow that with which we are familiar. The offences against 
 the rules of Greek grammar are greater in that which we are warranted, 
 perhaps, in considering the more accurate collation. But every one, 
 I suppose, will allow that the Gospel and the Epistle are very Hebraic 
 in their form and construction; much more so than the Gospel of 
 St. Luke and the Epistles of St. Paul. Hence their simplicity. Imagine 
 a writer who, — by divine ordinance, as we believe, using his circum- 
 stances and education, — had always been led to look at Greek through 
 the forms of his country's language, called upon to record visions 
 of that which is not under the laws of Time. Might we not expect 
 from him in such a case, a disregard of tenses, — the peculiarity of the 
 refined Lido-Germanic tongues,— a recurrence to the freedom of the 
 older prophets ? 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 137 
 
 walking in the midst of seven golden candlesticks, lect. x. 
 I use the word " vision," because it is the one which in what 
 
 , sense a 
 
 would be generally used to denote such an appearance Yidoiu 
 as is there described. But I must tell you that the 
 other word, " unveiling," or Revelation, is an immea- 
 surably better one, and for this reason. By a vision 
 we are apt to understand a momentary impression 
 made upon the eyes or upon the mind of a particular 
 person, of something that has been, or that is, or that 
 is about to be. We associate it with what is trans- 
 itory, with what belongs to the feelings and circum- 
 stances of an individual. Now a revelation, whether 
 we look at the origin of the word or at the use of it 
 in Scripture, suggests a meaning that is precisely 
 the opposite of this. A veil is withdrawn that we The word 
 
 i'ii i i j.i i*i. Apocalypse 
 
 may know that which has always been, though it j eWer . 
 has been hidden from us. That which is true and 
 permanent, but not visible, is laid bare. As the 
 Psalmist expresses it, the foundations of the round 
 world are discovered. And though the discovery is 
 made to a particular man, the truth which he learns 
 is for all just as much as for himself. 
 
 If you read the first chapter of the Apocalypse con- Not a mere 
 siderately and devoutly, you will see how unlike it is p r J ic . 
 to a mere dream. There is the profoundest reality 
 in it. And it is not a case of what the Scotch call 
 " second sight." It is not the apprehension of some- 
 thing that may come to pass hereafter, as if it were 
 present. The unveiling of Jesus Christ is that final 
 discovery for which all God's previous discoveries had 
 been preparing. It gathers them up ; it explains their 
 
 tions. 
 
138 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - x - purpose ; it shows what that truth is which was 
 
 beneath them all. 
 TheOandh- The form of the Revelation is connected with the 
 Candlestick in the Jewish Tabernacle. It tells us what 
 that Candlestick was teaching the people. A centre 
 of light there was, from which all partial light pro- 
 ceeded ; all creatures were dark when that was with- 
 drawn; each fulfilled its own work and illuminated 
 its own sphere, while it was drawing light from the 
 source of light. Jesus Christ here, as in the Gospel 
 of St. John, is declared to be this Centre of Light, 
 and to be ever dispensing it. He is walking in the 
 Tmnsia- midst of the seven golden candlesticks. The old 
 syZbahito Tabernacle has passed away; the Temple has either 
 reality. perished or is about to perish. But the meaning of 
 the Tabernacle and of the Temple remains. The living 
 Person of whom they have been testifying, is now 
 unveiled. And the old witnesses of His presence, — 
 not only the Tabernacle and the Candlesticks, but the 
 Nation whose office was to diffuse light through the 
 world, — have left other witnesses behind them. The 
 seven Candlesticks are the seven Churches. 
 The new Here, as in the Epistle, we find St. John reconciling 
 
 witnesses. 
 
 what seemed the opposite views of the Church, which 
 are presented to us by the Apostles of the Cir- 
 cumcision, and by St. Paul. We start from the 
 Jewish ground, from the Tabernacle and the Candle- 
 stick. But the truth contained in these is now 
 realized and exhibited in a number of distinct bodies. 
 These bodies, we shall see, differ as much from each 
 other in their characters, circumstances, dangers," 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 139 
 
 as those which St. Paul makes us acquainted with. Lect. x. 
 Though they were near to each other, there is 
 no obvious fellowship between them ; the Unity is 
 beneath. And St. John goes on to show us, how He 
 who is walking in the midst of them, and is their 
 common Centre, is, at the same time, acting upon 
 each one of them, speaking to each one. 
 
 The Apostles were now all of them dead, except ffoMrBMi 
 St. John. I have explained to you what kind of Churches. 
 government they exercised while they were alive, how 
 fatherly a government it was, how severe it often was, 
 yet how gracious, how little it was defined by rules, 
 how it reminded those who were subject to it of their 
 Divine Father and of His government. What was to 
 become of the Churches, when the Apostles passed 
 away? The Epistles to Timothy and Titus tell us 
 how St. Paul ordained overseers in Ephesus and 
 Crete, to correct evils which were working in the 
 Churches there, and to set them in order. The worth 
 of these Epistles cannot be overrated. They teach 
 us much respecting that age ; they are guides to 
 all after ages. But the Jewish polity was then 
 standing. St. Paid did not desire to set up 
 another in the place of it. It might be said that 
 Timothy and Titus were both exercising their func- 
 tions in subordination to the Apostle. We could not 
 conclude what would happen in the new state of 
 things after the great overthrow. The same writer 
 who tells us that the seven candlesticks were the 
 seven Churches, tells us that the stars in Christ's Thenars 
 right hand were the Angels of the seven Churches. rljjahaJi. 
 
140 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. And then he interprets his own words, by delivering 
 a message, not in his own name, but in Christ's 
 Name, to these Angels. 
 
 TheAwjds. The name Angels is not defined, as words are 
 defined in a dictionary. But there could not be a 
 word which is equally significant to those who read 
 the Bible, and especially to those who read this book. 
 The Angel is the messenger between the invisible and 
 the visible world. Each Church exists as a witness 
 that there is an intercourse between these worlds, that 
 Christ has broken down the barrier between them. 
 He who presides over each Church testifies in his own 
 person of this fellowship. His position declares that 
 he has no light in himself, no authority of his own ; 
 that any good he does, any power he exerts, comes 
 from One who is not seen, but who is really present, 
 the Guide of his spirit, the true Shepherd of his 
 flock. I must beseech you to keep this principle 
 steadily in recollection. I cannot tell you what mists 
 have gathered round the Church from the forgetfulness 
 of it, or how much it may help us in seeing our 
 way through those mists. 
 
 The Messa- The messages to these seven Churches, which are 
 
 civwch; contained in the second and third chapters of the 
 
 how they Apocalvpse, have seemed to some persons so wonder- 
 aye often 1 j 1. ' i 
 
 interpreted, fully descriptive of different periods in the history of 
 the modern world, that they have talked of the 
 Sardian age, and the Philadelphian age, and the 
 Laodicean age, as if the Apostle's object was to point 
 out conditions of society which were to succeed each 
 other in some predestined order. I do not know 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 141 
 
 any thing which affords one a greater test of the JLect. x. 
 truthfulness of the book and of the inspiration of 
 the writer, than this. Every one sees allusions in the 
 words to something which he has read of or^ met 
 with. And he is not wrong. These applications, and 
 multitudes which have not been observed, may all be 
 admitted, if we do not try to bind the divine Teacher 
 with our withes ; if we will take the words as we find 
 them, and believe that Christ was actually speaking 
 through His servant to different Churches, which were 
 existing in that day. For my purpose, I must adhere 
 resolutely to that simple course. 
 
 The Angel of the Ephesian Church may, or may Ephesus. 
 not have been Timothy, whom St. Paul set over it. 
 Whoever he was, he is described as very earnest in 
 trying those who say they are Apostles and are not; as 
 being patient and laborious ; as hating the deeds of the 
 Nicolaitans ; but as having fallen from his first love. 
 You will easily suppose that there were many at this Fuhe 
 period, who pretended that they were Apostles, in the 
 sense in which St. Paul said he was an Apostle, —who 
 boasted that Christ had called them; who affirmed 
 that they had received a divine illumination, and 
 must therefore be heeded by all people who cared for 
 their salvation. The overseer of the Church in Ephesus 
 appears to have been a bold, sensible, clear-sighted 
 teacher, who was not daunted by these fanatics, but 
 brought them to plain tests, and proved that they 
 were not righteous men. There were also those who 
 talked of the Gospel as being spiritual, and as having 
 nothing to do with the Law. The flesh, in their 
 
142 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. judgment, was utterly contemptible ; they might use 
 Nkoiai- it as they liked. 1 Nicolas, one of the Deacons, is 
 tans ' said to have maintained a doctrine of this kind; and 
 
 either he or his disciples deduced from it the lawful- 
 ness of a community of wives. This doctrine, the 
 like of which we shall hear of often in the Church, 
 had found its way to Ephesus. The angel of the 
 Church there hated it, and tried to put it down, as 
 he was bound to do. You see he was a strict 
 upholder of straightforward honesty and morality, 
 Loss of against those who would subvert them. But, as often 
 first love, happens with people of his class, he appears to have 
 become somewhat indifferent to spiritual principles, 
 in his zeal against the abuse of them. Coldness and 
 hardness were creeping on him, in the midst of his 
 eagerness to assert the true, and to get rid of the 
 counterfeits ; he is bidden to repent, or his candle- 
 stick will be removed out of its place. The Spirit, 
 Tiiepvmisk- who is speaking to him, tells him, that if he overcomes 
 tf^lCsLg. ms besetting evil, he shall eat of the tree of life, which 
 is in the midst of the Paradise of God. You must 
 observe here, once for all, that in speaking to the 
 Angel of the Church, the Spirit speaks to the Church. 
 Its overseer represents it. His habits of mind, his 
 temptations, the threatenings and promises which 
 most concern him, belong to the society which he 
 
 1 The passage in Clemens, Sr/awjuara, Book III. (from which Eusebius 
 quotes, Book III. c. 28), if it cannot be assumed as strictly historical, has 
 considerable internal evidence in its favour. Nicolas, it appears, wished 
 to make a display of his amazing power of self-restraint. His followers 
 converted his teaching into a plea for unlimited self-indulgence. The 
 story has been repeated again and again in Church History. 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. l/j.;3 
 
 guides. Observe, too, that the great punishment of Lect.x. 
 all, is the extinction of Light. The candlestick shall 
 be taken away. 
 
 The Angel of the Church in Smyrna was exposed Smyrna. 
 to severe persecutions. The Apostle indicates clearly 
 whence they came. There were some who said they 
 were Jews, but were not. He maintains the believer 
 in Jesus to be the true Jew, the true assertor of the 
 covenant with Abraham. The other Jews, though TheSyna- 
 they might be numerically stronger, were a synagogue gogue ' 
 of Satan. But they had the greatest power of annoy- 
 ing their countrymen, who clung to the right king, 
 either directly, or by their influence with heathen 
 magistrates and mobs. The Smyrna angel and 
 Church had need to remember Him who had been 
 dead and was alive ; if they clung to Him — whatever The secovd 
 befel their bodies — they could not be hurt by the ( 
 second, the spiritual death. 
 
 I imagine that nearly all the persecutions of this Pcrgamos. 
 time still proceeded from the Synagogue; for the 
 bitterness of the Jews against those whom they re- 
 garded as their worst enemies, both a little before the 
 fall of Jerusalem, and (as we shall find) for many 
 years afterwards, became intenser, from their own 
 calamities and disappointments. If so, " the throne of 
 Satan" which is alluded to in the message to Perga- 
 mos that follows, must be interpreted by " the syna- 
 gogue of Satan," in the one to Smyrna. There the 
 Jewish influence was probably stronger than in the 
 other Asiatic cities. This Church is said to be in- 
 fested by a set of men holding the doctrine of Balaam, BaUcmius. 
 
14 4 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. which the angel of the Church had not sufficiently 
 discouraged. Balaam represents in the Old Testament 
 History the prophet who had abused divine inspira- 
 tions, to the accomplishment of covetous and sensual 
 purposes. St. Peter had already used his name to 
 denote a class which would appear in his — the latter — 
 days. Simon, the Jewish enchanter, whom we met 
 in Samaria, and who, after he was baptized, is sup- 
 posed to have made his knowledge of the Gospel an 
 instrument of his trade, is a specimen of the class. 
 St. John speaks of them as bringing idolatry and 
 
 The Flesh sensuality into the Church ; the confusion of the flesh 
 
 Z^!md- and tne s P irit bein § tlie beginning of both. The 
 «*• Nicolaitan doctrine was another form of this tendency ; 
 
 the two appeared together in Pergamos. The angel 
 of it was brave and unflinching in his conflict with 
 external foes. It was in the power of distinguishing 
 between the true and counterfeit within the Church, 
 that he was deficient. He who had the sharp sword 
 with the two edges calls upon him to repent of the 
 moral confusion which was in him and in his flock, 
 and to seek for the blessing of clearness of conscience, 
 that white stone of absolution which no man knoweth 
 but he who receiveth it. 
 Thyaiira. The Angel in Thyatira, amidst higher praises than 
 those bestowed on Ephesus or Pergamos, is blamed 
 for suffering a prophetess, who is called Jezebel, to 
 teach and to seduce the servants of Christ to eat things 
 offered to idols, and to commit fornication. This 
 tampering with idolatry and with the sins of which 
 idolatry was at once the sign and the promoter, is, 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 145 
 
 as we might expect, the great peril of that time ; Lect. x. 
 it has been the peril of all times ; the peculiarity of 
 Thyatira consisted in this, that a female enchanter ProjLtc**. 
 or prophet was the instrument in the temptation. 
 The name given to her, like that of Balaam to 
 the other deceivers, is, of course, intended to con- 
 nect the later history with that of the Old Testa- 
 ment. The Phoenician wife of Ahab, it has often 
 been supposed, was more than a mere worshipper 
 of Baal. She may have been his priestess ; at all 
 events, she had a fixed design of alienating the people 
 of Israel from the worship of the unseen God of 
 Righteousness, to the worship of a mere Lord of 
 Power, a visible Ruler. The same kind of effect we Why called 
 may assume was produced by the teachings of the 
 woman of Thyatira upon the Church there. They 
 were led to substitute the visible for the invisible ; 
 and this from a notion that they had sounded some 
 " depths " of wisdom which their ordinary instructors 
 had not reached. A loss of moral strength, the com- 
 mission of gross sins, was the consequence. He whose 
 eyes are as a flame of fire declares that He will 
 search out these secret evils, and bring them to the 
 light of day; He promises to him who overcomes 
 this temptation to be like the nations round about, 
 — to mimic their worship and covet their splendour, — Ruling the 
 that he shall rule the nations. 1 
 
 1 It is added, " And I will give unto him the morning star" The words 
 must refer to the celebrated passage in Isaiah, respecting Lucifer, the 
 Son of the Morning. The Jews, who were always aiming to be like 
 the Babylonians, are told how then- Man-god shall be cast down. If 
 they will follow their own true King, the God-man, they shall triumph 
 
 L 
 
146 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. X. 
 Sardis, 
 
 Ph iladd- 
 phia. 
 
 The new 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 Laodicea. 
 
 No special deceivers are pointed out in the Sardian 
 Church. It is simply declared with its overseer to be 
 in a low torpid state. It has a name to live and is 
 dead. He in this falling Church that overcometh its 
 temptations will be clothed in white raiment; his 
 name shall not be blotted out of the book of life. 
 Christ will confess him before His Father and the 
 Angels. 
 
 The Philadelphia!! Church, like those in Smyrna 
 and Pergamos, was exposed to the special opposition 
 of the pretended Jew. But it had clung in weakness 
 to its true strength, and He that is holy and true, 
 that hath the key of David, promises to keep it and 
 its Angel from the hour of temptation, which shall 
 come upon all the world to try them that dwell upon 
 the earth. He is coming quickly. The Philadelphian 
 Angel is bidden to hold fast that which he has, and 
 to let no man take his crown. If he overcomes, 
 Christ will make him a pillar in the temple of His 
 God, and will write upon him the name of His God, 
 and the name of the city of His God, the New 
 Jerusalem, which cometh down out of Heaven 
 from God. 
 
 The Angel of the Church of the Laodiceans is 
 discovered to be neither hot nor cold. He thinks 
 that he is rich and increased in goods, and has need 
 of nothing. He knows not that he is wretched, and 
 poor, and blind, and naked. Christ is standing at 
 the door and knocking. If any one hear His voice 
 
 over all mere earthly powers, and over the spiritual powers which defy 
 Him. The lesson is carried out and expanded by St. Jolin. 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 14 7 
 
 and open the door, He will come in to him and sup Lect. x. 
 with him. He that overcomes the lukewarm spirit 
 shall sit with Christ on His throne, as He has over- 
 come and is set down with His Father on His throne. 
 
 You will feel more and more, as we proceed in our Tl,e Seven 
 
 1 ■ i • i tt Churches, 
 
 history, how serious the words are, " He that hath i n w h a t 
 an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto these r i s { ect . 
 
 1 Johannine. 
 
 Churches." But there are one or two points which 
 you should take notice of, in order that you may 
 appreciate the force of the words to the generation 
 for which they were at first designed. Observe, then, 
 that these seven Churches all belonged to Asia Minor^ 
 to the region with which St. John appears to have been 
 himself conversant during his later years. They are 
 not Churches connected with Palestine, they are not 
 Macedonian or Greek Churches, they are not Latin 
 Churches ; nevertheless, as their number seven indi- 
 cates, they are evidently intended to set forth the 
 Church as one complete body consisting of distinct 
 portions. Though the Apostle exercises a kind of How they 
 
 • P -1 1 represent 
 
 oversight m each 01 these societies, he does not pre- the whole 
 tend for a moment that it is he who unites them ; he Chuvch - 
 does not even pretend that he knows what is going 
 on in them, or can speak to them, or judge them. 
 The kind of deference which was paid him by the 
 Asiatic Churches, both in his life-time and after his 
 death, must have been very great indeed. We shall 
 find that they appealed to traditions which they sup- 
 posed they had received from him, in opposition to 
 traditions which the western Churches followed. But 
 he disclaims any such dignity himself. His revelation 
 
 l2 
 
148 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. is of another and diviner Overseer, who will remain 
 for ever, and to whom the overseer of each Church is 
 directly responsible. Another observation is one which 
 you cannot have failed to make for yourselves, but 
 which I must not be weary of repeating to you, viz. 
 that each one of these messages supposes a great 
 crisis or judgment to be at hand, through which some 
 of the Churches would pass well and some ill. I want 
 you to understand that whether Jerusalem had yet 
 fallen or not, the whole of this time was one of 
 tremendous sifting, one in which the pure gold would 
 have to be proved in the fire and in which the dross 
 would be consumed. You will remark, at the same 
 time, how many allusions there are to a New Jerusa- 
 lem, a better and diviner society of which the world 
 in general would be ignorant, but which the hearts of 
 true and faithful men would enter into, and of which 
 Christ would make them citizens. This you must 
 bear in mind, in what I have to say about the rest of 
 this book. I wish to pass it over as rapidly as I can, 
 for I would not have you think I am giving you any 
 neAv theory about it. But I must show you that 
 whatever other meanings it may have, it has one 
 which makes it the best cf all introductions to Eccle- 
 siastical History. 
 The When you read in the fourth chapter of a door 
 
 Heavenly b em g opened in Heaven, you may think that we are 
 
 vision. o i ' j ii 
 
 carried into some distant region, with which we may 
 have to do after death, but which stands apart from 
 the common events of this earth. If you adopt that 
 notion, I believe you will never understand this Reve- 
 
' THE APOCALYPSE. ]49 
 
 lation, nor any of God's revelations, nor Church Lect. x. 
 
 history which rests upon them. The vision which 
 
 the Apostle has of a throne, and of One who sat 
 
 upon it, and of the seven Spirits before the throne, 
 
 and of the four beasts and the Elders, and of the 
 
 Lion of the tribe of Judah, who is also the Lamb 
 
 that has been slain, and who has seven eyes that go 
 
 through the earth, and seven horns of power — is the 
 
 vision of those divine and substantial realities which The eternal 
 
 . i • i i • present, not 
 
 the eye cannot see or the ear hear, which are objects future , 
 of faith not of sight, but which do not belong to the 
 future more than to the present or to the past. They 
 are always present. They constitute that Heavenly 
 Kingdom which Christ came to reveal, which He 
 declares is for the poor in spirit, which it will be 
 the blessing of every one to apprehend hereafter, 
 the misery to lose, but which the Apostle would 
 tell us is with us here. This is that state of things 
 which abides amidst all the changes and fluctuations 
 of this world's history and policy. And that Book, TiieBook 
 sealed with seven seals, which was in the hand of * 
 Him that sat upon the throne, was, I apprehend, the 
 book which showed how this perfect and eternal 
 world is connected with the world of time and 
 change ; how all the dark and sad events which men 
 witness, those that had been going on since the 
 world began, those that were passing when the Apostle 
 wrote, those with which different generations should 
 be acquainted after he had gone away, are dependent 
 upon Him who governs in this higher world, are 
 subject to His laws which are obeyed there, and will 
 
 with seven 
 seals. 
 
150 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. serve for the manifestation of His righteousness. If 
 The Lion this is the case, you will see why only the Lamb that 
 Lamb. was s l am could break the seals of this book ; for it is 
 He who binds the two worlds together, it is He who is 
 alive and was dead, who, as the Apostle speaks, has the 
 keys of death and hell. This was the new and divine 
 revelation which had been made by His death, and 
 resurrection, and ascension. But that revelation did 
 not supersede the old truth which the Jewish nation 
 had been proclaiming. That chosen nation had existed 
 to testify of a Son of God, who should be born of 
 the tribe of Judah, and who was the Prince of all the 
 kings of the earth. St. John says this Prince of the 
 kings of the earth is the Lamb that was slain. His 
 sacrifice marks Him out for the true King. All power 
 which stands on any other ground than this, is rotten ; 
 it is falling to pieces now ; it shall perish utterly. 
 Method of Keep these thoughts in your minds, and then I 
 have no doubt that you will be able by degrees to see 
 a meaning in each of those seals, which the Lion of 
 the tribe of Judah was able to break ; a far better 
 meaning than I could give you. I have felt the 
 exceeding value of that passage of Scripture, as I have 
 read different pages of civil and ecclesiastical history. 
 But I am afraid to confine it by partial notions and 
 apprehensions of mine. I have no doubt that they 
 are true as far as they go, but other men's apprehen- 
 sions of it, though very different from mine, may be 
 true also. God's revelation, we may be sure, is infi- 
 nitely wider and deeper than our thoughts of it. All 
 I wish is, to put you in a method in which I think you 
 
 study. 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 151 
 
 may proceed safely. And by explaining to you, as I lect. x. 
 
 have tried to do, what an earthquake there was at TheEwrth- 
 
 this time ; how, as the Apostles speak, it was one that ^ uake - 
 
 not only shook earth but also Heaven, which caused 
 
 all the dynasties of the world and all the powers above, 
 
 to which they had been doing homage, to tremble 
 
 and be moved from their seats ; I think I have helped 
 
 you to see that the convulsion when the sixth seal 
 
 was opened, though it may have often occurred since, 
 
 and though we may look for it in a more terrible form 
 
 to occur again, is yet exactly what did take place while 
 
 the last of the Apostles was tarrying till his Lord came. 
 
 You will perceive also, I think, that when St. John The sealed 
 speaks of God's sealing 12,000 of each of the tribes 
 of Israel with His Name, he teaches us that the 
 divine purpose in setting apart a nation was not in 
 any way frustrated by the unbelief of those who said 
 they were Jews, but were not ; that Israel was pre- 
 served though Israelites fell away ; that the existence 
 of a Christian Church is a testimony to the fact that 
 the calling of God is without repentance. At the 
 same time, you will learn from the magnificent con- 
 clusion of the seventh chapter, that we are not to 
 confine God by the limits of any tribes or nations, 
 by any thing that we see on earth or read of in 
 history; that the visible world is surrounded by an 
 invisible one ; that in that there are multitudes which The muiti- 
 
 i piij. - i l • i i i tude that 
 
 no man can number, ot all nations, and kindreds, and no man 
 peoples, and tongues, who have come out of great cmdd 
 
 110 ° number. 
 
 tribulation, and have washed their robes and made 
 them white in the blood of the Lamb. 
 
152 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. x. You will read in the allusions to the altar and the 
 The golden censer, and the incense and the prayers of the 
 
 prayers of 
 
 the Saints, saints, and what followed them, how close and inse- 
 parable is the connexion between prayer and sacrifice ; 
 how both suppose a real connexion between the visible 
 and the invisible world ; how unreal that connexion 
 would be, if there were not a Mediator between God 
 and man, One who is both the Priest and the Sacrifice, 
 One who has offered Himself up that God's will may 
 be done on earth as it is in Heaven. 
 
 Hit Trum- You will see how the Apostle adopts the language 
 of the Old Testament, and explains its meaning, 
 where he speaks of the seven Angels with the seven 
 trumpets. As those which Avere blown, when the 
 children of Israel went round Jericho, announced the 
 approaching fall of an accursed city, so all the different 
 forms of God's judgments, whether they fall on sea, 
 or earth, or air, whether they destroy the things in 
 which man has delighted or come directly upon him- 
 self, whether they are plagues to his body or terrors 
 and torments to his conscience, whether they affect 
 the mass of a people or its heads and rulers, are 
 always forewarnings that a false state of things is 
 doomed and coming to an end, and that a righteous 
 King is declaring His own power and government. 
 i f you ask me whether the city, on which the trumpets 
 in St. John's day pronounced the sentence, was the 
 city of Jerusalem, I can only answer by what I have 
 
 what was told you already. It seems to me that the whole 
 
 the accursed -r, 1 i i • 1 n 
 
 c;[ y, iloman world at that time had come into an accursed 
 
 atheistic condition ; that that Babylonian principle 
 
TEE APOCALYPSE. 153 
 
 which the Jewish nation existed to denounce was the lect. x. 
 only one any longer recognised ; but that the very 
 heart and core of the evil was among the chosen 
 people themselves ; that Jerusalem was the centre of 
 the crime and wickedness of the earth ; that all the 
 surrounding nations shared in the revolution, the 
 most tremendous effects of which descended upon it. 
 I think St. John teaches us this truth as we go on 
 with his book, and it is one which we ought earnestly 
 to lay to heart. 
 
 He seems to tell us very clearly in the 10th chap- The open 
 ter, that the book which had been sealed with the 
 seven seals was opened, and that the mystery of God, 
 which He had declared to His servants the prophets, 
 was about to be accomplished. This is exactly what 
 1 have been trying to show you, that the period we 
 are speaking of was one in which the iniquities of all 
 previous times were gathered up, and in which that 
 mystery of the divine Love which had been revealing 
 itself in all previous times, was also fully declaring 
 itself. 
 
 In the hour of utter darkness which is spoken of The two 
 in the next chapter, two witnesses are said to be 
 prophesying in the midst of a great city, which is 
 spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where also our 
 Lord was crucified. You will hear of many attempts 
 to find out who these tw T o witnesses were. Some of 
 those attempts greatly confuse, I think, the course of 
 ecclesiastical history, and make the records of God's 
 dealings with men unintelligible. All I woidd say to 
 you on the subject is this: that as these two witnesses 
 
254 0N CHUllCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.x. are affirmed to be the two olive-trees and the two 
 Hints candlesticks standing before the Lord of the whole 
 ZZ ni ' l!/ eartll > wnidl tlie P ro P liet Zechariah speaks of, there 
 must have been two such witnesses in the old times. 
 As Moses and Aaron represented the law and the 
 priesthood of the Jews — as Zerubbabel and Joshua 
 represented the same law and priesthood after the 
 captivity — we may suppose that there have always 
 been some men, or some forms and institutions, who 
 have asserted the great principles of God's order and 
 of His fellowship with man. The particular men may 
 have been killed ; the forms may have perished for a 
 time ; there may have been a sense of triumph in the 
 world, as if it had been rid of tormentors. But the 
 principles could not die. They have revived, and have 
 been found more terrible than ever, to the exulting 
 wickedness which they denounced. That this should 
 have been so in the city where our Lord was crucified, 
 in its worst state, is according to all reason and pro- 
 bability. It is not very important for us to know 
 who or what the witnesses then were : it is very 
 important to understand the course of God's dealings 
 with His creatures in every fearful crisis — in every 
 hour of darkness. 
 TheWomcm We are told in the 12th chapter, that there ap- 
 "chiid 6 peared a great wonder in Heaven. A woman is 
 travailing in birth ; she brings forth a man-child ; a 
 dragon is seeking to destroy it; there is a battle 
 between the hosts of heaven and the powers of hell ; 
 there is a great victory of the one over the other. 
 All this passes behind the veil. These are great 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 155 
 
 truths and principles, of which the effects are to be lect. x. 
 manifested in this world. God has redeemed huma- 
 nity; Christ the Son of Man is to rule over the 
 nations ; the powers of evil have struggled against 
 Him. He has vanquished. The loud voice has The hosts 
 declared in heaven, " Now is come salvation and ^^ 
 strength, and the Kingdom of our God, and the 
 power of His Christ. For the accuser of our bre- 
 thren is cast down, which accused them before God 
 clay and night." The Apostle goes on to intimate, 
 that those who understood and believed this — who 
 perceived that man was redeemed, and that a Brother, 
 and not an accuser, was between them and God, were 
 able to overcome the tempter by the blood of the 
 Lamb and the word of His testimony. On earth 
 they understood the mystery of heaven, and so they 
 loved not their lives unto the death. 
 
 But there is another vision upon earth. Though TheWoman 
 Humanity is redeemed — though the Child is caught 
 up to heaven — the Woman is still on earth, persecuted 
 by the dragon. Do you ask me what this woman is? 
 The interpreters will all say, the Church. I would 
 say the same. But yet I believe St. John's words 
 are better than ours — that they teach us something 
 which our substitutes for them do not teach. The 
 Church is a true Church while she feels that she is 
 the representative of Humanity as redeemed in Christ, 
 when she looks up to Him and acknowledges that the 
 Son of Man is at the right hand of God. She has to 
 endure persecution for this witness so long as she 
 bears it, But God preserves her. The wings of a 
 
 persecuted. 
 
156 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. great eagle cover her. She is safe in any desolation. 
 This principle is, I believe, true universally. But as 
 the Apostle speaks of a time and times and half a 
 time, I take it for granted that he alludes to the spe- 
 cial tribulation through which those who believed in 
 Christ and testified of Him were passing at that period. 
 The forms In like manner, the beast that came out of the sea 
 ar>Tof ial — the image of brute force — to which the evil spirit 
 spiritual g ave his dominion, will, I doubt not, be found the 
 
 wickedness. 
 
 great antagonist of the Church and of man in all 
 days. This is the godless, inhuman power, which 
 sets itself against the Prince of the kings of the 
 earth — against Him whose kingdom is based on 
 sacrifice. And the other image of lying spiritual 
 power which works miracles beside him, and draws 
 men away to pay him homage, has, I am sure, been 
 found doing the same work from age to age. But 
 I cannot get rid of plain words, which seem to show 
 that this brute-power was gathered up into some 
 person, — I should suppose, a Roman Emperor — most 
 probably Vitellius, — and that all the enchantments 
 and lying wonders which we have heard of as so 
 prevalent in the empire, were likewise conspiring, 
 perhaps through some one insignificant agent, to 
 deceive and degrade the world which the Emperor 
 The mark vn \ e ^ r fo ]jq subject to this beast was the appointed 
 
 of the least. J L l 
 
 lot of Christian men as of other men. Their patience 
 and faith were to be shown in not joining in the 
 conspiracies and revolutions of the empire. But what 
 they had to beware of was, lest they should receive 
 the mark of the beast on their forehead and on their 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 157 
 
 hands, lest they should inwardly reverence this brutal lect. x. 
 force and think it divine. 
 
 The world in general, it is intimated, did this. The marie 
 There were some who could not do it. For they had % ath \ ri 
 another Name marked upon them, the name of a 
 Father. They followed the Lamb that was slain; they 
 stood as redeemed men, singing a new song before 
 the throne. They are described as a guileless band — 
 unlike, you will say, any of those Churches exhibited 
 to us in the Apostolical Epistles ; for in them there 
 was much of division, unbelief, and evil. Unlike, only 
 in this respect, that these who are said to be gathered 
 on Mount Sion, (they may have been scattered, as far 
 as place and fleshly intercourse went, far and wide,) 
 understood their privilege as baptized men ; that they 
 claimed to be what St. Paul declared the Churches 
 that he blamed most, were — elect in God the Father, The band 
 and in Jesus Christ. Such songs as these have been °?. Mount 
 sung in all, even the darkest, times. With them the 
 Apostle teaches us to connect a proclamation going 
 forth from an angel's voice in the midst of Heaven, 
 and reaching to every nation and kindred of the earth. 
 Fear God and give glory to Him, for His judgments 
 are come, and worship Him that made Heaven and 
 earth, and the sea, and the fountains of water. This 
 summons to turn from all divided worship, all devil 
 worship, and to confess the living and universal God 
 — the God in whom is Light and no darkness at all, 
 the God whose Life Christ had revealed — is called 
 an everlasting Gospel. Upon it follows the shout of The Gospel 
 an angel. Babylon — the Babel city, the city of con- 
 
158 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. fusion, — the city of divided Gods and lawless tyranny, 
 The fail of i s fallen. And then the decree of another angel, 
 
 Babylon. _ _ 
 
 " If any man worship the beast and his image, and 
 receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, 
 the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, 
 which is poured out without mixture into the cup of 
 His indignation." How closely these proclamations are 
 linked to each other, how wonderfully the history of 
 the Church and of the world has at various periods 
 confirmed them, I believe you will know better 
 hereafter. But St. John was permitted to see in the 
 events of his own day the clear and authentic testi- 
 
 me true mony of them. The judgments on Jerusalem and on 
 
 cewedZ Rome, the miseries of Jewish and heathen beast- 
 worshippers, connected as they were with the preach- 
 ing of the everlasting glad tidings, of the true Father 
 and the righteous King, announced emphatically to 
 his purged ears, however few might understand the 
 message, that Christ was putting His sickle into the 
 earth, and gathering the vine of the earth. 
 
 The Song. if U1 this spirit you read that song of Moses, the 
 servant of God and of the Lamb, which is contained 
 in the 15th chapter, and the description in the 16th, 
 
 The Vials, of the seven vials, and of the voice which said, " It is 
 done" and of the division of the great city ; though 
 you may find many things too deep for you, much 
 about which you must in ignorance and patience 
 desire to be enlightened — you will feel that you are 
 not reading a book of tricks and puzzles, but a book 
 full of awe, and wonder, and reality, which we w T ant 
 a child's heart to enter into, but which becomes most 
 
 the true 
 Prophet 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 159 
 
 needful, as the plot in the great drama of the world Lkct.x. 
 thickens, and its catastrophe draws nearer. You will 
 then. I think, approach the account of the judgment 
 of the great harlot, the woman who teas arrayed in n b 
 purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and 
 pearls, having a. golden cup in her hand, full of abomina- 
 tions and flthiness of 'her fornications ; upon whose fore- 
 head was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great. 
 the mother of J ''■. and abominations of the earth, 
 with a full readiness to profit by all the suggestions 
 which great and learned men have offered respecting 
 it — with an assurance that what they have said must 
 have much worth, and be entitled to the most seric - 
 reflection — but also with a determination to let the 
 divine Teacher Himself open the book, and tell you 
 its meaning. And then I apprehend that the mystery Modern 
 of iniquity described there will be found indeed to T^' 
 
 1 ' Uons of it, 
 
 have worked most mightily in Christendom, and to hmc t0 u 
 
 ^ " regarded. 
 
 have called forth the protests of reformers and mar- 
 tyrs, whose names should be unspeakably dear to us. 
 in this country and in all countries ; but that it is 
 not safe to limit its operation to any time or place or 
 Church ; and therefore that it is better, and more 
 hopeful, to perceive how deeply the evil principle had 
 penetrated in St. John's own day. how widely it had 
 diffused itself, how fully he believed that a principle 
 had been revealed which was mightier, which was 
 going forth against the other, to battle and to 
 victory. 
 
 If you study the 1 5th chapter of the Apocalypse 
 well, you will find how many aspects of evil are dis- 
 
160 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. X. 
 
 The evil 
 city seen 
 under 
 various 
 aspects. 
 
 T/ce impe- 
 rial city ; 
 the com- 
 mercial 
 cities; the 
 religious 
 city. 
 
 The bridal 
 of the 
 Lamb. 
 
 closed to us there — sensual, commercial, spiritual- 
 It reads, certainly, like a picture of the breaking up 
 of a whole complicated system of society, that had 
 been sustaining itself upon an unrighteous, anarchical, 
 selfish, anti-christian principle. It is a prophecy, I 
 doubt not, — a prophecy of which we shall find many 
 fulfilments, and may yet find more perfect fulfilments; 
 but it is also a most accurate history of that over- 
 throw of all social order which affected the city of 
 Rome itself, the great mercantile cities which Rome 
 had adopted into its huge empire, and the city which 
 was so holy in its own eyes, and which is so horrible 
 in ours, whereof Rome was the predestined scourge 
 and destroyer. 
 
 The spectacle of such a judgment — in spite of the 
 awful righteousness which we feel to be in it, and 
 which makes us rejoice, because the evidence it bears 
 is so clear and decisive, that the righteous God is the 
 King of the earth — would be too appalling, if it were 
 not for the last chapters of this great Revelation ; if 
 there were not the vision of the marriage of the Lamb 
 with the Bride who had made herself ready ; of Him, 
 the divine Word of God, by whom all things were 
 made, in whom is Life, and whose life is the Light of 
 men, — as the Conqueror and Judge, followed by the 
 armies of Heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and 
 clean ; of the utter overthrow of the beast and the 
 false prophet ; of the binding of Satan — though after- 
 wards to be loosed for a season ; of a judgment of the 
 dead as well as of the quick ; of a new Heaven and 
 a new earth ; of a city which had no need of the sun, 
 
THE APOCALYPSE. 101 
 
 neither of the moon, to shine in it; for the glory of God Lect. x. 
 did shine in it, and the Lamb was the light thereof : The miy 
 and into which the nations should bring their glory lty ' 
 and honour; of a pure river of water of life proceeding 
 from the throne of God and of the Lamb ; of a state 
 in which there is no curse, because His servants serve 
 Him, and see His face, and His name is in their 
 foreheads. When are these things to be ? St. John me office 
 answers, " Behold, I come quickly." He evidently %£&, 
 believed they were then; that Christ was then coming 
 to make it evident that these sayings were faithful 
 and true. On their truth and faithfulness, I believe, 
 our Christendom, our modern world stands. I can- 
 not but believe that the Church of God has existed, 
 and does exist, to bear witness of a Father, a Son, 
 and a Spirit, a one living God, who is mightier than 
 all the gods whom men have made for themselves to 
 worship ; of a kingdom of Christ, to which the king- 
 doms of the world are subject, and must at last con- 
 fess their subjection ; of a divine Word and Wisdom, Tramidcm 
 from which all the wise thoughts and words of men 
 have proceeded ; of a spiritual unity which has made 
 itself goo'd, and shall make itself good against all 
 divisions and separations. How the Church has 
 borne this testimony ; how the Church has failed to 
 bear it ; how God has borne it by her, without her, 
 in spite of her — is the subject of the Lectures which 
 I shall hereafter deliver to you. 
 
 Before I conclude, it may be convenient that I 
 should tell you what method I shall hereafter adopt. 
 
 The first division of my lectures will extend to 
 
 M 
 
 age. 
 
162 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. the death of Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome, 
 General a.d. 605. The second division will extend from 
 
 tfitr tllat time to tlle end of tlie Pop edom of Boniface 
 History. VIII., a.d. 1303. The third will extend to the 
 commencement of the present century. The first 
 period will be divided by the beginning of the 
 reign of Constantine the Great, a.d. 306. The 
 second, by the opening of the eleventh century. 
 The third, by the commencement of the German 
 Reformation, a.d. 1517. I cannot explain to you 
 at present why I fix upon these epochs as boundary 
 lines. I hope they will explain themselves to you 
 as we proceed. I have given the subject some 
 consideration, and I think the arrangement that I 
 have adopted, is, on the whole, the most natural, and 
 will prove the most convenient to you. Within each 
 Division °f these divisions, I shall follow the order of the 
 mto centuries. It would be a good reason for doing so. 
 
 centuries. _ ° 
 
 that I am walking in a line which the experience 
 of ecclesiastical historians has led them to choose. 
 They knew well enough that there were some dis- 
 advantages in it, but they found that the advantages 
 preponderated; and if you try any other method, I 
 think you will find that it is so. As I wish my 
 lectures to be guides to you in your reading, I 
 would not willingly embarrass you by inventing new 
 plans which you would not be able to reconcile with 
 those which more learned men have struck out for 
 themselves. 
 
Jednm on % jtotii Cental. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 THE DIFFERENT CHURCHES IN THE SECOND CENTURY. 
 
 Some of you have asked me about the books Summaries 
 which I should wish you to use while you are list- %J^ h 
 ening to these lectures. If I could find a text-book 
 that satisfied me, I should desire you to get it, for 
 it is a considerable help in class-teaching. But I 
 have not fallen in with one that would exactly suit 
 my purpose. I must therefore do as well as I can 
 without it. The manuals which are most in use 
 among us are .translations from French or German 
 authors, some of whom have written in their own 
 tongues, some in Latin. The exceptions are Dr. a few of 
 Burton's book, which only extends over three centu- f^lll 
 ries ; the sketch of Bishop Hinds, originally published England 
 
 , i enume~ 
 
 in the Encyclopaedia Metropolitan^ which does not rated, 
 go so far — at least, the part which has been repub- 
 lished ; the History of Milner; Dr. Waddington's 
 History, published by the Society for Promoting 
 Useful Knowledge ; and the short one of Mr. Palmer, 
 published in the Englishman's Library. Each of 
 these has its own merits. Two or three of them are 
 books of much care and learning. I hope I may 
 assist you in profiting by them all, as well as in using 
 the work of Mosheim, which is a most learned and 
 
 m 2 
 
164 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. I. 
 
 Gibbon. 
 
 Neander. 
 
 Gieseler. 
 
 Men, more 
 than books. 
 
 valuable index to Ecclesiastical History, drawn up by 
 an honest, conscientious man, but from which I think 
 you would hardly learn what the Church is, or what 
 it has done in the world. If you read him in English, 
 you must get the latest translation, revised by Soames. 
 Gibbon, though he hated Christianity, will make you 
 feel the reality of the Church, and its influence on 
 the politics of the world, far better than the regular 
 Ecclesiastical Historian. What he will not tell you, 
 how the faith of the Church moulded the hearts of its 
 members, you will learn from Neander, considerable 
 portions of whose deeply interesting work have been 
 translated into English. You will find Gieseler's 
 Manual, of which there is an American translation, 
 an invaluable book of reference, when you want to 
 study the literature of the Church as it bears upon any 
 particular topics. He illustrates questions by quota- 
 tions from original authors, with remarkable fair- 
 ness and skill. But you must beware of trying to 
 ascertain the convictions and mind of a writer, even 
 from passages that are chosen most impartially to 
 explain his opinions. You must know the battles he 
 has fought with himself, the men he has mixed with, 
 the work he has done, if you would know him, or 
 even understand his words. I shall be most thankful 
 if any hints of mine should put you in the way of 
 getting this kind of acquaintance with the persons of 
 whom I shall speak to you, and with the times in which 
 they lived. Most of you will be too much occupied 
 hereafter, to have much leisure for antiquarian inves- 
 tigations. But I should like you to feel that the 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. iq 5 
 
 facts of Ecclesiastical History concern yourselves and lect,i. 
 your flocks; that the people whom it brings before EccUsi- 
 us were men of our own flesh and blood ; that He astical 
 
 History for 
 
 who called them to their work is calling us to ours, workers. 
 I do not think it is our business, but our laziness, 
 which keeps us from understanding God's world and 
 God's Church. If we were more alive, and more 
 interested in all the men and things that are passing 
 around us — in all that we and other men have to do 
 and to suffer — the history of past times would become 
 infinitely more clear to us. At all events, that is the 
 way in which we Englishmen must get to know any 
 thing about it. The study of books and manuscripts 
 may be pursued more diligently elsewhere than here. 
 We ought to be most grateful to those who have pur- 
 sued it, or are pursuing it, in any part of the world. 
 All their studies, their discoveries, their mistakes, are 
 of exceeding worth. We are to discover their worth 
 by life. Instead of complaining that God has put us 
 into the midst of a bustling, working nation, we are 
 to make use of that bustle and work, to explain 
 thoughts and desires, fears and hopes, which men 
 have cherished in their closets, and uttered in their 
 prayers. Then, what was spoken to them in the 
 secret ear, will likewise teach us what we have to 
 proclaim on the house-tops. 
 
 The method I have adopted in my introductory History of 
 lectures — or rather, the method which the Acts of the d Zing* 
 Apostles and the Apocalypse have pointed out to us ««**««»•• 
 — will be the best for us in future. I shall consider A . D . 98. 
 what information we have about those Churches which f^Jj 
 
166 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. I. 
 
 Antoninus 
 
 Pius, a. D. 
 
 138. 
 
 Marcus 
 
 Aurelius, 
 
 a. r». 161. 
 
 Commodus, 
 
 a. D. 180. 
 
 Pertinax, 
 
 a.d. 193. 
 
 Julianus, 
 
 a.d. 193. 
 
 Sept. 
 
 Severus, 
 
 a.d. 193. 
 
 Palestine, 
 
 Absence of 
 infor- 
 mation. 
 
 Probable 
 condition 
 of the 
 Palestine 
 Christians. 
 
 the Scripture History brings before us, when we lose 
 sight of it, and what new Churches arose out of these. 
 I begin to-day with the reign of the Emperor Trajan, 
 a.d. 98. I shall follow out the information to the 
 end of the century. 
 
 Our first interest is, of course, about Palestine. 
 From the hints I have given you, you will be pre- 
 pared for much vagueness in the reports upon this 
 subject. Eusebius, who lived in Palestine, and must 
 have had access to written memorials, if any were to 
 be found, acknowledges that he knew of none : he only 
 believed from tradition that Justus succeeded Symeon ; 
 that circumcised men ruled the Church till the time 
 of Hadrian ; that then a number of men, indifferently 
 circumcised or uncircumcised, followed each other at 
 very short intervals. 
 
 These reports tell us something by their very ob- 
 scurity. The Palestine Church clung to the city and 
 the Temple : they were gone. It had tried to assert 
 the sanctity of the calling of the Jews : God seemed to 
 have disowned that calling. The Christians may have 
 striven hard to preserve their character. They may 
 have put themselves under the guidance only of those 
 who had the sign of the old Covenant. They may 
 have even resolved only to acknowledge as their legiti- 
 mate guides, those who were of the house of David. I 
 suppose there may have been great party conflicts; 
 many of the old sects may have appeared with new 
 faces ; there may have been questions not only who 
 should govern them, but about the form of govern- 
 ment they should adopt. But the Ebionitic party 
 
THE SECOND CENTUKY. 167 
 
 was probably in effect predominant — the one which lect. i. 
 boasted that it followed the tradition of St. James. 
 
 Then came what we may always expect in such 
 circumstances — a time of persecution. There arose a Tiie Jewish 
 false Christ — Barcochba was the name which he bore J^JT^" 
 — who stirred up the Jewish people to revolt. It is 
 the common opinion that the Roman ploughshare 
 had not yet gone round the city of Jerusalem. The 
 Temple had perished, against the wish of Titus. Who 
 could tell that both might not rise out of their ruin ? 
 There was such a hope always latent in the Jews 
 every where. It was likely to be strongest in Pales- 
 tine. They only wanted a leader. When one appeared 
 with the old characteristics — a fanatic and a brigand 
 — using the Name of God and the words of Scripture 
 — ready to die and to murder in that Name, and for 
 the accomplishment of those words — multitudes were 
 sure to gather about his standard. The revolt of 
 desperate people, who have ties of blood and religion 
 to each other, is always very formidable. Through a 
 great part of the reigns of Trajan and of Hadrian, 
 this Jewish war troubled the Roman empire, and 
 required the serious efforts of the legions to put it 
 down. It is not unimportant in that point of view ; 
 but it is most important in the history of the Church. 
 The insurgent Jews, who were often triumphant — Persecution 
 who were in possession of towns and districts in °/. Ch '?*\ l 
 
 1 tians by the 
 
 Palestine for a long time — regarded, as you will sup- insurgents. 
 pose, the followers of Jesus with especial hatred. I 
 should not think that any organized persecutions 
 which they suffered afterwards could have been worse 
 
2Q3 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. than the sufferings they underwent from these anar- 
 chists ; though they are not of a kind that are likely 
 to be recorded, and though the Palestine Church was 
 in too unsettled a condition to preserve records. The 
 trial may have been temporary, but the effect of it 
 was permanent. This war seems to have been the 
 great means of severing the Church, there as well as 
 Effect of u. elsewhere, from the synagogue. After it, there could 
 be no question whether the disciples of Jesus were a 
 Nazarene sect or no. Those who were still inclined 
 to acknowledge that name, and to cling to their 
 Jewish distinctions, were now regarded as separatists. 
 The Ebionites were treated as a party outside of the 
 Church. 
 jEiia Capi- The end of this war in the reign of Hadrian was 
 memorable for another reason. Jerusalem, the holy 
 city, the city of David, the city of Jehovah, acquired 
 a new name. It was called iElia Capitolina. The 
 first name was taken from the emperor, iElius 
 Hadrianus ; the second declared that it was dedicated 
 to the Jupiter of the Roman Capitol. There is some- 
 thing more significant in this change than even in 
 the overthrow by Titus ; or rather, one was the con- 
 summation of the other. That mighty witness that 
 the earth has an unseen God over it, a righteous 
 King ruling over the inhabitants of it, was now 
 utterly gone. The Jew might approach the city once 
 a year, and only once, to think of what it had been. 
 Two centuries hence we shall hear of the old name 
 again. It will meet us in various passages of our 
 history ; it will never lose its power over the heart of 
 
 tolina. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. jgcj 
 
 Christendom. But at this time Christians rather Lkct. i. 
 pointed with a kind of exultation to the witness 
 which was borne by its downfal to their King. They 
 preferred long afterwards to speak of Csesarea as the 
 chief city of the Palestine Church. 
 
 Samaria, you will remember, had a different cha- Samaria. 
 racter from Judaea in the Apostolical records, as well 
 as in the earlier times. Simon the enchanter pre- 
 sented himself to us there in conflict with St. Peter. 
 I have hinted at various traditions that became cur- 
 rent respecting him, all of which turn more or less 
 upon the belief that his doctrine was in some way 
 especially opposed to that of this Apostle. St. Peter sets 
 forth Jesus Christ as the centre and corner-stone of 
 all fellowship among men ; Simon believed in a Christ, Simon. 
 one among many who exercised great powers, and 
 had some mysterious divinity. This distinction 
 becomes more and more important, as we proceed in 
 the history of this century. I speak of it here, be- 
 cause Samaria is always regarded, by old historians at 
 least, as the starting-place of the debates to which this 
 radical difference gave rise. Menander is said to have Menander. 
 been Simon's successor. You must not infer from the 
 word "successor" that they were necessarily related to 
 each other as pupil to teacher, though that may very 
 possibly have been the case. The phrase only intimates 
 that Menander had the same habit of mind as Simon; 
 that they both looked upon the Christ mainly, either 
 as One possessing miraculous powers, or as an emana- 
 tion from the Divinity — that they both separated Jesus 
 the humble Man from Christ the divine Power. They 
 
170 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. did this probably in a more Jewish way than those 
 we shall hear of afterwards. I think there is no 
 doubt that we may trace in Samaria the rude form of 
 a system which became refined and complicated in 
 Syria and Egypt. 
 
 Justin, a As I wish you always to associate eminent men 
 with the countries from which they sprung, when we 
 can know them, I will add, before I leave Samaria, that 
 Justin, of whom we shall hear much hereafter, was 
 born in one of its villages. His after life is connected 
 with the Greek cities and with Rome. I do not 
 suppose that he had anything to do with the Church 
 in Samaria ; he was probably an unbeliever in Jesus 
 while he dwelt there. Nor is there an evidence that 
 he was a Jew by birth ; it seems to me clear that he 
 was not. Nevertheless, his Samaritan origin must have 
 affected his thoughts and character not inconsiderably, 
 the more as he must in his childhood have heard 
 much of the war under Barcochba, if he did not 
 witness some of the later events of it. 
 
 Syria. We will now go to Antioch. Here we find ourselves 
 
 in quite a new region. There is evidently a settled 
 society ; a father or overseer is at the head of it : 
 there is fellowship between it and other societies that 
 we have heard of already in the Apostolical records ; 
 the Heathen people wonder what it means, and begin 
 to regard it as troublesome, even formidable. I told 
 you that there was a tradition of St. Peter having 
 presided over this Church, in the same way as St. 
 James did at Jerusalem, and that there was very little 
 justification for the opinion in the facts of his history. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 171 
 
 We know nothing of the society, after the story in Lkct. i. 
 the Acts of the Apostles leaves us, till we find Ignatius 
 there in the days of Trajan. 
 
 There has been a great controversy about his let- Ignatius. 
 ters, one in which our Bishop Pearson took a con- 
 spicuous part. A number of epistles had been passing 
 under the name of Ignatius, which were manifestly 
 forgeries, and which had brought the rest into dis- 
 credit. Pearson maintained the genuineness of the His Letters. 
 letters to the Churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, Rome, 
 Philadelphia, Smyrna, and of one to Polycarp. These 
 epistles contain some very strong passages respecting 
 the authority of the Bishop or Overseer, and the 
 impossibility of a Church acting without him. The 
 question, therefore, whether they are genuine, has been 
 mixed up with the opinions of men upon this subject. 
 However much they may have wished to look fairly 
 at the evidence, their wishes to find, or not to find, 
 something in so early a document which might support Controversy 
 their previous conclusions, have more or less affected JJJJ 6 M 
 their judgments of it. The recent discovery of a 
 Syriac version of these epistles, greatly reduced in 
 size, has given a new turn to the controversy, some 
 maintaining that this version enables us to make out 
 a consistent original text, some that it was garbled to 
 suit the purposes of persons who did not like the 
 sentiments of Ignatius. 
 
 I am not going into this dispute. But I have said Advantage 
 
 CL71CL 7)llS~ 
 
 thus much to you about it because I desire to point c M e fofit. 
 out to you a good and an evil which has followed 
 from the argument. The good is, that documents are 
 
172 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - l sifted — that each person, on whatever side he writes, 
 brings out some fact or observation which others had 
 overlooked — that between them some maxims and 
 rides of evidence which may be applied to different 
 cases are established. The evil is, that the readers, 
 and still more, the disputants, begin to form quite 
 a false notion of the man about whom they are 
 talking. Some of you have fancied, I dare say, 
 because I have alluded to statements respecting 
 the authority of the Bishop, that Ignatius was a 
 polemical author, who was maintaining some doctrine 
 or theory about Church government. You could not 
 make a greater mistake. He is the simplest, most 
 Ignatius a child-like man, one can meet with anywhere. We call 
 /ather. * hi m one of the Apostolical Fathers, and we could not 
 give him a better name. Whichever text of his 
 writings is the true one, that character comes out 
 most evidently in him. He is a shepherd watching 
 over a flock, a father looking after a family. There 
 are other flocks under different shepherds, distinct 
 families under distinct fathers. These he claims fel- 
 lowship with, because he confesses one chief Shepherd, 
 one Father that is over them all. But he is as little 
 of a debater or of a speculative man as it is possible 
 to conceive. His only thought is how to keep his 
 sheep together ; what is likely to tempt them to wander 
 and choose ways of their own. Even on this point 
 he does not go into any refinements. He knows very 
 little about the thoughts that were stirring in men's 
 minds at that time, or how to bring out the truths of 
 the Gospel in reference to them. He has no calling 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 173 
 
 to that work, and he does not pretend to do it. If you Lect. i. 
 
 fancy that because he lived so near the time of the cannot he 
 
 Apostles, and because he was, perhaps, the disciple c °^^ ed 
 
 and friend of the Apostle John, there must be some Canonical 
 
 i-i -it • Epistles. 
 
 danger of confounding his letters with those m the 
 Bible, you have only to read them, and you will find 
 the difference. All that wonderful and various wisdom 
 which was brought out in the Apostle Paul, to meet 
 the various circumstances of men in different nations 
 and churches of the world, is entirely wanting in 
 Ignatius. The deep theology of the Apostle" John, 
 which reconciles so many different and opposing 
 thoughts, and which remains a treasure for the 
 peasant and the sage in every new period, has 
 nothing which corresponds to it in his pupil. 
 Yet in one sense the mantle of his master has 
 fallen upon him. The affectionate, loving, uniting Resem- 
 spirit is with him. That was wanted for the new t ZeltLm. 
 time as for the old. In every other respect the 
 Apostolical Fathers were to offer the most striking 
 and lively contrast to the writers whom they reve- 
 renced, and who were by degrees to be recognised 
 as canonical. 
 
 Yet Ignatius had a calling of his own, and I want Deswe/or 
 you to see how great and noble a one it was. You ^ilJimtiZ. 
 must think of him as a man and a pastor, much more 
 than as a doctor ; and then you will understand what 
 his doctrine was, how living it was, how entirely it 
 meant faith and trust in a living Person, how, for that 
 reason, it could sustain him in his work and in his 
 death. He had certainly a weakness, and one which 
 
it. 
 
 174 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - t - might afterwards do much harm in the Church, when 
 it was indulged by men of another character than 
 his. He had an intense craving to die for his Master. 
 It was not that he attached the least merit to such an 
 Reason of act; that thought never entered his mind, or, at least, 
 never dwelt there. But the death of Christ was so 
 present to him, he so much lived upon it and in it, 
 that he could conceive no blessedness or glory like 
 that of entering into it thoroughly and altogether. 
 He could not feel himself much at home in the 
 frivolous city in which his body dwelt ; his home was 
 elsewhere. And there was a certain impatience to get 
 rid of his earthly tabernacle, that he might be ever 
 with the Lord, which shows how real his faith was, 
 but shows too, I think, that there was some great 
 difference between him and that Apostle who was 
 content to be a prisoner of Nero, that he might be 
 a witness for God. 
 Trajan and There is nothing, however, much more instructive, 
 or more beautiful, than the story which is preserved 
 to us of the interview between this old Father and 
 the Emperor Trajan. Trajan had the kingdoms of 
 the world in possession ; he was adding to them by 
 fresh conquests ; he was ruling them, on the whole, 
 wisely and honestly. He took the society of the Roman 
 empire as he found it, with its beliefs and its unbe- 
 liefs, its vices and its gods, — the order which had 
 come down from other days, the corrupt habits and 
 passions which were threatening that order with 
 destruction. He did not pretend to make this world 
 better : he was to hold it together as well as he 
 
 Ignatius. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 175 
 
 could. He felt he was bound to do that ; and he Lect.i. 
 did not shrink from the labour that was wanted for Character 
 
 n °f the 
 
 the task. He was a man of strong, clear sense, ot Emperor. 
 kindly dispositions, covetous of power, but desirous 
 to be just. Ignatius was a ruler, too, in his way, — a 
 ruler on a very small scale, over a few sheep or chil- 
 dren, such as I have described, in the midst of a city 
 that was hungering after wealth, given up to pleasure, 
 worshipping the gods, — in a great measure for the 
 games and festivals with which their worship was 
 accompanied. The Christian family was not one which 
 left the inhabitants of this city quiet. It is not 
 like those who frequented the Jewish synagogue, — a 
 people with curious rites, which they have inherited 
 from their fathers, and who leave other people to 
 keep their own traditions, while they keep theirs. 
 This family is intrusive, aggressive, — it claims all 
 people as belonging to it, — it tempts them within its 
 circle. If they come into it, they abandon their 
 own. 
 
 It was impossible for Trajan not to take notice of m» reasons 
 such a society. You will easily conceive that when ^J%Zg 0f 
 the two men looked each other in the face, they ig™ tius - 
 would understand each other very little. Trajan 
 accused Ignatius of transgressing his commands, and 
 of tempting many to their ruin. He called him 
 KaKohalfioiv, by which he meant much what a person 
 would mean in our day, by calling one for whom he 
 had a contempt, a poor devil. Ignatius took hold of 
 the word, and said, " That one who bore God in him 
 could not be called a demon or devil, seeing that the 
 
170 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. i. demons depart from the servants of God. But if the 
 Emperor meant that he was evil towards the demons, 
 he confessed it. Having Christ as his Heavenly 
 King, he broke their plots in pieces." " Who is it," 
 asked Trajan, " who carries God within him ? " 
 Ignatius answered, " He that has Christ in his 
 heart." " Why," said Trajan, " do you not think 
 
 Tkedemons. that we have the gods in our mind, seeing that we 
 have them as our allies against our enemies?" Igna- 
 tius said, " The demons of the nations, thou, in thy 
 error, callest gods. For there is one God, He that 
 hath made the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, 
 and all things in them ; and one Christ Jesus, the 
 Son of God, the Only-Begotten, whose kingdom may 
 I enjoy." " Do you mean," said Trajan, " Him that 
 was crucified under Pontius Pilate ? " Ignatius said, 
 " Him that hath crucified my sin with the inventor 
 of it, and hath put down all demoniac error and 
 wickedness under the feet of those who bear Him 
 
 Christ in in their heart." "Dost thou, then," said Trajan, 
 
 the man. u ^^ ^ Crucified Q nQ witlmi thyself?" Iglia- 
 
 tius said, " Yea. For it is written, ' I will dwell 
 in them, and walk in them.' " Thereupon Trajan 
 pronounced sentence : " We ordain that Ignatius, 
 who says that he bears the Crucified within him, 
 be led as a prisoner to Rome, there to be made 
 the food of wild beasts, for the amusement of the 
 people." 
 
 The records * Sna ^ llot ^Well as mucn as some nave done, Oil 
 
 of his the records of martyrdoms. Many of them are clearly 
 
 martyrdom. . . . -,-,,. i t • i 
 
 oi later invention. But this, and one or tw T o to Avlncli 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 177 
 
 I shall allude in the second century, have not only a Lect. i. 
 real savour of antiquity in them, but make known to 
 us the innermost principles upon which the Church 
 was standing, and the secret of the power which it 
 was exerting in the world, a secret often misunder- 
 stood by those who glorified the Fathers of the Church 
 in after days. For instance, it became a custom in Ignatius, 
 the Church to call Ignatius QeUopos, * the God- ***** 
 
 o r r ' sense 
 
 bearer,' because he spoke of his carrying Christ in ®^<pop ^. 
 him. So far as this name expressed merely the 
 respect and love of his own flock, and their convic- 
 tion that he was living in close communion with the 
 spiritual world, there was no great harm in applying 
 it to him. But certainly he never meant to claim it 
 as if it were some special title. His quotation from the 
 Scriptures showed that he looked upon every Christian 
 man as a Qe6<f>opos, whether he was mindful of his 
 high and awful privilege or not. His exhortations 
 had no meaning, if this were not true. He had no 
 testimony to bear to Trajan against the visible gods 
 to whom he was bowing down, if he could not speak 
 of Christ having come to claim men as members of 
 Himself, and so, as children of His Father. The 
 limitation of the language was a dangerous symptom. 
 I cannot say how early it may have manifested itself; 
 but I have no doubt very soon, it is so natural. And 
 there was another bad symptom, which the history of March for 
 the martyrdom of Ignatius makes known to us. His 
 friends gathered up relics of his body after he was 
 killed, and preserved them : so the story says, and I 
 cannot see any reason for disbelieving it. The act 
 
 N 
 
178 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.i. was a simple and innocent one at first, but, like the 
 
 Epliod which Gideon made, it became a snare and 
 
 a sin to the house of Israel. The antiquity of the 
 
 practice makes no difference at all in this respect. 
 
 There was peril in it from the beginning. We shall 
 
 see by-and-by with what other perils it speedily 
 
 became connected. 
 
 intercourse I spoke of Ignatius as knowing very little of the 
 
 h churland thoughts by which men were exercised in his time, 
 
 the Persian fa 0Vi a\\ he fulfilled his own work so faithfully. You 
 
 sages. D 
 
 must not suppose that such ignorance was universal 
 
 in the Church of Antioch. It was on the borders of the 
 
 old Persian empire. The members of it met continually 
 
 with men who had been nourished in that faith of 
 
 which I spoke to you in a former lecture. It had not 
 
 lost its poAver, — it could not, for it appeals to some of 
 
 the strongest and deepest experiences in men's hearts. 
 
 The dark "Are we not dwelling in an evil world?" these 
 
 ^dbright p ersiang as ked;— "Who can have made it?— Surely 
 
 some dark and evil being. But there is a better 
 
 world we think of and dream of. It may be in the 
 
 bright stars over our heads, in the sun, or moon ; — 
 
 it may be in some region where spirits dwell, but 
 
 which the eye does not see. No doubt that world 
 
 must have something to do with ours. All the light 
 
 that visits us must proceed from it. Doubtless from 
 
 time to time some persons or spiritual beings come 
 
 thence to do us good. How else could we account 
 
 for any good men dwelling here, in the midst of all 
 
 our evil? They must be the chosen favourites of 
 
 Heaven, picked out from the rest, by these beings that 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 179 
 
 descend to us, and act in a multitude of secret ways lect. i. , 
 upon us." 
 
 Such thoughts were more distinctly and broadly widedif- 
 
 expressed in the Persian faith than in any other. £?°«o^Ls 
 
 But they were diffused, in one form or other, through in thc 
 
 # second 
 
 the Roman world. That passion for enchantments, century. 
 that ready belief in all teachers who spoke of strange 
 new influences, was a sign of their prevalence. The 
 visible powers to which men paid a traditional, heart- 
 less homage, were not enough for them. There must 
 be some unknown, mysterious agency, of quite a differ- 
 ent nature from these. Nay, were not these then' op- 
 pressors, from which they were crying to be delivered? 
 
 The preachers of Christ's Gospel said, in plain Apparent 
 terms, that they were. They spoke of the rulers of % wUh l tl 'l 
 the darkness of this world. They spoke of Christ te ^'""i 
 delivering men from them. Those who embraced the Gospel. 
 Gospel heartily, in the love of it, soon found what 
 these words meant. They felt they w r ere not the 
 servants of dark, malevolent powers, — that they were 
 not the servants of visible things. They had found 
 their true Father : they had arisen and gone to Him. 
 Christ, by His acts of power, had claimed earth, 
 and sea, and air, for Him. They coidd confess an 
 unseen, heavenly, spiritual Lord of all. They could 
 invite their fellow men to renounce any other worship, 
 and serve Him. 
 
 This was the spirit in which Ignatius spoke to Tra- inferences 
 Jan. But those who had not felt the true burthen of the £2wJjj* 
 world's evil on their hearts, or had not sought deliver- 
 ance from it as he had, could easily draw from his 
 
 n 2 
 
180 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 A ttempts 
 at a higher 
 devotion. 
 
 Lect. t. words the sense that this world was the possession of 
 evil spirits ; that it belonged of right to them ; that 
 Christ had come as an alien or intruding power into 
 it ; that He had chosen out a few favourites while He 
 was down here on earth, whom He meant to be with 
 Him in the world of Light ; that their duty was to 
 keep themselves out of all contact with material 
 things which were utterly evil, and, as far as they 
 could, from any intercourse with a world which was 
 not only devil-tainted, but devil-possessed. 
 
 For some time, those who held those thoughts 
 would seem to themselves and to others more eminent 
 Christians than the rest of the Church; stronger 
 protestants against the surrounding heathenism; hold- 
 ing up a higher ideal of devotion to their brethren. 
 They knew that St. Paul had striven to bring his body 
 into subjection ; they could invent devices for the pur- 
 pose of showing their utter contempt for it, and of 
 separating their souls from all intercourse with it. 
 The further they carried these experiments, the more 
 they appeared to ascend into an invisible region, and 
 to acquire the power of investigating its secrets. 
 By degrees, however, those who had admired these 
 
 founded™ teachers for t j ie su blimity of their virtue and of their 
 
 the asceticat •> 
 
 practice. aspirations, would be startled by very strange language 
 from their lips, language which seemed not only at 
 variance with all they had heard from Ignatius, all 
 they read in the writings of the Apostles, but abso- 
 lutely subversive of their doctrine. " Matter being 
 essentially evil — the body being accursed. — is it possi- 
 ble," these spiritual men would ask, " that Christ has 
 
 Doctrines 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 1S1 
 
 actually taken flesh, that He has died on an actual Lect. i. 
 cross ? Can He, the pure spiritual Being, have come Christ's 
 into direct contact and conflict with the defilements h °^ e ^' nQt 
 of our world ?" " Oh ! surely not," they replied : " it •"»* 
 must have been only an apparent flesh He wore; it was 
 only an apparent death He died." This was enough 
 for some. Others must have a new theory to ex- 
 plain this. No doubt the Evangelists attributed 
 plain, simple, earthly acts to their Lord and Master. 
 So they might. Jesus of Nazareth did, no doubt, jes USS epa- 
 perform those acts. But the Christ, the spiritual 2TcCis7. 
 Being, must not be identified with Him. Was it not 
 said that the Spirit descended upon Him at His bap- 
 tism? The Christ is He who is anointed with the 
 Spirit. Why might not the Christ descend into Jesus 
 then, and desert Him again before His passion ? 
 
 Those who had arrived at this point, were already seeming 
 on the same ground with those in Persia or else- a ^'^ ml 
 where, who spoke of divine helpers and redeemers, retrogres- 
 
 sion. 
 
 coming from the world of light into the world of 
 darkness. There was nothing in what they called 
 Gospel, which essentially differed from this old belief. 
 For it had ceased to be a Gospel. It was no longer a 
 message to mankind about One who had been actually 
 born into this world, that He might claim them and it 
 for His Father and their Father. It was a scheme about 
 the descent of a certain divine essence into the body of 
 a mere man. Such essences might have dwelt in other 
 bodies before ; or they might have moved about with- m ¥ngkd, y 
 out any bodies. Might they not, as the Persians said, with 
 
 J .;.... Christian 
 
 have come from the stars ; the world of light which the Theology. 
 
182 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. I. 
 
 Satwrni- 
 
 tms. 
 
 His opin~ 
 ions, how 
 far local, 
 how far 
 human. 
 
 good Creator had formed ? Must not they have ap- 
 peared here, to rescue certain holy souls from the evil 
 Creator? Might not all the acts of Christ, as well as 
 His relation to those who had dwelt on earth and 
 been helpers to man before Him, be explained on tins 
 hypothesis ? 
 
 The name of Satuminus is connected in the Church 
 of Antioch with doctrines of this kind. They seemed 
 to him and to his followers far more profound than 
 those which had been taught in the Church before. 
 The simpler men in the Church were scandalized by 
 them as startling denials of what was most precious 
 to them. Later times have wondered how opinions, 
 which, when they are brought together, seem so 
 strange and incoherent, coidd have ever arisen in 
 the mind of one man, or been adopted by others. I 
 apprehend that there was the most profound meaning 
 in the thoughts of those Persian sages, who had asked 
 what this world is, and what other and better world 
 there is than this. But if the news that Jesus Christ 
 had taken flesh and redeemed mankind, was the only 
 possible answer to this question, Saturninus and his 
 friends were not finding out a new and deeper satisfac- 
 tion of men's difficulties, but setting aside one which 
 had been given. The form which their opinions took, 
 was determined by the circumstances in which they 
 lived, or in which they were educated. The tempta- 
 tion to the opinions lay in their desire to be different 
 from -other men; in not liking to acknowledge a com- 
 mon Lord, and common Deliverer. It is not safe 
 merely to dwell on their extravagances. It is ncces- 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. I33 
 
 sary to remember that these formed themselves by Lbct. i. 
 degrees most naturally, and that, if we are in no danger 
 of falling into their particular habits of thought, we are 
 just as much in danger as they were, of accepting 
 the principle, which gave these habits of thought all 
 their mischief and malignity. If we do, the practical May be 
 results will be the same ; we shall not really believe repeated - 
 that Christ has come in the flesh more than they did. 
 I shall say nothing more about the Church of An- 
 tioch in the second century, except that one of its 
 bishops, Theophilus, wrote a defence of the Christian Tiieo P j,iia$, 
 faith, which is still extant; and that we have a fragment no" A ' D ' 
 by another, Serapion, in reference to a Gospel, passing Strapi m , 
 under the name of St. Peter, which inculcated, he A ' D ' 181 ' 
 affirms, many false doctrines. On both these subjects 
 I may have to speak to you, when I turn from 
 particular Churches to the Church as forming one 
 Society. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
 
 CHURCHES IN ASIA MINOR. 
 
 Leot. ii. I shall now pass to the Churches in Asia Minor. One 
 
 Asia of the Epistles of Ignatius, as I told you, is addressed 
 
 to the Church of Ephesus. As it is greatly reduced 
 in the Syriac version, I will draw no conclusions from 
 it respecting the character of those to Avhom it was 
 addressed. But the name Onesimus occurs in both 
 versions. If we may assume, — as most ecclesiastical 
 
 Onesimus historians have assumed, — that this Onesimus was he 
 p m r " about whom St. Paul wrote to Philemon, a society in 
 one of the wealthiest cities of the Roman empire 
 must have looked up to a runaway slave as its 
 spiritual overseer and father. There is no reason 
 to doubt the tradition. Even the existence of it 
 shows how certain it was that a Gospel which was 
 preached by fishermen, and confessed One who was 
 called the Carpenter's Son as the Son of God, would 
 break the chains of the captive, and establish a much 
 more wonderful equality at the root of society than 
 destroyers of ranks, than the most sweeping revolu- 
 tions, have been ever able to create. 
 
 Sardis. The Church at Sardis, you will remember, was in 
 
 a very unpromising state when it was addressed by 
 St. John. We may hope that it had recovered its 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 185 
 
 ground before the middle of the second century ; for Lect. ii. 
 at that time we find it under the government of a Mditm 
 man who was, at all events, a voluminous and pains- ^°^ hcd 
 taking writer. None of his books remain to us, but Marcus 
 
 i • 1 i Aurelius. 
 
 you shall have the titles of them ; because they will 
 tell you what people were thinking about at this 
 time. He wrote on Easter ; on Polity ; on Prophets ; Subjects 
 on the Church ; on the Lord's Day ; on the Nature ° boo ^ 
 of Man ; on Creation ; on the Obedience of Faith ; 
 on the Objects of Sense ; on the Soul and Body, or 
 the Higher Mind; on Baptism; on the Origin and 
 Birth of Christ; on Prophecy; on Hospitality; — a 
 book called The Key ; on the Devil ; on the Apoca- 
 lypse ; on the Incarnate God ; and a book addressed 
 to the Emperor Antoninus. You will not understand, 
 at present, the occasions which led him to touch upon 
 some of these topics. I shall tell you immediately 
 about one of them. 
 
 The Overseer of the Church of Smyrna during a Smyrna. 
 great part of this century was Polycarp, who is 
 represented, on good evidence, as having been the 
 friend, and disciple of St. John. I call him by this 
 name, Overseer, which is a good and venerable name. 
 Yet it describes the office more than the man. If we 
 speak of him as a Father, we shall be much nearer the 
 impression which he made on his contemporaries. If His Letter. 
 his letter to the Philippians is genuine, as it is gene- 
 rally held to be in England, it shows us what the 
 secret of his influence must have been. There are no 
 discussions in it of such subjects as Meliton handled, 
 — not the least speculation of any kind. It consists 
 
St. John's 
 authority, 
 
 186 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - n - mainly of extracts from the Canonical Epistles, — not 
 on questions of debate or doctrine, but on purity, and 
 righteousness, and the love of money. If he wrote to 
 an European Church, it indicates a communion which 
 one likes to think may have existed consciously as 
 well as in the spirit, between those which were at 
 a distance from each other. One who knew and 
 revered him, certainly, became a teacher in Gaul. 
 Sphere of Still the influence of Polycarp must have mainly 
 eace been m the regions of Asia Minor. These Churches 
 
 clung with great tenacity to the customs which 
 Weight of they believed that St. John had observed. I have 
 tried to show how earnestly he laboured that the 
 Jewish calling should not be forgotten in the 
 Gentile world, — that the new commandment should 
 be felt as the real expansion and interpretation of 
 the old. In this spirit, he may have kept up till 
 his dying day something like an observation of the 
 Jewish Paschal feast, while he taught his disciples 
 how Christ had translated it into a higher, — the 
 festival of an accomplished redemption and of a 
 The Pass- divine life. There would have been nothing inconsis- 
 °Easteri)a}i. tent in his following the maxims of his youth, as to 
 times and seasons, while he was most possessed with 
 the meaning and power of the Resurrection, as fulfil- 
 ling all that the Passover had shadowed out. The 
 more the Churches felt the ground on which they were 
 standing, the more wonderful the day of Resurrection 
 appeared to them ; the more they hailed it as the new 
 birth-day of the world, which, for the sake of the world, 
 as much as for the sake of their own unity, they were 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 187 
 
 to proclaim by their acts as well as their words. The lkct. h- 
 Apostles had been sent forth to testify of the Resur- 
 rection ; what had the Church to testify of, that was 
 so glorious a Gospel to mankind, concerning their true 
 King, — concerning the deliverance He had wrought 
 out, — concerning the union He had established be- 
 tween the seen and the unseen world? The connexion Differences 
 of Easter with the Passover was, no doubt, close ; but churches. 
 as Christians began to be more separate from the 
 synagogue, they were more disposed to dwell on the 
 difference than the resemblance between the two 
 dispensations. The Christians in the West eagerly 
 insisted that Easter Day must be kept on the first 
 day of the week; that all other celebrations must 
 regulate themselves by this. With those of Asia 
 Minor St. John's example was mightier than any 
 arguments. The day which they had seen, or sup- 
 posed him to observe, must be the right one. No 
 authority on earth should induce them to change it. 
 Polycarp seems thoroughly to have shared this feel- Polycarp 
 ing. We are told that he made a journey to Rome, cetus , Eu . 
 and argued the question with Anicetus, who was the s eUus,hwk 
 Overseer of that Church. They could come to no 
 agreement about the subject in controversy ; but 
 they parted with a sense of inward communion, 
 which was stronger than any diversity of customs 
 could break. It was not, we shall find, to be so 
 always. 
 
 Polycarp belongs to the same class of men with 
 Ignatius ; but there are marked individual differences 
 between them. In the scanty records we have of 
 
188 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 "2,t.i.vpvalu}V 
 
 7repi 
 
 fxaprvpiov 
 rod dyiov 
 TloXvKap- 
 
 TTOV. 
 
 A somewhat 
 abridged 
 version in 
 Eusebius, 
 book iv. 
 c. 14. 
 
 Polycarp 
 retreating 
 from perse- 
 cution. 
 
 He is dis- 
 covered. 
 
 their lives, these differences are less conspicuous. 
 They come out clearly in the accounts of their deaths. 
 Polycarp survived Ignatius full fifty years. He lived 
 till the reign of Marcus Aurelius. In that reign the 
 Church of Smyrna was sorely persecuted. A letter 
 was written in its name, when it had gained a little 
 rest, which tells of others who fought and fell, but 
 especially how its dear and venerable father endured 
 to the end. From this letter it is evident that the 
 eager longing to suffer which had characterized Igna- 
 tius, had been imitated by men with very little of 
 his faith. One Quintus is especially named, who 
 came out of Phrygia, expressly that he might offer 
 himself as a victim for the faith, but who, when he 
 saw the wild beasts, was affrighted, and made the 
 sacrifices and took the oaths which the Proconsul 
 prescribed. Polycarp gave a different example to 
 his flock. A cry went up from the multitude, " Away 
 with the atheists; let Polycarp be sought for." There- 
 upon, though wishing to remain in the city, he con- 
 sented to withdraw to a place in the country, where 
 with a few friends he spent his time night and day 
 praying for all men, and for the Churches throughout 
 the world, as was his wont. While he was praying, 
 it is said, he beheld a vision, which assured him that 
 he must be burnt alive. Still his Master's precept 
 to fly, seemed to him binding; he sought another 
 hiding place. It was discovered. Late in the even- 
 ing, horsemen arrived at the house in which he was 
 concealed. When he heard that they were come, he 
 went down from the upper chamber to meet them. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 189 
 
 They wondered at his quietness and his dignity, and Lect. h. 
 at the pains they had been taking to apprehend so 
 old a man. He desired his attendants to bring forth 
 food and drink for them. He himself asked an hour 
 for uninterrupted prayer. Tor two hours, it is said, m* 
 he continued his supplications, remembering all with 
 whom he had ever conversed, little and great, illustri- 
 ous and insignificant, and the whole Catholic Church 
 throughout the world. Then they placed him upon 
 an ass and brought him into the city, the day being 
 the Sabbath immediately preceding the Easter festival. 
 The Irenarch asked him what harm there was in 
 saying Lord Caesar, and in offering sacrifice, and what 
 else was required of him . At first he did not answer 
 them. Then, when they continued, he said, " I am 
 not going to do what you advise me to do." ' As he 
 entered into the arena, says the writer of the letter, a The Yoke. 
 voice from Heaven was heard saying to him, " Be 
 strong, and be a man, Polycarp." That such a voice, 
 or one imparting still higher strength than this, 
 reached his inward ear, we cannot doubt, from what 
 followed — though the by-standers may have only 
 dreamed that they caught the echo of it. When he 
 was brought before the Proconsul, he was asked 
 whether he was Polycarp. On his confessing to the 
 name, — "Have compassion on thy age," said the Pro- Polycarp 
 consul ; " swear by the fortune of Caesar ; abandon p VOC o nsu i 
 thy error ; cry aloud, Away with the Atheists." Then 
 
 1 The unhappy Latin translator substitutes for this famous answer, 
 the following piece of rant :— Ad hoc se nunquam perduci non igne, non 
 ferro, non arctorum doloribus vinculorum, non fame, non exsilio, non 
 flagellis;' ! ! 
 
190 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Leot. ii. turning with a firm face to all the people, lifting his 
 hand, and looking up to Heaven, Polycarp said, 
 " Away with the Atheists ! " " Take the oath, and 
 renounce Christ," said the Proconsul, "and I will 
 release thee." Polycarp answered, " Eighty and six 
 years have I served Him, and He hath done me no 
 wrong ; and how can I speak evil of my King, my 
 
 The oath. Saviour ? " " Swear by the fortune of Caesar," said 
 the Proconsul. " If from mere idleness," answered 
 Polycarp, " thou requirest that I should swear by the 
 fortune of Caesar, pretending that thou dost not know 
 who I am, hear me. I am a Christian. But if thou 
 wishest to know the Christian doctrine, give me a 
 day, and hear." The Proconsul said, " Persuade the 
 people." (Probably to save him, the Roman really 
 wishing to do so, if the mob could have been satis- 
 fied.) Polycarp said, " Thee I have counted worthy 
 to hear our doctrine; for we are bidden to pay all 
 seemly reverence, such as is not destructive of us, to 
 the powers and authorities that are ordained by God. 
 
 The mob. But these I count not worthy that I should make my 
 apology to them." The Proconsul said to him, " I 
 have wild beasts : to these I may cast you, if you 
 change not your mind." " It is good," he answered, 
 " to change from the worse to the better, not from 
 the better to the worse." The other replied to him, 
 " If you care nothing for wild beasts, I can cause you 
 to be consumed with fire." Polycarp said, " Thou 
 threatenest the fire that burns for an hour and 
 speedily is quenched. Thou knowest not the fire of 
 the coming judgment, and of eternal punishment that 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 191 
 
 is kept for the ungodly. But why tamest thou ? lect. it. 
 Order whichever thou pleasest." Then, it is said, the ^ ie leasts. 
 countenance of Polycarp was filled with exceeding 
 courage and joy; and the Proconsul sent a herald 
 into the midst of the arena, proclaiming, " Polycarp 
 hath confessed himself to be a Christian." Thereupon 
 the multitude of the Jews and Gentiles that dwelt in 
 Smyrna cried aloud, " This is the teacher of impiety, 
 — the Father of the Christians, who teacheth multi- 
 tudes not to sacrifice, nor to worship the gods." So 
 speaking, they urged the Asiarch, — an officer who had 
 the care of the games, uniting in himself some civil 
 with some sacerdotal functions, — that he would let 
 loose a lion upon him. The person appealed to, 
 refused, seeing that his office had expired. Then Thefire. 
 they cried out, "That he should be burnt alive," — 
 according to the intimation, his biographer adds, that 
 he had received in his vision. The multitude ran 
 eagerly to fetch the wood and what else w r as needful, 
 for the burning ; the Jews, as was their custom, being 
 specially busy in this work. Then, when they were 
 about to fasten him with fetters, he said, " Leave me 
 so. Tor He who has given me power to endure the 
 fire, will give me power, without your securities, to 
 remain unmoved at the stake." Then, when they 
 had bound his arms, he prayed : " Lord God Omnipo- Prayer at 
 tent, the Father of Thy beloved and blessed Son, 
 Jesus Christ, through whom we have received the 
 knowledge of Thee, the God of angels and principali- 
 ties, and of all the creation, and of all the generation 
 of the righteous, who live before Thee ; I bless Thee 
 
192 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Leot.ii. that Thou hast counted me worthy of this day and of 
 this hour, that I should have part in the number of 
 Thy witnesses, in the cup of Thy Christ, so to attain 
 to the resurrection of eternal life of soul and of 
 body, through the incorruptibleness of the Holy Spirit. 
 Among these (witnesses) may I be received before Thee 
 to-day for an acceptable offering, according as Thou 
 hast prepared me, and hast manifested beforehand 
 Thy will, and hast accomplished it, who art the faith- 
 ful and true God. For this and for all things, I 
 praise Thee, I bless Thee, I glorify Thee, with the 
 eternal and heavenly Jesus Christ, Thy beloved Son ; 
 with whom to Thee and the Holy Spirit be glory, 
 now, and in the ages to come. Amen." As he 
 finished the prayer, the men who were waiting for 
 that intent kindled the fire. 
 TJiere- What follows is not worthy of Polycarp's words 
 
 mainder of , . . . . . _ _ .. 
 
 the Letter. &Dd prayer, seeing that it chiefly relers to the im- 
 pression on the by-stanclers, who were liable in that 
 exciting time to various fancies, which seemed more 
 wonderful and divine to them than facts, but which 
 cannot seem so to us, if our minds are in a right 
 state. The historian complains, that through the 
 craft of the devil, the disciples of Polycarp were 
 prevented at first from obtaining any relic of his 
 
 Search for body. He attributes the attempt to rob them of this 
 privilege to the representations of Jews, that they 
 intended to turn the bones into objects of worship. 
 He protests, evidently with the greatest sincerity, 
 against the notion that it was possible for them who 
 acknowledged Christ as the Lord of all, to commit 
 
 remains. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. ]93 
 
 such an offence, however they might desire to reve- Lect. n. 
 rence those upon whom God had put the highest 
 honour. The Church meant what it said. But it had 
 not yet learnt that the devil's arts might be employed 
 in other ways than to save them from a great tempta- 
 tion ; they had not yet learnt that the Jew might be 
 an unconscious instrument in God's hands to warn 
 those who had inherited the stewardship of his fathers 
 against falling into the sins of his fathers. 
 
 Such, and so beautiful, are the records of the Church 
 in Smyrna; so accurately did it bear out in the second 
 century, the description which St. John had given in 
 the first of the struggles it would undergo, and the 
 class of enemies it would have to encounter. 
 
 We have not similar records of the Church in the Bithynia. 
 particular cities in Asia Minor ; but there are two or 
 three of its provinces which offer facts that are very 
 deserving of our notice. You have heard of Trajan's 
 personal conflict with Ignatius in Syria. Several 
 years before his coming there, he had received a letter 
 from his able friend and minister, Caius Plinius, who 
 was Proconsul in Bithynia, asking for his judgment piinywent 
 about the treatment of the Christians there. The ^.'iosT**' 
 authenticity of the letter has been doubted; but I 
 think that scholars in general accept it. There is Letters, 
 
 • • o • i • • T n book X. 
 
 nothing m the tone ot it to make it suspicious. It ep . 96. 
 there are some passages which a Christian likes to 
 dwell upon, there are others which show how little 
 the early times were free from the inconstancy and 
 false profession of the later. Pliny assumes that the 
 Christians in his province are to be treated as offenders; 
 
 o 
 
194 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Deserters. 
 
 Lect. ii. that had evidently been the practice before he came 
 to it. But he was not clear about the amount 
 of punishment that was to be awarded to them, — 
 whether it was to be the same for young and old, 
 strong and weak, — whether they were to be pardoned 
 if they retracted, — whether the mere name of Chris- 
 tian, without any evidence of further offences, was to 
 ms method suffice for their condemnation. His course hitherto, 
 tithChL he says, had been to ask them whether they were 
 tians. Christians; the second time to threaten punishment. 
 Inflexible obstinacy he assumed to be a crime, though 
 there were no other. Some he sent to Home, because 
 they were Roman citizens. Many anonymous charges 
 were conveyed to him against different persons : some 
 of these denied that they had ever been Christians ; 
 some admitted that they had been three years or 
 more before ; one or two had renounced the profes- 
 sion full twenty years. All these submitted to the 
 tests which Pliny imposed. They invoked the gods ; 
 offered supplications, with wine and frankincense, to 
 the image of the Emperor, and reviled Christ. These 
 he dismissed. Those who were, indeed, Christians 
 would do none of these things. The recanters told 
 Pliny that the height of their crime or error had 
 consisted in the habit of meeting on a fixed day 
 before it was light ; in singing hymns to Christ as to 
 a God ; in binding themselves by an oath, to abstain 
 from thefts and adulteries ; — not to violate their faith; 
 not to withhold deposits when called to give them up. 
 The Sacred Then they were wont to depart, and to meet again 
 
 Meal. 
 
 for the purpose of eating bread. The meal, it ap- 
 
 Their con- 
 fessions. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. ^95 
 
 peared, was harmless and " general :" but it was aban- lect. ii. 
 doned when the Proconsul published the Emperor's Promis- 
 command against secret assemblies. The Proconsul C T - 
 says that he examined two maid-servants by torture, word > 
 but that he could extract no further testimony from to high and 
 them than this. It was a depraved and extravagant low '" 
 superstition. But he needed the Emperor's direc- 
 tions ; for many of all orders, and both sexes, were 
 involved in the charge. The contagion of this super- The spread 
 stition had spread not only into cities, but in the ti n c,and 
 villages and country districts. Still, he trusted it thechecks 
 
 • mi t0 *'*' 
 
 might be stopped. There was evidence that the 
 temples which had been almost deserted were begin- 
 ing to be frequented again, and that sacred solemni- 
 ties, which had been long intermitted, were renewed. 
 It seemed, therefore, wise to try what might be done 
 by holding out encouragement to a change of mind. 
 Trajan, in his answer, approves the policy of Pliny. TheEmpe- 
 He does not wish to lay down general rules, which rors an ~ 
 might not be applicable to all places and circum- 
 stances. He would not have Christians sought for ; 
 he would have them punished whenever they were 
 'accused and convicted; — if they would give some 
 manifest proof of repentance, such as offering to the 
 gods, they should be pardoned. He did not like 
 anonymous accusations : the precedent was bad, and 
 unsuitable to his time. 
 
 What these letters tell us about the general policy iv/emice 
 of the Roman Empire, and the nature of its conflict Letters! 86 
 with the Church, I shall consider hereafter. I intro- 
 duce them here, because they throw light upon the 
 
 o 2 
 
190 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 Of whom 
 
 the Bitliy- 
 
 nian 
 
 Church 
 
 probably 
 
 consisted. 
 
 Heathen- 
 ism reviv- 
 ing from a 
 shock. 
 
 Paphlago- 
 
 Marcion 
 apparently 
 went to 
 
 condition of a particular province of Asia, at the 
 commencement of the second century. Pliny, it seems 
 to me, does not describe to us an organised Christian 
 society. He does not speak of any one whom he 
 could look upon as the responsible representative and 
 father of the Christian flock, in any of the cities under 
 his government. Possibly Bithynian Jews, who had 
 been led by St. Peter, and other Apostles of the Cir- 
 cumcision, to understand that Jesus was their King, 
 and who felt that they were to testify of Him, by 
 abstaining from surrounding corruption, and by 
 shining as lights in the world — but who still felt 
 themselves too much part of the old Jewish polity to 
 seek for any new social order — formed the bulk of 
 those who gave Pliny so much trouble. Their wit- 
 ness was evidently a very powerful one ; it shook the 
 heathenism of Asia, which was already tottering. 
 But the desertions seem to have been numerous. And 
 it is clear from the conclusion of Pliny's letter, that 
 there was a reaction in favour of the old heathenism, 
 the indifference for it being changed into zeal, either 
 by the mere fact of opposition to it, or by the 
 feebleness and inconsistencies of the opposers. 
 
 In Paphlagonia, on the borders of the Pontus 
 Euxinus, stood the city of Sinope. Here, about the 
 middle of the second century, we have a glimpse of a 
 Christian Church, and of a Christian bishop. But he 
 only comes before us as the father of a man who is 
 denounced as the introducer of a new and blasphe- 
 mous doctrine by his contemporaries, and whom some 
 in later times have been disposed to represent as a 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 197 
 
 reformer and champion of truth. This is Marciori. Lect. n. 
 
 According to the statements we have respecting him, R ome ie- 
 he was the disciple of one Cerdo, a Syrian, who gave JJJ^jJj, 
 the first hint of the opinions which he elaborated, andstudied 
 
 . under Cer- 
 
 The good God, — so he is said to have taught, — was do there. 
 not the God whom the Jews worshipped. Their God, The good 
 the God of Abraham, was, he said, a mere Creator or t £ e Jewis1l 
 Demiurgus. To deliver men from his oppressive Demiva-gua. 
 yoke, Christ came into the world. He revealed the 
 benevolent and loving God : He declared the King- 
 dom of Heaven, into which men might enter, if they 
 renounced this world, and the service of the tyrant. 
 These propositions Marcion is said to have maintained Writings of 
 in a book, called Antitheses, wherein he contrasted 
 Judaism and Christianity. He rejected the Gospels of 
 Matthew and Mark as Jewdsh ; he adopted an expur- 
 gated and altered version of St. Luke as the only safe 
 narrative of our Lord's life on earth. 
 
 Those who defend Marcion say, that no trust can m* de- 
 he placed in these reports ; that they are the misre- 
 presentations of men, who either did not understand 
 what he was aiming at, or wdio deliberately embraced 
 a false system, against which he was protesting. 
 They think they can perceive very clearly that he 
 was vindicating the Christian liberty which St. Paul 
 preached — the spiritual Gospel, which he had such a 
 hard fight to maintain, against the Judaisers of his 
 days— from the attacks of men, who were trying to 
 impose the same fetters on the Church of the second 
 century. I tell you of this diversity of opinions, be- 
 cause it might startle you if you met with it for the 
 
193 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ii. first time in some book. You might fancy there was 
 
 How to deal no security for any records that bear upon human 
 
 togsZ- 8 ' opinions. And no doubt it is true that we cannot 
 
 mmtsof arrive at certainty about the faith of Marcion or of 
 
 this kind. 
 
 any other man. There is another judge than we are; 
 and Christ has forbidden us to take His office. We 
 should never forget that ; if we do not, these very 
 oppositions about particular men, will help us rather 
 than hinder us. If we are not in a hurry to form our 
 opinion, or to take a side, we shall be perhaps led so 
 to weigh the evidence, and compare it with what we 
 have known of others and of ourselves, that we shall 
 learn more from the history through the seemingly con- 
 tradictory interpreters of it, than we could from either 
 separately. 
 Probability I quite belie ve with Marcion' s admirers, that he 
 desired to niay have been scandalized by the statements of a 
 defend St. j uc | a i ca i party, which was perhaps predominant among 
 truth. the Christians of his neighbourhood; and that he fled 
 to the Epistles of St. Paul, as a refuge from their hard 
 teaching, and a continual testimony against it. I can 
 quite understand that he may have been strongly and 
 deeply possessed by the New Testament divinity 
 which he found in St. Paul, and that he may have 
 burned to deliver the Church from that which he sup- 
 posed to be a relapse into an older condition. I can 
 imagine that his faith on these points met with no 
 response from the men who had most influence in 
 Paphlagonia, that some eager disciples clung to him, 
 that he was misunderstood and harshly opposed. 
 But I do not on this account distrust the statements 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 199 
 
 which have come clown to us respecting the opinions lect. n . 
 which he ultimately adopted. It seems to me that The old 
 such opinions were very likely indeed to grow up in XullL 
 the mind of a man in that age, and that with some no * t0 oe 
 
 e rejected. 
 
 modifications they might appear in our own age. At 
 that time it was not possible that men could talk 
 merely of Judaism or Christianity. The one question 
 was, " What God do you worship, what God have you 
 to proclaim to men ? " If once a man acquired a 
 violent conviction that the Old Testament was opposed 
 to the New, he could not stop short of the assertion, 
 that the God of the Old Testament was different from 
 the God of the New. And if he looked upon Christ's 
 Gospel as the good news of a redemption, and a 
 redemption from a spiritual oppression, he would Processes 
 
 of mind. 
 
 begin to argue, that the author of that oppression was 
 the being whom he had previously learnt to contrast 
 with the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Having 
 adopted this theory as the Christian theory, he would 
 be obliged to practise violence upon facts and docu- 
 ments, in order to bring them into consent with it. 
 Those that were utterly unmanageable he would cast Documents 
 aside ; the others he would persuade himself might, s p ["^J° ° 
 by subtractions and additions, become his allies in- 
 stead of his opponents. To think that the additions 
 and subtractions were most natural, that they restored 
 the true and consistent text, is the next and a most 
 easy process. I am sure I am giving you no history 
 which is at all singular or improbable. If you or I 
 should think that we might not go through it in our 
 own minds, we should be in great danger ; for he that 
 
200 
 
 Lect. II. 
 
 The result. 
 
 Phryykt. 
 
 Pa/pias. 
 
 Euscbius, 
 book iii. 
 c. 39. 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 tliinketh lie standeth, is the man who has most need to 
 take heed lest he fall. I do not say that Marcion was a 
 dishonest or a bad man ; but it seems to me most pro- 
 bable, that he arrived at a conclusion which I do con- 
 sider exceedingly bad, — one that separates the past from 
 the present and the future, — the visible world from the 
 invisible,— the kingdom of earth from the kingdom of 
 heaven, — the Creator from the Father. It has been 
 my great object in former lectures, to show you how 
 essential the Old Testament revelation was to the 
 New Testament; what a riddle the Old would be 
 without the New to explain it. I have told you we 
 should meet with various attempts to tear them 
 asunder. The Ebionite who set up the Old Testa- 
 ment against the New, is one; the Marcionite who 
 glorified the New to the contempt of the Old, is 
 another. 
 
 Hierapolis, in Phrygia, is spoken of as the dwelling- 
 place of Philip the Deacon, during his latter years, 
 with those daughters who are described as prophet- 
 esses in the Acts of the Apostles. Our information 
 about him is derived from a man upon whose reports 
 we cannot place much dependence ; though he boasts 
 that he did not give heed to the crowd, but sought 
 for the truth from the lips of those who had heard 
 the Apostles. There is something necessary besides 
 the opportunity of hearing wise teachers, — the faculty 
 of apprehending what they teach; and this, Papias 
 does not seem to have possessed. Idle traditions 
 about miraculous cures, and fancies of an outward 
 Ihrone, on which Christ should sit, bodily and visibly, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 201 
 
 seem to have taken possession of his mind, and to lect. ii. 
 have hindered him from entering into the true 
 mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 The Phrygian temper (the Phrygians, you will 
 remember, were neighbours of those Galatians who 
 were at one time ready to pluck out their eyes to 
 give them St. Paul, and then were tempted by false 
 apostles to think that he had deceived them), seems 
 to have greatly inclined to fanaticism and superstition. 
 That doctrine of an earthly Christ and an outward 
 throne, which had such attractions for Papias, reap- 
 peared in another form in the latter part of this 
 century. It was proclaimed at first in a small village 
 of Phrygia. A man named Montanus, who is said to Mmtamm, 
 
 ' . , about a.d. 
 
 have been originally a priest ot Cybeie, and two 170 . 
 
 females, Priscilla and Maximilla, affirmed themselves 
 
 to be possessed by a divine Spirit, which forced them 
 
 to break through all ordinary rules. " They began to 
 
 speak in the Church," says an eye-witness, "and to 
 
 utter strange voices, prophesying contrary to the *ETe P o</>a,- 
 
 ° *• x ill vetv, to speak 
 
 usage of the Church, and the order that had been in strange 
 received from its commencement." Some conceived St ^ trin 
 that a diabolical spirit had overmastered them, and Emebius, 
 
 1 book v. 
 
 sought to rebuke it and cast it out. Some were c . i6. 
 shocked at such efforts to control what they believed 
 to be the Divine Voice. At length the prophets 
 began to denounce the Church generally, as rejecters 
 of the Divine Spirit ; to foretel instant and approach- 
 ing judgments; and to declare that a city in Phrygia Pepmati* 
 
 tvt t i mi NewJeru- 
 
 was to be the seat of the New Jerusalem. lhe sakl)U 
 doctrine spread widely. Apollinarius of Ilierapolis, 
 
202 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ii. and many others, girded themselves to encounter it. 
 Montanus and his followers were excommunicated. 
 But he affirmed himself to be the Paraclete, whom our 
 Lord had promised. He had been sent to fill up 
 what had been left imperfect in the teaching of the 
 Apostles, — to restore what had decayed. A more 
 ascetical discipline was needed ; the Church had be- 
 come psychical or carnal. Montanus laid down the 
 rules to which a true Church ought to conform. Only 
 those who adhered to these rules were spiritual men. 
 in what We are not to suppose, because Montanus used 
 
 ZZs m this language, that he believed himself to be the 
 mikd Mm- j_i \y Spirit. We may hope he would have shrunk 
 Paraclete, from such blasphemy. He began, probably, with the 
 feeling that the Church was forgetting the Divine 
 Teacher, whom its Lord had promised and had sent. 
 Seme of He brooded over the thought till he began to suppose 
 that some token of His presence must be vouchsafed, 
 to convince those who had sunk into sloth and indif- 
 ference. What that token must be, he did not, 
 perhaps, very earnestly or reverently inquire. The 
 more startling it was, — the more disorderly, — the 
 Craving better he would be pleased. St. Paul had already 
 for signs, warne( j i\ ie Corinthians of their tendency to suppose 
 
 and rejec- J l L 
 
 tionof that the Spirit of Order, of Truth, of Unity, is a 
 Spirit of Confusion, of Self-exaltation, of Division. 
 He had told them that the spirits of true prophets are 
 subject to the prophets. The words had no effect on 
 Montanus. Once yielding to his own impulses, and 
 mistaking them for the power which was to guide 
 them, the words of Scripture were mere carnal fetters 
 
 warnings. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 203 
 
 in his eyes, which it was a glory to break. Thus he Lect. ii. 
 himself, the possessed, oracular man, became more 
 and more the object of his admiration. The idea of 
 a Spirit, from which he started, was almost entirely- 
 obscured. He could think only of an outward Teacher. Sdf- 
 All Christ's promises seemed to be fulfilled in such a * 
 gift. And he is the Teacher. He is to remould the 
 Church ; to lay down its laws ; to build the Divine 
 City. Do not forget the lesson. The Cataphrygian 
 doctrine is one which we shall meet with again and 
 again. It lies very near to us all. 
 
 But there is another lesson which we have to learn Treatment 
 from Phrygia in the second century, before we take °f v f* onta ~ 
 leave of it. The teachers of the Churches were very 
 eager to encounter Montanism, and to overthrow it. 
 It was easily shown how much arrogance there was 
 in its prophets ; what extravagances they committed ; 
 what divisions they were causing. But it was not 
 easy to escape the temptation of setting up an oppo- 
 site doctrine, for the sake of refuting theirs, and of 
 denying the truths which were hidden under all their 
 errors. Many in Phrygia seem to have concluded Tiwreac- 
 
 .i . ,1 /> . n • n , n n . • Hon ar/ainst 
 
 that the safest way ot escaping trom the doctrine his doc . 
 about a visible kingdom, was to reject the Apocalypse. trme - 
 Some seem to have persuaded themselves that St. 
 John's Gospel, concerning the Word and the Com- 
 forter, was itself the cause of Montanism, and that its 
 testimony should be silenced. The extreme form of 
 this opinion may have been confined to a few, who, in TiieAhgi. 
 later days, were called Alogi, or deniers of the Word. 
 But it was adopted, in a modified form, by a man of 
 
204 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Leot.il eminence in the Phrygian Church, who had been a 
 faithful confessor during some of its persecutions. 
 Monarch- Prcumeas appears to have so set his mind on the 
 p?: . mischiefs of Montanism, that every doctrine which 
 was in was hostile to it looked well in his eyes. Was it safe 
 
 Rome about , , . , „ „ 
 
 a.d. 192. to talk — so he seems to have asked lumsell — ol a 
 Divine Teacher who was distinct from the Eternal 
 Father? Did not such a belief interfere with that 
 witness which the Christian Church was appointed to 
 bear before the Heathen for the Oneness of God? 
 Could not the phrases about the Word be explained 
 to mean only some principle that dwelt in the Father, 
 as a man's thought dwells in him? This is the 
 hint of a theory of which you will hear much in the 
 third century, and in subsequent centuries. We 
 shall meet with it again in the second. I wish you 
 to see how it sprung up in the mind of a Phrygian 
 who had been scandalized by Montanus, and who 
 saw no better way of hindering the progress of his 
 opinions, than by striking at the strong and earnest 
 convictions out of which they grew. 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
 
 CHURCHES IN GREECE AND EGYPT. 
 
 I have nothing special to tell you about the Lect. hi. 
 Churches in Macedonia which St. Paul established. 
 You remember that we hear nothing in the Acts of the Athens. 
 Apostles of a Church in Athens, though St. Paul's 
 discourse there is one of the most memorable in all 
 Scripture, and the great text and guide for all 
 Missionaries to philosophical Heathens. The single 
 male convert who is mentioned by St. Luke, Dio- Dionysius 
 
 theAreopa- 
 
 nysius the Areopagite, has been the hero of a multi- fJ ite. 
 tude of legends. The Churches in Gaul fancied that 
 they owed their origin to him. Books for a long 
 time passed under his name, written probably in the 
 fourth century, which exercised no slight influence 
 upon the thoughts of men in the Middle Ages. We 
 know however, upon what must be considered good Eusebms, 
 
 1 book iv. 
 
 authority, that of a Bishop of Corinth, his namesake, c . 23. 
 in the middle of this century, that he presided over 
 the Christian society in Athens. After him, Publius 
 is mentioned by the same authority as ruling in 
 the Church, and as dying a Martyr. Quadratus, he 
 says, followed, through whose diligence the Church 
 
206 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. hi. was increased, and its faith enkindled. After that 
 he speaks of a decay in faith and Christian fellowship, 
 and of a tendency to apostasy. 
 
 The name of Quadratus is of some importance in 
 the history of the Church. He and Aristides ad- 
 EuseUus, dressed Apologies to the Emperor Hadrian. This 
 h °°2 1V ' word Apologies is a new one. Ignatius and Polycarp 
 Apologies, wrote letters as St. Paul had written letters ; they 
 adopted the form of writing of which Scripture had 
 given them examples. The apology is borrowed 
 from another example. Socrates, when he was 
 accused before the tribunal of Athens of introducing 
 new Gods and corrupting the minds of the youth, 
 Precedent made a defence or apology. His two disciples, 
 of Socrates. Xenoplion and Plato, gave their report of what he 
 had said, or of what they thought he should have 
 said. Their works were familiar to all Athenians. 
 It was most natural that an Athenian should borrow 
 the expression, seeing that he and his friends were 
 charged with the very crimes with which Socrates 
 had been charged in their city. Sometimes they 
 were called Atheists as he was, because they wor- 
 shipped no visible image ; sometimes they were said 
 to be bringing in new daemons, because they spoke 
 of Christ as the divine King, the Son of God. The 
 charge of drawing away people, and especially the 
 young, from the worship of their country, was 
 Hadrian, common to them with him. The Emperor Hadrian 
 mc a,ac- ^^ & great affecter of Greek habits and accomplish- 
 ments ; he was fonder of Athens than of Rome, and 
 had more of the Athenian than of the Roman 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 207 
 
 character. It was likely enough that Quadratus and Lect. hi. 
 Aristides should wish to make him acquainted with 
 their actual belief, and that they should use those 
 forms of language with which he and their country- 
 men were familiar. 
 
 The commencement of this apologetic literature is Tendencies 
 
 „, . . -, . T , , of tins new 
 
 an important era m Christian history, it marks a u lem ture. 
 new kind of thought which was springing up in the 
 Church, and a new class of men who were assuming 
 a prominent place in it. I may have to tell you 
 hereafter more of what I think were the effects of this 
 movement for good or for evil. I wish you now to 
 notice where it took its rise, and how it was connected 
 with Greece and with the Roman Empire, because 
 these circumstances are very helpful in enabling us 
 to understand the character of the writings them- 
 selves. We have only a very short fragment of the Fragment 
 first Apologist ; but it is one which gives us a clear if^T" 
 hint of the form which the Apologies were likely to f^^f 
 take. We feel at once as Ave read it, that we are no Spy* 6A 
 longer listening to a Gospel, but to an argument. Emeiius 
 Quadratus, though so far as we can judge in a simple ubl SUIjra - 
 and manly style, still sets about proving that our Lord 
 wrought certain miracles. He does not, like the 
 Evangelists, produce his acts of power and healing 
 as if they were the proper and natural acts of the 
 King and Deliverer of the world. The difference is 
 remarkable; the further we proceed the more we 
 shall feel its importance. 
 
 You will remember that I spoke to you of a man Justin. 
 named Justin, who was born in a village of Samaria. 
 
208 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. hi. I wished to make you aware of that fact, for I think 
 it has much to do with the after life of Justin ; but 
 I said I could not go on with his story because it 
 was not there that his mind received its chief or 
 permanent direction. It is not possible to assign 
 
 ifisadture. him to any one distinct Church or city; but he 
 certainly owed more of his culture to Greece than to 
 any other country, though he had a semi-Hebrew 
 origin, and though he probably died at Rome. It is 
 in place to speak of him here, as I have just intro- 
 duced you to the earliest Apologists, and as the 
 defence which he addressed either to Antoninus Pius 
 or Marcus Aurelius is the first which has been pre- 
 served to us. But I am still more concerned with 
 another book of his which has always been supposed 
 to contain his own biography, and which throws 
 much light upon this whole period, especially upon 
 the way in which the Jewish and the Greek influences 
 were working together upon the Christian Church. 
 
 jews in the rpi ie j ew f the secon( i century, after Hadrian had 
 
 Second m # ^ 
 
 Century. changed the name of his city, and the last effort for 
 the restoration of his nation had been crushed, was 
 a very homeless being. He went about seeking rest 
 and finding none. If he had no higher ambition 
 than to make money, he might gratify his passion in 
 the commercial cities of the empire quite as well now 
 as when he dreamed of a Son of David. If his tastes 
 were more intellectual, he might frequent the different 
 Their schools of Greece or of Egypt, debating all manner 
 cravmg f questions about God and man listlessly and inge- 
 
 for occupa- 
 tion, niously, because he had ceased to care about them or 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 209 
 
 to hope for any satisfaction upon, them, but yet Lect.iii. 
 wanted some occupation for his head as well as his 
 hands. Generally the teaching of his childhood, 
 though it produced little effect upon his character, 
 coloured all his thoughts and gave him a certain 
 sense of his own consequence, after the excuses for it 
 had disappeared. At all events, no converse which His haired 
 he had with other men made him hate the Christians %%L M 
 less, for they pretended that they had succeeded to **»*»«««*■ 
 the privileges of the children of Abraham, and spoke 
 of a revelation, while he was only a guesser. 
 
 A man of this class, named Trypho, is the chief Dialogue 
 person in the Dialogue of Justin to which I alluded. JjLfo, 
 It is an argument between a Christian and a Jew, 
 but between a Christian and a Jew who both call 
 themselves philosophers. They are supposed to meet The jew 
 on a walk near one of the Greek cities. Justin's ™ ,dChr i*- 
 
 tian ma - 
 
 cloak led Trypho at once to accost him as a philo- ing as 
 
 l i • i Philo- 
 
 sopher, and to question him about the sect to which sophers. 
 he belonged. Justin demurs to the question, main- 
 taining that philosophy is one, that it is a high gift 
 of God, and that it is not to be denoted by the name 
 of this or that teacher. He expresses his wonder 
 that Trypho should not have learnt more from his 
 own lawgiver and prophets than he could find in the 
 Greek schools ; then he proceeds to tell him his own 
 experience. He had tried nearly every Greek sect. Justin's 
 One after another had failed to tell him the secret expene!lCe - 
 he was in search of. At last he fell in with an old 
 Christian teacher, who persuaded him that Christ had 
 made those things known which others were only 
 
 p 
 
210 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. hi. disputing and discoursing about. " This," he says, 
 " I found at last to be the safe and profitable philo- 
 sophy." The confession is received as Ave might 
 expect; Trypho tells him that it would have been 
 far better for him to have adhered to the philosophy 
 of Plato,- or of any other teacher, cultivating fortitude 
 and self-restraint and modesty, than to have been 
 deceived with lying words, and to follow men who 
 were good for nothing. As long as he continued in 
 his earlier course and lived blamelessly, there was 
 hope of his finding a better portion; but when he 
 left God and hoped in a Man, what salvation was 
 
 Trypho's left for him ? In all friendship, Trypho would advise 
 him first to be circumcised, then to keep the Sabbath 
 and the festivals as Moses had appointed, and gene- 
 rally all things that were written in the law ; then he 
 
 xpio-ros s^ might have some hope of mercy from God. If Christ 
 
 IvTa, 111" had been indeed born at all, He was still in obscurity ; 
 
 fori ttoc, nor ^j jj e k now himself, nor had He any power, till 
 
 ayi>w<TT0S 
 
 Uti. k.t.k. Elias came and anointed Him, and made Him manifest 
 to all. " Meanwhile," he says, " you having accepted 
 a vain and idle rumour, are inventing a Christ for 
 yourselves, and are heedlessly throwing away all 
 present blessings for the sake of Him." Justin de- 
 clares that he has not followed a cunningly devised 
 fable, and that he is willing to give a reason of the 
 Popular hope that is in him. He alludes to some monstrous 
 Igaimt opinions that were current about Christians, that 
 christians. they were cannibals and held the most horrible 
 orgies. These popular stories Trypho acknowledges 
 that he entirely disbelieves. But he thinks that the 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 211 
 
 commands in the Gospels, which lie has taken some Lbct. hi. 
 pains to acquaint himself with, are such as no one can 
 keep. On the other hand, he is astonished that while 
 the Nazarenes pretend to be pious men and to believe in 
 the prophets, they yet cast aside all those institutions 
 which the law and the prophets had enjoined, and 
 that they placed their hope in a crucified Man. 
 This introduces the substantial part of the con- 
 troversy. Justin maintains that all the law and the 
 prophets are speaking of a final law and a perfect The perfect 
 covenant, which it was needful that all men, and not ovenant 
 merely Jews, should keep, who aspired to the divine 
 inheritance. " Christ Himself," he says, " has been 
 given to us as the eternal and final law and the a/oWst? 
 faithful covenant ; after which there is no law, nor Tai'reKfZ 
 precept, nor commandment." These words might ra7os ° 
 
 11 _ & Xpurrds 
 
 have led Trypho to suppose that his opponent was tMev *<*> 
 setting aside the great principles of the law, and was ^^ 
 leaving an opening to all licentiousness. Justin \ °" ! ,6/i0S 
 
 010 OV TTpLCT- 
 
 therefore goes on to show that the Christian was raynaoiK 
 asserting the real moral power which the Jew is circum- 
 denying. " There is need," he says, " of another cision and 
 
 J & . . . Sabbaths. 
 
 circumcision, and you are boasting of the circum- 
 cision in the flesh. The new law wishes us to be 
 always keeping sabbath, and you fancy that you are 
 holy if you are idle for one day, not knowing why 
 that day was appointed you. And if you eat unlea- 
 vened bread, you think you have fulfilled the will 
 of God. Not in these things is the Lord our God 
 well pleased. But if there is any false swearer 
 among you, or thief, let him cease ; if there is any 
 
 p 2 
 
212 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. hi. adulterer, let him repent : so the wholesome and true 
 sabbaths of God are kept. If any one has not clean 
 hands, let him wash them, and he is clean. Eor verily 
 Isaiah did not send you to the bath to wash away 
 murder and other sins, which the whole water of the 
 
 The moral sea could not .cleanse. But, as is reasonable, this was 
 of old that saving spring which followed the penitents, 
 who were cleansed, not with the blood of goats or 
 sheep or the ashes of an heifer, but by faith, through 
 the blood of Christ and His death, who has died for 
 this very end, as Isaiah testifies, saying, The Lord will 
 reveal His holy arm, &c. Through the laver of repent- 
 ance then," he continues, " and of the knowledge of 
 God which hath been prepared for the transgression 
 of the people of God, we have believed; and we 
 declare that this is indeed that baptism which He 
 proclaimed, the only one which is able to cleanse 
 those who have repented. This is the water of life ; 
 whereas you have dug out for yourselves cisterns that 
 are broken, and that can avail you nothing. For what 
 availeth that baptism which cleanseth the flesh and 
 
 T.ietrue the body only? Baptize the soul from wrath and 
 from covetousness, from envy, from hatred, and, 
 behold, the body is clean too. This is the significance 
 of the unleavened bread, that ye should not do the 
 old works of the bad leaven. But you look upon 
 all things carnally, and count it piety, if while doing 
 such things your souls are filled with deceit and all 
 wickedness." 
 
 infer, ace. I do not purpose to make any more extracts from 
 this Dialogue. My object has been to give you some 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 213 
 
 hints about its character, that you may know the Lkct. hi. 
 writer of it better. He had felt the powerlessness 
 of Judaism and of heathen philosophy to make him 
 be the man which he wanted to be. The outside 
 practices of the synagogue, — the mere talk of the 
 schools, — had offended him equally, and had proved 
 equally ineffectual for his needs. He wanted a power 
 which coidcl make him another man, — which could 
 enable him to do the things which the law prescribed, 
 and know what the philosophers reasoned about. He 
 desired to be both a real philosopher and a Jew in 
 the highest sense of the word. One respects him for Strength of 
 trying to meet men on their own ground, and to 
 show that Christ can speak to each man in the tongue 
 wherein he was born, according to the habits of 
 thought in which he was educated. But there seems Weakness. 
 to have been a little affectation in his continuing to 
 wear the philosophical cloak ; and I do not know that 
 he was more just to the Greek philosophers because 
 he assumed to be one of another kind himself. Justin 
 belongs, in some measure, to the new argumentative 
 class of the Apologists. But he mixed with their 
 tendency much of true simplicity. The Gospel had 
 been a deliverance to him out of wearisome dispu- 
 tations. He was not so much disposed, as many of 
 his contemporaries, to make it a theme and an 
 excuse for fresh disputations. Justin's 
 
 I said that the Apolosw of Quadratus was addressed A J^ jlw Jy- . 
 
 1 ~ J 1 he worship 
 
 to Hadrian, an affecter of Greek fashions, and the ofAntinous 
 
 referred to 
 
 introducer of one of the most shameful forms of new by Justin, 
 idolatry into the empire. His two successors were i^po' r i 
 
214 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. III. 
 
 The just and 
 the philoso- 
 phical Em- 
 peror. 
 
 Character 
 of the 
 Apology 
 determined 
 by the cha- 
 racters of 
 the Em- 
 perors. 
 
 High moral 
 tone of 
 Justin. 
 
 of a far nobler temper. Antoninus Pius acquired his 
 name from his old Roman habit of mind ; especially 
 from his reverence for his parents. Marcus Aurelius 
 united to Roman justice the best form of Greek 
 wisdom. It is not easy to determine in which of the 
 two reigns Justin's Apology was written; there is much 
 in the opening of it which might incline us to think 
 first of one, then of the other. He appeals to the 
 Emperor as^acknowledging principles of righteousness 
 and truth, by which all his acts should be regulated. 
 He appeals to him also expressly as a philosopher. In 
 the former character he invites him to a severe exami- 
 nation of the conduct of the Christians, who ought to 
 be condemned if they are found guilty of any crime 
 against their fellow-citizens, or any offence against the 
 state; who ought not to be condemned for a mere name. 
 In the latter character, he invites him to an examination 
 of the actual faith of the Christians, reminding him 
 that Socrates had been charged with Atheism pre- 
 cisely for the same reason as they were, because he 
 protested against the acknowledging of visible and 
 corrupt divinities. There is a brave and healthy tone 
 about this part of the Apology, an assertion of the 
 Righteousness of God and of the Righteousness that 
 He demands of rulers, which is to me infinitely more 
 delightful than any of the mere reasonings of Justin, 
 or of his brother Apologists. There was peril even 
 here ; since it is always dangerous for men to be 
 making out a case for themselves. But it is a peril 
 which must sometimes be incurred ; and Justin 
 shows that he cared far more to justify the ways 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 215 
 
 of God to men than to justify the class to which he Lect. hi. 
 belonged. 
 
 He had, too, a genuine faith in the Emperor to Faith in 
 whom he writes ; a belief that there was that in him 
 which could respond to the truth he was asserting. 
 It was not a false confidence, though it appeared to 
 be belied by the result, Marcus Aurelius had sym- 
 pathies with what is pure and just and good. His 
 philosophy was no mere fashion or pretence. He 
 sought to be right and to do right. Nevertheless, 
 his philosophy itself and the very piety he tried to 
 cultivate, made him hostile to Christians. Justin Justin's 
 died at Rome, probably by order of this very emperor, 
 who was instigated against him, it is said, by 
 Crescens, one of the philosophers of his court, 1 
 
 1 As Tatian calls himself an Assyrian, I have no rig-lit to notice 
 him in this division of the subject. But, as he was a pupil of Justin, 
 and as his chief book is an Oration against the Greeks, I do not know 
 where I could refer to the melancholy bat useful moral which his work 
 and life suggest, better than here. All that is most offensive in the 
 Apologetic literature comes out in him. How his Oration can have won 
 the praise of ''excellent" from so fair and reasonable a judge as 
 Du Pin, I cannot conceive. It appears to me, in spite of occasional flashes 
 of eloquence, which prove Tatian to have been a very able man, morally 
 offensive and mischievous. He starts with the purpose of proving that 
 the Greeks derived their wisdom from the Barbariaus, whom they 
 despised, — not a very important thesis for a Christian writer to main- 
 tain, and which is established by the most unsatisfactory evidence. 
 Then he gathers together the miserable gossip of Greek anecdote- 
 mongers, to convict the best Greek writers and thinkers of the foulest 
 crimes. The moral contrast between Tatian and his master we could 
 never have lost sight of, if we had not fallen into a way of thinking that 
 all arguments for Christianity ought to be commended, even when they 
 have been the means of leading many to reject it, and more to disgrace 
 it. Tatian ended with becoming an Encratite — that is to say, he pro- 
 nounced marriage unholy, as being an indulgence of the flesh, which was 
 essentially evil. A fit and almost necessary result for a man who did not 
 think of things pure and lovely — who rejoiced in iniquity, not in the 
 truth. 
 
216 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. III. 
 
 A thenago- 
 ras. 
 
 Mis Apo- 
 logy is 
 referred to 
 the year 
 a.d. 177. 
 
 Treatise on 
 the Resur- 
 rection. 
 
 Diony.ii w 
 of Corinth 
 belongs to 
 the age of 
 the Anto- 
 
 Euschius, 
 look iv. c. 
 23. 
 
 Athenagoras was a cotemporary of Justin. He is 
 usually spoken of as an Athenian, though some recent 
 scholars would place him in Alexandria. He fell, as 
 much as any of the Apologists, into the fashion of 
 calling himself a philosopher and Christianity a philo- 
 sophy. I do not find as much to sympathise with in 
 Athenagoras as in Justin ; he writes more like a pro- 
 fessional arguer and sophist, less like one to whom 
 the Gospel has given a new life. His books are more 
 mere books than Justin's, and tell us much less of the 
 man. He wrote a treatise on the Resurrection, which, 
 I own, seems to me very clever, cold, and unsatis- 
 factory. The few words, " Christ has risen, and 
 become the first-fruits of them that slept," are worth 
 all the elaborate arguments and theories which 
 Athenagoras has deduced from a mixture of old 
 Greek notions about the soul and the body with his 
 Christian lore. 
 
 It is a relief to turn from this learned and accom- 
 plished reasoner to a genuine pastor of a flock. Such 
 Dionysim of Corinth seems to have been. He is a 
 letter-writer, not an apologist. We have only some 
 fragments of him in Eusebius, but they are very 
 valuable as exhibitions of his own character, and as 
 hints respecting the condition of the Churches. I 
 have quoted already from his Epistle to the Athenians. 
 Eusebius mentions another to the Lacedemonians, 
 " instructing them in right doctrine, and exhorting 
 them to faith and unity ; " another to the Church 
 in Nicomedia, in which he contends against the 
 doctrine of Marcion. A third, he says, was addressed 
 to Gortyna and the other Churches in Crete, wherein 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 217 
 
 he makes mention of their overseer Philip, and of the lect. hi. 
 Church under him, as being memorable for many 
 worthy deeds. He speaks of another to Guossus in Subjects of 
 
 J ... the Letters. 
 
 Crete, alluding to some maxims respecting virginity 
 which the Bishop Pinytus had encouraged or en- 
 joined, and which Dionysius conjures him to relax. 
 Pinytus in his answer complained of the tenderness 
 of Dionysius, and maintained that he gave only milk, 
 not the meat which strong Christians required. 
 
 In a letter to the Churches of Pontus, Dionysius 
 appears to have " commented on the Scriptures, and 
 to have discoursed of marriage and purity." His 
 most memorable and agreeable testimony is in a letter 
 to the Church of Rome, which I shall have to extract 
 when I speak of that Church. In the course of the 
 letter he alludes to the Epistle of Clemens, the Roman 
 Bishop, to the Corinthians, and observes that they had 
 been reading it in Corinth on that very day, being the 
 holy clay of the Lord, and that they should always keep 
 it to read for their admonition, as well as the former, 
 ' which he had written to them. But he makes a re- Mutilation 
 mark about his own letters, which discloses one of the 
 characteristically evil tendencies of this time. They 
 had been mangled and interpolated; and he adds 
 that it is no wonder ordinary Avritings received such 
 treatment, when the Scriptures were exposed to it, 
 when the words of Apostles were altered and per- 
 verted to suit the convenience of those who were 
 introducing false doctrines. 
 
 These fragments of Dionysius are more important 
 for what they suggest than for what they contain ; 
 
 of docu- 
 ments. 
 
218 
 
 UN CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Alexandria. 
 
 lect. hi. one aspect of the Church militant, in the second 
 century, is faithfully presented in them. But it has 
 need to be compared and connected with others, of 
 which I have spoken and am about to speak, before 
 the image of it can come out clearly and fairly 
 before us. 
 
 The Church in Alexandria is said to have been 
 founded by St. Mark. There is no strong evidence 
 which should induce us to dispute the tradition or 
 to affirm it. The after condition of the Church was 
 little affected by its supposed origin ; it was very 
 much affected by other circumstances, which existed 
 in Alexandria before the Gospel was preached there. 
 To some of these I referred when I was speak- 
 ing of St. John's Gospel : I told you how much the 
 Alexandrian Jews had dwelt upon the Divine Word 
 or Wisdom, of whom the Jewish Scriptures testify 
 so continually ; how while they had believed that the 
 Word had chosen their own countrymen to be the 
 witnesses of the invisible God to the world, they 
 had acknowledged that the wisdom of Gentile sages ' 
 must also have come from Him; how, in their im- 
 patience of those who merely adhered to the dry 
 letter of Scripture, and saw no spiritual sense in it, 
 they had changed its plain and beautiful histories into 
 fantastical, often jejune allegories. I told you how 
 St. John had claimed their truths, when he affirmed 
 that the Word was with God and the Word was 
 God ; and that all light is from Him, and that the 
 Light lighteneth all who come into the world, and 
 that all things are made by Him ; how he separated 
 
 Reference 
 to the cha- 
 racter of 
 the Jewish 
 teachers 
 there. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 219 
 
 these truths from mere symbols, and established them lect. hi. 
 on the facts of our Lord's life on earth ; how he con- 
 nected all the doctrines of our Lord's life before the 
 worlds were, with the assertion that He was made 
 flesh, and manifested forth the glory of the Father, in 
 humiliation and suffering. 
 
 You must bear these facts in mind, when you hear Effect of 
 
 „., , . this teach- 
 
 what I have to tell you respecting the Church in i ng i n the 
 Alexandria. Eusebius gives us a list of the over- church - 
 seers who ruled over it in the second century ; but 
 they are mere names; we know nothing that they 
 did or spoke. On the other hand, we have full 
 records of a number of teachers who arose in this 
 Church, and who propagated doctrines in it which 
 were very memorable in that age, and which are very 
 important for all Ecclesiastical history. I must men- 
 tion a few of them. 
 
 Basileides belongs to the reigns of Hadrian and Basiieides. 
 Antoninus Pius : that his mind was formed in Egypt 
 there can be no doubt, though he may have been 
 born in Syria. He used to speak of Glaucus, a His alleged 
 scribe, or interpreter of St. Peter, as the teacher 
 from whom he had received his wisdom ; his fol- 
 lowers boasted that St. Matthias was the head of 
 their school. Any disciple, or any Apostle, may 
 have awakened the thoughts in the mind of Basi- 
 leides, out of which he fashioned his system, for 
 they were true and divine thoughts. He believed Hhcon- 
 that the knowledge of God is the highest blessing ' 
 which man can attain ; that those who are received 
 into the neAv Covenant are meant to enter into that . 
 
220 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. hi. fulness of knowledge which kings and prophets had 
 sighed for; that the manifestation of the fulness 
 of the Godhead is in some way connected with 
 the manifestation of the Divine Word or Wisdom. 
 Moreover, if he took the words of the Gospels in 
 their plain . signification, he must suppose that a 
 Kingdom of Heaven — a spiritual world — had been 
 opened to men, and that they might enter into the 
 mysteries of it. Was not man himself a part of this 
 spiritual world? Was not the wonderful Reason 
 with which God had endowed him — the power of 
 knowing invisible things — were not even all the 
 subordinate faculties of his soul — proofs that he too 
 was a spirit, that he had a divine and heavenly birth, 
 that he was a fellow with the Angels ? 
 
 Is not this high and scriptural doctrine? If 
 any one denies it, must he not deny the lessons 
 which St. Paul and St. John are labouring to com- 
 Buiiding municate ? Starting, then, from this point, Basileides 
 up a system. p roceec | ec ^ \ connect together the different ideas, each 
 of which had such a justification in the language 
 of the Scripture, such a witness of their truth in 
 his own heart. He began to construct a theory or 
 system, — about the way in which man may ascend 
 to the knowledge of God ; about the way in which 
 it was possible that the infinite fulness of God should 
 be brought near to the perceptions and faculties of 
 man; about the relation between these perceptions 
 and faculties, and the spiritual powers or beings which 
 may or may not have partaken of man's faJl — which 
 may be drawing him to good or tempting him to 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 221 
 
 evil. Do you wonder that any man should under- lect. hi. 
 take such a task as this ; — to organise and construct, 
 not merely this universe in which we dwell, hut all 
 and every possible universe, past, present, and to 
 come ; to show how they have begun to exist ; 
 under what laws they exist, what beings dwell in 
 them ? Are you startled and overwhelmed with the 
 thought that the creature, in his eagerness to as- 
 sert and glorify the fulness of the Godhead, shoidd 
 actually reduce it under his own terms and defini- 
 tions ? Wonder if you will, but do not deal hardly 
 with Basileides. The temptation to do all this is 
 one, not only into which it is easy to fall, but which 
 it is exceedingly hard for thoughtful, even for devout 
 men to avoid. Each step seems to follow so closely, 
 so naturally, upon the one that went before — there 
 is such delight in linking our conceptions together — 
 there is such a wonderful satisfaction in gazing at 
 the Babylons which we have built, that it is only 
 men very ignorant of themselves, who can be with- 
 out sorrow and fellow feeling for those who have 
 fashioned what seem to us the most unsightly, and 
 what have proved to be the most unsafe, of these 
 intellectual worlds. 
 
 Clemens of Alexandria has preserved to us a num- Merits of 
 ber of separate thoughts and sayings of Basileides, Basilades - 
 from which much is to be learnt ; in which there are 
 clear indications that he had a desire to assert the 
 goodness of God; that he had perceptions of the 
 relations which exist between different qualities in 
 men ; that he felt what a battle men have to fight 
 
222 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. h i. with their own propensities, and with evil powers ; that 
 he had a skill in definition. But when once a man 
 begins to build a system, the very gifts and qualities 
 which might serve in the investigation of truth, become 
 the greatest hindrances to it. He must make the dif- 
 ferent parts of the scheme fit into each other; his 
 dexterity is shown, not in detecting facts, but in 
 
 How they cutting them square. The great object of Basileides, 
 
 tvere turned p/-ii 
 
 to mischief, to lead men upwards to the knowledge ol bod, was 
 defeated by his system, for the God whom he desired 
 to contemplate as above all, the ground and root of 
 all things, was included in the system, was merely one 
 portion of it. The great principle from which he 
 started, that the Word or Wisdom of God is the 
 means whereby man rises to the knowledge of God, 
 was overturned by the system ; for this Word only 
 became one of a number of powers and agents who 
 were acting upon men and drawing their life from God, 
 or one of the faculties by which man apprehends 
 
 Results. God. The faith in God which Basileides certainly 
 wished to cherish became identical with the know- 
 ledge which was to be the result of it, and the know- 
 ledge at last terminated in itself. It is a great thing 
 to know — what ? Basileides, who was, I should 
 think, far better than his system, 1 might have found 
 an answer by falling on his knees, — careless what 
 became of his beautiful logic, provided he could be 
 saved from being an Atheist. With those who accepted 
 
 1 His respect for marriage is one of the redeeming points in his 
 character, and marks a very decided difference between him and many 
 other Gnostics. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 223 
 
 his system it was not so. His son Isidorus indeed Lect. hi. 
 seems to have striven, with honest filial reverence, to isidorus. 
 vindicate what he had learnt of him from some of its The School. 
 worse consequences. The after teachers completed 
 the theory and excluded the glimpses of air and sun- 
 shine that had broken in through the creaks which the 
 caution or piety of their master had left in it. 
 
 It is wonderful how easily words are arranged in Tiieeom- 
 a scheme when the life is gone out of them, and sc ] ieme . 
 therefore they can offer no resistance. The Basilidean 
 sect could put Reason, and Wisdom, and Logos, and 
 Power, one after the other ; they could speak of the 
 heavens which these had created, and of others that 
 corresponded to them. They could make perfect 
 arrangements of numbers, and explain accurately how 
 all that they saw and could not see, came into being. 
 They were not merely, as you might fancy, talking Effect on 
 at random. Their thoughts about the connexion of christians. 
 the different powers and faculties in men were often 
 founded upon a subtle observation, and may suggest 
 valuable hints. But when an earnest man, who had 
 received the Gospel as an announcement that God had 
 really sought after His creatures, and delivered them 
 from their enemies, and claimed them as His children, 
 looked into their doctrine, he found, indeed, most of 
 the words and phrases with which he was familiar ; 
 he heard high promises of emancipation, and light, 
 and discovery ; but all that he had believed in and 
 hoped for Avas gone. Christ was lost amidst a mul- 
 titude of powers and energies that were whirling 
 dizzily in mysterious abysses. The Cross to which 
 
224 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTOKY. 
 
 Moral 
 
 cjjects on 
 the defen- 
 ders of the 
 scheme. 
 
 lect. in. he had clung as the one witness that God was recon- 
 ciled to the world, and that Death and Hell were 
 not his masters, was declared to be a fiction or super- 
 stition which elect and elevated souls could cast beneath 
 them. God Himself, who was to be the end of all 
 their search, had become a vague abstraction. And 
 though we may believe there is exaggeration in the 
 statements we have received respecting the morals 
 of those who embraced this system, — though such 
 statements are always to be listened to with the 
 greatest caution, because the better men who make 
 them often take them from much worse men, mere 
 gossips and praters, who rejoice in evil, and not in 
 the truth,— and though we may joyfully acknowledge 
 the innocence of the first teacher, — yet we are war- 
 ranted in thinking that those who lived in this cloud- 
 world could not have found any very definite laws or 
 principles to regulate them in their converse with the 
 actual world of men and women. 
 
 Valentinus lived somewhat later than Basileides. 
 He was an Egyptian by birth and by the whole habit 
 of his mind. Clemens has preserved some passages 
 from letters and homilies of his, which show that he 
 was a man of much reflection. He had observed 
 attentively and seriously one of the most important 
 facts in our human life. " God has set one thing over 
 against another," says Solomon ; that is to say, each 
 thing in our universe seems as if there were some- 
 thing else that corresponded to it, and was necessary 
 to complete it. " The man is not without the woman," 
 says St. Paul, " nor the woman without the man, in 
 
 Valentinus. 
 
 His 
 
 sagacity. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 225 
 
 the Lord." Valentinus, I say, had observed this lect. hi. 
 truth and had meditated upon it, as we all should. 
 He traced it through nature, and through the re- 
 lations of man with man, and of man with his Maker. 
 The union between Christ and the Church corre- 
 sponded, as St. Paul had pointed out, to the union 
 between the man and the wife ; one sustained the 
 other. The more mysterious union still of the Father 
 and the divine Word was beneath this, as St. John's 
 Gospel had so fully declared. Fresh unities or His 
 Syzygies, as Valentinus called them, presented them- yzygtes 
 selves at every turn ; what could be more delightful 
 than to note them, and so to see the harmony of the 
 divine works and the divine principles, in the lowest 
 things and the highest ; in the most external and the 
 most inward ? 
 
 Nothing ; if only we continue to watch, and wait Facts made 
 and receive new light ; and so to admire more and temSi 
 adore more. But oh ! the craving for systems, how 
 insatiable it is ! how restless the man is till he can 
 get the Universe into his own hands and can settle and 
 complete it, so that no room shall be left for wonder 
 and for fresh discovery ! Oh how feverish he is till 
 he can put a centre into the divine order ! — yes ; till he 
 can become the centre of it himself. So it happened 
 with Valentinus ; so did his beautiful observations 
 prove his snares; so did the glorious Syzygies of 
 God's world turn themselves into webs and chains, 
 which bound his own spirit all the while that he was 
 talking of emancipation, and bound Him who would 
 have emancipated it ! Basilides had spoken of a 
 
 Q 
 
226 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. in. Pleroma or Fulness; Valentinus spoke of a Bythos 
 
 TheBytUs. r Abyss. The first was a good word to express the 
 Perfection of Him of whom are all things and by 
 whom are all things. The second was as good a 
 word to denote that man cannot sound the depths 
 of Godhead, — that he must sink and be lost in it. 
 But how poor are such phrases when they stood in 
 place of the very Being whose nature they sought to 
 describe ! — when they actually limited the Fulness 
 and paved the Abyss ; when you had a Pleroma for a 
 Father, and the proposition " God is an Abyss" for 
 St. John's " God is Love." 
 
 jEons. So Basilides had talked of Dynameis or Powers ; 
 
 Valentinus spoke of iEons, or spiritual substances, as 
 distinguished from forms that are clothed with matter. 
 Such powers there must be ; it is impossible to con- 
 template the world without acknowledging them; 
 those who try to resolve all things into the effects 
 of mere mechanism are bewildered every moment, 
 and fall into countless superstitions. We cannot 
 speak of Righteousness, or Wisdom, or Truth, as the 
 Apostles and Prophets speak of them, without feeling 
 
 Substances, that they are spiritual substances ; that they are 
 realities which lie beneath our thoughts, not notions 
 which our thoughts create. But when Valentinus 
 undertook to settle the genealogy of these substances — 
 to show how one was derived out of another; or 
 when and by what means they came into contact 
 with human beings — he emptied them of their sub- 
 stance; he turned them into notions of his under- 
 standing ; and instead of their having any power to 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 
 
 227 
 
 work any good for human beings, their only effect Lect.iii- 
 was to hide the one great Head of Principalities and 
 Powers — Him in whom and for whom all Angels 
 and Mons are created — to make His work, His re- 
 demption, His victory over death and the grave, & 
 dreams and fantasies. 
 
 The fact that all things in the universe are in pairs Carpo- 
 struck Valentinus, and seems to lie at the root of his 
 system. Carjjocrates, on the other hand, was im- 
 pressed by the existence of a law or principle of 
 equality in God's dealings with His creatures. The Equality. 
 sun shineth upon the good and the evil, upon the 
 just and the unjust. Every creature, man and 
 woman, or sheep, fowl, insect, is equally an object 
 of divine care. From truths of this kind, the worth Law 
 of which cannot be overrated, Carpocrates proceeded 
 to deduce the doctrine that Law, seeing it distin- 
 guishes between good and evil, is to be cast aside ; 
 that Property, the creature of Law, partakes of the 
 falsehood of its parent ; that marriage, as appor- 
 tioning God's creatures and interfering with common 
 rights, is equally incompatible with the divine 
 kingdom, the true Society. It has been supposed Commu- 
 that he derived this notion from Plato's Republic; puim- 
 but you will hear of its re-appearance, hereafter, hlht y°f' tf - 
 among people who had never heard of Plato. It 
 is a scheme into Avhich men are at all times and 
 places exceedingly likely to fall, and none so likely as 
 those who are impressed with the excellence of the 
 Christian Church in that it binds men together, and 
 treats them as all upon a level before God ; and 
 
 Q2 
 
228 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. in. who think that all the previous discipline by which 
 God prepared men to feel the eternal difference of 
 right and wrong, the beauty of family life, the pre- 
 ciousness of national distinctions, is good for nothing 
 or became obsolete when the universal fellowship in 
 Christ was made known. Depend upon it, if you once 
 fall into this habit of thinking, you may become as 
 
 Cure of strong communists as Carpocrates was. The cure for 
 
 Commn- ^q delusion lies in the discovery that instead of ob- 
 taming the equality we seek by these methods, we are 
 certain to be opening a way to the most grovelling 
 tyranny. The son of Carpocrates is said to have been 
 worshipped as a god in Cephalonia ; the disciples 
 
 Effects of it. of Carpocrates, who were called emphatically the 
 Gnostics, because they, more than others, set up 
 speculation in opposition to practice, seem to have 
 consistently followed out their doctrine, that man is 
 not to assert his superiority over the swine. 
 
 By various symbols, sometimes by strange cabalis- 
 tical words, the old Egyptians had shown their sense 
 of a Wisdom which they could not measure or define, 
 which could not be revealed to the world, but which 
 the initiated priest might hold converse with. One 
 and another of these symbols and strange words were 
 adopted into the systems which I have described, 
 the object of them all being to explain the appearing 
 
 The false or manifestation of the Divine Word in the world 
 
 and true . , 
 
 wisdom. without adopting the doctrine that the Word was 
 made flesh. But all men had been aware — these 
 Gnostics could not be ignorant — that there has been 
 a corrupt and depraving wisdom as well as a purify- 
 
 The 
 Ophites, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 229 
 
 ing and elevating one. Much of their thought was Lect.iii. 
 employed on this subject. They were continually 
 trying to explain how the evil wisdom had grown out 
 of the good; how far they were opposed, how far 
 they were identical. The confusion reached its Confusion 
 highest point in the teaching of the Ojjhites. The 
 serpent had been an object of worship to many tribes 
 of the earth. Sometimes it was an object of mere 
 horror, as the source of the subtlest mischief; some- 
 times an object of reverence, as a symbol of the Divine 
 knowledge which men wish for, and feel must be in 
 some way intended for them. The Ophites, blend- 
 ing together these old conceptions with the records 
 in the book of Genesis respecting the Fall and with 
 the Christian doctrine of the Divine Word, seem some 
 of them to have regarded all wisdom as detestable 
 and dangerous, derived from the poison of the Serpent ; 
 some of them to have actually identified the Serpent 
 with the Teacher from whom comes the wisdom that 
 is pure, gentle, easy to be intreated. You must 
 not expect to harmonize the different accounts we 
 have of this sect ; the contradictions in it show 
 us, more than anything else could, what were the 
 difficulties, not of one of the Gnostical schools, but 
 of all. 
 
 It was long, probably, before the Church of Alex- The new 
 andria became aware of the nature of this confusion 
 or of the divine remedy for it; but, at length, the 
 light began very clearly to dawn upon some of its 
 teachers ; and if a great portion of the second century 
 only contains a record of opinions that look very 
 
230 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Eusebius, 
 
 bookv.c.ll 
 Pantcenus. 
 
 lect.iii. monstrous, and of systems that were bewildering and 
 mischievous in proportion to the ingenuity that was 
 exhibited in the construction of them, the latter years 
 of the century disclose as beautiful a history as, I 
 think, we can find anywhere, of the method by which 
 God leads his faithful servants to turn the difficulties 
 in their own hearts, and in the society around them, 
 into instruments for glorifying His Name, for learning 
 and diffusing His Truth. 
 
 Pantcenus is spoken of by Eusebius as a man of 
 rich cultivation, and of great zeal. He was brought 
 up a Stoic ; when he became a Christian, he was so 
 eager to tell heathens of the Gospel, that he went as 
 a missionary to Arabia Felix, possibly even to India. 
 You see the man ; he did not live to speculate like 
 Basilides or Valentinus ; he had a message for man- 
 kind — he had something which he could and must 
 proclaim. But you are not on that account to con- 
 clude that Pantsenus was indifferent to the lore which 
 he had received from his Stoical teachers, or to that 
 which he found in his own city. He returned thither, 
 and he became the first catechist of the Alexandrian 
 school. I shall have much to say of this school ; 
 I wish, therefore, I could tell you more of its founder ; 
 but his books are gone, only the savour of his name 
 remains ; or it woidd be more right to say, he lives in 
 the noble pupil whose mind he was permitted in some 
 measure to form. 
 
 I have often referred, in this Lecture, to Titus Pla- 
 vius Clemens. My reports of the different Gnostical 
 teachers have been taken chiefly from him ; for though 
 
 The first 
 Catechist 
 
 Clemens. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 231 
 
 there are other authorities respecting them — I shall Lect.iit. 
 
 refer to one when I speak of the Western Churches — ■ 
 
 he is immeasurably the best. He lived in their city j m true 
 
 he had breathed the atmosphere which they breathed ; Gnostlc - 
 
 he could understand them, and he is just to them. 
 
 He quotes their sentiments respectfully, sometimes 
 
 with sympathy; he seldom uses disparaging words 
 
 about the individual men ; he evidently wishes us to 
 
 know what they thought, as much as what he thought 
 
 about them. Clemens speaks of his own dear master, 
 
 Pantaenus, as a Gnostic ; he claims the name for 
 
 himself; yet there was no man who did so much to 
 
 undermine the Gnostical systems as he did. I will 
 
 endeavour to show you in what way. I ought to let 
 
 you know that much of the work of Clemens falls 
 
 into the third century. But as the foundations 
 
 of his teaching were laid, and, probably, his books 
 
 were written in this time, and as I shall have enough 
 
 to do in speaking of the successors he left behind 
 
 him when I come to the next period, I shall introduce 
 
 him here. 
 
 Gnosticism, as I have exhibited it to you in these The man 
 different Alexandrian teachers, is the search for a imowGod. 
 knowledge of God. A great and glorious search 
 Clemens thought it was ; worth the labour of a life, 
 or of many lives. He had pursued it as a Heathen 
 in the schools of Greece ; he eagerly sought the helps 
 which Jewish or Heathen sages could afford him 
 in Egypt. But when he received the doctrine of 
 the Cross, another and wonderful truth flashed upon 
 his mind. God knew him. The words of the 139th 
 
232 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. III. 
 
 God know- 
 ing us. 
 
 The 
 
 npdyvwais 
 and iiri- 
 
 The 
 Teacher. 
 
 Pupils of 
 the School. 
 
 Psalm were livingly true ; there was a depth of truth 
 in them which was appalling. " Thou hast searched 
 me and known me ; Thou hiowest my downsitting and 
 my uprising ; Thou understandest my thoughts long 
 before?' This was no new discovery ; it was a very 
 old one. If any one had spoken of it to Basilides or 
 Carpocrates, he would have smiled at the ignorance 
 and simplicity which could dwell on such a truism. 
 But that truism may become the very centre of a 
 man's thoughts and hopes ; it may change the posi- 
 tions and relations of all objects to him. It may at 
 first revolutionize his being; ultimately it may set 
 in order all that had been disturbed and inverted 
 there. So I think it was with Clemens ; he could 
 perceive how St. Paul speaks of the yvooo-cs or 7rpoy- 
 vcoa-19 of God — of our e-jrlyvwais of Him ; the one 
 answers to the other. He apprehends us that we 
 may apprehend Him. It is in His light that we 
 must see light. 
 
 This must have been the lesson which Clemens 
 had been taught by Pantaenus, on account of which 
 he regarded him as the true Gnostic : but if he had 
 it first from him, he had to learn it again for him- 
 self. He had another teacher than Pantaenus, and 
 it was on the recognition of this Teacher that the 
 Alexandrian catechetical school stood; it existed for 
 the purpose of declaring Him to the Jew, the Greek, 
 the barbarian, the wise and the unwise. 
 
 You must think of Clemens as a lecturer, sur- 
 rounded by scholars of all ages, who had had the 
 most various kinds of discipline previously ; who had 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. £33 
 
 most of them heard a multitude of notions and theo- lect. hi. 
 ries on every possible subject ; who, whether they 
 were Heathen or Jews, or baptized or preparing 
 for baptism, had been bred in an exceedingly cor- 
 rupt city ; who had speculated on morality as on 
 every thing else, but had only now and then heard 
 that they must practise it. You must recollect that 
 all of these were familiar with the names Wisdom and 
 Word ; that these had become customary phrases 
 of the schools — I had almost said of the market- 
 place. You will then be able to estimate a little the 
 books which Clemens has bequeathed to us — books 
 which, though they are often censured as being 
 learned and philosophical and mystical, were, I am 
 convinced, written with a more distinctly practical 
 purpose, and produced a more practical effect, than 
 any which we have received from this or almost from 
 any century. 
 
 There are three complete Treatises of Clemens TkeTrea- 
 Alexandrinus, and some very important fragments JJmai*, 
 which are commonly attributed to him. The prin- Principle 
 ciple of all his books is the same. It is not the ' em ' 
 creatures only who are seeking God ; He is seeking 
 them. In the Heathen Fables, and in the Heathen 
 Philosophies also, one perceives how men's con- 
 ceptions of God have darkened His nature — how 
 they have changed Him into their likeness. But in 
 these very fables, still more in these philosophies, there 
 is a witness how God has been withdrawing his 
 creatures from their own fancies and falsehoods, how 
 He has been speaking to then hearts of something 
 
234 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. hi. true and eternal and substantial — of Himself; how 
 
 He had been stirring them to feel after Him if haply 
 
 Fables and they might find Him. In all then — even the 
 
 Philo- . 
 
 sophies. strangest, the most distorted, apprehensions of God 
 among human beings — in all their apprehensions 
 concerning themselves, of what they were, of what 
 they were to do, and of what they were to leave 
 undone — there was a proof at once of man's im- 
 potence, and of the gracious will which was working 
 towards him; at once the proof that God had not 
 left those whom He had formed without a knowledge 
 of Himself, and a pledge that He would reveal 
 Himself more perfectly ; that He would lead them to 
 that which they were blindly seeking after. Such, if I 
 understand it right, is the burthen of the first Treatise, 
 TheAoyos the Aoyos TlporpeTTTiKos, which is especially addressed 
 K s s . to the Gentiles. It is in strict harmony with the 
 
 second, which I would recommend any one to read 
 earnestly who wishes to. understand Clemens and to 
 know what was the office of his school. I wish you 
 might some of you be persuaded to grapple with the 
 original book, in which you will find difficulties now 
 and then, but which will repay the trouble of 
 mastering them. If you will not do that, you may 
 get a good notion of it from the Analysis of Dr. Kaye, 
 the Bishop of Lincoln. 
 The This Treatise, the TlcuSaycoyos, develops fully that 
 
 nc " 5 "" idea of the Teacher to which I have alluded already, 
 in which lay, I believe, the great counteraction of the 
 false Gnosticism which had been, and was then, so 
 rife in Alexandria, The divine Logos or Word, in 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 235 
 
 this book of Clemens, is no high Power or JEon Lect. in. 
 about whose relation to other Powers or ^Eons men Purpose of 
 are to form a system. He is the Son of the Father, use. 
 the Lover of man, who has undertaken to discipline 
 and educate his spirit, to purge it of its follies and 
 corruptions, to lead it upwards to the knowledge of 
 Him in whose image it was created. That He may 
 accomplish this gracious design, that He may fully 
 reveal the Father, may fully enter into sympathies 
 with the creature, may redeem them from the slavery 
 into which they have fallen, may bring them back 
 to their right condition ; the Word must take flesh, The Word 
 must actually die, actually rise again. These acts, incarnate. 
 which were such scandals to the ordinary Gnostic, 
 which he must invent such a number of subtle de- 
 vices to get out of his way, seem to Clemens the 
 necessary expression of the divine philanthropy — the 
 only possible means of our deliverance. It follows, 
 from this w T ay of contemplating the subject, that the 
 Word never can be thought of as an abstraction, or 
 as merely a superior Reason in Man. He comes 
 from God; he rules and orders and fashions the 
 hearts to which he comes. He curbs then restless- 
 ness, fetches them back when they wander, trains 
 them to submission. All their knowledge comes 
 through acknowledgment of their ignorance; they 
 are not free till they have entirely yielded to His 
 government. 
 
 The Scriptures, as the full exposition of the govern- The ship- 
 ment which the Divine Word exercised before His 
 Incarnation, while walking with His disciples on 
 
236 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. hi. earth, after He ascended, are of course most dear to 
 Clemens. They are his lesson-books ; he has no 
 desire to alter, or abridge, or add to them ; he would 
 
 Difficulty of merely desire to know what they are. In studying 
 
 'standing to fillcl 0ut tlie SeilSe ° f tne111 ' ne W£lS UaWe t0 mali y 
 
 them f ^e same temptations as Philo, and as those who 
 
 had succeeded him among the Jews and Christians of 
 Alexandria. It was impossible to breathe the free 
 air of the Mesopotamian plains, on which Abraham 
 fed his flocks — of the hills on which David saw the 
 sun rise — in the lecture-room of a philosophised Greek 
 city. The simple records of family and national life, 
 in which the mystery of God's teaching and of man's 
 learning is contained, were almost sure to be turned 
 into spiritual allegories by men who were formed under 
 the Roman despotism, and had just begun to look for 
 a city that has foundations, whose Builder and Maker 
 is God. Oh ! we cannot be thankful enough for our 
 
 Saxon Saxon training — for the reverence of marriage and of 
 
 culture. a p^ homely morality, with which that has inspired us, 
 — for the glorious privilege of belonging to a nation. 
 This it is which God has used for the interpretation 
 of His Old Testament. This has restored to us the 
 books of the Law and the Prophets in their simple 
 letter. You must not expect Clemens to understand 
 that. But there is much which he did understand 
 that we have forgotten, and which we may be content 
 to sit at his feet, or at the feet of the Teacher to 
 whom he refers all his own wisdom, that we may 
 learn. 
 
 o^Ckmem. ^ s the g rea t object of this teacher is to separate 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 237 
 
 the flesh or carnal appetites from the spirit in man, lect. in. 
 much of his book is devoted to methods of discipline. 
 I do not say that these are all of them applicable to 
 us ; I do not say that they are all right methods in 
 themselves. Clemens was as likely as any one else 
 to make mistakes in this matter. The same causes 
 which led him often to misunderstand the teaching 
 of Scripture about the things of earth, may have 
 led him to adopt notions and rules winch would 
 rather be a bondage than a deliverance to men. Still, 
 his great object is to set them free — to break the 
 chains of sense, of sin, of selfishness, of idolatry, that 
 were binding them. A man who has this end con- 
 tinually before him will not lead us far wrong. If he 
 suggests means which are not helpful generally, or 
 not helpful for us, God will show us some better 
 means. We shall not be the less grateful to the kind 
 friend who has told us what we want, because we do 
 not find him infallible, and are driven, as he would 
 have us driven, to put our trust in a surer Guide. 
 
 The Gnostics, of whom I have spoken to you in The two 
 this lecture, had two opposite temptations. Some- langers - 
 times they were inclined to speak of the wisdom or 
 knowledge of God as attainable only by a choice 
 initiated circle. They utterly scorned the vulgar herd 
 of men. Sometimes — as you have seen in the case of 
 Carpocrates — they broke down all distinctions. The 
 righteous and the wicked, the seeker of God and the 
 servant of the devil, were all alike. Clemens, by How 
 exhibiting the Divine Word as the Lover of man — of smujht to 
 the poor, the ignorant, and the helpless — cast down avotdlhem - 
 
23 H ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. hi. the barriers which they had raised. By exhibiting 
 the Divine Word as the great clistinguisher between 
 the spirit in man which looks upwards after good, 
 and the flesh which looks downwards to the earth, he 
 vindicated the eternal distinctions which they were 
 abolishing. But here, too, he had his infirmity. 
 Sailing between Scylla and Charybdis, he was sure to 
 
 To whkh be nearer the one rock than the other. He was more 
 
 he inclined, afraid f i^g too general than of being too exclu- 
 sive; more afraid of profaning the mysteries of the 
 Gospel than of hiding them from those whom they 
 were meant to bless. He had such a sense of God's 
 love to men, and loved them so much himself, that 
 the evil was counteracted in him, and only showed 
 itself now and then. But it was there. He had the 
 notion of a circle of refined and devoted men, to 
 whom truths might be known which the vulgar could 
 not reach. The thought was akin to reverence ; but 
 we may find hereafter, that it was akin also to that 
 superstition which is most fatal to reverence. When 
 men seek to put a veil upon that face which God in 
 His Son has made open, they set up their wisdom 
 against His; they lead men to fear something else 
 than Him. 
 
 Tiit The third treatise of Clemens is the one from 
 
 which I have taken my extracts respecting Basilides, 
 Valentinus, and Carpocrates. It is a treasure-house 
 of information respecting the opinions of men in the 
 Church and in the world ; a gathering together of the 
 information which Clemens had been accumulating 
 since he was a youth. But it is no mere magazine 
 
 Stromata. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 239 
 
 of opinions. They are arranged and harmonized by a lect. hi. 
 
 man who has entered into them, and feels how they Meir ob- 
 ject and 
 are connected with human life, and who never loses value. 
 
 sight of the purpose to which his life was devoted. 
 He does not fashion these opinions into a great 
 system ; he does not attach himself to one school of 
 opinion, or bring the doctrines of all schools into con- 
 sent with his own. He believes that God is leading 
 men through the maze of notions and opinions— of 
 their own crude thoughts and fancies — into the clear 
 day. He is ready and desirous to go down into the 
 mines where they have been toiling, that he may 
 rescue whatever treasures they have found, and that 
 he may show them the open heaven and the bright 
 sun, which he thinks God means them as well as him 
 to enjoy. 
 
 On the whole, I do not know where we shall look Conclusion. 
 for a purer or a truer man than this Clemens of 
 Alexandria. I should like to be able to tell you 
 something; of his countenance and of his manner, 
 as well as to give you more particulars of his 
 history. But the facts are few and unimportant 
 which his modesty has made known to us, or which 
 his successors have preserved. We must be content 
 to make his acquaintance through the words which 
 he has spoken. Judging from them, he seems to me 
 that one of the old Fathers whom we should all have 
 reverenced most as a teacher, and loved best as a 
 friend. 
 
LECTURE IV. 
 
 THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
 
 THE CHURCHES IN ITALY AND GAUL. 
 
 Lect. iv. g T Paul did not go to Rome to establish a 
 
 St. Paul Church, but to dwell in a prison. He had already 
 addressed his letter to the Christians there whilst 
 he was still working in Greece : when he arrived, 
 we are told that he gathered the Jews about him 
 to explain the reason of his coming ; we do not 
 hear of any other interview with the members of the 
 Church than that which took place when some of 
 them met him on his way at Appii Forum. 
 
 Origin of How this Church was formed is altogether obscure ; 
 
 Chmrch but so it is with most of the Churches we shall hear 
 
 unknown. Q £ jj. - g on jy nQW an( j flien we can conue ct them 
 
 with great names of Apostles or Evangelists. If we 
 are not content to believe that the Spirit of God binds 
 men together and teaches them of the meaning and 
 mystery of their fellowship — if we have not accepted 
 that testimony of the Divine record — if it seems to us 
 unsatisfactory, we must, in general, do without in- 
 formation, or invent it for ourselves. Eor my own 
 part, I think the darkness is better than the torch- 
 light which we kindle. I would rather believe that 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 241 
 
 God founded a Church to which I belonged, than Lect. iv. 
 guess what St. Peter or St. Paul may have had to do 
 with the foundation of it. 
 
 The members of the Church I am speaking of St. Peter. 
 have been rather uneasy in their ignorance on this 
 and many other topics. If they cannot distinctly 
 say when the name of Christ was first heard and 
 confessed among them, they think they can at least 
 discover who first presided over them, who gave them 
 the form and consistency of a society. They claim 
 St. Peter as that person ; they believe that he was 
 the first Overseer of their Church, because they be- 
 lieve also that he was the first of the Apostles, — 
 the one to whom the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven 
 were committed ; the one whose name denotes the 
 rock on which the whole Church stands. 
 
 I am not the least anxious to dispute the tradition, Probability 
 evidently a very old one, that St. Peter went to Rome Z2™ 
 and suffered there. It is a question for antiquarians jj*^ 
 to settle according to the evidence. I would earn- respecting 
 estly entreat you to believe that we have not the 
 least interest in wishing it settled one way or the 
 other. Nor have we any interest in proving that he 
 did not occupy the position which has been assigned 
 him in the Roman Church. For a reason I have 
 given you already, it seems to me that we have no 
 ground for supposing that either at Antioch or Rome 
 he held the kind of office which belonged to St. James 
 at Jerusalem. In both cities, of course, his authority 
 will have been greatly reverenced ; but I do not see 
 why he should be supposed to have fixed himself 
 
 h 
 
242 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IV. 
 
 In what 
 way they 
 are in- 
 structive. 
 
 Roman 
 character. 
 
 Special 
 tendencies 
 of the faith 
 of Roman 
 Christians. 
 
 in any one place, or to have exercised more than 
 a general oversight over those whom he visited volun- 
 tarily, or among whom he was brought by necessity. 
 
 Much, however, is to be learnt from these tra- 
 ditions respecting St. Peter, and from the fact that 
 they are connected so closely with the Roman Church. 
 The love of order, of organisation, was, as I have 
 pointed out already, the characteristic of the Roman 
 mind, that which had been expressed in all Roman 
 history. Almost from the moment we get any 
 glimpses of the Church in the capital, we perceive 
 that it has inherited the qualities of the nation ; 
 that in these will lie its strength and its temptations. 
 The impatience of any doubt respecting the person 
 to whom it can refer its existence as a society — 
 the impossibility of feeling that it is one till it has 
 a man's name to give it unity — these are signs which 
 may come out more clearly before us hereafter, but 
 which we may notice at once. We are not to notice 
 them only as signs of that which is evil. There was 
 good in them as well as evil, just as there was good 
 mixed with the evil in the party tendencies of the 
 Greeks and in the Gnostical tendencies of the Alexan- 
 drians. If the Roman Christians felt that God was 
 setting up a Kingdom which would, in a most real 
 and practical sense, break in pieces the kingdom of 
 the Caesars, they believed a truth which history has 
 established. And it was the truth which they, more 
 than the inhabitants of other cities, had need to ap- 
 prehend, — the only one which could sustain them 
 against the pomps of the imperial palace as well as 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 243 
 
 against its persecutions. If they thought that this Lect. iv. 
 kingdom could not be limited to their city, but was 
 to spread further than the empire of which it was 
 the centre had extended, they proved that they be- 
 lieved the words of the Prophets, and believed that 
 Christ had come to fulfil them. If they thought itssuistan- 
 that St. Peter had really opened the doors of this 
 Kingdom when he preached of Christ's resurrection 
 to the Jews at the Pentecost and to the Gentiles who 
 were gathered round Cornelius, they put an honest 
 and simple construction upon the language of Scrip- 
 ture. If they believed that the Apostle of the cir- 
 cumcision — he who had testified that the Jewish 
 calling had been a holy one from the first, and that its 
 meaning had not ceased, but had been deepened and 
 expanded by the manifestation of the Son of David — 
 was bearing that witness to the Latin world, as he 
 had borne it to his own country, — or that the Latins 
 were to feel that the blessings and obligations of the 
 inheritance were theirs, God, and not man, taught 
 them the lesson. How man might pervert what 
 God had taught, we may discover by-and-by. 
 
 Though the members of this Church are very Clemens 
 certain that St. Peter was its first Overseer or Bishop, 
 they are not agreed who was his successor. Jerome 
 says that the greater part of the Latins regarded 
 Clemens as second after Peter, though many put 
 Linus and Anacletus between them. Clemens is 
 identified by Eusebius and Jerome with the person 
 of whom St. Paul speaks in the Epistle to the 
 Philippians. There is no decisive evidence in favour 
 
244 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. of this opinion, though there is nothing in the age 
 
 of Clemens to contradict it. He certainly lived in 
 
 Date of the the first century. Some suppose that his Letter, 
 
 from which all our real knowledge of him is derived, 
 
 was written before the destruction of Jerusalem in 
 
 the year 68 ; some place it in the reign of Domitian, 
 
 in 97. Jerome fixes his death in the third year 
 
 of Trajan. He is therefore the earliest of the Teachers 
 
 of the Church of whom I have yet spoken to you, one 
 
 whom I am hardly entitled in strictness to connect 
 
 Hierony- with this century. Clemen s Romanus, more closely 
 
 mus Lib. ^ a fl ier man, connects the apostolical time 
 
 de viris J ' i - 
 
 illustrious, w ith the time that followed it. Many of the early 
 
 c. 16; and .-,.-, . , .' 
 
 seethe Churcnes seem to have been inclined to receive his 
 notes m ] c tter as an apostolical one : Jerome thinks that he 
 
 Dr. Jacob- I ' 
 
 sonsedi- traces in it resemblances to the Epistle to the 
 
 tion of the 
 
 Apostolical Hebrews. As to words and phrases, there may be 
 vol Tp 8 ground f° r the observation ; but if one looks into the 
 De vita substance and character of the Epistles, I cannot 
 
 et Scrip- . . . , 
 
 tiss.cic- conceive any two which were ever written in the 
 
 mentis. t i ,• i -i -i 
 
 world, more entirely unlike. 
 The Epistle. The letter of Clemens is addressed to the Co- 
 rinthians. It speaks of the love and order and 
 harmony which had existed for a long time among 
 them, but which had recently been broken up by 
 men who were exciting feuds and factions. To this 
 state of things the writer addresses himself. That 
 same pastoral patriarchal spirit which we discovered 
 in Ignatius and Polycarp, breathes through the whole 
 of it. There is no attempt to grapple with difficult 
 questions, to meet the arguments of Jews or Gentiles, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 245 
 
 to show how a new world was rising out of the old. lect. iv. 
 It is an exhortation, full of childlike beauty and itscha- 
 tendemess, to avoid the spirit of ambition and rival- 
 ship which had been the curse of all societies ; against 
 which the Scriptures of the Old Testament were so 
 full of warnings ; freedom from which had been the 
 great blessing and glory of every saint. At first 
 when you read it you may think that Clemens is 
 uttering a set of moral truisms ; you may compare Compared 
 him with his namesake at Alexandria, and be sur- ciemcns of 
 prised how much less thought and variety there is in i^ aVr 
 the earlier Teacher than in the later, in the Italian 
 than in the Egyptian. But the admirable man of 
 whom we were hearing in the last Lecture would 
 have been the last to invite or sanction the com- 
 parison. Nor is it a sound and true one. There is 
 a weight and solemnity in the words of the Roman 
 pastor which we shall feel more and more as we 
 know ourselves and study history. The texts which 
 he quotes so simply, the instances of divisions pro- 
 duced by rivalry, and of the men whom God made 
 great by making them humble, will be read by us as 
 the most solemn prophecies, written at the very com- 
 mencement of the Church's life, of the blight which 
 was to destroy its blossoms, of the canker which 
 would feed upon its root ; prophecies which those to 
 whom Clemens wrote, and those in whose name he 
 wrote, might have done well to lay to heart ; but 
 which we shall do well if we think are quite as 
 applicable to ourselves as ever they were to any men 
 in the world. 
 
24G 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IV. 
 
 Extract, 
 Epistle, c. 
 1 9 and 20. 
 Humility 
 the r/round 
 of Peace. 
 
 Peace 
 throughout 
 the physical 
 
 I will give you one extract from Clemens, that you 
 may see he is not the less eloquent because he is 
 simple. " It was the humility of mind, the subjection 
 which was wrought through obedience in those whom 
 I have spoken of, and in all who have received the 
 like testimony, which hath elevated not only us but 
 the generations before us, and all who have received 
 God's oracles in fear and truth. Having then become 
 inheritors of their great and glorious deeds, let us run 
 onwards after that prize of peace which has from the 
 beginning been held forth to us, and let us stretch 
 our eyes to the Father and Creator of the whole 
 universe, and be knit firmly together by those His 
 glorious and unspeakable gifts and benefits of peace ; 
 and let us contemplate Him in our spirits, and dwell 
 with the eyes of our soul upon His long-suffering 
 will, and consider how free He is from anger towards 
 all His creation. The heavens, moving by His 
 ordinance, are subject to Him in peace. Day and 
 night accomplish their accustomed course at His 
 bidding, never clashing with each other. Sun and 
 moon and the choirs of stars at His command fulfil 
 the spheres that have been marked out for them, in 
 concord, without any transgression. The pregnant 
 earth at His will in its appointed seasons brings forth 
 the abundant nourishment for men and beasts, and 
 for all the creatures that are upon it, not disputing 
 or changing any of His decrees. The inaccessible 
 abysses and the unknown dispositions of the worlds 
 below are held together by his appointments. The 
 waves of the immeasurable sea gathered into heaps at 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 247 
 
 His decree, pass not over the boundaries that have lect. iv. 
 been erected for them, but do as He has given com- 
 mandment, for He hath said, " Thus far shalt thou 
 come, and no further." The ocean that has been 
 untrodden by men, and the worlds that are beyond it, 
 are kept even by the same decrees of the great Master. 
 The seasons of spring and summer, and autumn and 
 winter, in peace succeed to each other. The winds 
 in their stations in their own seasons perform their 
 ministries without reluctance. The ever-springing 
 fountains that have been ordained for enjoyment and 
 health, with no failures offer their breasts that men 
 may draw life from them. The very meanest of living 
 beings hold their meetings together in peace and 
 harmony. All these things the great Master and 
 Ruler of all hath ordained to be in peace and 
 harmony, doing good to all, but to us more abun- 
 dantly who have fled to His mercies through our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and honour for 
 ever and ever. Amen." 
 
 This belief in the sacredness and divinity of peace The later 
 must have been closely connected in the mind of ^icate a 
 Clemens, and of every member of the Roman developed 
 
 Christian 
 
 Church, with the idea of government. Obedience polity. 
 was to him the secret of blessedness. Nevertheless, 
 there are no distinct indications, I think, in the 
 letter of Clemens, of that complete order in the 
 Church which seems to have grown up in Asia 
 Minor under the eye of St. John, and which in the 
 second century spread itself through the Church 
 generally. If the earlier, even if the later, date 
 
248 ox CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. iv. assigned to the letter of Clemens be the true one, 
 this is what we should expect, There are passages 
 in his epistle which seem clearly to show that he 
 recognised the priesthood of the Jews as not alto- 
 gether passed away. Till it had passed away he was 
 not likely, whether he was under the instruction of 
 St. Peter or not, to speak of the Church polity as 
 providing any substitute for it. 
 The ch- There are certain books connected with the name of 
 
 andRecog- Clemens, "the Clementines" and "the Recognitions, 
 nitions. ^--^ ^jcJj he had nothing to do, but which must 
 belong, even in then earliest form, to a late period 
 of the second century. These books, though un- 
 justly attributed to him, are important for the history 
 of the Church. And though it may be difficult to 
 connect them directly with the Church over which 
 Clemens presided, there must be some reason why 
 his name rather than any other was given to them. 
 They will come again under our notice ; but I will 
 tell you here that they are books of an Ebionitic 
 character, and that they set up the name of St. Peter 
 expressly as the Apostle of the circumcision, evidently 
 slighting the Apostle of the Gentiles. 
 Special The tradition is that Clemens died a martyr. There 
 
 IhoTwhf * s no P 1 * 00 ^ that he did. But such reports are more 
 ruhd in probable about the Fathers of the Roman Church than 
 
 the Roman 
 
 Church. about any other. They were directly under the eyes 
 of the Emperor; and as we shall find when I come 
 to speak more particularly on that subject, there 
 was no Emperor from the end of the first century 
 who did not look upon the Chinches with suspicion, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 249 
 
 and with the more suspicion the more organized Lect. iv. 
 
 they appeared to be. It is therefore quite possible 
 
 that the eminent men in the Roman Church may 
 
 have glorified God by their deaths. This may have 
 
 been their calling. And thus they may have acquired 
 
 a peculiar reverence as being foremost in clanger, 
 
 having their dwelling icliere the throne of Satan ivas. 
 
 As writers, they were less conspicuous than the T ^ Chwch 
 
 1U€Ct/C lib 
 
 members of most Churches. After Clemens, there Literature. 
 is no one to whom any books or letters can be 
 honestly referred ; though, when we come to the ninth 
 century, we shall find that a whole series of letters 
 have been invented for this time, and the names of 
 Roman Fathers forged to endorse them. 
 
 The Roman Church had, however, one grace which strong in 
 was probably more serviceable to itself and to the ta u {1 j. 
 Church generally than the gift of composing boohs 
 could have been. Clemens dwells much on the duty 
 of hospitality. It was one of the truest pentecostal 
 signs, to dispense treasures to the needy, to entertain 
 strangers, to wash the feet of the brethren. These 
 w T ere better proofs that the Spirit was among them 
 than the speaking with tongues. Dionysius of 
 Corinth, in a letter to Soter, who was Overseer or 
 Father of the Roman Church between 168 and 177, 
 bears witness of this disposition in the sister com- 
 munity. There is scarcely a higher commendation 
 extant respecting any. 
 
 The demand for this proof of Christian love and ^"feTthe 
 
 fellowship must have been greater in Rome than else- 
 where, for thither people resorted from all countries, churches. 
 
 Roman and 
 the other 
 
course. 
 
 250 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. Some doubt lias been recently thrown by an in- 
 genious writer upon all the stories and documents 
 which assume an intercourse between the Churches, 
 as if they presumed facilities of communication which 
 Probability could not have existed. 1 But the more one considers 
 wouidl'e what Rome had done by the making of roads to 
 such inter- cre ate such facilities, and how certain it was that 
 men instinct with a missionary spirit and a spirit 
 of brotherhood would avail themselves of them, the 
 less weight one attaches to such scepticism — the 
 more easily one believes that there will and must 
 have been a confluence of Christians, as* well as of 
 other strangers, at the capital — the more easily one 
 credits the reports which occur, I think, in Ensebius, 
 naturally, (wherever I detected a purpose, I should 
 be as much inclined to suspect him as any writer I 
 know,) concerning men of various opinions, and with 
 various intents, who came up to consult with the 
 lloman Overseers. The habit of regarding Rome as. a 
 centre must have passed very early from the Empire 
 to the Church. It must have been strengthened 
 in the hearts of Christians by every new case of men 
 brought from a distance, as Ignatius was, to be ex- 
 
 1 See the History of the Church of Rome, by the Rev. E. J. Shep- 
 herd, (Longman, 1S51,) especially the Proof and Illustration, No. 4, 
 Victor, p. 197- It does not fall within my province to speak, in this 
 book, on the question of the authenticity of Cyprian's letters, which 
 Mr. Shepherd has raised and discussed with so much ingenuity. I hope 
 to examine his arguments more completely hereafter; in the meantime 
 one can express nothing but thanks to him for the courage and freedom 
 from all ecclesiastical bias with which he has entered upon his task. 
 Such criticism must lead to good results ultimately, however one may 
 dissent from some of its first conclusions. 
 
THE SECOND CENTUEY. 251 
 
 posed in the Amphitheatre. Rome became a sacred lect. iv. 
 place as holding the actual tombs of so many 
 martyrs; the fact affording afterwards the excuse 
 for the fiction, that she had possession of innu- 
 merable bones which had been consigned to far dis- 
 tant earths and seas. The consequence was nearly 
 inevitable. There would be acts of assumption claims of 
 on the part of the Roman Fathers ; they would call *££j* 
 forth resistance. To say that these things were not P ected in 
 
 , . Rome. 
 
 likely m the second century, because it was a time 
 of unruffled moderation and purity, one in which 
 there could not be any claims of dominion re- 
 sembling in kind those which later periods wit- 
 nessed, is to trifle with the facts of history. We 
 have found other forms of corruption and impurity, 
 why not this ? What do all the warnings and 
 exhortations of Clemens mean, if the human heart 
 was free from this evil in that day ? — if favourable 
 circumstances were not sure to call it forth ? 
 
 The story then to which I alluded before, of Poly- The Easter 
 carp coming to Rome in the days of Anicetus and J^'° 
 discussing with him the time for keeping Easter, 
 though it has been vehemently questioned, seems to 
 me perfectly reasonable. Poly carp was an old man, 
 certainly, to undertake such a journey ; but his age 
 has been a good deal exaggerated, to make him better 
 acquainted with the Apostles than he was ; and all 
 accounts represent him as unusually hale in body as 
 well as zealous in spirit. It was an occasion worthy 
 of an unusual effort. It was no trifle for an old 
 Asiatic to give up a practice he had learnt from 
 
252 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. St. John ; it was a very serious thing for a Christian to 
 feel that the witness which the Christian family was 
 bearing to the world might be weakened by a dif- 
 ference between Orientals and Occidentals. It is 
 The story of consistent, I thin k, with experience and with the 
 arJ C Anice- position of the Roman Father, that he should have 
 tus consis- re f usec ] to abandon his own ground, and should have 
 
 tent. ° 
 
 thought it strange for a man of Smyrna to doubt 
 that a Roman was a better judge of customs that 
 were suitable to the Churches generally, than he was. 
 It is equally natural that he should at last have de- 
 ferred to the venerable age of his companion, and 
 have felt that he had no right to enforce even the 
 most desirable practice on him if it involved a breach 
 of their fellowship. 
 victor and The sadder sequel to this narrative I accept on 
 EusethT' similar grounds. We are told that Victor, the last 
 booJcv.c.zi. p u0mall Overseer of this century, was engaged in the 
 same controversy with Polycrates of Ephesus ; that 
 the latter defended what he supposed was the tra- 
 dition of St. John even more strongly than Poly- 
 carp had done ; that Victor gave no heed to his 
 arguments, and entirely cast aside the toleration 
 victor's of his predecessor, deliberately excommunicating all 
 nkatTon' Churches which would not keep Easter according 
 to the Western ride. His decision is said to have 
 been arrested by the mild and excellent counsels of 
 Irenscus, the Bishop of Lyons, though it does not 
 appear to what extent his mediation was successful. 
 It has been argued that such an exercise of power in 
 that age is absolutely incredible ; that the documents 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 253 
 
 which represent it must be forgeries of a later time ; Lect. iv. 
 that if they had not been, we should at least have 
 found in the letter of Irenams some more vehement 
 protest against such an assumption of authority by 
 the Roman, not a mere attempt to dissuade him from 
 the exercise of it. There is, I suspect, a double fal- what ims 
 lacy in this plausible reasoning. First, it transfers .- t 
 the notions of the middle ages to the second century, 
 and supposes that the exercise of excommunication 
 necessarily implies some formally recognised supe- 
 riority and authority in the person or the Church 
 whence it proceeds ; whereas a weaker body may re- 
 fuse to hold communion with a stronger, as well as 
 a stronger with a weaker. Secondly, it underrates Counteract- 
 one of the moral powers which was acting upon the iAeg% 
 Christians at that time. In the age of Poly carp — the 
 influence of St. John, was a power, and a great — in 
 Asia Minor a paramount — one. In the influence of 
 the capital and its associations was another — a 
 counteracting influence to this ; — able in the West 
 to overpower it. 
 
 To the same period of Victor belongs another visit Pmxeas at 
 from the East, which, if we may trust our authorities, * ome ' 
 had serious consequences in the West. Praxeas, of 
 whom I have spoken already, full of the mischiefs 
 which the Montanists were causing in Phrygia, de- 
 nounced them in the capital. That he came thither 
 for the purpose, we need not suppose ; being there, it 
 was not strange that he should dwell on the subject 
 that was nearest his heart. With it he seems to have 
 connected his own doctrine of Monachism, into which 
 
254 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. iv. lie had been led through his hostility to Montanus. 
 Conduct of Victor accepted his denunciations of his opponents ; 
 appears to have overlooked the errors of his own 
 system. Such, at least, was the impression which his 
 conduct made on a presbyter of Carthage, who was in 
 Rome at that time, and who, unlike Victor, had con- 
 ceived the greatest dread of Praxeas, and (first, perhaps, 
 through that dread) an affection for the supposed 
 Paraclete. Of this presbyter I shall have much to 
 tell you. I introduce him here because the disgust 
 with which Victor inspired him had a great effect 
 upon his after life, and upon his relations to the 
 Church generally. 
 Minucius As I have said that the literature of the Roman 
 fotwt'the Church in this century was comparatively insignin- 
 sd century. can ^ j s h ou ld like to make a memorable exception to 
 the remark, by telling you of Minucius Felix, who 
 was a Roman advocate, and wrote a delightful little 
 book called " Octavius," in defence of the Gospel. 
 But, though very eminent men have placed him in the 
 reign of Marcus Aurelius, there is more ground for 
 the opinion which refers him to about the year 230 
 or 240. I must, therefore, defer my account of him 
 for the present. I have already told you that the last 
 days of Justin were probably passed in Rome. 
 Gaui. How and when the Church in Gaul was founded, 
 
 we know not. The traditions respecting Dionysius 
 the Areopagite, though baseless in themselves, might 
 lead us to suppose that its first teachers came from 
 Greece Proper ; but it is more likely that it had an 
 Asiatic origin. The first clear tidings we have of 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 255 
 
 it are in a letter addressed " by the servants of Christ Lect. iv. 
 duelling in Vienna and Lyons of Gaul, to the brethren EmeMus, 
 in Asia and Phrygia, having the same faith and hope v ' c ' ' 
 of redemption with us : to whom they wish peace 
 and grace and glory from God and from our Lord 
 Jesus Christ." This letter is one of the noblest 
 archives a Church could have, — worth all the miracu- 
 lous legends in the world. I hope the members of the 
 French Church duly prize it. It tells of the witness The utter 
 which was borne for the name of God by poor men X^mT 
 and weak women in the city of Lyons during the cwtum 
 reign of Marcus Aurelius. I do not suppose the 
 persecution there was the direct consequence of any 
 order from him. It was more probably a native 
 movement, which the Roman governor could scarcely 
 have checked if he would, but which he encouraged 
 and legalized, acting, no doubt, in conformity with 
 the wishes of the Emperor. The writer of the letter 
 testifies, " that the wrath of the multitude and the 
 governor and the soldiers was especially directed against 
 Sanctus, a deacon from Vienna ; and against Maturus, The mt- 
 
 . . -, ncsses. 
 
 a newly baptized man, but a gallant warrior; and 
 against Attalus, whose family was from Pergamos, 
 who had been for a long time a pillar and support of 
 those who dwelt there; and against Blandina, through Biandina. 
 whom Christ made it manifest that the things which 
 are poor and uncomely, and are despised by man, are 
 counted of great glory by God, in virtue of their love 
 to Him, which conies forth in power, and does not 
 glory in appearance." " For when we all feared," he 
 goes on, " and her mistress after the flesh likewise, 
 
256 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. who liad herself been one of the warriors, lest she 
 should not be able to make her confession boldly, 
 because of the weakness of her body, Blandina was 
 filled with such inward might that those who were by 
 turns torturing her from morn to even were ex- 
 hausted, and confessed that they had no more that 
 they could do to her, and wondered that she still 
 remained breathing after all that she had undergone, 
 seeing that one form of the torment seemed enough 
 to wear out her life, not to speak of so many and 
 various kinds. But the blessed woman seemed to 
 gather new strength, like a brave athlete, in the con- 
 fession, and she experienced a revival, and rest, and 
 unconsciousness of that which was befalling her, while 
 she cried, ' I am a Christian, and no evil thing goes 
 
 Sunctus. on amongst us.' Sanctus, likewise, after enduring all 
 maimer of ignominies, and insults, and sufferings, his 
 unrighteous foes hoping that through the greatness 
 of his torments they should hear something from him 
 that was not fitting, so steadfastly withstood their 
 purpose, that he did not even utter forth his own 
 name, or the name of his nation, or of the city whence 
 he came, nor whether he was slave or free, but to all 
 that was asked him answered, in the Latin tongue, 
 ' I am a Christian.' This served him for name, for city, 
 for race ; but no other voice did the Gentiles hear 
 from him. ... In whom Christ suffering accomplished 
 His glory, putting clown the adversaries and holding 
 forth an example to those who should come after, 
 that there is nothing to be feared where there is the 
 Father's love, nor painful where there is Christ's glory. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 257 
 
 The people of Lyons, though they might have Lect. iv. 
 thought the mere profession of a Christian a sufficient Thyestean 
 
 . Banquets 
 
 warrant for these punishments, had associated with imputed to 
 it all maimer of horrible imputations. The Chris- ti e ans ^ s ' 
 tians were supposed to offer human sacrifices, and in %°»a. 
 their secret feasts to feed upon the victims. The 
 object was, by torture, to bring them to the confession 
 of these enormities. In not a few cases the expe- 
 riment was successful; the sufferers denied Christ, 
 and confirmed the charges against His disciples. 
 Some of these, along with those who had remained me Prison. 
 faithful, and had survived the torture, were thrown 
 into a dark dungeon, — the bodies which had already 
 suffered so much being bound with heavy chains. 
 Many of the young and vigorous died there of suffo- 
 cation. Pothinus, the Bishop of Lyons, who was Pothmus. 
 ninety years of age, and very weak in body, after 
 bearing a good confession, was thrown again into 
 prison, and at the end of two days breathed out his 
 life. Those who had denied the faith there were as ill 
 treated as those who had confessed it, seeing that 
 they had acknowledged themselves to be murderers, 
 and guilty of all manner of crimes. There was a 
 startling contrast between the looks of the two when 
 they were brought forth,—" the one cheerful, glory 
 and much grace being mixed in their countenances, 
 so that even their bonds hung upon them like goodly 
 and bridal ornaments; the other cowed, and with TheDmi**. 
 pained countenances, and full of shame— reviled, 
 moreover, by the heathen as unmanly cowards— bear- 
 ing the disgrace which they had put upon themselves, 
 
258 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 TJieir 
 restoration. 
 
 lect. iv. having lost their honourable, and glorious, and life- 
 giving title." 
 
 But the example of the one was not lost upon the 
 other. The writer, though inclined to expect various 
 miraculous succours for the faithful, speaks of this as 
 the greatest miracle which was wrought on their 
 behalf, that " through the living the dead were made 
 alive, and that martyrs conferred blessings on those 
 who were not martyrs j and much joy came to the 
 Virgin-mother (the Church) when those whom she 
 had thrown out as dead, she received back alive. 
 For, by means of the true witnesses, many of those 
 who had denied Christ were begotten again and 
 kindled afresh; and being nerved to the struggle, 
 went to the judgment-seat, encouraged by the voice 
 of Him who desireth not the death of a sinner, but 
 is gracious to penitents, that they might be again 
 questioned by the governor," and suffer what he 
 ordained. 
 
 The treatment of the corpses is thus described : — 
 " The bodies of the martyrs, then, having been ex- 
 posed and left in the open air for six days, having 
 been afterwards burnt and consumed, were cast into 
 the river Rhone which was flowing near, so that no 
 relic of them might remain on the earth. And these 
 things they did, as if they were able to conquer God, 
 and to take away from His servants their regenera- 
 tion, and, as they said themselves, that they might 
 have no hope of a resurrection — their confidence in 
 which had led them to introduce a strange and new 
 worship, to despise terrors, and to go with joy to 
 
 Drowning 
 the corpses 
 to prevent 
 resurrec- 
 tion. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 259 
 
 death. ' Let us see now whether they will rise, and lect. iv. 
 whether their God can assist them, and deliver them 
 out of our hands.' " 
 
 Eusebius has preserved some further words of this o. 2. The 
 
 ,, surviving 
 
 letter, which ought not to be passed over. " Those, confessors 
 he says, " who had withstood the torture, and had ^Jj t0 u 
 undergone all manner of sufferings, but had survived, Martyrs. 
 were greatly displeased when they were called wit- 
 nesses or martyrs by their brethren. ' Christ/ they 
 said, ' is the faithful and true Martyr, the First- 
 begotten from the dead, and Prince of the divine life. 
 Those may be called martyrs whom Christ hath 
 raised up in their confession, sealing their witness 
 by their departure from earth. We are but poor and 
 indifferent confessors.' And with tears they besought 
 the brethren that continual prayers might be made for 
 them, that they might be perfected. Nevertheless," They lived 
 adds the writer, " though they refused the name, they 
 showed forth the power of martyrdom in deed, speak- 
 ing with all boldness to the heathen, making manifest 
 their high birth by their patience and their fearless- 
 ness towards men, being filled with the fear of God. 
 They humbled themselves," he adds, "under the 
 mighty hand by which they are now exalted. They Their love. 
 pleaded for all, they accused none ; they delivered all, 
 they bound none ; they prayed for those who inflicted 
 all cruelties upon them; they poured out tears for 
 those who had fallen, to the Father ; they asked life 
 of Him, and He gave it to them, which also they 
 shared with those who were about them. Conquerors 
 in all things, they have gone to God, having loved 
 
 s 2 
 
260 ON CHURCH HISTORY, 
 
 Lect - vl peace always, and endowed ns with peace, departing 
 in peace ; having left no pangs to the mother who bore 
 them, or strife to the brethren, but joy and peace, 
 and unity and love." 
 irenceus. The writer of this letter was probably Irenaeus 
 
 " the Peaceable." You may wonder how he came 
 by such a name, and may suspect that some inven- 
 tion has been at work in the words that are given 
 to him, and the stories that are told of him ; but 
 it was probably the new name which he received 
 when he was baptized, and therefore may have been 
 chosen by himself, or by his parents, because it ex- 
 pressed the temper of mind which he most admired, 
 or which was most characteristic of him. If he had 
 been a convert from heathenism, he might have taken 
 it in mature life; but, apparently, he was born of 
 His letter Christian parents, for he writes thus to Plorinus, a 
 Euscbivs, ' presbyter of the Roman Church, who had adopted 
 6ooAv.c.20. some opinions which he thought dangerous : — "I knew 
 thee when I was a boy, in the Lower Asia, when 
 thou wert with Polycarp, when thou wert trying to 
 have a good reputation with him; for I remember 
 those things better than the things that have come 
 Early re- to pass recently. The lessons we get in boyhood, 
 growing up with the soul, become one with it ; so 
 that I can describe to you the place in which the 
 image of blessed Polycarp used to sit and talk, his goings out 
 mOB . and his comings in, the fashion of his life, his look 
 
 and figure, the discourses which he made to the 
 multitude ; how he told us of his intercourse with 
 John, and of others who had seen the Lord ; how he 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 261 
 
 repeated their words, and what he had heard from Lect. iv. 
 them concerning the Lord, concerning His mighty 
 acts, concerning His doctrine ; for Polycarp having 
 received them from the eye-witnesses of the Word 
 of Life, gave forth all things in harmony with the 
 Scriptures. These things even then, thanks to the 
 mercy of God that was upon me, I diligently listened 
 to, noting them down, not on paper, but in my heart, 
 and ever, by the grace of God, I feed upon them 
 again and again. And I can testify before God that 
 if that blessed and apostolical old man had heard any 
 such doctrine as that you have put forth, he would 
 have cried, and stopped his ears ; and uttering his 
 familiar phrase, ' good God ! to what times hast 
 Thou kept me, that I should bear these things !' he 
 would have fled the place in which, sitting or stand- 
 ing, he had heard such words." 
 
 From this passage we may conclude that Irenaeus irenam in 
 grew up in Smyrna, and that he was taught from his 
 youth to revere Polycarp. Under what circumstances 
 he left Asia and came into Gaul we are ignorant ; but 
 that he was presbyter in Lyons during the persecu- 
 tions, and became Overseer, perhaps immediately after 
 the death of Pothinus, seems clear. He speaks of Heresies, 
 
 „ , , lib. i. Pro- 
 
 himself " as having not learnt the art ot words, or cui- ce m i mu 
 tivated the power of a writer," and " as living among J^f v f id _ 
 Celts, and chiefly busied with their barbarous dia- a.**™^ 
 lect." Still his interest in his old home, and m the a v X oA OU - 
 affairs of the Church at large, must have been as lively ^ vuv ' 
 as ever. What he says of Polycarp may explain his feel- 
 ings respecting the Easter question, even apart from his 
 
262 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. iv. love of peace. He thought the Asiatics entirely wrong 
 
 His sym- on that point ; but he had an affectionate sympathy 
 
 P Asia. Wltk witn tliem > and nothing caused him so painful a 
 
 wrench as the possibility of a separation in spiritual 
 
 bonds between the new and the old country. 
 
 irmcms His letter to Florinus explains another part of his 
 
 as a writer. . . . , 
 
 life, which you may fancy was inconsistent with the 
 conciliatory disposition which the Paschal dispute ' 
 called forth in him. The work for which he has be- 
 come memorable is in five books, written " for the 
 exposure and subversion of Gnosis, falsely so called ;" 
 or, as the Latin translator (the greater part exists 
 only in a Latin translation) describes it, " against all 
 heretics." Why should the peace-lover have plunged 
 into such a fierce war as this? Why should the 
 simple man who dwelt among barbarians, and had 
 trained himself so little to subtleties of words, have 
 thought himself called to engage with men who had 
 Expiana- the command of all subtleties ? The words I have 
 Jmk. quoted contain the answer. Irenseus had been 
 brought up under a teacher who knew nothing of 
 theories and opinions ; who was never intended to 
 grapple with them; who regarded them with the 
 natural indignation and impatience of an old man, 
 feeling that he had a hold of a truth which he could 
 not part with ; who suspected with good reason that 
 many he knew or heard of were substituting their 
 notions for realities; who left it to younger men 
 to see whether there might be any wheat mixed with 
 feelings as the tares. Polycarp, we have seen, had his own 
 1° iniLs prejudices. The customs which he thought St. John 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 263 
 
 probably observed were almost as venerable in his Lect. iv. 
 eyes as the principles which St. John had been ap- 
 pointed by God to embody in enduring words; 
 nay, the stories which he had heard from the lips 
 of the Apostle may have seemed to him more dear, 
 more sacred, because they were told to him, than his 
 Gospel itself. Irenaeus had loved the simplicity of 
 his master's character. He thought he should pre- Attempt to 
 
 i tit* confront 
 
 serve that simplicity to the Church if he could bring the old with, 
 his authority, and what he recollected of his sayings, the new ' 
 into direct conflict with the complicated theories of 
 the Gnostics. He thought, as many have done since, 
 that the best way of encountering an error was to set 
 up that in opposition to it, which was at the furthest 
 imaginable distance from it. 
 
 Accordingly, Irenaeus undertook in that retreat of 
 his at Lyons, while preaching the Gospel to Celtic 
 barbarians, to confute all the opinions which had 
 grown up in the most polished cities of Syria and 
 Egypt. Having this design, and looking at things The method. 
 from this point of view, we cannot wonder at the 
 method he adopted. The Valentinian system was the 
 most refined, the most elaborate of all the Gnostical 
 systems ; it had, as I have explained to you, become 
 still more elaborate in the hands of Valentinians 
 than it was in the hands of Valentinus. Irenaeus 
 encounters it first, and encounters it in the most 
 matured period of its growth. Another man might 
 have applied himself first to the demolition of some 
 of the simpler forms of error ; then, when he had 
 acquired the free use of his tools, have gone on to 
 
2G4 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. those that were more knotted and fibrous. Irenseus 
 Attacks the deliberately adopts the opposite course; because 
 nians first, nothing can so astonish his reader, or make him so 
 long for the older Smyrnsean lore, as to be at once cast 
 among the interminable genealogies of those who had 
 tasked their own native ingenuity most, and had 
 besides imported the greatest variety of Gnostical 
 notions from every religion and philosophy under 
 heaven. 
 The First The whole of the first of the five books is occupied 
 with an exposition of the different Gnostical systems, 
 proceeding in that inverted order which I have 
 described, from the most to the least complicated. 
 In this book there is much unquestionably that we 
 cannot find elsewhere, and which it is important that 
 we should know. But I cannot believe that, if we 
 had no other help than that which Irenseus affords 
 us, his account would be intelligible, or therefore of 
 any great practical use to us. 
 its great At the same time, I am far from wishing to deny 
 
 that the honest and simple reverence which Irenseus 
 showed for the words of the Apostle, whom Polycarp 
 had taught him to reverence above all others, was 
 not often more effectual in confuting the systematisers 
 than the arguments to which a more learned and in- 
 genious man might have resorted. Take the following 
 example. The Valentinians had pretended to deduce 
 their different syzygies from the first chapter of 
 St. John's Gospel. They did this by making the va- 
 rious words in the early part of the chapter announce- 
 ments of different iEons, which together composed 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 265 
 
 what they called an " Ogcload." Irenaeus replies thus: lect. iv. 
 " Manifest is the fiction of this interpretation : for irenceus, 
 
 lib i c 9 
 
 whereas John proclaims one God Almighty, and one and 10! 
 only-begotten Christ Jesus, through whom he says 
 that all things became, and declares Him to be the Son 
 of God, Him to be the Only -Begotten, Him to be the 
 Maker of all things, Him to be the true Light that 
 lighteneth every man, Him to be Maker of the world, 
 Him to have come to His own, Him to have been 
 made flesh, and to have dwelt among us, they, twisting 
 the interpretation according to their devices, would 
 have there to be another Only-Begotten, in virtue of 
 an emission or emanation, whom, forsooth, they call 
 Beginning ; another to have become the Saviour ; 
 another to be the Word, Son of the Only-Begotten ; 
 and another the Christ, thrown forth in order to 
 restore or rectify the Pleroma. And having separated The separa- 
 each one of these from the truth, and having abused ^mls. 
 the different names to their own purpose, they con- 
 trive that John should make here no mention of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ. For if he spake of the Father, ^ Gospel 
 and Grace, and the Only-Begotten, and Truth, and °f th 1 0ne 
 
 J o > Word. 
 
 the Word, and Life, and Man, and Church, then, ac- 
 cording to their hypothesis, he spake concerning the 
 first Ogdoad in which Jesus was not yet, nor Christ 
 the Teacher of John. But that the Apostle did not 
 speak concerning their syzygies, but concerning our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, whom also he knew as the Word of 
 God, he has made plain. For, gathering up his doctrine 
 concerning the Word whom he had spoken of in the 
 beginning, he adds, ' And the Word was made flesh, 
 
266 0N CHURCH HTSTORY. 
 
 Lect. iv. and dwelt among ns.' But according to them, it was 
 not the Word that was made flesh, as He never came 
 out of the Pleroma ; but He that came according to 
 a providential arrangement and dispensation, being 
 
 TheEco- younger than the Word, the Saviour. Learn then, 
 foolish ones, that Jesus, He that hath suffered for us, 
 He that hath taken up His dwelling in us, He it is 
 that is the Word of God. For if any other of the 
 iEons had become flesh for our salvation, it would 
 have been reasonable for the Apostle to have spoken 
 of that other ; but if the Word of the Father, He 
 that descended, is He also who ascended, the only- 
 begotten Son of the only Father, if He was made 
 flesh according to the good pleasure of the Father for 
 man, John has not made his discourse concerning any 
 other, or concerning an Ogdoad, but concerning the 
 
 The Lord Jesus Christ. For according to them, the Word 
 
 Saviour. i n 1 i i a i • l 
 
 was not made flesh, but the Saviour put on a psychical 
 body, contrived by an unspeakable Providence to be 
 The actual visible and tangible. But flesh is that ancient 
 ^ es ' formation by God out of the dust which took place 
 
 in the Adam, which flesh John declares the Word 
 of God truly to have become. So their first and 
 original Ogdoad is broken up. For one and the same 
 Person being declared to be Word, and Only-Begotten, 
 and Light, and Life, and Saviour, and Christ, and Son 
 of God, and this Person having become incarnate for 
 us, the machinery of the Ogdoad is dissolved; and this 
 being dissolved, the whole scheme falls to pieces, which 
 they idly dreaming, impute to the Scriptures, having 
 moulded them anew according to their fashion." 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 267 
 
 This is a very thorough and masterly exposure Lect.iv. 
 
 of the system-builders. Little can be added to it 
 
 which would not weaken it; for as I endeavoured 
 
 to show you before, St. John's Gospel, by setting forth tjw Gospel 
 
 the revelation of a Person, is marvellously contrived °a n d°the 
 
 to shatter the notions which had been alreadv in Tradltion 
 
 °f p oiy- 
 his day circulated, — equally contrived to anticipate carp. 
 
 all future experiments to restore these notions, 
 or to put them into new and more plausible shapes. 
 And here, therefore, it seems to me, Irenaeus 
 would have done well to leave the whole matter. 
 He had asserted the great principle which under- 
 mined the false Gnosticism. He might have spared 
 a refutation of its particular tenets, which he perhaps 
 did not thoroughly understand, and for which he 
 might often be inclined to substitute tenets of his 
 own, which, if they had not been grounded upon 
 so living and deep-rooted a faith, would not have 
 been much better or safer than those they sup- 
 planted. It was a great advantage for him certainly 
 to have known Polycarp. But, if he was inclined to Danger of 
 put forth Polycarp as the teacher of the Church because 
 he had listened to an Apostle, — yes, if he was in- 
 clined to make the Apostle himself the teacher, — he 
 was contradicting his own words, he was destroy- 
 ing that principle which St. John lived to assert, and 
 in which, as Irenaeus in his brighter moments per- 
 ceived, must lie the real antidote to all erroneous 
 doctrine. When Irenaeus forsook this light, he was 
 weak as another man. Motives to superstition, which 
 existed in his age, his circumstances, his character, 
 
268 0N CHURCH HTSTOTIY. 
 
 lect. iv. prevailed over his better reason. He listened to 
 vain gossip, he fell into childish fantasies, which one 
 would rather not dwell upon when one is speaking 
 of so good, and in many respects of so wise, a man. 
 Conclusion Let us think of his letter about the martyrs of Lyons, 
 Ihtory. an d gladly accept the probable report that he became 
 one of the band of martyrs himself ; so we shall not 
 forget that he did a better work, and fought a better 
 fight, than when he was writing his five books against 
 all heresies. And now we must pass from the Church 
 of Gaul to another which will occupy us for some 
 time, though we know it almost entirely through one 
 of its members. 
 
LECTUBE V. 
 
 THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
 
 THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 
 
 I have spoken to you of one part of the African lect. y. 
 continent; but I prepared you, in my introductory Contrast 
 
 between 
 
 lectures, to expect that what we heard of Egypt Alexandria 
 would help us very little in understanding the cir- ",'" "'" 
 cumstances of that part of Africa whereof Carthage 
 was the capital. In one most important respect, 
 there was indeed a resemblance between the circum- 
 stances of these two countries. Both had received 
 a civilization which was foreign, and not only foreign, 
 but unnatural, to them. One country may owe to a foreign 
 
 ,-\ n •. , • -n, /->< i it civilization 
 
 another some ot its most precious gilts, (jaul would commm t0 
 never have been what it is, if it had not been invaded 00th - 
 by the Franks of Germany. Our country would 
 never have been what it is, if it had not been subdued 
 by the Saxons and Normans. But the civilization 
 which came to us and to our neighbours in this way 
 was preceded, as I shall hope to show you hereafter, 
 by conflicts which matured the seeds under ground 
 — which caused different, apparently opposing, influ- 
 ences to work together— which removed much that 
 had been merely superficial and external, that what 
 
270 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 The 
 
 foreign cul- 
 ture did 
 not in 
 either case 
 develop the 
 native 
 seeds. 
 
 Greek ten- 
 dencies of 
 the A lexan- 
 drian 
 Church. 
 
 Latin 
 habits of 
 the Cartha- 
 ginian 
 Church. 
 
 Its great 
 influence. 
 
 was deeper and more native might come forth with 
 greater strength. It was not so, I think, in the case 
 of either of the countries I am speaking of now. The 
 old Egyptian character and habits were overlaid, and 
 to a great extent stifled, by the Greek civilization 
 which the Ptolemies introduced. The Punic mind 
 was still more crushed by the Roman conquest. 
 Therefore we must look for great and terrible changes 
 to befal these lands. We must not wonder if the 
 Greek culture of the one, and the Latin culture of 
 the other, should both at last be found feeble and 
 merely outward, and if God in His providence 
 should appoint another, apparently a very severe 
 and tremendous, discipline for these countries, which 
 after long ages may fit them to bring forth fruits 
 of which before they were incapable. I say this, not 
 only to prepare you for portions of our history that 
 otherwise might seem very startling and incredible, 
 but also that you may understand better the circum- 
 stances of the Christian Churches as they present 
 themselves to us in the second century. You have 
 seen how much of good there was in the Alexandrian 
 Church — how much there was in it that was not good, 
 but artificial and fantastical — nay, what a leaven 
 there was of this even in its noblest and truest men. 
 The same observation will come out, I think, more 
 strongly in reference to the Church in the province 
 of Africa. You will find there a Church which has 
 exerted as great an influence upon the whole of 
 Christendom as any that could be named. You will 
 find one unlike in almost every respect to the Church 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 271 
 
 in Alexandria — unlike in its virtues and in its failings, Lect. v. 
 in the thoughts and habits of its guides, and of those 
 who revolted from their guidance — almost opposed in 
 the effects it has produced upon the world. But itsanifi- 
 you will see also, I think, some signs that the Church "" c 
 had not struck its roots deeply into one land or into 
 the other ; that it had not taken hold of those who 
 were the proper inhabitants of the soil ; that in the 
 one country it was far too purely Greek, in the other 
 far too exclusively Latin. My meaning must be ex- 
 plained by the history. Part of it you will not 
 understand till a later time; part, I think, will be 
 evident from the account I am about to give you 
 of the man to whom I referred at the close of my 
 last lecture. 
 
 The Church of Carthage may have been established 
 early in this century; but we know nothing of its 
 doings till we stumble at once upon the writings of 
 Q. Septimius Florens Tertullianus. It might be Age of 
 
 . n m Tertulltan. 
 
 a question in his case, as in the case ot Clemens, 
 whether he should be more properly referred to the 
 second century or to the third. Some of his books 
 must have been composed before the reign of S. 
 Severus, but the greater part fall within his reign ; 
 some may possibly belong to that of Caracalla. But 
 I have no hesitation about reckoning him in the 
 second century, to which Severus himself most strictly 
 belongs. His mind was formed in this age ; he had 
 already given the impression of his mind to Carthage, 
 or if not, had exhibited what were its tendencies, 
 within the period which these lectures embrace. 
 
272 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 Passage of 
 Eusebius 
 
 relating to 
 Tertullian. 
 
 A Juris- 
 consult. 
 A Rheto- 
 rician. 
 An Advo- 
 cate. 
 
 A Presby- 
 ter. 
 
 Eusebius scarcely mentions Tertullian in his his- 
 tory ; one sentence contains the notice which he gives 
 of him ; it is, I conceive, an important one. " Ter- 
 tullian," he says, " was a man profoundly acquainted 
 with the Roman laws, and in other respects conspicuous 
 and very illustrious at Rome." Eusebius was appa- 
 rently ignorant of Tertullian's real country ; perhaps 
 he had not read his books. In his own " Apology," 
 he calls Africa " our country." Again and again he 
 assumes it to be so. Eusebius might therefore only 
 mean that he was a Latin ; but he might also have 
 heard that he exercised the function of an advocate 
 in Rome. Everything in Tertullian's writings con- 
 firms the opinion that he had been carefully educated 
 in Roman law, still more carefully in Roman rhetoric. 
 There were abundant opportunities for studying 
 rhetoric in the schools of Carthage, but for the exer- 
 cise of his profession he more probably went to the 
 capital. It was the great age of Roman lawyers and 
 jurisconsults ; Papinianus, the most eminent of them, 
 was the counsellor of Severus. Tertullian may have 
 ceased to be a lawyer when he became a Christian, 
 (he speaks of himself as originally a Pagan,) but he 
 certainly brought with him to his new faith the fruits 
 of his former discipline. It is disputed whether he 
 was ever ordained a presbyter, (Jerome says confi- 
 dently that he was, and he is probably right,) but it 
 is certain that whatever other functions he exercised, 
 and whatever changes his mind underwent, he con- 
 tinued an advocate and a rhetorician to the last. 
 
 He was a consummate advocate, and a splendid 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 073 
 
 rhetorician. He has never the least difficulty in Lkct. v. 
 maintaining an argument upon any topic ; he can His intd - 
 
 lectual 
 
 always crush an opponent, if he cannot convince him. qualities. 
 There are passages of striking declamation in his writ- 
 ings which can scarcely be paralleled in any author 
 of ancient or modern times. Though his style is 
 laboured, often very obscure, full of strange phrases, 
 arising, Niebuhr says, from an affectation of anti- 
 quity which belonged to his time 1 and country, it is 
 always forcible and imposing. More is to be learnt 
 from his books than, perhaps, from those of any other 
 Father, about the practices of the early Church ; there 
 are no books that contain so many hints and antici- 
 pations of opinions and practices which were to be 
 developed in after times. 
 
 I have told you some of Tertullian's intellectual His moral 
 merits ; I am sure he had also great moral virtues. 
 He was thoroughly earnest in his belief. People 
 speak of his African vehemence ; but if God calls 
 a man into existence in a particular country, He 
 
 1 The strangeness of his style has been attributed by some ingenious 
 writers to the pressure of Christian ideas, under which the classical 
 Latin gave way. But I have yet to discover that Minucius Eelix, 
 Cyprian, Lactantius, Augustin, who did not adopt his extraordinary 
 phraseology, who could write ordinary and intelligible Latin of the 
 iron age, were less possessed with Christian ideas than he was. Any 
 one who will be at the pains to look into any " Clavis TertuUiana," 
 {e.g. the one which is affixed to Semler's edition,) may judge for himself 
 how many of his difficult and uncouth forms of expression have any- 
 thing to do with the special doctrines of the Gospel. I do not say — it 
 is hard to say in any case — how far they were genuine representations of 
 the mind of the man; how far they were merely fantastic; but I do 
 contend that Christianity is not in the least responsible for them, except 
 that he desired to make it technical, and to separate it from the common 
 sympathies. 
 
274 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.v. means him surely to have the qualities of that 
 country, not of some other. Vehemence is not an evil 
 thing in itself, but a good. It has its temptations, as 
 the opposite habit of feeling has, but I do not know 
 that the temptations are greater ; at all events, they 
 can be resisted, and the hot blood may glorify God 
 and be serviceable to mankind as much as the cold. 
 We may hope that Tertullian was aware of the dan- 
 gers to which his peculiar character made him liable ; 
 nobody, certainly, was more alive to the dangers which 
 assaulted himself and his countrymen from without; 
 no one was more eager for plans of discipline to ward 
 His temper, them off. If he does not seem to have been always 
 equally on his guard against the internal provocations 
 to anger and bitterness, we are not judges what his 
 conflicts with himself may have been. We have no 
 right to suppose that he imposed a less strict rule upon 
 himself than upon his brethren ; and, therefore, as he 
 dwelt continually on the necessity of penitence for 
 them, we may assume that it followed his own falls. 
 Tertullian I confess that I find less fault with the passionate 
 the Lawyer. tem p er w ] a j c } 1 Tertullian is supposed to have derived 
 from his country, than with the skill in supporting 
 a cause, which he owed to his Roman education. 
 A man who is betrayed into hard words against an 
 opponent may be ashamed of himself, and may make 
 amends by greater generosity afterwards; but Ter- 
 tullian is systematically hard and overbearing with 
 those he is attacking. To use our English expression, 
 he feels that he is retained against them, and that he 
 should be unjust to his client if he did not exhibit 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 275 
 
 the opposite side in the worst possible light. You will lect. v. 
 
 say, perhaps, that his client was Christianity, and that 
 
 a man might be well afraid of betraying such a cause. 
 
 I fully believe that that was Tertullian's feeling : let 
 
 him have all the benefit of the admission. But it 
 
 seems to me an utterly wrong feeling. Think of a TertvMan 
 
 .... , , . the patron 
 
 poor earth-born man taking Christianity under ins f C h 
 
 tns- 
 
 patronage. It was precisely the mistake of the Cartha- Hamt ^ 
 ginian to do this, as it has been the mistake of thou- 
 sands of others. They have thought that the Gospel 
 was their cause, which they had to manage, to defend 
 by their wit and chicanery. The truth was not some- 
 thing above them to be adored, sought after, lived for, 
 died for ; it was something which they had grasped 
 and comprehended, which was precious because it 
 belonged to them, and which they were to defend 
 against all invaders by fair means or foul. 
 
 In the ordinary accounts which are given of Ter- Ordinary 
 
 Cl'lVlSl-OTl Of 
 
 tullian and of his works, especially by writers of the TertvUiard 
 Romish communion, you will find a line drawn be- Jj^JJ*! 
 tween two periods of his life. "No one," it is said, 
 " was so strictly orthodox and catholic for a long term 
 of years; afterwards he conceived a disgust for the 
 Romish Bishop Victor, partly from his supposed en- 
 couragement of Praxeas ; then he threw himself vehe- 
 mently into Montanism, acknowledged Montanus as the 
 Paraclete, and used the same terms which he used in 
 denouncing the great body of the Church." No doubt 
 there are books of Tertullian's which seem to be clear 
 from all taint of the doctrine which he subsequently 
 adopted ; no doubt there are others which distinctly 
 
 t 2 
 
276 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. avow it. But the task of arranging his books in 
 Difficulty reference to this change has been a difficult one, 
 
 of the , 
 
 arrange- and to some who have engaged m it must have 
 been a very painful one; for the works which they 
 would most like to claim as maintaining the true 
 faith, and as confuting heretics, were confessedly 
 written after the time in which he became a heretic 
 
 See Du himself. To this class, for instance, Du Pin, a most 
 
 P% ^x vol 1 
 
 Art'.Tertid- reasonable critic, himself a Romanist, refers the book 
 han. tt q u t j ie p reS criptions of Heretics," which is often 
 
 quoted as containing the most perfect and satisfactory 
 rule for distinguishing false opinions from the true. 
 Five long books against Marcion, one against Her- 
 mogenes, one against Praxeas, one against the Jews, 
 one on the Soul, one on the Resurrection of the Flesh, 
 one on the Flesh of Jesus Christ, are placed by this 
 equitable judge in the same list. Others on Modesty, 
 on Fasts, on Flight in Persecution, were written 
 expressly for the Montanists, and in opposition to the 
 great body of the Church. There remain a book on 
 Baptism, on Prayer, on Penitence, his Apology for 
 the Christian Religion, some books on Patience, which 
 are supposed to belong to the first stage of his life, 
 and a few others which fall into a transition period 
 between his Orthodoxy and his Montanism. 
 The wife of Another difficulty has troubled some of Tertullian's 
 
 Tertullian. . . . . 1 .,.„ m , 
 
 critics, connected with his domestic lite. There are 
 Books Ad two books addressed to his wife ; the object of them is 
 
 Uxorem. 1 . 
 
 to persuade her to remain single alter his death, — 
 not, he solemnly assures her, because he has any 
 jealousy of her falling into the hands of another man, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 277 
 
 but because he is thoroughly convinced that she lect. v. 
 would lose in spiritual life by again entering into 
 wedlock. It is quite clear from the whole tenor 
 of the book, that Tertullian undervalued marriage, 
 looking upon it as a necessity for many men, but 
 as involving the sacrifice of a nobler moral condition 
 which might be attained. He comments in the 
 usual style upon the seventh chapter of the First 
 Epistle to the Corinthians, and, like a judicious advo- 
 cate, does not touch at all upon the Epistle to the 
 Ephesians. These books would have been, therefore, 
 very acceptable to those who exclude the priesthood 
 from marriage, if they did not suggest the question, 
 how Tertullian himself came to be married. Jerome The mar- 
 affirms that he was a priest ; Tertullian's authority as p^. ° 
 a Church Doctor would be diminished if he was 
 not one. But if he was a presbyter when he wrote 
 this treatise, presbyters must at that time have been 
 permitted to have wives. I state the case nearly as 
 it is put by Du Pin. On the general subject I may 
 have to speak by-and-by ; I am interested in it 
 now only as it illustrates the life and thoughts of 
 Tertullian. 
 
 The tone of feeling which comes out in these two TertMian, 
 books was characteristic of all which Tertullian wrote ,£V.. e 
 on similar subjects. Some persons must read these Muikrum, 
 
 J L . DePudi- 
 
 books ; they are necessary to our understanding of titia, ,t-c. 
 the growth of opinions in the Church — necessary to 
 the interpretation of many of its greatest puzzles and 
 conflicts. But I dare not say that they are purifying 
 or elevating books ; I dare not say that they give me 
 
278 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. a gratifying impression of the mind of the man who 
 
 wrote them. That he was a religious man I do not 
 
 doubt, one who aimed at the cultivation of a high 
 
 religious sentiment; but if by a religious sentiment 
 
 is meant a sentiment in accordance with the mind 
 
 and spirit of either the Old or the New Testament, 
 
 we must look for it elsewhere than here. 
 
 Booh Be The book to which I have alluded, " On the Pre- 
 
 tioniblT scriptions of Heretics," explains the statement of 
 
 Hmretko- Eusebius respecting Tertullian, and shows how much 
 
 rum. . 
 
 his mind was cast in a legal mould. According to 
 the Roman law, which we have imitated in our 
 English law, a man whom an adverse claimant sought 
 to disturb in the possession of his property, might 
 plead that he had had possession of it for a given 
 number of years. This was his prescription, which made 
 it unnecessary that he should establish his original title 
 to it by any further evidence. What a satisfactory 
 method this would be, thought Tertullian, to use 
 against those who would disturb us in our spiritual 
 AppUca- possessions ! Why need we trouble ourselves to prove, 
 by arguments from Scripture, our title to them ? Why 
 cannot we turn round and say, " We have held these 
 doctrines without dispute since the time of the 
 Apostles : what business have you to pretend that 
 any others can be truer than they?" There was a 
 wonderful charm in this thought to a person of 
 Tertullian's disposition. He was delighted to seize 
 a maxim with which he had been familiar ; he was 
 delighted with his own ingenuity in bringing it to 
 bear on a new subject ; and he was delighted, because 
 
 Hon. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 
 
 279 
 
 he looked upon the Christian faith very much as a lect.v. 
 property of his, which he was to maintain against 
 those who would intrude upon it. If another Roman Objections 
 lawyer had been allowed to speak, he might have method 
 said, " But, after all, do you find it easier to prove f rom di -' 
 
 ferent 
 
 this uninterrupted possession, than to defend the title quarters. 
 itself? Is there no difficulty in bringing evidence 
 on that point as well as on the other ? May not the 
 difficulty be increased for your successors ? " A hea- 
 then disputant might have said, " If you rest all 
 upon prescription, cannot we plead a prescription for 
 our idolatries ? And if you say that your prescrip- 
 tion starts from Apostles, must not you explain how 
 these Apostles acquired their original right ? and does 
 not that involve the very necessity you seek to get 
 rid of?" Christian objectors did actually say, "Our Ashing not 
 Lord commanded us to ask that we might receive, to a^Z ° 
 seek that we might find, to knock that it might be have - 
 opened." Whatever answer Tertullian had ready for 
 the other objectors, these he could silence with a dash- 
 ing, peremptory interpretation of our Lord's words. 
 Asking, seeking, and knocking, are very well for those 
 to whom the truth has not been made known ; to us 
 it has been made known ; therefore, for us such acts 
 are unnecessary. I find it hard to stifle my indig- 
 nation at such trifling with the Divine precept. And 
 yet this treatise, the leading maxim of which coidd 
 not be sustained, as its clever author knew, without 
 that outrage, has been a text-book among those who 
 reverence the words of their Divine Master ! 
 
 I have told you that the man who had this receipt 
 
280 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTOilY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 Books 
 
 against 
 
 Marcion. 
 
 Specimens 
 of theolo- 
 gical 
 ribaldry. 
 
 Profane- 
 ness of 
 such lan- 
 guage. 
 
 for extinguishing heretics was himself a heretic at the 
 time he composed it. But if he Avas so, he could 
 make up for his own departures from the faith of 
 the Church at large by the most unscrupulous lan- 
 guage respecting all others. He begins his treatise 
 against Marcion with a description of the inhospitable 
 character of the Pontus Euxinus near which he dwelt, 
 and the ferocity of those who inhabited its coasts. 
 " But," he goes on, " nothing in Pontus is so bar- 
 barous and dark as this, that it is the birth-place of 
 Marcion, who is wilder than the Scythian, more 
 unstable than the Hamaxobian, more inhuman than 
 the Massagetse, more audacious than the Amazon, 
 darker than the clouds, colder than the winter, more 
 fragile than the ice, more deceitful than the Danube, 
 more precipitous than the Caucasus." Having named 
 the Caucasus, he goes on to compare him with Pro- 
 metheus, and then with different animals, especially 
 with the mice of that region. 
 
 I have said that I did not complain of the passion 
 into which Tertnllian is sometimes betrayed ; but 
 this is not passion at all, — it is the vulgar vitu- 
 peration of a professional advocate. However little 
 he might have cared to spare Marcion, a man who 
 had a real sense of the awful question that was in- 
 volved in the dispute between them would not have 
 indulged in this frantic abuse. The very issue upon 
 which Tertullian puts it, whether there were two 
 Gods, or one living and true God, would have taught 
 him the impertinence and profaneness of such an in- 
 troduction to so grave and dreadful a controversy. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. OQ1 
 
 New heretics, however, were not more scorned lect. v. 
 and hated by Tertullian than old philosophers. Be- Ms treat- 
 cause the heretics had borrowed from the philoso- p^^. 
 pliers, he thought the first step to extinguish the one phers - 
 
 1 ' & x & Book De 
 
 was to destroy the reputation of the other. In his Animd, c. 
 Prescriptions, he pours forth his rich vocabulary of 
 vituperation upon Aristotle ; his treatise On the Soul 
 is introduced by sneers at the prison discourse of 
 Socrates on immortality. His insinuations against 
 the man are heartless and mean ; but it is far 
 worse when he proceeds to deal with the question 
 itself, which Socrates so solemnly and earnestly 
 brought before his disciples. Tertullian avers broadly, 
 that since nothing coidd be known on such a 
 subject but what it pleased God to reveal, it was 
 wrong to think about the matter, and that Socrates Socrates, 
 was, in fact, more devil -inspired than ordinary " °yi/ 
 heathens. 1 There is no other sense to be put upon Uan - 
 his words than this ; and they may well make us 
 inquire by what process a man could have worked 
 himself into a conviction, which startles and outrages 
 the conscience of every one who hears it. The process 
 
 1 De Anima, c. 1. Adeo omnis ilia tunc sapientia Socratis de industria 
 venerat consultse sequanimitatis, non de fiducia compertse veritatis. Cui 
 enim Veritas comperta sine Deo ? cui Deus cognitus sine Christo ? cui 
 Christus exploratus sine Spirit u Sancto ? cui Spiritus Sanctus accom- 
 modatus sine fidei sacramento? Sane Socrates facilius diverso spiritu 
 agebatur. Si quidem aiunt dsemoniuni illi a puero adhsesisse, pessimuni 
 revera pagdogogum, etsi post deos et cum diis dsemonia deputantur per 
 philosophos et poetas. Nondum enim Christiana? potestatis documenta 
 processerant quse vim istam perniciosissimam, nee unquam bonam, antiqui 
 erroris artificem, omnis veritatis avocatricem, sola traducit. Quod si 
 idcirco sapientissimus Socrates secundum Pythii quoque daemonis suf- 
 fragium scilicet negotium navantis socio suo, &c. 
 
282 °K CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. v. is this : Tertullian believed that he had been taught 
 
 Tcrtuiiian'a a religion which he was to maintain against all other 
 re igion religions. It was good for nothing in his eyes, unless 
 he conld show that it set aside all that honest men 
 had been thinking of, and feeling after, before it was 
 proclaimed. That was the proof that it came from 
 God ; that was the only comfortable evidence Tertul- 
 lian could have, that the inheritance which had been 
 left him was safe against invaders. I believe that 
 his doctrine was far more fatal to that which he 
 defended than to that which he opposed ; nay, that 
 it has been the doctrine which, more than any other, 
 has hid the glory of Christ's Gospel from men, 
 and has been the cause of its becoming blended with 
 the heathenism from which Tertullian professed to 
 separate it. 
 His flattery There is a part of this passage, at the opening of 
 the treatise On the Soul, which is very characteristic 
 of Tertullian, and is, I think, intensely mischievous. 
 In order to throw contempt upon Socrates, he con- 
 trasts his prison scene, and his drinking the hemlock, 
 with the constancy of the Christian martyrs, who 
 " did not bring in new demons, but drove out old 
 ones ; who did not corrupt the minds of the youth, 
 but informed them with all modesty ; who did not 
 sustain the unjust sentence of one city, but of the 
 whole world, for the sake of a truth more hateful 
 because more full ; who did not swallow the cup 
 with a sort of luxurious enjoyment, but endured to 
 be burnt alive," &c. : a sentence exhibiting all the 
 cleverness of Tertullian, but, it seems to me, most 
 
 of Chris 
 tians. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 
 
 283 
 
 immoral, most corrupting to the minds of Christians, lect. v. 
 because inflating them with a sense of their own 
 superiority, teaching them to regard themselves as 
 righteous, and to despise others. 
 
 And this is to me so much the effect of nearly all Effects 
 
 of h is 
 writings. 
 
 Tertullian's ingenious arguments and splendid oratory, ° 
 
 that I often feel tempted to wish they had been used 
 against the Gospel ; I think then I could have done 
 them greater justice. But that is a wrong desire; 
 they would not be such warnings to us as they are, if 
 we will use them aright, of the dangers into which 
 Christians may fall — they would not be such pro- 
 phecies of the evils into which the Church has 
 fallen, if they had been turned in a different direc- 
 tion. What I do most fervently beseech of you, 
 what I would ask of God for you, is that you may 
 be preserved from admiration of that kind of wit and 
 intellectual power, which does not humble itself to 
 be the servant and soldier of the Gospel, for the 
 glory of God and the good of mankind, but assumes 
 to be the champion and protector of the Gospel, and 
 so turns it to the denial of God's goodness and truth, 
 and to the injury of those for whom Christ died. If 
 I thought less of Tertullian's gifts than I do ; if I 
 did not see from the history of the Church how much 
 power he had exercised over it ; if all that seems to 
 me most wrong and dangerous in him, was not ex- 
 tremely likely to recommend itself as right and safe, 
 I should speak less strongly. As it is, I must think 
 that no man has lived in the Church whom God 
 
284 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 Tertullian 
 the Apo- 
 logist. 
 
 Booh De 
 Velandis 
 Viryinibus. 
 
 intends less as an example, and more as a beacon, to 
 the members of it. 
 
 Tertullian's Apology is far from being his most 
 important work, yet it has become more associated 
 than any other with his name. And this is not 
 wonderful. Tertullian may almost be called the 
 Apologist ; every book he has written is an Apology. 
 He would not have liked to be told so, for the word 
 suggests philosophy and Socrates ; but it was the 
 misfortune and retribution of his habit of mind, that 
 he was compelled to imitate those whom he trampled 
 upon ; to entangle himself in subtle reasoning while 
 he denounced reasoning ; to be superstitious while he 
 raved against superstition ; to fall into heresy while 
 he could speak of nothing but destruction to heretics. 
 There are passages in his books, worthy to be 
 remembered and written in one's heart, in which he 
 draws the most beautiful distinctions ; others where 
 he seems in love with what is natural and simple ; 
 presently you find the distinctions have entrapped you 
 into propositions utterly subversive of the premises 
 from which they are deduced, that the admiration 
 of simplicity obliges you to some most artificial 
 conceit. His treatise On the Veiling of Virgins (you 
 must not suppose that it has anything to do with 
 nuns and convents, of which this age knew nothing ; 
 it only treats about the proper dress of unmarried 
 women) opens with a noble contrast between Truth 
 and Custom, one which was often quoted in the 
 ecclesiastical discussions of the middle ages, and 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 9 cx 
 
 cannot be dwelt upon too much by any of us. But l^ct. v. 
 this very contrast is the plea for erecting a certain 
 practice, which was probably desirable in Africa at 
 that time, into a principle; for though there are 
 passages in the treatise which seem to allow the 
 liberty of Churches to judge what is best for them- 
 selves in such cases, the whole effect of it is to 
 make an external rule part of the moral and spiritual 
 code. The treatise On Baptism begins with a vindi- Booh Be 
 cation, just and eloquent, of the ordinance, as an ai ' li " w ' 
 illustration of the simplicity of God's operations, 
 and with a complaint, well founded though surlily 
 expressed, of those who despise it for that reason. 
 But he straightway enters into a series of refined 
 speculations about the nature, and properties, and uses 
 of water; some of them reasonable and suggestive, 
 all of them ingenious ; but surely most inapplicable, 
 when the object was to set forth the character of a 
 sacrament, which was to be received by the poor and 
 ignorant no less than the wise, as a testimony of what 
 .God was, and of what He had done for them. Even 
 when Tertullian appeals, as he does in the book On Book Be 
 the Testimony of the Soul, to the witness which men ^im^ U ° 
 bear for God, and against their own idolatrous notions 
 of Him, by their common, unconscious language, — a 
 fertile and most interesting subject, and one upon 
 which the writer entered with good- will, because it 
 enabled him to throw out an insinuation against some 
 of his brethren who had appealed to the wisdom of 
 heathen sages, when they ought to have appealed to 
 the sense of mankind, — even then you see how much 
 
2S6 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. V. 
 
 Neander. 
 The Anti- 
 
 Gnosticus. 
 
 the practised rhetorician is mixing his own skilful and 
 far-fetched fancies with the plain popular convictions 
 which were most alien from them. 
 
 A very eminent historian and thinker of our day, 
 dissatisfied with the ordinary attempts to divide Ter- 
 tullian into two men, — the adherent to the Church, 
 and the adherent to Montanism, — perceiving that he 
 is essentially the same person in both his periods, 
 has endeavoured to explain the end and upshot of 
 his whole life by calling him " The Anti- Gnostic." 
 No doubt a horror of Gnosticism was a prominent 
 characteristic in the mind of this distinguished 
 African. If the offence which was given him 
 respecting Praxeas was the immediate occasion of his 
 aversion to Montanism, the secret cause of it may 
 have been a feeling that the Montanists were more 
 opposed to all the Alexandrian speculators, and 
 offered a better protection against them, than the 
 Church at large. But one requires to understand 
 upon what ground he adopted that opinion, and why 
 a Phrygian theory should have been so much more, 
 palatable to him than an Egyptian one. Much, I think, 
 Montanism may be attributed to the discontent and impatience 
 place for m ^o which a man falls who regards Christianity as 
 a restless j j iave ^j^ y 0U ^^ Tertulliaii did. The spirit 
 
 man. * L 
 
 requires something to rest in, which is not what 
 it is always defending and protecting; that which 
 it claims as a property does not offer it a home. 
 In hours of weariness it will cry out for something 
 new to be given it ; it will embrace the new thing 
 all the more readily, if it comes without any pomp of 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 287 
 
 argument and demonstration. It will bow down lect. v. 
 to a teacher who claims divine inspiration, that it 
 may be delivered from the burden of its own dreary 
 subtleties — that it may throw off, if possible, its own it was a 
 intellectual haughtiness. At whose feet the oblation jfUJ""* * 
 is made, signifies comparatively little. intellect. 
 
 I think, too, that while Tertullian was always it held out 
 speaking of spiritual things and a spiritual world, he the hope of 
 must have been conscious that the Spirit which our spiritual 
 Lord promised — the Spirit which was to unite, the mind. 
 Spirit of meekness and charity, and which was to 
 guide into all truth — had not yet received his entire 
 homage, had not subdued his strong passions to itself, 
 or driven out the proud demon of self. If he could 
 obtain this blessing by a voluntary abdication of his 
 own judgment, — by laying himself low before some 
 outward Paraclete, — he might hope that the One 
 whom he could not see would reign more triumph- 
 antly in his heart. 
 
 Some of the passages which I have quoted from his This biess- 
 writings, after he became a Montanist, do not afford Zlti^not 
 much ground for thinking that the expectation was ful- attained - 
 filled. At all events they are not less presumptuous — 
 they do not show less reliance upon his own powers — 
 than his earlier writings. He had only found a larger 
 field for censure, — more men whom he could denounce 
 as earthly and sensual. Montanism, however, could 
 still afford him consolation, such as it was. It was not Tertullian 
 merely an escape from the Gnostical speculations ; it fX?™"/ 
 was a new religion. This was what Tertullian had hisovm. , 
 all along craved for. He did not really want a 
 
288 
 
 ON CHUTtCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. v. Church— a great divine and human fellowship — in 
 which he was one member ; he wished for a religion 
 well-compacted, severe, exclusive, according to which 
 he might shape his life, which he might support 
 against all who rejected it, which might separate him 
 from the mass of mankind. His biography, so far as 
 we know it, is the great test and experiment whether 
 this is really the one thing needful, — the good thing 
 which God has prepared for those that love Him. I 
 believe and trust that there is another part of that 
 XcTo/ Us biography which we do not know : if the veil were 
 struggles withdrawn from that, we should find that the great 
 
 and disap- _ ° 
 
 pointments. Apologist became once more the little child, content 
 to give up himself, and to be one of that family in 
 heaven and earth which is named with the name of 
 Christ, not of Montanus or of Tertullian. 
 
 Humility 
 may have 
 been the 
 ultimate 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE GODS. 
 
 I have now finished what I had to tell you about lect. vi. 
 the separate Churches. I must try to bring before you Tht Church 
 
 • /-n l ir considered 
 
 something like a picture of the whole Chinch. Much as a whole. 
 of what I say will be grounded upon what you have 
 already heard about particular places and particular 
 men : some facts must be added which could not 
 be brought under any of the previous heads. My 
 main business will be — what I announced before — to 
 show you how the Church fulfilled the calling which 
 she had received from God ; how far she failed of 
 fulfilling. 
 
 We talk familiarly, in an off-hand way, of the 
 Church and the world. Oftentimes we attach to the 
 world the notion of a society which is pursuing secu- 
 lar objects and neglecting religion ; we think of the 
 Church, as a society which is despised for being too 
 religious — because it cares chiefly for divine exer- 
 cises — because it exaggerates the sacredness of 
 public services — because it cultivates in its inte- 
 rior circle a transcendent morality and purity. If 
 you apply these maxims to the second century, 
 you will make a very great mistake indeed. The 
 people in Antioch and Alexandria were sensual and 
 
290 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vi. corrupt enough • they pursued secular objects, money 
 
 Not an ir- and pleasure, as men do here — more systematically, 
 
 world. perhaps, with far fewer restraints of opinion — but 
 
 they were not irreligious. Religion formed one of 
 
 their regular formal occupations ; it entered into 
 
 all their occupations ; it was connected with most 
 
 of their amusements ; it blended with every part of 
 
 TJiereii- their local polity. Each city had its own pecu- 
 
 parlkuiar nar g°ds, priests, sacrifices, festivals, which it had 
 
 places. inherited from former days, and to which it clung as 
 
 its most proper and native characteristic; the sign 
 
 that it was a city of the past, though its civil freedom 
 
 was gone, and though it was merged in the great 
 
 The religion empire. Then every part of the imperial system 
 
 Empire. was religious. The Jupiter of the Capitol was still 
 
 acknowledged as the power which held the state 
 
 together. The Pantheon, with him as its centre, was 
 
 capable of a continual expansion ; it did actually 
 
 expand to meet every new emergency, to take in each 
 
 new form of worship that had prevailed in any of the 
 
 Soman conquered tribes. But the Roman gods still retained 
 
 Ipecificaiiy, their own ascendency ; they were incorporated into the 
 
 history of the land. The institution of their priests — 
 
 the reasons for the sacrifices that were offered to 
 
 National, them — formed a principal element in the narratives 
 
 which reminded the people of their greatness, and 
 
 in what way their forefathers achieved it. The 
 
 life of the particular families which composed the 
 
 state, and whose deeds had made it illustrious, 
 
 were associated with traditions of the gods; the 
 
 images of the great men, which their descendants 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 291 
 
 preserved and contemplated, could not be separated Lect. vi. 
 from the images of the household deities. The more Domestic. 
 you read, the more you will perceive how auguries, 
 divinations, and sacrifices, were worked into the 
 whole tissue of social life at that time. It is true 
 that the faith of the people at large had grown 
 weaker; they were not the least sure whether the 
 gods heard them, or even whether there were gods 
 to hear. But they did not forego their devotions Not checked 
 for this scepticism. Their actual sorrows, individual JJT^ 
 and political, were not less than they had been ; the 
 stings of conscience were not less. Something must 
 be done to obtain comfort and relief, even if it was 
 done in desperation. It was judicious therefore, they 
 thought, as well as natural, to adhere to the old rites. 
 They were performed more in fear than before, more 
 to avert the anger of evil powers ; but they were 
 performed. And if the nature of other powers that 
 were worshipped was uncertain, the power of the 
 emperor was indisputable. The gods had assuredly The impe- 
 delegated their authority to him ; his name must be r ™ reh ~ 
 sworn by ; to his image must sacrifices, with all fear 
 and observance, be presented ; not to do so was to 
 violate the duty of a citizen, which in this, as in 
 all things else, was dependent upon religion, and 
 coidd in no way be disengaged from it. 
 
 Nor must you forget the fact to which I have so Thereiigion 
 often alluded, that besides the vast religious machinery banters 
 of the Roman world, there were flying about in all 
 directions men who made light of mere machinery, 
 and appealed to the sense in our hearts of hidden 
 
 u 2 
 
292 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vi. powers, which may act upon us suddenly for good 
 What they or for mischief, which may affect our soids or our 
 
 professed to ^.^ ^.^ ^ ^^ ^^ Qr ^^ ^ ^ 
 
 sickness, which may give us marvellous intimations 
 of terrible or fortunate events that have befallen or 
 are to befal individuals or states. If you leave the 
 enchanters, auguries, prophets, of Jewish or heathen 
 origin, out of your calculation, when you are trying 
 to understand the world of the second century, you 
 
 Their free- will have a very imperfect conception of it. These 
 
 tuL fV0 ' n men had all the influence which those possess in all 
 
 ages who are supposed not to be bound by the rules 
 
 and terms of an organized community — to have a 
 
 secret illumination and divine afflatus; and yet, on 
 
 Yet not the other hand, there was a method in all their 
 
 r2»r madness. Many of them possessed real knowledge ; 
 they addressed themselves to undoubted instincts, 
 fears, hopes, in their fellow-creatures; and having 
 shaken off to a great extent the sense of moral obli- 
 gation, they could turn these to account fearlessly. 
 The speculators and gold-seekers of the age had long 
 discovered that inspirations might be made a regular 
 and profitable branch of trade. 
 
 The church And if this was the world, what was the Church ? 
 
 AtMst^ In tne e ) es of tneir heathen neighbours, its members 
 were an utterly godless race. The name which the 
 people of Smyrna gave them, when they called for 
 vengeance on Polycarp, was the name they bore every- 
 where. They were the Atheists. A people without 
 images, who frequented no temples, who offered no 
 sacrifices — what could it mean? Yet a people who 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 293 
 
 evidently had a fellowship — a strong, close organiza- Lect. vi. 
 tion — who were. intimately bound together with each 
 other in each city, who held evidently some strange 
 bond of intimacy with those in distant cities ! What 
 could go on in those private meetings of theirs? 
 It was impossible that they should not have some 
 sacrifices. Words had been heard from them which 
 seemed to signify that they thought much of sacri- 
 fice — nay, of a human sacrifice. Horrors, no doubt, Suspected of 
 
 ,i • i fearful 
 
 not to be spoken of, were enacted m their late crimes . 
 and early assemblies. Some affirmed that they de- 
 voured human victims. What a small step was it 
 from that charge, to suppose that those victims were 
 their own children ! Intelligent men, like Trypho, 
 might not attach much weight to these reports; 
 men with great opportunities of information, like 
 Pliny, might almost know that they were groundless. 
 But Trypho was as much scandalized as any one wiujTi W ho 
 could be, by what seemed to be the Christians' neglect t ^ mc 
 of all the ceremonies, which, if they believed the 
 Jewish Scriptures, they ought to practise. However 
 harmless the meetings before sunrise might be, which 
 Pliny heard of from the tortured servants, the " super- my Ptiny 
 stition," nevertheless, seemed to him exitiabilis ; for thmim 
 it was secret — it had the signs of a conspiracy— it was 
 like no other; it undermined the religion of the 
 empire. However paltry might be its exercises, or its 
 apparent instruments, it had a power which could 
 not be overlooked, which was affecting all classes and 
 conditions of Trajan's subjects. 
 
 How was this power put forth ? How did it make 
 
294 °N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vi. itself felt ? I can only answer the question by 
 Power of referring to the name into which those who seemed 
 
 the Church. . -i-nii- 
 
 Atheists to the Polytheists of the world around them 
 The name were baptized. Their baptism declared that they 
 confessed a Father. The name was no new one to 
 the population in the midst of which they were 
 dwelling. It was familiar to Greeks. Homer had 
 spoken continually of the Father of gods and men. 
 Romans, who had adopted Greek poetry and mytho- 
 logy, had yet deeper associations with the name than 
 they had. It was connected with their domestic 
 hearth, with a multitude of old thoughts, — sadly 
 worn out, but never lost, — of which that hearth had 
 Appeal to been the centre ; with the polity which had been 
 BxmaT based on the reverence for fathers. Think of such 
 convictions, words as these ringing in the ears of Greeks and 
 Form of the Romans : " The Father of all has spoken to us. His 
 
 Proclama- . . 
 
 Hon. name is not a mere name. lie has emancipated us 
 
 from our slavery to visible things; He has actually 
 claimed and adopted us as His children." Think, 
 I say, of such words uttered in the ears of men who 
 were crushed under a weight of religious rites and 
 observances, who felt they had no hold on any living 
 being in heaven or earth, or under the earth, yet 
 who felt that there was some God, to whom all other 
 gods owed obedience, and before whom men were 
 to tremble. But, then, add that these were not mere 
 words — that all the language and institutions of those 
 who spoke them had this name of Father at their 
 basis — and you will understand something of the 
 charm with which they worked. If you ask me how 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 295 
 
 they made their point good — how they proved to Lect. vi. 
 people that they had a right to call themselves chil- The ar v^- 
 
 7H,€7ttS of 
 
 dren of God — I can give you a very poor answer, and the Ch-is- 
 I am not sure that theirs woidd have been much tw f sd%d 
 
 not help 
 
 better. Their attempts at proofs and evidences were them ■*»•«*> 
 very numerous, sometimes very ingenious ; they 
 could fetch them from Scripture and from nature, 
 from types and from plain history. There were 
 precious grains of wheat in their arguments, but 
 I am forced to express my conviction that there was 
 also much chaff; and I feel confident that it was 
 not the best arguments or the worst which in- 
 fluenced the hearts of heathens or of Jews. It was 
 the Gospel — " There is such a Father for you," 
 speaking to those who had need of one, and were 
 craving for one — which was immeasurably mightier 
 than all the authorities by which it was supported, 
 and which imparted its own momentum to those 
 that had least force of their own. Those argued best 
 who were most conscious of this truth ; those who 
 could not argue at all, broke down strong-holds more 
 effectually by their lives and their deaths. 
 
 Here, then, was the first great engine that under- Why could 
 mined that vast polytheistic world which I have con teMwith 
 described to you. The Jews, who protested against P™ achm 9 
 the Christians as deserters to a Nazarene impostor, theism? 
 asked why they could not stop here ? Was not the 
 declaration of a One God the all-sufficient protest 
 against many gods ? If that was all that the Church 
 had said, no doubt it had merely repeated what the 
 synagogue had been saying for so long, and saying 
 
296 °N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vi. not altogether in vain — for its testimony had been 
 one of the great powers which had shaken the faith 
 of heathenism, — but certainly without establishing a 
 faith, or effecting any great moral change in the 
 condition of the world. To speak of a Father was 
 not the same thing as to speak of a One God; 
 heathens as much as Christians felt that it was not. 
 The difference is the turning point of the most 
 perplexing questions of the second century. To 
 understand those questions, you must fix your minds 
 resolutely upon it — still more, to understand the effect 
 
 TheCrcator. which the Church actually produced. The simplest 
 and bravest men lifted up their voices to proclaim a 
 Creator of heaven and earth. Only so far as they 
 made that proclamation, could they rescue men from 
 the worship of things in heaven and earth. When 
 they made it thoroughly and boldly, they were able 
 to look upon nature with clear and joyful eyes ; to 
 speak of its peace and harmony as the Roman Cle- 
 mens does in that extract I read to you, — an extract 
 which is a specimen of a number of passages that 
 
 Admira- occur in the writers of this century. Their eyes 
 
 Mature. were often opened to see a beauty and order in the 
 world, which had been hidden even from the most 
 graceful and accomplished thinkers of the old time. 
 But this illumination came from their belief: " Oar 
 Father is the Creator of heaven and earth. We are 
 not a part of these things which we look upon ; we 
 are above them. We belong to another economy; 
 we are citizens of His kingdom, members of His 
 family." 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 297 
 
 And, therefore, it was inevitable that the Church Lect. vi. 
 should utter the second Name in its baptismal formula, The Son or 
 if there was to be any meaning and power in the first. 
 Was it enough for them to say, " We have a Father, 
 for a great Prophet and Teacher has come down from 
 heaven to teach us ?" By speaking thus, would they 
 have broken the chains which bound the necks of the 
 heathens around them? would they have brought 
 about any fellowship among those who were divided 
 by places and traditions ? The people about them Damons, 
 believed in a multitude of daemons, demigods, sons ^ eran J ods > 
 
 o ' bons of 
 
 of the gods — beings who connected together earth Gods > vij " 
 and heaven — rulers of cities, who were also rulers Powers. 
 of sun, or of moon, or of stars. They believed in 
 intellectual powers and moral virtues, as well as in 
 powers of darkness and evil, which they clothed with 
 forms. What teacher or prophet could rise above all 
 this complicated machinery? what exchange would 
 he have been for all these messengers and medi- 
 ators ? The thought of them was a burden upon the 
 spirit; they were masses of clouds which darkened 
 the heaven, and hid the face of God ; but they had 
 grown up out of the wants of the human heart, and 
 however feeble, and unsatisfactory, and burdensome 
 they were, the heart must cling to them till it found 
 a substitute for them. When the members of the The only 
 Church spoke of an only-begotten Son of God — of a s ! lbst f ltu,te 
 living Word, who was the Lord of men's spirits and 
 the Lord of angels, in whom the mind and will of the 
 Father uttered itself to His creatures, in whom He 
 acknowledged them as His children — this substitute 
 
298 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 century. 
 
 lect. vr. was provided. This news shook not earth only, but 
 " also heaven. It did not encounter one of the popular 
 schemes of worship, but all of them. It encountered 
 them, not by taking away anything from the heart on 
 which it had rested, but by showing it what it had 
 to rest upon; how it had been seeking at a dis- 
 tance for that which was at home ; how it had been 
 building castles and prisons from fragments of the 
 Rock upon which God had built His universe. 
 The second But how was this Divine Son, this eternal Word, 
 IftiT* 6 connected with the poor, miserable, sinful creatures to 
 whom He was proclaimed ? This, as you have seen, 
 was the second of the great puzzles by which the 
 minds of men in the second century were perplexed. 
 All the great questions and controversies of the time 
 were involved in the question, whether they might 
 really identify this Divine Word with Jesus, the Man 
 of sorrows, who had died upon the cross. We have 
 seen how some of the debates on this subject were 
 conducted; we shall have to return to them again. 
 What I am speaking of now is the power which the 
 Church exercised on the surrounding world ; and this 
 power, I conceive, was greater or smaller in proportion 
 to the strength or weakness with which she asserted 
 the position that the Son of God had actually taken 
 human flesh, and suffered under Pontius Pilate, and 
 been crucified, dead, and buried. Where that message 
 was proclaimed broadly and nakedly, all the schemes 
 by which men had sought to make their way from 
 earth to heaven — to bring the gods into peace and 
 reconciliation with men, to avoid the penalties of evil, 
 
 Jesus of 
 Nazareth, 
 the Word 
 made flesh 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 299 
 
 to escape from the conscience of it — were supplanted Lect. vi. 
 by the one great doctrine and fact, that a recon- 2%e recon- 
 ciliation had been made between God and His crea- accom . 
 tures, that He had made peace with them. The i ' lishe(l 
 condition of humanity was placed upon a new ground, 
 for a Son of man had been revealed. Whatever might 
 have been its condition, He was now declared to be its 
 centre and its root. 
 
 But this testimony of reconciliation, mighty as it 
 was, would have been utterly ineffectual without that 
 one which the Apostles had borne at first, which they 
 were sent forth to bear, which was the characteristically 
 Christian testimony. " Christ is risen !" was the alto- TheRcsur- 
 gether amazing and monstrous proclamation which Christ 
 sounded in the ears of a scoffing, exhausted, lazy 
 generation, — tired of miracles, hopeless of any blessing 
 to themselves or the world, — from an insignificant body 
 who were believed to be Atheists, and to eat the flesh 
 of children. And yet, if the previous message were 
 listened to, this must be received ; not the authority 
 of the teacher, but the conscience of the disciple, 
 demanded that it should. The words of the Apostle, 
 " It is not possible that He should be holden of death," Power of 
 were the natural, necessary sequel to the announce- 
 ment of the living Word, in whom all power dwelt, and 
 yet who had humbled Himself, and submitted to the 
 death of the cross. And so, amidst the multitudes 
 who confessed daemons to be great, and the emperor 
 to be in some sense greater than the daemons, but 
 who positively knew that death was greater than the 
 emperor, and was the tyrant of each of them, there 
 
 this mes- 
 
300 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Tartarus 
 
 and 
 
 Elysium. 
 
 Leot. vi. went forth the actual news of a Conqueror of death, 
 news which, if at first it was incredible, almost 
 ridiculous, yet spoke to hearts that had been craving 
 for it ever since they began to beat, and had an 
 assurance within that it must be true, unless the 
 whole universe was a lie. Their assurance of immor- 
 tality had come to them in a thousand ways before. 
 Every Tartarian and Elysian story bore as authentic 
 tidings of it to the popular mind, as the inquiries 
 of the most serious thinkers did to theirs. But the 
 Church preached not of immortality, but of resur- 
 rection — not of the surviving of some particle of our 
 nature, but of the resurrection of man — not of the 
 resurrection of a man, but of the Son of man, of 
 the Lover of men, of Him who had borne death for 
 man. And yet if these acts done for men — this con- 
 descension to their misery — had been all, the perpetual 
 longing in men to send up their thoughts and prayers 
 to One above them would have been unsatisfied ; the 
 belief in a heaven, which had been the strongest, 
 the most helpful to them of all — with whatever con- 
 fusions it had been mingled, however it had cut them 
 off from their gods — would have been extinguished. 
 He is gone up on high to His Father — He lives to 
 make intercession for us — was the great sequel to the 
 message of resurrection. All who heard it felt that 
 the first part of it would have been unmeaning with- 
 out the second. 
 
 With these thoughts of immortality had been in- 
 separably associated the witness of a separation 
 between the right and the wrong doer ; the dreams 
 
 Ascension, 
 Inter- 
 cession. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 301 
 
 of yEacus and Rhadamanthus ; the dim, hazy vision Lect. vi. 
 of fields in which the blessed wandered ; the vision visions of 
 
 ■..•lip p i Judgment. 
 
 that rose not more distinctly, but tar more frequently 
 and naturally, before the conscious criminal, of a dark 
 river, and groans, and solitude. How utterly ineffec- 
 tual these anticipations were to produce morality, or 
 to check crime, the open atrocities of the Roman 
 world, which the sword of the magistrate, not the 
 terrors of the priests, kept from being utterly de- 
 structive, — not to speak of the stench of its more 
 inward and secret corruptions, may sufficiently attest. 
 The message of resurrection went forth in the se- 
 cond century, as it had done from St. Paul's lips at 
 Athens and before Felix, joined with the message 
 of judgment. The Divine Word, the Lord of the Christ the 
 hearts and reins of men, He who had come into the 
 world to redeem them from their evil, knew what 
 that evil was. He would bring it to light; what- 
 ever was done or spoken in darkness, would come 
 out into the broad day. His voice woidd be heard 
 by the whole creation ; the dead as much as the 
 quick woidd own it. To connect judgment with a 
 Person — with an actual Discerner of thoughts and 
 intents — with a Deliverer, — what a change was this 
 from that old, worn-out apprehension of a world after 
 death, which was so inoperative for morality, but 
 upon which the religious scheme of the empire had 
 by degrees established itself! When this trumpet 
 was blown, the walls of the great Roman Jericho 
 shook more than at almost any other sound. Had it 
 been blown more strongly, they might have fallen 
 
302 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vi. clown at once ; for though such a prophecy of judg- 
 ment was so new, it awakened the oldest and deepest 
 convictions that had been slumbering in the spirits 
 of men. 
 The Holy But the Gospel of a resurrection and of a 
 ' lw judgment would have been unintelligible, — it would 
 
 not have been a Gospel, because it would have come 
 with no pledge of a new and higher life, — if the third 
 name in the Christian covenant had been separated 
 from the other two. You have heard how the news 
 of a Spirit coming down to dwell among men was 
 interwoven with all that our Lord did upon earth, 
 with all that He spoke of a kingdom of heaven which 
 was at hand. You have heard how the preaching 
 of the resurrection, on the clay of Pentecost, inter- 
 preted the sound of the rushing and mighty wind, 
 and the cloven tongues of fire that sat upon the 
 Apostles. You have heard how the gift of this Spirit 
 created the Christian society out of the chaos of Jewish 
 sects, changed the ministers and members of it from 
 The Spirit ignorant cowards into brave and wise men. But to 
 of Truth in unc j crstanc i t \ ie rea i p0 wer of the announcement that 
 
 opposition L 
 
 to the Spirit sue}! a Spirit of truth, and unity, and power had 
 hood. Si come, you must "think of it in connexion with that 
 lying spirit by which the diviners and enchanters of 
 the Roman world were possessed. I use that lan- 
 guage deliberately. The teachers of the second 
 century talked of evil spirits and diabolical possession. 
 We often abuse their words to a superstitious 
 meaning; it may often have had that meaning in 
 their mouths. But the more one considers the horror 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 303 
 
 of lying, — the more one considers that those lies which Lect. vi. 
 connect themselves with the name of God are the Overthrow 
 
 of the 
 
 most inward, essential, radical of all lies, that they are Magicians. 
 those which enter into the spirit of a man, and 
 corrupt and destroy him, and that all outward lies 
 of act and word are their progeny ; the more one is 
 compelled to talk of a spirit of lies, to talk of it as 
 penetrating the habits and temper of an age, as coming 
 forth in innumerable forms, but as concentrated in 
 the religious impostors, in those who abuse spiritual 
 influences and terrors to fleshly and earthly purposes. 
 And the more simply one adheres to the language 
 of Scripture in saying that the Spirit of truth, the 
 Spirit of the Father, the Spirit with which Christ was 
 anointed, is given to men to renew them in the 
 spirit of their minds, to deliver them from the spirit 
 of lies, to cast him out; the more we understand 
 how it is possible that a man or a world shoidd be 
 regenerated. To oppose the Holy Spirit, the one 
 uniting Spirit, to the unholy and dividing spirit which 
 they saw working its portents all around them, was 
 assuredly one chief part of the mission of the Church 
 in this century — one which all its higher members 
 understood that they were to fulfil. 
 
 But the Holy Spirit did not merely exorcise that The Holy 
 which was unholy. He testified to those who yielded 
 to Him, that they were members of a holy body. 
 There could be no limits assigned to this body; it 
 stood in Christ the eternal Word ; the fetters of time 
 and space had been broken down for it. The 
 Christians knew inwardly that they were united to 
 
304 
 
 Lect. VI. 
 Universal. 
 
 The per- 
 plexity : 
 Separate 
 and yet 
 universal, 
 saints and 
 yet men. 
 
 Communion 
 essential to 
 Christian 
 life. 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 those who were separated from them by lands, and 
 seas, and death. In so far as they were partakers 
 of God's love, they had fellowship with all the 
 creatures over whom that love extended. 
 
 But here the third great difficulty forced itself upon 
 them. The Spirit separated them from the corrupt 
 world by which they were hemmed in ; He made 
 them saints. They seemed brought into a narrower, 
 smaller circle than other men — actually brought into 
 it by the suspicions and hatred of Jews and heathens 
 — spiritually and inwardly brought into it, in propor- 
 tion as they acquired a disgust for the practices in 
 which when Jews and heathens they took delight. 
 And yet the effect of their union with Christ, of the 
 power and indwelling of His divine Spirit, was to 
 enlarge their hearts, to give them sympathies which 
 they never had before — sympathies with that which 
 is human — sympathies with the publicans and sin- 
 ners, with whom their Lord conversed on earth, and 
 for whom He died. Were they to be more exclusive 
 than others, or wider, broader, more catholic ? 
 
 Whether individuals could answer this question or 
 not, the Church, so far as it carried on a successful 
 war against heathenism, found the answer. That which 
 undermined the divided, exclusive fellowships into 
 which heathen worshippers were necessarily broken 
 U p — as worshippers of natural idols, as servants of 
 local gods, as devoted to mere objects of sense — was 
 the communion of saints. The discovery that this 
 apparently narrow and separating body was really 
 able to embrace all within its circle, — that it could 
 
a United 
 
 iven ess 
 sins. 
 
 THE SECOND CENTURY. 3Q5 
 
 not contract itself, without being false to its pro- Lect. vt. 
 fession. The Church was feared so far as its mem- 
 bers were united; so far as they held themselves Terror of 
 separate from all contact with idols • so far as they a B ^ u 
 were ready to embrace all idolaters. Herein lay the 
 secret of that power which the world around trembled 
 at, — herein the secret of the attraction which was 
 continually bringing men from all quarters into the 
 Christian circle. 
 
 But the force of this magnet would not have been 
 felt by. those who were drawing near to different 
 altars, for the sake of getting some relief from the 
 reproaches of conscience, if another had not been 
 joined with it, The Christian Church could say Fo? g 
 boldly, " God for Christ's sake has forgiven us." It o/ 
 could invite men to lay the burden which was 
 oppressing them before God. It could say, 'This 
 forgiveness is for you. The Spirit of forgiveness, 
 who makes the heart guileless and loving, is for you. 
 When God takes you as His children, He puts away 
 your offences ; and He promises that each day you 
 shall receive that cleansing and renewal of heart — 
 that inward restoration which you will more and more 
 feel that you need.' What a blow was this one The. gnat 
 proclamation to the whole scheme of priestcraft, by j^J° 
 which men had aimed at bringing Heaven to overlook 
 the wrongs which they knew they had committed ! 
 What an assurance it was, not of ease in the evil, but 
 of deliverance out of it ! 
 
 Something more was needed still. For with bodies 
 actually bowed down by sickness and anguish, it is 
 
 x 
 
 tcraft. 
 
306 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 LECT • ^ L not enough to be told of a deliverance that has been 
 effected for their spirits ; of a Spirit who unites 
 
 Bodily those spirits to Christ and to each other. It is not 
 
 ti on . enough to hear that Christ, the Son of God, has 
 
 redeemed His own body from death. They need 
 to be told that those bodies of theirs, which are 
 groaning under a heavy and intolerable burden, shall 
 be rescued from it ; that they shall be delivered 
 from disease and death. The power of the Spirit is 
 not complete over the enemies of men, if this news 
 cannot be declared to them. The Church uttered 
 this promise, too, in the ears of men who were subject 
 to this bondage. It said, " If the Spirit of Him 
 who raised up Christ dwell in you, He shall also 
 
 Life quicken your mortal bodies." Nay, it spoke words 
 
 deeper even than these — not perhaps as fully under- 
 stood, but yet most necessary for those who had 
 confessed death to be their master. It spoke of the 
 Spirit as making men partakers of the eternal life 
 which was with the Father, and which Christ had 
 manifested. 
 
 Origin of I have been repeating, as you will have perceived, 
 
 the Creed. 1 . . , . , , 
 
 the principal articles in what we call the Apostles 
 Creed, because I could not find any other way of 
 telling you so well in what kind of armour it was 
 that the Church in the second century fought, when- 
 ever she gained any victories. I do not care to 
 prove that these were just the words or phrases 
 in which she delivered her message. That it was 
 the substance of her message, I think you will be 
 convinced the more you read the different books to 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 3Q7 
 
 which I have referred you in former Lectures, and Lect.vi. 
 compare them together. There does occur in several 
 of these books a form of words, very like our 
 " I believe." It is evidently put forth as the bap- 
 tized man's confession. People in later times were Attempts to 
 so puzzled to understand how the second century Zwtery. 
 should have got such a creed, and how after 
 centuries should have retained it, that they fell into 
 the strangest fancies to explain the marvel. Some 
 of the Christian writers had called it " an apostolical 
 tradition." Might it not then be asserted, that the Was it 
 Apostles had met together to construct it? that c ^ ructed 
 perhaps each Apostle had originated a clause ? Might Council of 
 not rolycarp have had it from St. John ? Might it 
 not have been given as a deposit to all the Churches 
 to keep ? No Evangelist or Apostle, I need scarcely 
 tell you, has given any account of a meeting for 
 this purpose, though St. Luke does speak of two 
 or three of the Apostles meeting to discuss the ^ heNove - 
 
 r ° . list of the 
 
 question of circumcision. A writer of the third third cm- 
 century, — the earliest of religious novelists, — a man 
 
 V ° ' SeeRecorj- 
 
 who feigned the name of Clemens for a book which rations, m. 
 he called the " Recognitions," — certainly introduces l '^' Peter 
 the twelve Apostles holding a disputation, and reports teUsCiemms 
 speeches which each of them made. But this auda- Apostles 
 cious and profane, though far from stupid or ill- l^J^" 1 
 meaning romancer, merely used the lips of Apostles ie f° re 
 
 D . . . Caiaphas, 
 
 as instruments for giving currency to his own and «,*- 
 sentiments ; not one of the honester and wiser ^^ to y 
 Fathers would have either ventured to assert the d> 'f erent 
 
 objectors. 
 
 Apostolical Convocation as a fact, nor to introduce it 
 
 x 2 
 
30 S ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vi. into a fiction. The Creed, I think you will see, grew 
 up in a much simpler and more natural manner. The 
 apostolic tradition the Christian Church had : the bap- 
 tismal formula was that tradition. The Church had 
 
 The Creed the writings of the Apostles, who were sent forth with 
 
 naturally . . i • i i 
 
 developed the commission to preach the name into which they 
 out of the baptized. The Church had the experience of heathen 
 
 Baptismal ■>■ L 
 
 name. corruptions and heathen needs. And the Spirit of God 
 was promised to them, to make the words which they 
 had received, and all the experiences of others and of 
 themselves, effectual to guide them into truth.. If 
 we want more than this, to show how they may have 
 obtained this confession, we have not yet learned what 
 an Ecclesia is, or why such a body has existed in our 
 world. 
 
 Prayer. Do not however suppose that a mere creed, if it 
 
 were the best in the world, could have expressed 
 divine principles to the members of the Church, or 
 have made them effectual for subverting heathenism. 
 The relations of men to God must utter themselves in 
 prayer and praise. Any other language is imperfect 
 language ; it may give us the shell of a belief, — it 
 cannot express the life and essence of it. If there 
 
 The Lord's had not been an " Our Father" as well as an " I be- 
 lieve," the Church would have fared very ill in its 
 battles with the world. There, the whole mystery 
 of God's revelation of Himself to His creatures is 
 presumed in their invocation of Him. He has made 
 them His children, therefore they speak to Him. 
 That His Name may be hallowed by them, and known 
 upon the earth, is the end for which He has called 
 
 Prayer. 
 
THE SECOND CENTUKY. 
 
 309 
 
 theui, and for which they exist. But He must hallow Lect.vi. 
 that Name ; they cannot, otherwise than as His in- 
 struments. They are sure that He has a kingdom 
 in them, and a kingdom over the whole earth ; they 
 desire that His kingdom should come mightily in both. 
 They know that His will is the right will — that there 
 are those who obey it; they desire that then wills 
 and all wills may be subdued to it. He has provided 
 all things that man wants ; they desire to bless Him 
 for them, and to receive His gifts each day from His 
 hand, and that all should share them together. They 
 want that forgiveness which comes to them only while 
 they forgive, and, therefore, the Spirit of forgive- 
 ness, which includes both blessings. They have a 
 Tempter near them, and God only can keep them from 
 him ; there is evil within and without — He only can 
 deliver them from it. 
 
 That this prayer was the root of all the prayers This Prayer 
 of the Church in the second century,— that they f eccntre °f 
 
 J ' J the devotions 
 
 unfolded themselves out of it, — we have abundant °f the 
 
 gclvTm 
 
 evidence. Each clause in the prayer struck at the church. 
 
 heart of some superstition that had enslaved human 
 
 spirits, — at the great and cardinal superstition of all, 
 
 that prayer, instead of coming from God, and being 
 
 the creature's act of sacrifice and submission to Him — 
 
 its flight to Him from the evil that was oppressing it 
 
 — was an effort to convert His will, to make Him 
 
 favourable to avert the evil of which He was the 
 
 author. This prayer converted everything else into 
 
 an organ of prayer and thanksgiving. It threw back 
 
 a light upon the old psalms, explaining the enemies The Psalms. 
 
310 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VI. 
 
 Poly carp's 
 
 universal 
 
 Prayer. 
 
 The 
 
 Heathen 
 
 Sacrifice. 
 
 with which David was struggling, — his confidence, his 
 confessions, his cries to be judged, — his feeling that 
 when he was praying, all Israel was praying with 
 him ; that when he was giving thanks, he was praising 
 the Lord of the whole earth. It turned all the gifts 
 of nature into excuses for praise, because they were 
 not gifts of nature but of God. It found a necessity 
 and encouragement to prayer in dungeons, fires, wild 
 beasts. 
 
 You have heard how Polycarp prayed, not, as his 
 Latin translator represents, for support to himself in 
 his hour of peril, but for the whole Church and for 
 all mankind. His sympathies expanded and became 
 deeper as that hour approached which most men 
 regard as separating them from others, and as obliging 
 them to fix their thoughts upon themselves. Whence 
 came ih.Q difference ? I tried to indicate the cause of 
 it when I was speaking of him and of Ignatius ; but 
 the subject is so important, and is so involved in the 
 one of which I am speaking now, that I must present 
 it to you from another side. 
 
 I have told you what the heathen world said of 
 the Christians in reference to sacrifice. Sometimes 
 they were thought to neglect sacrifice altogether; 
 sometimes it was suspected that they offered sacri- 
 fices of the most monstrous kind. Evidently this 
 was the point on which there was most difficulty in 
 understanding them ; this, therefore, was the test to 
 which they were always brought : Would they offer 
 sacrifices, or not? would they rather be sacrificed 
 themselves than do it ? The answer was distinct : 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 32 1 
 
 ' We cannot offer your sacrifices ; we choose to be Lect. vi. 
 sacrifices ourselves. For the great human Sacrifice TkeEumcm 
 has been offered; it is upon that we feed in those 
 secret meetings you speculate about. We believe 
 that Sacrifice to have been offered for the whole 
 world ; therefore it is our right and privilege to offer 
 ourselves as sacrifices to God.' 
 
 I want you to connect these three things in your The con- 
 mind : the heathen sacrifices which each man was to See» 
 offer, to make the gods propitious to him ; the Chris- them - 
 tian declaration that the Sacrifice had been offered 
 once for all, and that by it God had reconciled the 
 world to Himself; and the belief of the Christian 
 man, that his own death was a sacrifice which 
 God had prepared, and which He would accept 
 for the sake of His Son. Then, I think, you will Tiie death 
 understand why Poly carp was not thinking of his own ° not hi ™ ' 
 death, but of Christ's death at that time, and, because own deafh > 
 
 present to 
 
 of Christ's death, therefore, of all everywhere for a martyr. 
 whom He died. And then, I think, you will further 
 understand what was and must have been the centre 
 of all Christian worship, in order that it might carry 
 out the principle and meaning of the Lord's Prayer. 
 There are many differences of statements about the 
 liturgies of this time ; but the most learned anti- 
 quarians, and scholars of different nations and dif- 
 ferent schools, seem to be agreed on this point ; the The 
 Eucharist was the centre of the worship ; everything 
 was referred to that. Thanksgiving and praise for a 
 complete and accepted sacrifice, a sacrifice for the 
 sins of the whole world, was at the root of all devotion 
 
31;2 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 i^ect. vi. aiid all praise : everything was included and gathered 
 up in that service. There was the highest utterance 
 of praise and thanksgiving, there was the lowliest con- 
 fession and humiliation ; there they sought the power 
 The apex as to act and to suffer ; there they learnt that to make 
 lase of an oblation of themselves, was not to do a great act 
 worship md m or( j er ^ wnl a g re at prize, but was itself the 
 highest gift and prize that God could bestow on them, 
 — a participation in the life and death of His Son. 
 Therefore, of all the weapons in the Christian armoury 
 with which they shattered the old gods, and those 
 who served them and burnt incense to them, this, 
 I conceive, was the most powerful, at least it was that 
 which explained the purpose and direction of all 
 the rest. 
 
LECTUEE VII. 
 
 THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. 
 
 HE FAILURES OE THE CHURCH IN THE BATTLE WITH THE GODS. 
 
 ^e have lost the guidance of Scripture as to the lect.vit. 
 
 icts of our story ; we have not lost it at all as to The Bible 
 e principle by which we are to judge of the facts. aThf s to% 
 he history of the called people in its earliest stages °f the 
 
 J . . second 
 
 the interpretation of its history in the latest. What centwy. 
 are told of Jews after they entered Canaan, may TheJewsin 
 teach when we are to look for victories, when for Canaan - 
 defeats, to the Church after it had got a footing in the 
 Roman world. 
 
 The cases were, indeed, widely different. The Differences 
 Church was to conquer for itself no special land ; the toasts." 
 one in which the Jewish capital and temple had stood 
 was given up to the heathen world. It was not to 
 expel the old inhabitants of the world into which it 
 came ; it had a message of peace and deliverance 
 to them. Its power lay in its weakness ; it was to 
 subdue by enduring. But in spite of these differences, 
 — in spite of those other mighty differences between the 
 new Covenant and the old, the revelation by prophets 
 and angels, and the revelation by a Son, which every 
 day of conflict between the Church and the Synagogue 
 
with Hea- 
 thens. 
 
 314 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. brought into stronger light, — the underground was 
 Resevi- t] ie same# if the members of the Church forgot that 
 
 blance in 
 
 principles they were a called body, — called out to do a work, 
 
 dangers called by God, — they became powerless, just as the 
 members of the Nation became from the same cause. 
 If they did not think that their work was to be 
 a blessing to all the families of the earth, they con- 
 tracted precisely the habits which had led the Jews 
 to reject the Son of Man, to anathematise the 
 Apostles of the Gentiles, to be rejected and anathe- 
 matised themselves. 
 
 Sympathy These two evils — the forgetfulness of their calling 
 and covenant, the fancy that they were possessors, 
 not stewards of the blessings they had received — had 
 gone through all periods of the history; sometimes the 
 tendency to idolatry, sometimes the tendency to despise 
 and hate idolaters, being more conspicuous. Each 
 implied the other. They were fain to fall into super- 
 stition, if they did not feel they were sent to deliver 
 the earth from it, by fighting for the living and true 
 God. They were sure to contract hardness and 
 
 Hatred of exclusiveness, and dislike of mankind, if they ever 
 supposed that Judaism was a special religion which 
 they were to uphold against other religions. In the 
 language of the Psalmist, they forgot God's counsel ; 
 they dwelt among the heathen, and learned their 
 works. In the language of the Apostles, they became 
 enemies to God, and contrary to all men. 
 
 Duty of the Amidst the noble and beautiful records of the 
 second century, it behoves us, if we would follow the 
 light which Scripture gives us, and not choose a way 
 
 Heathens. 
 
 Church 
 Historian 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 3^5 
 
 of our own, to notice these same causes of disap- Lect. vn. 
 pointment, that we may be more thankful for the 
 successes, that we may be less surprised when we 
 see the seeds of evil and of good, the wheat and the 
 tares, multiplying and growing together in after 
 generations. We shall be preserved from a great 
 many blunders, a great many acts of injustice, a 
 great many unfaithful complainings, if we do not 
 frame to ourselves the notion of a golden age in 
 this century or any other ; if we believe that the Bow to 
 good men of that day deserve to be contemplated, t ^ period. 
 precisely because they were men prone to all the evils 
 to which we are prone, prone to the particular evils 
 of their own age and country, great in God, paltry 
 in themselves ; heroic examples, therefore, when they 
 trusted in God and forgot themselves ; beacons when 
 they trusted in themselves and forgot God. 
 
 Nor is it impossible or over bold, as some would Fear of 
 
 , ,11 i i_ i • ,i condemning 
 
 persuade us, to declare when we are to admire them, the acts of 
 and when we are to shun them. If that is so, history f J ood mcn - 
 is a delusion ; God has not written it ; we are left to 
 crawl before any idols whom our forefathers may have 
 set up, or whom we may set up. We may easily call 
 it reverence to do this, but it is no such thing. It is 
 irreverence towards God ; it is unbelief in Him, and in 
 the word He has given us. No doubt we may make The 
 a thousand mistakes in interpreting His words and the ^ZTstwt 
 signs of His providence, as well as in estimating the thesafeone. 
 characters of His servants. But we shall make far 
 fewer mistakes, if we desire earnestly and faithfully to 
 honour whatever is true and honest, and just and 
 
31G 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VII. 
 
 Necessity of 
 acknow- 
 ledging a 
 ft igher 
 wisdom 
 than mans, 
 if we would 
 appreciate 
 them. 
 
 The oppo- 
 site course 
 leads to 
 injustice 
 and in- 
 sincerity. 
 
 lovely, because we are sure that it is of God, and to 
 hate whatever is contrary to this, when it appears in 
 the best man or the worst, in Christian or heathen ; 
 we shall make far fewer mistakes if we act upon this 
 principle, hoping for the Spirit of truth to make 
 us see the truth every day more clearly, than if 
 we feign to admire deeds or words which directly 
 contradict and counteract each other, and have evi- 
 dently produced the most opposite effects, because we 
 are afraid of seeming to condemn what better men 
 than we have done or approved. I do not find that 
 those who profess this principle act upon it. I see 
 them applying it one moment very strictly, when a 
 set of favourites of their own are in peril — deserting 
 it when they are sitting in judgment upon those 
 whom they dislike. I find great censoriousness and 
 harshness mixed with this boast of humility. There- 
 fore I would once for all discard those maxims which 
 it seeks to canonise. If God teaches us to judge 
 ourselves, He will not allow us to judge other men 
 harshly; He will not permit us even to call any- 
 thing evil, till we have seen and worshipped the good 
 to which it is opposed, or which it is counterfeiting. 
 But He will enable us, — if we desire to be purged of 
 the evil ourselves, and not to be betrayed by the 
 counterfeit, — to see how those whose steps we would 
 follow have yielded to the one, and been led astray 
 by the other. Cultivate love and admiration all you 
 can ; the more you cultivate them, the less will you 
 endure falsehood, the more able will you be to detect 
 it. Fear God ; and then you will not fear, when His 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 3] 7 
 
 truth demands it, to speak boldly about the ways in Lect. vn. 
 which some even of His most faithful servants have 
 thwarted His purposes. 
 
 If what I said in the last Lecture is true, the work 
 of the Christian Church in the second century was 
 as wonderful a one as it is possible for us to 
 think or dream of. We use the word to regenerate Regenera- 
 sometimes dogmatically, sometimes carelessly. Now tm 
 we argue, whether the blessing of regeneration is Debates 
 communicated by God in a certain ordinance to a w ™ d 
 individual men; now we speak, as if we might by 
 some plans of ours regenerate society. If we would 
 meditate a little upon the war of the world and the 
 Church at this time, we might clear our minds on 
 both these topics ; we might begin to understand one 
 another better. 
 
 Think of any set of men undertaking to reform 
 such a society as the Roman empire ! Think of such 
 a set of men undertaking it as those I have described 
 to you, — a handful of people, brought up in the very 
 system they would have to contend with, infected with 
 all its worst notions and corruptions ! But think of 
 any one of these men undertaking to reform himself; 
 to get down to the root of his own evil, and to 
 extirpate it ! One here and one there makes the ex- 
 periment. He has done his best, or thinks he has, 
 and he is in despair. Then he hears the message 
 — ' God Himself gives you a new and diviner 
 birth ; He takes you to be His children.' Supposing ncforma- 
 a man to believe this news, and to be baptized, u ^ c ^ am 
 and to find himself one of a family which believes **«*• 
 
318 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect vii. the same, lie could not but understand that that 
 had been done for him which he had been unable 
 to do for himself. Whereas he had before thought 
 only of reforming himself, of making himself a better 
 man, he will now naturally change that word for the 
 other. If he was really radically reformed in the 
 will and purpose of his mind, it was because God had 
 regenerated him ; the nobler inward state implied a 
 birth from above. He was right because the Right 
 and True Being had recognised him as His ; he was 
 right just so long as he stood on that ground — as he 
 renounced every other. But if his baptism thus 
 explained to him his own position, — thus signified 
 to him that he was planted on a deeper root, and 
 was therefore capable of a better life, — did it not 
 show him also what must be the ground of a 
 general and social reformation ? What else could 
 renew this carcase of Roman civilization, which the 
 Roman religion was making more putrid every day, 
 but the belief of a living Father, but the news that 
 He had redeemed men in His Son ? Might not this 
 Gospel re-form the society ? would not the reform be 
 a regeneration ? 
 
 The divine It was a mighty work this for such a set of poor 
 outcasts as the Church was composed of to meditate. 
 Very few of them could meditate it or dream of it; 
 nor was it the least necessary that they should. They 
 had only to speak the truth which had been taught 
 them, to bear witness of that they knew, to testify 
 that they had seen ; the rest they must leave to God. 
 To make the mustard- seed shoot forth into a tree, 
 
 and human 
 tasks, 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 319 
 
 was His work ; to scatter the seed on the ground, Lect. vii. 
 and, if it pleased Him, to enrich the ground with 
 their blood, was theirs. And therefore, as I think simplicity 
 we have seen already, no teacher of the Church ^uself 
 failed through simplicity, or through ignorance of f clllure; 
 the various and complex opinions of the people 
 among whom he was dwelling. If he said broadly 
 and nakedly the thing he had to say, the word met 
 thoughts and hopes that had been struggling, or that 
 had been stifled. The princess in her thorny bower 
 felt that her lips had been touched, not by any mortal, 
 but by the true Lover ; and as she awoke out of her 
 slumber, all the attendants that were torpid and 
 fixed around her awakened also. Whenever there 
 was a true voice really coming out of the heart of a 
 man, there was some heart that responded to it, — 
 some one which said, " I believe, not because of thy 
 saying ; I know for myself that He whom you speak 
 of is the Christ, the Son of God." 
 
 The defect was much more in the absence of this But the 
 simplicity. You will not misunderstand me to mean 2»iWi*. 
 that God did not raise up men of various endowments 
 for various occasions ; that He did not bring men from 
 the East as well as from the West, from the schools as 
 well as from the seat of custom, or that one set of His 
 servants were less faithful than another ; the history 
 of the second century is a confutation of any such 
 notion. Justin and Clemens of Alexandria gave as 
 much proof that they were possessed with the spirit 
 of the Gospel, and were ready to live and die for it, 
 as Ignatius or Polycarp. They would not have been 
 
320 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. simple and honest men, if they had adopted the 
 Different dialect or mode of thinking of Ignatius or Polycarp ; 
 
 signs of 
 
 simplicity, in them that would not have been natural but 
 affected, for it had pleased God that they should be 
 educated differently ; it would not have been doing 
 their own work, but intruding upon one which they 
 had not been set to do. 
 Tiieattempt But what I mean is this. It was a most easy thing 
 a christian for Christians, who looked round and saw what a 
 religion. nil mber of religions there were in the Roman empire, 
 to fancy that they were the proselytes of a new 
 religion ; one a great deal better than any that had 
 been before it, one which was to break all others in 
 pieces, one which would obtain for them much 
 greater blessings than any other hereafter, though it 
 might subject them to some penalties here. They 
 might say, " This Christian religion of ours is to 
 beat down the heathen religions, to beat down 
 the old national religions. We have not, indeed, 
 got swords with which we can do that at present ; 
 our opponents have them, and we must submit 
 to their violence till our turn comes round. But, 
 in the meantime, words may do much ; we can 
 argue, and reason, and demolish their conclusions ; 
 we can strengthen our own position ; we can draw 
 the lines about our opinions more definitely and 
 accurately ; we can organize our customs, and habits, 
 and scheme of worship; we can be always putting 
 ourselves into an attitude of defence. Sometimes we 
 can invade the enemy, and carry one or another of his 
 posts ; by degrees our religion will become a really 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 321 
 
 great and formidable power to the world around us. Lect. vir. 
 At the same time we shall become much more secure 
 of the blessings of it ourselves." 
 
 Now, what I affirm is that this view of their 
 position was one which Christians were exceedingly 
 likely to take up ; that it was one from which the best 
 and truest men could not always free themselves ; but 
 that it was one which was fatal to the simplicity 
 of the Christian faith — equally fatal to its effect on 
 Roman Polytheism. 
 
 I will endeavour to illustrate what I have said by Faith in 
 going over the ground which we have just been travel- f 7 f-^ an 
 'ling. You have seen how the Apostles' Creed unfolded opinion 
 itself out of the name into which the members of the 
 Church were baptized, — how, so unfolding itself, it 
 really expressed a belief in a Father, a Son, and a 
 Spirit. But do you not see how easy it was for men 
 to say, " This Creed is what divides us from other 
 men. As Zeus is the god of the Greeks, as Amnion 
 is adored by the Egyptians, as the Romans boast 
 of Mars, so this is the Being whom we Christians 
 worship." When I put the feeling into words, I am 
 sine it will cause a shrinking and revolting in all your 
 minds. That is what I wish — thank God for it ! I 
 believe that it woidd have caused a still greater shock 
 to the mind of any devout man in the second century. 
 Polycarp would have cried out, as Irenaeus tells us he 
 did, " What times I have fallen upon, that I should 
 hear such things as these !" He would have been 
 certain, though he might not have been able to say 
 why, that the truth he was believing in had been 
 
 Y 
 
322 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vii. changed into something else, — that the shell remained, 
 but that the substance was gone. But a man who 
 had become an habitual arguer about his faith, would 
 
 The Chris- goon }} ecome unconscious of this difference. The 
 
 turn dispii- 
 
 ter really a more he disputed, the more evanescent it would be. 
 
 this world. At last he would come to thmk it was not a difference 
 at all. If a man could explain in accurate terms 
 what his opinion was about the Being whom he wor- 
 shipped ; if he could point out why he rejected this 
 or that notion which some other person had put 
 forward concerning the Father, or the Word, or the 
 Spirit ; or if he could expose some Greek, or Egyptian, 
 or Roman notion respecting their divinities ; or if he 
 could confound the Jews, who supposed that they 
 were confessing the one Jehovah; his mind was 
 satisfied; he had been fighting the Christian fight, 
 — he was a champion of the divine Name. Yes, 
 
 The result, of one whom he had chosen to be a Father, but not 
 of a Father who had claimed him to be a child ; 
 of one whom he had acknowledged as a Son and 
 Word of God, not of a Son or Word of God in whom 
 he had been created and redeemed, and who had 
 chosen him that he should go forth and bear fruit; 
 of a Spirit to whom he could attach great titles, on 
 whom he could bestow high reverence, not of a Spirit 
 who had come down to purify him of his evils, to 
 mould him anew, to unite him to his brethren. Yes, 
 of a Name which he could use for confuting other 
 men, for attacking their errors, for cutting them off; 
 not of a Name which could renew and regenerate the 
 hearts, the faith, the worship, of all nations. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 323 
 
 It was impossible there could be this change Lect. vii. 
 without another, which affected the ordinance wherein W ect on the 
 
 idea of 
 
 men were sealed with this name. When they re- Baptism. 
 ceived it simply, it was the most beautiful and broad 
 testimony of their adoption, — of their being clean and 
 pure by being grafted upon the true root, — of the 
 new and divine well of life within them. But the 
 heathens had their purifications and lustrations; 
 the Jews had theirs. The earnest and true-hearted 
 Justin perceived, as you will have heard in the extract 
 I gave you from his dialogue with Trypho, how the 
 Christian sacrament resembled these, how it differed 
 from them ; that while they testified the need of an 
 inward purification, but could only confer an outward 
 one, it bore witness that God was commencing His 
 renewal from within, that He was making the tree 
 good that the fruit might be good. But those who Tiie two 
 would set up a Christianity which should be an anti- thc ordir 
 heathenism or an anti-judaism, might take either nance - 
 of two apparently opposite courses. They might say, 
 " What have we to do with this water, — this old Jewish 
 or heathen type? what care we for these outward 
 lustrations, if we can be made what we want to be 
 within ?" Or they might glorify the act of baptism as 
 being the Christians' great service and ceremony, 
 which contradistinguished them from heathens and 
 Jews, and whereto it had pleased God to attach for 
 their sakes certain unspeakable and miraculous bless- 
 ings, from which the world at large was excluded. 
 Each of these ways seemed wonderfully right to those 
 who took it. They could not question that they were 
 
324 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vii. maintaining the high dignity and purity of the 
 
 Christian religion, and putting down its adversaries. 
 
 T ' ie . u A class of heretics called Cainites set up the first 
 
 Uainites. L 
 
 theory ; Tertullian's book on Baptism, which was 
 written expressly to answer them, may be looked 
 upon as the earliest and most elaborate exposition 
 of the second. It opens at once with a denunciation 
 of those who rejected baptism ; it goes on to speak 
 of the true believers as simple fish who could not be 
 persuaded to leave their water by the anglers on the 
 shore, — a pleasantry which might be looked upon as 
 pardonable if the subject were less serious, or which 
 might be accepted as an innocent niaiserie in a 
 simple-minded man ; but which must be regarded as 
 an intolerable affectation in a man so cultivated and 
 Tertullian's artificial as the Carthaginian presbyter was. The 
 baptism, treatise, in spite of many valuable passages in it, is 
 I think worthy of this commencement, full of refine- 
 ment, reasoning, disputation, tending to build up a 
 theory about baptism, and to destroy its life. Rightly 
 and consistently Tertullian argues against the admi- 
 ji e nistration of it to infants. If it was to be the mere 
 
 Moot™ s ^ n °f t ne salvation which God had purposed to give 
 Baptism. one set of men, and from which He designed to 
 exclude the rest, it was most unreasonable that those 
 who could make no profession of their faith, who 
 could not in any wise prove themselves to be other 
 than Jews or heathens, should be admitted to a 
 participation of it. Tertullian's mind, which was 
 most clear and acute in following out its own con- 
 clusions, at once perceived the contradiction. If the 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 305 
 
 Clmrcli had been allowed to follow its own impulses, Lect. yii. 
 and draw its own lines about itself, eitlier the Cainite 
 or the Tertullian practice would have prevailed ; 
 Baptism would have been rejected, or it would have 
 been limited to the adult professor. But since God 
 designed it for the mark of a communion of saints, 
 which was to be the witness of a redemption for 
 mankind, neither the heretic nor the Church doctor 
 had power to defeat His purpose, though they might 
 succeed in disguising it from the eyes of many, both 
 of those who were to bear and of those who were to 
 receive the testimony. 
 
 What I have said has reference especially to the Practices 
 idea of baptism, and its connexion with the Divine ™£fi££. 
 name. But with this were closely associated certain *»»* 
 practices which gradually gained ground in the 
 Church, and which might be innocent and useful, or 
 pernicious, according to the principle which was 
 recognised as lying at the root of them. Exorcism Exorcism. 
 became connected with baptism in the second century, 
 not habitually or universally, but so frequently and 
 in so many places, as to intimate a feeling in the 
 Church of some close relation between them. The 
 words which I quoted from Ignatius, in his con- 
 versation with Trajan, may show you how naturally 
 the thought of this relation would have sprung up. 
 Christians were the enemies of the daemons ; God had 
 delivered them from the powers of evil ; God had sent 
 them to do battle with these powers. What truths 
 were here ! What a deep practical understanding 
 did they show of the fact that Christ had triumphed 
 
32G ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vii. over the Spirit of evil, had denied and broken in 
 pieces his power ; and that His disciples, in the faith 
 of that conquest, were to wrestle not chiefly with 
 outward enemies, but with the powers of spiritual 
 wickedness which were trying to claim them as their 
 subjects ! What a significant translation into act it 
 seemed of these principles, for the convert to say at 
 baptism, " I renounce the dominion of evil spirits," 
 or for him who administered the rite to say, " I de- 
 clare thee free from them !" 
 
 How u was But the moment baptism was regarded, not as 
 a witness of God's truth and of Christ's redemp- 
 tion, but of an advantage which a particular set 
 of men had acquired over another set, this formula 
 was sure to acquire a different, almost an opposite 
 sense. It was not any longer a denial of the devil's 
 right over mankind, but rather a vehement assertion 
 of it. The exorcism came to mean, " Other men are 
 his rightful subjects ; we claim a special exemption 
 from his yoke." Here was shown the danger of any 
 additions to Christ's ordinance, however pleasing or 
 even profitable they might be for a time and to 
 certain persons. The flesh was sure to turn them to 
 its own uses, — the natural heart would make them 
 excuses for superstition and for exclusion. 
 
 ThcChrism. The use of Chrism, or of anointing with oil, also 
 seems to have gained ground in this century. It 
 imparted not only to old words of the Scripture, but 
 to old practices of heathenism, a new and living force. 
 The Spirit, it said, is the oil of gladness of which the 
 Psalmist speaks : this was that which fitted kings, and 
 
TEE SECOND CENTURY. 327 
 
 prophets, and priests for their work. In a lower sense, Lect. vit. 
 it prepared runners and wrestlers for the combat, after 
 their bodies had been brought down and purged of their 
 grossness by hard and scanty fare. A lesson surely of 
 the greatest worth, and not open, so far as one can see, 
 to the same kind of objection as the last of which I 
 spoke. But there was this objection : anointing with Use ami 
 oil was a custom most suitable to the East, not equally f & 
 intelligible to Occidentals. There was danger, therefore, 
 lest a local custom should put itself forward in the 
 character of a universal law • a danger comparatively 
 slight as loner as the Church maintained the sense of its 
 divine calling, and was engaged heartily in its divine 
 work, but most serious when it began to think that it 
 was an isolated body which was to fence itself round 
 with a set of habits with which other men had nothing 
 to do. The oil would then be no longer the oil of glad- 
 ness — it would speak no more of a Spirit given ; it 
 would be itself the miserable substitute for that Spirit. 
 
 In connexion with this anointing, I have hinted Fasts. 
 at the discipline or acts of self-restraint, which the 
 members of the Church in the second century prac- 
 tised in order to fit themselves for the work they had 
 to do, and to bring their bodies into subjection. 
 There was a difficulty about these acts. They felt the vifficuity. 
 necessity of strictly obeying our Lord's command ; 
 they were not to appear to men to fast, but to their 
 Father who saw them in secret ; and yet there was 
 an almost necessary community in all the doings of 
 a body which had a common Lord to serve, and 
 common sins to confess. There was a still more true 
 
328 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.vii. and necessary tendency to connect all tlieir acts with 
 the acts of their Lord ; to feel that His fasting and 
 temptation must be the foundation and the strength 
 of theirs. So long as they felt that discipline had no 
 virtue of its own, — that it was only a preparation for 
 service, only a sign of submission to God's Spirit, 
 that He might work in them more freely to will 
 and do God's pleasure — a means to the emancipa- 
 tion of body and soul from the sloth and luxury 
 Way out which enfeebled both, — so long these apparent diffi- 
 culties were sure to right themselves in practice. 
 While that salutary, almost excessive, fear of Judaical 
 practices to which Justin gave utterance, prevailed, 
 the Church was not likely to impose rules upon its 
 members, which might make them think that they 
 were subject to the old covenant of the letter, not to 
 The oppos- the new covenant of the Spirit. It is clear from 
 dmties. many proofs that this feeling was strong in the 
 Church ; sometimes it might degenerate into laxity 
 and carelessness. But it is equally clear that the 
 opposite tendency was gaining ground. The Mon- 
 tanist was vehemently desirous that the Christian 
 asceticism should be a match for that of the Pytha- 
 TertuWan gorean or the Brahmin. Tertullian, when he became 
 deJejuniis, a Montanist, and gave full loose to the desire for 
 building up a great religion which had been always 
 working in him, reviled, denounced, almost anathe- 
 matised the body of the Church, for the imperfection 
 and irregularity of its observances. While the mild 
 Irenseus was arguing with Victor, that there had 
 always been a variety of customs with reference both 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 329 
 
 to the fast and to the festival, and that to draw the Lect. vii. 
 lines too close was to endanger the fellowship of the 
 Church, the Carthaginian was finding fault with the 
 same Victor and with his Roman community, for not 
 recognising a sufficiently stringent and unbending 
 rule ; was denouncing them and Christians generally, 
 because, as he said, they only spent a few days in 
 mourning the Bridegroom's absence from His Church. 
 His voice, though it was raised at first in denun- Tcrtuiiian's 
 ciation of that which he affirmed to be a current t0 w j ia t It 
 practice, was nevertheless one which was sure to a PP ealed - 
 attract a great many listeners then and afterwards. 
 Though it was at variance with some of the tendencies 
 of the natural heart, it was in accordance with others 
 which are quite as strong; it conspired with the 
 pride of soul which had led so many in former days, 
 and was leading so many then, to the contempt of 
 the body ; it conspired with that other and subtler 
 pride, which preferred to obtain redemption for itself 
 rather than to receive redemption from God. And 
 therefore, like the other tendencies of which I have 
 spoken, it helped to bring many of the superstitions 
 of heathenism into the Church, while it laboured to 
 make the Church more of a rival to heathenism. 
 
 I have alluded more than once to the experiments The Fes- 
 which were made to bring the different Churches to 
 an understanding about the great resurrection festival 
 which they were to celebrate, and to the failure of 
 these experiments. 1 Considering the great apparent 
 
 1 The dread of " Sabbatising," which. Justin so faithfully expressed, 
 and in which he felt so much to be involved, might have made him and 
 
330 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.vii. reasonableness of them, there could scarcely have 
 been a more distinct proof that it was not the will 
 of God that men should settle these questions at once 
 by formal decrees ; that they must come to unity by 
 another process ; that any attempt to hasten it or 
 force it would tend to the subversion, not to the main- 
 tenance, of the true ecclesiastical order. Never- 
 theless, the sense of the necessity and duty of order 
 and unity, and the conviction that in worship that 
 unity and order must be realized most perfectly, was 
 continually expressing itself in some beautiful attempt 
 
 Daysjiows, t connect days and hours with holy acts, and these 
 
 stations. ■/• 
 
 with the acts of our Lords life upon earth. Then 
 when these thoughts had sprung up, as thoughts 
 spring up in the mind of some poet or artist, and had 
 produced forms which were suitable to them, there 
 was a hurry and impatience to get them fixed and 
 stereotyped, — the same diseased craving being every- 
 where visible that the Church might present a well- 
 many others afraid of sanctioning the new Sabbath — the weekly resur- 
 rection day — as a fixed ordinance of the Church. But it did not 
 require their sanction. Like all other great institutions, ecclesiastical and 
 civil, that have taken root in the modern world, it established itself 
 without precept or pre-arrangement, by the force of an inward law, 
 which men could not control or fashion according to their pleasure. The 
 day of rest had been asserted once for all by the revelation to the Jews, 
 as one of the permauent laws of humanity, framed in conformity with 
 a divine and eternal principle, to which the divisions of time must at 
 last adapt themselves. The Christian Church could not repeal the 
 enactment. It could only say, " The divine and eternal principle of rest 
 was never fully developed till the resurrection ; those who believe in 
 the resurrection must make the Lord's-day their Sabbath." And this 
 truth only dawned upon them by degrees. They found themselves 
 observing the day ; in time they learnt more or less clearly why they 
 observed it. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 331 
 
 compacted religious system to the world — the same Lf.ct. vii. 
 forgetfulness of the danger lest it should become such 
 another world itself. 
 
 The question may sometimes present itself to you, The sacred 
 " How did the Christians of the second century know 
 which books they should reckon divine and authori- 
 tative, and what they should reject ? Had they any 
 divine intimation on this subject? Were they not 
 liable to confusion and mistake ?" The answer must 
 be given simply. They did not always know what 
 books they should reckon divine and authoritative; 
 they doubted about some which we include in our 
 canon ; they were disposed to account some as of great 
 value which we do not esteem at all. They had no 
 message from heaven, such as Mahometans say that 
 they have, about their books ; they changed their 
 minds at different periods of their lives respecting 
 some by which they had set great store. Instead The helps 
 of hiding these facts from you, I wish to bring them need for a 
 under your notice, because they seem to me in perfect wm ' k ' pr0 ~ 
 consistency with all we have heard hitherto, and with them. 
 the whole course of God's government and education ; 
 they show more clearly than almost any other facts 
 what that government and education is. He calls men 
 to a work ; then He teaches them to know what they 
 need, in order that they may be enabled to do their 
 work rightly ; He shows them how He has provided 
 for their wants. As long as the members of the The Church 
 Church in the second century were conscious of their Bihu * * 
 calling, I do not think that they had the least diffi- 
 culty in discovering what lesson-books they wanted to 
 
332 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii . train them for fulfilling it. They found in the Jewish 
 writings, and in the writings of the Apostles, the 
 history of the manifestation of the Divine Word, their 
 King and Saviour, through different ages — the history 
 of the gradual revelation of the Divine name into 
 which they were baptized. They found the history 
 of God's calling out of a people to witness of His 
 name. They found His Old Testament passing into 
 a New. They found themselves; what they were; 
 what they had to do ; what divine aid they had and 
 might reckon upon. They might not be able to trace 
 all the steps of the history. They might often jump 
 at conclusions, and mar the truth with their fancies. 
 Andrjather- But, on the whole, there was what they needed to 
 *rfitac- know ; there was that which they could learn nowhere 
 cordmg to excep t there ; there was that which interpreted what 
 
 their need. *■ A 
 
 they saw and heard elsewhere. 
 Learning Although, therefore, they could not exactly tell why 
 to dutm- good and honest a letter as that of the Roman 
 
 Clemens should not stand among the apostolical 
 documents, it did not really hold a place among 
 them. It gave useful hints which they were glad to 
 profit by, — but it assumed the existence of a reve- 
 lation which it could not impart; it practically 
 renounced any extravagant claims that might be put 
 forth in its behalf. 
 TheShep- It was n °t exactly the same with another book, 
 herd of which, if not as early as the letter of Clemens, 
 
 Hennas. , , 
 
 belongs assuredly to a very early time. This is the 
 " Shepherd of Hennas." We have only a Latin 
 translation of it, and it has probably suffered 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 333 
 
 additions which are more serious than mutilations lbot.vii. 
 
 would have been. It is divided into three parts, 
 
 Visions, Precepts, and Similitudes. Good was no Character 
 
 doubt to be got out of it by humble minds, which ° vse a e n d° ' 
 
 can often derive nourishment from that which is in f eebleness °f 
 
 it. 
 
 itself dry, and have a wonderful capacity of rejecting 
 what is mischievous without detecting it. Hennas 
 gave them the hint that there was a living Teacher 
 and Shepherd, and a Church here and in the other 
 world, and that nature is full of images and like- 
 nesses of the spiritual kingdom. So far he assured 
 them of what they might have known from a better 
 source. What he added to their knowledge was soon 
 discovered not to be very helpful. When Tertullian 
 became a Montanist, he rejected Hermas on other 
 grounds than his want of apostolical authority ; he 
 found in him sentiments which clashed with his own 
 religious scheme. 
 
 I wish you to see that the supposed confusion Letter of 
 between such books as these, and those that had a 
 higher origin, was not serious so long as the Church 
 was seeking to teach and bless the nations. Even 
 the venerable name of Barnabas did not succeed 
 in procuring for an Epistle which passed under 
 his name, and which, though not his, may possibly 
 have come froni his country, and have been written 
 by some disciple of his, more than a doubtful and 
 passing recognition : for the Epistle, from whom- Why it 
 
 • 1 c • n j_/» n i • could not 
 
 soever it came, was tor idlers, not tor men 01 busi- stand the 
 ness, — for those who had leisure to play with the trialo ffi re - 
 phrases, and forms, and analogies of Scripture, — not 
 
334 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. for those who needed its truths to break down strong- 
 holds. External criticism did not sever it from the 
 writings of the companion of Barnabas. They sepa- 
 rate themselves, as the writers whose name they 
 bear once did, because the difference is so sharp 
 between them that they cannot go to the same work, 
 or carry out the same ends. 
 When the But all this was greatly changed when the sense 
 ceases to le °f this work grew feeble, and when that other work 
 received as f setting up a Christian religion was substituted 
 
 a look of m ° L ° 
 
 life, and as for it. You do not at first perceive the alteration. 
 
 teacher? Texts are quoted as respectfully, the apostolical 
 authority seems to be as much heeded by the doc- 
 tors, who are busy in constructing an anti-Pagan or 
 anti-Jewish system, as by those who are declaring a 
 Gospel for the renewal of mankind. But look more 
 closely, and you will observe that the main diligence 
 of the former class is employed in showing that such 
 and such passages of Scriptures confute adverse 
 opinions, — that such and such passages do not confute 
 theirs, though they seem to do so. Now, a text is a 
 sharp stone which can be hurled at an enemy — 
 ' how can he withstand that ? ' Now it has an in- 
 convenient, awkward edge, which must be smoothed 
 away lest it should do mischief. Every page 
 of Tertullian almost would illustrate what I am 
 saying, and would furnish terrible instances of the 
 irreverent torturing of Scripture to his own purposes, 
 — of a resolute determination that it shall never 
 contradict or weaken any purpose of his — all the while 
 that he professes to take it as his guide and his judge. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 335 
 
 But tlie most serious consequence of this habit of Lect. vit. 
 mind, — closely connected with the one to which Habit of 
 I have just referred, — was the loss of truthfulness God , 
 and of the love of truth among those who yielded 
 to it. When it was once supposed that the Spirit 
 of truth had not come to guide men into all truth, 
 but to build up a new scheme, by attaching them- 
 selves to which they secured the favour of God and 
 the salvation of their soids, it was scarcely possible Bow it 
 
 _ ' , steals upon 
 
 that fraud should not be thought as prudent, and as christians. 
 lawful, and as necessary, by Christian teachers, as it 
 was by heathens. When your first thought is, how you 
 may convert a man from darkness to light, fictions are 
 awful and intolerable to you ; your only trust is in 
 Him who is true, and in whom is no lie. When your 
 first thought is, how you may get 'proselytes, you will 
 hate facts, you will resort to fictions ; you will do 
 things that a plain man of the world will blush at 
 and think shameful, to compass so great an object. 
 And when you have compassed it, remember who 
 told us the result : I dare not use such words if 
 He had not used them. We make our proselyte 
 two-fold more the chid of hell titan ourselves. The 
 seeds of this frightful evil were sown and began to 
 spring up, in the second century. 
 
 Many of the heretics found their account in muti- The for- 
 lating the Gospels and Epistles, or in forging gospels jjJJJj/' 
 and epistles to confirm their own opinions. This was Mp**J> 
 
 ■i m make the 
 
 a providential circumstance for the Church ; it made church less 
 those who opposed the heretics more conscious of the ' 4e ' 
 sinfulness of such acts than they would otherwise 
 
336 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. vii. have been ; it cultivated in them the power of discri- 
 minating between spurious writings and genuine. 
 
 But not But I cannot affirm that these practices were confined 
 to the heretics. There were a number of legends put 
 forth respecting our Lord's life on earth, and respect- 
 ing the deeds of His Apostles, which must have had 
 a different origin. A man who was thoroughly con- 
 vinced that an opinion which he had adopted on one 
 side or on another was very important, and required 
 to be defended, or that some story would promote 
 piety, might persuade himself, after a little battling 
 with his conscience, that it was no great crime to 
 forge an Apostle's name in support of it. I said that 
 the author of the books which bear the name of 
 Clemens, portions of which at least belong to this 
 century, was not apparently an ill-intentioned man. 
 
 Thegroictk I do not retract that opinion; yet just listen to one 
 
 of y m s/- f £j ie w i c ] iec i statements which this man puts forth, 
 without any indication of shame or remorse. He 
 pretends that the Pharisee Gamaliel had a secret 
 understanding with the Apostles — that he was in fact 
 a Christian convert — but that he agreed with them to 
 suppress his convictions, in order that he might serve 
 their cause more effectually in the Sanhedrim ! St. 
 Peter is actually made to communicate this fact as a 
 valuable and interesting secret to Clemens, his young 
 
 TJieRecog- convert. Now, the author of the " Recognitions," 
 though not an orthodox writer, though in many 
 respects an heretical one, is yet a most vehement sup- 
 porter of some of the maxims which were gaining 
 currency at that time in the Latin Church. St. Peter 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 337 
 
 is with him the Apostle of the West; St. Peter lect. vii. 
 
 invests Clemens with his episcopal office at Rome; 
 
 St. Peter writes to James, whom he recognises as the The Epistle 
 
 . . of Peter to 
 
 great Jerusalem Apostle, enclosing certain writings James> U)H i 
 of his which are only to be divulged to persons ^J™' 
 whom he has tried and found faithful, and which heiongto 
 
 the Cle- 
 
 James binds them, under a most tremendous anathema, mentmes. 
 (quoting at the same time his own opinion against 
 oaths,) to keep as a sacred deposit. There is a temper 
 of mind disclosed in such a work as this which can- 
 not have been confined to a man, which must have 
 been infecting the time, though there may have been 
 great and powerful antidotes, which prevented it from 
 producing all the mischief which it was to produce 
 afterwards. In that story of Gamaliel lies the germ The story of 
 of a doctrine of concealment and suppression of truth J^ifi cant 
 which was to take the most various forms, and to of much. 
 put on the most seemly disguises. In that story of the 
 communication of the books, and the curse upon the 
 reading of them, is the hint of the terror which men 
 would in due time conceive of the Scriptures being 
 known to the people, the hint also of a doctrine 
 respecting secret lore, which was already taking hold 
 of better and wiser men than the pseudo Clemens. 
 
 I told you that even Clemens of Alexandria was Feelings of 
 
 TT . , the A lexan- 
 
 not free from a temptation of this kind. His devout drian 
 mind revolted, no doubt, at much of the talk which c ^ ns 
 he heard concerning divine truths. He felt that they reserve. 
 are lying beneath all our thought ; and that terrible 
 mischief comes when we project them outside of us, 
 and handle them, play with them, argue about them. 
 
338 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. vii. He knew the worth of silence and secret communion ; 
 he had perceived a force in what the teachers of 
 Alexandria said of principles, which the carnal and 
 vulgar soul cannot apprehend. But how near are 
 precious truths to the falsehoods which are most de- 
 structive of them ! The reverence for mystery, which 
 in the mind of an earnest and faithful man means the 
 reverence for a truth which he cannot grasp, but on 
 which he can rest, and which is as close to others as 
 it is to him, may become in the worse moments of 
 his own life — will become, when other men catch it 
 from him — the boast of some profound treasure which 
 he and one or two more have got sight of, which is 
 hid in a mine of theirs, of which men in general are 
 
 The mys- to know nothing. Mysteries there had been in all 
 the religions of the world — mysteries there were in 
 nearly all the schools of philosophy ; surely Chris- 
 tianity cannot be without its mystery ! Might it 
 not be said that the mystery of Christianity was the 
 deepest of all — that it was that depth which was 
 quite unfathomable ? 
 
 The mystery Surely this might be said. If there was any mean- 
 ing in the facts or principles which the Church pro- 
 claimed, it must be said. Was not the sacrifice of 
 the Only-Begotten of the Father this mystery of 
 unfathomable love ? Was not this something which 
 no words could measure, no images set forth ? So 
 
 The Eucha- the Church believed. The celebration of the Eucha- 
 
 rhticalmys- ^ &g ^ centre an( j p r i nc ipl e of all its Worship, 
 
 embodied the belief; but it embodied also the belief 
 that a sacrifice had been offered for the sins of the 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 339 
 
 whole world, a sacrifice which had taken away the lect.vil 
 sins of the world. It embodied the belief that that 
 unfathomable love of God had been revealed to men, 
 and that the poorest beggar, the most miserable sinner, 
 might enter into it, dwell in it, feed upon it, be 
 penetrated and possessed by it. If one of these con- 
 victions drove out the other, what would happen? 
 The celebration of the Eucharist would become indeed 
 a mystery, the Christian counterpart of that which 
 the Egyptian priests gloried in; but it would no 
 longer be a mystery of thanksgiving for a love that 
 had been manifested in a stupendous act. The service 
 would be mysterious, that is to say, it would be kept 
 from the public gaze ; it would be reserved for the 
 initiated ; but that which it signified would more and 
 more disappear, — it would be lost in the service. 
 Those who had sought for something too inward, too 
 unutterable for words or forms, would find these 
 continually putting themselves forth in place of 
 it. And then, in process of time, there woidcl be a Opposite 
 demand that the other side of the truth which had e ^ e % 
 been suppressed should be brought out. The sacri- 
 fice which is for men must be made broad, palpable, 
 visible, that men may confess it and adore it. If there 
 is that in it which answers to the heathen mysteries, 
 there must be also that which answers to the open 
 heathen sacrifices. The Eucharist, considered as a 
 bond of peace to all the members of the Church — a 
 testimony of Christ's death to the world — answered to 
 both, for it declared in the simplest form the fulfil- 
 ment of both by God, the full realization of both by 
 
 z 2 
 
340 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. VII. 
 
 The Pres- 
 byter cele- 
 brating the 
 Eucharist. 
 
 Reasonable- 
 ness of the 
 practice. 
 
 man. The same Eucharist, reduced into a mere part 
 of a religious system, corresponded now to one, now 
 to the other j it was a new mystery, gathering up into 
 itself all the exclusiveness of the old; it was a new 
 sacrifice, gathering into itself all the superstition of the 
 old. What could it do, when it assumed this shape, 
 to break in pieces the fetters by which men were 
 bound ; to testify of the truth which makes free ? 
 
 There are some who fancy that they can trace up this 
 evil in the second century, and in subsequent centuries, 
 to the growth of a persuasion that the presbyter in the 
 Christian Church corresponded to the old sacrificial 
 priest of the Jew and of the Gentile, and, therefore, 
 that he was the person who could alone administer 
 the Eucharist. I do not myself see how the Church 
 could have avoided feeling that the elder brother of 
 the community was testifying of the great Elder 
 Brother who had gone up to the right hand of God, 
 and, therefore, that the duty of setting forth the 
 finished sacrifice appertained most fittingly to him. 
 I do not suppose that there was any law or decree 
 designating him to the office, any more than there was 
 a law or decree fixing which were the books of Scrip- 
 ture, or that the Sunday should supersede the Satur- 
 day as the day of rest. I do not suppose that the 
 Church did adopt this practice at once ; it seems to 
 me to have been one of those ordinances which 
 worked themselves out in the called body under the 
 Divine teaching, because it was suitable to its whole 
 character and constitution, — because in no other way 
 could the unity and universality of the sacrifice, and 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 34 ^ 
 
 the fact that Christ had already offered and completed lect.vii. 
 it, have been so perfectly expressed. It is not in the 
 association of the presbyter with the old priest that 
 I find the degradation of the Christian Sacrament, but 
 in the confusion of the one with the other, in the 
 notion that the Christian presbyter was like the 
 Jewish, a witness of that mystery which was not yet 
 revealed, of a Lamb which had not yet been offered 
 and accepted — like the heathen, a witness that the 
 mind of the Father was to be made propitious by the 
 oblations of His creatures. Here is that mystery of The real 
 iniquity which I believe has ever been working itself con f uslon ' 
 out by the side of the mystery of godliness. I have 
 been tracing some of the indications of them both in 
 these last two Lectures ; and I wish you to meditate 
 on them well, that you may be able to watch their 
 growth in each subsequent century ; still more, that 
 you may be able to distinguish them in your own 
 hearts. 
 
LECTUEE VIII. 
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE EMPERORS. 
 
 Lect.viii. 'What I said about the Presbyter in my last 
 The Over- Lecture will have perplexed you, if you have not 
 S bLZ p . connected it with some hints which I threw out 
 respecting the constitution of the Church in former 
 Lectures. You will have observed that I have scarcely 
 ever used the word Bis/top in speaking of the 
 different Christian communities. I have abstained 
 from it, not because I dislike the word, or because 
 I think it does not fitly describe any class of per- 
 sons in the second century, but because it does not 
 at once suggest the meaning of the Greek word of 
 which it is the rendering. At the risk, therefore, 
 of appearing pedantic, I have talked of the " Over- 
 seers" of the Churches whenever I have had occasion 
 to translate the original word. But I have taken one 
 or two opportunities of remarking, that I do not think 
 that even this title expresses fully and satisfactorily the 
 condition of the person who commonly bore it, or the 
 Pawl- feeling with which the Church regarded him. I be- 
 "nmioTof lieve tnat not onl y in tnat century, but in all subse- 
 the Church, quent centuries, we should understand the character 
 of the Church better, if we resorted to our own old 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 343 
 
 English phrase of Fathers in God. There may be Lect.viii. 
 difficulties in the application of that phrase, arising 
 from various circumstances with which yon will 
 become more familiar hereafter. In later times, when 
 the Empire and the Church were united, Patriarchs 
 began to be distinguished from Bishops for civil 
 purposes, in a certain sense for ecclesiastical purposes. 
 The Patriarchs or Fathers in the East became asso- 
 ciated with certain sees ; in the West, the Bishop 
 of a particular see claimed to be the universal Pope 
 or Eather. But these very facts, though they cause 
 some embarrassment in the use of the word, make 
 our recollection of it the more necessary. It will give 
 a continuity to all your thoughts of Church history 
 if you fix it on your minds now. Above all, it will be 
 a great help in understanding the subject which I 
 touched upon at the close of the last Lecture, still 
 more in understanding the subject upon which I shall 
 speak to you in the present. 
 
 The Jewish nation, I said, was not only called out office of the 
 to bear witness against false gods, but against tyran- ™™ on in 
 nical men, against the scheme or system of society res P ect °f 
 
 J J great em- 
 
 which is denoted in Scripture as the Babel or Baby- pins. 
 Ionian system. The huge empires of the East were 
 the great antagonist powers to the Jewish nation. So 
 long as it maintained its own faith in God, its own 
 unity as a nation, so long its very existence bore 
 witness that a kingdom stands on righteousness, and 
 
 „ Supposed 
 
 not 011 force. extinction 
 
 When the Jewish nation was gone, in what way °/ this . 
 
 function m 
 
 could the Church take up this testimony ? We are the church. 
 
344 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. apt to think, many of us, that it might be a very- 
 effectual protester against paganism, that it might 
 by degrees undermine that ; but that it had not much 
 to do with the Roman polity, nay, that it was bound 
 to stand aloof from any interference with that polity. 
 The Christians of Rome were told by the Apostle in 
 the days of Nero, that they were to be subject to the 
 powers that be, nay, that Nero's power itself was 
 ordained of God. Were they to take part in con- 
 spiracies against the emperors? If they had, how 
 they would have displayed their weakness as men ! 
 how certainly they would have disobeyed God, and 
 have been refused any succour from Him ! 
 
 All this is very true, and all this was most distinctly 
 
 The Church acknowledged by the teachers of the second century. 
 
 ttslif'Zyai The apologists professed, without exception, the alle- 
 
 tothe giance and loyalty of the members of their com- 
 
 emjyerors. ° . 
 
 munity to the emperors. They challenged their 
 opponents to bring evidence which could convict 
 them of any acts of disloyalty ; they denied that they 
 were restrained from them by fear so much as by 
 conscience. To be treasonable to the visible king 
 woidcl be to sin against the invisible one; their 
 sacraments to the one bound them not to violate 
 their obligations to the other. 
 
 Not only is this true ; but it is true also that the 
 its huiif- Christians were indifferent to the policy of the Roman 
 ^proceed- empire in a way in which the old Jews never could be 
 ingsofthe indifferent to the policy of the nations which sur- 
 
 world at r •/ 
 
 large. rounded them. To a great extent Christians in the 
 
 second century cultivated this indifference. Their 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 345 
 
 citizenship, they said, was in heaven, — their hopes Lect.viii. 
 were there; the arrangements of states, the nego- 
 tiations and battles which other men deemed so 
 important, did not concern them. It was impossible 
 for men who were penetrated with the divine charity 
 to carry out this maxim; the famines, pestilences, 
 wars which afflicted the world, must have had a 
 solemn interest for those who loved Christ. Readers 
 of the Jewish Scriptures could not but perceive that 
 God was represented in them as taking part in mun- 
 dane events ; they could not suppose that these were 
 merely types of some spiritual principle. Yet this 
 was assuredly the inclination of their minds ; their 
 circumstances greatly favoured it. So far, therefore, 
 as the Chmch was under the direction of its teachers, 
 we may readily admit that it woidd have been per- 
 fectly innocent of any interference with the existing 
 conditions of the empire; that it would never have 
 given it that amount of disturbance to which it had 
 been subject from the province of Palestine before the 
 destruction of the Jewish capital. 
 
 But the Church was not under the direction of the The church 
 individual men who composed it; they had not the againsftL 
 power to determine how far they should affect the em P irein 
 
 x ° spite of 
 
 politics of the earth. We may say boldly, the itself. 
 Church could not have borne that protest which it 
 did bear against paganism, without bearing at the 
 very same moment a protest against the military 
 despotism of Rome : it could not undermine the one 
 without undermining the other. This truth has never 
 been fairly and fully proclaimed either by pagan, 
 
346 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.VIII. 
 
 The empe- 
 rors con- 
 scious of 
 the fact. 
 
 Tltey did 
 not merely 
 punish the 
 Christians 
 for oppos- 
 ing 
 Paganism ; 
 
 But as a 
 political 
 enemy. 
 
 Christian, or infidel writers ; but all these have 
 implicitly confessed it. The conviction has been forced 
 upon them, that the rise of the Church was neces- 
 sarily contemporaneous with the decline and fall of 
 the Roman empire. 
 
 The emperors themselves had a clearer instinct on 
 this subject than the members of the Church. There 
 was not one of them, from Nerva to Commodus, who 
 was not a man of much more than average intelli- 
 gence and average benevolence ; not one, with the 
 exception perhaps of Hadrian, for whom we may not 
 claim positive moral worth. It may be asserted, 
 almost as confidently, that just in proportion to their 
 worth, was their suspicion of the Christian Church. 
 Trajan feared it more than Hadrian ; Marcus Aurelius 
 feared it more than Trajan. The fact is undoubted ; 
 how is it to be accounted for ? 
 
 To say that the emperors were interested in the 
 support of paganism is true ; what I told you in the 
 last Lecture but one will show you how true it is. 
 The whole social condition of the empire was bound 
 up with the worship of the gods ; the hierarchy could 
 not be separated from the imperial system. But this 
 is not all the truth. The emperors evidently felt that 
 the Christian Church, as such, was dangerous to the 
 empire, as such ; mighty as the one was, insignificant 
 as the other was, they were antagonists, one of 
 which must perish if the other was to live. And the 
 more you consider the Church in that light in which 
 I have endeavoured to set it before you — as a family 
 or patriarchal society growing up in each city, with 
 
out. 
 
 THE SECOND CENTURY. 347 
 
 a father as its head, that father being a witness Lect.viii. 
 of a common Father in heaven — the more you will 
 perceive how reasonable this apprehension was ; how 
 much more formidable such a body was than one 
 which came forward with greater apparent pre- 
 tensions ; which encountered the military power with 
 its own weapons, or which merely exhibited the 
 pattern of a national fellowship, as the Jews had 
 done, in contrast with it. 
 
 If you speak of the Church as monarchical, or Old forms 
 aristocratical, or democratical, or as combining these mentworn 
 elements, you introduce notions with which the Greek 
 and the Roman world were perfectly familiar, — notions 
 that had been tried in different combinations, and had 
 been to all appearance exhausted. A society thus 
 constructed would have led men back to one of those 
 experiments which had been pronounced futile, on 
 the day when the general became the king of 
 kings. But here was an experiment of quite a 
 different kind, thrust upon the notice of all the 
 imperial provinces. It was the simplest, most primi- 
 tive of all forms of society, older than any of those 
 national forms which the great tyranny had extin- 
 guished. And this simplest form of society was also 
 proclaimed to be divine and comprehensive. God 
 was said to be revealing Himself as the Head and 
 Parent of a family, and that family was to spread 
 itself east and west, north and south, to the ends of 
 the earth. 
 
 Pliny found the Christians in Bithynia effecting 
 a real and practical, if not a permanent revolution. 
 
348 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. He was too wise a man not to know that a movement 
 
 Pliny's in the heart of a society, affecting its habits, customs, 
 
 sions re- principles, is far more serious than any which disturbs 
 
 Thurl the its surface - He had a right to feel and to warn his 
 
 well master, that he should not slight the indications of 
 
 such a movement, merely because the conduct of those 
 
 who professed the new superstition was orderly. He 
 
 had a right to think that a faith of this kind could 
 
 not be treated, as it was the policy of the empire to 
 
 treat the religions with which he had up to that time 
 
 been acquainted. There was a something in it which, 
 
 as a statesman, he could not but acknowledge had a 
 
 political, not merely a religious, significance. 
 
 nisjudg- This conclusion he arrived at upon evidence far 
 
 firmed by l ess clear and decisive than that which Trajan found 
 
 TraQwiCs ou {- f or himself, The venerable appearance of Igna- 
 
 ooservalions ■*■ L ° 
 
 at Antiock. this made the sort of influence he was exerting more 
 conspicuous. He was not merely the teacher of a 
 doctrine ; his disciples reverenced him on some other 
 ground than the words which he spoke. There was 
 an order and government of a very peculiar sort 
 among his people; they were evidently connected, 
 by secret ramifications, with men whom they had 
 never seen or heard of. Secret societies were pro- 
 hibited by the wisdom of the empire, as freemasons' 
 lodges are in some countries of modern Europe; 
 here was a secret society which might spread under- 
 ground through Europe and Asia, and which, if not 
 checked, might make itself known by some tremen- 
 dous explosion. 
 
 Such language applied to the fathers of the Church 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 349 
 
 may seem to us very strange ; but we must not evade lect.viii. 
 the force of it by false pleas, which are as inconsistent False 
 
 • l l 1 -j_i rn • ' mi attempts to 
 
 with our faith as they would be with irajan s. Ihe represent 
 real question is, whether the Church was revolu- t ^^^ i 
 tionary or regenerative ; whether it had a commission &»«• 
 to destroy Roman greatness, or to bring it forth out 
 of the mass of corruption under which it was hidden ; 
 whether it was disturbing the laws and principles 
 which bind man to man, or vindicating them and 
 placing them on their true and eternal foundation ; 
 whether it was going back to the source of order, and Revolution 
 refinement, and civilization, or merely hastening a Ztiln.^ 
 return to barbarism. This question must, of course, 
 be answered differently, according as we think that 
 the Church was or was not a body called out to be 
 a blessing to mankind. But the conclusions of the 
 emperors corresponded more strictly to the facts 
 which they saw — they have been more confirmed by 
 the experience of the world — than the doctrines of 
 those who pretend that the Church was a harmless 
 fellowship, which would have worked no mischief to 
 the dynasties of the earth, which would have left 
 them as it found them, if they had not rudely endea- 
 voured to crush it. The case is not so. We say of 
 the principles of this society — 
 
 "Igneus est ollis vigor et coelestis origo," 
 
 and its fiery strength was to manifest itself by con- 
 suming what was corrupt and insincere ; the celestial 
 origin was to make itself good by overcoming that 
 which had a dark and subterranean origin. 
 
350 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii, I have guarded you already against the supposition 
 The Empe- that the emperors were the direct or the main insti- 
 
 rors less 
 
 persecutes gators of the persecutions which have been reported 
 ftk - t0 us in different Churches. The mobs had far more 
 share in them than the proconsuls ; proconsuls were 
 often more responsible for them than the emperors. 
 Eusebius gives us several imperial rescripts (and if not 
 of positive authority, they may at least have a true 
 foundation), which were designed to abate the popu- 
 lar violence, and to give the Christians the advantage 
 of some of the laws which protected the other subjects 
 Nevertheless of the state. Such signs of moderation only make it 
 'obiigZZ more obvious that the policy which the best emperors 
 do their adopted was not the result of cruelty but of con- 
 
 titmost for _ , , 
 
 theextinc- viction ; being what they were, they could not act 
 
 ChZ?L the otherwise. As conservators of the state, they must 
 
 put down those who, with whatever motives, were to 
 
 all appearance working for the subversion of it. 
 
 Character I cannot doubt that it was the piety of the em- 
 
 ™ McJm peror Marcus Aurelius — his genuine unaffected piety, 
 
 Aureiius. as we vj as jjjg c i es i re f upholding the state which had 
 
 been committed to his care — that led him to feel more 
 
 strongly, and act more severely against the Christians, 
 
 than any of his predecessors. No one felt more 
 
 keenly and bitterly than he did, the decay of moral 
 
 strength among his people; few saw more clearly 
 
 that moral strength must be grounded upon faith in 
 
 the invisible. I wish you and I confessed as sincerely 
 
 as he seems to have done, the presence of a righteous 
 
 Judge of his acts and thoughts, or sought as much 
 
 to impress other men with that conviction. If his 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 351 
 
 subjects had lost so much of their faith in the gods Lkct.viii. 
 already — so much of their sense of right and wrong, — 
 what a crime it must be to make them more irreli- 
 gious still ! to take from them the sanctions upon 
 which their conduct depended ! Were not the Chris- 
 tians doing this? Were not they teaching citizens 
 and even slaves to despise the gods ? What a duty 
 must it be for him to do all that in him lay to stop 
 such an infection, to preserve and strengthen the 
 internal life of the empire, as the only means of pre- 
 serving its external machinery. 
 
 So I believe he reasoned, and such reasoning led Hisconduct, 
 him to be a persecutor. I should feel it a great sin to Jj^S^f 
 pass judgment upon him. We can see so clearly how v J ew ! ?™te 
 
 JUSt \jl 0,0 LC* 
 
 the subject may have presented itself to his mind; 
 we can tell so little that, in the same circumstances, 
 we might not have acted more harshly, less consci- 
 entiously, than he did. He was not a superstitious 
 man ; he laboured hard to deliver himself from su- 
 perstition, and to preserve an awe at once, and an 
 affection, for the divine Power. He thought, as most 
 statesmen and philosophers do, that the common 
 people must be superstitious in order to be moral ; 
 that fear of the future must be the chief means of 
 keeping them right ; but I do not find that he held 
 that opinion more strongly than many apparently 
 earnest believers in Christ hold it. And, looking at 
 the utterly corrupt and sunken condition of the world 
 in his day, what man had greater excuse for saying, 
 " Only the vulgarest motives can keep these people 
 from the most intolerable crimes " ? 
 
352 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. Those who had received the Gospel knew that this 
 
 Why Chris- reasoning, in which it might have been difficult to 
 
 sure tha/ detect a flaw, was radically and essentially false. They 
 
 they ought k new what had reclaimed them from evil habits and 
 
 to incur the 
 
 risk of un- principles — what alone could reclaim them. Nothing 
 the Roman but a message from God, that it was His will to set 
 religion,- them free from the secret chains by which they were 
 bound, could, they were sure, have enabled them to 
 cast away those chains ; they could not have heartily 
 confessed Him as a Lawgiver and a Judge, unless 
 they had first confessed Him as a Redeemer. They 
 could not therefore be careful to answer the arguments 
 of such men as Marcus Aurelius, though they may often 
 have been staggered by them ; they could leave them- 
 selves and the world too in God's hands. They were 
 sure that when they refused to offer sacrifice to the 
 image of the emperor, they were refusing to sanction 
 a lie which never could help to make Romans or any 
 Even men righteous or obedient ; they were sure that when 
 
 werelnda- they were owning Him who made the great sacrifice 
 mming it on fae cross to be the King of all kings, they were 
 empire asserting the truth which had restored them, and 
 which had power to restore the universe. They had 
 nothing more to do, but to offer themselves as sacri- 
 fices in that faith. Their cause was with the Lord, and 
 their work with their God. It was His world and 
 not theirs, in which they were dwelling ; in his own 
 good time, He might show clearly that the kingdoms 
 of it were the kingdoms of Him and of His Christ. 
 
 I can never affect to doubt that this faith of the 
 martyrs was a true faith, and consequently that their 
 
 together. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 353 
 
 preaching and their acts were, as Marcus Aurelius legt.viii. 
 and the emperors generally thought they were, helping influences 
 to break in pieces the fabric of the world as it then c »«z their 
 stood — helping to bring about an entirely new social ^22/ 
 order. But I cannot doubt, also, that there were feel- ( >fp° m ; 
 
 cal justice. 
 
 ings and notions working at that time in the minds of 
 Christians — to work more mightily afterwards — which 
 were greatly at variance with this faith, which served 
 even in that day to weaken and counteract the effects 
 of it, which have made the blessed issues of that 
 faith in after ages doubtful to many, which have 
 marred and debased them where their existence is 
 most manifest. Of these I must speak now, as I did 
 in the last Lecture of the causes which made the 
 Christian testimony against Paganism feeble and con- 
 tradictory. 
 
 I. The catechetical teachers of Alexandria — admi- 1. 2%e spa- 
 rable and noble men as they were, and great as the J u t c ^ s " 
 service was which they rendered in certain directions ^""" 
 
 " , drians. 
 
 to the Gospel — cannot be said to have assisted in 
 giving effect to this part of its witness. By asserting 
 the knowledge of God to be the supreme good, 
 by setting Him forth as willing to give His crea- 
 tures this knowledge, they struck at the root of 
 Polytheism ; but they left the rulers of the earth the 
 only region which they claimed, to use it as they 
 might. I do not call them abstract speculators; 
 I have said that they were practical teachers, helpers 
 of Jews, Gentiles, and Christians, men who brought 
 their knowledge to bear on common difficulties and 
 outward temptations. But they were in no sense 
 
 A A 
 
354 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. politicians ; they scarcely contemplated the Church 
 was a polity ; they looked upon it — in the best, not 
 in the party, sense of that word — as a school. What- 
 ever revelations of the Scriptures bore upon spiritual 
 truths, they grasped with a wonderful intuition ; 
 whatever revelations bore upon the order and govern- 
 ment of earth, they twisted to a spiritual sense. 
 They held out no promise or hope, therefore, of 
 a reformation of human society ; the wishes that 
 pointed to such an object had apparently little which 
 
 Theydis- answered to them in their hearts. The Apocalypse 
 
 /■j Z»/> iff fi 
 
 Apocalypse. they were inclined to disbelieve in, because it seemed 
 to speak of a redeemed earth. Here was their weak- 
 ness, and it was the cause of an opposite weakness 
 elsewhere. 
 
 2. The Mil- n. For there was a very decided reaction in another 
 
 lenarian 
 
 doctrine a part of the Church against these spiritualising ten- 
 
 al/ainsuhis dencies — a very strong determination to say, " God 
 
 tendency. ] ias spoken about the things of earth as well as the 
 
 things of heaven, and we will take His words in their 
 
 plain and obvious sense." The cardinal illustration of 
 
 this tendency is to be found in the latter chapters of 
 
 Faith of the fifth book of Irenaeus, from the 3 2d chapter to the 
 
 Irenceus in - to 1 1 1 • 
 
 a reign of end. borne persons seem these chapters nothing but 
 earth not carna l dreams. I confess they are to me exceedingly 
 camai delightful, not only as protests against the rage for alle- 
 gorising which was gaining so much ground in the 
 Church — not only as a healthy attempt to maintain that 
 
 1 To confound the doctrine of Irenseus with that of Cerinthus is 
 shamefully unjust. If any one will carefully read the chapter to which 
 I have referred, he will find that Irenseus was much farther from the 
 sensualists than he was from the allcfforisers. 
 
THE SECOND CENTUKY. 355 
 
 vines and fig-trees are vines and fig-trees in the Bible Lect.viii. 
 as they would be elsewhere — but also for the bright and 
 cheerful hopes which they show were dwelling in this 
 good man's heart. He was sure that God had made the 
 fields to bring forth and bud, and that some day the 
 most barren of them would give seed to the sower, and 
 bread to the eater ; he was sure that some day there 
 would be righteousness, and not violence, in the deal- 
 ings of men with each other. There, among his wild 
 Gauls, he was cherishing these visions of what should 
 be after the resurrection of the just : he knew not how 
 much he was doing that they might be fulfilled. 
 
 Why, then, do I set down these visions as among But it was 
 the signs that the Church was not fully understanding ^w&epro* 
 her work ? Because it seems to me that though Ire- i' cted ini0 
 
 the future. 
 
 nseus was right to expect that Christ's kingdom should 
 come on the earth, — though it was good and whole- 
 some for him to think that God's will should be done 
 there as well as in heaven — he was not believing the 
 words, which he refused to allegorise, in their full and 
 plain sense, so long as he failed to acknowledge that 
 this kingdom had come, that Christ was even then the 
 King of the earth, and that every man who was 
 baptized with water, or who baptized the earth with 
 his blood, was declaring audibly to the emperors 
 and their servants, " This Gaul, and Italy, and Africa, 
 are verily His, and not yours." 
 
 Irenseus hoped that after the resurrection, the earth Ropes of 
 would be what God meant it to be. He might have be a / ter t j ie 
 been — must have been — right, that when he joined the resurrec - 
 assembly of the just made perfect, he should see more 
 
 a a 2 
 
356 °N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. blessings descending upon the earth than he had seen 
 while he was upon it ; perhaps he might be the instru- 
 ment of bestowing many more upon it than he could 
 win for it here. He might be right that mighty and 
 long battles would have to be fought, and new crimes 
 committed, and new dynasties established and over- 
 thrown, before the cross of Christ would thoroughly 
 subdue either Romans or Celts ; but he could not be 
 right in postponing to a distant future that supremacy 
 which the Church, by all her acts, by the form of her 
 polity, by her very existence, was asserting for her 
 Master in that day. 
 The third III. This was a truth to which Christians of another 
 defenders °l ass were strongly alive. They felt that the order 
 of the f £] ie C] mrc h was a rea ] arK [ divine order; that God 
 
 Church as 
 
 anexhtiwj must have established it; that the preservation of it 
 was as sacred a part of their duty as the preservation 
 Feeling of of their faith. Supposing all the passages of Ignatius 
 andTmia- about the authority of the Overseer were struck out 
 tins. f his letters, still there is both in him and in Clemens 
 
 a sense of the unspeakable necessity of order to the 
 existence of the Church, a demand for a filial obe- 
 dience on the part of its members to those who are 
 set over them, which cannot be got rid of, and 
 which indicated even more than they expressed. 
 Evidently these writers perceived a very close and 
 intimate relation between the divine Name on which 
 the society stood, and its political constitution, — a 
 very strong conviction that any disturbance of its 
 unity, through the insubordination of any of its 
 members, might be fatal to its inward life, as well 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 357 
 
 as to the effect which it was to produce on the lect.viii. 
 world. 
 
 And surely they were right. When our Lord laid Radical 
 down the principle, that in His kingdom the chief of f the 
 all is the servant of all, He proclaimed the great f?™ om 
 paradox on which all society rests, one which the 
 ruler of states and the chief of hosts must act upon, 
 if subjects and armies are not to be in slavery or in 
 anarchy. But in the Church this law was to be em- 
 bodied and carried out, that men might see it working 
 there, and confess it to be indeed God's law, and the 
 law of their lives. The restless assertion of rights 
 and powers, in one brother against another, Clemens 
 and Ignatius felt must be destructive of the Church's 
 polity, and therefore of its testimony. In one of the Distinc- 
 passages in the letters, which is omitted in the defivMions. 
 modern version, the Overseer is spoken of as the key- 
 note of a symphony. The words may be interpolated ; 
 but they indicate a feeling which was more charac- 
 teristic of Ignatius than of those who, in later times, 
 are likely to have abused his name for the purpose 
 of drawing formal lines about the different offices of 
 the Church. The disposition to do this soon made 
 itself manifest. One can never tell what circumstances 
 may justify the establishment of clear and verbal 
 definitions about the limits of the power which this 
 or that man is to exercise. They may become indis- 
 pensable, but they presume £he existence of some- 
 thing wrong; and if they check the growth of the 
 wrong in one direction, they often promote it in 
 another. In the Church order everything, as we have 
 
358 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. seen, depended upon the acknowledgment of relations 
 Relations between the ministers and members of the Church. 
 
 and offices. 
 
 If this acknowledgment was lost, and they began to 
 be regarded as mere officials, their character was lost ; 
 nor did you restore it by calling them divine officials, 
 by saying that God put them into their places. No 
 doubt He did ; but the places which they claimed 
 when they began to jostle each other, and to fight 
 about precedence, were not those which He meant 
 for them. 
 
 This is a point which ought especially to be under- 
 stood in reading; Church history. You will hear 
 
 Orders in ° d 
 
 the c/Mrch. great discussions about the time when the Orders in 
 the Church began to be clearly distinguished from 
 each other, when the Overseer obtained the full 
 recognition of his difference from the Presbyter, when 
 the Presbyter learnt how he stood apart from the 
 Deacon, when the broad line was drawn between the 
 Clergy and the people or Laity. You will find much 
 learning on all sides; you will sometimes be quite 
 bewildered by the evidence which shows that these 
 differences were and were not clearly perceived in the 
 second century. You will hear of a number of offices 
 besides these, all demanded by the gradually in- 
 creasing wants of the Church ; and you will be asked 
 how these were distinguished from what we in 
 England commonly call the three Orders. 
 a Polity I believe, as I have told you, that the polity of 
 
 Hierarchy, the Church is not made up of a set of offices, three 
 or more; that it has a different and much deeper 
 ground. But just as men very early began to think 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 359 
 
 of substituting a Christian religion for the Gospel of Leot.viii. 
 Jesus Christ, so I think they very early began to 
 think of substituting a hierarchy for a polity. There 
 was a hierarchy in the Roman empire — a huge 
 sacerdotal machinery. It had lost its root in any- 
 thing sacred or divine ; but it was a vast scheme of 
 offices which the imperial power was anxious to pre- 
 serve, hoping to be preserved by it. Weak as the 
 Church was at first, it had promises and pledges of 
 expansion in it. Might it not some day expand into Earthly 
 such an hierarchy as this ? Rome did not grow in ^ITthf 
 a day. Its walls were once said to have been leaped Chur & 
 
 • t might he. 
 
 over by the brother of their founder. Why might 
 
 not the walls of the Church, if they were well laid and 
 
 carefully cemented now, rise into as goodly a city ? 
 
 Alas ! it was too true a dream. They might do The divine 
 
 this ; the Church might become the image of this ££"** 
 
 old hierarchical system. But God had a different interact- 
 ing each 
 
 work for her; she was sent to remould His world, other. 
 not to make a world for herself. A number of men 
 in the second century were working for the first end, 
 laboriously and lovingly ; there were those who were 
 working chiefly for the other. It cannot be affirmed 
 that the false idea was not mixed with the true in 
 the one, nor the true with the false in the other. We 
 cannot ascertain the amount of right or wrong in 
 any person ; but history shows what were the results 
 of the right and the wrong, — that the true Church- 
 man was working out deliverance, that the false was 
 forging fresh chains for mankind. 
 
 IV. But there is a fourth aspect of this subject, 
 
3G0 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect.viii. which came before us while we were studying the 
 The church recorc l s f the Roman Church. There was not merely 
 
 looking out 
 
 for a capi- a tendency to establish the Church into a hierarchy of 
 offices ; there was a tendency to give that hierarchy a 
 centre. You cannot wonder that such a feeling should 
 have arisen very early indeed in the minds of Church- 
 men — arisen long before they were aware of it them- 
 selves. Their Jewish origin must never be overlooked 
 or forgotten. The sense of succeeding to Jewish privi- 
 leges and responsibilities was, as I have endeavoured 
 to make you feel, most precious and important to 
 
 Jerusalem their existence. But Jerusalem had been a centre 
 to the Jewish faith and polity. It had perished 
 through its rejection of the true King. Why might 
 He not be acknowledged in some other great city? 
 Why might He not make that His capital ? If this 
 were possible, what must the city be ? Must it not 
 be the one to which God had already given the 
 dominion of the world? 
 
 The Jewish It is not a mere fancy that such thoughts were at 
 
 or Ebionitic i • ,i i c ,, • ,■ T1 
 
 feeling mix- work m the minds ot men at this time. I nave 
 itigmth re f errec i to the Homilies which bear the name of 
 
 lite Latin. 
 
 Clement, and which are worked up into a story in the 
 Recognitions. They must have been written shortly 
 after the second century, probably in it. There we 
 see a very curious process. The Ebionite, the man 
 whose whole faith was in the city where St. James 
 presided, and in him as the teacher of what he took 
 to be the pure original Jewish religion, as reformed 
 by Christ the divine Prophet, transfers his affections 
 to Rome, looks upon St. Peter as holding there the 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 361 
 
 place which St. James held at Jerusalem, and assumes lect.yiii. 
 the name of Clemens that he may magnify this new •^ mes > 
 position, and connect it with the old ideas. This Clemens. 
 seems to be the true meaning of these documents. 
 It has been somewhat lost sight of because the 
 person who wrote them, in conformity with his 
 Ebionitic notions, makes many remarks about Sa- 
 crifice which were not in accordance with the 
 after doctrines of the Roman Church, and mixes 
 heretical traditions with his pretended narratives of 
 the apostolical teaching. Nevertheless, he does very 
 distinctly enable us to trace the unfolding of the 
 notion, that St. Peter was to be the primate of 
 a universal society, and was to have Rome for his 
 New Jerusalem. And lie does very clearly show 
 that the root of that opinion must lie in a low con- 
 ception of our Lord's character and work; in the Forgetful- 
 
 716SS Of 
 
 acknowledgment of Him as a great Prophet and Christ as 
 Teacher, who delegates His authority to some man, ^ e a ^' tthe 
 not as the eternal King and Overseer of His Church, root of the 
 not as the living Corner-stone by which alone it is theory . 
 held together. Believing this to be the fact, I can- 
 not help looking upon the stories respecting Victor as 
 additional illustrations of a tendency, which though 
 only beginning to show itself, yet was showing itself 
 in the second century. 
 
 The Church then was the witness to the world 
 of a living and righteous King, who is the centre 
 of all society, the bond of the visible and invisible 
 world, the Judge of empires, who will shatter in Summary 
 pieces all powers that are not righteous, who will 
 
362 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect.viii. raise the nations out of their thraldom and death 
 to a new life. Churchmen were secretly cherishing 
 the thought that it would be glorious to have a great 
 city for their centre, to sit there and use the power 
 which the emperors had used, to have the nations for 
 their subjects and not their masters, and therefore 
 to be able to crush them more than the Caesars had 
 crushed them. 
 
LECTURE IX. 
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE PHILOSOPHERS. 
 
 There are many periods in history in which a Lect. ix. 
 separate notice of the relations of the Church to the Unimpon- 
 
 1 m ance of 
 
 teachers of philosophy would be quite unnecessary, philosophy 
 When philosophers shut themselves up in schools, to ti ^ eg Ul 
 dispute even about the greatest and deepest ques- 
 tions — when Philosophy makes itself a profession, 
 apart from the business of mankind — we may afford 
 to leave it for those who prefer it to some other 
 amusement, and who have not discovered that we 
 live for some other end than to talk. 
 
 In the second century, there was the ordinary amount E<m the 
 of persons who reduced philosophy into a profession, in tke 
 nay, into a trade — perhaps we might say, more than s ™™ d cc>1 ' 
 the ordinary amount. But the excess, if it existed, 
 was caused by the fact that there were many who 
 regarded it quite in a different light ; who turned tc 
 it, not as an escape from the realities of life, but as a 
 help to face them; who considered it as no school 
 business, but connected it with facts, and history, and 
 experience; who sought by means of it to solve con- 
 tradictions which tormented them in their daily 
 practice ; who hoped by it to rule empires better — 
 
364 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. I must say also, to serve and know God better. For 
 Christians, therefore, to be indifferent about the move- 
 ments of philosophers in this age was impossible. 
 You have seen in a number of instances how impos- 
 sible it was. They encountered it in the most various 
 shapes, before and after they had accepted the Gospel ; 
 it had already given the form and colour to the 
 minds of many when they first heard of Christ : they 
 must determine afterwards in what relation their old 
 search and their new discoveries stood to each other. 
 The old Tor the reason I have just given you, it is not 
 
 IxistLy. desirable that you should merely learn from some 
 digest of opinions what schools of philosophy were 
 prevalent at this time. You will be told, and told 
 truly, that there were Epicureans, and Academicians, 
 and Peripatetics, and Stoics now, as there had been 
 for many generations before ; that they disputed 
 about some old and some new questions ; and that 
 names have been preserved to us of disputers who 
 were more famous than the rest. But this infor- 
 mation is not exactly what you want. You should 
 try to find out what were the effective thoughts 
 that were at work in the heart of the Roman 
 empire at this time, — what forms they took, — how 
 they mingled with other influences, — how the Gospel 
 But they came into contact with them. You will not find, I 
 tlttlt the believe, that these thoughts cast themselves exactly 
 philosophy m t tlie moulds which the digests present to us; 
 
 of the time. . 
 
 they made moulds for themselves, working up more 
 or less of the old material, preserving some of the 
 old names, but not so that they can be described by 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 365 
 
 tliem ; the most living part of men's convictions was Lect. ix. 
 that to which these names did not correspond. 
 I will try, though I doubt of my success, to give 
 you a few hints which may enable you to discrimi- 
 nate the habits and modes of thought which most 
 affected this time, and which have left the greatest 
 impression on after times. You will not then 
 winder that you have heard Justin, Athenagoras, 
 Clemens — even Irenaeus and Tertullian — discoursing 
 so much about philosophy, and its bearing upon 
 Christianity. 
 
 I. There was what I shall call, though there The hiatm-i- 
 may, perhaps, be a much better name for it, the sop k^ 
 Historical Philosophy. A man who lived in the 
 empire — after it had swallowed up all Greece and 
 some of the cultivated regions of the East, after the 
 glory of Rome itself as a free city was departed — • 
 woidd ask himself whence the power had been de- 
 rived which had raised states to consequence, and by 
 which individual men had achieved greatness. He 
 would be struck with characteristic differences be- 
 tween the conquering and the conquered race — the 
 Latin and the Greek ; with the reverence, subordina- 
 tion, and domestic fidelity, which had been the source 
 of strength to the one ; with the subtlety, the power 
 of distinguishing, the acknowledgment of mind as 
 mightier than matter, which had belonged to the 
 other. If he w T as a Greek himself, he would dwell Comparison 
 much on this last quality ; he would see that it had ° an dLatLs. 
 availed to give the Greek a triumph even in his 
 fall and slavery, — that it had made him the teacher 
 
3G0 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. of his rulers. He would begin to think that in this 
 secret wisdom, this victory of the man over the animal, 
 lay the real power of both races, the real power of 
 each person who had been illustrious in either. In 
 this sense philosophy, or the love and pursuit of 
 wisdom, would appear to him the explanation both 
 of biography and history. But at the same time he 
 could not fail, — if he were an earnest man, with an 
 historical mind, — to observe in the fall of nations, 
 Divine in the humiliation of those that had so many pledges 
 g Zl'iT eHt of dominion and permanence, the signs of a govern- 
 historg. men t that was higher than man's. Such an observer 
 would listen much more reverently than the mere 
 speculators were wont to listen, to the popular doc- 
 trines respecting the rule of the gods, and their 
 interest in human affairs. He would be quite unable 
 to account for the progress of events, and even for 
 the exaltation and depression of individuals, if he cast 
 aside these doctrines with the contempt which the 
 extravagances and absurdities that accompanied them 
 had begotten in the minds of many thinkers of his 
 Thephih- own and former ages. The grave testimonies of poets 
 sopherseeh- ag we ^ ag f statesmen to a continual Providence 
 
 mg aid 
 
 from the over them and over the world, would strike him as 
 Editions, worthy of the most serious consideration; it was 
 unphilosophical as well as impious to disregard them. 
 The belief of a directing Power or Spirit over the 
 human spirit, which had been held so strongly by 
 Socrates, and by many besides him, would seem to our 
 thinker still more reasonable and necessary ; perhaps 
 the very condition and principle of philosophy might lie 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 3G7 
 
 in that belief. Holding it, lie would feel as Socrates Lect. ix. 
 
 did, that it was not safe to trifle with popular opinions ; 
 
 that they all pointed to a truth which men could not 
 
 grasp, but which was essential to their existence. But 
 
 he would be as sensible as Socrates was — more so, Dread of 
 
 , ,, n i • ip ±' ■ -"rcrsfition. 
 
 because the progress ot centuries and ot corruptions 
 
 had made the effects of superstition more palpable — 
 
 what perils lay in many of the current and popular 
 
 notions ; how they destroyed the moral strength and 
 
 freedom of men ; how they degraded the nature of 
 
 the divine Power ; how they made evil and not good 
 
 an object of reverence and fear to man. Such a man 
 
 as I am giving you a sketch of coidd not, therefore, 
 
 attach himself to any school or sect of philosophers. 
 
 His opinions would seem to those who did, often 
 
 indefinite, often contradictory ; perhaps they would 
 
 not seldom seem so to himself. But they would be BemUs of 
 
 the result of a fair and honest study of history. There cau,^,,;',,. 
 
 might be many mistakes in his conclusions about it, 
 
 as well as in his judgment of the facts of it ; but, on 
 
 the whole, his observations must be important to 
 
 himself, and important to after times. They must 
 
 have taught him of principles which concerned his 
 
 own being, and the life of the universe. If he could 
 
 not fully act out his own convictions of what was 
 
 rio-ht, he will have discovered some of the causes 
 
 of his failure, something of the source whence his 
 
 help must come. If he could not harmonise all the 
 
 puzzles of generations, he could at least put them in 
 
 such order — he could group them so together — that 
 
 when the light fell upon them from some higher 
 
368 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IX. 
 
 Plutarch, 
 the speci- 
 men of 
 these histo- 
 rical stu- 
 dents. 
 
 The Pytha- 
 goreans. 
 
 Traditions 
 
 of Pytha- 
 goras. 
 
 sun, they would no longer appear as mere atoms 
 whirling and striking against each other in a chaos. 
 
 You must not think that I have been drawing a 
 fancy sketch. If you read Plutarch of Chaeronea, 
 and compare the work of his which you have known 
 from childhood with his more learned and elaborate, 
 but not really more instructive and philosophical, 
 works, you will find that I have represented to you an 
 actual man, the most remarkable assuredly of a class, 
 but still one who could not have existed alone, — 
 who shows us what was passing in a number of other 
 minds, though they might not be able to utter it as 
 he did. 
 
 II. The next class of thinking men who were 
 producing a strong impression at this time, I shall 
 denote by what will sound more like the name of 
 a sect than that which I chose under the last head. 
 I must call them the Pythagoreans, for it is the name 
 by which they would probably have liked to call 
 themselves. But there had been a Pythagorean 
 school existing for many ages in Greece, and still 
 possessing its regular teachers, with whom they would 
 not have wished to identify themselves at all, to 
 whom, in fact, they had no real resemblance. Their 
 delight was to think of the man whose name this 
 sect had adopted, not of its doctrines and dispu- 
 tations. 
 
 They did not, indeed, know much of Pythagoras. 
 He had left no writings ; the traditions respecting him 
 were most of them very uncertain. What is clear 
 about him, is that he felt himself inspired with his 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 369 
 
 wisdom by God ; that the divine Unity was the great lect. ix. 
 
 object of his search ; that he gathered about him a influence. 
 
 band of zealous, loving disciples ; that he cultivated ° on \^ 
 
 in them habits of silence, and reverence for some second 
 
 century. 
 
 Being whom they could not see with their eyes, or 
 comprehend with then understandings ; that his ends 
 were political ; that he desired to reform society more 
 than to propagate a doctrine ; that he actually esta- 
 blished a community in South Italy, which passed 
 through many struggles, and at last was extinguished, 
 — these were the facts of his history which made the 
 miraculous tales of him credible to the men of this 
 time, and made them think that if they proposed to 
 themselves the same objects as their Samian master, 
 they might, perhaps, receive the divine power on 
 which he appeared to depend. It is clear from the nd>- false- 
 books of Lucian of Samosata, the great wit and 
 scoffer of this age, that these Pythagorean doctors 
 were many of them pretenders and quacks ; that they 
 connected themselves with the ordinary enchanters, 
 and perhaps supplied them with a doctrine which 
 they might use for the purposes of their trade. All 
 of them may have been liable to fall into this de- 
 pravity; few may have been altogether free from 
 it. But it would be a great mistake to suppose v 
 that even those who were most chargeable with 
 imposture, or most yielded to the temptation to 
 become impostors, did not start with a higher aim, 
 and did not retain to the last some of the impulses 
 which had prompted them at first. One of them, 
 who belongs to the first century, but whose name 
 
 B B 
 
370 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. became chiefly celebrated in the third, Apollonius of 
 Apoiionius. Tyana, must, I think, have been an enthusiastic 
 young man, with a real desire to improve the condi- 
 tion of the world around him, with a conviction that 
 it could only be reformed by Divine Wisdom, and 
 that the influence of that Wisdom must be exerted 
 to deliver men from their slavery to visible and evil 
 powers. If he ultimately cared only to magnify 
 his own name, and to establish his influence over 
 people and kings, the history is a sad and a too 
 common one ; we might be sure that his means 
 would then become wicked, because his end was 
 wicked ; that being false at heart, he would pretend 
 that the divine power which he had once looked 
 for to maintain him in speaking the truth, was im- 
 parted to make his lies effectual. 
 Wherein Under all its conditions of good and evil, this 
 
 mwTJn'his Pythagorean teaching was very strikingly indicative 
 movement f the direction which men's thoughts were taking in 
 
 consists. . 
 
 the second century. It showed how little they could 
 acquiesce in the mere formulas of older schools, and 
 yet how little they could separate themselves from the 
 ages that were past; how needful it was that they 
 should establish a connexion with those ages, and 
 should recover, as the most precious part of their 
 inheritance, the truths which the earliest teachers 
 and lawgivers had proclaimed. This necessity came 
 forth very remarkably in a portion of the Pytha- 
 goreans, who appear to have been less busy in the 
 affairs of the world, and more busy in their closets 
 Numenius. and their hearts. One of these, Numenius, discovered 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 37 \ 
 
 that Moses had anticipated the principles which lect.ix. 
 
 Attic philosophers had afterwards unfolded. He had 
 
 an instinctive conviction that the Hebrew lore must 
 
 in some way illustrate and interpret the Greek lore ; 
 
 and when he began to inquire in what way, he seems 
 
 to have reached this point, that the absolute and 
 
 eternal Being, the I AM of whom Moses spoke, He 
 
 who Pythagoras said was only to be thought of in 
 
 silence, must act upon men and the universe, though 
 
 a Being like Himself, one with Himself. 
 
 III. The third most interesting and living form of The Roman 
 thought at this time would be ordinarily described as 
 the Stoical. If you will qualify that word by calling 
 it the Roman-Stoical, I do not object, though I ques- 
 tion whether there would not be a little cheating in 
 the use of such a double adjective, like that which 
 we practise when we talk of a knife as the same, 
 though the blade and handle are both new. At any 
 rate, the Stoicism which I am going to describe to 
 you is unlike, in nearly all particulars, to the notion 
 which we have formed, and not wrongly formed, from 
 some of the intimations we have of it in the times 
 from which it dates its origin. Marcus Aurelius, of 
 whom I have already spoken to you in his imperial 
 character, is the Roman Stoic of this period. To 
 him we refer when we speak of the influence of this 
 form of philosophy on the time. It is manifest from Writings 
 his writings that he was surrounded by many, who, ^ ure u USt 
 though immeasurably inferior to himself, yet had both 
 communicated impressions to him, and received an 
 impression from him; so that we should be autho- 
 
 b b 2 
 
372 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 His charac- 
 ter the oppo- 
 site of that 
 we usually 
 attribute to 
 the Stoics. 
 
 lect. ix. rized, even if lie had not governed a world, in taking 
 him as the representative of a state of mind of 
 which very many were, consciously or unconsciously, 
 partakers. 
 
 You ought, then, to understand that Marcus 
 Aurelius, instead of being, what we are wont to 
 suppose a Stoic must be, a man of a specially hard, 
 unbending nature, was peculiarly tender and consi- 
 derate of others. His failures were on this side. He 
 had an indifferent wife, and a detestable son. His 
 main error was over-indulgence to both, an unwilling- 
 ness to believe anything wrong of them. He had 
 a profound affection and reverence for his mother; 
 there was not one of his friends towards whom he did 
 not show an almost overwhelming gratitude. He 
 was willing to learn from all quarters, from the schools 
 which were at the furthest remove from the Stoics, 
 as well as from them. He was, so far as we can judge, 
 humble in his opinion of his own doings ; certainly, 
 self-suspicious and watchful over his thoughts as well 
 as over his acts. The severity which entitled him to 
 be called a Stoic was directed towards himself; he 
 evidently felt that he knew errors in his own heart 
 which he could not attribute to his fellow-men ; and 
 that, therefore, Roman justice obliged him to pass a 
 sentence on himself which he could not pass on theim 
 He was conscious, at the same time, that he was not 
 
 His sense of competent to sit in judgment upon the transactions 
 
 an inward r> i • tp i ,i it • iii. 
 
 judge, °* ms own n * e > ne was thoroughly convinced that 
 and of his there was a Judge continually near him and with him, 
 
 duty to his . 
 
 people. to whom his secret intents were exposed. He never 
 
 His 
 
 modesty 
 and self- 
 suspicion. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 373 
 
 for a moment fancied that he could separate himself Lect. ix. 
 from the people whom he governed, or make a cha- 
 racter or secure a reward for himself whilst he was 
 indifferent to them. He was not to call himself a 
 philosopher, and to despise people who were not phi- 
 losophers; his philosophy was to make him more 
 conscious of his responsibility as their guardian, or 
 it was worth nothing. 
 
 I give you the picture of Marcus Aurelius as I find Expiana- 
 
 ...-,. .,. ,,. . r ,. tion of his 
 
 it m his writings, not being conscious ot any motive v ^ e in the 
 or inclination to exaggerate his merits, but saying of Gos i> eL 
 him what I think is true, and what excellent Chris- 
 tians have said of him before, applying the lesson to 
 their own humiliation. If he was such as I have 
 represented him, we should not take any pains to 
 conceal the fact from ourselves and others, but rather 
 lay it to heart, and ask what it means. I believe 
 the Gospel will tell us what it means ; that nothing- 
 else can ; and that some of the preachers of the 
 Gospel in this century were able both to interpret 
 the fact, and to understand what obligations it im- 
 posed upon them ; how bound they were to proclaim 
 that which Marcus Aurelius did not believe ; how it 
 was confirmed, not refuted, by that which was right 
 and wise in him ; how little he could find any sub- 
 stitute for it ; how, if he persecuted it, they must die 
 for it. 
 
 IV. I have one more class of influences to men- Thephysi- 
 tion, which I think I ought not to pass over, because ™ Z J s A *i° s °" 
 they must have been powerful, though the subject is && time - 
 one that I do not at all understand, and could not speak 
 
374 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. ix. much of without exposing my ignorance. Galen, the 
 Gakn. great physician, belongs to this age ; he was intimate 
 with Marcus Aurelius, and was honoured by him. 
 No man, I suppose, in his own sphere better deserves 
 the name of a philosopher ; for he seems to have been 
 an honest searcher into the mysteries of nature, as 
 well as an earnest and reverent one. Nor did he in 
 the least confine himself either to the labours of his own 
 profession, or to the studies which immediately bear 
 upon it. He felt how closely it was related to the 
 whole life of man ; how impossible it is to separate 
 nature from that which is above nature ; how much 
 those who deal with the body of man have need to 
 understand the entire man. Like those I have spoken 
 of hitherto, he was not the follower of any one of the 
 sects, which were as numerous and as strange in me- 
 dicine as in morals. Neither did he attempt a formal 
 and artificial reconciliation of their opinions, but 
 marched boldly on in the investigation of nature, and 
 so learnt what there was in these theories which 
 answered to facts, and what contradicted them. 
 ah these ]\j t one of those courageous and intelligent students 
 
 men igno- 
 rant of whom I have enumerated felt that the Gospel was 
 
 itllndif- speaking to them. All, with more or less decision, con- 
 ferent to it, olxaclecl that either it had nothing to say to the questions 
 
 or opposed , _ . . 
 
 to it. with which they were occupied, or that it stifled these 
 
 questions, or that it gave a false answer to them. What 
 Plutarch thought of it we guess only by his silence. 
 Many of the Pythagoreans even in that century felt 
 that it was an intruding rival into their province. 
 Marcus Aurelius not only endeavoured to put it down 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 375 
 
 as a statesman and religious man, but still more Lect. ix. 
 emphatically, and with a kind of personal indignation, Feelings of 
 because its disciples, being vulgar people, had attained A ^ihcs 
 by a kind of spring to that contempt of death, and a^dOaien. 
 that power of encountering it in its worst form, which 
 was one of the special and hardly won privileges 
 of the trained philosopher. Galen had seen some 
 Christians, for whose zeal and fidelity he expressed 
 the kind of admiration which a friendly and truth- 
 ful onlooker might express ; yet though he was no 
 sceptic or heathen fanatic, but a devout man, he 
 never seems to have fancied that the Gospel could 
 assist him in his inquiries, or throw any fresh light 
 on the relation of spirit to body. 
 
 On the other hand, Justin, as we have heard, em- Reference 
 braced Christianity expressly as the true philosophy. 
 That was the form in which it revealed itself to 
 him; he claimed it, and knew it by that title. I 
 hope you have got enough glimpses into his character 
 to have seen that the Gospel was not less dear to his 
 inmost heart — was not embraced less by him with 
 the spirit of a child — because he contemplated it 
 thus. His account of the struggles through which 
 he passed is evidence enough that he yielded to 
 the Son of God as a weak and faint warrior, who 
 knows that he has no strength left in himself, and 
 has found the only Lord he ever ought to have 
 obeyed, not as a servant who is seeking a new 
 master, because he wants greater independence and 
 higher wages. A more genuine conversion than 
 his, one could not easily find or read of in any 
 
376 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect, ix. time. We feel at once that it could not have been 
 as true as it is, if he had cast his old life aside, 
 and pretended to think all philosophy contemptible. 
 A comparison of his writings with some who did 
 adopt that language, will show whether he or they 
 bowed most simply and humbly to the Scriptures, 
 and most submitted his wisdom to theirs. Never- 
 oijections theless it may fairly be questioned — I ventured to 
 
 to ItlS fO V' 
 
 muia. throw out the doubt, when I was alluding to his 
 story — whether the words, " Christianity is the true 
 philosophy," were well chosen to express Justin's 
 inmost conviction, and whether the adoption of that 
 
 Embarrass- formula did not greatly embarrass him in his after 
 
 merit which <i i . t ,• tt j. * i v i l 
 
 it caused thoughts and practice. He certainly did not mean 
 him. that Christianity was another sect of philosophy ; he 
 
 vehemently disclaimed sectarianism, as inconsistent 
 with the idea of philosophy. Nor did he mean that 
 the Gospel was a search after wisdom, which every 
 philosophy is and ought to be. He looked upon 
 it, — his Dialogue with Tryplio proves decisively 
 that he did, nay, it is the very burden of the 
 dialogue, — as the announcement of a truth from 
 above, which could not be arrived at by any seek- 
 ing. This conviction he could not sacrifice. But 
 neither could he sacrifice the belief that the divine 
 Teacher had awakened those thoughts which the 
 revelation met, and that the revelation, instead of 
 making him less a seeker than he was before, led 
 him continually to more earnest and more devoted 
 investigations into the mysteries of the eternal Mind. 
 He was, I think, puzzled to reconcile in words these 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 377 
 
 two testimonies of his conscience. He reconciled lect. ix. 
 them, in fact, by his strong faith in the living and 
 divine Word — a faith which comes ont in all the 
 brightest and noblest passages both of the Dialogue 
 and the Apology, and which formed the radical and 
 substantive belief in Justin's heart. Still that in- 
 convenient phrase, of Christianity being the true Effect on the 
 philosophy, must have affected, it seems to me, in- ^J.™' 
 juriously, his influence on philosophers. They could 
 not but regard him as a rival professor, — as a 
 man who had a scheme to produce which was to 
 slay their schemes. If it was this, why not assume 
 some other name ? . why not declare at once that 
 he was come with authority and commission to settle 
 all controversies? If it was not this, why should 
 not the philosopher's cloak denote in his case that 
 he who bore it was willing to discuss and debate 
 all cpiestions on fail and even ground? Such ob- 
 jections I think would be raised, and Justin could inferences. 
 not fairly dispose of them by alleging (though the 
 allegation would have been perfectly true) that nine- 
 tenths of the philosophers were dogmatists and not 
 seekers. His object should have been to bring them 
 out of that false position, to make them earnest ques- 
 tioners, to help all who w T ere so. Here then one 
 discovers, in another instance, the infirmity of good 
 men, which led them to set up the Gospel as a sub- 
 stitute for, or competitor with, that which it found 
 living and powerful, not as the interpreter and re- 
 generator of it. 
 
 My reason for admiring Clemens Alexandrinus 
 
378 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ix. is, that I believe he apprehended thoroughly that 
 Difference truth which was in Justin's inmost soul, but which 
 
 in the case t • -i i p i • e c "L 
 
 of ckmens was disguised by some of his forms ot speech. 
 
 AUxan- N eve r losing sight of Christ as a Person ; never 
 permitting himself for a moment to think of Him 
 only as living and acting when He was revealed in 
 our flesh, though attaching a supreme importance 
 to that revelation; Clemens was able to regard all 
 the events recorded in the history of the world as acts 
 which had received their form and determination from 
 Him, however they might be turned awry by the 
 
 His view of self-will and unbehef of man. He could look at the 
 great and heroic deeds done in one age or country, 
 or another, not as glorifying the creatures who had 
 performed them, but Him from whom the impulse 
 to them had proceeded, and whom they had, however 
 ignorantly, obeyed. He could take the Bible as, what 
 it seems to be, an exposition of God's acts towards a 
 creature whom He has formed in His image, and 
 whom He is reclaiming from all the sensual idolatries 
 to which he is addicted. He could recognise in that 
 addiction the fullest and saddest evidence of the 
 infection of the nature of man, of his downward 
 tendency, of the power which the outward world 
 acquires over him, of the temptations of the evil 
 spirit. But he could never admit that all these 
 tendencies are so mighty as God's order and grace. 
 He must accept the battle of the Son of God in our 
 nature, and His victory, as the everlasting answer to 
 that assertion of the devil, as the vindication of His 
 own righteous dominion. 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 379 
 
 Though the force of these statements, which I Lect.ix. 
 think are fairly deduced from the books of Clemens, How it met 
 was partly weakened in their effect on the historical J^ c 
 school to which I have alluded, by the want of historical 
 
 school. 
 
 stronger political sympathies in him, yet the more 
 we consider them, the more we must feel how won- 
 derfully they correspond to the anticipations and 
 cravings of that school ; the more we must hail them 
 as the divine answer to those affectionate, serious, 
 though often perplexed inquiries, after a thread 
 through the labyrinth of ages and dispensations, of 
 nations and races, of destiny and human freedom, 
 which we hear from Plutarch the biographer, as well 
 as Plutarch the speculator ! 
 
 To believe again that the divine Word, instead of sis witness 
 leaving men to wander on in their darkness and S^«L. 
 ignorance, had been continually illuminating the 
 consciences of men respecting Himself, and inspiring 
 them to greater efforts for the improvement of their 
 fellows, — what a help was this to the Pythagorean, 
 who read in the scanty traditions of past times, 
 which he helped out with others gathered elsewhere, 
 and with the dreams of his fancy— that there had 
 been somewhere a great heaven-sent Reformer, and 
 that the power which quickened him could not be 
 dead, but might still have its appointed instruments, 
 and produce still mightier renovations in a decayed 
 and perishing society! What a deliverance was it ThePytha- 
 from the vague, fantastical anticipations of some divine JJJJJ^ 
 help to the sage, not granted to the crowd— from the formation. 
 giddiness of brain and heart that came along with 
 
3S0 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect - ix - the sense of having received it, and the final prosti- 
 tution of gifts to selfish and unworthy ends — to hear 
 of God's interventions in his world as not sudden and 
 irregular, of the Word as the continual and orderly 
 Teacher of the spirits of men ! How the meaning 
 
 His silence, of the solemnity and awe which Pythagoras had urged 
 upon his disciples was interpreted, when submission 
 of the spirit to this divine Teacher, that he might 
 rescue it from its restlessness, and bring light out 
 of its darkness, was declared to be the great blessing 
 of all ! What a satisfaction was it to the craving for 
 energetic work, that the divine Word had promised 
 to send His Spirit from the Father, that His disciples 
 might testify of the truth which would make men 
 free ! And when those of this school listened to 
 these lessons, who had perceived the necessity of a 
 divine Mediator between the absolute Essence which 
 they dared not think of, and the world which they 
 could not contemplate without Him, what clouds 
 might be scattered, which their own thoughts and the 
 speculations of generations had gathered ! what joy 
 and rest to dwell, by awful meditation and humble 
 
 The Divine prayer, in the Father, the Word, and the uniting 
 nity ' Spirit ! And then with what comfort, too, might such 
 an inquirer learn the truth of those notions of 
 Sacrifice which, as they existed in the world, he had 
 felt part of his mission to denounce ; to feel that in 
 casting himself at the cross of Christ, and confessing 
 
 Sacrifice, the great Sacrifice, he was not practising those dark 
 rites which had really set the creatine above the 
 Creator, but pronouncing the great sentence upon 
 
THE . SECOND CENTURY. 3S1 
 
 them, — acknowledging that the only acceptable sacri- lect. ix. 
 fice is that which is grounded on the words, " Lo, I 
 come to do thy will, O God !" 
 
 Of course, it is impossible to say how many of Effect of 
 either of these schools were actually brought into the ing not t0 
 fold of Christ, or brought through the means of l *™ d ^' 
 Clemens. That the catechetical school was a mighty measured 
 
 0?/ US 
 
 instrument of good — mightier because silent and often 
 censured — I think there is clear evidence in the next 
 age. But all these secrets are with God. What 
 I want you to see is, that taking this form, the Gospel 
 did not present itself as a rival philosophy to the 
 heathen world, but as a message from God ; and yet 
 that it crushed no reed, quenched no smoking flax, 
 but hailed and recognised whatever was earnest and 
 beautiful in the belief and hopes of men, as having 
 their origin and their satisfaction in the well-beloved 
 Son. 
 
 And although I can easily conceive that if Clemens ne doc^ 
 
 n n .,, • -i j. i trine which 
 
 and Marcus Aurehus had met, neither might have Marcus 
 understood the other, and they might have parted in ^£w 
 disappointment; though it is right and safe to set 
 such a result before oneself as probable, and accord- 
 ing to experience, that we may not exalt human 
 agents, or fall into silly fancies of what this or that 
 person might have done which was not done ; though 
 if a man goes forth with any fancy that he has some 
 special medicine for the diseases of his fellow-men, 
 or some special way of applying it, God will ordinarily 
 confound his vanity, and make his quackery evident 
 to others and to himself; yet I do believe that the 
 
382 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. ix. doctrine of the divine Word, as the Teacher and Light 
 of men, was the one, and the only one, which could 
 have met that deep sense in the mind of the emperor 
 of an actual Judge and Ruler of His spirit, whom he 
 found it almost impossible to distinguish from the 
 daemons of his country, or from the speculations of 
 his own mind, or from an overruling destiny. Thanks 
 be to God ! if that is His truth, He could convey it to 
 the heart of Marcus Aurelius through the dying prayer 
 of some martyr, or without any instrument at all, as 
 well as through the most learned Alexandrian doctor. 
 Tiie Divine I fully believe, though this is a subject on which 
 W ui'detothe I must llot enter > an( i which I trust wiser men will 
 natural hereafter consider and illustrate, that Galen's studies 
 in nature might have been stripped of many super- 
 stitious accidents, and have been pursued with fresh 
 bravery, and humility, and hope, if he too had con- 
 ceived of Christians, not as a new sect, with a heap of 
 new and strange opinions, but as the witnesses of 
 One by whom all things had been created, and in 
 whom they subsisted. The illumination of the paths 
 of physical science has surely come to men, and may 
 come in greater brightness still, from the faith that 
 He who awakens and guides the thoughts of His 
 children towards the kingdom of peace and righteous- 
 ness, is the same who teaches them to explain the 
 secret order of His visible kingdom, that He may be 
 
 Reference to glorified in both. 
 
 Tertullian's j ^ t dd WQrd hicll can look like 
 
 contempt 
 
 and hatred further disparagement of an eminent doctor of the 
 
 of philo- ID • l • l 
 
 sophy. Church; but as I have quoted the terms m which 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 383 
 
 Tertullian speaks of Socrates and of philosophy gene- lect. ix. 
 rally, I must now explain why these words drew from 
 me such expressions of indignation. Their harshness 
 and cruelty are painful; but these are only the 
 external signs, as it seems to me, of a much more 
 radical evil. By such language Tertullian was deny- 
 ing in fact, what he would have wished to kill any 
 one for denying in terms, that Christ lived before all 
 worlds. Nothing, he intimates clearly, could be 
 known of Him, except what it pleased Him to declare 
 by His Church, after the incarnation. To say this, was 
 not to insult the memory of Socrates ; it was to make 
 an outrageous assault upon St. John ; it was to deny 
 his express and most sacred words. And it was the 
 most mischievous of all forms into which this denial 
 could have been put ; for it is one which natters the 
 pride and exclusiveness of Christians, while it robs 
 then Master of His glory. It makes the testimony 
 of the Cross to heathen philosophers of no effect; 
 but it has had the more fatal consequence of leading 
 the professors of the Gospel to trust in that profes- 
 sion, and not in the living God. 1 
 
 1 It may be thought by some that the miraculous powers claimed by 
 the early Christians must have especially scandalized the philosophical 
 sects generally, and a physical philosopher like Galen particularly. I 
 apprehend that considerable mistake prevails about these claims. The 
 belief that Christ had, by curing the sick and raising the dead, given 
 proofs of His own dominion, and that the same acts performed by the 
 Apostles proved that He was not ruling less after He ascended than 
 before, was undoubtedly a fixed and rooted one in their minds. The 
 Apologists brought it forth outwardly, in the shape of arguments and 
 evidences. There was little question that the same powers might be 
 used again, — no broad and formal line was drawn about the age of the 
 Apostles, to confine them within that. But I think the reader of the 
 
3S4 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. IX. documents written in the second century will be rather struck "with the 
 
 rarity of any pretensions of this kind than with their abundance, and 
 
 that he will find them in general connected with some displays of un- 
 righteous power, attributed to the daemons by the enchanters, which 
 the Church is said to have overcome in the name of its Lord. Even 
 the story of the Thundering Legion, in the time of Marcus Aurelius, 
 whatever be the foundation of it, is put forth as an illustration of the 
 effect of prayer in the name of Christ, not of some agency exercised 
 by any man or body of men. The philosophers, who were often them- 
 selves so much mingled with the magicians, — whose physical science and 
 practice were so much confounded ^by the people, and often by them- 
 selves, with magic,— could certainly at this time draw no inference 
 against the Gospel, from any 'attempts which its followers made to 
 interfere with the operations of ordinary laws. 
 
COL. COLL 
 
 LIBRARY, I 
 
 N.YOTiii. ) 
 
 L.TOTUUE X 
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE SECTS. 
 
 You arc aware that the word " Heresies" means l ect. x . 
 "Sects." The sects of the Jews, Pharisees, Sad- Reword 
 
 Heresies. 
 
 ducees, Herodians, Esscnes, were the heresies of the 
 Jews. The different Samaritan parties, which were 
 very numerous before and after the time of our Lord, 
 were the heresies of the Samaritans. The Christians 
 were said by the Jews to follow the Nazarene sect or 
 heresy. 
 
 We have seen how the Apostles were taught that The SfrvrW* 
 they did not belong to a sect, but to a Nation, of which 
 Christ was the King ; then how they were gradually 
 taught by the Spirit who had imparted to them that 
 lesson, that they were the seed of a universal family, 
 in which those whom Jews had accounted utterly 
 unholy were included. How hard it was to realize How He 
 this faith, how hard it was to keep this faith, we have Church and 
 proofs enough in the Apostolical history. This is the preserved 
 great attestation of the presence of the Spirit among 
 them, more than all gifts of tongues, and of healing — 
 they were able to keep it. They did not sink into TiieNaza- 
 a Nazarene sect, though they were always in danger 
 of sinking into it. The heresies or sects which were 
 
 c c 
 
38 G 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. on all sides of them did not overpower them. They 
 were able to maintain their position as a family which 
 God had called out to be a witness to the world. 
 They were able to draw men out of their sects and 
 heresies into this family. They were able to lay bare 
 the foundations of a Church. 
 
 I recal your attention to these facts, which I took 
 some pains to impress upon you in my Introductory 
 Course, because I suspect that we do not in general 
 connect them with those which we hear of in the 
 second century. We fancy that the Christian sects 
 or heresies occupied a position wholly different in 
 reference to the Christian Church from that which 
 the Jewish sects or heresies occupied in reference to 
 the nation out of which they sprung. The difference 
 
 Jewish sects we suppose to be this. The Sadducees and Pharisees 
 
 respectable. ■ 1 ,i r -i-, i , 1 •]•, 
 
 were evidently men ol credit and respectability ; 
 many of them rich, all of them claiming their place 
 as children of the Covenant. They might denounce 
 each other as bad Jews, as not holding the true 
 tradition of the fathers. But instead of being exiles 
 from the commonwealth of Israel, they were its most 
 honoured guides and champions. The Christians had 
 not power to cast them out. They had power to 
 cast out the Christians. They were able to say, 
 ' Theirs is the intruding heresy, we will put down 
 the professors of it.' 
 Ordinary On the other hand, you probably suppose that the 
 TTtiiw'the Christian heretics must have been always numerically 
 heretics. insignificant compared with the body which was able 
 to describe itself as the Church ; that they never can 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 387 
 
 have resembled the Pharisees and Sadducees ; that lect. x. 
 they were always an outlying rejected class. Much 
 that yon hear from different sides will confirm yon in 
 this opinion. Some will try to impress you with the 
 belief that the opinions of the Church were so clear, 
 and definite, and ascertained, that it could at once 
 turn round to any strange teacher, produce its 
 vouchers, denounce his doctrine, procure his expulsion 
 from the fold. Others will represent the heretics as 
 bold and heroical assertors of the freedom of opinion, 
 and the right of private judgment, against a tyrannical 
 majority, or against doctors who had established for 
 themselves an undisputed supremacy. Either state- 
 ment leads to the same inference as to the difference 
 between the state of things in the Jewish and 
 Christian world; neither, I believe, will bear 
 examination. 
 
 When we read the Epistle to the Corinthians, we The sects 
 perceive at once that those who bound themselves to the Aposto . 
 the names of Paul, of Apollos, of Cephas, were not l ^ rches 
 sects lying outside the Church, but were the different 
 parties within it, which had sway over it. The 
 Judaizers in Galatia were the prevalent influence there. 
 Those who are pointed out at Colosse as inculcating 
 the opinions which were the forerunners of Gnosti- 
 cism, if they are not to be identified with it, had, 
 to all appearance, the ascendency in the Church. Yet 
 all these are censured by St. Paul because they were 
 bringing in divisions, — because they were esta- 
 blishing sects or heresies. In the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews, the party which Avas dragging the Church 
 
 c c 2 
 
388 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. X. 
 
 The Ebion- 
 ites trium- 
 phant in 
 Judcea. 
 
 The Sama- 
 ritan here- 
 tics power- 
 Jul. 
 
 towards apostasy, by exaggerating the glories of the 
 old Covenant, and building all their hopes upon its 
 continuance, were, one has every reason to think, 
 superior in authority, numbers, — assuredly in conceit 
 of their orthodoxy — to those who sympathised with 
 the writer of the Epistle. And all the Apostles 
 speak of a time in which there should be an influx 
 of notions and opinions from all directions, which, 
 if the Church had no help but in the resources 
 of its members, or in its machinery, would certainly 
 crush it. 
 
 I have given you my reasons for thinking that these 
 anticipations were fulfilled in the Apostolical age. And 
 the first spectacle which presented itself to us when 
 we entered upon the new century was that of the 
 Church in Judaea struggling, feebly and ineffectually, 
 against the Ebionitic tendencies of its members. There 
 can be little doubt that the Ebionites, strong in the 
 opinion that they were the true successors of St. 
 James — that Christ had come for the express purpose 
 of reviving the old law and faith of the Jews, — that 
 they had now the primitive religion of the world, — 
 were the predominant party in the Church till they 
 were driven by the war in Hadrian's time, either to 
 enlist in the armies of the false Christ, or to seek an 
 alliance with the Gentile Christians, whose society 
 they had abjured. 
 
 The few glimpses one can get of the condition of 
 Samaria would certainly lead us to suppose that 
 the Christians there, besides sharing in this Ebio- 
 nitic tendency, were greatly influenced by Simon 
 
THE SECOND CENTUKY. 389 
 
 and by Menancler, who, far from being insignificant Lect. x. 
 men, easily crushed by the decrees of Overseers 
 or Doctors, were probably men of wealth, as well 
 as of talent, using the power which was most 
 reverenced at that time — using it, besides, in a 
 period of commotion, when such persons are most 
 sought after ; possessing both a Jewish and Gentile 
 reputation. 
 
 Antioch had apparently a more settled polity than 
 most of the Churches. But the character of Ignatius, Thom- 
 as it comes forth in all our records of him, would ^tiL »» 
 show that it owed its order and harmony far less to (lverl!n J 
 
 ' m heresies, 
 
 his dogmatical precision, to his sagacity in dis- wheat 
 cerning the limits where truth passes into error, to 
 his acquaintance with the Magian lore, than to his 
 apostolical simplicity, to his parental government, 
 to his strong belief in Christ as a Person, in whom 
 he dwelt and who dwelt in him. On that ground he 
 could assert a unity and fellowship with all the 
 Churches, East and West ; on that ground he could 
 hold out the most solemn warnings against those who 
 disturbed it. But it was disturbed in Syria as else- 
 where, and we have no reason to suppose that men 
 taking so high an ascetical ground as Saturninus and Satuminus. 
 his followers did — seizing so vigorously on some of 
 the points on which Ignatius had dwelt, and giving 
 them forth with plausible additions, appealing to a 
 number of Jewish, and a number of Persian sym- 
 pathies — may not have established a very strong 
 party in the Church, one which could not be over- 
 come without great conflict. I need scarcely remind 
 
390 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 lect. x. you that the Syrian Fathers had no material weapons 
 
 in their armoury ; and that they made so much use of 
 
 their intellectual weapons, is a proof that the enemy 
 
 was a formidable one. 
 
 Mardon- How far Marcion's influence may have extended, 
 
 ites and i r> , • ■ ii . •, , 
 
 Montanists. we nave no means oi ascertaining; that it must 
 have been strong in his own inhospitable region, 
 and that it must have stretched much beyond that 
 region, Tertullian's vehemence would seem clearly 
 to prove. For the power of Montanism in Phrygia, 
 and its wide diffusion, the same witness, whose feel- 
 ings in this case were so different, may be safely 
 appealed to. The letter of Clemens Romanus to the 
 Corinthian Church, and the testimonies of Dionysius 
 respecting Athens, would show that Greece retained 
 its old characteristics. In Alexandria the evidence is 
 Aiexan- far more decisive. There we have every reason to 
 tle^ascen- conclude that Basilideans, Carpocrateans, Valentinians, 
 dency. an d the other numerous sects, held not an undis- 
 puted ascendency in the Church — for each would 
 dispute the ascendency of the others, and there would 
 be a continual production of new opinions and modi- 
 fication of the old — and there must have been many 
 souls waiting for the kingdom of heaven who were 
 driven by the strifes about them to seek peace else- 
 where than in any opinions — 'but still held so much 
 influence as to overshadow for a long time every 
 other. It may not be safe to assume that the most 
 earnest men in the Church would not, in a statistical 
 table, have been set down as belonging to one of these 
 schools ; just as Simeon, and Anna, and Joseph, would 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 39] 
 
 all have been described as Pharisees, and the lawyer, Lect. x. 
 who answered onr Lord discreetly, as a Sadducee, 
 till a time came which set them loose from their 
 factions, and made them understand the grounds of 
 their union. 
 
 Alexandria affords the most striking instance, I The church 
 think, of a process by which men emerged slowly into JJfJJe j^ 
 the deep and settled belief, that they had a foundation amdschooh. 
 in Christ which was deeper than the foundation of 
 opinions, and that to substitute the one for the other 
 — to make opinions the bond of union, as the sects 
 were doing — was to destroy the Gospel and the Church. 
 We may not look into the long and painful struggles 
 by which they were led to the full apprehension of 
 this truth, and thence to the belief that their lives 
 should be spent in the uprooting of heresies ; we may 
 only affirm confidently, that if the Scripture means 
 anything, it was the same Spirit who first brought the 
 Christian Church out of the Jewish sects, that guided 
 their minds into these struggles and through them. 
 To dream that Pantsenus and Clemens were enabled, No imoer 
 by the force of decrees, or of some formula which was % J ^ Un ' J 
 recognised as authoritative in the Church, to secure schools. 
 the submission of the members of the numerous and 
 powerful schools by which they were surrounded, is 
 to trifle with history. I thank God that they did 
 overcome those schools; because I believe that in 
 doing so they asserted the holy and blessed name of 
 God as a haven and a resting-place for the weary and 
 heavy laden, for men of all kindreds, and peoples, 
 and tribes — for men who never could rest in opinions 
 
392 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. x. and notions, the dullest or the cleverest, whether 
 Sea-et of ^ey were the deposits of ages, or were struck afresh 
 
 the victory d 
 
 of the in the mint of some restless bram — but who could 
 be at peace in themselves and with each other when 
 they had laid down their arms and gone to the Father, 
 who had reconciled them in His Son, who embraced 
 them with His Spirit. But I am sure that they over- 
 came by the blood of the Lamb, and the word of 
 His testimony — by holding forth Christ as the true 
 uniting Sacrifice ; not by any peremptory decision, or 
 ecclesiastical censure, or any tradition before which 
 their opponents were forced to stoop. 
 
 It is quite true that Clemens appealed to an Apo- 
 ciemens stolical tradition as much as Irenseus did. The nature 
 ^poatofiad °f tne a PP ea l proves how strong his opponents were, 
 tradition; an( | ^^ w h a t arguments they were wont to fight. 
 
 why and in ... 
 
 what seme. One traced his opinions to a disciple of Matthias ; 
 another said that all which he taught had been learnt 
 from a scribe of St. Peter's. Clemens answered them 
 in their own style : ' This tradition of yours only takes 
 you back to the beginning or middle of our century. 
 We say that the faith in Christ the living Word 
 of God, has come to us directly from the Apostles 
 themselves.' If he had had nothing more to say than 
 this, the schools which had already established their 
 position, and had a compact band of champions, would 
 have smiled, as they probably did, at his presump- 
 tion. Uniting themselves for once, they would have 
 told him that he was maintaining a ridiculous strife, 
 not with one of them, but with all ; they would have 
 asked him how he knew more about the tradition of 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 303 
 
 the Apostles than they did. But lie was able not only lect. x. 
 to talk about it, but to produce it. He trusted in %%?J£ 
 the thing itself, not in the persons from whom it was. 
 came. The Father, and the Word, and the Holy 
 Spirit, were mightier, unless his whole profession was 
 a lie, than the persons who had been the instruments 
 of making the Name known, and who had received 
 the commission to baptize in it. Clemens could 
 thank God that they had received it ; their tradition 
 was unspeakably precious to him : he loved to think 
 that they were still beholding the battle in which he 
 was engaged, and taking part in it. He knew that 
 they would have disclaimed him as an ally if he had 
 set any one of them, or all of them together, in the 
 place of Him of whom they had lived and died to 
 testify. 
 
 I do not take the Church of Alexandria as in all irenuema 
 respects a specimen of the Churches. Its discipline tJie] ^ ame 
 and its work were peculiar. There was in that city, °f G f> 
 
 1 not for a 
 
 for reasons which I have explained to you, a tumult tradition 
 of opinions, and at the same time a skill in classifying Namet c 
 and constructing opinions, which could be found no- 
 where else. Alexandria was the native seat and 
 capital of Gnosticism — at least, in all its more refined 
 forms. But the principle which 1 have laid down is 
 one which I have already illustrated by the case of 
 Irenseus, in Gaul, who was so far removed in temper 
 and in erudition from the Alexandrian catechist. 
 Whatever may have been his reverence for the tradi- 
 tions of Polycarp — though his reverence for him as 
 a man was one of the most affecting traits of his 
 
394 ON CHURCH HISTORY 
 
 lect. x. character — he was obliged, when he undertook the 
 arduous task which he had assigned himself, to 
 make the Gospel of St. John his standing-point ; for 
 he discovered that all the heresies which had grown 
 to such a startling bulk, and had spread into such 
 strange varieties, bore upon the Person of Christ ; 
 that they all began and ended with the question, 
 whether He was really the Word of God, and whether, 
 being such, He had been made flesh and dwelt among 
 men. If, therefore, he would resist heresies, he must 
 plant his foot upon this ground. Traditions about 
 Christ might be very interesting and valuable, but 
 Christ Himself was needed to bind men together, 
 and take the place of the opinions which had sepa- 
 rated them. Irenseus could confute heresies while he 
 brought Him forth livingly and personally. Him the 
 Syzygies and the Ogdoads knew; when a disciple 
 of His used any other charms to scatter them, they 
 could leap on him and overcome him. 
 The polity You must not suppose, because, I speak thus, that 
 °cimrch ■"■ am re tracting any thing which I have said before 
 precious, respecting the importance of the polity of the Church, 
 
 because it , . 
 
 testifies of a its prayers and its sacraments. The principle for 
 of'notions which I am contending is this, that Christ alone coidd 
 be the centre of a polity, that He alone could bind its 
 members in one. The heretics could make schools; 
 they could not build men up as members of a family. 
 Opinions were their foundations. The opinions of 
 this man about God, or humanity, or the universe, 
 produced the opposing opinions of that man. There 
 was an endless whirl and interchange of notions, but 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 395 
 
 no rest and no progress. For men to live together and lect. x. 
 grow together, every one contributing to the life and 
 nourishment of the other, — each kindly action helping 
 to the increase of knowledge, each accession of knoAV- 
 leclge making action more free and healthful, — the 
 diversities of gifts, and powers, and modes of thinking 
 making themselves more manifest as the sense of 
 fellowship and unity becomes stronger — there must be 
 a living root, and a living sap continually proceeding 
 from that root. The Church's polity, where all 
 orders and offices betoken under-springs of life, and 
 bear witness of them to the world, is precisely of this 
 character. This was what the truest and holiest men 
 of the Church were trying to realize. The causes 
 that disturbed the working of this polity, which 
 they were sure God had established, were the subjects 
 of all their mourning. But these evils they knew Prayers 
 could only be checked, this divine fellowship coidd a J^ nts ac ia ~ 
 only be sustained, by confessions and thanksgivings 
 and litanies for the Church and for the world, by 
 continually recurring to the pledge and sign of their 
 uniting covenant, by continually feeding upon the 
 Sacrifice which had been given for the life of the 
 world — had been given that the self-exaltations and 
 self-glorifications, the strifes and seditions which were 
 its sin and its death, might be taken away. 
 
 It should be no matter of surprise to us, that the church in 
 Church in Rome, — which had a greater experience of idea 'J s 
 the contentions and heresies by which the different i> uttin 9 «« 
 
 d end to 
 
 Churches were tormented than any other could have heresies. 
 had, because the representatives of them all gathered 
 
396 
 
 ON CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Legt. X. 
 
 Victor's 
 failures. 
 
 His good 
 intentions. 
 
 Carthagi- 
 nian ten- 
 dency. 
 
 in the capital, and which had besides by origin, 
 education, habit, a stronger instinct about the import- 
 ance of government and the necessity of obedience for 
 the sake of work, — should have been eager to check 
 these opinions, and should have hoped, sometimes by 
 acts of exclusion and excommunication, sometimes by 
 conciliation and temporising, to bring about a durable 
 peace. It would be hard to censure these experiments 
 in this early period merely because some of them 
 evidently proved abortive, and some produced positive 
 mischief. They may have been undertaken often- 
 times with a good intent, even when they led to 
 disastrous results. They showed a craving for a 
 necessary end, if the means which were chosen to 
 accomplish it were not wise. They at least bore 
 witness to the truth, that opinions are not so precious 
 as peace, though truth may be much more precious 
 than either. Victor of Rome apparently made a 
 grievous mistake in his negotiations with Praxeas and 
 the Montanists. He did not assert the truth of God's 
 unity against the perversion of it in the Monachism 
 of the one ; he stimulated rather than checked by his 
 vehemence the fanaticism of the other. He incited 
 Tertullian to be its advocate and the Church's ad- 
 versary. The lesson as to this mode of putting down 
 heresy and establishing unity is instructive, and 
 should be laid to heart. Yet I think there is another 
 way of treating it which is more dangerous still. 
 
 To oppose sects and heresies by decrees, be- 
 cause they interfere with good order and efficient 
 work, was the temptation of the Roman Church. It 
 
THE SECOND CENTURY. 397 
 
 led to a dangerous assumption of authority in the Lect. x. 
 
 person of its spiritual father, to a hasty suppression 
 
 of men's thoughts, as if they were to he put down 
 
 merely because it was convenient to put them down. 
 
 The temptation of the African Church was to crush Worship of 
 
 . . . .. 1-1111 opinions. 
 
 heresies by setting up a certain opinion winch should 
 be maintained as the right opinion on the ground 
 of tradition or of prescription. According to this view 
 of the case, the heretics were not wrong for exalting 
 opinions into the place of Christ, but only for choosing 
 one opinion about Him instead of another. I believe 
 that to learn the difference between these two prin- 
 ciples and methods is to learn the cardinal lesson 
 of ecclesiastical history, the one which all its darkest 
 and its brightest records are intended to impress 
 upon our hearts. I shall only make one more remark 
 on the subject now ; it is this. It was a blessed Mimnder- 
 
 . . i-i i standing of 
 
 thing for the Christian Church m the second century, Rome and 
 that the representatives of Rome and Carthage could ^jj* a 
 not understand one another, but maintained then 
 respective theories against each other. Victor's wish 
 to raise government and order above opinion had a 
 true meaning at the root of it. Tertullian's protest on 
 behalf of an opinion had a true ground in it ; for it 
 was a witness that a man cannot surrender his con- 
 viction at the pleasure of another man. The real Possibility 
 peril was, that these two maxims should ever become unioiu ' 
 united; that the ruler and the politician should 
 become the dogmatist, now bidding men bow down 
 before the true opinion, now before his own judgment- 
 throne, which was to give opinions the force of laws. 
 
398 0N CHURCH HISTORY. 
 
 Lect. x. If that fearful conjunction should be seen in any 
 Final subsequent part of our history, we shall be taught 
 how impossible it is for the Church to preserve its 
 unity, or to heal the distracted sects and heresies 
 of the earth, unless it confesses that it has its ground 
 in One who is not the stifler of thoughts, but the 
 Quickener and Inspirer of them; who is not the 
 conservator of Opinions, but who for this end was 
 born, and for this end came into the world, that He 
 might bear witness to the Truth ; wmo has been, is, 
 and ever will be, the Way, the Truth, and the Life. 
 
 Understand, then, that the distinguishing of the 
 Church from sects and heresies, was not man's work, 
 but God's. Because that distinction is more deep and 
 eternal than the distinction of day and night — because 
 the well-being of mankind is involved in the discovery 
 of it, — therefore we may be sure that it has been 
 brought forth and manifested by every Christian who 
 went forth to conquer the gods, not in the strength of 
 an opinion, but in the strength of the Cross ; by every 
 martyr who died, not for his opinion, but for his 
 King and Brother ; by every emperor who persecuted 
 the Church, not for its opinions, but for its political 
 Order and Unity ; lastly, by those very efforts to sup- 
 press heresy, which really assumed its principle, and 
 gave it greater virulence ; because their weakness, 
 their inconsistency, and the injury which they have 
 done to the truth, when they are revealed by God's 
 judgments, serve for the vindication and establish- 
 ment of it. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 Note 1. — The question respecting the marriage of Presbyters, to which 
 I have alluded in my remarks on Tertullian, has been handled by the 
 learned and excellent author of "Hippolytus and his Age," and will 
 probably receive much fresh illustration in the new edition of that work, 
 which is promised. I can hardly think that the great and important 
 principles which are involved in that question, can depend on the evi- 
 dence which Chevalier Bunsen hopes to produce in favour of the early 
 date and authority of some of the Apostolical Constitutions. Both the 
 sound and the mistaken views of the early Church on the primary 
 institution of Humanity, must have been determined, I should fancy, by 
 deeper considerations than any which could express themselves in pre- 
 mature and hasty efforts to legislate. Such efforts, if they were made, 
 must surely be one of the indications that the Church was striving to be 
 like the heathen round about, and was forgetting those truly Apostolical 
 constitutions — so different from mere decrees — so directly grounded on 
 eternal principles — which are contained in the Epistles of St. Paul. 
 But if M. Bunsen should fail, as I almost hope he may, in establishing 
 this point, we shall only feel more deeply our obligations to him for 
 leading us to the Liturgies which expressed the true life and unity 
 of the early Church. Amidst the numerous claims which he has upon 
 the personal gratitude and affection of a number of Englishmen, illus- 
 trious and insignificant, this will surely always be felt by us as a claim 
 of a still higher kind. Nationally, we should thank him for teaching us 
 the worth of our greatest national possession ; as members of the 
 Catholic Church, we should thank him for reminding us that there are 
 bonds of faith and love which, even in the judgment of those who honour 
 criticism most, are more precious than that — which, even in the judgment 
 of those who find most fault with portions of our polity and our theology, 
 may yet keep us in the fellowship of past ages and of other lands— of the 
 Fathers of the Church in the second century, of our own Saxon Fathers 
 in Germany. 
 
400 NOTES. 
 
 Note 2. — I have not been able to read, till these Lectures were almost 
 ready for the press, the portion of Dean Milman's new and important 
 work on the Latin Church, which belongs to the period treated of in 
 them. But there is one passage of such evident truth and such great 
 value, that I must beg the reader to connect it with what I have said 
 of the Roman Church, and to receive it as both a correction of, and a 
 supplement to, my imperfect account of its condition in the second 
 century. 
 
 " For some considerable (it cannot but be an undefinable) part 
 of the first three centuries, the Church of Rome, and most, if not all, 
 the Churches of the West, were, if we may so speak, Greek religious 
 colonies. Their language was Greek, their organization Greek, their 
 writers Greek, their Scriptures Greek, and many vestiges and traditions 
 show that their ritual, their liturgy, was Greek. Through Greek the 
 communication of the Churches of Rome and of the "West was constantly 
 kept up with the East ; and through Greek every heresiarch, or his 
 disciples, having found his way to Rome, propagated, with more or less 
 success, his peculiar doctrines. Greek was the commercial language 
 throughout the empire, — by which the Jews, before the destruction of 
 their city, already so widely disseminated through the world, and alto- 
 gether engaged in commerce, carried on their affairs. The Greek Old 
 Testament was read in the synagogues of the foreign Jews. The 
 Churches, formed sometimes on the foundation, to a certain extent on 
 the model, of the synagogues, would adhere for some time, no doubt, to 
 their language. The Gospels and the apostolic writings, so soon as they 
 became part of the public worship, would be read, as the Septuagint was, 
 in their original tongue. All the Christian extant writings which ap- 
 peared in Rome and in the West, are Greek, or were originally Greek ; 
 the Epistles of Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Clementine 
 Recognitions and Homilies ; the works of Justin Martyr, down to Caius 
 and Hippolytus, the author of the Refutation of All Heresies. The 
 Octavius of Minucius Pelix, and the treatise of Novatian on the Trinity, 
 are the earliest known works of Latin Christian literature which came 
 from Rome. So was it, too, in Gaul : there the first Christians were 
 settled, chiefly in the Greek cities, which owned Marseilles as their 
 parent, and which retained the use of Greek as their vernacular tongue. 
 Irenseus wrote in Greek ; the account of the Martyrs of Lyons and 
 Vienne is in Greek. Vestiges of the old Greek ritual long survived, not 
 only in Rome, but also in some of the Gallic Churches. The Kyrie 
 
NOTES. 401 
 
 eleison still lingers in the Latin service. The singular fact related by 
 the historian Sozomen, that, for the first centuries, there was no public 
 preaching in Rome, here finds its explanation. Greek was the ordinary 
 language of the community, but, among the believers and worshippers, 
 may have been Latins who understood not, or understood imperfectly, 
 the Greek. The Gospels, or Sacred Writings, were explained according 
 to the capacities of the persons present. Hippolytus, indeed, composed, 
 probably delivered, homilies in Greek, in imitation of Origen, who, when 
 at Rome, may have preached in Greek : and this is spoken of as some- 
 thing new. Pope Leo I. was the first celebrated Latin preacher, and 
 his brief and emphatic sermons read like the first essays of a rude and 
 untried eloquence, rather than the finished compositions which would 
 imply a long study and cultivation of pulpit oratory. Compare them 
 with Chrysostom. 
 
 " Africa, not Rome, gave birth to Latin Christianity." — Hitman's 
 History of Latin Christianity, vol. i. book i. c. i. p. 27. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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