The Protestant historian, Mosheim, cites in his History of the Church, several authors, who state, that, in the second century, several Christian churches imitated the mysteries of Paganism. The profound respect, they say, that the people entertained for those mysteries, and the extraordinary sacredness ascribed to them were for the Christians a motive sufficient to give a mysterious appearance to their religion, so as to command as much respect to the public as the religion of the Pagans. To this effect they called mysteries the institutions of the Gospel, particularly the Eucharist. They used in this ceremony, and in that of baptism, several words and rites consecrated in the mysteries of the Pagans. This abuse commenced in Orient, chiefly in Egypt; Clement of Alexandria, in the beginning of the third century,was one of those who contributed the most to this innovation, which then spread in Occident when Adrian had introduced the mysteries in that portion of the Empire. Hence, a large portion of the service of the Church hardly differed from that of Paganism.
That the Church of Rome copied many of the ceremonies, rites, customs, and fables of Pagan mysteries is certain, for they have been perpetuated in that Church down to our days. From the Pagan mysteries the Roman Church borrowed the following:
In the initiation to the Pagan mysteries there were degrees; so in the Roman Church there are the degrees of porter or door-keeper, of acolyte, of reader and of exorcist; the latter degree confers the power of expelling the devil. The ecclesiastical ornaments in the Church of Rome, with the difference of the cross represented on them and of some trimming, are like those used in the mysteries of the Pagans, at least in Rome, and in Greece. The long floating gown, the girdle, the casula, the stola, the dalmatica, the round and pyramidal cap, the capa, and several other garments and ornaments, are alike to those used in the temples, where the mysteries of the Pagans were celebrated.
In those temples there was an altar richly decorated; so it is in the Church of Rome. In those temples there were twelve flambeaux, representing the twelve months of the year: so there are inCatholic churches, upon the first degree above the altar, six chandeliers with six tapers burning during the celebration of the mysteries or mass; six others are on the second degree. The vestals kept a light constantly burning in the Pagan temples: so a lamp is kept burning, day and night, near the altar, in the Catholic churches. In the Pagan temples the disc of the sun and his beams were represented: so they are in the Catholic churches. Upon the altar, in the Pagan temples, there was an image of the god Osiris or Bacchus, and the emblems of an aries or lamb: so upon the altar, in Catholic churches, there is a tabernacle in which God is said to dwell, and the door of the tabernacle represents a bleeding lamb.
The Pagans solemnly and processionally carried the image of Osiris, or Bacchus, around the head of which there was a halo representing the rays of the sun: so in the Romish church the priests processionally and with great pomp, carry, both in the aisles of the churches and on the streets, a wafer which they call God. It is encased in a silver or gold ostenserium, whose circular centre, in which their pretended God is seen between two crystals, is shaped like the disc of the sun; and the outside, of which called halo or glory, is shaped like his rays. In the Pagan temples there was a sanctuary exclusively reserved to the high-pontiff, and to the priests: so it is in the Catholic churches. In the Pagan temples the sanctuary was turned towards the Orient: so it is in the Catholic churches.
The Pagans did not permit their candidates to initiation to assist at the celebration of the mysteries, which was always preceded by this formula, solemnly and loudly spoken by an officer, "Away from here ye profane and impious men, and all those whose soul is contaminated with crimes!" So in Catholic churches, not now, but from the first centuries down to the middle age, the deacon arose after the homily, turned toward the assistant, and ordered the catechumens to leave the church, because the celebration of the mysteries was to commence. Those mysteries are the mass, during which the priest who officiates commands Jesus Christ to descend from heaven into a wafer, which he, (priest,) holds in his hands, and to change it into his own blood, flesh, soul, and divinity. The Pagans initiated the candidates near the front door of their temples: so in the Catholic churches, the baptismal fonts where the catechumens are initiated, namely, baptized, are placed near the portal. Here we shall remark, that, for many centuries, children are baptized, (even now parents are obliged under the pain of mortal sin to have their children taken to the church to be baptized) three days after they are born. The Pagans initiated candidates chiefly on the eve of great celebrations: so, in the Romish church, catechumens are baptized chiefly on the eve of Easter, and of Pentecost.
The Pagans believed that initiation made them holy; so the Romish church holds that baptismremits the original and all other sins, and makes holy. The Pagans revered in their temples the statue of Pan, in whose hands was a seven-pipe flute; also, they revered other emblems of the seven planets: so in the Romish Church holds the doctrine of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, and of the doctrine of the seven sacraments. In the month of February the Pagans celebrated the Lupercales, and the feast of Proserpine: so the Church of Rome celebrates the Candlemas-day. We cite the very words of Bergier, a Catholic priest, and an ultra Papist, who writes thus in his Theological Dictionary; article Candlemas:
"Several authors ascribe the institution of Candlemas-day to the pope Gelase, for the purpose of opposing it to the Lupercales of the Pagans, who went processionally out in the fields making exorcisms. It is the opinion of the venerable Bede. 'The Church,' he says, 'has happily changed the lustrations of the Pagans, which took place in February around the fields. She has substituted to them processions, in which the people carry in their hands burning tapers.' Others ascribe this institution to the pope Vigil, and say that it has been substituted to the feast of Proserpine, which the Pagans celebrated in the first days of February with torches.'
The Pagans worshiped Juno as the wife of the god Jupiter: so the Church of Rome worships the virgin Mary as the wife of God. The Pagans celebrated the exaltation of the virgo or virgin,the sixth sign and seventh constellation in the ecliptic; so the Romish Church has established the feast of Assumption, namely, of the ascension of the virgin Mary to heaven. The Pagans made solemn processions to honor the goddess Ceres; so the Romish Church has instituted pompous processions in the honor of the virgin Mary.
Remark.—All the above institutions and doctrines of the Romish Church, and also those which we shall examine in the following chapters, date from the first centuries. All the Catholic doctors, theologians, and historians, confess it.
From the numerous and undeniable historical facts summed up in this chapter we legitimately draw the conclusions, 1st. That, in the first centuries of the Christian era, the Church of Rome established mysteries; 2d. That the Church of Rome borrowed her mysteries from the mysteries of the Pagans; and, 3d. That a law of secrecy was binding the catechumens after their initiation, though this law was not so stringent as it was among the Pagans.
When, in the sixteenth century, the Protestants shook the yoke of the Pope, they rejected many of the mysteries of the Church of Rome; however, they kept several of them, such as the mystery of Trinity, namely, of three Gods composing but one God; the mystery of incarnation, namely of God himself descending from the heavens, vesting our mortal clay in the womb of a woman for the purpose of being persecuted and slain on a crossby men, thus pay to himself the debt owed to him by men who had disobeyed him, (though they did not live yet,) in the person of Adam. These, we say, and other mysteries of the Romish Church, the Protestants or Heterodox in the opinion of the Catholics, preserved and transmitted them to their sons, or Partialists, who now call the Roman Catholics heathens; call the liberal Christian Churches heterodox, and call themselves most emphatically Evangelical Churches, Orthodox Churches.
The final and strictly logical conclusion of this chapter is this:
Therefore the mysteries of the Romish Church, and those of the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches, are of Pagan origin.
Corollary.Since mysteries are of Pagan origin, and since Jesus Christ and his apostles did not establish mysteries, there ought not to be mysteries in Christianity. Since Jesus Christ and his apostles preached the Gospel in open air to all, everywhere, there cannot be any mysteries in their teaching, and there cannot be any mysteries in their writings, we mean in the New Testament.
PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE DOCTRINE OF A PERSONAL DEVIL.
Thecelebrated Plutarch, historian, philosopher, and priest of Apollo, in the first century of the Christian era, thus writes: "We ought not to believe that the Principles of the universe are not animated, as Democrite and Epicure thought; nor that an inert matter be organized, and ordained by a Providence that disposes of all, as the Stoicians taught. It is impossible that one sole being, either good or bad, be the author of all, for God can cause no evil. The harmony of the world is a combination of contraries like the strings of a lyre, or like the string of a bow capable of being bent and unbent. In no case, the poet Euripedes says, good is separated from evil: there must be a mixture of the one and of the other. This opinion is of immemorial antiquity, and has been held by theologians, legislators, poets, and philosophers. Its inventor is unknown, but it is verified by the traditions of mankind; it is consecrated by mysteries and sacrifices among the Barbarians, as well as among the Greeks. They all acknowledge the dogma of two opposite Principles in nature, who, by their opposition, produce the mixture of good and evil.
"Therefore it may not be said, that a single dispenser draws events like a liquor from two casks to mix them together; for this mixture is found in all the phenomena of nature. We must admit two opposite causes, two contrary powers, bearing the one to the right, and the other to the left; and who thus govern our life and the whole sublunar world, which for this reason is subject to all the irregularities and vicissitudes we witness, for nothing is done without a cause. As the good cannot produce evil, then there is a principle causing evil, as one causing good."
We see by this passage of Plutarch, that the true origin of two Principles proceeds from the difficulty which men, in all times, found in explaining, by one sole cause, good and evil in nature, and in making flow from one sole spring, virtue and crime, light and darkness. "This dogma," Plutarch adds, "has been admitted by nearly all nations, and more especially by those renowned by their wisdom. They believed in two gods of different trade, if I may say so, who caused, the one good, and the other evil. They called the first God by excellence, and the second Demon."
In fact the Persians, disciples of Zoroaster admitted, and even in our days, the Parsis, their successors, admit two principles, the one called Oromaze, and the other Ahriman. Plutarch says: "The Persians believed that the first was of thenature of light, and the second of that of darkness. Among the Egyptians the first was called Osiris, and the second Typhon, eternal foe to the first."
All the sacred books of the Persians, and of the Egyptians, contain the marvellous and allegorical recital of the various combats given by Ahriman and his angels to Oromaze, and by Typhon to Osiris. These fables have been rehearsed by the Greeks in the war of the Titans against the Giants, against Jupiter, or Principle of good and light; for Jupiter, Plutarch remarks, was the Oromaze of the Persians, and the Osiris of the Egyptians.
To these examples quoted by Plutarch, and which he extracted from the Theogony of the Persians, of the Egyptians, of the Greeks, and of the Chaldeans, we shall add others, which are living yet, at least the most of them. The inhabitants of the kingdom of Pegu admit two Principles; the one author of good, and the other of evil. They particularly endeavor to obtain the favor of the latter. The Indians of Java acknowledge a chief supreme of the universe, and address offerings and prayers to the evil genius lest he harm them. The Indians of the Moluc and Philippine islands do the same. The natives of the island of Formose worshiped a good god, Ishy, and demons, Chouy; they sacrifice to the latter, but seldom to the former.
The negroes of the Cote-d'or admit two Gods,the one good, and the other bad; the one white, and the other black and evil. They do not adore the former often, whereas they try to appease the latter with prayers and sacrifices; the Portuguese have named him Demon. The Hottentots call the good Principle the Captain of above, and the bad principle the Captain of below. The ancients believed that the source of evil was in the underneath matter of the earth. The Giants and Typhon were sons of the Earth. The Hottentots say, that, whether the good Principle is prayed to or not he does good; whereas it is necessary to pray to the evil Principle, lest he might do harm. They call the bad god Touquoa, and represent him small, crooked, irritable, a foe to them; and they say that from him all evils flow to this world.
The natives of Madagascar believe in two Principles. They ascribe to the bad one the form and badness of a serpent, they call him Angat: they name the good one Jadhar, which means great, omnipotent God. They rear no temple to the latter because he is good. The Mingrelians more particularly honor the one of their idols, which they think to be the most cruel. The Indians of the island of Teneriffe believe in a supreme God, whom they call Achguaya-Xerax, which means the greatest, the most sublime, the preserver of all things. Also they admit an evil genius named Guyotta.
The Scandinaves have their god Locke, who wars against the gods, and particularly againstThor. He is the slanderer of the gods, Edda says, the great forger of deceit. His spirit is evil; he engendered three monsters; the wolf Feuris, the serpent Midgard, and Hela, or death. He causes the earthquakes. The Tsouvaches and the Morduans recognize a supreme being, who gave men all the blessings they enjoy. They also admit evil spirits whose occupation is to injure mankind.
The Tartars of Katzchinzi adore a benevolent god, in kneeling towards the Orient; but they fear another god, Toüs, to whom they pray to disarm his wrath; and to whom, in the spring, they sacrifice a stallion. The Ostiaks and the Vogouls name that evil god Koul; the Samoyedes name him Sjoudibe; the Motores, Huala; the Kargasses, Sedkyr. The Thibetans admit evil spirits which they place in the regions above. The religion of the Bonzes supposes two Principles. The Siamoeses sacrifice to an evil spirit, whom they consider as being the cause of all the misfortunes of mankind.
The Indians have their Ganga and their Gournatha, spirits whom they try to appease with prayer, sacrifices, and processions. The inhabitants of Tolgony, India, believe that two Principles govern the universe; the one good, he is light; and the other bad, he is darkness. The ancient Assyrians, as well as the Persians, admitted two Principles; and they honored, Augustine says, two gods, the one good, and the other bad. The Chaldeans also had their good and bad stars, animated by geniuses or intelligences also good and bad.
In America the dogma of two Principles, and of good and bad spirits, is also found. The Peruvians revered Pacha-Camac as being a good god, and Cupaï as being a bad god. The Caraïbs admitted two sorts of spirits; the one benevolent, who dwell in the heaven; and the other evil, who hover over us to lead us to temptation. The former, on the contrary, invite us to do good, and each of us is guarded by one of them. Those of Terra-Firma think that there is a god in the heaven, namely, the sun. Besides they admit a bad Principle, who is the author of all evils; they present him with flowers, fruits, corn, and perfumes. The Tapayas, situated in America by about the same latitude as the Madegasses in Africa, believe also in two Principles.
The natives of Brazil believe in a bad genius: they call him Aguyan; and they have conjurors who can, they say, divert his wrath. The Indians of Florida and of Louisiana adored the sun, the moon, and the stars. They also believed in an evil spirit named Toïa. The Canadians, and the savage tribes of the Bay of Hudson, revered the sun, the moon, the stars, and the thunder; but they more particularly prayed to the evil spirits. The Esquimaux believe in a god supremely good, whom they call Ukouma, and in another, Ouikan, who is the author of all evils; who causes the tempests, and who capsizes the boats. The savages of the strait of Davis believe in beneficent and malignant spirits.
This distinction of two Principles, of a god, and of geniuses or spirits, authors of good and light; and of a god and geniuses, authors of evil and darkness, is immemorial. This opinion has been so universally adopted for the only reason, that those who observed the opposite phenomena of nature could not account for them, and could not reconcile them with the existence of a single cause. As there are good and bad men, they believed that there were good and bad gods, the ones dispensers of good, and the others authors of evil.
Such was the universal belief when Jesus Christ came to the world. The Jews themselves, since the captivity of Babylon, generally believed in those two Principles. They went so far as to immolate their own children on the altars of evil deities, in order to appease them. Jesus preached his Gospel, died, and left on earth his apostles with the trust of continuing, among men, his saving mission. As in the writings of the Evangelists the word demon, or devil, was used figuratively, meaning lust, wrong desire, etc., some of the first Christians understood the true sense of these figurative words, and others did not. In the third century the Church of Rome, which had been tending to supremacy over other churches, and which, from policy, to gain more adepts, was compromising with Paganism, understood the word demon, or devil, literally, and preserved the heathen doctrine, which, as she grew, became widely spread, and afterwards an article of faith.
The Fathers of the Church, of that age, believed that the demons, or devils, were innumerable; that their chief, Lucifer, had entrusted a demon to accompany each man through life, to tempt him to sin; that Lucifer had as many bad angels, or demons, under his command, as God had good angels; that all those demons were corporeal, and that those male committed fornication and adultery with the daughters of men; and those female with the sons of men; that they had generated the giants; and that they had incited the oppressors of the Christians to persecute them. Thus thought Justin, Tatian, Minutius-Felix, Athenagoras, Tertullian, Julius-Firmicus, Origen, Synesius, Arnobe, St. Gregory of Nazianze, Lactance, St. Jerome, St. Augustine, etc., as seen in their works in either edition of the Benedictines, or of the canon Caillot, of Migne, a priest, now editor in Paris. Even in our days the most of the superstitious practices of the Pagans, in regard to evil spirits, are preserved in the Papal Church,—conjurations, exorcisms, Agnus Dei, holy water, etc., and others which they have added, such as the sign of the cross, the expulsion of the devil from houses, barns, wells, wagons, beasts, fields, etc. These ceremonies are oftentimes performed, as a matter of course, for money.
The same took place in the Church of Rome in reference to the heathen dogma of good angels being under the command of the good spirit, or God; this dogma was generally believed even bythe Jews, at least since the captivity of Babylon. We saygenerally, because the Sadduceans did not believe it; and perhaps, also, the Samaritans and the Caraïtes, for we have but two testimonies that prove they partook of the opinion of the Samaritans on this point, namely, the testimony of Abusaïd, author of an Arabic version of the Pentateuch, and that of Aaron, in his commentaries of the same. The Papal Church holds still that the angels form three hierarchies, or choirs. The first is that of the Seraphims, Cherubims, and thrones; the second comprises the dominations, the virtues, and the powers; and the third is composed of the principalities, of the archangels, and of the angels. One of these angels, called guardian, is obliged to stand by each one of us all the days of our life. Temples, altars, prayers and sacrifices are offered to them.
Tertullian, Origen, Clement of Alexandria, etc., thought that the bodies of the good angels were formed of a very thin, subtle matter. Other Fathers, Basile, Athanase, Cyrille, Gregory of Nysse, John-Chrysostomus, etc., considered them as spiritual beings; however, they believed that they may take a body when they please. The Church of Rome holds, as an article of faith, that the good angels ought to be adored.
As seen above, the Church of Rome has preserved, with a very slight modification, if any, the heathen dogma of two Principles, the one good, God; and the other bad, Lucifer, or the devil; alsothe nomenclature of geniuses, or spirits, or angels, which are, the ones under the command of God, and the others under the command of Lucifer. When, in the sixteenth century, the Protestants parted with the Church of Rome, they cut off many branches of this dogma; but they kept its body, namely, instead of understanding the words demon, or devil, as meaning lust, abuse of free agency, wrong desire, etc., they understood them of personal beings, either material or immaterial, but existing, tempting each man to sin; and relentlessly seeking the ruin of mankind.
Therefore the doctrine of a Personal Devil is of Pagan origin.
PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE DOCTRINE OF ORIGINAL SIN.
TheRoman Catholic writers are unanimous in the opinion that it was the belief of a large number of Pagans that man had fallen from a higher state of existence. St. Augustine, more especially, lengthily and emphatically insists upon the general belief of the Pagans in original sin, when he writes against Pelage. However, we shall bring forth other testimonies, which will not leave, in the mind of the reader, any doubt that the Pagans generally believed in original sin.
Cicero, in his work De Republica, book third, after painting the grandeur of the human nature, and then contrasting its subjection to miseries, to diseases, to sorrow, to fear, and to the most degrading passions, was at a loss to define man. He called hima soul in ruins. It was for the same reason that, in Plato, Socrates reminds to his disciples that those who had established mysteries, and who, he said, were not to be despised, taught that according to their ancestors, any one who dies without having been purified is plunged into the mire of the Tartarus; whereas, he who has beenpurified dwells with the gods. Clement of Alexandria, in his Stromata, book third, writes, that, according to the testimony of Philolaüs, the Pythagorician, all the ancient theologians and poets said that the soul was buried in the body, as in a grave, as a punishment for some sin. It was also the doctrine of the Orphics, as can be seen in Plat., Cratyl., Opera, tome third.
In the pages 48, 50, and 51, of the treatise of Plutarch, on the Delays of Divine Justice, we read: "A State, for instance, is one same thing continued, a whole, alike to an animal which is ever the same, and the age thereof does not change the identity. The State then being one, as long as the association maintains the unity, the merit and the demerit, the reward and the punishment for all that is done in common are justly ascribed to it, as they are to a single individual. But if a State is to be considered in this point of view, it ought to be the same with a family proceeding from the same stock, from which it holds I do not know what sort of hidden strength; I do not know what sort of communication of essence and qualities, which extend to all the individuals of the race. Beings produced through the medium of generation are not similar to the productions of arts. In regard to the latter, when the work is completed it is immediately separated from the hand of the workman, and it no longer belongs to him: true it is done by him, but not from him. On the contrary, what is engendered proceeds from the substance itself of thegenerating being; so that it holds from him something which is justly rewarded or punished in his stead, for that something is himself."
According to the doctrine of the Persians, Meshia and Meshiane, or the first man and first woman, were first pure, and submitted to Ormuzd, their maker. Ahriman saw them and envied their happiness. He approached them under the form of a serpent, presented fruits to them, and persuaded them that he was the maker of man, of animals, of plants, and of the beautiful universe in which they dwelled. They believed it; and since that Ahriman was their master. Their nature became corrupt, and this corruption infected their whole posterity. This we find in Vendidat-Sade, pages 305, and 428.
Thus sin does not originate from Ormuzd; but, Zoroaster says, from the being hidden in crime. This testimony is found in the Exposition of the Theological System of the Persians, extracted from the books Zends, Pehlvis, and Parsis, by Anquetil du Perron. The following passage, "There are stains brought by man when he comes to life," is found in the 69th tome of the Memoirs of the Academy of Inscriptions.
We read in the Ezour-Vedam, book 1, chapter 4, tome 1, pages 201 and 202: "God never created vice. He cannot be its author; and God, who is holiness and wisdom, can be the author but of virtue. He gave us his law in which he prescribes what we ought to do. Sin is a transgression of this law by which it is prohibited. If sin reigns on the earth, we ourselves are its authors. Our perverse inclinations have induced us to transgress the law of God; hence, the first sin which has induced us to commit others." The same author in book 5, chapter 5, tome 2, acknowledges that the first man was created in a state of innocence; and that he was happy because he controlled his passions and desires.
Maurice in his Indiæ Antiquitates, vol. 6, page 53, proves that the Indians had a knowledge of the fall of the first man and of the first woman; he proves also that the dogma of original sin was taught by the Druids. Voltaire, on the seventeenth page of his work, Additions to General History, confesses that the Bramas believed that man was fallen and degenerated: "this idea," he adds, "is found among all the ancient peoples."
The Father Jesuit Bouchet, in a letter to the Bishop of Avranches, writes: "The gods," our Indians say, "tried by all means to obtain immortality. After many inquiries and trials, they conceived the idea that they could find it in the tree of life, which was in the Chorcan. In fact they succeeded; and in eating once in a while of the fruits of that tree, they kept the precious treasure they so much valued. A famous snake, named Cheiden, saw that the tree of life had been found by the gods of the second order. As probably he had been entrusted with guarding that tree, he became so angry because his vigilance had beendeceived, that he immediately poured out an enormous quantity of poison, which spread over the whole earth."
In the Ta-Hio, or Moral of Confucius, page 50, Confucius, after saying that reason is a gift from heaven, adds, "Concupiscence has corrupted it, and it is now mixed with many impurities. Therefore take off those impurities so that it resume its first luster, and all its former perfection." The philosopher Tchouangse taught, in conformity with the doctrine of King or sacred books of the Chinese, "that in the former state of heaven, man was inly united to the supreme reason; and that he practiced all the works of justice. The heart relished the truth. There was in man no alloy of falsity. Then the four seasons of the year were regular. Nothing was injurious to man, and man was injurious to nothing. Universal harmony reigned in all nature. But the columns of the firmament having been broken, the earth was shaken in its very foundations. Man having rebelled against the heavens the system of the universe was deranged; evils and crimes flooded the earth." This testimony is extracted from the Discourse of Ramsey on Mythology, pages 146, and 148.
M. de Humboldt, in the tome 1, pages 237 and 274, and also in the tome 2, page 198 of his Views of the Cordilleras and of the monuments of America, says, "That the mother of our flesh; the serpent Cihuacohuati, and her are famous inthe Mexican traditions. Those traditions represent the mother of our flesh fallen from her first state of innocence and happiness." Voltaire, in Questions on Encyclopedia, says; "The fall of man degenerated is the basis of the theology of all the ancient nations."
There were nearly among all nations expiatory rites, to purify infants when they were born. Usually this ceremony was done in the day when the child was named. Macrob informs us, in his Saturn, book 1, that "that day, among the Romans, was the ninth for the boys and the eighth for the girls. That day was called lustricus, because of the lustral water used to purify the new born child." In the Analysis of the Insc. of Rosette, page 145, we read that the Egyptians, the Persians, and the Greeks had a similar practice. In Yucatan the new born child was brought in the temple, where the priest poured on his head the waters destined to this use; and then he gave him a name. In the Canary islands the women performed this priestly function. Caril, in his American Letters, tome 1, pages 146, and 147, speaks of these ceremonies. A law prescribed these expiatory rites among the Mexicans.
M. de Humboldt, Views of the Cordilleras, and of the Monuments of America, tome 1, page 223, writes: "The midwife, in invoking the god Ometeuctly, (the god of celestial paradise,) and the goddess Omecihuatl, who live in the abode of the blessed, poured water on the forehead and onthe breast of the new-born child. After pronouncing several prayers, in which water was considered as the symbol of the purification of the soul, the midwife called near her the children who had been invited to give a name to the new-born child. In some provinces a fire was kindled at the same time, and they did as if really the child was passed through the flame to purify him both with water and fire. This ceremony reminds the practices whose origin, in Asia, seems to be immemorial."
Likewise, the Thibetans have similar expiatory rites: this we find in the thirty-first page of the preface of the Thibetan Alphabet. We extract the following from the Works of the Society of Calcutta: "In India, when a name is given to a child, his name is written on his forehead, and he is plunged three times into the water of the river. Then the Brama exclaims, 'O God, pure, one, invisible and perfect! to thee we offer this offspring of a holy tribe, anointed with an incorruptible oil, and purified with water.'"
In the mysteries, the Hierophant taught the doctrine that our nature had been corrupted by a first sin. The sixth book of the poem Eneida is nothing but a brilliant exposition of this doctrine; and perhaps antiquity offers nothing that proves more the power of tradition on the human mind, than the passage in which the poet, following Eneas in the abode of the dead, describes in magnificent verses the dismal spectacle which firststrikes his gaze. If there is any thing in the world that wakes up in our mind the idea of innocence, assuredly it is a child who has been unable neither to know nor to commit sin; and the supposition that he is subject to punishment and to suffering, is a thought which our soul abhors. However, Virgil, in the 6th book, verses 426, and 429, places the children dead when yet nursing, at the entry of the sad kingdoms, where he represents them in a state of pain, weeping and moaning—vagitus ingens. Why those tears, those cries of sufferings? Which faults do those children, to whom their mothers had not smiled, expiate? (Virgil, Ecloga 4, verse 62.) What has inspired the poet with this surprising fiction? On what does it rest? Whence does it originate, if not from the ancient belief that man was born in sin?
Therefore, the doctrine of original sin was generally believed by the Pagans.
We stated, at the commencement of this chapter, that the Roman Catholic writers are unanimous in the opinion that it was the belief of a large number of Pagans, that man had fallen from a higher state of existence. However, a small number only of the same writers are of the opinion that the Jews believed in the doctrine of original sin; and they find no other proof of the assertion than the ceremony of circumcision, which, as is familiar to all, was a mere legal and national observance, and had not the virtue of remittingsin. In the first centuries of the Christian era, baptism was considered as a mere ceremony for initiating catechumens to the Christian profession.
It was only towards the end of the third century, that the belief of the transmission of Adam's sin to all his descendants was introduced in the Church of Rome, which already considered herself the mistress of the other churches. Soon afterwards the dogma that baptism had the virtue of remitting original sin was established. As proof of these two facts, we have the testimony of more than twenty-three Christian sects of the first centuries, which did not admit the dogma of original sin; and did not believe that baptism had the virtue of remitting sin. We quote a few of those sects: the Simonians, the Nicolaïtes, the Valentinians, the Basilidians, the Carpocratians, the Ophites, the Sethians, the Pelagians, all the Gnostic sects, etc.
Therefore, the Church of Rome borrowed the dogma of original sin from the Pagans. To this many Roman Catholic writers say: true the Pagans held this doctrine, but we did not borrow it from them; we found it in the first chapters of Genesis. We rejoin that even the fathers of the fourth century did not understand those chapters literally, and thereby as teaching the dogma of original sin. St. Augustine, in his work, City of God, avers that it was a general opinion among Christians, that the first three chapters of Genesisare allegorical, and that he himself is inclined to think so. He confesses that it is impossible to take them literally without hurting piety, and ascribing to God unworthy actions. Origen says: "Where is the man of good sense, who can ever believe that there have been a first, a second, and a third days, and that those days had each an evening and morning, though there were not yet neither sun, nor moon, nor stars? Where is the man credulous enough to believe, that God was working like a gardener, and that he planted a garden in Orient; that the tree of life was a real tree, whose fruit would preserve life?"
Origen compared the temptation of Adam to that of the birth of Love, whose father was Porus, or Abundance, and whose mother was Poverty. He adds that there are in the Old Testament facts, which, if understood literally, are absurd, and which, if understood allegorically, contain valuable truths. We refer the reader for the above to the following works: See St. Augustine, De Civitate Dei, liber xi, cap. 6, et liber 2, cap. xi, No. 24.—De Genesi ad Litteram, liber 4, No. 44.—De Catechis Rudibus, cap. 13. The opinion of St. Athanase can be found in his Oratio Contra Arium, No. 60.—That of Origen, in his work De Principiis, liber iv, No. 16, contra Celsum, liber 6, No. 50, 51. That of St. Ambrosius, in his Hexam, liber one, cap. 7, et Sequentia. That of Theodoret, in his Quest. in Genes. interpr. cap. v. et Sequentia, and that of St. Gregory in his Moral, in Job, liber 32, cap. 9.
The Fathers and the Christian sects named above, did not take the first three chapters of Genesis literally, because it would imply absurdity and blasphemy. The idea of God, namely, of the supreme and eternal cause, who clothes our clay for the pleasure of walking in a garden; the idea of a woman conversing with a serpent; listening to its counsels and heeding them; that of a man and a woman organized for reproduction, and yet destined to be immortal on earth, and to procreate a mathematical infinity of beings, immortal like themselves, who also will infinitely multiply, and will all find their food in the fruits of the trees of a garden where they will all dwell; a fruit culled that is to kill Adam and Eve, and to be transmitted as a hereditary crime to all their descendants, who did not participate to their disobedience, crime which will be forgiven only in as much as men will commit another crime, infinitely greater, a deicide—if such a crime might exist; the woman who since that time is condemned to bring forth with pain, as if the pains of childbirth were not natural to her organization, and were not common to her, as well as to the other animals which have not tasted the forbidden fruit; the serpent forced to crawl, as if a footless reptile could move any other way: so many absurdities and follies, heaped in those first three chapters, they could not believe and ascribe them to God.
Maimonide, one of the most learned Rabbins of the Jews, thus wrote in the twelfth century: "Weought not to understand literally what is written in the books of the creation; nor entertain about the creation the opinions generally agreed. It is for this reason that our wise men urged upon us to keep their true teaching secret, and not to lift up the veil of allegory which conceals the truths they contain. If taken literally the relation of the creation gives us the most absurd and extravagant ideas of the Deity. Whoever will find out their true teaching, ought to keep it to himself; this is the earnest recommendation of our wise men, and more especially in regard to the first six days. Those who know ought to speak about it but obscurely, as I do myself, so as to let their hearers guess if they can."
The above facts and proofs lead us to the conclusion that the Church of Rome borrowed the dogma of original sin from the Pagans.
As the Protestants, who call themselves Orthodox, borrowed it in the sixteenth century from the Church of Rome, it follows that they also hold it from the Pagans.
Therefore, the doctrine of Original Sin is of Pagan origin.
PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE DOCTRINE OF TRINITY.
TheRoman Catholic writers themselves confess that the Pagans believed in Trinity; also the most of the self-called Protestant Orthodox historians and authors. The neutral authors are unanimous on this point. The following facts and proofs we shall impartially extract from those three classes of writers:
The Egyptians believed in Trinity; the Greek inscription of the great Obelisk of the major circus, at Rome, reads thus: Megas Theos, the great god, Theogentos, the begotten of god; and Pamphegges, the all-bright, (Apollo, the Spirit.) Heraclide, of Pont, and Porphyre relate a famous oracle of Serapis: Prota Theos, metepeita logos, kai pneuma soun autois. Sumphuta de tria panta, kai eis en eonta. [Translation:] All is God in the beginning; then the word and the spirit; three Gods coengendered together and united in one.
The Chaldeans had a sort of Trinity in their Metris, Oromasis, and Araminis, or Mithra, Oromase and Aramine. The Chinese had also, andstill have, a mysterious Trinity. The first god generates the second one, and both generate the third one. The Chinese say that the great term, or great unity, contains three, one is three, and three are one. In India Trinity was immemorially known. The Father Jesuit Calmet writes: "What I have seen mostly surprising is a text extracted from Lamaastambam, one of the books of the Indians.... It begins thus: The Lord, the good, the great God, in his mouth is the word. (The term which they use personifies the word.) Then it speaks of the Holy Spirit in these words: Ventus seu spiritus perfectus; [translation] breath or perfect spirit,—and it ends by the creation, ascribing it to God alone."
The Jesuit Calmet says, writing about the Thibetans: "I learned the following about their religion. They call God Konciosa, and they seem to have some idea of the adorable Trinity; for they call God sometimes Konsikosick, God-one, and at other times Kocioksum, God-three. They use a kind of bead on which they pronounce these words:om,ha,hum. When they are asked the explanation, they answer thatomsignifies the intelligence, or arm, namely power; thathais the word; thathumis the heart or love, and that these three words signify God."
The Father Bouchet, a Roman Catholic missionary in India, wrote the following to the bishop of Avranches: "I commence by the confused idea which the Indians preserve about the adorableTrinity. My Lord, I have spoken to you of the three principal deities of the Indians, Bruma, Wishnou, and Routren. The greater portion of the people say, it is true, that they are three different gods, and really separate. But several Nianigneuls, or spiritual men, assure that these three gods, apparently distinct, compose in reality but one god: that this god is called Bruma, when he creates and exercises his all-power; that he is called Wishnou, when he preserves the created beings, and does them good; and that, finally, he takes the name of Routren, when he destroys the cities, chastises the wicked, and makes men feel his just anger."
English missionaries have found at Otaïti some traces of the Trinity among the religious dogmas of the natives.
Plato refers to this doctrine in several passages of his works. "Not only," says Dacier in his translation, "it is believed that he knew about the Word, eternal Son of God; but also that he knew about the Holy Spirit, for he thus writes to the young Denis:
"'I must declare to Archedemus what is much more precious and more divine, and which you so eagerly desire to know; for you sent him to me for this express purpose. According to what he told me, you think that I have not sufficiently explained to you my opinion about the first Principle, therefore I shall write it to you, enigmatically, however, in order that, if my epistle is interceptedat sea or on land, he who will read it will be unable to understand it. All things are around their king; they exist through him, and he is the only cause of good things, second for the second things, and third for the third things.'
"In the Epinomis," continues Dacier, "Plato establishes as Principle, the first good, the Word, or intelligence and the soul. The first good is God;... the Word, or intelligence, is the son of this first good, who begets him similar to himself; and the soul, which is the term between the Father and the Son, is the Holy Spirit."
Plato had borrowed this doctrine about Trinity from Timee of Locre, who held it from the Italian philosophical school. Marsile Ficin, in one of his remarks on Plato, shows from the testimonies of Jamblic, Porphyre, Plato and Maxim of Tyr, that the Pythagoricians knew also the excellence of the Ternary; Pythagoras himself indicated it in this symbol: Protima to Schema, kai Bema, kai Triobolon. The Jesuit Kirker, dissenting about the unity and trinity of the first Principle, traces vestiges of the doctrine of Trinity up to Pythagoras, and to the Egyptians.
St. Augustine himself, though the staunchest defender of the dogma of Trinity, confessed that, among all the nations of the world, a Trinity, nearly similar to the one he believed in, had been held. He added that the Pythagoricians, the Platonicians, and that a great number of Atlantes, Lybian, Egyptian, Persian, Chaldean, Scythian,Gallenses, and Hibernian philosophers, held several dogmas about the unity of the God, Light, and Good, in common with the Church of Rome.
Macrobe gives us a summary of ancient or Platonician theology, which contains a true Trinity, of which that of the Papists and of the self-called Protestant Orthodox is but a copy. According to this summary, the world has been formed by the universal soul: this soul is the same as their spiritus, or spirit. They also call the Holy Spirit Creator: "Veni Creator spiritus," etc., [translation,] Come Spirit Creator, etc., (Catholic hymn.) Macrobe adds, that from this spirit or soul the intelligence, which he callsmen'sproceeds. Is this not the Father, the Son, or wisdom, and the Spirit that creates and vivifies all? Even is not the expressionto proceedcommon to the ancient and to the Papist and Protestant Orthodox Churches in the filiation of the first three beings?
Macrobe goes farther. He recalls the three Principles to a primitive unit, who is the sovereign God. After resting his theory on this Trinity he adds: "You see how this unit, or original monade of the first cause, is preserved entire and indivisible up to the soul, or spirit, which animates the world." This testimony of Macrobe has so much more bearing, that he wrote in the beginning of the fifth century; that he was the first Chamberlain of the emperor Theodose, and was the most learned antiquarian of that age.
Another most important fact we shall record.It is beyond any doubt that before the coming of Jesus Christ the Jews did not hold the dogma of Trinity, nor do they now. Their Rabbins, and all the Roman Catholic theologians, agree on this point.
During the first three centuries of the Christian era the dogma of Trinity was not generally believed. The Simonians, the Nicholaïtes, the Valentinians, the Basilidians, the Carpocratians, the Ophites, the Sethians, all the Gnostics, and many other Christian sects rejected it. It was only in the fourth century, that Arius and the above sects were condemned in the council of Nice, because they denied the divinity of Jesus Christ. This council was assembled by the order of the emperor Constantine I., who was urged to it by the Bishop of Rome, (or Pope,) whose Church held the dogma of Trinity. As a matter of course the bishops of the council had to decide according to the will of those two leaders; for Constantine threatened them with deposition and exile: in fact he banished Arius, and deposed seventeen bishops, who did not subscribe to the decision of the council.
The doctrine that Jesus Christ was not God himself was so generally spread, and so deeply rooted in the minds, that several successors of Constantine I. embraced Arianism; and it was only after centuries that Arianism, which was spread nearly all over the East, was crushed by the papal and the imperial power.
Now let us draw our conclusions. Since the Jews had no knowledge of the dogma of Trinity, the Church of Rome could not borrow it from them; since the generality of the Christian sects during the first three centuries did not believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ, the Church of Rome did not find the dogma of Trinity in the Gospel; (besides, the Catholic theologians never pretended that the Scriptures teach it—they simply pretended, and still pretend, that it was a tradition.) Since the dogma of Trinity was believed by many Pagan sects, then the Roman Church borrowed it from them.
In turns, the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches borrowed this doctrine from the Church of Rome, in the sixteenth century.
Therefore the doctrine of Trinity is of Pagan origin.
PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE SUPREME DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST.
Itwill be demonstrated that the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ is of Pagan origin, if it can be proved, 1st, That the Church of Rome, from which the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches borrowed this doctrine, in the sixteenth century, did not hold it from the apostles of Jesus Christ; and, 2d, That the Church of Rome uses, in her adoration to Jesus Christ, rites and ceremonies of a striking similarity with those used by the Pagans, in their adoration to the sun, under the names of Bacchus, Hercules, Osiris, Mithra, Atys, etc.
But it can be proved, 1st, That the Church of Rome, from which the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches, in the sixteenth century, borrowed the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, did not hold it from the apostles of Jesus Christ; and, 2d, That the Church of Rome uses, in her adoration to Jesus Christ, rites and ceremonies of a striking similarity with those used by the Pagans in their adoration to the sun, under thenames of Bacchus, Hercules, Osiris, Mithra, Atys, etc.
1st. We prove that the Church of Rome, from which the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches, in the sixteenth century, borrowed the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, did not hold it from the apostles of Jesus Christ.
It will be evident that the Church of Rome, from which the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches, in the sixteenth century, borrowed the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, did not hold it from the apostles of Jesus Christ, if, until nearly the end of the third century, the various Christian denominations, or sects, did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. But, until nearly the end of the third century, the various Christian denominations, or sects, did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
This we prove:—
We request the readers to bear in mind, in reading this chapter, that we have extracted all the proofs and statements brought forth therein, from the works of the Roman Catholic priest Bergier, which we have studied in our Catholic theological school; from the works of the Rev. Father Jesuit Feller; from the History of the Church, by Berrault-Ber-Castel, a Roman Catholic priest; and from the Ecclesiastical History, by the Roman Catholic clergyman Fleury. Those proofs and statements can be verified, in the first two writers,at the articles of the sects, and of their authors, arranged in alphabetical order; and in the other authors at the dates of the centuries and years.
Bergier says: "The Cerinthians pretended that Jesus Christ was born from Joseph and Mary like other men; but that he was endowed with a superior wisdom and holiness; that when he was baptized, Christ, or the Son of God, had descended on him under the form of a dove, and had revealed to him God the Father, till then unknown, in order that he might make him known to men." The Cerinthians sprung up, according to St. Epiphane, in the middle of the first century, but according to St. Ireneus, at about the year 88.
Therefore the Cerinthians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Bergier says: "The Carpocratians supposed the pre-existence of the souls; pretended that they had sinned in an anterior life; that as a punishment of their crimes they had been condemned to be shut up in bodies.... In their belief, the soul of Jesus Christ, before her incarnation, had been more faithful to God than the others. It is for this reason that God had endowed her with more knowledge than the souls of other men; also with more strength both to defeat the geniuses opposed to humanity, and to return to heaven against their will. God, they said, grants the same favor to those who love Jesus Christ; and who, like him, know the dignity of their souls. Thus the Carpocratians considered Jesus Christas being simply a man, though more perfect than the others; they believed that he was the son of Joseph and Mary, and confessed his miracles and sufferings. They are not accused of denying the resurrection, but of denying the general resurrection; and of holding that the soul only (not the body) of Jesus Christ, had ascended to the heavens." The sect of the Carpocratians commenced towards the end of the first century.
Therefore the Carpocratians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Bergier writes thus about the Ebionites: "It is very probable that (although some authors say that they date from the year 72 of the first century) they commenced to be known only in the year 103, or even later, under the reign of Adrian, after the total ruin of Jerusalem, in the year 119; that the Ebionites and the Nazarenes are two different sects; it is the opinion of Mosheim, Hist. Christ., sœc. 1, par. 58, sœc. 2, par. 39.... The Ebionites considered Jesus Christ as being simply a man born from Joseph and Mary."
Consequently the Ebionites did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The Christian sect of the Basilidians was founded in the beginning of the second century by Basilide of Alexandria, Feller says; he had been converted from the philosophy of Pythagoras and Plato to Christianism. Bergier writes about the Basilidians: "They believed that God had sent his Son, or intelligence, under the name of JesusChrist, to liberate those who would believe in him; that Jesus Christ had really performed the miracles ascribed to him by the Christians; but that he had only a fantastical body and the appearances of a man."
Therefore the Basilidians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The sect of the Marcionites was established, in the middle of the second century, by Marcio, the son of a bishop of Pontus. The Marcionites held that God, principle of the spirits, had given to one of them, Jesus Christ, the appearances of humanity; and had sent him to the earth to abolish the law and the prophets; to teach to men that their souls come from heaven, and that they cannot be restored to happiness except in reuniting to God.
Therefore the Marcionites did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Valentin founded the sect of Valentinians in 140. He was an Egyptian, and had been converted from philosophy to Christianism. Bergier, after lengthily exposing the doctrines of his sect, says, "Consequently the Valentinians neither admitted the eternal generation of the Word, nor his incarnation, nor the divinity of Jesus Christ, nor the redemption of mankind, in the proper sense. In their opinion, the redemption of mankind by Jesus Christ did not extend farther than this—Jesus Christ had come to the world to liberate men from the tyranny of the Eons, and hadgiven them examples and lessons of virtue, and had taught them the true means of obtaining eternal happiness."
Therefore the Valentinians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The Ptolemaïtes did not believe the doctrine of Jesus Christ, and held that he was but the Son of God.
St. Epiphane in his work Hære. 36, and Bergier, inform us that the Heracleonites, whose chief was Heracleon, and who were widely spread, particularly in Sicily, believed that the Word divine did not create the world, but that it had been created by one of the Eons, or spirits. In their opinion, there were two worlds, the one corporeal and visible, and the other spiritual and invisible, and they only ascribed the formation of the latter to Jesus Christ, who was one of the greatest Eons, or spirits. The Heracleonites were organized as a sect in the year 140.
The Colarbasians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Sanderus and Bergier say, that the Barules professed to believe that the Son of God had but a fantastical body; that there was no original sin; that all our souls had been created before the world, and all had sinned in that former state of existence; and that Jesus Christ was not God.
The Bardesanists, thus named from their founder, Bardesanes, a Syrian, who lived in the second century, became a large sect. Beausobrein his History of Manicheanism, tome 2, book 4, chap. 9, writes, that they believed in two Principles, originators of all things, the one good and the other bad. They denied that the eternal Word, or Son of God, had taken a human flesh; they said that he had taken only a celestial and aerial body. They denied the future resurrection of the body. Bergier, Feller, etc., say the same.
Then the Bardesanists did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The Marcosians rejected the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, and held only that he was one of the principal Eons, or spirits. The Marcosians were founded by Marc in the second century.
The Theodotians, Bergier says, believed that Jesus Christ was not God but a man; that he was above the other men only by his miraculous birth, and by his extraordinary virtues. Theodote, a native of Bysance, founded them in the second century.
The Artemonians also denied the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The Docetes held that Jesus Christ was only the Son of God, and that he had but apparently suffered humiliations, torments, and death.
The Tatianists did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. Tatian gave them his name when he organized them as a Christian denomination, in the second century. Bergier pretends that some passages of the writings of this learned author can be understood of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, but Fauste Socin, and others, in the Bibliotheca Fratrum Polonorum, in ten volumes, in folio, proves the contrary; and at the same time they prove that Clement of Alexandria and other Fathers of the second century disbelieved the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. Bergier confesses, however, that it is doubtful that Tatian had been Orthodox about the generation of the Word.
The Apellites denied the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. In their belief there was but one God, who sent to the world his Son, who took a body not in the womb of the virgin Mary, but from the four elements. Their sect widely spread in the East during the second century.
Bergier says, writing about the doctrines of the Ophites, a Christian sect of the second century: "In their belief, matter was eternal; the world was created against the will of God, and was governed by a multitude of spirits who govern the world. Christ united to the man Jesus to destroy the empire of the Demiourge, or creator of the world."
Therefore the Ophites did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
One of the doctrines of the Cainites was, that Jesus Christ was a spirit sent by God to save the world.
The Hermogenians, or followers of Hermogene,a Stoician philosopher, converted to Christianism at the end of the second century, believed that matter was eternal; that there was but one God, who had sent a spirit, Jesus Christ, to correct the evil that was among men.
"The Hermians, or disciples of Hermias," Bergier says, "taught that matter is eternal; that God is the soul of the world; that Jesus Christ, ascending to the heavens left his body in the Sun, from whom he had taken it; that the soul of man is composed of fire and of subtle air; that the birth of children is the resurrection, and that the world is hell." Bergier adds, in another article, that they believed that there was but one God, who had sent to the world a spirit, Jesus Christ.
Therefore the Hermians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Bergier, writing about the Sethians, says: "They said that the soul of Seth had passed to the body of Jesus Christ, and that Seth and Jesus Christ were the same person."
St. Augustine informs us that the Severians did not believe the doctrine of the resurrection of the flesh, and rejected the Old Testament. They did not believe that Jesus Christ was God himself.
The Encratites never held that Jesus Christ was God. Bergier says, "They did not believe that the Son of God was truly born from the virgin Mary."
The Valesians rejected the doctrine that Jesus Christ was God himself.
Bergier writes: "The Hieracites, heretics of the third century, were established by Hierax, or Hieracas, a physician by profession, born at Leontium, or Leontople, in Egypt. St. Epiphane, who relates and refutes the errors of this Sectarian, confesses that the austerity of his morals was exemplary; that he was familiar with the Greek and Egyptian sciences; that he had thoroughly studied the Scriptures, and that he was gifted with a persuasive eloquence. He denied the resurrection of the body, and admitted but a spiritual resurrection of the souls. He confessed that Jesus Christ had been generated by the Father; that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father as well as the Son; but he had dreamed that the Holy Ghost had taken a human body under the form of Melchisedek. He denied that Jesus Christ had a true human body."
Therefore the Hieracites denied the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Bergier thus writes about the Samosatians: "They were disciples and followers of Paul of Samosate, bishop of Antioch, at or about the year 262. This heretic taught that there is in God one sole person, namely, the Father; that the Son and the Holy Spirit are only two attributes of God, under which he manifested himself to men: that Jesus Christ is not God, but a man to whom God has communicated his wisdom in an extraordinary manner."
Therefore the Samosatians did not believe the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
The Manicheans denied the divinity of Jesus Christ, and believed that Jesus Christ had not a real body while on earth. His soul, they said, was of a nature similar to the nature of the souls of other men, though more perfect. He was the Son of God.
Therefore the Manicheans denied the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
All the above sects composed nearly the whole Christian body, during the first three centuries; and, as shown to the reader, every one either ignored or denied the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ.
Then it remains evident that the Church of Rome, from which the self-called Orthodox Protestant Churches, in the sixteenth century, borrowed the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, did not hold it from the apostles of Jesus Christ.
Confirmatur.—As a confirmation of this last and very important consequence, we are to prove,
1st. That in the Church of Rome, herself, the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ was established only at about the year 180.
Remark.—By the Church of Rome, we mean only the church whose bishop (who after centuries assumed the title of Pope,) was at Rome, and which, then, did not extend farther than the province of Rome, and a few other occidental places.
2d. That in the council of Nice, held in 325,despite the efforts of the Bishop of Rome; and despite the tyranny of the emperor Constantine I., who invoked the council at his own expense, attended, surrounded, and enforced it with military force, it was with the greatest difficulty that the Church of Rome obtained, from the bishops who composed it, a decision in favor of the doctrine she held, that Jesus Christ was God himself.
3d. That it was only long after the council of Nice that its decision, in favor of the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, prevailed among the churches which depended on the Emperor of Constantinople, and on the Bishop of Rome.
4th. We will also present a succinct view of the large number of Christians, who, without the pale of the communion of Rome, preserved the former belief that Jesus Christ was not God.
1st. We prove that in the Church of Rome herself, the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ was established only at about the year 180.
Bergier himself makes the following confession: "An ancient author, who is believed to be Caïus, bishop of Rome, who had written against Artemon, and of whom Eusebe has related the words, Ecclesiastical History, book 5, chap. 22, seems to confound together the Theodotians and the Artemonians.... They maintain, he says, that their doctrine is not new; that it has been taught bythe apostles, and that it has been followed in the church until the pontificates of Victor and of Zephyrine his successor, but that since that time the truth has been altered."
Bergier adds, "The Theodotians believed that Jesus Christ was a man, and not God, that Jesus Christ was above the other men only by his miraculous birth, and by his extraordinary virtues." Also, Bergier says, that, although Theodote was a native of Bysance, he resided in Rome, where he preached the same doctrine as Theodote, at least in regard to Jesus Christ being a man and not God.
Therefore in the Church of Rome herself, the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ was established only at about the year 180.
2d. We prove that in the council of Nice, held in 325, despite the efforts of the Bishop of Rome; and despite the tyranny of the emperor Constantine I., who convoked the council at his own expense, attended, surrounded, and enforced it with military force, it was with the greatest difficulty that the Church of Rome obtained, from the bishops who composed it, a decision in favor of the doctrine she held, that Jesus Christ was God.
Arius, a priest of Alexandria, surprised at hearing Alexander, his bishop, teaching in an assembly of priests, that Jesus Christ was God, protested against this new doctrine. An animated controversy between him and Alexander, andthen between the friends of the Church of Rome, which held this doctrine, and other churches which did not, ensued. The council of Nice assembled, and there seventeen bishops boldly faced the legate of Sylvestre, the emperor Constantine and his military force; and they sided with Arius. Eusebe, bishop of Cesarea, the most learned of the bishops who composed the council, sided with Arius. He is the same Eusebe who wrote the Evangelical Preparation and Demonstration, in two volumes in folio; who wrote an Ecclesiastical History, the Life of Constantine, a Chronic and a Commentary on the Psalms and on Isaiah. Constantine forced them either to yield and to acquiesce to the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ, or to be expelled from their episcopal sees; and Arius, exiled, had to retire in Palestine.
Consequently, in the council of Nice, held in 325, despite the efforts of the Bishop of Rome; and despite the tyranny of the emperor Constantine I., who convoked the council at his own expense, attended, surrounded, and enforced it with military force, it was with the greatest difficulty that the Church of Rome obtained, from the bishops who composed it, a decision in favor of the doctrine she held, that Jesus Christ was God himself.
3d. We prove that it was only long after the council of Nice, that its decision in favor of the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ,prevailed among the churches which depended on the Emperor of Constantinople, and on the Bishop of Rome.
Bergier, despite his partiality in favor of the Church of Rome, is obliged to make the following avowal:
"The anathema pronounced against Arianism did not destroy it;the larger portion of those(bishops)who had signed the decision of the council, only for fear of being exiled, remained attached to the party of Arius. Constantine himself, influenced by an Arian priest, recommended to him by his sister Constantia, at her death bed, and who had gained his confidence, consented to the repeal of Arius from his exile, in 328. This heretic reunited to his partisans, and commenced spreading his errors with even more earnestness than before. But St. Athanase, who had succeeded to Alexander in the episcopal see of Alexandria, constantly refused to commune with him, and by this firmness displeased Constantine I.
"Since that time the Arians became a redoubtable party. They held several councils where they obtained the majority.... Arius died in a tragic manner, in the year 337. After the death of Constantine I., in 337, the party of the Arians was alternatively the stronger, in ratio of the less or greater protection extended to them or to the Orthodox by the Emperors. Under Constance, who favored them, they filled the Orient with seditions and troubles; but Constantine Junior and Constant, who reigned in Occident, prevented Arianism from spreading. In 351, Constance, who had become the master of the whole empire by the death of his two brothers, protected Arianism more openly than before. Several councils were held in Italy, in which the Arians had the majority; and others, in which the Catholics had the superiority.... Julian, who was emperor in 362, sided neither with one party nor with the other. Valens, emperor of the Orient, in 364, favored and embraced Arianism; whereas Valentinian, his brother, did all in his power to extirpate it from the Occident.