The emperor's reply follows:
"Trajan to Pliny:
"You have done perfectly right, my dear Pliny, in the inquiry which you have made concerning Christians. For truly no one general rule can be laid down, which will apply itself to all cases. These people must not be sought after. If they are brought before you and convicted, let them be capitally punished, yet with this restriction, that if any one renounce Christianity, and evidence his sincerity by supplicating our gods, however suspected he may be for the past, he shall obtain pardon for the future, on his repentance. But anonymous libels in no case ought to be attended to; for the precedent would be of the worst sort, and perfectly incongruous to the maxims of my government."
**Causes of the Apostasy.—Internal Causes**.
1. The cruel persecution to which the adherents of Christianity and the Church as an organized body were subjected during the first three centuries of our era have been treated as external causes, contributing at least indirectly to the general apostasy. Details of Judaistic and heathen opposition have been given with sufficient fulness to show that the unpopular Church had a troubled existence, and that such of its members as remained faithful to the tenets and principles of the gospel were martyrs in spirit if not in fact.
2. As would naturally be expected, the immediate effect of persistent persecution on those who professed a belief in the divinity of the Lord Jesus was diverse and varied; indeed it ranged from unrestrained enthusiasm expressed in frenzied clamoring for martyrdom, to ready and abject apostasy with ostentatious display of devotion in idolatrous service.
3. Many of the Christian devotees developed a zeal amounting to mania, and, disregarding all prudence and discretion, gloried in the prospect of winning the martyr's crown. Some who had been left unassailed felt themselves aggrieved, and became their own accusers; while others openly committed acts of aggression with intent to bring resentment upon themselves.—(See Note 1, end of chapter.) These extravagances were doubtless encouraged by the excessive veneration accorded the memories and the bodily remains of those who had fallen as victims in the cause. The reverential respect so rendered developed later into the impious practice of martyr worship.
4. Commenting on the imprudent enthusiasm of the early Christians, Gibbon says: "The Christians sometimes supplied by their voluntary declaration the want of an accuser, rudely disturbed the public service of paganism, and, rushing in crowds round the tribunal of the magistrates, called upon them to pronounce and to inflict the sentence of the law. The behavior of the Christians was too remarkable to escape the notice of the ancient philosophers; but they seem to have received it with much less admiration than astonishment. Incapable of conceiving the motives which sometimes transported the fortitude of believers beyond the bounds of prudence and reason, they treated such an eagerness to die as the strange result of obstinate despair, of stupid insensibility or of superstitious frenzy."—(Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," ch. XVI.)
5. But there is another side to the picture. While imprudent zealots invited dangers from which they might have remained exempt, others, affrighted at the possibility of being included among the victims, voluntarily deserted the Church and returned to heathen allegiances. Milner, speaking of conditions existing in the third century, and incorporating the words of Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, who lived at the time of the incident described, says: "Vast numbers lapsed into idolatry immediately. Even before men were accused as Christians, many ran to the forum and sacrificed to the gods as they were ordered; and the crowds of apostates were so great, that the magistrates wished to delay numbers of them till the next day, but they were importuned by the wretched suppliants to be allowed to prove themselves heathens that very night."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. III, ch. 8.)
6. In connection with this individual apostasy of Church members under the pressure of persecution, there arose among the provincial governors a practice of selling certificates or "libels" as these documents were called, which "attested that the persons therein mentioned had complied with the laws and sacrificed to the Roman deities. By producing these false declarations, the opulent and timid Christians were enabled to silence the malice of an informer, and to reconcile, in some measure, their safety with their religion."— (Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," ch. XVI.) A modification of this practice of quasi-apostasy consisted in procuring testimonials from persons of standing certifying that the holders had abjured the gospel; these documents were presented to the heathen magistrates, and they, on receipt of a specified fee, granted exemption from the requirement of sacrificing to the pagan gods.—(See Milner, "Church History," Cent. III, ch. 9.) As a result of these practices, whereby under favorable circumstances the wealthy could purchase immunity from persecution, and at the same time maintain a semblance of standing in the Church, much dissension arose, the question being as to whether those who had thus shown their weakness could ever be received again into communion with the Church.
7. Persecution at most was but an indirect cause of the decline of Christianity and the perversion of the saving principles of the gospel of Christ. The greater and more immediate dangers threatening the Church must be sought within the body itself. Indeed, the pressure of opposition from without served to restrain the bubbling springs of internal dissension, and actually delayed the more destructive eruptions of schism and heresy.—(See Note 2, end of chapter.) A general review of the history of the Church down to the end of the third century shows that the periods of comparative peace were periods of weakness and decline in spiritual earnestness, and that with the return of persecution came an awakening and a renewal in Christian devotion. Devout leaders of the people were not backward in declaring that each recurring period of persecution was a time of natural and necessary chastisement for the sin and corruption that had gained headway within the Church.—(See Note 3, end of chapter.)
8. As to the condition of the Church in the middle of the third century, Cyprian, the bishop of Carthage, thus speaks: "If the cause of our miseries be investigated, the cure of the wound may be found. The Lord would have his family to be tried. And because long peace had corrupted the discipline divinely revealed to us, the heavenly chastisement hath raised up our faith, which had lain almost dormant: and when, by our sins, we have deserved to suffer still more, the merciful Lord so moderated all things, that the whole scene rather deserves the name of a trial than a persecution. Each had been bent on improving his patrimony; and had forgotten what believers had done under the apostles, and what they ought always to do:—they were brooding over the arts of amassing wealth:—the pastors and the deacons each forgot their duty: Works of mercy were neglected, and discipline was at the lowest ebb.—Luxury and effeminacy prevailed: Meretricious arts in dress were cultivated: Frauds and deceit were practiced among brethren.—Christians could unite themselves in matrimony with unbelievers; could swear not only without reverence, but even without veracity. With haughty asperity they despised their ecclesiastical superiors: They railed against one another with outrageous acrimony, and conducted quarrels with determined malice:—Even many bishops, who ought to be guides and patterns to the rest, neglecting the peculiar duties of their stations, gave themselves up to secular pursuits:—They deserted their places of residence and their flocks: They traveled through distant provinces in quest of pleasure and gain; gave no assistance to the needy brethren; but were insatiable in their thirst of money:—They possessed estates by fraud and multiplied usury. What have we not deserved to suffer for such conduct? Even the divine word hath foretold us what we might expect.—'If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments, I will visit their offenses with the rod, and their sin with scourges.' These things had been denounced and foretold, but in vain. Our sins had brought our affairs to that pass, that because we had despised the Lord's directions, we were obliged to undergo a correction of our multiplied evils and a trial of our faith by severe remedies."—(As quoted by Milner, "Church History," Cent. III, ch. 8.)
9. Milner, who quotes approvingly the severe arraignment of the Church in the third century as given above, cannot be charged with bias against Christian institutions, inasmuch as his declared purpose in presenting to the world an additional "History of the Church of Christ" was to give due attention to certain phases of the subject slighted or neglected by earlier authors, and notably to emphasize the piety, not the wickedness, of the professed followers of Christ. This author, avowedly friendly to the Church and her votaries, admits the growing depravity of the Christian sects, and declares that toward the end of the third century the effect of the Pentecostal outpouring of the Holy Spirit had become exhausted, and that there remained little proof of any close relationship between Christ and the Church.
10. Note his summary of conditions: "The era of its actual declension must be dated in the pacific part of Diocletian's reign. During this whole century the work of God, in purity and power, had been tending to decay. The connection with philosophers was one of the principal causes. Outward peace and secular advantages completed the corruption. Ecclesiastical discipline, which had been too strict, was now relaxed exceedingly; bishops and people were in a state of malice. Endless quarrels were fomented among contending parties, and ambition and covetousness had in general gained the ascendency in the Christian Church. * * * The faith of Christ itself appeared now an ordinary business; and hereterminated, or nearly so, as far as appears, the first great effusion of the Spirit of God, which began at the day of Pentecost. Human depravity effected throughout a general decay of godliness; and one generation of men elapsed with very slender proofs of the spiritual presence of Christ with His Church."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. III, ch. 17.)
11. If further evidence be wanted as to the fires of disaffection smoldering within the Church, and so easily fanned into destructive flame, let the testimony of Eusebius be considered with respect to conditions characterizing the second half of the third century. And, in weighing his words, let it be remembered that he had expressly recorded his purpose of writing in defense of the Church, and in support of her institutions. He bewails the tranquillity preceding the Diocletian outbreak, because of its injurious effect upon both officers and members of the Church. These are his words: "But when by excessive liberty we have sunk into indolence and sloth, one envying and reviling another in different ways, and we were almost, as it were, on the point of taking up arms against each other, and were assailing each other with words, as with darts and spears, prelates inveighing against prelates, and people rising up against people, and hypocrisy and dissimulation had arisen to the greater heights of malignity, then the divine judgment, which usually proceeds with a lenient hand, whilst the multitudes were yet crowding into the Church, with gentle and mild visitations began to afflict its episcopacy; the persecution having begun with those brethren that were in the army. * * * But some that appeared to be our pastors, deserting the law of piety, were inflamed against each other with mutual strifes, accumulating quarrels and threats, rivalry, hostility, and hatred to each other, only anxious to assert the government as a kind of sovereignty for themselves."—(Eusebius, "Ecclesiastical History," Book VIII, ch. 1. See note 4, end of chapter.)
12. As further illustrative of the decline of the Christian spirit toward the end of the third century, Milner quotes the following observation of Eusebius, an eye-witness of the conditions described: "The heavy hand of God's judgment began softly, by little and little, to visit us after His wonted manner; * * * but we were not at all moved with His hand, nor took any pains to return to God. We heaped sin upon sin, judging like careless Epicureans, that God cared not for our sins, nor would ever visit us on account of them. And our pretended shepherds, laying aside the rule of godliness, practiced among themselves contention and division." He adds that the "dreadful persecution of Diocletian was then inflicted on the Church as a just punishment, and as the most proper chastisement for their iniquities."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. III, ch. 17.)
13. It will be remembered that the great change whereby the Church was raised to a place of honor in the state, occurred in the early part of the fourth century. It is a popular error to assume that the decay of the Church as a spiritual institution dates from that time. The picture of the Church declining as to spiritual power in exact proportion to her increase of temporal influence and wealth has appealed to rhetoricians and writers of sensational literature; but such a picture does not present the truth. The Church was saturated with the spirit of apostasy long before Constantine took it under his powerful protection by according it official standing in the state. In support of this statement, I quote again from Milner, the avowed friend of the Church: "I know it is common for authors to represent the great declension of Christianity to have taken place only after its external establishment under Constantine. But the evidence of history has compelled me to dissent from this view of things. In fact, we have seen that for a whole generation previous to the [Diocletian] persecution, few marks of superior piety appeared. Scarce a luminary of godliness existed; and it is not common in any age for a great work of the Spirit of God to be exhibited but under the conduct of some remarkable saints, pastors, and reformers. This whole period as well as the whole scene of the persecution is very barren in such characters. * * * Moral and philosophical and monastical instructions will not effect for men what is to be expected from evangelical doctrine. And if the faith of Christ was so much declined (and its decayed state ought to be dated from about the year 270), we need not wonder that such scenes as Eusebius hints at without any circumstantial details, took place in the Christian world. * * * He speaks also of the ambitious spirit of many, in aspiring to the offices of the Church, the ill judged and unlawful ordinations, the quarrels among confessors themselves, and the contentions excited by young demagogues in the very relics of the persecuted Church, and the multiplied evils which their vices excited among Christians. How sadly must the Christian world have declined which could thus conduct itself under the very rod of divine vengeance? Yet let not the infidel or the profane world triumph.It was not Christianity, but the departure from it, which brought on these evils."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. IV, ch. 1. The italics are introduced by the present writer. See also Note 5, end of chapter.)
14. The foregoing embodies but a few of the many evidences that could be cited in demonstration of the fact that during the period immediately following the apostolic ministry—the period covered by the persecutions of the Christians by the heathen nations,—the Church was undergoing internal deterioration, and was in a state of increasing perversion. Among the more detailed or specific causes of this ever widening departure from the spirit of the gospel of Christ, this rapidly growing apostasy, the following may be considered as important examples:
(1). The corrupting of the simple principles of the gospel by the admixture of the so-called philosophic systems of the times.
(2). Unauthorized additions to the ceremonies of the Church, and the introduction of vital changes in essential ordinances.
(3). Unauthorized changes in Church organization and government.
15. We shall consider in due order each of the three causes here enumerated. It may appear that the conditions set forth in these specifications are more properly to be regarded as effects or results, than as causes, incident to the general apostasy,—that they are in the nature of evidences or proofs of a departure from the original constitution of the Church, rather than specific causes by which the fact of apostasy is to be explained or accounted for. Cause and effect, however, are sometimes very intimately associated, and resulting conditions may furnish the best demonstration of causes in operation. Each of the conditions given above as a specific cause of the progressive apostasy was, at its inception, an evidence of existing unsoundness, and an active cause of the graver results that followed. Each succeeding manifestation of the spirit of apostasy was at once the result of earlier disaffection, and the cause of later and more pronounced developments.
1.Inordinate Zeal Manifested by Some of the Early Christians: "The sober discretion of the present age will more readily censure than admire, but can more easily admire than imitate, the fervor of the first Christians; who, according to the lively expression of Sulpicius Severus, desired martyrdom with more eagerness than his own contemporaries solicited a bishopric. The epistles which Ignatius composed as he was carried in chains through the cities of Asia, breathe sentiments the most repugnant to the ordinary feelings of human nature. He earnestly beseeches the Romans that when he should be exposed in the amphitheatre, they would not by their kind but unreasonable intercession, deprive him of the crown of glory, and he declares his resolution to provoke and irritate the wild beasts which might be employed as the instruments of his death. Some stories are related of the courage of martyrs who actually performed what Ignatius had intended: who exasperated the fury of the lions, pressed the executioner to hasten his office, cheerfully leaped into the fires which were kindled to consume them, and discovered a sensation of joy and pleasure in the midst of the most exquisite torture."—(Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," ch. XVI.)
2.Internal Dissensions During Time of Peace. As stated in the text, the early part of Diocletian's reign—the period immediately preceding the outburst of the last great persecution to which the Christians were subjected—was a time of comparative freedom from opposition, and this period was characterized by internal disturbances and dissensions within the Church. Illustrative of the tolerance shown by the emperor before he became hostile to the Church, and the accompanying decline of spiritual earnestness among the Christians themselves, Gibbon says: "Diocletian and his colleagues frequently conferred the most important offices on those persons who avowed their abhorrence of the worship of the gods, but who had displayed abilities proper for the service of the state. The bishops held an honorable rank in the respective provinces, and were treated with distinction and respect, not only by the people, but by the magistrates themselves. Almost in every city the ancient churches were found insufficient to contain the increasing multitudes of proselytes; and in their place more stately and capacious edifices were erected for the public worship of the faithful. The corruption of manners and principles so forcibly lamented by Eusebius, may be considered not only as a consequence, but as a proof, of the liberty which the Christians enjoyed and abused under the reign of Diocletian. Prosperity had relaxed the nerves of discipline. Fraud, envy, and malice prevailed in every congregation. The presbyters aspired to the episcopal office, which every day became an object more worthy of their ambition. The bishops who contended with each other for ecclesiastical preeminence, appeared by their conduct to claim a secular and tyrannical power in the church; and the lively faith which still distinguished the Christians from the Gentiles, was shown much less in their lives than in their controversial writings."—(Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," ch. XVI.)
3.The Effect of Peace on the Early Church. "Disastrous as the persecutions of the early Christian centuries were, still more mischievous to the Church were those periods of tranquillity which intervened between the outbursts of rage which prompted them. Peace may have her victories no less renowned than those of war; and so, too, she has her calamities, and they are not less destructive than those of war. War may destroy nations, but ease and luxury mankind corrupt—the body and the mind. Especially is peace dangerous to the church. Prosperity relaxes the reins of discipline; people feel less and less the need of a sustaining providence; but in adversity the spirit of man feels after God, and he is correspondingly more devoted to the service of religion. We shall find the early Christians no exception to the operation of this influence of repose. Whenever it was accorded them, either through the mercy or the indifference of the emperors, internal dissensions, the intrigues of aspiring prelates, and the rise of heresies, characterized those periods."—(B. H. Roberts, "A New Witness for God," p. 70.)
4.Schisms and Heresies in the Early Church. Eusebius, whose writings date from the early part of the fourth century, cites the writings of Hegesippus, who lived in the first quarter of the second century, as follows: "The same author [Hegesippus] also treats of the beginning of the heresies that arose about this time, in the following words: 'But after James the Just had suffered martyrdom, as our Lord had for the same reason, Simeon, the son of Cleophas, our Lord's uncle, was appointed the second bishop [of Jerusalem] whom all proposed as the cousin of our Lord. Hence they called the Church as yet a virgin, for it was not yet corrupted by vain discourses. Thebuthis made a beginning, secretly to corrupt it on account of his not being made bishop. He was one of those seven sects among the Jewish people. Of these also was Simeon, whence sprang the sect of Simonians; also Cleobius, from whence came the Cleobians; also Dositheus, the founder of the Dositheans. From these also sprung the Gortheonians from Gortheoeus; and also Masbotheans from Masbothoeus. Hence also the Meandrians, the Marcionists, and Carpocratians and Valentinians, and Basilidians, and the Saturnillians, every one introducing his own peculiar opinions, one differing from the other. From these sprung the false Christs and the false prophets and false apostles, who divided the unity of the Church by the introduction of corrupt doctrines against God and against His Christ."—(Eusebius, "Ecclesiastical History," Book IV, ch. 22.)
5.Early Decline of the Church: Milner, summing up the conditions attending the Church at the end of the second century, says: "And here we close the view of the second century, which, for the most part exhibited proofs of divine grace, as strong, or nearly so, as the first. We have seen the same unshaken and simple faith of Jesus, the same love of God and of the brethren; and—that in which they singularly excelled modern Christians—the same heavenly spirit and victory over the world. But a dark shade is enveloping these divine glories. The Spirit of God is grieved already by the ambitious intrusions of self-righteous, argumentative refinements, and Pharisaic pride; and though it be more common to represent the most sensible decay of godliness as commencing a century later, to me it seems already begun."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. II, ch. 9.)
Mosheim, writing of conditions attending the closing years of the third century, says: "The ancient method of ecclesiastical government seemed in general still to subsist, while, at the same time, by imperceptible steps, it varied from the primitive rule and degenerated toward the form of a religious monarchy. * * * This change in the form of ecclesiastical government was soon followed by a train of vices, which dishonored the character and authority of those to whom the administration of the Church was committed. For, though several yet continued to exhibit to the world illustrative examples of primitive piety and Christian virtue, yet many were sunk in luxury and voluptuousness, puffed up with vanity, arrogance and ambition, possessed with a spirit of contention and discord, and addicted to many other vices that cast an undeserved reproach upon the holy religion of which they were the unworthy professors and ministers. This is testified in such an ample manner by the repeated complaints of many of the most respectable writers of this age, that truth will not permit us to spread the veil, which we should otherwise be desirous to cast over such enormities among an order so sacred. The bishops assumed in many places a princely authority, particularly those who had the greatest number of churches under their inspection, and who presided over the most opulent assemblies. They appropriated to their evangelical function the splendid ensigns of temporal majesty. A throne, surrounded with ministers, exalted above his equals the servant of the meek and humble Jesus; and sumptuous garments dazzled the eyes and the minds of the multitude into an ignorant veneration of their arrogated authority. The example of the bishops was ambitiously imitated by the presbyters, who, neglecting the sacred duties of their station, abandoned themselves to the indolence and delicacy of an effeminate and luxurious life. The deacons, beholding the presbyters deserting thus their functions, boldly usurped their rights and privileges, and the effects of a corrupt ambition were spread through every rank of the order sacred."—(Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical History," Cent. III, Part II, ch. 2:3, 4.)
**Internal Causes.—Continued**.
1. First among the specific causes of disturbance operating within the Church, and contributing to its apostasy, we have named: "The corrupting of the simple principles of the gospel by the admixture of the so-called philosophic systems of the times."
2. The attempted grafting of foreign doctrines on the true vine of the gospel of Christ was characteristic of the early years of the apostolic period. We read of the sorcerer Simon, who professed belief and entered the Church by baptism, but who was so devoid of the true spirit of the gospel that he sought to purchase by money the authority and power of the priesthood.—(See Acts 8:9, 13, 18-24.) This man, though rebuked by Peter, and apparently penitent, continued to trouble the Church, by inculcating heresies and winning disciples within the fold. His followers were distinguished as a sect or cult down to the fourth century; and, writing at that time, Eusebius says of them: "These, after the manner of their founder, insinuating themselves into the Church, like a pestilential and leprous disease, infected those with the greatest corruption, into whom they were able to infuse their secret, irremediable, and destructive poison."—(Eusebius, "Ecclesiastical History," Book II, ch. 1.) This Simon, known in history as Simon Magus, is referred to by early Christian writers, as the founder of heresy, owing to his persistent attempts to combine Christianity with Gnosticism. It is with reference to his proposition to purchase spiritual authority that all traffic in spiritual offices has come to be known as simony.
3. Through the mouth of the Revelator, the Lord reproved certain of the churches for their adoption or toleration of doctrines and practices alien to the gospel. Notably is this the case with respect to the Nicolaitanes, and the followers of the doctrines of Balaam.—(See Rev. 2:15; compare verse 6; see also verse 20. See Note 1, end of chapter.)
4. The perversion of true theology thus developed within the Church is traceable to the introduction of both Judaistic and pagan fallacies.—(See Note 2, end of chapter.) Indeed, at the opening of the Christian era and for centuries thereafter, Judaism was more or less intimately mixed with pagan philosophy, and contaminated with heathen ceremonies. There were numerous sects and parties, cults and schools, each advocating rival theories as to the constitution of the soul, the essence of sin, the nature of Deity, and a multitude of other mysteries. The Christians were soon embroiled in endless controversies among themselves.
5. Judaistic converts to Christianity sought to modify and adapt the tenets of the new faith so as to harmonize them with their inherited love of Judaism, and the result was destructive to both. Our Lord had indicated the futility of any such attempts to combine new principle with old systems, or to patch up the prejudices of the past with fragments of new doctrine. "No man," said He, "putteth a piece of new cloth unto an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse. Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved."—(Matt. 9:16, 17.) The gospel came as a new revelation, marking the fulfilment of the law, it was no mere addendum, nor was it a simple reenactment of past requirements; it embodied a new and an everlasting covenant. Attempts to patch the Judaistic robe with the new fabric of the gospel could result in nothing more sightly than a hideous rent. The new wine of the covenant could not be bottled in the time-eaten leathern containers of Mosaic libations. Judaism was belittled and Christianity perverted by the incongruous association.
6. Among the early and most pernicious adulterations of Christian doctrine is the introduction of the teachings of the Gnostics. These self-styled philosophers put forth the boastful claim that they were able to lead the human mind to a full comprehension of the Supreme Being, and a knowledge of the true relationship between Deity and mortals. They said in effect that a certain being had existed from all eternity, manifested as a radiant light diffused throughout space, and this they called thePleroma. "The eternal nature, infinitely perfect and infinitely happy, having dwelt from everlasting in a profound solitude, and in a blessed tranquillity produced at length from itself, two minds of a different sex, which resembled their supreme parent in the most perfect manner. From the prolific union of these two beings, others arose, which were also followed by succeeding generations; so that in process of time a celestial family was formed in the Pleroma. This divine progeny, immutable in its nature, and above the power of mortality, was called, by the philosophers,Aeon—a term which signifies, in the Greek language, an eternal nature. How many in number these Aeons were was a point much controverted among the oriental sages."—(Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical History," Cent. I, Part II, 1:7.)
7. Then one of the Aeons, distinctively called the Demiurge, created this world, and arrogantly asserted dominion over the same, denying absolutely the authority of the supreme parent. The Gnostic doctrine declares man to be a union of the body, which, being the creation of the Demiurge, is essentially evil, and a spirit, which, being derived from Deity, is characteristically good. The spirits thus imprisoned in evil bodies will be finally liberated, and then the power of the Demiurge will cease, and the earth will be dissolved into nothingness.
8. Our justification for introducing here this partial summary of Gnosticism is the fact that early efforts were made to accommodate the tenets of this system to the demands of Christianity; and that Christ and the Holy Ghost were declared to belong to the family of Aeons provided for in this scheme. This led to the extravagant absurdity of denying that Jesus had a body even while He lived as a man; and that His appearance as a corporeal being was a deception of the senses wrought by His supernatural power.—(See Note 3, end of chapter.)
9. That the doctrines of the Gnostics were unsatisfying even to those who professed to believe therein is evident from the many cults and parties that came into existence as subdivisions of the main sect; and it is interesting to note that in modern times certain free-thinkers have prided themselves in assuming a title expressing the full antithesis of the name Gnostics, viz. Agnostics.
10. The practical effect of the principles of Gnosticism in the lives of its adherents is strangely diverse. One division of the sect followed a life of austerity, embracing rigorous self-denial, and bodily torture, in the vain belief that the malignant body could thus be subdued, while the spirit would be given added power and increased freedom. Another cult sought to minimize the fundamental difference between right and wrong, by denying the element of morality in human life; and these abandoned themselves to the impulses of the passions and the frailties of the bodily nature without restraint, on the assumption that there was no such relation between body and soul as would cause injury to the latter through bodily indulgences and excesses.
11. Another sect or school whose doctrines were in a measure amalgamated with those of Christianity was that of the New Platonics. The ancient sects of Platonists or Platonics were allied in some points of doctrine with the Epicureans, and were rivals if not opponents of the Stoics. The early Platonics held that unorganized matter has existed from all eternity, and that its organizer, God, is similarly eternal. As God is eternal, so also His will or intelligence is without beginning, and this eternal intelligence existing as the will or intent of Deity, was called theLogos. Such precepts had been taught long before the Christian era, and the philosophy professed by some of the contending sects among the Jews in the time of Christ had been influenced thereby.
12. As the principles of Christianity became generally known, certain leaders in the sect of Platonics found in the new doctrine much to study and admire. By this time, however, Platonism itself had undergone much change, and the more liberal adherents had formed a new organization and distinguished themselves by the appellation New Platonics. These professed to find in Jesus Christ the incarnation of the Logos, and accepted with avidity the declaration of St. John: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. * * * And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us."—(John 1:1, 14.) According to the Eclectic or New Platonic philosophy, the "Word" referred to by St. John was the "Logos" described by Plato.
13. The Platonic conception of the Godhead as consisting of the Deity and the Logos, was enlarged in accordance with Christian tenets to embrace three members, the Holy Ghost being the third. Thence arose bitter and lasting dissension as to the relative powers of each member of the Trinity, particularly the position and authority of the Logos or Son. The many disputes incident to the admixture of Platonic theory with Christian doctrine continued through the centuries, and in a sense may be said to trouble the minds of men even in this modern age.
14. It is wholly beyond our purpose to classify or describe the hybrid offspring resulting from the unnatural union of pagan philosophy and Christian truth; nor shall we attempt to follow in detail the dissensions and quarrels on theological points and questions of doctrine. Our purpose is achieved when by statement of fact and citation of authority, the reality of the apostasy is established. We shall consider therefore only the most important of the dissensions by which the Church was troubled.—(See Note 4, end of chapter.)
15. About the middle of the third century, Sibellius, a presbyter or bishop of the church in Africa, strongly advocated the doctrine of "trinity in unity" as characterizing the Godhead. He claimed that the divine nature of Christ was no distinct nor personal attribute of the man Jesus, but merely a portion of the divine energy, an emanation from the Father, with which the Son was temporarily endowed; and that in like manner the Holy Ghost was a part of the divine Father. These views were as vigorously opposed by some as defended by others, and the disagreement was rife when Constantine so suddenly changed the status of the Church, and brought to its support the power of the state. Early in the fourth century the dispute assumed a threatening aspect in a bitter contention between Alexander, bishop of Alexandria, and Arius, one of the subordinate officers of the same church. Alexander proclaimed that the Son was in all respects the equal of the Father, and also of the same substance or essence. Arius insisted that the Son had been created by the Father, and therefore could not be co-eternal with His divine Parent; that the Son was the agent through whom the will of the Father was executed, and that for this reason also the Son was inferior to the Father both in nature and dignity. In like manner the Holy Ghost was inferior to the other members of the Godhead.
16. Arianism, as the doctrine came to be known, was preached with vigor and denounced with energy; and the dissension thus occasioned threatened to rend the Church to its foundation. At last the emperor, Constantine, was forced to intervene in an effort to establish peace among his contending churchmen. He summoned a council of church dignitaries which assembled in the year 325, and which is known from its place of session as the Council of Nice. This council condemned the doctrine of Arius, and pronounced sentence of banishment against its author. What was declared to be the orthodox doctrine of the universal or Catholic church respecting the Godhead was promulgated as follows:
17. "We believe in one God, the Father, Almighty, the maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, only begotten, (that is) of the substance of the Father; God of God, Light of Light; Very God of Very God; begotten not made; of the same substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, that are in heaven and that are in earth: who for us men, and for our salvation, descended and was incarnate, and became man; suffered and rose again the third day, ascended into the heavens and will come to judge the living and the dead; and in the Holy Spirit. But those who say there was a time when he [the Son] was not, and that he was not before he was begotten, and that he was made out of nothing, or affirm that he is of any other substance or essence, or that the Son of God was created, and mutable, or changeable, the Catholic Church doth pronounce accursed."
18. This is the generally accepted version of the Nicene Creed as originally promulgated. In form it was somewhat modified, though left practically unchanged as to essentials, by the council held at Constantinople half a century later. What is regarded as a restatement of the Nicene Creed has been attributed to Athanasius, one of the chief opponents of Arianism, though his right to be considered the author is questioned by many and emphatically denied by some authorities on ecclesiastical history. Nevertheless, the statement referred to has found a place in literature as the "Creed of Athanasius," and whether rightly or wrongly named it persists as a declaration of belief professed by some Christian sects today. It has a present place in the prescribed ritual of the Church of England. The "Creed of Athanasius" reads as follows:
19. "We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance. For there is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is all one: the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. Such as the Father is, such is the Son; and such is the Holy Ghost. The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate and the Holy Ghost uncreate. The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible. The Father eternal, the Son eternal, the Holy Ghost eternal. And yet there are not three eternals; but one eternal. As also there are not three incomprehensibles, nor three uncreated; but one uncreated, and one incomprehensible. So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty, and the Holy Ghost Almighty; and yet there are not three Almighties, but one Almighty. So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and yet they are not three Gods but one God."
20. The Council of Nice is known in ecclesiastical history as one of the most famous and important gatherings ever assembled as an official body concerned with church administration. Not only was the Arian dispute disposed of, so far as ecclesiastical decree could dispose of a question vitally affecting the individual conscience, but many other subjects of controversy were similarly quieted for the time. Thus the long-standing dispute as to the time of celebrating Easter was settled by vote, as was also the question agitated by Novatus and his followers—as to the propriety of re-admitting repentant apostates to the Church; and the schism caused by Meletius, a bishop of Upper Africa, who had refused to recognize the superior authority of the bishop of Alexandria. From the number and diversity of the questions brought before the Nicene Council for adjudication, we may safely conclude that the newly enthroned Church was not characterized by unity of purpose nor harmony of action. However, compared with the bitter contentions that follow, the dissensions in the reign of Constantine were but as the beginnings of trouble.
21. The moral effect of the potent spirit of apostasy operating through the first three centuries of the Church's existence and nourished by the contributions of heathen philosophy, proved, as was inevitable, highly injurious and evil. Some of the most pernicious of these effects it becomes our duty to consider.
22.Perverted Views of Life. One of the heresies of early origin and rapid growth in the Church was the doctrine of antagonism between body and spirit, whereby the former was regarded as an incubus and a curse. From what has been said this will be recognized as one of the perversions derived from the alliance of Gnosticism with Christianity. A result of this grafting in of heathen doctrines was an abundant growth of hermit practices, by which men sought to weaken, torture, and subdue their bodies, that their spirits or "souls" might gain greater freedom. Many who adopted this unnatural view of human existence retired to the solitude of the desert, and there spent their time in practices of stern self-denial and in acts of frenzied self-torture. Others shut themselves up as voluntary prisoners, seeking glory in privation and self-imposed penance. It was this unnatural view of life that gave rise to the several orders of recluses, hermits and monks.
23. Think you not that the Savior had such practices in mind, when, warning the disciples of the false claims to sanctity that would characterize the times then soon to follow, He said: "Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold he (Christ) is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not."—(Matt. 24:26.)
24. When the Church came into the favor of the state under Constantine in the fourth century, there sprang up many orders of recluses who "maintained that communion with God was to be sought by mortifying sense, by withdrawing the mind from all external objects, by macerating the body with hunger and labor, and by a holy sort of indolence, which confined all the activity of the soul to a lazy contemplation of things spiritual and external." Mosheim, the author just quoted, continues: "The Christian church would never have been disgraced by this cruel and unsocial enthusiasm, nor would any have been subjected to those keen torments of mind and body to which it gave rise, had not many Christians been unwarily caught by the specious appearance and the pompous sound of that maxim of the ancient philosophy: 'That in order to the attainment of true felicity and communion with God, it was necessary that the soul should be separated from the body, even here below; and that the body was to be macerated and mortified for this purpose.'"—(Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. IV, Part II, ch. 3:12, 13.)
25. The fruit of this ill-sowing was the growth of numerous orders of monks, and the maintenance of monasteries. Celibacy was taught as a virtue, and came to be made a requirement of the clergy, as it is in the Roman Catholic church to-day. An unmarried clergy, deprived of the elevating influences of home life, fell into many excesses, and the corruption of the priests has been a theme of reproach throughout the centuries. "The Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him,"—(Gen. 2:18.) and again, "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."—(Verse 24.) His inspired apostle proclaimed: "Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord."—(I Cor. 11:11. Compare I Tim. 4:3.) Nevertheless an apostate church decrees that its ministers shall be forbidden to follow the law of God.
26.Disregard for Truth. As early as the fourth century, certain pernicious doctrines embodying a disregard for truth gained currency in the Church. Thus, it was taught "that it was an act of virtue to deceive and lie, when by that means the interests of the church might be promoted."—(Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. IV, Part II, ch. 3:16.) Needless to say, sins other than those of falsehood and deceit were justified when committed in the supposed interests of church advancement, and crime was condoned under the specious excuse that the end justifies the means. Many of the fables and fictitious stories relating to the lives of Christ and the apostles, as also the spurious accounts of supernatural visitations and wonderful miracles, in which the literature of the early centuries abound, are traceable to this infamous doctrine that lies are acceptable unto God if perpetrated in a cause that man calls good.—(See Note 5, end of chapter.)
1.The Nicolaitanes. This sect is mentioned specifically in the divine communication wherein John the Revelator was instructed to write to the churches of Asia (Rev. 2:6, 15); and the reference proves the abhorrence with which the Lord regarded the teachings and practices of the cult. The attempt to corrupt Christianity by the introduction of Nicolaitan ceremonies was a real danger threatening the Church. The following extract from Smith's Bible Dictionary is instructive:
"The sect itself comes before us as presenting the ultimate phase of a great controversy, which threatened at one time to destroy the unity of the Church, and afterward to taint its purity. The controversy itself was inevitable as soon as the Gentiles were admitted in any large numbers into the Church of Christ. Were the new converts to be brought into subjugation to the whole Mosaic law? The apostles and elders at Jerusalem met the question calmly and wisely. The burden of the Law was not to be imposed on the Gentile disciples. They were to abstain, among other things, from 'meats offered to idols,' and from 'fornication' (Acts 15:20, 29), and this decree was welcomed as the great charter of the Church's freedom. Strange as the close union of the moral and positive commands may seem to us, it did not seem so to the synod at Jerusalem. The two sins were very closely allied, often even in the closest proximity of time and place. The messages to the churches of Asia, and the later Apostolic Epistles (II Peter, and Jude,) indicate that the two evils appeared at that period also in close alliance. The teachers of the Church branded them with a name that expressed their true character. The men who did and taught such things were followers of Balaam (II Peter 2:15; Jude II.) They, like the false prophet of Pethor, united brave words with evil deeds. In a time of persecution, when the eating or not eating of things sacrificed to idols was more than ever a crucial test of faithfulness, they persuaded men more than ever that it was a thing indifferent (Rev. 2:13, 14). This was bad enough, but there was a yet worse evil. Mingling themselves in the orgies of idolatrous feasts, they brought the impurities of those feasts into the meetings of the Christian Church. And all this was done, it must be remembered, not simply as an indulgence of appetite, but as part of a system supported by a 'doctrine,' accompanied by the boast of a prophetic illumination (II Peter 2:1)."
2.Imitation of Heathen Mysteries, and the Result. The worship of God by the early Christians was decried and ridiculed because of its simplicity and the absence of mystic ceremonies. True, the zeal of persecutors soon made necessary a prudent secrecy in religious service and worshipping assemblies, but aside from such necessity, there was a voluntary effort to feign a secrecy that was uncalled for. On this point Gibbon remarks as follows: "The precautions with which the disciples of Christ performed the offices of religion were at first dictated by fear and necessity; but they were continued from choice. By imitating the awful secrecy of the Eleusinian mysteries, the Christians had flattered themselves that they should render their sacred institutions more respectable in the eyes of the pagan world. But the event, as it often happens to the operations of subtle policy, deceived their wishes and their expectations. It was concluded that they only concealed what they would have blushed to disclose. Their mistaken prudence afforded an opportunity for malice to invent, and for suspicious credulity to believe, the horrid tales which described the Christians as the most wicked of human kind, who practiced in their dark recesses every abomination that a depraved fancy could suggest, and who solicited the favor of their unknown God by the sacrifice of every moral virtue. There were many who pretended to confess or to relate the ceremonies of this abhorred society."— (Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," chap. XVI.)
3.Ebionites and Gnostics."Beside the general design of fixing on a perpetual basis the divine honors of Christ, the most ancient and respectable of the ecclesiastical writers have ascribed to the evangelic theologian [St. John] a particular intention to confute two opposing heresies, which disturbed the peace of the primitive Church. I. The faith of the Ebionites, perhaps of the Nazarenes, was gross and imperfect. They revered Jesus as the greatest of the prophets, endowed with supernatural virtue and power. They ascribed to His person and to His future reign all the predictions of the Hebrew oracles which relate to the spiritual and everlasting kingdom of the promised Messiah. Some of them might confess that He was born of a virgin; but they obstinately rejected the preceding existence and divine perfections of the Logos, or Son of God, which are so clearly defined in the Gospel of St. John. * * * II. The Gnostics, who were distinguished by the epithet of Docetes, deviated into the contrary extreme, and betrayed the human while they asserted the divine, nature of Christ. Educated in the school of Plato, accustomed to the sublime idea of the Logos, they readily conceived that the brightest Aeon or Emanation of Deity, might assume the outward shape and visible appearance of a mortal; but they vainly pretended that the imperfections of matter are incompatible with the purity of a celestial substance. While the blood of Christ yet smoked on Mount Calvary, and the Docetes invented the impious and extravagant hypothesis that, instead of issuing from the womb of the Virgin, he had descended on the banks of the Jordan in the form of perfect manhood; that he had imposed on the senses of His enemies and of His disciples, and that the ministers of Pilate had wasted their impotent rage on an airy phantom, who seemed to expire on the Cross, and, after three days, to rise from the dead."—(Gibbon, "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," ch. XXI.)
4.Admixture of Pagan Doctrines With Christianity. The following statements by modern writers as to the effect of pagan "philosophy" on the Church are worthy of attention. Summarizing conditions prevailing in the latter part of the second century, Milner says: "We have hitherto found it no hard matter to discover, in the teachers and writers of Christianity, the vital doctrines of Christ. We shall now perceive that the most precious truths of the gospel begin to be less attended to, and less brought to view. Even Justin Martyr, before the period of eclectic corruption, by his fondness for Plato, adulterated the gospel in some degree, as we have observed particularly in the article of free will. Tatian, his scholar, went bolder lengths, and deserved the name of heretic. He dealt largely in the merits of continence and chastity; and these virtues, pushed into extravagant excesses, under the notion of superior purity, became great engines of self-righteousness and superstition; obscured men's views of the faith of Christ, and darkened the whole face of Christianity. Under the fostering hand of Ammonius and his followers, this fictitious holiness disguised under the appearance of eminent sanctity, was formed into a system; and it soon began to generate the worst of evils. * * * St. Paul's caution against philosophy and vain deceit, it appears, was now fatally neglected by the Christians. False humility, 'Will-worship,' curious and proud refinements, bodily austerities mixed with high, self-righteous pretensions, ignorance of Christ and of the true life of faith in Him, miserably superseded by ceremonies and superstitions,—all these things are divinely delineated in the second chapter to the Colossians; and, so far as words can do it, the true defense against them is powerfully described and enforced."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. II, ch. 9.)
"The schisms and commotions that arose in the church, from a mixture of the oriental and Egyptian philosophy with the Christian religion were, in the second century, increased by those Grecian philosophers who embraced the doctrine of Christ. The Christian doctrine, concerning the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and the two natures united in our blessed Savior, were by no means reconcilable with the tenets of the sages and doctors of Greece, who therefore endeavored to explain them in such a manner as to render them comprehensible. Praxeas, a man of genius and learning, began to propagate these explications at Rome, and was severely persecuted for the errors they contained. He denied any real distinction between the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; and maintained that the Father, sole Creator of all things, had united to Himself the human nature of Christ. Hence his followers were called Monarchians, because of their denying a plurality of persons in the Deity; and also Patropassians, because, according to Tertullian's account, they believed that the Father was so intimately united with the man Christ, His Son, that He suffered with Him the anguish of an afflicted life and the torments of an ignominious death. However ready many may have been to embrace this erroneous doctrine, it does not appear that this sect formed to themselves a separate place of worship, or removed themselves from the ordinary assemblies of Christians."—(Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical History," Cent. II, Part II, ch. 5:20.)
5.Spurious Writings in the Apostolic Period. "Not long after Christ's ascension into heaven, several histories of His life and doctrines, full of pious frauds and fabulous wonders, were composed by persons whose intentions, perhaps, were not bad, but whose writings discovered the greatest superstition and ignorance. Nor was this all: productions appeared which were imposed upon the world by fraudulent men, as the writings of the holy apostles. These apocryphal and spurious writings must have produced a sad confusion, and rendered both the history and the doctrine of Christ uncertain, had not the rulers of the church used all possible care and diligence in separating the books that were truly apostolical and divine from all that spurious trash."—(Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical History," Cent. I, Part II, ch. 2:17.)
**Internal Causes.—Continued**.
1. As one of the effective causes leading to the apostasy of the Primitive Church we have specified:Unauthorized additions to the ceremonies of the Church, and the introduction of vital changes in essential ordinances.
2. The ridicule heaped upon the early Church by the pagans on account of the simplicity of Christian worship has already received mention. This cause of reproach was none the less emphasized by Judaistic critics, to whom rituals and ceremony, formalism and prescribed rites, figured as essentials of religion. Very early in its history, the Church manifested a tendency to supplant the pristine simplicity of its worship by elaborate ceremonies, patterned after Judaistic ritual and heathen idolatries.
3. As to such innovations, Mosheim writes as follows, with reference to conditions existing in the second century: "There is no institution so pure and excellent which the corruption and folly of man will not in time alter for the worse, and load with additions foreign to its nature and original design. Such in a particular manner was the fate of Christianity. In this century many unnecessary rites and ceremonies were added to the Christian worship, the introduction of which was extremely offensive to wise and good men. These changes, while they destroyed the beautiful simplicity of the gospel, were naturally pleasing to the gross multitude, who are more delighted with the pomp and splendor of external institutions than with the native charms of rational and solid piety, and who generally give little attention to any objects but those which strike their outward senses."—(Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. II, Part II, ch. 4.) The author just cited explains that the bishops of that day increased the ceremonies and sought to give them splendor "by way of accommodation to the infirmities and prejudices of both Jews and heathen."—(See Note 1, end of chapter.)
4. To more effectually reconcile the gospel requirements with Jewish prejudice, which still clung to the letter of the Mosaic law, the officers of the Church in the first and second centuries took to themselves the ancient titles; thus, bishops styled themselves chief priests, and deacons, Levites. "In like manner," says Mosheim, "the comparison of the Christianoblationwith the Jewishvictimandsacrifice, produced a multitude of unnecessary rites, and was the occasion of introducing that erroneous notion of theeucharist, which represents it as a real sacrifice, and not merely as a commemoration of that great offering that was once made upon the cross for the sins of mortals."—(Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. II, Part II, ch. 4:4.)
5. In the fourth century we find the Church still more hopelessly committed to formalism and superstition. The decent respect with which the remains of the early martyrs had been honored degenerated or grew into a superstitious reverence amounting to worship. This practice was allowed in deference to the heathen adoration paid to deified heroes. Pilgrimages to the tombs of martyrs became common as an outward form of religious devotion; and the ashes of martyrs as well as dust and earth brought from places said to have been made holy by some uncommon occurrence were sold as sovereign remedies against disease and as means of protection against the assaults of malignant spirits.
6. The form of public worship was so changed during the second and third centuries as to bear little resemblance to the simplicity and earnestness of that of the early congregations. Philosophic discourses took the place of fervent testimony bearing and the arts of the rhetorician and controversial debater supplanted the true eloquence of religious conviction. Applause was allowed and expected as evidence of the preacher's popularity. The burning incense, at first abhorred by Christian assemblies because of its pagan origin and heathen significance, had become common in the Church before the end of the third century.
7. In the fourth century the adoration of images, pictures, and effigies, had been given a place in the so-called Christian worship; and the practice became general in the century following. An effort to check the abuses arising from this idolatrous practice in the eighth century, actually led to civil war.—(See Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. VIII, Part II, ch. 3:9, 10.)
8. In considering such evidences of pagan ceremonial and superstitious rites taking the place of the simple procedure incident to genuine worship characteristic of the Church in the days of its integrity, who can question the solemn and awful fact of actual apostasy?—(See Note 2, end of chapter.) But more important yet, more significant still than mere additions to the ritualistic ceremonial, are the perversions and changes introduced into the most sacred and essential ordinances of Christ's Church. As it is common with ecclesiastical authorities to consider the most essential ordinances of the gospel originally established by Christ and maintained by His apostles, as comprising baptism and the sacrament of the Lord's supper, we shall examine into these alone as examples of the unauthorized alterations now under consideration. In this restriction of our illustrative examples we do not admit that baptism and the sacrament named were the only ordinances characterizing the Church; indeed, there is abundant proof to the contrary. Thus, the authoritative imposition of hands for the bestowal of the Holy Ghost in the case of baptized believers was equally essential with baptism itself,—(See Acts 8:5-8, 12, 14-17; also 19:1-7; see also 2:38; Matt. 3:11; and Mark 1:8.) and was assuredly regarded as a vital ordinance from the first.—(See Matt. 3:11.) Furthermore, ordination in the priesthood, whereby men were commissioned by divine authority was indispensable to the maintenance of an organized Church. The examples selected, however, will be sufficient for the purposes of our present inquiry.
**The Ordinance of Baptism Changed**.
9. First, then, as to baptism,—in what did the ordinance originally consist, as to purpose and mode of administration, and what changes did it undergo in the course of progressive apostasy through which the Church passed? That baptism is essential to salvation calls for no demonstration here; this has been generally held by the Christian Church in both ancient and modern times.—(For a concise treatment of this subject, see the author's "Articles of Faith," Lecture 6:8-29.) The purpose of baptism was and is the obtaining of a remission of sins; compliance with the requirement has been from the first the sole means of securing admission to the Church of Christ.—(See Mark 1:4 and Luke 3:3; also Acts 2:38; I Peter 3:21; and Acts 22:16. Compare II Nephi 31:17.)
10. In the early Church, baptism was administered on profession of faith and evidence of repentance, and was performed by immersion—(See Note 3, end of chapter) at the hands of one invested with the requisite authority of priesthood. There was no delay in administering the ordinance after the eligibility of the candidate had been shown. As instances we may cite the promptness with which baptism was administered to the believers on that eventful day of Pentecost;— (Acts 2:37-41) the baptism administered by Philip to the Ethiopian convert immediately following due profession of faith;—(Acts 8:26-39) the undelayed baptism of devout Cornelius and his family;—(Acts 10:47, 48) and the speedy baptism of the converted jailer by Paul, his prisoner.—(Acts 16:31-33.)
11. In the second century, however, priestly mandate had restricted the baptismal ordinance to the times of the two Church festivals, Easter and Whitsuntide, the first being the anniversary of Christ's resurrection, and the second the time of Pentecostal celebration. A long and tedious course of preparation was required of the candidate before his eligibility was admitted; during this time he was known as acatechumen, or novice in training. According to some authorities a three years' course of preparation was required in all but exceptional cases.—(Schlegel, Book VIII, ch. 32.)
12. During the second century the baptismal symbolism of a new birth was emphasized by many additions to the ordinance; thus the newly baptized were treated as infants and were fed milk and honey in token of their immaturity. As baptism was construed to be a ceremony of liberation from the slavery of Satan, certain formulas used in the freeing of slaves were added. Anointing with oil was also made a part of the ceremony. In the third century the simple ordinance of baptism was further encumbered and perverted by the ministrations of an exorcist. This official indulged in "menacing and formidable shouts and declamation" whereby the demons or evil spirits with which the candidate was supposed to be afflicted were to be driven away. "The driving out of this demon was now considered as an essential preparation for baptism, after the administration of which the candidates returned home, adorned with crowns, and arrayed in white garments, as sacred emblems,—the former of their victory over sin and the world; the latter of their inward purity and innocence."— (Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. III, part II, ch. 4:4.) It is not difficult to see in this superstitious ceremony the evidence of pagan adulteration of the Christian religion. In the fourth century it became the practice to place salt in the mouth of the newly baptized member, as a symbol of purification, and the actual baptism was both preceded and followed by an anointing with oil.
13. The form or mode of baptism also underwent a radical change during the first half of the third century,—a change whereby its essential symbolism was destroyed. Immersion,—(See Note 3, end of chapter) typifying death followed by resurrection, was no longer deemed an essential feature, and sprinkling with water was allowed in place thereof. No less an authority than Cyprian, the learned bishop of Carthage, advocated the propriety of sprinkling in lieu of immersion in cases of physical weakness; and the practice thus started, later became general. The first instance of record is that of Novatus, a heretic who requested baptism when he thought death was near.—(As to the scriptural doctrine of baptism, the mode of its administration and the symbolism thereof, see the author's "Articles of Faith," Lecture 7.)
14. Not only was the form of the baptismal rite radically changed, but the application of the ordinance was perverted. The practice of administering baptism to infants was recognized as orthodox in the third century, and was doubtless of earlier origin. In a prolonged disputation as to whether it was safe to postpone the baptism of infants until the eighth day after birth—in deference to the Jewish custom of performing circumcision on that day—it was gravely decided that such delay would be dangerous, as jeopardizing the future well-being of the child should it die before attaining the age of eight days, and that baptism ought to be administered as soon after birth as possible.—(See Milner, "Church History," Cent. III; ch. 13.) A more infamous doctrine than that of the condemnation of unbaptized infants can scarcely be imagined, and a stronger proof of the heresies that had invaded and corrupted the early Church need not be sought. Such a doctrine is foreign to the gospel and to the Church of Christ, and its adoption as an essential tenet is proof of apostasy.—(For a discussion of infant baptism, see the author's "Articles of Faith," Lecture 6. See Note 4, end of chapter.)
**Changes in the Ordinance of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper**.
15. The sacrament of the Lord's Supper has been regarded as an essential ordinance from the time of its establishment in the Church by Jesus Christ. Yet in spite of its sanctity it has undergone radical alteration both as to its symbolism and its accepted purpose. The sacrament, as instituted by the Savior and as administered during the days of the apostolic ministry, was as simple as it was sacred and solemn. Accompanied by the true spirit of the gospel, its simplicity was sanctifying; as interpreted by the spirit of apostasy its simplicity became a reproach. Hence we find that in the third century, long sacramental prayers were prescribed, and much pomp was introduced. Vessels of gold and silver were used by such congregations as could afford them, and this with ostentatious display. Nonmembers and members "who were in a penitential state" were excluded from the sacramental service—in imitation of the exclusiveness accompanying heathen mysteries. Disputation and dissension arose as to the proper time of administering the sacrament—morning, noon, or evening; and as to the frequency with which the ordinance should be celebrated.—(See Note 5, end of chapter.)
16. At a later date the doctrine ofTransubstantiationwas established as an essential tenet of the Roman Church. This briefly summarized, is to the effect that the species—i. e., the bread and wine used in the sacrament—lose their character as mere bread and wine, and become in fact the flesh and blood of the crucified Christ. The transmutation is assumed to take place in such a mystical way as to delude the senses; and so, though actual flesh and actual blood, the elements still appear to be bread and wine. This view, so strongly defended and earnestly reverenced by orthodox members of the Roman Church, is vehemently denounced by others as "an absurd tenet,"— (Milner) and a "monstrous and unnatural doctrine."—(Mosheim.)
17. There has been much discussion as to the origin of this doctrine,—(See Note 6, end of chapter.) the Roman Catholics claiming for it a great antiquity, while their opponents insist that it was an innovation of the eighth or ninth century. According to Milner it was openly taught in the ninth century;—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. IX, ch. 1.) was formally established as a dogma of the Church by the Council of Placentia A. D. 1095,—(The same, Cent. XI, ch. 1) and was made an essential article of creed, belief in which was required of all by action of the Roman ecclesiastical court about 1160.—(The same, Cent. XIII, ch. 1.) An official edict of the pope, Innocent III, confirmed the dogma as a binding tenet and requirement of the Church in 1215;—(Mosheim, "Eccl. Hist.," Cent. XIII, Part II, ch. 3:2.) and it remains practically in force in the Roman Catholic Church today. The doctrine was adopted by the Greek Church in the seventeenth century.—(The same. Cent. XVII, Part II, ch. 2:3.)
18. The consecrated emblems, or "host," being regarded as the actual flesh and blood of Christ, were adored as of themselves divine. Thus, "a very pernicious practice of idolatry was connected with the reception of this doctrine. Men fell down before the consecrated host, and worshipped it as God; and the novelty, absurdity, and impiety of this abomination very much struck the minds of all men who were not dead to a sense of true religion."—(Milner, "Church History," Cent. XIII, ch. 1.) The "elevation of the host,"—i. e., the presentation of the consecrated emblems before the congregation for adoration, is a feature of the present day ritual of worship in the Roman Catholic Church. The celebration of the mass is taught to be an actual though mystic sacrifice, in which the Son of God is daily offered up anew as a constantly recurring atonement for the present sins of the assembled worshippers. A further perversion of the sacrament occurred in the administration of bread alone, instead of both bread and wine as originally required.
19. Thus was the plain purpose and assured efficacy of the sacrament hidden beneath a cloud of mystery and ceremonial display. Contrast such with the solemn simplicity of the ordinance as instituted by our Lord,—He took bread and wine, blessed them and gave to His disciples and said, "This do in remembrance of me."—(Luke 22:19, 20; compare Matt. 26:27, 28.) Of the bread He said, "This is my body;" of the wine, "This is my blood;" yet at that time His body was unpierced, His blood was unshed. The disciples ate bread, not flesh of a living man, and drank wine, not blood; and this they were commanded to do in remembrance of Christ.—(For a general treatment of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, see the author's "Articles of Faith," Lecture 9.) The perversion of the sacrament is evidence of departure from the spirit of the gospel of Christ, and when made an essential dogma of a church is proof of the apostate condition of that church.
20. Behold, "they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant."—(See Isaiah 24:4-6.)
1.Ceremonies Added as a Compromise. "Both Jews and heathens were accustomed to a vast variety of pompous and magnificent ceremonies in their religious service. And as they considered these rites as an essential part of religion, it was but natural that they should behold with indifference, and even with contempt, the simplicity of the Christian worship, which was destitute of those idle ceremonies that rendered their service so specious and striking. To remove then, in some measure, this prejudice against Christianity, the bishops thought it necessary to increase the number of rites and ceremonies, and thus to render the public worship more striking to the outward senses. This addition of external rites was also designed to remove the opprobrious calumnies which the Jewish and pagan priests cast upon the Christians on account of the simplicity of their worship, esteeming them little better than atheists, because they had no temples, altars, victims, priests, nor anything of that external pomp in which the vulgar are so prone to place the essence of religion. The rulers of the Church adopted, therefore, certain external ceremonies, that thus they might captivate the senses of the vulgar, and be able to refute the reproaches of their adversaries." (Mosheim, "Ecclesiastical History," Cent. II, Part II, ch. 4:2, 3.)
A note appended to the foregoing excerpt by the translator, Dr.Archibald Maclaine, reads as follows:
"A remarkable passage in the life of Gregory, surnamed Thaumaturgus, i. e., the wonder worker, will illustrate this point in the clearest manner. The passage is as follows: 'When Gregory perceived that the ignorant multitude persisted in their idolatry, on account of the pleasures and sensual gratifications which they enjoyed at the pagan festivals, he granted them a permission to indulge themselves in the like pleasures, in celebrating the memory of the holy martyrs, hoping that in process of time, they would return of their own accord to a more virtuous and regular course of life.' There is no sort of doubt, but that by this permission, Gregory allowed the Christians to dance, sport, and feast at the tombs of the martyrs upon their respective festivals, and to do everything which the pagans were accustomed to do in their temples during the feasts celebrated in honor of their gods."