He taught that He was not only as great as the Messiah whom the Jews expected but greater. He is himself the King of that divine kingdom, which He came to found, and through all His Messianic claims there is the suggestion that He is in a unique sense the Son of God. When He was discovered by His mother in the Temple at the age of twelve, He showed that He was conscious of being the real Son of God; the same truth was repeated in the voice heard from heaven at His baptism, and, although He taught His disciples to call God 'Our Father,' He called God His own Father in a special sense (Matt. xvi. 17). The Jews interpreted Ps, ii. 7 and Ps. lxxxix. 27 as Messianic, but it was only in a titular and honorific fashion that they applied the phrase 'Son of God' to the Messiah. They were willing to believe that the Messiah, as the head of a theocratic state, sufficiently resembled God to be called His Son. They were not willing to allow that any teacher could literally share in the Divinity of God.

But our Lord claimed to be literally divine. In the synoptic Gospels He asserts that He stands in a relation to God which no man could possibly occupy, He alone adequately reveals and knows God (Matt. xi. 27). He accepts the title of 'the Son of the living God' (Matt., xvi. 16) from St. Peter's lips, and will not save His life by disowning it when addressed by the high priest He had previously suggested it in an unmistakable manner when He uttered the parable about the one son, the 'beloved,' who was killed by the wicked husbandmen (Mark xii. 6). If we carefully consider the statements recorded by the Synoptists, we shall welcome the light which is thrown upon them by the statements recorded in St. John's Gospel. For in the synoptic Gospels Christ claims to be the perfect Saint, the supreme Lawgiver, and the final Judge. He declares himself to be the sole Master of His disciples (Matt. xxiii. 10), He inserts His own name between that of the Father and that of the Spirit (Matt. xxviii. 19) and promises to be wherever two or three are gathered together in His name (Matt. xviii. 20).

St. John represents Jesus as saying that He had the life of God within himself (John v. 26) and that 'the Father hath given all judgment unto the Son; that all may honour the Son, even as they honour the Father' (John v. 23). He co-ordinates His work with the work of God when He commands an impotent man to carry his bed on the Sabbath day. He teaches that there is a unity, not only of co-operation, but also of omnipotence, in the passage where he declares, 'I and the Father are one thing' (John x. 30). He asserts that He existed before Abraham was born, and in such a manner as to show that His existence had no beginning and could have no end (John viii. 58). The Jews understood Him and attempted to kill Him. They detected blasphemy in His assertions, for they perceived that He regarded himself as God (John x. 33). St. Mark shows that the high priest assumed that the Sanhedrim would condemn Him the moment that Jesus stated that He was the Son of God. St. John does nothing more than logically continue the synoptic narrative when he says that the Sanhedrim declared to Pilate, 'We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God' (John xix. 7). All the Gospels agree in proving that the history of Christ's death is unintelligible unless He called himself the Son of God, not merely in an ethical sense, nor merely in the official sense of 'Messiah,' but also in the deeper sense that He claimed to be a divine Person who had clothed himself with human nature (cf. Luke i. 35).

The Fatherhood of God.--The teaching of our Lord revealed to men the true nature of the Fatherhood of God. The more devout Jews had some conception of God acting as a Father to His chosen people, pitying His children 'like as a father' (Ps. ciii. 13). But in the teaching of Christ this idea is central and dominant. It carries with it the thought of a love which creates and teaches, which plans and gives, and is bestowed upon all God's children freely. But it must be remembered that Christ does not teach that His disciples are or can be sons of God in the same unique sense as himself. He speaks to them of 'your heavenly Father' (Matt. vi. 14) in a manner which marks a distinction between His own Sonship and theirs. Nor does Christ teach that we are the children of God if we reject His Son (John viii. 42). It is only through submission to Christ that we become God's children (John xiv. 6 ff.; Rom. viii. 15).

Christ's Teaching about Salvation.--When Christ began His ministry He said, 'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor' (Luke iv. 18). He makes salvation depend upon the acceptance of His message from God. He is the Sower who scatters the word of God; the word contains the power of fruitfulness in itself, though its actual fruitfulness depends upon the soil which receives it. The great subject of this message is the Kingdom of God. The Jews expected that the theocracy or Kingdom of God which had nourished among them in the times of David and Solomon would return in a more glorious form. This expectation nerved them to maintain their nationality and their religion. At the same time the interpretation of the Kingdom of God which was current among them was so secular that it was necessary for Christ to transform it.

(1) The Jews expected that it would be a kingdom of material prosperity and success. Christ opposes this by specially promising a share in it to the 'poor in spirit' (Matt. v. 3). He describes it as the highest good which men can seek and as a spiritual sphere of life.

(2) The Jews thought that it had not yet come. Christ teaches that the final stage has not yet come (Luke xxii. 18), but He says that it is already here and suffering violence (Matt. xi. 12). Christ himself has brought it (Luke xi. 20).

(3) The Jews believed that it was a national Jewish kingdom, to which the Jews had a hereditary right. Christ assured them that it would be taken from them (Matt. xxi. 43). He opened it to all who would recognise Him as their King, and by a sincere repentance or 'change of mind' (Luke xxiv. 47) forsake sin and fulfil His commands in the spirit of little children (Mark x. 15).

Our Lord never ceased to preach the Kingdom of God, which is also His own Kingdom (Matt. xiii. 41). But when He had sufficiently trained His followers to believe absolutely in His message, and declared that it was necessary not only to trust His message but to receive Him as God himself. He showed that the Kingdom of God was henceforth to be identical with the Christian Church.

When Peter confesses that He is 'the Son of the living God,' Christ rewards him by sayings 'Upon this rock I will build my Church . . . I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven' (Matt. xvi. 18, 19). The word 'Church' had been used by the Jews as a name of God's chosen people. Christ now founds what He calls 'my Church.' It is His own institution, and He describes it in terms which show it to be visible and imperishable, and opened by an appointed human guardian. In Matt. xviii 15-20, He further describes His Church as the home of brothers whose brotherhood depends upon submission to Christ. The brother who persists in sin and refuses to hear the Church is to be excluded, and this exclusion will be ratified in heaven. After this solemn statement our Lord declares that He is personally present with the members of the Church who gather together in His name. His language on this occasion implies His true Divinity as much as any language used by Him in the Gospel of St. John.

It finally became necessary for Jesus to tell His disciples that He must die. He could not reveal this to them until they were firmly rooted in their faith. The Jews did not imagine that their Messiah would die or even suffer. But when His disciples had learnt that He was indeed the Son of God, He was able to suggest to them the full truth. He says, 'I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be a accomplished' (Luke xii. 50). With greater clearness He tells them that He must 'give his life a ransom for many.' By this He means that man is a prisoner who cannot purchase freedom from sin for his soul, and that the Son of God pays the precious ransom which sets man free. A year before His death, in the great discourse recorded in John vi., He declared that He would give to men a living bread which is the flesh which He would give for the life of the world.

The night before He died. He made plain what He meant by His former language about this life surrendered to God and imparted to men. While celebrating the Passover with His disciples, He consecrated a portion of the unleavened bread and a cup of wine mingled with water, saying, 'This is my Body'--'This is my Blood.' He apparently wished to recall to His disciples the blood of the Paschal lamb which was sprinkled on the doorposts of the Israelites in Egypt, and saved them from the visitation of the destroying angel.

He also claimed to found that new Covenant between God and His servants which Jeremiah had foretold. The shedding of His blood secures deliverance from evil, and makes a new and closer relation between God and man. The Lord's Supper was therefore meant to be a sacrificial feast of reconciliation with God, a reconciliation made possible by the death of Jesus. It was also meant to be a means of receiving from Jesus that life of which He is the Source, and which He derives from the eternal Father (John vi. 57).

After He was risen from the dead, Christ ordered Christian Baptism, directing that the converts made by His disciples should be baptized 'into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.' When the Jews made proselytes, these proselytes were not admitted to the full privileges of sons of Israel until they were baptized. If they had children at the time, these children appear to have been baptized also. John the Baptist baptized his disciples to prepare them for the new Covenant of Christ. But our Lord himself instituted another cleansing to be an actual means of entrance into His own kingdom. Some modem critics have asserted that our Lord could never have used such a formula as 'the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.' But although the early Christians perhaps baptized sometimes only 'into the name of the Lord Jesus' (Acts viii. 16), there is no real reason to doubt that Christ used the above formula. St. Paul uses the same formula in 2 Cor. xiii. 14, and the synoptic Gospels and St. John's Gospel agree in mentioning a Trinity of divine persons (John xiv. 26; cf. Eph. v. 18-20; Hebr. x. 29).

St. Paul's teaching about Faith, Righteousness, and the law.--The enthusiastic surrender to Christ which results in moral victory and progress, St. Paul calls Faith. This is the act by which a man desires to identify himself with Christ, to die with Christ, and rise with Him in newness of life. It is an act of a man's whole nature, including the intellect, the affections, and the resolution to obey Christ. In popular language Faith is sometimes represented as the conviction that Christ was punished by God instead of sinners. This conception of Faith is part of the truth. For sinless as Christ was, He drank the cup which our sins had mingled. He felt forsaken by the Father. The love of God the Son accepted the suffering which the love of God the Father permitted. But when St. Paul speaks of Faith in its truly Christian sense, he means the attitude of a man who devotes himself to Christ and allows his whole character to be rooted in Christ, and thus finds in Christ not only a Saviour from punishment but also a Saviour from Sin. A one-sided view of Faith always tends to be antinomian and immoral. But the Pauline doctrine of Faith teaches us that Faith is trust in One who lifts us into communion with the supreme Moral Being. A Faith which does not stimulate the highest moral tone is not Faith at all.

The same truth is enforced by St. Paul's teaching about Righteousness. To have believed that there was only an arbitrary connection between the righteousness of Christ and the righteousness of the Christian would have been to oppose all his religious experience. He teaches that there is an organic union between the spiritual man and Christ quite as real as the connection between our own fleshly nature and the fleshly nature of Adam. A man is justified, or acquitted as non-guilty and righteous by God, when that man receives 'the righteousness of God.' This phrase means the righteousness inherent in God himself and bestowed by God upon man. The method of attaining this righteousness is through that faith by which a man sees that Jesus is Messiah and Lord, is made a member of Christ by baptism, and receives His Spirit. Christ then lives in him, his deeds are Christ's. The Christian is therefore literally and truly righteous, although 'ungodly' up to the moment of his acquittal. When he submits to the control of the Flesh, he ceases to be righteous, he falls under the condemnation of God, and will be 'broken off' like the withered branches of Judaism.

Experience of 'the righteousness of God by faith' gave St. Paul a key to the meaning of the Jewish Law and all Law. He holds that Law, all external enactment saying 'thou shalt' or 'thou shalt not'' was given in consequence of sin. It would have been unnecessary if there had been no sin. St. Paul is convinced that the Law is good and that it is spiritual. In Rom. vii. he shows that it discharges functions which are incompatible with the view that the Law is sinful. For it teaches man what sin is, and it cannot itself be sin if it irritates sin into activity. But it is in fundamental contrast with the Gospel; it cannot make men righteous, and if it could do so, Christ's death was useless. The Law is, to use a modern illustration, like a bracket in the page of God's dealings with mankind. It does not limit the promise which God gave to Abraham, it comes between that promise and its fulfilment in order that men may realise their need of 'the righteousness of God by faith.' It is a stage in the development of our moral education, a stage which we are bound to outgrow.

The relation of the Christian to the Law is twofold. (1) By identifying himself with Christ crucified and becoming infused with His Spirit, the Christian becomes discharged from the Law and sin at the same moment. Christ until He died was under the Law (Gal. iv. 4). But His risen life is a life of complete freedom from the Law. In the same way the man who identifies himself with Christ and dies to sin is free from the jurisdiction of the Law. (2) Release from the Law does not mean license to sin. On the contrary, the Christian is now able to perform what the Law declares to be righteous (Rom. viii. 4). He does it spontaneously because he now possesses the righteousness of God. He is moved by that love which is the fulfilling of the Law. Therefore St. Paul asserts, 'We establish the Law.' Shining through the narrow and many-coloured windows of the Jewish Law there is an eternal and universal Law which will be cherished by all the sons of God. The whole matter is summed up in three sentences, each of which conveys an aspect of the same truth. 'Neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature' (Gal.vi. 15). 'In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love' (Gal.v. 6). 'Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing; but the keeping of the commandments of God' (1 Cor. vii. 19).

St. Paul's Doctrine of Christ's Person.--St. Paul's doctrine of Christ's person is fundamentally the same through all his Epistles. Christ is throughout both divine and human, the Son of God in a unique sense, and the sinless Mediator between God and man. But St. Paul developed his statements and explanations of this doctrine in accordance with the lessons which he desired to enforce, and in opposition to the errors against which he was obliged to contend. In the two earlier groups of his Epistles the teaching about Christ is mainly implicit. His Divinity is implied in the position assigned to Him. In the third group of Epistles the teaching is explicit. His Divinity is explained for one or other particular purpose.

The Epistles to the Thessalonians form the first group of St. Paul's Epistles. Here the unique character of Christ's Sonship is suggested by the phrase, 'Wait for his Son from heaven . . . even Jesus, which delivereth us from the wrath to come' (1 Thess, i. 10). Jesus is in both Epistles called 'The Lord Jesus,' and each letter closes with the prayer that His grace, or unmerited kindness, may be with the readers. The stress of persecution seems to have raised in the Thessalonians an eager desire for the return of Christ which alone could bring them release. St. Paul makes no full statement about the person of Christ, nor does he explain the atonement (touched upon in v. 10). He simply assumes that Jesus is the exalted Lord who dispenses salvation and will return to judge the world. The connection between this Epistle and the sayings of our Lord in Matt. xxiv. is obvious. In 2 Thess. the apostle speaks of a 'man of sin' who will be annihilated by the true Messiah at His second coming. This 'man of sin' will assume equality with God and sit in the temple of God. The apostle seems to regard unbelieving Judaism as personified in an Antichrist who will pretend to be a consubstantial representative of God like the One who is foretold in Mal. iii. 1. This picture of the false Messiah suggests the supreme position which St. Paul attributes to the true Messiah, to whom he ascribes divine functions.

The Epistles to the Corinthians, Galatians, and Romans form the second group of St. Paul's Epistles. They contain a large amount of teaching about the person of Christ. In writing to the Corinthians St. Paul had to warn his readers against the dangers connected with tlie presence of idolatry. And in 1 Cor. viii., in view of pagan polytheism, he points out the dignity of Christ. 'As there are gods many, and lords many; yet to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we unto him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ through whom are all things, and we through him.' Here the true God is contrasted with the so-called gods and the true Lord with the many lords. It cannot be questioned that the apostle means that Christ belongs to the sphere of divine life. The same doctrine is implied in those passages which speak of our relation to Christ. On the one hand we see that Christ is 'the first-born among many brethren' (Rom. viii. 29), and that we are destined to be conformed to His image. He is therefore in a true sense our brother. But on the other hand He is God's 'own Son' (Rom. viii. 3) in a supreme sense, and to Him alone belongs the privilege of being 'image of God' (2 Cor. iv. 4). We may reflect His likeness, but He alone has eternally been related to the Father in such a way that He is fitted to reveal Him completely. St. Paul does not hesitate to draw the conclusion which logically follows from his belief in this communion of life between the Father and the Son. He applies to Christ passages which in the Old Testament refer to Jehovah, and in Rom. ix. 5 says that He is 'over all, God blessed for ever.'

Not much is said about the historical human life of our Lord. He was 'born of a woman ' (Gal.iv. 4) and sent into the world in the likeness of sinful flesh, but nevertheless knew no sin (2 Cor. v. 21). His life was one of self-denial, and His sufferings and resurrection are mentioned. This human Christ who suffered and rose again is none other than the Son of God by virtue of the divine nature or 'Spirit of holiness' which He possesses (Rom. i. 4).

We should notice in conclusion that the Epistle to the Romans does not seem to have been written as an argument against Judaising tendencies in the Roman Church, but as a mature statement of God's dealings with mankind through Christ a statement which would end any controversy which might arise between Jewish and Gentile Christians. The divine Lordship of Christ is assumed rather than stated, as the readers of the Epistle are in no uncertainty as to the foundations of Christian teaching.

The Epistles to the Philippians, Colossians, and Ephesians.--In Phil. ii. 5-11 we have an important passage which is introduced with a definite purpose--to illustrate the spirit of self-sacrifice. Our Lord is held up as the pattern of those who do not insist upon their rights. We are told that Christ 'being in the form of God, counted it not a prize to be on an equality with God, but emptied himself taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.' The Arians of the fourth century interpreted this to mean that He was a lesser God who did not grasp equality with the great God. But it is plain that all such interpretations are absurd. For the force of Christ's example would have been worthless if He had been a created spirit who only abstained from grasping at divine prerogatives which it would be impious to desire. There is no self-sacrifice in abstaining from such impiety. St. Paul means that Christ had the form or attributes of God, but that He humbled himself by taking the attributes of a servant. This involved a 'self-emptying,' an entrance into human limitations, and was followed by a life of humble dependence upon God. This was self-sacrifice indeed, and it is to be the model of Christian conduct. The reward of the human obedience of Jesus Christ was His exaltation into heaven. The Name which He bore during His humiliation, and is the symbol of His human nature, now calls forth the adoration of angels and of men and of the souls of the departed.

In Colossians St. Paul gives a full statement of the significance of Christ's person in order to correct some errors prevalent at Colossæ. A heresy had become prevalent which was a kind of Christian theosophy. It taught that for the perfection of the Christian life something more than ordinary Christian doctrine and morality was required. Christianity was therefore combined with various Jewish and Oriental superstitions and with rigidly ascetic rules of life. The doctrine and the conduct of the false teachers were based upon one principle, namely, that material and physical existence is degrading. Therefore it was taught (i) that man must approach God by repressing all bodily instincts, and (ii) that God approaches man through a chain of intermediate beings among whom His attributes are divided. The lowest of these beings would be sufficiently material to condescend to come into contact with mankind.

St. Paul saw how much this teaching would destroy a true conception of the dignity of Christ. He therefore declares that the Son is the image of God, the adequate counterpart of the Father. He is also the 'firstborn of all creation,' i.e. not created, but, as the context shows, 'born before all creation,' and Lord of creation. All things were created in Him, since in His mind the plan of creation was eternally present; by Him, since it was through His power that all things came into being; unto Him, since every creature finds the explanation of its being by living for His glory. All things cohere in Him. The sum total of the attributes of God dwells in Him bodily (Col. ii. 9). Material and physical life are therefore hallowed both by the creation and by the incarnation. The Son is Saviour as well as Creator. He is the one divine link between the Father and the world both in redemption and in creation. The Church is the new creation, and Christ is the Head with whom all the members of the Church are in communication. He directs their functions so that the whole body works together (Col. ii. 19).

The Nazarenes became gradually mingled with the Syriac-speaking Christians of Palestine. The Ebionites continued to exist for a long time in Palestine and Arabia, and it was chiefly from them that Muhammad derived his teaching. The detestation which the Moslems have for Christianity shows us what a prophetic insight St. Paul had into the true character of his Judaising opponents.

Catholic Gentile Christianity.--The strictly theological Catholic writings of this period are the Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians (A.D. 97), the Epistle of Barnabas (? A.D. 98), the seven Epistles of Ignatius (A.D. 110), the Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians (A.D. 110), the fragments of the Expositions of Papias (A.D. 130), the Shepherd of Hermas (A.D. 140), and the so-called Second Epistle of Clement (? A.D. 140).

The Catholic faith itself is clearly set forth in the Roman baptismal creed of this period:--

'I believe in God, the Father Almighty, and in Christ Jesus, His Son, the only-begotten, Who was born of the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary, Who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and buried, on the third day rose again, ascended into the heavens, sitteth at the right hand of the Father, whence He cometh to judge the living and dead. And in the Holy Ghost, and the Resurrection of the flesh.'

The exact date of some of the remaining clauses of the creed is doubtful, but the words 'holy Church' and 'forgiveness of sins' were probably recited in the creed during part of the second century.

While the theology of the Catholic writers is marked by considerable variations of thought and expression, they show a close agreement as to the main articles of the Christian faith. A clever attempt has been made to prove that the early Christians held two fundamentally different conceptions as to the person of Christ, one party believing that He was only a man to whom the Holy Spirit was given, and that He was afterwards adopted by God and made semi-divine, the other party believing that He was a heavenly Spirit who took flesh and then returned to heaven. This theory may be compared with Baur's theory that the primitive Church contained two parties which differed fundamentally with regard to the observance of the Mosaic law. But just as there is no proof that any of the apostles insisted that Gentile converts should observe the law, so there is no proof that any members of the early Church denied that Christ existed in heaven before He appeared on earth.

The Epistle of Barnabas was probably written by a converted Jew of Alexandria, but is anti-Jewish in tone. The view of Christ is a high view. He is in a unique sense the Son of God, the Beloved, and the Child or Servant of God. He is the Son 'not of man, but of God.' He was 'Lord of the whole world' at the creation, and 'the prophets receiving grace from Him prophesied concerning Him.' He 'came in the flesh' for if He had not assumed human flesh men could not have looked upon Him, any more than they can endure to gaze upon the rays of the sun. A propitiatory character is attributed to His death. He 'desired so to suffer' that we might be cleansed 'through the blood of His sprinkling.' 'He could not suffer except for our sakes.' He is the 'future Judge of quick and dead.' He has 'renewed us in the remission of sins, so that we should have the soul of children.' This renewal takes place in 'the baptism which bringeth remission of sins.' The author closely connects faith with hope, and teaches that we are under 'the new law of our Lord Jesus Christ,' this law being 'free from the yoke of constraint.' We Christians are 'children of gladness.'

The real beauty of much that is said in this Epistle is somewhat marred by the author's extreme antagonism to Judaism and his strange idea that the Jews were wrong in giving a literal interpretation to the ceremonial commands of the Jewish Law.

St. Clement, bishop of Rome, is one of the most interesting figures of the early Church. His letter was written to restore order in the Church of Corinth, where the laity had been quarrelling with their presbyters, or 'overseers' as they are still called. Clement writes in a sober and moderate tone, but he insists strongly upon the principle of Apostolical Succession, and his statements imply that the Jewish threefold ministry of high-priest, priest, and Levite is reflected in the threefold ministry of the Christian Church. Although he does not use the word 'overseer' in the sense of bishop, the position which he occupied at Rome and the tone of his directions combine to prove that he believed in an episcopal system of Church government

Clement's theology is comprehensive though not profound. It unites various elements of apostolic teaching in a manner which would have been impossible if the apostolic band had been divided into the two camps which have been depicted by modern sceptics. Clement uses the phrase 'justified by faith,' but he is anxious that good works should be strenuously maintained, for we are under 'the yoke of the loving-kindness' of Christ. He asserts that 'the Lord Jesus Christ liveth' and mentions His name together with the name of the Father and of the Holy Spirit. He speaks of the sufferings of Christ as the sufferings of God. He is 'our High-priest and Guardian.' He is called Lord, and it is said that He 'hath given His blood for us by the will of God, and His flesh for our flesh and His life for our lives.' It should be observed that although Clement firmly believes in the Divinity of Christ, he does not hesitate to call Him by the title 'Beloved Child ' or 'Beloved Servant.' We are therefore justified in saying that the early Christians did not, when they used that title, mean that Christ was only an exalted man.

The old Homily which is incorrectly called the Second Epistle of Clement teaches similar doctrine. It says, 'We ought to think concerning Jesus Christ as concerning God, as concerning the Judge of quick and dead.' The pre-existent divine nature of Christ is called 'Spirit' in contrast with His 'flesh' or human nature--'Christ the Lord who saved us, being at first Spirit became flesh and thus called us.' The practice of calling the divine nature of Christ' Spirit' is found in the New Testament (John vi. 63; 1 Cor. xv. 45; 2 Cor. iii. 17, and probably Rom. i. 4). It is found in Athanasius, although in his time this use of the word was rare. In writers of the second century this was very common,

Hermas, v. Sim. 6; Iren. adv. Har. v. 1, 2; Theophil. ad Autol. ii. 10; Tert. Apol. 21.

St. Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, wrote seven letters shortly before his martyrdom at Rome in 110. While the tone of these letters is emotional and enthusiastic, the theology is well-reasoned and highly developed. Ignatius desired to warn his readers against certain tendencies to Judaism which he had observed in Asia Minor, and also against some Docetic theories which represented that the human life and suffering of Christ were unreal, as though He were too sacred to share our lot. The completeness of the theology of Ignatius is largely the result of this double attack upon the Christian religion.

The doctrine of Ignatius is that 'God appeared in human form unto newness of eternal life.' Christ is 'our God.' He was 'with the Father before the ages' timeless, invisible, and unbegotten, i.e. He did not derive life from His Father in the same way as men derive life from their fathers. Ignatius is quite convinced that the Son is God, and yet he confidently says that 'there is one God, who manifested himself through Jesus Christ.' The Son took true human flesh, and therefore we worship 'one only Physician, of flesh and of Spirit, generate and not generate, God in man, true Life in death. Son of Mary and Son of God, first passible and then impassible, Jesus Christ our Lord.' The Son is called the Word as in the Gospel of St. John, and in the manner of St. John Ignatius says, 'I wish for the bread of God which is the flesh of Christ.' The fact that Christ was miraculously born is asserted in the plainest way, for Ignatius puts side by side 'the virginity of Mary, and her child-bearing, and likewise also the death of the Lord.' He lays stress upon the indwelling of Christ in the Christian; Jesus Christ is 'our true living,' 'our inseparable life.'

If we had no remnant of the age which came after the death of the apostles except these letters, it would be almost impossible to doubt that the apostles held those doctrines which we find in the writings which bear the names of St. Paul and St. John.

Ignatius in maintaining the unity of the faith does everything in his power to preserve the unity of the Church. He regards the episcopate of what he calls the 'Catholic Church' as the guarantee of the Church's visible unity. He is the earliest writer known to us who uses the word 'episkopos' or 'overseer' no longer as the title of a presbyter but as the title of the highest order in the Christian ministry. He speaks of bishops as 'established in the farthest parts of the earth,' and his statements with regard to them are one of the strongest proofs that the apostles created a permanent order of ministers to govern the local presbyters and deacons. He regards a valid ministry as essential to the existence of a Church. 'Apart from these (sc. bishop, presbyters, and deacons) there is not even the name of a Church.'

St. Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, suffered martyrdom in 155 or 156. Of his letters, that to the Philippians alone survives, but a full account of his martyrdom and a true index to his opinions is found in an epistle written immediately after his death by the Christians of Smyrna. Polycarp remembered St. John, he received from Ignatius an epistle which still exists, and he taught Irenaeus. He is therefore the most important link between the age of the apostles and the date when the Church emerges into the clear daylight of history. His letter is very simple, and abounds in quotations from St. Paul's Epistles. He shows the same horror as Ignatius towards the tendency to deny the real manhood of Christ. Christ is called 'our Lord and God' and 'the eternal High-priest.' His atonement, example, and future judgment are mentioned. It is important to notice that although Polycarp was the disciple of St. John, he delights in the teaching of St. Paul. His letter, like the letter of Clement of Rome, shows no trace or recollection of any fundamental opposition between the different apostles, and the simplicity of the document makes any idea of a pious fraud entirely ridiculous.

The letter of the Smyrnaeans on the martyrdom of Polycarp is a writing of the utmost dignity and pathos. It is historical and not doctrinal, but contains some passages of great doctrinal importance. The dying words of Polycarp therein recorded show a clearly defined belief in the Holy Trinity. 'I praise Thee, I bless Thee, I glorify Thee, through the eternal and heavenly High-priest, Jesus Christ, Thy beloved Son, through whom with Him and the Holy Spirit be glory both now and ever and for the ages to come. Amen.'

The Smyrnaeans in worshipping Christ did not regard Him as a deified or saintly man. They expressly distinguish their worship of Christ from their reverence for the saints. 'For Him, being the Son of God, we adore, but the martyrs as disciples and imitators of the Lord we cherish as they deserve.' Like Ignatius, whose writings this letter somewhat resembles, the Christians of Smyrna speak of 'the Catholic Church throughout the world,' of which Church Christ is the Shepherd.

Papias, bishop of Hierapolis, was another disciple of St. John. Only a few fragments of his writings remain. From a doctrinal point of view they are important for two reasons. (1) Papias interpreted the story of the six days of creation and of Paradise 'spiritually,' i.e. he apparently thought that they contained an allegorical account of the Church; (2) He believed that after the general resurrection Christ will reign with the saints upon the earth and the Kingdom of God will come, creation being renewed and the fruits of the earth becoming extraordinarily productive. Jerome calls this 'a Jewish tradition of the Millennium' but the tradition is also connected with such Christian sources as Rev. xx. 4 and Rom. viii. 19.

The Shepherd of Hermae is an important work written by a Roman Christian about 140. The book is marked by a desire for the moral improvement of the Church, and at the same time its severity is tempered by rules which admit the possibility of a new admission to Church privileges after one serious fall. Hermas teaches that penitence does remove sins committed after baptism, that the gravest sins may be forgiven, but that this penitence, which implies a certain routine, must take place only once.

The teaching of Hermas with regard to the Holy Trinity is not very clear, and it has been asserted that he does not believe in the Trinity at all, but in two divine persons, viz., the Father and the Holy Ghost. It has also been asserted that he taught the 'Adoptionist' theory of Christ's person, namely, that Jesus was a mere man upon whom the Holy Ghost descended at His baptism, so that He became an 'adopted' Son of God. This is then alleged to be a truer form of Christian doctrine than we find in Ignatius and Polycarp, and so the Shepherd of Hermas is quoted in order to throw doubt upon the historical character of the Catholic faith.

All these assertions rest upon a complete misconception. Hermas is not an Adoptionist at all. He says nothing about any exaltation of Jesus at His baptism, and so far from teaching that He was a man who became half-divine at His baptism, Hermas teaches that the 'Son of God' existed before the creation of the world, was the Counsellor of the Father at the creation, and upholds the world.

v. Sim. 6; ix. Sim. 12 and 14.

Montanism.-- About A.D. 157 Montanus, formerly a mutilated priest of Cybele, headed a strange religious revival which has had several parallels during the nineteenth century, more espeially among Irvingites and the Mormons. He pretended to possess a gift of prophecy, and was joined by two women named Prisca and Maximilla who also professed to prophesy. They proclaimed that the reign of the Paraclete, foretold in St. John's Gospel, had now truly arrived, that the heavenly Jerusalem would descend, and that Christ would speedily return. Pepuza in Phrygia was to be the favoured spot chosen for the new city of God.

Montanism spread rapidy through Asia Minor, and from thence to Thrace, Rome, Gaul, and North Africa, where it secured an ardent advocate in the great Tertullian. It is evident that it owed some of its sucess to the conservative elements which it retained. The Montanists maintained a stringent discipline at a time when merely nominal Christianity was not uncommon. They strongly opposed Gnosticism, which wsa one of the most serious forces arrayed against the Church. They forbade flight under persecution, and were eager to suffer for the Christian faith. The 'recognition of spiritual gifts,' suh sa prophecy, a recognition on which the Montanists particularly prided themselves, had not only been common during the apostolic age, but the Catholics of the second centurey frequently testify to the existence of such gifts in their own day. Why, then, did the Church oppose Montanism? The chief reasons were these:--

(1) The Montanists organised schismatical communities, an treated the Church sa a second-rate institution, now superseded. (2) The Montanists held that mortal sin committed after baptism must not be forgiven by the Church, but could only be wiped out by martyrdom. (3) The Montanist prophecy was a 'new prophecy.' It was chiefly on this ground that the Catholics criticised the Montanists. It was new both in matter and in form. The Montanists said that 'the Holy Spirit was in the apostles, but not the Paraclete, and that the Paraclete said more things in Montanus than Christ uttered in the Gospel -- and not only more, but even better and greater.' These sayings were delivered in a state of frenzy. Thus Montanus said that he was in a state of sleep and passive like a lyre when the Lord made him prophesy, and Miltiades, a Catholic opponent of Montanism, affirmed that 'a prophet ought not to speak in an ecstasy.' These ecstati frenzies led to the wildest blasphemy. Montanus spoke of himself as 'the Father and the Son and the Paraclete,' and Prisca said that Christ had appeared to her in a female form.

Some Montanists came to deny the doctrine of the Trinity. The sect was persecuted by Justinian, and nearly two hundred years later, in A.D. 722, the surviving Montanists burnt themselves alive rather than submit to orthodox baptism.

St. Irenaeus. -- St. Irenaeus became bishop of Lyons, in Gaul, after the martyrdom of his aged predecessor, Pothinus, in 177. Just previously he had visited Eleutherus, bishop of Rome, and consulted him with regard to Montanism. Irenseus is the most important figure in the Church history of the second century. He had known Polycarp, the pupil of St. John, and his testimony to the authenticity of the fourth Gospel and of the synoptic Gospels is of unique value. He was acquainted with Christian life and thought in Asia Minor, Rome, and Gaul, and his evidence as to the traditions of the Church therefore rests upon a threefold foundation. His writings are largely directed against Gnosticism, but give us information about other important heresies.

The theology of Irenseus is profoundly Christian. His writings are more imbued with the spirit of the Gospel than those of the Apologists, although he seems to have been influenced by the Apologists. There is much in his books which reminds us of the writings of St. Ignatius and St. John and of the more developed Christology of St. Paul. Opposition to Gnosticism has caused him to reflect upon and define the faith of the Church.

The Doctrine of God in Irenseus. -- Against the Gnostics who denied that the Creator is the same as the God revealed in Christ, Irenseus insists that the Creator is the Redeemer. There is one omnipotent God, not two Gods who limit each other's action, or one God with a train of emanations attached to Him. This one God is an omnipresent, active Spirit; everything originates with Him and is what it is through His will -- 'the substance of all things is the will of God.'

Adv. Haer, ii. 30. 9.

The Doctrine of the Word in Irenaeus. -- The Son, who is also the Word, 'is ever co-existing with the Father ' He is 'the measure of the Father,' who alone fully knows and reveals the Father. There is an identity of nature between the Father and the Son. The Word is the Creator as truly as the Father is the Creator; it is He who revealed the Father to the angels, and appeared to the patriarchs (so the Apologists). The manner of His generation from the Father cannot be declared by man.

The Word is known to us through the historical life of Christ, who was born of the Virgin Mary, the new Eve. Why did God thus become man? The answer of Irenaeus is clear and unmistakable: 'On account of His boundless love He became what we are, in order that He might make us what He is himself.' In Irenaeus the doctrine of the incarnation of God is as fundamental as the doctrine of the unity of God. 'Without God we cannot know God.' Christ is the centre of theology, not because He is a Teacher, but because He is both God and Man. 'He united man with God.' Man was destined to resemble God; the development of this resemblance was broken by the fall of Aaam, but restored by Christ Irenseus loves to dwell upon the thought that Christ is the second Adam who 'recapitulates' mankind (cf. Eph. i. 10). Jesus Christ is the first who realised the true destiny of mankind in His own person. He is the Teacher who reforms mankind, but He is above all the Giver of incorruptibility, which consists in the sight and the service of God and in a communion with His nature. 'Those who see God partake of life: and therefore the Unseen made himself seen and comprehended and contained by the faithful.

An attempt has been made to prove that Irenaeus, in spite of his vigorous opposition to the Gnostics, borrowed from the Gnostics the theory that Christ had two distinct natures. But the doctrine of Irenaeus is quite different from that of the Gnostics. Irenaeus is true to the doctrine of St. Paul, who teaches in Phil ii. that Christ, who had from eternity 'the form' or nature of God, condescended to take 'the form' or nature of a slave, and yet remained essentially divine. The Gnostics, on the contrary, denied that Jesus Christ was essentially or truly human. They preferred to say that there was a 'Jesus' who suffered, and that on this Jesus descended a 'Christ' who could not suffer. Irenaeus opposes this heresy in the most explicit terms; he declares that Jesus is the Christ, and that Jesus Christ suffered and rose again, and that Jesus Christ is 'truly man, truly God.'

We should finally observe that Irenaeus has a distinct conception of the personality of the Holy Spirit, and that he brushes aside the notion of some of the Apologists that the Word was not from all eternity the Son of God.

Adv. Haer, ii. 30. 9.

Clement of Alexandria. -- Clement appears to have begun to teach about 190. His style is pure and captivating. He was much influenced both by his Christian predecessors and by Plato. He took in hand the work which had been begun by Justin and some other Apologists. That is, he attempted to show that Christianity is able to satisfy all men who are intellectually and morally in earnest. But he attempted to do the work of the Apologists on a far more magnificent scale than they had attempted themselves. He tried to combine Christian tradition with Greek philosophy in such a way as to present the world with a complete philosophy of religion. That ideal of fellowship with God which was prominent in much of the later Greek philosophy was heightened by Clement, and the attainment of this ideal was promised to those who desired to know and love God through Christ. Clement agreed with the later Platonists in saying that God might be known by those who freed themselves from the bonds of sense, and he said that the Christians who fear Greek philosophy are 'like children who are afraid of hobgoblins.' We may almost say that what Philo is towards Judaism, Clement is towards Christianity. But we cannot quite say this, for Clement is less visionary and more practical than some of his sayings might lead us to imagine, and the knoio- iedge of God which he extols is not a rare, ecstatic rapture, but the joyful confidence of a mind which has been disciplined by the Word of God.

The Doctrine of the Word in Clement. -- Clement, after the manner of the Neo-Platonists, regards God the Father as 'beyond being'; we cannot describe Him adequately. But nevertheless He was eternally Father, never without the Son.

Strom. v. 1. 1.

Number of the Sacraments.--As the word 'mystery' and the word 'sacrament' were both used in a wide sense, so as to include any of the deep things revealed by God in Christ, it follows that the early Christians could not speak of 'two' or 'seven' Sacraments in the modern fashion. It was not until the twelfth century that Hugh of St. Victor and Roland, and still more clearly Peter the Lombard, reckoned seven Sacraments. Hugh and Peter spoke of Baptism and the Eucharist as the principal Sacraments, and in this they retained the spirit, if not the letter, of the early Fathers of the Church. These two Sacraments certainly far outweighed all other rites in the estimation of the early Christians, as is shown by St. Augustine and previous writers. It is possible that Confirmation would have been placed in nearly as high a position, if Confirmation had not been usually administered immediately after Baptism and included in the baptismal service itself.

Baptism.--The abundant teaching contained in the New Testament with reference to Baptism removed the necessity of much discussion as to the nature of its effects. St. Paul had plainly taught that Baptism alters the spiritual status of the baptized, cancelling his past sins, and imparting a power of divine life. It is the laver of regeneration (Tit. iii. 5). Baptism was in the name of the Three Persons of the Trinity (Didache vii.). In this book, immersion is regarded as the best method of baptizing, but to pour water upon the head is sufficient. In the Epistle of Barnabas, Christian Baptism is distinguished from Jewish Baptism, inasmuch as the former alone 'bringeth remission of sins.' Justin speaks of the baptized as 'recreated,' and calls Baptism 'the bath for remission of sins and unto regeneration' (Apol. i. 66). Ignatius also regards Baptism as a defence against future sin--'let your Baptism remain your shields.'

In Hermas we have the poetical idea that the Church is built upon waters (3 Vis. iii.), and the author regards Baptism as so necessary that he thinks that those who died before the coming of Christ were baptized in Hades by the apostles and the teachers of Christianity.

Hermas calls Baptism the 'seal,' a word which had been used by St. John in the Apocalypse to describe the mark given to the tested followers of our Lord. Justin calls Baptism an 'enlightenment,' the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews having previously spoken of those initiated into Christianity as 'enlightened.' The words 'seal' and 'enlightenment' were used by the pagans in connection with their mysteries. Clement of Alexandria says: 'Being baptized we are enlightened, being enlightened we are made sons, being made sons we are made perfect, being made perfect we are made immortal.'

Paed. i. 6. 26.

Origen calls Baptism 'the first remission of sins.'

In Lev. Hom. ii. 4.

Infant Baptism probably dates from apostolic times. There are good grounds for thinking that when the Jews baptized their proselytes they baptized their children also. Justin compares baptism with circumcision, which suggests that it was administered to children. Irenaeus definitely mentions Infant Baptism.

Adv. Haer. ii. 22. 4; cf. Greek Fragment, 33.

The Eucharist as a Sacrament--The Church constantly maintained the teaching of St. Paul that to partake of the consecrated bread and wine is to partake of the body and blood of Christ. The outward symbols were not regarded merely as symbols but as the channel or vehicle for imparting the life of Christ to the believer. Although the Didache gives us a rather meagre idea of belief, even here the Eucharist is thought to be connected with a special presence of Christ, as is suggested by the use of the words Maran atha (the Lord cometh) and the thanksgiving at the communion, 'Thou didst bestow upon us spiritual food and drink and eternal life through Thy Son.' Wherever apostolic traditions were strong and the doctrine of the incarnation was intelligently grasped, a definite belief as to the Eucharist prevailed. The language of our Lord in John vi. had a marked influence in the creation of this belief.

So Ignatius (ad Eph. xx.) says, 'breaking one bread, which is the medicine of immortality, and he reproaches the Docetists, who denied the reality of the incarnation, because 'they abstain from Eucharist and prayer because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ' (ad Smyrn. vi.). In the same way Justin says, 'We have been taught that this food (over which thanks have been offered by the word of prayer which comes from Him, and on which our blood and flesh are nourished by a transformation) is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh; (Apol. i. 66). In these statements of Ignatius and Justin we see that the Eucharist is regarded (a) as a guarantee of the incarnation, a symbol of the union between the human and the divine nature of Christ, and (b) as a guarantee of the cleansing and resurrection of the Christian's body.

This is very clearly stated by Ireneeus: 'It is no longer common bread but the Eucharist, composed of two things, an earthly and a heavenly; thus also our bodies partaking of the Eucharist are no longer mortal, but have the hope of the resurrection' (adv. Haer. iv. 18. 5). These doctrines are sometimes represented by modern writers as magical and superstitious; but if we grant that the writings attributed to St. Paul and St. John are genuine, it is hard to deny that the doctrines are apostolic, and it is equally hard to represent them as inconsistent with the apostolic doctrine of Christ's person. The teaching of Tertullian is fundamentally the same as that of Irenseus, and his belief is misrepresented when he is said to hold that the Eucharist is only a figure of the body of Christ.

The teaching of Clement of Alexandria and Origen is less clear, being affected by their allegorical method of interpreting religious facts. Clement says that the Eucharist brings man to immortality and to a union between the human spirit and the divine Logos. But he seems to regard the body of Christ in the Eucharist as itself a spirit (Paed. ii. 2. 20). In the same way Origen quite simply says, "We eat loaves which have become through prayer a certain holy body which also sanctifies those who use it with sound intention' (c. Cels. viii. 33). But he elsewhere speaks of the body and blood of Christ received in the Eucharist as 'the word which nourishes and the word which rejoices the heart' (in Matt. Comm. Ser. 85). It is therefore difficult to determine what precise meaning Clement and Origen attached to holy communion, but they believed that the communicant receives 'the divine Word,' i.e. the Divinity of Christ, or a word from the Word. They did not believe that the Christian only receives Christ figuratively, but on the other hand they did not state with sufficient clearness that the Christian partakes of the flesh of Christ. This is the result of their doctrine of Christ's person in which Christ is too exclusively regarded as belonging to the sphere of spirits. We may say that Clement and Origen imagined in the Eucharist a mystery behind the mystery discerned by their predecessors, for they regarded the elements not simply as united with the flesh and blood of Christ but with a flesh and blood which are divine energies.

The Eucharist as a Sacrifice.-- The Eucharist from very early times was habitually called a sacrifice, although very little attempt was made to define the word 'sacrifice.' The Ante-Nicene writers agree in regarding the Eucharist as a sacrifice in which we offer the first fruits of earth with thanksgiving for all that God has done for us, and consecrate these first-fruits so that they become Christ's body and blood, and thereby we make a memorial not merely of His death but of Him. During the Middle Ages there arose a tendency to lay such stress upon the passion of Christ as to forget His ascended life, and side by side with this tendency grew the habit of connecting the Eucharist almost entirely with the death of Christ. This habit passed from mediaeval Catholicism into Protestantism, but it was generally absent in the early Church. The ancient liturgies do not isolate the passion of Christ but connect it with His resurrection

St. Cyprian, Ep. 63. 16, says that whereas Christ offered the Eucharist in the evening, Christians offer it in the morning in commemoration of the resurrection.

The most ancient references to the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist are in 1 Cor. x. 14-22 and, probably, Hebr. xiii. 10. The theory that the word 'altar' in the latter passage has reference to the Lord's Supper is supported by the use of the word in a passage in Ignatius: 'There is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup unto union in His blood; there is one altar, as there is one bishop; (ad Philad. iv.). Clement also teaches this doctrine in a very simple form when he says that it is the duty of the Christian clergy 'to offer the gifts,' i.e. oblations (ad Cor. 44). In the Didache xiv. the Eucharist is called a sacrifice and is described as the pure offering foretold in Malachi i. Justin also quotes this prophecy, and calls the Eucharist 'the bread which our Christ delivered unto us to offer for a memorial of His incarnation' (Dial. 70). Irenaeus, like Justin, believes that our Lord intended that His disciples should offer up the bread which is made the body of Christ and the cup which is made His blood. Tertullian and the Canons of Hippopolytus show us that about A.D. 200 the Eucharist was offered for the departed.

These writers, however, are content to describe the elements as offered, and do little towards defining in what sense, if any, the Eucharist is offered after it has been consecrated.

St. Cyprian (died A.D. 258) seems to go somewhat further. He says: 'That priest acts in the place of Christ who imitates that which Christ did, and then offers in the Church to God the Father a true and perfect sacrifice' (Ep. 63. 14). But it is wrong to suppose that Cyprian represents the Eucharist as a repetition of the death of Christ, or to suppose that his words countenance the theory of some Roman writers that the essence of the Eucharistic sacrifice is that Christ in the Sacrament submits to a new 'self-emptying' or annihilation. Cyprian says: 'The passion is the sacrifice of the Lord which we offer" (Ep. 63. 17), and though he speaks of 'offering the blood' he also speaks of 'offering the chalice in commemoration of the Lord.' He apparently means that in the Eucharist we offer the blood which was once shed, and plead the merits of Christ's passion. In spite of the fact that he is now ordinarily regarded as having introduced a marked change into the doctrine of the Eucharist, we must conclude that his teaching shows but little development. Nor does his doctrine of the priesthood exclude the participation of the laity in the offering of the Eucharist. For he both speaks very plainly of the union of 'the people' with Christ in the Eucharist, and also by saying 'we offer' seems to allow all the faithful a share in the sacrificial work. This participation of the laity in the act of offering the sacrifice is expressed with great clearness in the Roman canon of the mass and in the present Anglican service.

Penitence.--While it was held from the first that Baptism was the means of obtaining remission of sins committed before conversion, the treatment of sins committed after Baptism underwent a gradual change. In the apostolic age it was found that some Christians might sin so gravely as to lose eternal life (1 John iii. 15). They might be guilty of crucifying Christ afresh (Hebr. vi. 6). While they continued in such sin it was impossible 'to renew them again unto repentance'; they were excommunicated, and Christians were forbidden to eat with them (1 Cor. v. 5, 11). It would even seem that after a man was excommunicated the Christians hesitated to pray for him. He was regarded as beyond the reach of prayer (1 John v. 16).

Stringent as this discipline was, the truly penitent sinner might be received again (2 Cor. ii. 7). Even in the case of less serious offences some kind of confession of sins was usual. St. James tells his readers to confess their sins one to another and pray one for another. In the New Testament to 'confess sins' does not only mean to acknowledge them to God, but to acknowledge them openly in the face of men.¹ In the Didache xiv. the communicants are to confess their sins 'in order that your sacrifice may be pure.' St. Clement urges the need of confessing transgressions to the divine Master (ad Cor. 52; cf. Barnabas xix.). The author of 2 Clement joins confession with repentance, urging that the craftsman may reshape a twisted vessel, but that he cannot mend it after he has once cast it into the fiery oven. That these confessions were sometimes made in public is shown in the Didache iv.: 'In church thou shalt confess thy transgressions.' Sometimes the confession was made to God only, as in Hermas 3 Vis. i.

It is clearly the purpose of Hermas to aid the Church by advising that a sinner should be allowed to be reconciled with the Church after one relapse, but not after a second relapse. It is presupposed that the Church intervenes. About A.D. 250 the penitent first made his confession privately to the bishop or a presbyter, who took care that the discipline enjoined was proportionate to the sin. A private confession seems also to be implied at an earlier date by Tertulian. From Irenseus (adv. Haer. i. 13. 5) and Tertullian we gather that the public discipline was accompanied by signs of self-abasement. The penitents asked the presbyters and martyrs for the prayers of the assembled Church. The more scrupulous Christians doubted whether the Church ought to grant absolution for idolatry, blasphemy, murder, false witness, fraud, adultery, fornication, 'and any other violation of the temple of God.' In some places, such as Carthage and Corinth, absolution was granted to the penitent after one

¹ See Westcott on 1 John i. 9. But the word 'confess' in Biblical Greek is also used for confession to God only. relapse into such sins. At Rome, however, the Church appears to have been more rigid. When Pope Callistus, A.D. 218, offered to grant absolution to those who repented of adultery or fornication, he was bitterly criticised by Hippolytus and Tertulian. The Montanists, in particular, regarded absolution for such sins as a shameless condescension to human weakness. Callistus and his supporters appealed with great fitness to the action of St. Paul at Corinth, to Christ's forgiveness of the adulteress, and to the parable of the prodigal son. Callistus had no intention of condoning sin, or even of granting absolution twice to the Christian who had fallen into such gross sins.

About 250 the persecution of the Church by Decius led to a new development in the ministry of penitence. During the persecution many Christians lapsed, and the question arose whether these lapsi who had denied the faith ought to be received back into communion with the Church. St. Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, is the man whose history and genius are most closely connected with this controversy. He set his face against (i) the rigorist theory that no absolution should be granted for apostasy, and (ii) the lax theory that a repentant apostate ought to be admitted again to communion if he received a recommendation from a Confessor, i.e. a Christian who had conspicuously suffered for the faith.

In spite of furious opposition Cyprian and the Church of Rome succeeded in carrying their point, and the absolution of sins became definitely regulated by means of a procedure approved by the bishops. Penitentiary presbyters were appointed by the bishops to receive confessions and direct the discipline of penitents. In the fourth century we find that this discipline corresponded closely with the discipline imposed on the catechumens who were being prepared for baptism. The party of Novatian, which insisted that the Church ought not to pardon apostates, left the Church and organised a powerful sect in 251.

Those modern writers who exaggerate the so-called sacerdotalism of Cyprian, declare that he secured the triumph of an unprimitive and unscriptural theory of the episcopate and of the Church. But Cyprian certainly does not attribute more authority to the episcopate than that which is attributed to the bishops by Ignatius and claimed by St. Paul for himself. It may be urged with fairness that to forgive apostasy seems to imply a forgetfulness of the truth that baptism means that the Christian has for ever dissociated himself from paganism. But the same argument holds good with regard to other mortal sins. If St. Paul and Callistus were right in allowing a Christian who had been guilty of impurity to be restored to communion with the Church, then Cyprian was right in allowing even an apostate 'a second plank' on which those who had made shipwreck of their lives might be saved.

The public penance which the Church required to be performed by those whose sins had been public, became rare after the end of the eleventh century, as it caused more scandal than edification.

It should be observed that the present Roman doctrine of Indulgences differs totally from the original conception. In the fourth century absolution was occasionally granted to a penitent before he had passed through the discipline ordinarily required. This was the only indulgence granted. But the present practice of the Roman Church is to say that inasmuch as the penance or discipline is not always enough to make satisfaction for the sin committed, the penitent ought to try, after his sin has been forgiven, to gain an Indulgence, i.e. remission of the temporal punishment due to sin. These Indulgences are granted for certain periods of time, so that the penitent who gains an Indulgence of one hundred days is reckoned as having endured an equivalent of one hundred days of such discipline as was anciently required before absolution was granted. Nevertheless, the penitent is required to perform the penance imposed upon him, whatever Indulgences he may gain.

Confirmation.--Baptism was immediately followed by the laying on of hands on the part of the bishop. The candidates were also anointed on the head with perfumed oil. Both these rites are mentioned by Tertullian about A.D. 200. In A.D. 251 Cornelius, bishop of Rome, explains that this laying on of hands communicates the holy Spirit and must follow Baptism. A similar statement is made by one of the bishops who acted with Cyprian. Until the thirteenth century children were confirmed as soon as possible after Baptism. The necessity of baptizing by priests in the absence of a bishop led to the present custom of the Eastern Church, in which Confirmation consists in the anointing of the child by a priest with oil which has been consecrated by the bishop. The ordinary Roman Catholic practice for a bishop, when confirming a large number of candidates, merely to extend his hand towards them, and not to lay his hand upon them, does not appear to have become general until after the Reformation.

Holy Orders.--In this small book it is impossible to make more than the briefest references to such a subject as the doctrine of the ministry. We may, however, observe that the belief that the apostles instituted a permanent threefold ministry depends mainly upon a belief in the authenticity of the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles to Timothy and Titus. These books make it evident that the apostles instituted the order of deacons and the order of presbyters, and that above these two orders there were officials who were either apostles or delegates of the apostles. All the ancient Churches of Christendom retain this type of government, which is known as Episcopacy, a name derived from the Greek word episkopos, or overseer, which was originally a title of the presbyters, but was afterwards given to the highest order of the clergy. At the present day the opponents of Episcopacy are divided among themselves, and their theories are even more antagonistic to one another than to Episcopacy. They all admit that the Episcopal system appears to have been dominant almost everywhere about A.D. 170, but hold that at the end of the first century the government of the Church was either (1) Presbyterian, the presbyters forming the highest class of officials, or (2) Democratic or Congregational, varying according to the pleasure and necessities of the various communities.

The writers who support the Presbyterian theory have failed hitherto to produce one clear case of the presbyters ruling a primitive Church. The only two instances which seem to favour their view being (a) the fact that St. Polycarp in writing to the Philippians about A.D. 110 only mentions presbyters and deacons, and no bishop, at Philippi; and (6) the fact that St. Jerome, late in the fourth century, states that in early times the presbyters of Alexandria 'nominated' their own bishop. It cannot be said with complete certainty that Jerome thought that this nomination included ordination, but it is possible that he meant this.

Both these facts are very far from conclusive. For to say that there was no superior at Philippi above the presbyters when Polycarp wrote is very different from proving that these presbyters were not under a superior. And there are statements in Origen and elsewhere which make it very unlikely that Jerome could say with accuracy that the bishop of Alexandria derived his commission from his presbyters.

The writers who support any Congregational theory of the ministry rely mainly upon the variations in the names of the ministers of the Church described in different parts of the New Testament. Some deny that the presbyters mentioned in the New Testament were officials at all. Some, including prominent continental Rationalists, find that their theory is quite incompatible with the genuineness of Acts and some of St. Paul's Epistles, and reject these writings chiefly on this ground. So much fresh evidence has recently been produced in favour of the genuineness of Acts, and the later Epistles attributed to St. Paul show a state of affairs so much in harmony with their traditional date, that it is now as unreasonable to reject these writings as it is unreasonable to reject those of St. Ignatius. Ignatius speaks of a threefold ministry in the most distinct terms. While mentioning presbyters and deacons, he regards bishops as essential in the Church and speaks of them as 'established in the farthest parts of the earth.'

To sum up. In Acts we have the apostles above the presbyters or episkopoi. In the Epistles to Timothy and Titus (about A.D. 62-67), in St. Clement A.D. 97, in the Didache perhaps near the same date, in St. Ignatius A.D. 110, in Hermas about A.D. 140, we find the presbyters are always under superior officials who were gradually given the title of episkopoi when it seemed unnecessary to use this title for the presbyters themselves. We also find that in the latter part of the second century Episcopacy was firmly established in regions where apostolic traditions were most faithfully preserved, and we have lists of the early bishops of Jerusalem, Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria, together with information about bishops in Smyrna, Ephesus, and Corinth, which go to prove that Episcopacy is an apostolic institution. We should finally add that ancient writers, and notably St. Clement, hold fast to the principle of Apostolical Succession. They assume that the ministers of the Church receive power to act as the representatives of man to God and as 'stewards of God's mysteries' through the laying-on of hands by the apostles.

2 Tim. i. 6; Acts xiv, 23.

The nature of some of the functions discharged by the clergy has already been indicated in the account of Baptism, Penitence, and the Eucharist. During the second century their duties of teaching and preaching seem to have been enlarged. This was partly caused by the fact that there was a diminution of those 'prophets,' whose office, as the name indicates, had been to 'tell forth' the divine message to the first Christians (see 1 Cor. xiv.).

Marriage.--The teaching of our Lord and His apostles raised Marriage to a level entirely different from that which it occupied among the Jews and the pagans of the Roman Empire. Some Jews married more than one wife, and many divorced their wives on the most trivial pretexts. The increase of divorce among the Romans was very marked, and the general moral tone among both Greeks and Romans was most degraded and unnatural. The Church proclaimed that marriage between Christians is indissoluble, and is of that sacred character which belongs to the union between Christ and His Church. This immediately brought Christianity into sharp antagonism both with popular licentiousness and with the exaggerated asceticism which was preached by some philosophers and sectaries. The Apologists give us some valuable information on this subject, and show how the Church had to denounce not only open vice, but also the conduct of pagans who, when married, used iniquitous means to avoid the responsibilities caused by marriage. The Christians in some quarters viewed a second marriage with dislike, and thus laid upon the laity a restriction which seems originally to have only affected the clergy.

1 Tim. iii. 2.

Anointing of the Sick.--The anointing of the sick by the presbyters of the Church is prescribed in St. James v. 15. There can be no reasonable doubt that this text would be considered a sufficient authority for making the rite general, but until the fifth century we have little evidence for its use among Catholics, except in a letter written to the Armenians by Macarius, bishop of Jerusalem, about A.D. 330. This letter only exists in an Armenian translation, but is probably genuine. Irenaeus shows us that the Gnostics employed this ceremony as a means of assuring the dying of forgiveness, and Origen also alludes to their practice. In spite of the fact that some of the prayers used at the administration of this rite are intercessions for the recovery of the sick person, the habit of postponing its administration until the hour of death has been common in Western Europe. Thus a rite which has full scriptural authority has become popularly perverted into a resemblance of a Gnostic 'mystery.' There is every reason why this abuse should be corrected by a widespread revival of the primitive custom. In our own day this anointing has been restored among Anglicans and among the Armenians who are subject to Rome.

Apollinaris.--Apollinaris and his father were excommunicated by the Semi-Arian George of Laodicea. They supported Athanasius and the Nicene faith. In 362, Apollinaris was made bishop of Laodicea. Jerome studied with him in 374. Soon afterwards his teaching caused great anxiety to the orthodox, and it was condemned at Rome, Antioch, and Constantinople. Apollinaris was a man of penetrating mind, well acquainted with Greek literature, and a voluminous writer. His followers became an organised sect, with bishops, churches, and ceremonies of their own. They exercised a deplorable influence by circulating writings of Apollinaris under the names of Gregory Thaumaturgus and Athanasius. It is from these works that we gain a knowledge of the opinions of Apollinaris, but our knowledge of them is extended by the statements of Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus, and a treatise Against the Appolinarians which has been popularly attributed to Athanasius.

1. Apollinaris wished to secure the infallibility and the sinlessness of Christ. Like Marcellus, he wished to present the world with a theory which would render Arianism an impossibility. Like Marcellus, he made the mistake of accepting a fundamental tenet of the men whom he intended to oppose. The Arians said that the body of Christ was truly human, but that He had no human spirit, the place of this spirit having been taken by the Word. Apollinaris admitted this, with the difference that he declared the Word to be essentially divine and not half divine. He declared that Jesus Christ comprised within himself three elements--human flesh, a fleshly soul, i.e. physical human life, and the divine Word. Christ had no human nous or rational soul, and therefore He could not err or sin.

2. The result was summed up in the phrase, 'We confess that there is one nature of God the Word which was incarnate. God and flesh made one nature, the flesh was divine because joined with God; there was only one energy in Christ, and therefore only one substance. The body of Christ was only a passive instrument of His Divinity. The Catholic Christ was denounced by Apollinaris as a hybrid being like a Minotaur.

Father, Son, and Spirit are not three separate beings like three human persons. They may be compared with the three facts of mind, knowledge, and will (or love), in one human being. The mind is the source of knowledge and of will, the mind knows itself in realising knowledge,
and the relation between the mind and the object of its knowledge produces an active will. Nevertheless these three facts are inseparable, and thus although 'the Father is one, and the Son another, and the Holy Spirit another, all together are one Lord.'

Deut. vi. 4.

The 'Athanasian' Creed.--This creed is in form completely Western and Latin, and it is most strange that it has become popularly associated with St. Athanasius. The origin of the creed is still involved in obscurity, but it is plain that it represents the theology of Augustine, and it may be regarded as fairly certain that it was composed during the fifth century in South Gaul. Possibly its author was Vincent of Lerinum who wrote about 434. Vincent was familiar both with the writings of St. Augustine and with the Nestorian controversy, and the creed shows traces of St. Augustine's influence and of the language used by the Catholics in opposing Nestorianism.

The 'Athanasian' Creed is here subjoined, with a new translation of some of its phrases, and references to the heresies condemned in its various clauses:--

INTRODUCTION

1. Whosoever wisheth to be saved, before all things he ought to hold fast the Catholic Faith.
2. Which Faith except a man have kept whole and unviolated, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.

THE DOCTRINE OF THE HOLY TRINITY

3. Now the Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity. 4. Neither confusing the persons (against Sabellianism, see p. 68) nor separating the Substance (against Arianism, see p. 87).
5. For there is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.
6. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one: the Glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal.
7. Such as the Father is, such is the Son: and such is the Holy Ghost.
8. The Father uncreated, the Son uncreated: and the Holy Ghost uncreated.
9. The Father infinite, the Son infinite: and the Holy Ghost infinite.
10. The Father eternal, the Son eternal: and the Holy Ghost eternal.
11. And yet there are not three eternals: but one eternal (i.e. the Three are not three separate Gods, but possess one eternal nature).
12. As also there are not three uncreated, or three infinites: but one uncreated, and one infinite.
13. So likewise the Father is Almighty, the Son Almighty: and the Holy Ghost Almighty.
14. And yet there are not three Almighties: but one Almighty.
15. So the Father is God, the Son is God: and the Holy Ghost is God.
16. And yet there are not three Gods: but one God.
17. So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord: and the Holy Ghost Lord.
18. And yet there are not three Lords: but one Lord.
19. For like as we are compelled by Christian truth to acknowledge every person by himself to be God and Lord;
20. So are we forbidden by the Catholic Religion: to say, There are three Gods, or three Lords (i.e. Catholicism repudiates the pagan doctrine that there are many gods).
21. The Father was made by no one; neither created nor begotten. 22. The Son is from the Father only; not made, nor created (against Arianism, see p. 87), but begotten (see p. 29).
23. The Holy Ghost is from the Father and the Son; neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but coming forth (i.e. there is only one perfect divine sonship, and the Spirit represents intercourse within the Godhead rather than filial relationship).
24. So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts.
25. And in this Trinity nothing is before or after, nothing is greater or less (i.e. the attributes of each distinct person are as eternal and as perfect as the attributes of the other two persons).
26. But all three persons are co-eternal together and co-equal.
27. So that in all things, as is aforesaid: both the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped.
28. He therefore that wisheth to be saved: must thus think of the Trinity.

THE DOCTRINE OF THE INCARNATION

29. Furthermore, it is necessary to everlasting salvation: that he also believe faithfully in the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
30. Therefore the right Faith is, that we believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man.
31. He is God, begotten from the Substance of the Father before the worlds; and He is Man, born of the Substance of His Mother in the world.
32. Perfect God: perfect Man, having a real existence with a rational soul and human flesh (against Apollinarianism, see p. 102). 33. Equal to the Father, as touching His Godhead: and inferior to the Father, as touching His Manhood.
34. Who, although He be God and Man, yet He is not two but one Christ (against Adoptionism, see p. 69, and Nestorianism, see p. 105).
35. One, not by a change of the Godhead into flesh (against Late Apollinarianism, see p. 100 ff.): but by taking of the Manhood into God.
36. One indeed, not by confusion of Substance (against Eutychianism, see p. 108) but by oneness of person.
37. For as the rational soul and the flesh are one man, so God and Man is one Christ.
38. Who suffered for our salvation; descended into the lower world, on the third day rose again from among the dead.
39. He ascended into heaven, He sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.
40. At whose coming all men must rise again with their bodies: and shall give account for their own works.
41. And they that have done good will go into life everlasting: but they that have done evil into everlasting fire.

CONCLUSION

42. This is the Catholic Faith: which except a man shall have believed faithfully and firmly, he will not be able to be saved.

The difficulties which are sometimes felt with regard to the so-called 'damnatory clauses' in this creed can be largely removed. For both external and internal evidence show that its condemnations are not directed against ignorant unbelief but against wilful apostasy.