blotted out, and the dogs shall lap up the blood of the last of his descendants in the field of Jesrahel." "We suspend our judgment then until your prediction be verified; and if the event foretold by you happen as you say, we will believe that you are a heavenly-taught man." It could not be otherwise the fulfilment of prophecy involves a miracle in the intellectual order of the very first class, the perpetration of which could be given to the friends of God only, and for the furtherance of the cause of morality and truth.

It would be idle to argue against prophecy in the following way: "The event you foretold may be naturally foreseen, therefore it proves nothing more than that you are a good connecter of cause and effect." It would be equally futile to say, "You have fulfilled fradulently what you predicted, in order to complete the proof you proposed." Prophecy is a supernatural prevision of something about to happen: its supernaturality is manifest, evident; this is its nature, the nature of prophecy. It would not be such if its object could be naturally foreseen or fraudulently accomplished.

It remained, then, for the Greeks and Jews to see if the evident supernaturality of prophecy fulfilled could be adduced by the preachers of Christianity in favour of Christ, his mission, his doctrine; for they must yield to such a demonstration, if it could be given, unless they chose to impugn the truth and justice of God, or to withdraw themselves from the guidance of reason. There was no need of much investigation. Hundreds of years had elapsed between ancient prophecies and the events which the Apostles sought to connect with them; ages through which no human vision could by natural possibility trace the birth of minute and complicated occurrences. After the lapse of centuries a great event should happen, unless the prophets had conspired to deceive. They could not conspire; they had no object in so conspiring. They were men of different dispositions, living at different times. They had even proved the truth of the great prophecy in which they all agreed by minor prophecies, which their own generation had seen fulfilled. Then they were unimpeachable as

prophets, unimpeachable in their prediction of a great event, the coming of a King to rule and of a Messias to save. Then he should come; and if the prophets spoke truth, as they did, the time of his coming was arrived. Evident consequence of the seventy weeks of years of the prophet Daniel, determining the date of his death! This was not all-a variety of minor events were to shroud and surround his coming. These, too, should fall out, for the veracity of the prophets was equally pledged to them. Both should come to pass, the great event and its attendant circumstances, with this difference, that the latter were to be a proof of the former, as if the ancient prophets said: "When Elias comes watch for the coming of the Messias; when a star appears in the East, know that his coming is nigh; receive not any claimant to the dignity of Messias, unless he be born in Bethlehem, born of a virgin. Are the Gentiles summoned to his presence? Is he wounded and bruised for the iniquities of men? Do they dig his hands and feet and number all his bones ?"

We need not point out the verification of these items, in the coming, birth and sufferings of Christ, as affirmed and proved by the Apostles. It is enough to say, that they affirmed them, proved them, and had hundreds of witnesses to attest their truth. They were accomplished to the letter and in every particular. Above all, the most painful part was fulfilled, that is, the dereliction and death of Christ in an ocean of grief and suffering. Allthat now happened accorded most perfectly with all that had been formerly predicted. Sublime and unquestionable miracle, or rather series of miracles, proving the identity of Christ with the promised Messias !

There was no resisting the argument of prophecy, as wielded by the Apostles, unless faith and reason were trampled under foot. And it was growing apace in magnitude and importance as new events were daily occurring, the prototypes of which were traceable in Isaias, Jeremias, and Daniel. And then it was not an insulated argument, but it was a miracle in the intellectual order, coalescing with numerous miracles in the physical order wrought by

Christ, and attested by living witnesses, or operated by the Apostles under the eyes of those who wished to see. So Jews and Greeks were defied, the former on religious, the latter on rational grounds to keep their traditions, if they could, against the fulfilment of promises and pledges, as old almost as the world itself. And they were drawn forth from their security and inertness, drawn forth by curiosity, perhaps, to examine first, then to doubt, to be perplexed between their attachment to what was old, and the manifest truth of what was new; finally to yield, unless the paramount ruler of the spirit in their case, was prepossession, passion, and blind ungovernable prejudice.

There is a pretty city, rising on terraces above the water, at a point where the bold and dark sublimity of mountains meets the undulating plains and smiling meadows that skirt the shores of Lake Leman. It was here, that on the 27th of June, 1787, Gibbon finished his great work on "the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." This remarkable production reflects in its pages the characteristics of the place where it was written. Its style and arrangement are fresh and beautiful, like the meadows beneath the town. Its ideas very often, and its tone are bold and precipitate, like the mountains that tower in the background. Among the daring assertions of Gibbon there are two that deserve a passing notice from us at this stage of our history. The first is, that the propagation of Christianity in the primitive ages was slow, and its conversions from Paganism and Judaism insignificant. The second is (and it is the consequence of the first) that the progress of Christian principles was the result of natural causes. The latter assertion we have already met with a negative. We have seen the difficulties that the Apostles encountered among Jews and Greeks, difficulties of such magnitude, and of such a nature, as could never be overcome by the natural powers that they could bring to the undertaking. And so we inferred "à priori," that supernatural aid was essential to them, if they would succeed in establishing the

Church on a large scale. The Sacred Scripture has enlightened us as to the nature of this supernatural aid; and we have discovered it to consist of grace, miracles, and the fulfilment of prophecy. Thus we have disposed of one of the rash assertions of Gibbon : in the next division of our work we shall have occasion to refer to the other.

DIVISION V.

VICTORY OF CHRISTIANITY AND ITS ORGANIZATION.

§ 1. Its Diffusion.-Christianity, entering into a strange world, that was full of barrenness and noxious weeds, conversing among nations, whose minds were averted from God who made them, combated successfully with the obstacles that were opposed to its progress, and diffused itself beyond the limits of civilization and the Roman empire. Its first mission was in the province of Judea. In the persons of St. Peter and St. John it laboured for some time in the conversion of the Jews. It passed the limits of that province; crossed the sea to the island of Crete; laboured there, converted many; to the opposite shore of Asia Minor, a great part of which it traversed, carrying faith and grace from city to city. It bent its course westward, and entered Greece from the north-east; conversed in the cities, where Sappho sung and Socrates uttered parables; on by Melita and Puteoli, until it arrived in the capital, Rome.

These were the successes of Christianity in one direction, and under the guidance of three Apostles.

The other apostolic missionaries turned their eyes in different directions, some to the east, others to the north and south. One of them preached in Scythia, whence he passed into Epirus and the adjacent countries. Another

traversed the sands of Arabia. Ethiopia, and Persia, Armenia and Parthia were theatres of apostolic labour, were fertilized by the blood of apostolic men. The bones of St. Thomas found a resting-place in Judea.

Thus, if we cast our eyes over the map of the world we see vast regions to the south and east of Judea. Through many of these had Christianity penetrated even before the end of the apostolic age; to the west and north—in them it had become naturalized. Doubtless, there was much difference between the positions occupied by the Christian congregations in the various countries which the Gospel had penetrated. In some places they were few and wide apart. In others they were numerous, and in some districts continuous. In Asia Minor, for example, and in Greece, many of the provinces were covered with Christian colonies. There is no reason for supposing that Persia or Arabia were similarly blessed. But the faith was growing apace, and the glad tidings of salvation were travelling in every direction, propelled by the breath of the Divinity.

Everything leads us to believe that the propagation of Christianity was very rapid, and that the number who embraced the faith was very considerable, even before the end of the first century of the Christian era. We have many

passages in the sacred writings which bear directly upon this subject; and the documents of profane history which remain to us, throw some light upon it in their casual allusion to the "hated" and "much dreaded "sect.

The first conversions among the Jews are detailed in the "Acts of the Apostles." In reference to them, we have such passages as the following:-"They, therefore, that received the word were baptized; and there were added in that day about three thousand souls."1 "But many of them who had heard the word believed, and the number of men was made five thousand." 2 "And the word of the Lord increased, and the number of disciples was multiplied in Jerusalem exceedingly." But the Scripture narration does not limit itself to enumerating the accessions to

3

1 Acts of the Apostles ii. 41. 2 iv. 4.

3 vi. 7.