to encounter proscription, danger, and even death, from the civil authorities: It was only four or five years after this, that the jealousy of the emperor Domitian revived the storm, which raged, with some considerable intervals, till after the lapse of more than two centuries, the inauspicious conversion of Constantine, gave to the Church the kingdoms of this world, and the glory of them.

As to the system of doctrine held by the christians at this period, we can determine few of its particulars, if indeed it be proper to say that such a system then prevailed. Their religion had not yet been taught on any regular plan, like that of a Body of Divinity. Its fundamental truths, that Jesus Christ was the Messiah of the only true God, and the Saviour of men, and that he rose from the dead, necessarily engrossed the chief attention of its professors, as these were the important facts they were obliged, almost continually, to urge on the people, and to defend against opponents. It is extremely difficult for us, who are brought up in a state of society where christianity is the original and universal religion, and where our disputes extend only to its particular tenets, to conceive of the simplicity in which the first preachers taught their faith, when, not the doctrine, but the truth itself, of that religion, was the principal point in dispute. When people were brought to acknowledge the mission of Christ, they were considered christians; and if their conduct became their profession, they were gladly received into the churches; though further instructions were then given, or afterwards added, just as

opportunities offered, and circumstances permitted b. Such being the liberal conditions on which the churches were gathered, they, of course, admitted persons of different, and even opposite sentiments, on many points of doctrine. Both the Jewish and Gentile converts retained some of their respective prejudices and notions. This circumstance had already occasioned disputes among them, particularly concerning the obligation of the Mosaic rituals, on one hand, and the heathen schemes of philosophy on another. The apostles themselves had, years before, interposed to decide these controversies; but even their authority was not able to remove the prejudices of the parties. Some of the Gnostic believers, in particular, had, perhaps, gone so far, even at this early period, as to separate from the other churches, and to form themselves into distinct bodies, which, however, must have been small and obscure. After all, we cannot suppose that the christians in general had so soon obliterated from their faith the prominent features of the apostolic doctrine; especially when we consider that most of the books of the New Testament were now in circulation, and that St. John still lived to be consulted, and to give instructions .

II. Proceeding, now, to the particular subject of our history, we shall, in the present chapter, produce all

b. This was the practice of the apostles. See the abstracts and accounts of those discourses which they addressed to unbelievers: Acts ii. 14-41. iii.12-26. iv. 8-12. v. 29–32. viii. 30-38. ix. 20-22. x.34 -48. xiii. 16-41. xvi. 30-33. xvii. 2-4. 18. 22-34. xxiii. 6. xxv. 18, 19. xxvi. xxviii. 23. e. The principal facts in this section are illustrated at large by Mosheim, Eccl. Hist. Cent. i; and more particularly in his Commentaries on the Affairs of the Christians, before the Time of Constantine, &c. Vol. i. Vidal's Translation.

that can be known, with any degree of certainty, of the views entertained by the christians from this time till A. D. 150, in relation to a future state of punishment and the eventual salvation of the world. The only direct light that gleams, at intervals, through the general obscurity of the course we now attempt, is derived from the few christian writings of this period, which are still extant. These are the productions of those commonly called the Apostolical Fathers, the first christian authors, whose works have reached us, after the Apostles themselves. They are the following: The First Epistle of Clemens Romanus; seven Epistles of Ignatius; The Epistle of Polycarp; The Epistle of Barnabas ; and The Shepherd of Hermas. Among these, we should perhaps insert a Relation of the Martyrdom of Ignatius. These writings, composed by men of little learning, and, for the most part, of as little judgment, are still valuable as they afford us some notion of the state of the early christians, and of the sentiments avowed by them; but whoever expects to find them instructive or edifying in other respects, will rise from their perusal in disappointment, if not with disgust.

d. Of the Second Epistle of Clemens Romanus, so called, the genuineness is considered doubtful by Eusebius, Jerome, Du Pin, Mosheim, &c. and wholly denied by Photius, Archbishop Usher, Lardner, Brucker, Le Clerc, and others. Scarcely one admits it. There are other writings extant, ascribed to Clemens Romanus, but which are now universally considered forgeries, and of a much later date. I omit The Acts of Paul and Thecla, a forgery of the First Century, because our present copy is either a forgery upon that original one, or else so much interpolated that we cannot determine what is ancient. See Lardner's Credibility, &c. Chap. Supposititious Writings of 2d Century. The reason why I place The Epistle of Barnabas, and The Shepherd of Hermas last in this catalogue, will be given under the ac

counts of those works.

A. D. 90, -95.

III. The Epistle of Clemens Romanus is distinguished for the respect it received. from the ancient churches, some of which caused it to be read, in public, with the books of the New Testament. It may be allowed, at least, the commendations, that it is simple though diffuse, somewhat resembling, in character, St. James's Epistle, and that it contains but one instance, of those absurd allegories which abound in the succeeding fathers. Clemens, who was bishop of the church at Rome, and perhaps the same person whom St. Paul mentions, (Phil. iv. 3.) wrote this Epistle to the Corinthian christians for the purpose of dissuading them from their quarrels and seditions. Earnestly exhorting them to repent of their mutual envy and abuse, he adduces, among other considerations, the justice of God as a motive of fear, and the terrible destruction of Sodom and its neighboring cities as instances of the divine judgments on sinners. But it is remarkable that in the whole of this Epistle, about as long as St. Mark's Gospel, there is no expression which discovers whether he believed in any future state of punishment, nor whether he held the salvation of all mankind. There are, indeed, two passages which may naturally, not necessarily, be understood to intimate

e.

Clemens Rom. Epis. § 12. Wake's Translation. The date of this Epistle was probably between A. D. 90 and 95. Lardner places it at A. D. 94 or 95; Junius, at 98; Baronius and Cotelerius, at 92; Dodwell, Wake and Le Clerc, between 64 and 70. f. Clem. Rom. Epis. § 26 and 49. In these two passages, Clemens expressly mentions the resurrection of those who "religiously serve the Lord," and are "made perfect in love;" but nowhere does he assert the resurrection of others.

that those only who here serve the Lord, will hereafter be raised from the dead.

A. D. 94, to 100.

In passing over the time at which St. John is supposed to have written the Revelation and, perhaps, his Gospel and three Epistles, we may remark that this last of the Apostles died at Ephesus, about the year 100. He left the world at a period when old errors appear to have been spreading in the church, and springing up there, under new forms and modifications. They were chiefly of the Gnostic kind, derived from the Oriental or Persian philosophy, and consisting of a monstrous union of christianity with the eastern notions of the "endless genealogies" of the Eons or angelic natures, and the inherent malignity of all matter. The thorough Gnostics, among the christians, denied the real body of Christ, and the resurrection of the flesh.

IV. We come next to the famous EpisA. D. 107, tles of Ignatius; the genuineness of which

or 116.

has been attacked and defended with a zeal little proportioned to their worth or real weight in any cause whatever. Though the question is still involved in considerable uncertainty, we shall follow, with some doubt, what appears the prevailing opinion, that the

g. Though there is not a universal agreement, there is but little doubt as to the date of the Revelation; for if written by St. John, it was during his banishment to Patmos, which most chronological critics assign to the year 94 or 96. Of the date of his other writings, various opinions are entertained: Dr. Witherspoon places the Gospel at A.D. 96, and the Epistles at 98; Lardner dates the Gospel at A.D. 68, and the Epistles at 80 and 85; by Le Clerc, the Gospel is assigned to the year 97, and the Epistles to 91 and 92; Dr. Owen places the Gospel at about A.D. 69; Jer. Jones, at 97; and Du Pin, at about A.D. 100.

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