sition from one system of religious ceremonial to another. In times of fierce persecution, the reality of a conversion is tried "as by fire." There was little, during the first three hundred years of Christianity, to encourage a profession of its faith, except so far as the heart had become sufficiently devoted to its holy and self-denying duties, to be willing to suffer on their account the loss of all things. Mere cold assent and dead formality were not likely to put themselves in the way of being torn by wild beasts or buried in the mines. The change wrought in the converts was, for the most part and notoriously, a change of heart and of life, as well as an entire change of opinion. The striking alteration in those who embraced the gospel, bore a powerful attestation to its divine authority. Philosophers complained that men improved but little in goodness under their instructions; while Paul could say to the Christians of Corinth, a city famous for the profligacy of its inhabitants, "Such were some of you: but ye are washed, ye are sanctified, ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." "The doctrine of Christ," says a writer of those times, "did convert the most wicked persons who embraced it from all their debaucheries to the practice of all virtues."*

So remarkable was the difference between the Christians and those whom they had once resembled, that Origen, defending their faith against the attacks of Celsus, challenges a comparison between their moral character and that of any other societies

* Origen cont. Celsum.

in the world. Even the sceptic Gibbon unites in this testimony. Speaking of these early converts, he says, "As they emerged from sin and superstition to the glorious hope of immortality, they resolved to devote themselves to a life not only of virtue, but of penitence. The desire of perfection became the ruling passion of their soul." "Their serious and sequestered life, averse to the gay luxury of the age, inured them to chastity, temperance, economy, and all the sober and domestic virtues. The contempt of the world exercised them in the habits of humility, meekness, and patience. The more they were persecuted, the more closely they adhered to each other. Their mutual charity and unsuspecting confidence has been remarked by infidels, and was too often abused by perfidious friends. Even their faults, or rather their errors, were derived from an excess of virtue." From all these authorities it is evident that the propagation of the gospel was not only of great rapidity, but of great power in transforming the hearts and lives of the multitudes who embraced it.

In connection with the moral power and vast extent of this work, it should be considered, that among those who were brought to the obedience of Christ were men of all classes, from the most obscure and ignorant to the most elevated and learned. In the New Testament we read of an eminent counsellor, and of a chief ruler, and of a great company of priests, and of two centurions of the Roman army, and of a Gibbon, vol. 2, ch. 15, p. 138, 139.

津

proconsul of Cyprus, and of a member of the Areopagus at Athens, and even of certain of the household of the emperor Nero, as having been converted to the faith. Many of the converts were highly esteemed for talents and attainments. Such was Justin Martyr, who while a heathen was conversant with all the schools of philosophy. Such was Pantænus, who before his conversion was a philosopher of the school of the Stoics, and whose instructions in human learning at Alexandria, after he became a Christian, were much frequented by students of various characters. Such also was Origen, whose reputation for learning was so great that not only Christians but philosophers flocked to his lectures upon mathematics and philosophy, as well as on the Scriptures. Even the noted Porphyry did not refrain from a high eulogium upon the learning of Origen.* It may help to convey some notion of the character and quality of many early Christians, of their learning and their labors, to notice the Christian writers who flourished in these ages. St. Jerome's catalogue contains one hundred and twenty writers previous to the year 360 from the death of Christ. The catalogue is thus introduced: "Let those who say the church has had no philosophers, nor eloquent and learned men, observe who and what they were who founded, established, and adorned it." Pliny, in his celebrated letter to Trajan, written about sixty-three years after the gospel began to be preached to the Gentiles, expressly states, that in the provinces of Pontus and Bythinia many Stillingfleet's Orig. Sac. p. 273, 274. See Paley, p. 346.

*

of all ranks were accused to him of the crime of being Christians.

We have now prepared the several facts that constitute the materials of our argument. Here is an unquestionable historical event—the rapid and extensive spread of Christianity over the whole Roman empire in less than seventy years from the outset of its preaching. Has any thing else of a like kind been

The early advocates of Christianity, in controversy with the heathen of Greece and Rome, were accustomed to dwell with great stress upon the argument from its propagation. Chrysostom, of the fourth century, writes, "The apostles of Christ were twelve, and they gained the whole world." "Zeno, Plato, Socrates, and many others endeavored to introduce a new course of life, but in vain; whereas Jesus Christ not only taught, but settled a new polity, or way of living, all over the world." "The doctrines and writings of fishermen, who were beaten and driven from society, and always lived in the midst of dangers, have been readily embraced by learned and unlearned, bondmen and free, kings and soldiers, Greeks and barbarians." "Though kings and tyrants and people strove to extinguish the spark of faith, such a flame of true religion arose as filled the whole world. If you go to India and Scythia, and the utmost ends of the earth, you will everywhere find the doctrine of Christ enlightening the souls of men." Augustine of the same century, speaking of the heathen philosophers, says, "If they were to live again, and should see the churches crowded, the temples forsaken, and men called from the love of temporal, fleeting things to the hope of eternal life and the possession of spiritual and heavenly blessings, and readily embracing them, provided they were really such as they are said to have been, perhaps they would say, 'These are things which we did not dare to say to the people; we rather gave way to their custom, than endeavored to draw them over to our best thoughts and apprehensions.'" Lardner, vol. 2, PP. 614, 597.

known in the world? Did the learning and popularity of the ancient philosophers, powerfully aided by the favor of the great and the peculiar character of the age, accomplish any thing in the least resembling the success of the apostles? It is a notorious fact, that only one of them "ever dared to attack the base religion of the nation, and substitute better representations of God in its stead, although its absurdity was apparent to many of them. An attempt of this kind having cost the bold Socrates his life, no others had resolution enough to offer such a sacrifice for the general good. To excuse their timidity in this respect, and give it the appearance of profound wisdom, they called to their aid the general principle that it is imprudent and injurious to let the people see the whole truth at once; that it is not only necessary to spare sacred prejudices, but, in particular circumstances, an act of benevolence to deceive the great mass of the people. This was the unanimous opinion of almost all the ancient philosophical schools."* No further proof is needed, that such men were incapable of effecting any thing approximating to the great moral revolution produced in the world by the power of the gospel. How different the apostles! boldly attacking all vice, superstition, and error at all hazards, in all places, not counting their lives dear unto them, so that they might "testify the gospel of the grace of God." But where else shall we turn for a parallel to the work we have described? What efforts, independently of the gospel, were ever

+ Reinhard's Plan, pp. 165, 166.