Part 144

"In the West, Rome remains and indeed becomes ever more and more the 'sedes Apostolica,' by far the most important centre where, alongside of the Roman element, there are to be found elements streaming together from all points of the Empire. Greek names, and the long lasting (still dominant in the second century) maintenance of Greek as the written language of Roman Christianity are here noteworthy. … Rome was the point of departure not only for Italy and the Western Provinces, but without doubt also for Proconsular Africa, where in turn Carthage becomes the centre of diffusion. … The diffusion in the Græco-Roman world as a whole goes first to the more important towns and from these gradually over the country. … The instruments however of this mission are by no means exclusively apostolic men, who pursue missions as their calling; … every Christian becomes a witness in his own circle, and intercourse and trade bring Christians hither and thither, and along with them their Christian faith."

_W. Moeller, History of the Christian Church, pages 105-107._

"It has been contended, and many still believe, that in ancient Rome the doctrines of Christ found no proselytes, except among the lower and poorer classes of citizens. … The gospel found its way also to the mansions of the masters, nay, even to the palace of the Cæsars. The discoveries lately made on this subject are startling, and constitute a new chapter in the history of imperial Rome. … A difficulty may arise in the mind of the reader: how was it possible for these magistrates, generals, consuls, officers, senators, and governors of provinces, to attend to their duties without performing acts of idolatry? … The Roman emperors gave plenty of liberty to the new religion from time to time; and some of them, moved by a sort of religious syncretism, even tried to ally it with the official worship of the empire, and to place Christ and Jupiter on the steps of the same 'lararium.' … We must not believe that the transformation of Rome from a pagan into a Christian city was a sudden and unexpected event, which took the world by surprise. It was the natural result of the work of three centuries, brought to maturity under Constantine by an inevitable reaction against the violence of Diocletian's rule. It was not a revolution or a conversion in the true sense of these words; it was the official recognition of a state of things which had long ceased to be a secret. The moral superiority of the new doctrines over the old religions was so evident, so overpowering, that the result of the struggle had been a foregone conclusion since the age of the first apologists. The revolution was an exceedingly mild one, the transformation almost imperceptible. … The transformation may be followed stage by stage in both its moral and material aspect. There is not a ruin of ancient Rome that does not bear evidence of the great change. … Rome possesses authentic remains of the 'houses of prayer' in which the gospel was first announced in apostolic times. … A very old tradition, confirmed by the 'Liber Pontificalis,' describes the modern church of S. Pudentiana as having been once the private house of the same Pudens who was baptized by the apostles, and who is mentioned in the epistles of S. Paul. … The connection of the house with the apostolate of SS. Peter and Paul made it very popular from the beginning. … Remains of the house of Pudens were found in 1870. They occupy a considerable area under the neighboring houses. … {449} Among the Roman churches whose origin can be traced to the hall of meeting, besides those of Pudens and Prisca already mentioned, the best preserved seems to be that built by Demetrias at the third mile-stone of the Via Latina, near the 'painted tombs.'… The Christians took advantage of the freedom accorded to funeral colleges, and associated themselves for the same purpose, following as closely as possible their rules concerning contributions, the erection of lodges, the meetings, and the … love feasts; and it was largely through the adoption of these well-understood and respected customs that they were enabled to hold their meetings and keep together as a corporate body through the stormy times of the second and third centuries. Two excellent specimens of scholæ connected with Christian cemeteries and with meetings of the faithful have come down to us, one above the Catacombs of Callixtus, the other above those of Soter." This formation of Christian communities into colleges is an important fact, and connects these Christian societies with one of the social institutions of the Empire which may have influenced the church as an organization. "The experience gained in twenty-five years of active exploration in ancient Rome, both above and below ground, enables me to state that every pagan building which was capable of giving shelter to a congregation was transformed, at one time or another, into a church or a chapel. … From apostolic times to the persecution of Domitian, the faithful were buried, separately or collectively, in private tombs which did not have the character of a Church institution. These early tombs, whether above or below ground, display a sense of perfect security, and an absence of all fear or solicitude. This feeling arose from two facts: the small extent of the cemeteries, which secured to them the rights of private property, and the protection and freedom which the Jewish colony in Rome enjoyed from time immemorial. … From the time of the apostles to the first persecution of Domitian, Christian tombs, whether above or below ground, were built with perfect impunity and in defiance of public opinion. We have been accustomed to consider the catacombs of Rome as crypts plunged in total darkness, and penetrating the bowels of the earth at unfathomable depths. This is, in a certain measure, the case with those catacombs, or sections of catacombs, which were excavated in times of persecution; but not with those belonging to the first century. The cemetery of these members of Domitian's family who had embraced the gospel—such as Flavius Clemens, Flavia Domitilla, Plautilla, Petronilla, and others-reveals a bold example of publicity. … How is it possible to imagine that the primitive Church did not know the place of the death of its two leading apostles? In default of written testimony let us consult monumental evidence. There is no event of the imperial age and of imperial Rome which is attested by so many noble structures, all of which point to the same conclusion,—the presence and execution of the apostles in the capital of the empire."

_R. Lanciani, Pagan and Christian Rome, chapter 1, 3 and 7._

The Church at Rome "gave no illustrious teachers to ancient Christianity. … All the greatest questions were debated elsewhere. … By a sort of instinct of race, [it] occupied itself far more with points of government and organization than of speculation. Its central position, in the capital of the empire, and its glorious memories, guaranteed to it a growing authority."

_E. De Pressensé, The Early Years of Christianity: The Martyrs and Apologists, page 41._

CHRISTIANITY: Gaul.

"Of the history of the Gallican Churches before the middle of the second century we have no certain information. It seems fairly probable indeed that, when we read in the Apostolic age of a mission of Crescens to 'Galatia' or 'Gaul,' the western country is meant rather than the Asiatic settlement which bore the same name; and, if so, this points to some relations with St. Paul himself. But, even though this explanation should be accepted, the notice stands quite alone. Later tradition indeed supplements it with legendary matter, but it is impossible to say what substratum of fact, if any, underlies these comparatively recent stories. The connection between the southern parts of Gaul and the western districts of Asia Minor had been intimate from very remote times. Gaul was indebted for her earliest civilization to her Greek settlements like Marseilles, which had been colonized from Asia Minor some six centuries before the Christian era; and close relations appear to have been maintained even to the latest times. During the Roman period the people of Marseilles still spoke the Greek language familiarly along with the vernacular Celtic of the native population and the official Latin of the dominant power. When therefore Christianity had established her headquarters in Asia Minor, it was not unnatural that the Gospel should flow in the same channels which already conducted the civilization and the commerce of the Asiatic Greeks westward. At all events, whatever we may think of the antecedent probabilities, the fact itself can hardly be disputed. In the year A. D. 177, under Marcus Aurelius, a severe persecution broke out on the banks of the Rhone in the cities of Vienne and Lyons—a persecution which by its extent and character bears a noble testimony to the vitality of the Churches in these places. To this incident we owe the earliest extant historical notice of Christianity in Gaul."

_J. B. Lightfoot, Essays on the work entitled Supernatural Religion, pages 251-252._

"The Churches of proconsular Africa, of Spain, of Italy, and of Southern Gaul constitute, at this period, the Western Church, so different in its general type from the Eastern. With the exception of Irenaeus [bishop of Lyons] and Hippolytus [the first celebrated preacher of the West, of Italy and, for a period, Lyons] who represent the oriental element in Gaul and at Rome, the Western Fathers are broadly distinguished from those of the East. … They affirm rather than demonstrate; … they prefer practical to speculative questions. The system of episcopal authority is gradually developed with a larger amount of passion at Carthage, with greater prudence and patience in Italy."

_E. De Pressensé, The Early Years of Christianity: the Martyrs and Apologists._

CHRISTIANITY: Spain.

"Christians are generally mentioned as having existed in all parts of Spain at the close of the second century; before the middle of the third century there is a letter of the Roman bishop Anterus (in 237) to the bishops of the provinces of Bœtica and Toletana; … and after the middle of the same century a letter of Cyprian's was addressed to … people … in the north … as well as … in the south of that country."

_J. E. T. Wiltsch, Handbook of the Geography and Statistics of the Church, pages 40-41._

{450}

CHRISTIANITY: Britain.

"All that we can safely assert is that there is some reason for believing that there were Christians in Britain before A. D. 200. Certainly there was a British Church with bishops of its own soon after A. D. 300, and possibly some time before that. Very little can be known about this Celtic Church; but the scanty evidence tends to establish three points, (1) It had its origin from, and remained largely dependent upon, the Gallic Church. (2) It was confined almost exclusively to Roman settlements. (3) Its numbers were small and its members were poor. … That Britain may have derived its Christianity from Asia Minor cannot be denied; but the peculiar British custom respecting Easter must not be quoted in evidence of it. It seems to have been a mere blunder, and not a continuation of the old Quarta-deciman practice. Gaul is the more probable parent of the British Church. … At the Council of Rimini in 359 Constantius offered to pay out of the treasury the travelling expenses of all the bishops who attended. Out of more than four hundred bishops, three from Britain were the only clergy who availed themselves of this offer. Neither at Rimini, any more than at Arles, do the British representatives make any show: they appear to be quite without influence."

_A. Plummer, The Church of the Early Fathers, chapter 8._

CHRISTIANITY: Goths.

"It has been observed that the first indisputable appearance of the Goths in European history must be dated in A. D. 238, when they laid waste the South-Danubian province of Moesia as far as the Black Sea. In the thirty years (238-269) that followed, there took place no fewer than ten such inroads. … From these expeditions they returned with immense booty,—corn and cattle, silks and fine linen, silver and gold, and captives of all ranks and ages. It is to these captives, many of whom were Christians, and not a few clergy, that the introduction of Christianity among the Goths is primarily due. … The period of the inroads, which so strangely formed a sowing-time for Christianity, was followed by a long period of tranquillity, during which the new faith took root and spread. … It is to the faithful work and pure lives of [Christian] men … who had fled from Roman civilisation for conscience sake, to the example of patience in misfortune and high Christian character displayed by the captives, and to the instruction of the presbyters sprinkled among them, that we must look, as the source of Christianity among the Goths. … The fact (to which we shall have to refer later), that, of all the sea raids undertaken by the Goths between the years 238 and 269, the Visigoths took part in only two, while the Ostrogoths, who were settled in Southern Russia along the coast of the Euxine from the Crimea to the Dneister, were engaged probably in all of them, makes it very unlikely that the captives mentioned by Philostorgius were carried anywhere else than the eastern settlements. To the influence of these Asian Christians, exerted mainly, if not entirely upon the Ostrogoths, must be added the ever-increasing intercourse carried on by sea between the Crimea and both the southern shore of the Euxine and Constantinople. To these probabilities has now to be added the fact that the only traces of an organised Gothic Church existing before the year 341 are clearly to be referred to a community in this neighbourhood. Among the bishops who were present at the Council of Nicaea (A. D. 325), and who signed the symbol which was then approved, we find a certain Theophilus, before whose name stand the words, 'de Gothis,' and after it the word 'Bosphoritanus.' There can be little doubt that this was a bishop representing a Gothic Church on the Cimmerian Bosphorus; and if, following the Paris MSS., we read further down the list the name Domnus Bosphorensis or Bosphoranus, we may find here another bishop from this diocese, and regard Theophilus as chief or arch-bishop of the Crimean churches. The undoubted presence at this council of at least one bishop of the Goths, and the conclusion drawn therefrom in favour of the orthodoxy of the Gothic Church in general, led afterwards to the greatest confusion. Failing to distinguish between the Crimean and Danubian communities, the historians often found their information contradictory, and altered it in the readiest way to suit the condition of the Church which they had specially in view. … The conversion of that section of the nation, which became the Gothic Church, was due to the apostolic labours of one of their own race,—the great missionary bishop Ulfilas [see GOTHS: A. D. 341-381]. But to him too was to be traced the heresy in which they stopped short on the way from heathenism to a complete Christian faith."

_C. A. A. Scott, Ulfilas, Apostle of the Goths, pages 19-30._

"The superstitions of the barbarians, who had found homes in the empire, had been exchanged for a more wholesome belief. But Christianity had done more than this. It had extended its influence to the distant East and South, to Abyssinia, and the tribes of the Syrian and Lybian deserts, to Armenia, Persia, and India."

_G. P. Fisher, History of the Christian Church, page 98._

"We have before us many significant examples of the facility with which the most intelligent of the Pagans accepted the outward rite of Christian baptism, and made a nominal profession of the Faith, while they retained and openly practiced, without rebuke, without remark, with the indulgence even of genuine believers, the rites and usages of the Paganism they pretended to have abjured. We find abundant records of the fact that personages high in office, such as consuls and other magistrates, while administering the laws by which the old idolatries were proscribed, actually performed Pagan rites and even erected public statues to Pagan divinities. Still more did men, high in the respect of their fellow-Christians, allow themselves to cherish sentiments utterly at variance with the definitions of the Church."

_C. Merivale, Four lectures on some Epochs of Early Church History, page 150._

"We look back to the early acts and policy of the Church towards the new nations, their kings and their people; the ways and works of her missionaries and lawgivers, Ulfilas among the Goths, Augustine in Kent, Remigius in France, Boniface in Germany, Anschar in the North, the Irish Columban in Burgundy and Switzerland, Benedict at Monte Cassino; or the reforming kings, the Arian Theodoric, the great German Charles, the great English Alfred. Measured by the light and the standards they have helped us to attain to, their methods no doubt surprise, disappoint—it may be, revolt us; and all that we dwell upon is the childishness, or the imperfect morality, of their attempts. {451} But if there is anything certain in history, it is that in these rough communications of the deepest truths, in these [for us] often questionable modes of ruling minds and souls, the seeds were sown of all that was to make the hope and the glory of the foremost nations. … I have spoken of three other groups of virtues which are held in special regard and respect among us—those connected with manliness and hard work, with reverence for law and liberty, and with pure family life. The rudiments and tendencies out of which these have grown appear to have been early marked in the German races; but they were only rudiments, existing in company with much wilder and stronger elements, and liable, amid the changes and chances of barbarian existence, to be paralysed or trampled out. No mere barbarian virtues could by themselves have stood the trial of having won by conquest the wealth, the lands, the power of Rome. But their guardian was there. What Christianity did for these natural tendencies to good was to adopt them, to watch over them, to discipline, to consolidate them. The energy which warriors were accustomed to put forth in their efforts to conquer, the missionaries and ministers of Christianity exhibited in their enterprises of conversion and teaching. The crowd of unknown saints whose names fill the calendars, and live, some of them, only in the titles of our churches, mainly represent the age of heroic spiritual ventures, of which we see glimpses in the story of St. Boniface, the apostle of Germany; of St. Columban and St. Gall, wandering from Ireland to reclaim the barbarians of the Burgundian deserts and of the shores of the Swiss lakes. It was among men like these—men who were then termed emphatically 'men of religion'—that the new races saw the example of life ruled by a great and serious purpose, which yet was not one of ambition or the excitement of war; a life of deliberate and steady industry, of hard and uncomplaining labour; a life as full of activity in peace, of stout and brave work, as a warrior's was wont to be in the camp, on the march, in the battle. It was in these men and in the Christianity which they taught, and which inspired and governed them, that the fathers of our modern nations first saw exemplified the sense of human responsibility, first learned the nobleness of a ruled and disciplined life, first enlarged their thoughts of the uses of existence, first were taught the dignity and sacredness of honest toil. These great axioms of modern life passed silently from the special homes of religious employment to those of civil; from the cloisters and cells of men who, when they were not engaged in worship, were engaged in field-work or book-work,—clearing the forest, extending cultivation, multiplying manuscripts—to the guild of the craftsman, the shop of the trader, the study of the scholar. Religion generated and fed these ideas of what was manly and worthy in man."

_R. W. Church, The Gifts of Civilisation, pages 279-283._

CHRISTIANITY: A. D. 312-337. The Church and the Empire.