The Early Christians in Rome

A sketch of the early Jewish colony in Rome--Allusion to Jews by Cicero--Favour shown them by Julius Cæsar--Mention of Jews by the great poets of the Augustine age--Characterist...

The great fire of Rome in the days of Nero brought the unnoticed sect of Christians into prominence--The games of Nero--Never again after A.D. 64 did Christians enjoy “stillness...

Nerva--Character of Trajan--Story of correspondence here referred to--Pliny’s Letters--Reply of Trajan, which contained the famous Rescript--Tertullian’s criticism of Rescript--...

_Hadrian_--His life of travel--His character--Early policy towards Christians--He insults Christianity in his building of Aelia Capitolina on site of Jerusalem--The great Jewish...

Certain reasons to which the rapid acceptance of Christianity was owing--The great numbers of the early converts is borne witness to by pagan authors, such as Tacitus and Pliny,...

The early Church remained continually under the veiled shadow of persecution--This state of things we learn, not from the “Acts of the Martyrs,” which, save in a certain number...

The sight of the martyrs’ endurance under suffering had a marked effect on the pagan population. This was noticed and dreaded by the Roman magistracy. Efforts were constantly ma...

Christian tradition by no means exaggerates the number of martyrs--the contrary, indeed, is the case--In the first two hundred and fifty years the general tone of the early Chri...

Early researches--Their disastrous character--De Rossi--His view of the importance of the testimony of the catacombs in early Christian history--Much that has been considered le...

Discovery of remains of S. Cecilia by Paschal I., A.D. 821--Appearance of the body, which he translated from the crypt in the catacomb of Callistus to her basilica--Her tomb in...

Uncounted numbers of graves in this silent city of the dead; computed at three, four, or five millions--belonging to all ranks--Some of these were elaborately adorned--Greek oft...

The story of the Jew--his past--his condition now, is the weightiest argument that can be adduced in support of the truth of Christianity--What happened to the “sad remnant” of...

At the beginning of the first century of the Christian era the Jewish colony in Rome had attained large dimensions. As early as B.C. 162 we hear of agreements--we can scarcely c...

The Roman Church in the year of grace 61 was evidently already a powerful and influential congregation: everything points to this conclusion: its traditions, we might even say i...

A flood of light is poured upon the early history of Christianity in the correspondence which passed between the Emperor Trajan and his friend and minister Pliny the Younger, wh...

Some four years after his correspondence with Pliny on the subject of the Christians in Bithynia, the Emperor Trajan died somewhat suddenly in the course of his Eastern campaign...

The scene of the following sketches of the life of a Christian of the first days is, generally speaking, laid in Rome; but much of what belonged to the Christian of the Roman co...

Christian governors, and calls attention to a Phrygian city whose whole population including officials were Christians. He was writing of the last years of the third century. Su...

There is really no doubt but that in the period of which we are writing in this Third Book, roughly stretching over some hundred and sixteen years, with very short intervals of...

We read in the pathetic and interesting study _De Laude Martyrii_ (On the Praise of Martyrdom) by an anonymous writer--a study which usually follows the works of S. Cyprian--how...

Considerable stress has been laid in the preceding pages on the question of the duration of the periods of persecution and the consequent number of martyrs who suffered in these...

An absolutely reliable source of information respecting the secret of the inner life of the Church in the early Christian centuries is the faithful record of the thoughts, the h...

Since the date of what may be termed the rediscovery of the Catacombs in the vineyard on the Via Salaria in 1578[120] the work of excavation and research in the streets of the C...

Out of the many pages of Catacomb lore, the story of the Crypt of S. Cecilia and its recent discovery, and the identification of the burial-places of S. Felicitas and her seven...

In this section we will give at some length what these (same) catacombs tell us of the _thoughts_ of the early Christian congregations on some of the more important problems dea...

Among all the various evidential arguments adduced in support of the truth of Christianity, many of them of a most weighty character and capable of an almost indefinite expansio...