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THE

CIIUPiCII OF THE APOSTLES.

BY THE

RIGHT REV. WM. INGRAIIAM KIP, D.D., LL.D.,BISHOP OK CALIFORNIA,

" Within these walls each fluttering guestIs gently lured to one safe nestWithout, 'tis aioaniug and unrest."Keble.

NEW YORK:D. APPLETON & COMPANY,

549 & 051 BROADWAY.1877.


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COPYRIGHT BYD. APPLETOH AND COMPANY,

1ST7.


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THE RIGHT REV. JOSEPH V. B. WILMER, D. D., LL. D.,BISnOP OF LOUISIANA,

THE AUTUORAFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBES THIS VOLUME,

IN REMEMBRANCE OFTHEIR EARLY STUDENT DAYS.


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PRATER OF THE ORIENTAL CHURCII." Grant, my Lord, that the ears which have heard the voice of Thy

songs, may never hear the words of clamor and dispute ; that tlie ej'cswhich have seen Thy great love, may also behold Thy blessed hope; thatthe tongues which have sung the Sandns, may also speak the truth ; thatthe feet which have walked in the church, may tread the region of lightthat the bodies which have tasted Thy living Body, may be restored tonewness of life."


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6 PREFACE.have for centuries awakened the bitterness of polemicaldisputants. His object has been to make these articlesmore historical than theological.

In discussing the Council of Nice, he has acknowl-edged, in several places, his indebtedness to the YeryRev. Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, D. D., Dean of West-minster. His work on " The Eastern Church " canhave no rival for picturesque effect, as the author hadadvantages possessed by no other writer on this sub-ject. He had himself visited these scenes of EasternEcclesiastical History, and, uniting the descriptions ofthe tourist with the narrative of the historian, he hasbeen enabled to impart an interest to his pages whichnothing else could have given them.

The writer has, however, carefully studied theworks of Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret,the original sources of the history of that Era in theChurch ; but he found that the Dean of Westminsterhad already selected every salient point from these oldchroniclers to weave the narrative for his own fascinat-ing pages. When, therefore, the writer may some-times seem to be following in the steps of Dr. Stan-ley, and drawing his facts from him, he is in realityquoting from the original authorities, the study ofwhich was common to them both.

The materials for a picture of the Early Church,even slight as that presented by the following pages.


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rEEFACE.are scattered widely tliroiigli the works of tliose cen-turies. They exist, too, in most varied forms. Afterleaving the sure record of Inspiration, which closes itshistory of the Church in suffering and persecution, wecome to the narratives of Eusebius of Csesarea, andthe other historians of that day whom we have men-tioned above. Then, in some cases, facts and points ofdoctrine have to be gleaned from sermons, and homi-lies, and controversial writings, or they are spread be-fore us in the glowing eloquence of St. Cyprian, as hesends his Epistles from the Church at Carthage. Andso, here and there, we gather up the story of the earlyfaith, until the review of this era ends, perhaps, in St.Augustine's " City of God," as he calls up the historyof the past, and sends forth his shout of triumph overthe fall of the " Eternal City " by the hands of thehalf-civilized Goths. When the crash startled the na-tions in terror, their ancient reverence for Home asthe Mistress of the world prepared them to' unite inher solemn requiem ; but to St. Augustine she wasonly the " Mystical Babylon," and the fiery Africanrecorded his loud gratulation that her power over theChurch had passed away forever.

There could not, indeed, have been selected a sub-ject which afforded less opportunity for originality thanan attempt to portray the Church of the early centu-ries. Since first the Christian Church became " a pres-


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8 PREFACE.ence and a power " in the world, countless writers, forvarious and often widely-different objects, liave beengleaning the field, and all that now can be attemptedbj any one is to select the facts, and so arrange themas to answer whatever purpose he may have in view.The explorer of the present day is " last of all, as onethat gathereth after the grape-gatherers."

'

As the drama of this world is drawing to its close,w^hile the coming of our Lord seems to be delayed, thescoffing spirit of the times is heard with greater bold-ness questioning the solemn verities of our faith. But,at the same time, the earnest and inquiring are askingwith deeper interest. Where is that Church which wasconstituted " the pillar and ground of the truth ? " Itis to answer this question that this volume is partlyintended, that men may see for themselves how ourLord and His apostles originally organized His Church,and then, as they look on the conflicts which are wast-ing the strength of so many who " profess and callthemselves Christians," they may recognize in the OneApostolic Church, in its different branches, the linea-ments of that likeness which has come down to us, stillexisting through all the intervening centuries.

The writer has endeavored not to make a mere de-tail of history, but to point out the practical lessonstaught by these events. As his readers follow the nar-

' Ecclus. xxxiii. IG.


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rREFAGE.rative of the progress of the faith " through the ages allalong," he would have them imbibe something of thespirit of those who then, even at the cost of life, gaveform and impress to the Church, and endeavor, in thiswaning period of the world" this setting part ofTime "to revive in their own hearts the lofty devo-tion of those who, in far bj-gone centuries, first chant-ed the anthems and uttered the prayers which arc nowour precious inheritance.

San Francisco, Ma>j^ 1877.


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OOI^TENTS.

Creeds . . . . . . . .13Fellowship . . . . . . .61eochakist . . . . . . . .91Liturgies . . . . . . .113concldsion . . . . . . . .109


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OEEEDS.

" Who gocth ill the \Yay that Christ hath gone,Is much more sure to meet with Iliui, thuu oue

That travelcth by-ways."George IIekceut.


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CREEDS.It was a declaration of one of the patriarchs of the

olden time : " Inquire, I pray thee, of the former ageand prepare thyself to the search of their fathers (forwe are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because ourdays on earth are a shadow). Shall not they teach theeand tell thee and utter words out of their heart ? " 'And in this sentence he reveals but a natural im-pulse of the human mind. We are tempted ever toturn from the harshness of present realities to the dis-tant past. We indulge in fond regrets for all that timehas swept away, and gaze with longing eyes upon thelandscape which lies far behind us, because it is clothedin a mellow light and rests there in dimness and si-lence. The tones of the living fall upon our cars witha harsh reality, and we look back with regret to thedead of ages past as their voices float gently " downtlirough the corridors of time," and swell about uswith solemn melody. We believe that theirs was thehappy age which was freed fi'om the evils of this pres-ent time.

The feeling, therefore, is a natural one, and seemsdeeply implanted in the mind of man. It is founded

' Jub viii. 8.


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16 THE CIIURCn OF TEE APOSTLES.on the belief that the early history of the human familywas one of peace and purity, while, as time advanced,each passing century caused the shadows to darkenmore deeply over the pathway of our race and the glorywhich had rested on its birth

" .... to (lie away,And fade into the light of common day."

The classic poets love, therefore, to dwell on theGolden Age, which they represent as gradually changingtill it became the Iron Age in which they lived. Thereis, too, a strange universality about this tradition. Werecognize its existence among all the nations of theEast. They all look back to some Elysium in the past,the reality of which is gone, and the remembrance onlysurvives in the legends they have inherited. Theyturn instinctively to the birthplace of the human race,and the Arab now, as he sits beneath his tent, narratesto his children wild and romantic stories of the earlyEden. Even now, he declares, there is a guardiansanctity resting on it ; that there the wild beast maynot wander, or the wild bird pause in its flight; butthe eye of God rests upon it, and the holiness of itsearly day still guards its hallowed precincts.

The Church has also its Golden Age to which it looksback. It is an age of primitive purity, when the Apos-tles had just received the commission from their Lord,and were going forth to " inherit the earth." Small,indeed, was the band to which this mighty work wascommitted, and a single " upper room " was able tocontain all who in the Holy City had professed the faithof the despised JSTazarene. And against them were ar-


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CREEDS. 17rayed the sacred learning of Judea, as taught by itsancient priesthood ; tlie brilliant philosophy of Athens,where men had bowed to the glorious dreams of Platoand the intellectual teaching of Aristotle; and thatwide-spread Oriental system, which could scarcely countits proselytes, as its influence stretched from the shrinesof Memphis and Heliopolis, far Eastward over the plainsof Asia, till it reached the caverned temples of India.

Yet the faithful were all of one heart and one voice,and therefore the infant Church went forth learlesslyto proclaim its authority over the systems of this world.And so it was that it triumphed, bowing down everyfalse creed before it, infusing a new life into the wastedforms of Eastern thought, and spreading a lofty tonethrough all the literature of the world, whether itsutterance was heard in the Christianized Platonism ofAlexandria, or it spoke out in the fantastic musings ofthe Fathers of the Desert.

" It was a religion of visible self-denial and holiness,that willingly took on itself the sorrows which to themultitude were inevitable, and lightened their sufferingsby its own pain and privation. It was not, then, that uni-bratile thing, that feeble exotic, shut up in churches, par-sonages, and parlors ; but walked abroad, made the mul-titude both the receivers, the collectors, and distribu-tors of her bounties ; compelled cities to wear her livery,and dared to inherit the earth. She then providedhomes and forms of operation for the heroic virtues,for lofty aims and firm resolves, making their torrentsflow in the manifold channels of mercy, instead of suf-fering them to waste the land with a baleful magnifi-cence. She then gave names, and methods, and ancient


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18 THE CnURCn OF THE APOSTLES.sanctions, and solemn order, and venerable holiness,and every quality men love and obey, to the pious bear-ers of spiritual and temporal aid to the ignorant andpoor, as even the many sacred titles, which in the OldWorld the streets, and gates, and bridges, are still suf-fered to bear, do testify. She then did so combine andtemper these works of benevolence with other holy em.ployments, with frequent daily prayer and oft-heardchoral praise, that the social acts of temporal and ghost-ly relief seemed no separate and adventitious work, nopetty craft of artificial goodness, but rather flowingfrom a something holy, natural, and complete in all itsparts. She then had officers and employments for allthat all, however humble in rank, or wealth, or mentalculture, might be personally interested in the Church'swork. She then could claim her own from every rank,teach all her holy character, make all acknowledge herclaims to sacredness and authority." ^

Such is the picture of the ancient Church ; and inthis day, when its glory seems to have faded, and itsmajesty to be blighted by the atmosphere of this work-ing worldwhen we look about us in vain for the hero-ism and the earnest convictions which characterizedthose distant days, when the seamless garment of Christis rent asunder, and they who bear the Christian namehave turned their weapons against each othershouldwe wish to call up this vision of beauty and to arraybefore us a true representation of the Holy CatholicChurch, we are obliged to look back through the cloudsand mistiness of centuries that are gone.

In endeavoring, then, to lead our readers to survey' British Critic, No. Ivi., p. 3 70.


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CREEDS. 19the Cliurcli in tlie peace and purity of its early day, wewould turn to tlie very fountain-lieadto the descrip-tion which the inspired writer has left of the fold ofChrist, as it appeared before it had lost the fervor ofits first love, or its early zeal had faded away. Hesums up all in a single sentence, " And they continuedsteadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship, andin breaking of bread, and in prayers." ^ Let us look, then,at these different points, as each develops the Churchin a new phase. Let us unroll the records of the past,and, taking the history of the Church as pictured by theEcclesiastical writers of that day, we shall see how wellin each particular it merited the commendation of St.Luke. The first point, then, brought before us is, theSTEADFASTNESS OF THE CuUKCH IN THE ApOSTLES' DOC-TRINE.

What was that doctrine, and where are we to lookfor it ? At first the Church needed no formal profes-sion of its faith, as was afterward embodied in itsCreeds. It was too early for the memory of its Lord'steaching to be lost, while His blood still crimsoned theheights of Calvary, and the earth was yet fragrant withHis footsteps. The first teachers, too, were men ofsimple hearts and no worldly learning ; and it was re-served for another age, when philosophy had begun itsendeavors to warp the faith to agreement with its ownlessons, to witness the perversion of those primarytruths on which the first generation rested its hopes.Few and simple, we believe, were at that time the testsof faith, for error had not yet crept into the fold.When the Ethiopian eunuch applied for baptism to

' Acts ii. 42.


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20 THE CEUEGH OF TEE APOSTLES.Philip the deacon, his answer was, " If thou believestwith all thy heart, thou mayest." And when the eu-nuch had declared, " I believe that Jesus Christ was theSon of God," he was admitted by that rite into theChristian Church, This simple profession of faith inthe Divinity and Messiahship of our Lord included ev-erything which in that day was necessary. There is,therefore, in this point of view, a philosophical truthin that sentence of Newman's, " Freedom from symbolsand articles is abstractly the highest state of Christiancommunion." '

But soon there was evidence of the necessity for amore formal declaration of the Christian faith, as therestless intellect of man began to frame doctrines notin accordance with the teachings of the Ajjostles. Thefirst inspired teachers left behind them no completesystem of Christian doctrine. The Epistles we nowhave were addressed to persons already instructed, al-ready put in charge of the sacred deposit of Christiantruth, before they received the Sacrament of Baptism." It is true, indeed, that they were so directed by theHoly Spirit in writing these apparently casual and un-connected pieces, that no portion of the mass of divine-ly-revealed truth should lack written proof in confirma-tion from some part or other of their writings ; butthat truth is nowhere exhibited entire, nowhere system-atically or theologically stated, as in a Creed or a Cate-chism, nowhere so stated as it was used for purposes ofinstruction or profession." '

But scarcely had these early laborers entered into their' Newman's " Arians of tlie Fourth Century."'* Mobcrly's " Forty Days," p. '78.


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CREEDS. 21rest, and the Cliurcli tlius been deprived of the powerof reference to men who had seen tlieir Lord in theflesh, when those who survived them felt the need ofsomething more. As the Church, too, extended intoheathen lands, it became of essential importance thatthe leading points of Christian doctrine they were toreceive should be placed before them compressed intoa small compass/ Experience soon demonstrated howuseless it was to bring before the minds of the uncul-tivated and the barbarous vague or indefinite views ofthe faith. It was a necessity, therefore, in dealing withthe heathen tribes M'ith whom they were soon broughtinto contact, that the great verities of Christianity shouldbe inculcated in brief and emphatic propositions, whichthe mind could grasp and the memory retain. Theteachers of the faith began, therefore, to state the greatoutlines of the Apostles' teachingthe doctrines theyhad received from themand these they required tobe professed by all who came forward to baptism.

Thus arose what is called the Apostles' Creedthatform which now, at the distance of eighteen centuriesfrom its origin, is repeated each time we assemble forthe worship of God. Though probably not composedby the Apostles themselves, yet it was acknowledgedin the Church throughout the world to contain a generalsummary of all the great and fundamental truths theytaught.

"We cannot but mark its perfect simplicityhow itdeals with nothing but the primary doctrines of ourfaith. This characteristic alone would be sufficient toshow the age in which it had its origin. According to

' Milman's "History of Cliristianity," ii., 115.


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22 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.the summary of it given in the Church Catechism, itteaches the great facts of " God the Father, who hathmade us and all the world ; God the Son, who hath re-deemed us and all mankind ; God the Holy Ghost,who sanctifieth us and all the people of God," It isevidently not intendedlike the later Creedsto guardagainst any particular errors. It is therefore the mostancient and the simplest expansion of the doctrines ofour Lord as they were handed down in the professionmade at baptism. " Just outside of the Canon of actualScripture, and not claiming a literal inspiration like thatof actual Scripture, it is nevertheless the earliest his-torical record of the systematic doctrine of the Apos-tles." '

But, were all other proofs of the antiquity of thisCreed wanting, we should draw the inference that it hadexisted in the days of the Apostles, from the fact thatwe so often meet with its expressions incorporated inthe writings of that period. It tinged the religiousfirmament, and, in treating of the faith, its early de-fenders seemed insensibly to adopt the phraseologyof the Creed as expressions with which they were fa-miliar.

"When St. Paul is charging St. Timothy to " holdfast the form of sound words which he had heard," hemust have been alluding to some well-known formularj'of doctrine which had been delivered to them. Andwhat more probable than that it should have been thisearliest Creed, which must have been M'idely spreadeven at that day ? And so, in writing to the Corinth-

' Moberly's " Forty Days," p. 79. See King's " History of the Apos-tles' Creed," ami Biiigliam's " Orig. Eccles.," b. xi., chap, vii., sec. 8.


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CREEDS. 23ians, in enforcing the doctrine of tlie resurrection, heseems to be quoting from the Creed which he had pre-viously taught them. " I delivered unto you first ofall that which I also received, how that Christ died forour sins, according to the Scriptures, and that he w^asburied, and that he rose again the third day, accordingto the Scriptures."

And, if we pass beyond the Canon of Holy Script-ures to the writings of men in the next generation, wefind the most evident use of the language of the Creed.So it was with St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch', whowas a disciple of St. John. In writing to the Trallians,at the close of the first century, he says : " Turn a deafear to any man who departs, in what he says, fromJesus Christ, who was of the seed of David and bornof Mary ; who truly w^is born, did eat, and did drink ;truly was persecuted under Pontius Pilate ; truly wascrucified and died, being seen of them that are inHeaven, of them that are on earth, and of them thatare under the earth ; who truly also was raised fromthe dead, His Father raising Him ; in the likenesswhereto we also who believe in Him shall His Fatherraise up through Jesus Christ, without whom we haveno real life." ^

So, again, Justin Martyr, in the year 140, in his" Apology for Christianity," in describing the rite ofBaptism, uses this language : " We lead them to a placewhere there is water, and there they are regenerated inthe same manner as we also were ; for they are thenwashed in that water in the name of God the Fatherand Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour, Jesus

1 1 Cor. XV. 3. 2 " Records of the Church " (Oxford), No. V.


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24 THE CnUBCn OF THE APOSTLES.Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. . . . He who is so illu-minated is baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, whowas crucified under Pontius Pilate ; and in the nameof the Holy Spirit, who, by the prophets, foi'etold allthings concerning Jesus." '

The fullest adoption, however, of the words of theCreed, is that shown by Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, inFrance, who died in the year 202. In the formularywhich he set forth, he says : " The Church, althoughextended through the whole world, even unto the endof the earth, has received from the Apostles and theirdisciples the belief in one God, the Father Almighty,maker of heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is inthem ; and in one Jesus Christ, the Son of God, whowas made flesh for our salvation ; and in the HolyGhost, who, by the prophets, proclaimed the mercifuldispensation, and the coming, and the birth from a Vir-gin, and the Passion, and the Kesurrection, and theAscension into heaven, in our flesh, of the belovedChrist Jesus, our Lord, and His appearing from heavenin the glory of the Father, to gather together all thingsin one, and to raise from the dead all flesh of humankind; that to Christ Jesus, our Lord and God andSaviour, and King, according to the good pleasure ofthe Invisible Father, every knee may bow, of things inHeaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth,and every tongue may confess Him, and that He mayrecompense jnst judgment upon all, sending into ev-erlasting fire wicked spirits and angels that trans-gressed and became apostates, and irreligious, unjast,lawless, and profane men, but upon the just and holy,

Juslin Martyr's "Second Apology."


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CREEDS. 25who have kept His commandments and persevere inHis love, whether serving Him from the first or turn-ing by repentance, may bestow immortality by the freegift of life, and secure for them everlasting glory." '

These are the words of the disciple of Polycarp, whohad known the Apostle John. But, one remove fromthe Apostles, he bears his witness to the Catholic faith,such as the Church holds to this day.

Three centuries rolled ])y, during which the Chris-tian Church had no need of any other profession of itsdoctrines. And we see the reason why Creeds and Con-fessions of faith during that period were short and sim-ple. '' While there were no heretics, there was no needto guard against heresy. Antidotes are only given topersons who have taken poison, or who are likely totake it. Neither do we use precautions against con-tagion when no disease is to be caught. The case, how-ever, is altered when the air has become infected andthousands are dying all around us. It is then necessaryto call in the physician, and guard against danger. Thecase was the same with the Church when she saw herchildren in peril from new and erroneous doctrines.When a member wished to be admitted, it was herduty to examine whether he was infected or not. Theformer tests were no longer sufficient. Words andphrases which had hitherto borne but one meaning-were now found to admit of several ; and the Bishopsand clergy were too honest to allow a man to say onething with his tongue while in his heart he meant an-

" Records of the Church " (Oxford), No. XIV.3


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26 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.other. It was thus that Creeds became lengthened andclauses were added to meet the presumptuous specu-lations of human reason. But the fault was with theheretics, not with the Church. Her great object fi'omthe beginning had been unity." '

There was something, too, in the changing characterof the age which produced this result. It had been anera of self-denial, and devotion, and active labor, whenthe great truths which it taught were regarded as themesfor adoration, not for dispute. At length, when thehand of persecution was withdrawn, men turned to thedeeper and more abstruse doctrines of our faith, andmade them the points of irreverent inquiry. The Eastwas.always the fatal and prolific soil of speculative con-troversy, and, on this occasion, the question of the Trin-ity was the one destined to give birth to the element ofdisunion in the Christian world.

It was caused by the rashness of Alexander, Bishopof Alexandria, who, preaching in the Church of St.Mark, in the presence of the Presbytery and the rest ofhis clergy, attempted to explain, with perhaps too philo-sophical minuteness, that great theological mystery.*Arius, one of his priests, thinking that the Bishop wasverging into the Sabellian 'heresy, opposed him withgreat logical acumen, while, in doing so, he ran intothe opposite extreme. He had been the competitor ofthe Bishop for the Episcopate, and failed by a veiy fewvotes. The tradition is, that on the Sunday after thisdiscussion Arius was appointed to preach in St. Mark's,while the Bishop officiated in the Baucalis. The Bishop,

' Burton's " History of the Christian Church," p. 428.2 Socratcs's " Ecclesiastical History," b. i., chap. v.


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CREELS. 27in his sermon, made no reference to the controversy,while Ariiis availed himself of the opportunity to givea full exposition of his views. The consequence was atumult, some of the congregation crying out, " This isnot the faith we have received from our fathers ;others, " Out with the second Cerinthus ! " " Anathemato the new Basileides ! " This commenced the contest.

The view of Arius was, that " there was a time, be-fore the commencement of the ages, when the parentDeity dwelt alone in undeveloped, undivided unity. Atthis time, immeasurably, incalculably, inconceivably re-mote, the majestic solitude ceased, the Divine Unity wasbroken by an act of the Sovereign Will, and the Only-Begotten Son, the Image of the Father, the Yicegerentof all the Divine Power, the intermediate Agent in allthe long-subsequent work of creation, began to heP 'The Arian doctrine was summed up in the single sen-tence, " There was, when lie was not." *

At this day, it seems to us like the highest irrever-ence thus to dissect, as it were, the nature of the Su-preme Being, or to endeavor to deprive it of that vague-ness which, to the ordinary mind, constitutes its sub-limity. The dispute, indeed, owed its existence to thatexquisite subtil ty of the Greek language which enabledthem to draw distinctions which in other tongues couldnot be expressed ; and while for three centuries theyhad bowed with awe before this great truth, looking onit only as a fact to be received with the most profoundreverence, it was now to be subjected to what a writercalls " the anatomical precision of philosophic Greek."

' " Milman's History," vol. ii., p. 68.^ Theodoret gives Arius's letter in full, lib. i., chap. v.


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28 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.It is strange that tliis metaphysical question, so en-

tirely abstract, which had no relation to anything whichconcerned man's spiritual interests, but referred only to" the ineffable relations of the Godhead before the re-motest beginning of time," should have awakened anexcitement which stirred up the most violent passionsto their highest exercise. " Beginning in the Schools ofAlexandria, the dispute," says Socrates, " ran through-out all Egypt, Libya, and the Upper Thebes, and atlength diffused itself over the rest of the provinces andcities." ' It became the absorbing topic of the day, en-listing all classes of the people.'' It excited popular tu-mults, leading to conflicts in the streets and in the am-phitheatre, which it required the utmost exertions of themilitary authorities to quell. The subject was parodiedin the theatres by the pagans, who rejoiced to exhibitthe manner in which the Christians " loved one an-other." Yerses composed by Arius, and setting forththe disputed doctrine, were sung by all classes throughthe whole East. Perhaps nothing so much shockedevery feeling of reverence in the orthodox mind asthese doggerel pieces which were called " Thalia." Themost sacred mysteries of our faith were ridiculed inlanguage which had previously been used in the lowestballads, and appropriated to subjects of disgraceful im-

' Socrates's " History," chap. vi.* " You know what a hairspUtthig, logicizing, philosophical set thecitizens arehow they hold a logomachy dearer than anything else ; and

the seed sown by Arius was now bearing most deadly fruit. Merchants,lawyers, officers, seemed as much interested in the question as divines,and the shops of Alexandria were full of debate on the deepest mysteriesof religion. Business seemed in abeyance ; polemical reasoning took itsplace."(" The Quay of the Dioscuri," p. 19.)


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CREEDS. 20purity. We give a modern version of some of the mostinnocent of tliese stanzas, that our readers may judge oftheir character

" A greater set of nonsenseWas surely never heard ;

Incredible and silly,Preposterous, absurd

Such stuff as is rejectedBy very boys at schoolSuch mysteries as can onlyBe handled by a fool.

"Be men, be men, Egyptians!Or, rather than such lorOj

Turn back again to ApisAnd Isis as of yore.

They never, in the old times,That siw King Pharaoli's court,

Bowed down before the follyThat Catholics support."

At the close of the Council of Nice, the book wasburned by authority, and became so rare that Sozomenhad never seen it, though he had heard of it.'

The dispute seems, indeed, to have excited a perfectpopular furor. As an historian of the fourth centurydescribes the excitement in Constantinople, so was itthrough every city of the East : " Every corner, everyalley of the city was full of these discussionsthestreets, the market-places, the drapers, the money-changers, the victualers. Ask a man, ' How manyoboli ? ' he answers by dogmatizing on generated andungenerated being. Inquire the price of bread, andyou are told, ' The Son is subordinate to the Father.'

' Sozomen's " History," i., 22.


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30 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.Ask if the bath is ready, and you are told, ' The Sonarose out of nothing.' " 'We might, perhaps, expect some excitement amongthe versatile, imaginative children of the East, but thestrangest feature in the history of this doctrine was itsspread through the distant West, among those whosemore practical character of thought would have savedthem, we should suppose, from such fine-drawn the-ories. This difference in the mental constitution ofthe East and the West had been noticed as far back asthe days of Aristotle, who speaks of the contrast be-tween " the savage energy and freedom of Europe andthe intellectual repose and apathy of Asia." ^ The Ori-entals were the successors of the Greek Sophists, whoin the Garden and the Porch once disputed on the re-fined theories of Plato, and, now that Philosophy hadgiven place to the doctrines of our Faith, they subjectedthem to the same intellectual crucible. They caredmore for accuracy in the minute tenets of Christianitythan for that wide-spread hold upon the world whichwas the object of the Latin Church. There was a sig-nificancy, therefore, in the title assumed by the EasternChurch, " Orthodox," while the West prided itself uponthe title of " Catholic."

Egypt and Syria were always the homes of thatdreamy repose which was developed into the monasticsystem of Oriental Christendom, and which, thoughtransplanted into the West, found its most congenialsoil in the caves of the Nile, or on the mountain-rangesof Lebanon. The bold energy and commanding action

' Greg. Nyss., quoted by Stanley, ''Eastern Church," p. I'TS.2 Aristotle, Pol. vii., Y.


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CREEDS. 31of Ambrose and Ilildebrand seem the natural resultsof the atmosphere of the AV^est, but in the Latin Churchwe look in vain for the passionless musings of the her-mit Anthony in the burning desert of the Thebiad, orthe lonely devotion of Simeon Stylites on his pillar.

So, too, was it with that prolihc brood of heresiesEutychianism, Nestorianism, and Sabellianismwhichfor centuries convulsed the East, and in their ever-chano-infr forms called for Council after Council andSynod after Synod, to define their shadowy divergencefrom orthodoxy. In the AVest they obtained no foot-ing, and their names were only known through thewritings of the Greek controversialists. No AVesternmind could have originated the disputed points of Ori-ental metaphysics

" bubbles forming and bursting onevery wave of human life." Of the swarm of heretics

who flit across the page of history, almost all are fromthe East. The only distinguished name which comesto us from the AVest is that of TertuUian, when in hislatter days he became a Montanist.

Arianism was the only strange exception to thisrule of national character ; it spread widely through theAYest, and, when the torrent of Gothic invasion poureddown upon Italy, the Romans found to their surprisethat their conquerors were not only nominal Christianslike themselves, but had adopted also the heresy ofArius. " These rude nations fell off from the faith ofthe Church, as from a system too exalted for them, intothe impieties of Arianism." * St. Augustine, in his" City of God," pays his tribute to the clemency ofAlaric and his followers in sparing the Churches dur-

' Bowden's " Life of G:-cgory VII.," vol. i., p. 30.


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32 THE CIIURCU OF THE APOSTLES.ing the sack of Rome. " The name of Christ roseswelling above the wild dissonance of the capturedcity." It was, however, owing to the fact that thevshared in the same faith with the conquered Romans.But Ulfilas, the Apostle of the Goths, who first trans-lated the Scriptures into their tongue, was an Arian,and from him they had received their belief.

So was it with Genseric, the conqueror of Africa.The North of Africa bowed to this heresy, and evenfrom the Churches of Carthage, built in memory of St,Cyprian, the orthodox were expelled by the VandalKing Honoricus, and the Arians put in possession. Norwere they recovered until nearly a century had passed,and Belisarius took Carthage and drove the Vandalsout of Africa. The fierce Lombards, too, shared inthat heresy, as did Theodoric the Great, King of Italyand it is not saying too much to state that the strongesthold of Arianism was in Spain and Southern France.At one time, indeed, the greater part of the Westernworld acknowledged that belief.

But, in thus narrating the triumphs of Arianism inWestern Europe and Northern Africa, we have antici-pated its history in the following century. We return,therefore, to its origin.

The anathemas of the Church at once expelled Ariusfrom its fold, because, in the language of that docu-ment, " he had dared to utter his blasphemies againstthe Divine Redeemer." But his doctrines, as we haveshown, lived and found a congenial atmosphere throughthe East, until at length an appeal was made to theEmperor to heal the wounds of the divided Church.He attempted the work, but his envoy to Egypt, Hosius


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CREEDS. 33of Cordova, the most eminent of the Spanish Bishops,met witli no success, though he bore a letter from theEmperor, entreating them to "cease vain contentionsabout words, and to return to the harmony which be-came their common faith." '

But Constantino was a hite convert from Paganism,*and the first Christian Emperor found himself unableto settle the disputes of the fold to which he had joinedhimself. We may believe, too, from his own expres-sions, that it was with bitter disappointment he foundthe Christian Church rent asunder by what to himseemed empty controversies. " You, Alexander,'' hesays in his address to the contending parties, " mootinga subject improper for discussion ; you, Arius, rashlygiving expression to a view of the matter, such as oughteither never to have been conceived, or if, indeed, it hadbeen suggested to your mind, it became you to bury insilence." And then he makes the appeal to them : " Re-turn again to a state of reconciliation, and by so doinggive back to me tranquil days and nights free fromcare. If this should not be effected, I must necessarilygroan and be wholly suffused with tears." "^

But one resource, therefore, remained ; and this, forthe first time since the birth of Christianity, was adopt-ed. By Imperial mandate, a General Council of theheads of the different Christian communities through-out the Roman Empire was summoned, to establish, onthe united authority of assembled Christendom, thetrue doctrine on these contested points ; and to this we

' Socrates, lib. i., chap. vii." Socrates, lib. i., chap. vii. Eusebius gives the whole letter in " Vit.

Const," ii., 68.


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34 THE CHURCU OF THE APOSTLES.owe the second Creed in our Service, wliicli still fromthis Council bears the name of the JSTicene Creed.

It was in the month of May, a. d. 325, that thisGreat Council met at Nicsea, in Bithjnia. There seemeda special wisdom in the choice of place. It was buttwenty miles from Nicomedia, which shortly beforehad been selected as the Capital of the East. JN^earenough, therefore, for easy access of the Emperor, sothat, to use his own words, " he might be at hand as aspectator and participate in what was done," it was notso near that the influence of the Court could overshadowtheir deliberations. Perhaps the name itself may havehad some influence in determining the place. " It is acity," said the Emperor, " fitting for the Synod, calledafter Victory, ' the City of Victory,' or ' Nicsea.' " '

Fifteen centuries have passed away, and still theancient city of I^icsea stands, a monument of the GreatCouncil, yet how changed from what it once wasThen, high above all other buildings, rose the greatdome of the Church of the Eternal Wisdom, and oneach side of it were the remains of the old heathentemples of Victory, and Juno, and Apollo, their brokenporticoes still beautiful in ruin. But time has sweptall these away. At the close of the thirteenth century,on the dismemberment of the Roman Empire, Nicseafell before the arms of Orchan, the Ottoman leader,and he at once transformed it into a Moslem cit}^ TheChurch of the Council was turned by him into a mosque,the symbol of Islam was substituted for the mosaicimages on its walls, and, amid the rubbish which nowmarks its site, Orchan's name appears sculptured over

' Eusebius, " Vit. Const.," iii., 6.


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CREEDS. 35tlie doorway. Attached to this mosque, the tirst Otto-man college was founded. " In this place," says YanHammer, " where the Bishops had been compelled, onpain of deposition and exile, to renounce their heresyand subscribe the Nieene Fornmlary, Christian children,destined to recruit the ranks of the Janizaries, werenow forced to forswear their faith."

Nature, indeed, is unchanged, and, as the travelernow approaches the ruined city, he sees the same grandfeatures of the landscape which must have arrested thegaze of those who had then gathered from every partof Christendomabove the city, the wooded slopesof the mountains covered by the chestnut-forests ; attheir base, the Arcanian Lake communicating with theSea of Marmora ; and, in the distance, the classicalOlympus, with its snowy peaks looking down on thewide stretch of hill and valley. Around the city stillremain the same ancient rectangular walls, which seemthe inclosure of a wild and forsaken chase, for withinall is ruin and desolation. Prostrate columns and shat-tered walls, which Nature is covering with her rich verd-ure, and tangled vines twining over the broken arches,fill the space. No sound of human life is heard, tillwith toil and labor the centre of the city is reached,and there is Isnik, a miserable Turkish village, "stand-ing within the walls, which form a circuit of four milesaround it." ' Near it, surrounded by ruined mosques,is the only monument of old Christian times, the de-serted Church dedicated to " the repose of the Virgin." ^Here the Moslem pilgrims search for the tombs of some

' Sir Chai-les Fellows's " Travels in Lycia," p. 8.3.2 Stanley's "Eastern Church," p. 1T2.


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36 TUE CEURCH OF THE APOSTLES.of the heroes of their early history, or the travelerfrom the "West endeavors to trace the faint memorialsof the city once so famous in Ecclesiastical History.

Yet that was a scene of stirring life when the firstGreat Council gathered there. More than three hundredBishops were present, and presbyters and deacons with-out number. They came from all parts of the world,from the distant East and the scarcely-known West.John the Persian stood side by side with Theophilus theGoth, from the extreme ISTorth. Alexander of Alexan-dria was there, to aid in allaying the tempest his ownrashness had raised ; and there, too, was Arius, readyto defend his doctrine. He was marked by his Asiaticdress and the wildness of his appearance, as if he was" in the world, yet not of the world." And face toface with him was Athanasius, then a young deacon,yet showing in that early day the same intellectual forceand energy which in after-years made him the GreatDefender of the Eaith. Probably, notwithstanding hisyouth, he was the master-mind of the assembly, and inthe Iberian convent at Mount Athos is an ancient fres-coed picture of the Council, which represents him seatedon the ground in his deacon's dress writing out theCreed. Perhaps this painting embodies the idea whichwas entertained through the East of his share in thisgreat work. The hermit Bishops came from their Egyp-tian caves to meet the astute logicians from Alexandriaand Antioch. Many of them bore the marks of havingsuffered for the faith, for the days of martyrdom hadnot long since ceased, and there were those still livingwho had passed through the great persecution of Dio-cletian.


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CREEDS. 37" Tliere were among tlie Bishops," says Socrates,

" two of extraordinary celebrity : Paphnutius, Bishop ofUpper Thebes ; and Spiridon, Bishop of Cyprus." Theformer had lost an eye in the persecutions, and wasesteemed for his wonderful sanctity. The latter wastaken from his sheepfold to be made a Bishop, and " onaccount of his extreme humility he continued to feedhis sheep during his prelacy." To both W'Cre ascribedthe power of working miracles.' But the time wouldfail us to mention even the prominent members of thatbody. Their names are wn-itten in the chronicles of thetimes, yet they sound strange to us as they come downthrough the intervening centuries.'

Socrates likens the Council to that great multitudewhich, on the day of Pentecost, listened to the preach-ing of St. Peter, composed of " devout men of everynation under heaven ; except," he says, " that congre-gation was inferior in this respect, that all present werenot ministers of God, whereas in this assembly, besidesthe Bishops, was an almost incalculable number of pres-byters, deacons, and acolyths, attending them." '

The historian Eusebius * describes the scene, at whichhe was present, as being himself deeply impressed with

' Socrates, lib. i., chap. x. and xi.2 It is perhaps a great loss that the Church history of Philostorgius

has not been preserved. It was favorable to the Arians, but nothing re-mains except a few fragments copied in Photius.

' Socrates, lib. i., chap. viii.* There were two of the most prominent members of the Council bear-

ing this name. This one, Eusebius the historian, Bishop of Caesarea,acted with the orthodox party, though he was said to be a semi-Arian.The other Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia, was an Arian, and, as will beseen in the further pages of this narrative, was one of the rcost activepartisans on that side.


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38 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.its solemnity. At its first meeting the assembly sat inprofound silence, while the great officers of state andother dignified persons entered the hall and awaited " inprond and trembling expectation " the appearance ofthe Emperor of the world in a Christian Council. Atlength he entered, wearing the Imperial diadema lightcrown of gold, set with rubies and sapphires alternatelyand his dress of purple blazing with gold embroidery andprecious stones. The whole assembly at once rose to dohim honor. He advanced to a low, golden seat preparedfor him, but did not take it till a sign of permissionhad been given by the Bishops. " Such," says Socrates,*" was the respect and reverence which the Emperor en-tertained for these men." On the one side of him satHosius of Spain, who had been his legate to Egypt inthe vain attempt to settle this difticulty, and on his rightwas his Eastern favorite, Eusebius of Coesarea, " thefather of ecclesiastical history."

' Socrates, " Hist.," lib. i., chap. riii. Tliis was a reverence which theChurch in that age always claimed from civil rulers. Gibbon says : " Inthe Christian Church, which intrusts the service of the altar to a perpetualsuccession of consecrated ministers, the monarch, whose spiritual rank isless honorable than that of the meanest deacon, was seated below therails of the sanctuary and confounded with the rest of the faithful multi-tude. The Emperor might be saluted as the father of his people, but heowed filial duty and reverence to the Fathers of the Church."(" History,"chap. XX.)

W^hen the Emperor Theodosius had entered the chancel to present of-ferings, he remained. St. Ambrose asked him what he wanted, and onhis replying that he remained for the purpose of partaking of the HolyMysteries, he directed the deacon to address him in the following words" The priests alone, Emperor, are permitted to enter within the pali-sades of the altar ; all others must not approach it. Retire, then, andremain with the rest of the laity. A purple robe makes Emperors, butnot priests."(Theodoret, lib. v., chap, xviii.)


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CREEDS. 39One of the leading prelatesprobably Eusebius

commenced the proceedings with a short address to theEmperor, followed by a hymn to God. Constantinothen delivered an exhortation to unity in the Latin lan-guage, which was interpreted to the Greek Bishops. Itdisplayed a Christian spirit which it would have beenwell for them to have imitated. " The moment," hesays, " which I shall consider the chief fulfillment ofmy prayers will be when I see you all joined togetherin heart and soul, and determining on one peaceful har-mony for all, which would well become you who areconsecrated to God, to preach to others." '

The Council sat for more than two months, and,as we before stated, the Nicene Creed was the resultof its solemn deliberations, while the anathema of theChurch was pronounced against Arius and his adher-ents. In the midst of the excitement of their debates,Eusebius proposed a Creed which had " existed beforethe rise of controversy." It was one which, ho subse-quently said, in an Epistle to his diocese, when describ-ing the proceedings of the Council, " he had receivedfrom the Bishops who were his predecessors, in the rudi-ments of which he was instructed when he was baptized,and which, both as a presbyter and when placed in theEpiscopal office, he had believed and taught." ^ Of ihii^,as an historical fact, there can be no doubt, since all towhom he made the statement in his Diocese of Cajsarcamust have been acquainted with the existence of thisCreed and able to confirm this assertion. It was adoptedwith some slight alterations, and, therefore, was almost

' Eusebius's "Vit. Const.," iii., 12.^ Thcodorct, lib. i., chap. xii.


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40 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.identical with tlie Nicene Creed as we have receivedit. It must have been an early formulary of doctrineadopted in the cradle of our tliiththe land of Pal-estine. The ISTicene Creed, therefore, has an antiqui-ty far beyond the date of its formal adoption at Ni-coea.

The Creed was intended, as we can at once perceive,to guard the doctrine of our Lord's Divinity by all thatlanguage can effect. It declares that he is " God ofGod, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten,not made, being of one substance with the Father."Three hundred and eighteen Bishops confirmed theCreed by their signatures, and thus was recorded theunited voice of the Christian Church.

The Creed is that we still use, except tliat for thelast division, which was afterward added at the Councilof Constantinople, a. d. 381, there originally stood thewords : " But those who say that there was a time whenHe was not, and before His generation He was not, andHe was formed out of nothing, or that He was of an-other essence or hypostasis, or that the Son of God iscreated, or is changeable, or is mutable, the Holy Catho-lic and Apostolic Church anathematizes."

Another change is the insertion of the word Jilioqneto declare the procession of the Holy Ghost, " from theFather and the Son.'''' "When this was done, it wouldbe difiicult to tell. Its adoption grew up gradually inthe West of Europe, but it was certainly not until theeighth century that it received any authoritative in-dorsement. Creeping into the Creed in this way, it isnow, unfortunately, the most serious obstacle to thecommunion of the Greek Church with our own. They


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CREEDS. 41say, and justly, that it should not have been added with-out the direction of an Q^cunienical Council.The difficulty of coming to some agreement in theCouncil arose not from open antagonism of ojDinion, forthis could have been met by argument. It was causedby the dishonest ingenuity of the Arians in professingtheir willingness to accept the orthodox language, whilethey secretly gave it a different meaning. In a workof hction, whose object is to picture the proceedings ofthose times,' there is a most truthful view given of theseceaseless evasions of the adherents of Arius in offeringto subscribe to articles of the Creed which, with a men-tal reservation, they held in a different sense. We willgive a scene from this work to illustrate this point.

" It was now wished to draw up a Creed whichshould serve to express the faith of the Church, andwhich should yet be acceptedif it might be sobyall the Prelates. The only difficulty was that whichconcerned the Son of God, to use language which couldnot be distorted, and which yet, in its declarations,should be simple and short.

" Alexander had been speaking, and he now con-cluded by proposing that the Council should simply de-clare the Son of God to be God.

" There was a great shout of applause. ' It is thefaith of Peter ! It is the faith of Paul ! Anathema tohim that gainsays !

" ' My brother of Nicomedia,' said the President, ' has' " The Quay of the Dioscuri," London, 18G0. Although this account

is given in the form of fiction, yet it is entirely based on the statementsmade by Athanasius, where all these evasions and references to texts arenarrated.("De Decret. Nic," sec. 19.)


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42 THE CHURCH OB' THE APOSTLES.it your approbation that this sacred Council, inspired bjthe Holy Ghost, should declare the Son to be God?'

" ' I would so declare it with pleasure,' said Euse-bius ; ' but, before I commit myself farther, I would,with your Brotherlincss's permission, consult with thosewith whom I usually act.'

" Accordingly, he and several other of the Arianleaders formed a circle toward the left-hand upper cor-ner of the hall, and seemed very eager in debate. Arius,Theonas of Marmarica, and Menophantus of Ephesus,appeared the most emphatic speakers. At the end ofabout a quarter of an hour, Eusebius of iN'icomediacame forward, and the others resumed their seats.

" ' We are content,' said he, ' that this should be soexpressed in the Creed : " I believe in the Son of God,God Himself."

" There was great applause, and I really thoughtthat the two parties were coming to an agreement.But Athanasius seemed very ill at ease ; he passed be-hind the golden throne, and spoke hastily to the leg-ates. In another minute Hosius said, 'Have I yourBrotherliness's leave to ask Arius a question ?

" ' Surely,' replied Eustathius." ' Arius,' said he, ' do I understand you also to af-

firm that the Son of God is God ?" ' I am ready to swear my belief in it,' replied he." ' And you would repeat the words as I have re-

peated them ?" ' Surelywhy not ? Is it' not written in your

law, " I said, ye are gods 1 " If he then called themgods'

" Eusebius of Cceoarca darted an indignant glance


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CREEDS. 43at Arius. So this was what they meant, this the gi'andtruth so carefully to be embodied in the Creed, that, asthey were called gods, so was the Eternal Word God80, and not otherwise !

" ' Out with the Egyptian ! Out with the heretic !was the cry.

" ' This will not do,' said Hosius ; ' in the samesense we may affirm any holy man to be God.'

" ' Say,' said Leontius of Ciesarea, ' that He is al-ways God.'

" ' I do say so,' replied Arius." ' Nothing clearer,' cried Menophantus." ' Does this great and holy Synod adopt that ex-

pression ? ' asked the president." ' Remembering,' said Arius, ' that it is written," We which live are always." ' Our Lord is, as I have

expressed it, God ; He lives God, therefore He is al-ways God.'

" ' I affirm,' said Alexander, ' that He is very Godof very God.'" ' I affirm the like,' retorted Eusebius of Nicome-dia ; ' if He has verily been so made, verily He so is.Why, the majority would be satisfied with nothing lessthan calling Him consubstantial with the Father.'

" ' Let us say so ! ' cried Athanasius." ' The Holy Ghost speaks by Athanasius ! ' was the

cry. ' Athanasius a second Peter ! ' ' Athanasius an-other Paul ! ' ' Let us worship the consubstantial ! ' "The great point of dispute ultimately turned on ani in the word which was used to assert the inherentDivinity of our Lord. Tiie word for which the ortho-

' 2 Cor. iv. 11.


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4i TEE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.dox contended was homousios (of the same substance),while that put forward by the Arians was homoiusios(of Hke substance). The former was expressed by theword consubstantial, adopted by the Council, but bit-terly opposed by the Arians. It had been unwittinglysuggested by the Arians themselves, and caught up andused by the orthodox. In the English version of theCreed it is expressed by the phrase, " Being of one sub-stance with the Father." The tradition always has beenthat Eusebius of Nicomedia first altered the documentby secretly inserting the i before he signed it. Thescene is thus pictured in the work to which we havebefore referred :

" On the next morning Constantino, who had in themean while received warning that if he were not therethe session was likely to be a stormy one, was present.At first matters proceeded tranquilly enough. TheCreed was produced, read over, and then the signatureswere called for. And, for two hours, Metropolitanafter Metropolitan, and Bishop after Bishop, came upto the little table of signature, took pen in hand, andaffixed his name. The recusants held back to the last.

" There were seventeen. Eusebius of Niconiediawas their spokesman.

" After much disputing, ' I entreat you,' he cried,' august Emperor, not to drive us to stand at bay. AVehave done good service to your throne ; we have everprayed for your life and that of your august familywe have labored for the propagation of the true faith ;and now, for a word unknown tounknown to ?rather rejected by, our fathers, we are to be made of-fenders.'


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CREEDS. 45" Hosins was about to reply, but the Emperor rose.

This great and oecumenical Synod,' said' he, ' has beenthe mouth ; I am but the hand. What it confirms withtlie sword of the Spirit I will ratify by the carnalweapon. I pronounce no theological judgment, but theBishop that signs not the symbol is sent into exile.'The resolute manner in which he spoke showed that noentreaties could move him.

" After an hour's weary discussion twelve moresigned. And now there were but five dissentients,Eusebius of Nicomedia, Theognius of Nicfiea, Maris ofChalcedon, and Secundus and Theonas of Lybia.

" For some time I thought that these five wouldhave remained firm, but the love of the world was toostrong in Eusebius. Just as the Emperor M^as about todeclare the session at an end, he advanced to the table.For a moment his hand was held over the symbol it-self, as if he were diligently perusing it ; he then signedhastily, and Maris and Theognius followed his example.

" Eusebius had inserted an i, thus turning homousiosinto Jiomoiusios ; ' as if they could thus cheat theSearcher of hearts. But the guile answered in thisworld."

It shows the Oriental character of the Council, that,of all the Bishops who signed the Creed, only eightwere from the West. The Greek, too, in which it waswritten it would have been impossible to translate intothe Latin or Teutonic languages. The expressions aretoo subtile to be represented in any other tongue, andthe fine-drawn distinctions (like the i on which the

' As a matter of history, this change is mentioned by Philostorgius,i, 8.


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46 TEE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.contest turned) with regard to our Lord's union of na-tures defied the attempts of the Western theologians toexplain them in their language. They were obliged,therefore, to coin new forms of speech, Greek in theircharacter, which often were but an approximation towhat had been fully set forth in the delicate idioms ofthe original text. " The West," says Milman, " accept-ed the Creed, which its narrow and barren vocabularycould hardly express in adequate terms." '

There was one point of difference between the con-tending parties at Nicasa so marked, that it deservesour serious attention. The orthodox Fathers did notreason from their own interpretation of Scripture, orbase their arguments upon it. They bore witness to asimple matter of fact, that the doctrine they avowedhad been received by them from the generations beforethem, and they knew of no other as ever existing intheir respective Churches. On the contrary, the handfulof men at the Council who advocated Arianism madeno appeal to uninterrupted tradition ; they only arguedfrom their own views of Scripture. They might havebeen included among those to whom Shakespeare re-fers, who live

" As the world were now but to begin,Antiquity forgot^ custom not l-noicn."' ^

The contrast is strikingly referred to in one of tlietreatises of Athanasius, when he points out to the Ari-ans the fact that they had dated one of their confes-sions of tliitli by the consulate of the current year.

' " Latin Christianity," i., 59.- " Hamk't," act iv., scene v.


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CREEDS. 47" Having composed," he said, " a creed according totheir tastes, they headed it with mention of the Consnl,and the month, and the day, as if to snggest to all menof understanding that now, from the time of Constan-tius, not before, their faith dates its origin. . . . Onthe other hand, at Nicsea, many as were the framers ofthe Creed, they ventured nothing such as these threeor four men have ventured. They did not care to headit with consulate, month, and day, but said, ' Thus be-lieves the Catholic Church ; ' nor had they any delayin stating what they believed, in proof that their viewswere not novel but Apostolical. And what they setdown was no discovery of theirs, but the doctrine whichwas taught by the Apostles." *

And this principle on which they acted was not amere vague and floating opinion. On the contrary,they regarded their interpretation of the doctrine whichthey embodied in the Creed as one fixed and recog-nized, formally committed to the guardianship of everyBishop everywhere, and by him made over to his suc-cessor. And we know that such a deposit did existand such a trad'itio or transmission, with regard to fun-damental doctrines, was formally observed in and fromthe Apostolic age. Each Bishop appointed to w^atch forthe welfare of the Christian Church " marked well herbulwarks, and set up her houses, that lie might tell themthat come afterP "^

There can be no doubt but that each branch of theChurch had its own distinct line of traditionary teach-ing from the Apostles. It is to this, perhaps, that St.

' " De Synod.," 3-5."^ Psalm xlviii. 12 (Prayer-Book version^.


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48 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.Jude refers, when he urges the duty of " earnestly con-tending for the faith which was once delivered^ Wemay believe, then, that the unanimity which prevailedin the Council of Nice was something higher than amutual sacrifice of differences for the sake of peace.It had more weight than the mere decision of a major-ity, no matter how large. It was the joint testimonyof the many branches of the Church represented bytheir Bishops as independent witnesses, to the separateexistence in each of them, from time immemorial, ofthe doctrine in which they found they all agreed.*

For many reasons the Council of Nice was the mostremarkable body which had ever met in the Church.It proclaimed to the world a startling announcement.For three centuries the Church and the Eoman Empirehad been growing up side by side, engaged in a cease-less struggle for the direction of the human mind.Here we have the first public and acknowledged con-fession that the Church had conquered. " The weakthings of this world had confounded the strong ; " andwhen at Nicoea the Emperor of all the known worldbowed before the spiritual authority of the Council, wemay feel that tha victory, to achieve which so manyhad laid down their lives, had been won at last.

During these passing centuries, too, filled as theywere with striking incidents in those days of heroicfaith and bitter persecution, nothing stands out promi-nent. In every part of the world to which the Gospelhad gone, whether amid the palaces of the ImperialCity, on the plains of India, or in the forests of West-ern Europe, there is the same story : on the one hand,

' British Critic, vol. xx., p. 192.


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CREEDS. 49the attempt to crush the Faith, and on the other, thesublime endurance of its followersthe ceaseless strug-gle between the Old AVorld and the New-born Church.

But there is no central point of interest or influence.At Nicaea a new era was inaugurated. For the firsttime the Church, as it were, emerges from the chaos,and, uniting its v^oice with that of the Empire, pointsout tlie path its followers were to tread in coming cen-turies. There was a significancv, therefore, in the titleit assumed, " The Great and Holy Synod."And to this day, in the Eastern Church, this Creedretains the power it had when first announced by themandate of the Roman Emperor. Among the manymillions of the Greek Church it is the one bond offaith. " It is still recited in its original tongue by thepeasants of Greece ; its recitation is still the culminat-ing point of the Service in the Church of Kussia. Thegreat bell of the Kremlin Tower sounds during thewhole time that its words are chanted. It is repeatedaloud in the presence of the assembled people by theCzar at his coronation ; it is worked in pearls on therobes of the highest dignitaries of Moscow. The an-niversary of the Council is still celebrated on specialdays. Every article of the ISTicene Creed is exhibited,according to the fashion of the Russian Church, in littlepictures, and thus familiarized to the popular mind." ^And so through the West. Wherever the Church ofEngland is plantedin India and Australia, in Africa, inthe isles of the Southern Ocean, and over the wide ex-panse of this continentthis Creed is incorporated in theLiturgy, and looked upon as the measure of faith. It is

' Stanley's " Eastern Church," p. 148.3


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50 THE CEURCn OF TEE APOSTLES.the tie wliich, more than anything else, unites us tothe distant Eastto the Churches of Constantinopleand Antioch. The Greek Church has never formallyreceived the Apostles' and Athanasian Creeds as apart of its ritual. The Nicene alone is common to allChristendom. The very place it occuj^ies in the Com-munion Service, and the direction to recite it before theadministration of the Eucharist, is derived from theGreek Church, " to guard that ordinance against Arianintruders." * There was, therefore, a prophecy, whichfifteen hundred years have verified, in that declarationof Athanasius, " The word of the Lord, which wasgiven in the CEcumenical Council of Nicsea, remainethforever."

And now, in concluding this sketch, will some ofour readers ask, " What was the future history ofArius ? " Though condemned by the Council, the evilhe had done lived after him. His heresy spread, as wehave shown, and had its strongest hold in the "West ofEurope, where the Gothic tribes had received it fromtheir earliest teachers. And so it continued for nearlytwo centuries after the adoption of the Creed at Nicseanor did it end in France until Clovis, on the field ofVouille, struck down the power of the Arian Visi-goths, and their leader died by his hand. In Spain itwas dominant until, in the sixth century, King Recared,in the Cathedral at Toledo, professed his submission tothe Catholic Church.^ Thenceforth Arianism seems to

^ In the Communion Service of the Church of England it is so pre-scribed. In the American Church the choice is allowed in the CommunionService between the Nicene and the Apostles' Creeds.

2 Stanley's "Eastern Church," p. 152.


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CREEDS. 51have lost its Yitality, until it gradually ceased to benumbered among the recognized heresies of the day.But Arius himself had passed the culminating pointof his notoriety. For a while he remained in Alexan-dria, vainly striving to be received once more into com-munion with the Church by Athanasius, who had suc-ceeded Alexander in his Episcopal office. Thence, aboutten years after the Council, by the advice of Eusebiusof Nicomedia, he removed to Constantinople. Therethe influence of his friends was exerted in his behalfwith the Emperor, and on his being admitted to an in-terview, Arius so earnestly avowed his belief in theCatholic faith, " deceitfully imitating," says Theodoret," the language of the Holy Scriptures," that the scru-ples of the Emperor were swept away, and he com-manded Arius to be received again to the communionof the Church. The words in which he delivered hisdecision were characterized by an anxiety and earnest-ness which subsequent events ahnost elevated to thedignity of prophecy. " Arius," said he, " has wellsworn, if his words had no double meaning ; otherwise,God will avenge," Unceasing, indeed, were the en-treaties of the Bishop Alexander, that the Emperorwould not inflict this disgrace upon the Church ; butall were without effect, and the day was appointed forhis reception, which his friends were to celebrate by atriumphal procession through the streets.

The previous night was passed by the aged Bishopin prayer in the Church of Peace, accompanied by twoother Bishops, Hermogenes of Cappadocia and James ofNisibis. There, before the holy doors of the altar,they knelt, while twenty-four priests were kneeling be-


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52 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.hind them, and the multitude which filled the Churchkept a solemn silence, as hour after hour their prayersascended on high. The night went on, and the morn-ing light stole in, and still Alexander, though fourscore-and-eight years old, kept his vigil, and the ceaseless pe-tition of the aged man was, " If Arius is to be joined tothe Church to-morrow dismiss me Thy servant ; or cutoff Arius, lest, if he enter into communion with ThyChurch, heresy enter also ! " '

The day broke, and over the whole city was heardthe music of trumpets, and flutes, and hautboys, as theprocession wound around through the streets. Fromthe Emperor's palace it was to make the circuit of thecity to the Great Church. On the procession swept,through the long street of St, Irene, till it reached theGreat Square and wound around the Porphyry Pillar ofConstantino.

Arius, Eusebius, Euzoi'us, and other leaders, camealmost at the end. The church was nearly reached, andthe moment of their triumph was at hand, when Ariuscomplained of sudden illness, and had to be taken intoa house near by. Then the procession halted, and astrange hush and silence fell upon the square, until ina few moments the announcement went forth, " Ariusis dead ! " And so it was. " Immediately," it is written," he fell down and burst asunder and expired." ^ Thushe died the death of Judas Iscariot.

That night hymns of praise ascended in the Church,and the aged Bishop returned thanks to God that hisprayer had been answered, the Church been freed from

' Tlieodoret, lib. i., chap. xiv.^ Athanasius, lib. i., p. 670.


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CREEDS. 53its threatened disgrace, and he who so long hindered thetruth " had been taken out of the way." " This wasnot," says Theodoret, " because he rejoiced at the deathof Ariusfar from it, for all men must die ; but it wasbecause his mode of death surpassed the judgment ofman." ' They glorified God, because so evidently " liehad visited His people."

A few years later and another Creed was put forth,rather as the amplification and explanation of the Ni-cene. Probably that refinement of Eastern dialects towhich we have before alluded, in many cases allowedthe heretical to repeat the Nicene Creed, while men-tally they afiixed a different meaning to its words.This, therefore, was placed beyond a doubt by theCreed called the Athanasian, which gradually made itsway into the Church and became an acknowledgedCreed of the West. It is a portion of the Kitual of theChurch of England, though not retained in the Ameri-can Church. For many centuries, through the MiddleAges, it was believed to be the work of Athanasinshimself. Even the English Reformers supposed it tobe from his hand. But this is disprov^ed by internal evi-dence. The phraseology is often that which Athanasiuswould not have used, while the assertion of the DoubleProcession of the Spirit" the Holy Ghost is of theFather and the Son "would have been disowned byhim, as it has been by the great body of Oriental Chris-tians.

The learned have now united in the belief that this' Tlicodorct, lib. i., chap. ,\ii.


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54 TEE CEURCE OF TEE APOSTLES.ancient Hymn, " Qiiicunqiie vult," is of a later date. Itwas probably composed by Hilary,' Bishop of Aries, inGaul, not earlier than the year 426, nor later than theyear 430. It was written, therefore, but little morethan half a century after the death of Athanasius.''And so it has come down to us in its pristine pu-rity, unmutilated among all the changes and heresieswhich arose. Martin Luther called it " the bulwark ofthe Apostles' Creed ; " and Calvin, " a sure and fitting in-terpreter of the Nicene Creed." It bears the name ofthe great Defender of the Faith, not because it was writ-ten by him, but because it is a faithful exposition ofthe doctrines for which he so bravely contended, whenhe stood almost alonewhat Milton calls " the sole ad-vocate of a discountenanced truth "when his motto wasobliged to be, " Athanasius contra mundum," and (inthe striking words of Hooker) " he had no friend butGod and death." ' Hooker, indeed, sums up the historyof this Creed in a single sentence : " Both in the Eastand West Churches it was accepted as a treasure of in-estimable price, by as many as had not given up eventhe very ghost of belief." *

Such are the three acknowledged Creeds of the Cath-' The authorship of this Creed has of course been the subject of great

dispute among theologians, but the whole question seems to have beenexhausted by Waterland, vol. iv., p. 218, "Ed. Van Mildert." His argu-ment in behalf of Hilary, once Abbot of Lerins, afterward Bishop ofAries, seems to be conclusive. In the historical notice of this point wehave adopted the argument contained in the Charge of the Archbishop(Beresford) of Armagh in 1874.

^ According to Socrates, " Eecles. Hist.," lib. iv., chap, xx., this tookplace in 371, but Jerome states it to be in 373.

2 " Eecles. Polity," book v., chap. 42. * Ibid.


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CREEDS. 55olic Church. Liidolph of Saxony, in his " Life of Christ,"says : " There are three symbols : the first of the Apos-tles, the second of the Nicene Council, the third of St.Athanasius ; the first for instruction in the faith, thesecond for explanation of the faith, the third for de-fense of the faith." In these, then, the doctrine of theChurch is contained. They declare the sum of what weare to believe concerning the Father, the Son, and theHoly Ghost. " Enlarged and unfolded during fourcenturies, according to the needs of the Church and thevarious assaults of heresy, these Creeds have been,throughout the history of the Church, her possession,her sum of truth, her sacred deposit." ^ These the earlyChristians repeated when they met together ; these wenow profess when we have gathered on each occasionof public worship ; these the Church has maintainedagainst her adversaries ; these she holds out to her chil-dren ; and with these she hopes to meet her Lord whenHe returns to judgment.

Let us look, then, at the reverence with which theseCreeds were regarded by the early Church ; how " stead-fastly " its members " continued in the Apostles' doc-trine." They considered an agreement on these pointsto be fundamental ; as essential to the very being of aChristian and his union with the Church. The Creedwas called the " Rule of Faith," ^ because it was thestandard and rule by Mdiich orthodoxy and heresy were

' Mobcrly's " Forty Days," p. 80.* Eingham's " Orig. Eccles.," lib. x., chap. iii.


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56 THE CHUECn OF THE APOSTLES.known and examined. Its profession was esteemednecessary to the admission of members into the Chm-cliof Christ by Baptism. lie who deviated from it in anypoint was regarded as one who had cut himself off andseparated from the communion of the Churcli.

IrenoBUs called it " the unalterable Canon and Rule ofFaith," and adds, in a passage so truly eloquent that wecannot forbear quoting it entire : " This is the message,and this the Faith, which the Church has received, andwhich, though dispersed throughout the whole world, shesedulously guards, as though she dwelt but in one place,believes as uniformly as though she had but one souland the same heart, and preaches, teaches, hands downto posterity, as harmoniously as though she had butone mouth." True it is, the world's languages are various, butthe power of the tradition is one and the same. Thereis no difference of faith or tradition, whether in theChurches of Germany, or in Spain, or in Gaul, or in theEast, or in Egypt, or in Africa, or in the more centralparts of the world ; but as the sun, God's creature, isone and the same in all the world, so also the preach-in.g of the truth shineth everywhere, and lighteth everyone who will come to the knowledge of the truth.Among the rulers of the Church, neither he who ispowerful in words speaks other doctrine (for no one canbe above his Master), nor does the weak in the worddiminish the tradition. For, whereas the faith is oneand the same, neither he who has much to say concern-ing it hath anything over, nor he who speaketh littleany lack." ^

' Ircnacus, lib. i , chap. iii.


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CREEDS. 57These were what we have referred to as the o^olden

days of the Church ; but now, alas !" The world is very evilThe times are waxing late."

We have fallen upon " the last days " foretold bythe Apostle/ when scoffers are found to deny each ofthese truths in which the early Christians trusted, andwhat to them were subjects of faith and adoration arenow flung from lip to lip with irreverent blasphemy.Yet, as thus we look out on a world rent by conflictingbeliefs, where the waves of j)opular opinion toss wildlyabout, and unity of doctrine is remembered only assomething belonging to far-distant centuries, is it notmore necessary than ever that we should cling to theseancient forms, which thus have come down to us sanc-tioned by the reverence and love of ages ? Is it not ablessing that they have been preserved to us, thus to beprofessed when we gather in God's House, so that if theliving minister should teach anything not sanctioned bythe faith, the words of the Creed which he is obligedto repeat would at once give in their denial ? Themembers of our Church have, therefore, ever beforethem the doctrine of the Apostlesthe " old paths "are plain in their sightand in all the essential pointsof faith he who errs must willfully wander from thetruth.

The history of the world, indeed, has demonstratedthe necessity for fixed creeds, to embody doctrine andpreserve it unimpaired from age to age. Whereverthey have been abandoned it seems as if all landmarks

' 2 Timotliy iii. i.


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58 THE CnURCn OF THE APOSTLES.had been given up, errors have crept in, and their prod-uct has been those thousand forms of heresy whichnow distract the world. The mind of man needs some-thing on which to leansomething to relieve it fromthe vague and the indefinitesomething fixed and cer-tainand this can only be furnished by these ancientformularies, which have come down to us from " ourfathers' days and the old times before them." Dealingonly with the essentials of faith, they place before usthose things which are necessary to salvationthosewhich he who abandons, denies the Lord who boughthim, and ceases to be a Christian.

And is it not of importance what we believe ? Doesthe Gospel anywhere indorse that false liberality ofmodern days which would esteem all creeds alike, andmake all opinions on religion matters of indifference ?No. A Christian disciple is bound to revere and main-tain the doctrines of his Divine Master. He belongs tothe school of Christ. The truths in which he restshave had their origin in Heaven. They are not specu-lative refinements, which are matters of fancy, but theyconstitute the living principles of action in a Chris-tian's heart ; and, in proportion to the freeness of theiraction, they give a coloring to his whole life, and formthe character of his future destiny.

If, indeed, we receive but half of the truth, the de-ficiency to us will be made up by a corresponding halfof error.' Would we be safe, therefore, we must go to

^ " Doctrinal errors ever produce corresponding errors in habits ofthinking and acting ; and the professor of a corrupted theology, strenu-ous as may be his efforts and pure his desires, in vain attempts to reachthe moral exaltation of him to whom it is permitted to make similar


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CREEDS. 59the full extent of all the knowledge which God hasseen fit to communicate. We must drink the whole ofthe cup of salvation which lie has so bounteously putinto our hands, and not rest satisfied with a taste on thelips, of that which He designs to pervade the wholebody with life and vitality. And if the Apostle hassolemnly declared that the heathen are inexcusable inneglecting to derive a knowledge of the Godhead fromHis visible works,* how much more inexcusable are theywho refuse to learn truly His revealed will, when it iswritten as with a sunbeam on the pages of His word,and the Church, " the pillar and ground of the truth,"is daily teaching them what it was that Apostles believed,and for which confessors and martyrs were willing toendure the fire and the stake ! Happy, then, will bethe blinded heathenhappy the rejecting Jewcom-pared with the enlightened Christian, who " continuesnot steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine ! " The truthis with him, but he prizes it not, and with light pour-ing upon his pathway he treads onward in darkness.

But is not this one of the trials of our probation ?In this mingled state we see nothing clearly, but inevery case something is left to faith ; and thus it is weare to select the truths to which we cleave, and whileerror in a thousand forms is seeking to entrap us, weare to " prove all things," and then " hold fast to thatwhich is good." Difiicult, indeed, would be the taskefforts under the guidance of a clearer light. In the Papal schools of theMiddle Ages we may find devotion, zeal, charity ; but we should not lookto them for that completeness, that holy consistency of character, whichwas the ornament of earlier and purer times."(Bowden's " Life of Greg-ory VII.," vol. i., p. 12.)

' Romans i. 20.


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60 THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.nay, often impossible, were we left to ourselves ; butthere are voices coming to us from the distant past.They are those formularies which have grown up amidblood and persecution, when holy men were compelledto concentrate all their powers, and give up all theirhearts and minds, to that word in whose truth alonethey could lind rest or happiness. To those, then, letus cling, until the time comes when all doubt is over,and faith gives place to certainty. As the redeemedenter the Paradise of God, the last shadow which dark-ens their spirit will fade away, and they find themselvesin the presence of Him who is " the Father of lights."And then, too, the Lord Himself shall be the teacherof His Church, and lead His people into all truth. Withminds no longer straitened by human infirmity, as cen-turies go by they will be learning more deeply the loreof Heaven, and be ever acquiring wider views of thosedoctrines of which the lessons of the Church on earthwere but the rudiments and first beginnings.


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11.

FELLOWSHIP.

*' blest communion, fellowship divine !We feebly struggle, fJic}/ in glory shine ;Yet all are one in Thee, for all are Thine.And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long.Steals on the ear the distant triumph-song.And hearts are brave again, and arms are strong."

W. W. How.


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II.

FELLOWSHIP.To "continue steadfcastly in the Apostles' fellow-

ship " was a necessary consequence of remaining stead-fast in their doctrine. Those who revered their teach-ing and wished to conform to the faith they preached,could not abandon the Unity of the Church. St. Paulhad indignantly asked, " Is Christ divided ? " Andwhen the Apostles had gone to their rest, and theChurch found the necessity of embodying its faith inCreeds, one article which it always held prominentlyforward was, " I believe in one Holy Catholic Church."Even heretics acknowledged this truth, and when theywandered from the faith, they still clung to the Apos-tolic ministry. The Arians attempted to form no newChurch ; and even the schismatic Donatists and l^ova-tians never gave up their claim to be a portion of theCatholic Church.

The early Christians knew no other doctrine ; theyrecognized no other faith. Looking back to the lastsolemn petitions of their Lord, when He prayed thatHis followers might be one, as He and the Father wereone,' they realized that grievous was the sin of himwho should break this holy fellowship, and introduce

' John xvii. 21.


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64: THE CHURCH OF THE APOSTLES.dissensions into that Churcli which is to be on eartha type of the Church in Heaven.

The subject, then, of this chapter will be, that fel-lowship WITH THE Apostles which was the privilegeof the early Christians, and which they have be-queathed to us who are now members of the CatholicChurch. It was the privilege of all who, in every pe-riod of the world, remained steadfast in the Chm-chwhich God founded. It was synonymous with mem-bership in the true Yisible Church. The view we shallattempt to give will necessarily be historical. Lookingback through all ages of the former dispensations, weshall see that everywhere the -^A^w of God was onewhich, as in the Apostolic days, recognized the Unityof the Churcli, and that every infringement of thisUnity was the result of man's evil passions alone.

The first Church was necessarily the Patriarchal."We behold its worship -in the earliest sacrifice whichwas offered, when, in the morning of the world, Cainand Abel presented their gifts before God. It wasseen again when Noah stood with a single family uponArarat, and there, looking out over a wor

Kip. The church of the apostles. 1877.

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Transcript of Kip. The church of the apostles. 1877.