Christianity will now ask leave of the world, how far it will permit them to proceed in religion without offence. I dare not say, that all this exactly took place at Sardis ; but much of it did, no doubt; and on occasion of this first instance of a general declension, it seemed not unreasonable to point out its ordinary progress and symptoms. The Church * The Christians of Philadelphia are highly extolled. They were a humble, charitable, fervent people, deeply sensible of their own weakness, fearful of being of Philadel seduced by Satan and their own hearts. The phia. Spirit assures them, that they had a little strength, which had at once been proved and exerted in holding fast the simplicity of the Gospel, and in detecting and resisting all adulterations of it. They are further assured, that the Judaical heretics should be brought at length to submit to become their disciples in religion: And a promise of strong support is held out to them, because they had maintained a true patience in suffering. To them, as to all the rest of the Churches, the rewards beyond the grave are proposed as the grand motives of perseverance. The Church of Laodi cea. Laodicea too much resembled Sardis.† The people were in a LUKEWARM state, a religious mediocrity, most odious to Christ; because his religion calls for the whole vehemence of the soul, and bids us to be cool only in WORLDLY things. The foundation. of this lukewarmness was laid in pride: They had lost the conviction of their internal blindness, misery, and depravity. When men go on for years in a placid unfeeling uniformity, this is always the case. They were satisfied with themselves, and felt no need of higher attainments. The counsel, which is given to them,to buy of him gold, white raiment, and eye-salve, is precious; and this call to their souls demonstrates that they had learnt to maintain, in easy indolence, an orthodoxy of sentiment without any vivid attention to the Spirit of God:-In a word, his influence was only not despised in Laodicea. Such were the situations of the seven Churches of Asia. The criticism is indeed inestimable: It is candid, impartial, and penetrating. He, who has indulged us with it, intended it Rev. iii. 7-13. + Rev. iii. 14-22. for the use of all succeeding Churches :-and " he that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches." CHAP. XV. THE REMAINDER OF THE FIRST CENTURY. It is the observation of one of the ancients, that St. Luke, in the close of his Apostolical history, leaves the reader thirsting for more. I feel the force and justness of the thought at this moment. I have hitherto sailed by the compass of Scripture; and now find myself at once entering into an immense ocean without a guide. In fact I have undertaken to conduct the reader through a long, obscure, and difficult course, with scarcely a beacon here and there set up to direct me :-but I must make the best use I can of the very scanty materials before me. It seems plain, that the Apostles in general did not leave Judea, till after the first council held at Jerusalem. They seem never to have been in haste to quit the land of their nativity. Probably the threatening appearances of its desolation by the Romans, hastened their departure into distant regions. It is certain that before the close of this century, the power of the Gospel was felt throughout the Roman empire. I shall divide this chapter into four parts, and review, First,-The progress and persecution of the Church. Secondly, the lives, characters, and deaths of the Apostles and most celebrated Evangelists. Thirdly, The heresies of this period. And, lastly,―The general character of Christianity in this first age. Burning of A. D. 64. I. It was about the year of our Lord 64, that the city of Rome sustained a general conflagration. The emperor Nero, lost as he was to all sense of Rome: reputation, and hackneyed in flagitiousness, was yet studious to avert the infamy of being reckoned the author of this calamity, which was generally imputed to him. But no steps that he could take were sufficient to do away the suspicion. There was, however, a particular class of people, so singularly distinct from the rest of mankind, and so much hated on account of the condem cution of the nation which their doctrine and purity of life affixed to all except themselves, that they might be calumniated with impunity. These were then known at Rome by the name of Christians. Unless we transplant ourselves into those times, we can scarcely conceive how odious and contemptible the appellation then was. The judicious Tacitus calls their religion a detestable superstition,* "which at first was suppressed, and afterwards broke out afresh, and spread not only through Judea, the origin of the evil, but through the metropolis also, the common sewer in which every thing filthy and flagitious meets and spreads." If so grave and cautious a writer as Tacitus can thus asperse the Christians without proof, and without moderation, we need not wonder that so impure a wretch as Nero should not hesitate to charge them with the fact of burning Rome. Now it was that the Romans legally persecuted the Church for the first time. And those, who know the virulence of man's natural enmity, will rather wonFirst perse- der that it commenced not earlier, than that Christians by it raged at length with such dreadful fury. A. D. 64. "Some persons were apprehended, who confessed themselves Christians; and by their evidence," says Tacitus, "a great multitude afterwards were discovered and seized and they were condemned not so much for the burning of Rome, as for being the enemies of mankind." A very remarkable accusation! It may be explained as follows:-True Christians, though the genuine friends of all their fellow-creatures, cannot allow men, who are NOT true Christians, to be in the favour of God. Their very earnestness, in calling on their neighbours to repent and believe the Gospel, proves to those neighbours in what a dangerous state they are then apprehended to be. All, who are not moved by the admonitions of Christian charity to flee from the wrath to come, will naturally be disgusted; and thus the purest benevolence will be construed into the most merciless bigotry. Thus Christians incurred the general hatred, to which the conduct neither of Jews nor heretics rendered them obnoxious. -And the same cause produces similar effects to this day. Their execution was aggravated with insult. They the Romans; *Tacitus, l. xv. c. 44. were covered with skins of wild beasts and torn by dogs: they were crucified, and set on fire, that they might serve or lights in the night-time. Nero offered his gardens for this spectacle, and exhibited the games of the circus. People could not, however, avoid pitying them, base and undeserving as they were in the eyes of Tacitus, because they suffered not for the public good, but to gratify the cruelty of a tyrant. It appears from a passage in Seneca,* compared with Juvenal, that Nero ordered them to be covered with wax, and other combustible materials and that, after a sharp stake was put under their chin, to make them continue upright, they were burnt alive to give light to the spectators.† We have no account how the people of God conducted themselves under these sufferings. What we know of their behaviour in similar scenes, leave us in no doubt of their having been supported by the power of the Holy Ghost. Nor is it credible, that the persecution should have been confined to Rome. It would naturally spread through the empire; and one of Cyriac's inscriptions found in Spain, demonstrates at once two important facts, -that the Gospel had already penetrated into that country, and that the Church there also had her martyrs. A. D. 68. Three or four years were probably the utmost extent of this tremendous persecution, as in the year 68 the tyrant was himself, by a dreadful exit, summoned before the divine tribunal. He left the Roman world in a state of extreme confusion. Judea partook of it in a remarkable degree. About forty years after our Lord's sufferings, wrath came on the body of the Jewish nation to the uttermost, in a manner too well known to need the least relation in this history. What became of the Christian Jews alone concerns us. The congregation were commanded, by an oracle revealed to the best approved among them, that before the wars began, they *Seneca. Ep. 14.-Juv. Sat. 1. v. 155 and Sat. 8. v. 235 with the Scholiast. + Bullet's History of the Establishment of Christianity, by Salisbury, p.6. [This inscription is believed by many to be a forgery, see Mosheim's Comm on the affairs of Christians, Cent i. sect. 35 Note: and Waddington's Hist of the Church p. 113. But Bullet maintains it to be genuine, and adduces some strong arguments in favour of it, p. 188.] § See Gibbon's Account of Christianity considered, p. 94. should depart from the city, and inhabit a village beyond Jordan, called Pella.* Thither they retired, and were saved from the destruction which soon after overwhelmed their countrymen and in so retiring they at once observed the precept, and fulfilled the well-known prophecy, of their Saviour. The death of Nero, and the destruction of Jerusalem, would naturally occasion some respite to them from their sufferings; and we hear no more of their persecuted state, till the reign of Domitian, the A. D. 81. last of the Flavian family, who succeeded to the empire in the year 81. He does not appear to have raged against the Christians, till the latter end of his reign. Indeed, in imitation of his father Vespasian, he made inquiry for such of the Jews as were descended from the royal line of David. His motives were evidently political. But there wanted not those who were glad of any opportunity of wreaking their malice on Christians. Some persons, who were brought before the emperor, were charged with being related to the royal family. They appear to have been related to our Lord, and were grandsons of Jude the Apostle, his cousin.† Domitian asked them, if they were of the family of David, which they acknowledged. He then demanded, what possessions they enjoyed, and what money they had. They laid open the poverty of their circumstances, and owned that they maintained themselves by their labour. The truth of their confession was evinced by their hands, and by their appearance in general. Domitian then interrogated them concerning Christ and his kingdom,-when and where it should appear? They answered, like their master when questioned by Pilate,that his kingdom was not of this world, but heavenly: that its glory should appear at the consummation of the world, when he should judge the quick and dead, and reward every man according to his works. Poverty is sometimes a defence against oppression, though it never shields from contempt. Domitian was satisfied, that his throne was in no danger from Christian ambition and the grandsons of Jude were dismissed with the same sort of derision with which their Saviour had formerly been dis Euseb. lib. iii. c. 5. + [Euseb. lib. iii. c. 19, 20.] |