of vain glory; for some of the boldest confessors were not always the best imitators of Christ, and mistook natural courage for spiritual power. There were, however, many faithful martyrs who died rejoicing amidst the most cruel sufferings; and the adversary, discomfited by many blessed examples of the constraining love of Christ, brought in a new device to spoil their testimony.

Some of the confessors, before their death, rashly desired that certain of the apostates, whom they named, should be received at the Lord's supper; and, through a mistaken veneration for persons supposed to be so very near Christ, their requests were granted. Cyprian warmly protested against this error, and reminded the brethren that even after far less offences than relapsing into idolatry, time had been allowed to prove the repentance of those who had sinned, and they were not received into communion till there was evidence of their restoration to God; and even then they were obliged to make an open confession, before the bishops and presbyters laid their hands on them in token of returning fellowship. Yet Cyprian himself was instrumental in furthering the subtle devices of the enemy by having the names of the martyrs, and the days on which they suffered, carefully registered, and observing these days on their annual return; for here originated a celebration of saints' days which soon became general. The language of Cyprian, indeed, shows how much darkness was on the mind of the best instructed Christians in these days, and how far they had been beguiled from the simplicity that is in Christ, in ceasing to be entirely guided by the Spirit and his word. In speaking of Laurentius and Ignatius, he describes them as martyrs who had received from the Lord crowns and palms of victory, but adds, we offer sacrifice for them when we celebrate the days of the martyrs;" and, again, with respect to another departed saint, we pray that God would forgive him all the sins he had committed through human infirmity, and bring him into the light and land of the living.into the bosoms of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,—into the place where pain, sorrow, and sighing flee away." The introduction of error is so gradual that it does not startle the mind till it has made considerable progress, and those who are going gra dually along with it do not know how far they have strayed. Some of the backward steps of the Church have been already

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marked, yet a thoughtful person is astonished at the returning idea of sacrifice, and little less at finding priests and altars formally recognised among Christians. It has been often said the word priest is merely a corruption of the Greek term Presbyter; but we have abundant proof it was in early use, in the sense of a sacrificer.

The subtle adversary knew that it was of no use to tempt the people of God with a direct lie; and therefore deceived them by an appearance of truth. The words of Christ "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you," were wrested from their simple signification of the living union and incorporation of Christ and his members, and applied to the bread and wine used at the supper.* Scripture and common sense were alike insulted by the gross idea that simple bread and wine were no longer signs, but the real body and blood of Christ. A question would of course arise how they could become such; and, in process of time, it was boldly asserted, that the hands and the prayers of the clergy changed these natural substances in a miraculous manner. This was called the doctrine of transubstantiation. He who first said the children of God were not at liberty to come together to break bread in remembrance of their Lord without an appointed minister or bishop, little expected that this first variation from scriptural liberty would be followed by such grievous departures from truth and simplicity. The bread and wine were at first carried round to the different members of the family by the ministers or servants of the Church; but at length these ministers, under the name of priests, pretended to take the sacrifice from the altar and administer it to the receivers kneeling around it. The clergy indeed had far greater pretensions than the Jewish priests; for they alone professed to make the sacrifice before they offered it: and it was no longer wonderful that persons, supposed to be possessed of such amazing powers, could forgive the sins of the living or the dead. The Jewish fable of a purgatory, or place of purification for the dead, was greedily received; and, the finished work of Christ being put out of sight, it was gladly believed that the priests and their sacrifices could deliver the departed sinner out of torment, or perfect the happiness of the * See the "Scripture Tracts."-No. 4.

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deceased saints. Such an idea as this may, perhaps, explain the language of Cyprian when he says, we offer sacrifice for them." Forgiven sinners were the class whom the Lord desired to break bread, and to drink wine, in remembrance of Him, and to show forth His death till He should return again; but, in process of time, forgiveness of sins was connected with the bread and wine in a new manner, and they were supposed to be the means of obtaining it.

When Christ is exalted as the only Perfect One, man must be abased; but when man is exalted in any way, the Lord of glory will be robbed of His preeminence, and His work and name dishonoured. As long as believers were simply looking to Jesus they might think of the cloud of witnesses who died in faith, with gratitude to Him who made them what they were, and take courage: but there was no observance of Saints' days, till some peculiar holiness was supposed to exist in certain men, something of their own which might be honoured apart from Christ, and which made them more holy than other saved sinners. The Spirit of God, by the apostles, addressed all who believed in Christ Jesus, as saints, because they were sanctified by God the Father; but man, ever wandering from the truth in one way or another, chose to reserve the name of saints for those whom he supposed deserving, and gave them this title only after their death.

This error grew as rapidly as any other; and, in process of time, the bones of noted martyrs and saints were collected with other relics, and miraculous powers attributed to them. Nor was this all; from their nearness to Christ it was supposed they could grant any request made to them, or at any rate persuade the Lord himself to hear the prayers of the dwellers on earth; and with these ideas they were invoked, and their names put in the place of the precious name of Jesus. These grievous and soul-destroying errors were only introduced by degrees; but they may be traced back to that mistaken veneration for the martyrs which was first strikingly shown at the time of the Decian persecution.

Up to this period, Christians, notwithstanding their declension, and the many mere professors united with them by baptism, were all of one name: and it was only their numbers and distant abodes that prevented them from meeting together

FIRST SEPARATION AMONG CHRISTIANS.

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in one place wherever they existed. The sects were composed of heretics, and not of Christians bearing a different name. The Church had not become one with the world; for there were efforts made to shut out those who were " of the world," and persecution helped to diminish persons of that class. The many evils that existed were not, as it were, tolerated by men instructed in the word of God, and with consciences thereby enlightened; but resulted from real ignorance of the written word, and, consequently, want of light in the mind and conscience. The first separation of Christians from each other arose from the disputes concerning the treatment of those who had relapsed into idolatry: some being willing to receive them into fellowship on account of the recommendatory letters of the martyrs; others rightly desiring to wait till it could be ascertained whether their profession of Christianity were true or false. The wiser Christians at Rome censured, without exception, all who had fallen away in time of temptation, and were cautious not to receive them again into communion till they were proved to be on the Lord's side. Many indeed who had fallen away came back to claim their former places as soon as the death of Decius put an end to the persecution, but some of the elders rebuked their forwardness, saying, "Let them knock at the doors, but not break them; let them go to the threshold of the Church, but not leap over it. Let them watch at the gates of the heavenly camp with the modesty that becomes those who have been deserters. Let them be clothed with humility and take up the shield of faith that they dropped through fear of death," &c.

But there were some in the Church at Rome who thought the sin of idolatry so great, that the fallen ones ought not to be received even upon the sincerest repentance. Novatian was the leader of the party that separated from the body on this account it appears he was an honest Christian and sound in the faith; but he retained something of the stoical severity that he had gloried in before his conversion; and this was opposed to the tenderness that dictated those gracious words, "Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted." Many of the followers of Novatian afterwards returned mourning to the general assembly but the sect long existed; and it does not appear that

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CHURCH AT ROME, A. D. 250.

they held any doctrines contrary to the Gospel. The separatists at Carthage were of a different character, and, being mostly persons of a loose character, or evil disposition, determined to have communion with the apostates who were not received by the body. Cyprian wrote concerning_them, There is one God, one Christ, one Church; depart I pray you from these men, and avoid their discourse as a plague.' At the same time he desired that the fallen ones should be treated with much tenderness, in order that they might be recovered.

The description of the Church at Rome at this period differs greatly from the simple notice of it in the epistle of Paul, "all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints;" for, as it has been before remarked, when man begins to make church arrangements and additions to the simple rules in the written word, we know not where or when the exercise of his inventive powers will stop. That which was considered admirable in the third century would have been intolerable to the first believers: the yoke which neither they nor their fathers were able to bear was now restored in a new form, and the orders and ceremonies introduced into the Church were more in number than those prescribed in the book of Leviticus.

There were eight orders of clergy: the three first, bishops, priests, and archdeacons, being termed holy or sacred; the other five ranks were called the unconsecrated: all were ordained according to particular forms, mostly significant of the services required of them. The subdeacons and acolythists waited on the superior clergy during the different services: the exorcists, at their ordination, were furnished by the bishop with a book containing the forms for casting out devils; and these, with the laying on of their hands, were considered effectual towards those who were possessed. Besides these, there were the readers, the door-keepers, the psalm-singers, the gravemen, and the parabolani. The office of the latter was to watch over the sick. At Rome there was one bishop, forty-six priests, seven deacons, seven subdeacons, forty-two acolythists, fiftytwo exorcists, readers, porters, &c., and upwards of fifteen hundred widows and infirm persons supported with them by the voluntary contributions of the Church.

The work of persecution seems to have been the whole employment of the magistrates in the reign of Decius; and their object was so to vary and prolong the torture that impatience