OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. BY PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D., AUTHOR OF THE HISTORY OF THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH. FROM THE BIRTH OF CHRIST TO THE REIGN OF CONSTANTINE, Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, By CHARLES SCRIBNER, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. R. CRAIGHEAD, Printer, Stereotyper, and Electrotyper 81, 83, and 85 Centre Street. PREFACE. ENCOURAGED by the favorable reception of my History of the Apostolic Church, I now offer to the public a History of the Primitive Church from the birth of Christ to the reign of Constantine, as an independent and complete work in itself, and at the same time as the first volume of a general history of Christianity, which I promised several years ago, and which I hope, with the help of God, to bring down to the present age. The church of the first three centuries, or the ante-Nicene age, possesses a peculiar interest for Christians of all denominations, and has often been separately treated, by Eusebius, Mosheim, Milman, Kaye, Baur, Hagenbach, and other distinguished historians. It is the daughter of Apostolic Christianity, which itself constitutes the first and by far the most important chapter in its history, and the common mother of Catholicism and Protestantism, though materially differing from both. It presents a state of primitive simplicity and purity unsullied by contact with the secular power, but with this also, the fundamental forms of heresy and corruption, which reappear from time to time under new names and aspects, but must serve, in the overruling providence of God, to promote the cause of truth and righteousness. It is the heroic age of the church, and unfolds before us the sublime spectacle of our holy religion in intellectual and moral conflict with the combined superstition, policy, and wisdom of ancient Judaism and Paganism; yet growing in persecution, conquering in death, and amidst the severest trials giving birth to principles and institutions which, in more matured form, still control the greater part of Christendom. Without the least disposition to detract from the merits of my numerous predecessors, to several of whom I feel deeply indebted, I have reason to hope, that this new attempt at a historical reproduction of ancient Christianity will meet a want in our theological literature and commend itself, both by its |