Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/138

 102 THE HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL EUROPE Christian reaction against ancient learning and civilization. Gnosticism, on the other hand, was a heresy of the second century which adopted the cosmology and astrology of the ancients and interpreted Christian story in the light of them. Many men of that day were inclined to take the Gospel story as a sort of allegory rather than as history, or to hold that God had never really become man, but that Christ was a kind of phantom or celestial image. The most dangerous heresy during the period of the Roman Empire was Arian- ism, which, the orthodox held, relegated Christ to a second- ary place compared to God the Father. Arianism in the fourth century had a strong hold in the East and most of the barbarian invaders of the fifth century were Arians. To prevent heresy church unity and organization devel- oped. The bishop became the chief local authority and one Develop- was elected by the members of the Christian Xurchor- community in each city. By the middle of the ganization third century the Christian Cyprian, in his Unity of the Church, declares that there is only one Catholic Church, and that no one outside it can be saved even though he suffer a martyr's death " for confessing the name of Christ." For "he can no longer have God for his father who has not the Church for his mother." In order to keep the various bishops in agreement two customs grew up. One was to have the bishops of a given area meet together; Cyprian, for instance, during the ten years that he was Bishop of Carthage called a number of such meetings or local church councils. Another method was to look to some one Christian community as a model or authority in doctrine and as an umpire in disputes. The church at Rome seems from an early date to have been thus looked up to; the sees of Alexandria and Antioch perhaps came next in importance. The bishops in such places were known as metropolitans or archbishops. The early Christians were very unfavorably regarded by Roman society. It is hard for us to realize that Christians, who have always prided themselves upon their lofty moral standards and regarded other faiths and rites as supersti-