Page:The rise, progress, and phases of human slavery.djvu/92

 Christ and his disciples, is to banish sin and slavery, crime and misery, from the world, but without pretending to any extraordinary mission, or to any other light than the revelations of Scripture interpreted and explained by reason. The Christianisme and the humanité of Pierre Leroux may be taken as samples of this modern revival of Christianity.

As a general rule, the early Christians exemplified in their lives the charity, the purity, and the disinterestedness enjoined by the Gospel; it was therefore they were so successful with the people. The persecutions of the pagans did not make them retaliate. They were too wise, too discreet, to rebel against laws or governments that could have crushed them at once; and for the unfortunate, deluded populace they had nothing but pity in the midst of their worst excesses. They knew it was ignorance alone that made the populace so furious against them: they knew they were the true friends of this populace; and that this populace would be their friend, if they could but understand each other. Hence the toleration preached and practised with such good effect in the early ages of the church. It is true, there were disputes and occasional intolerance amongst Christians from the first,—we have sundry proofs of it in Paul's Epistles, the Acts, and in the writings of the early Fathers; but it was not till after the legal establishment of Christianity that the guilt of intolerance or persecution could be charged against Christians as a body. Though corruption had been making way amongst them long before that, and though there were symptoms enough in the Church prognosticative of the dire effect that power and the mammon of unrighteousness might have upon them, yet the main body remained sound. What they suffered from the pagans naturally made them hold together for mutual aid and counsel; it also cemented in them habits of mutual love and tenderness for each other's feelings: above all, it confirmed them in their aversion to tyranny and intolerance, and enamoured them more and more of that Gospel which everywhere enjoins charity, tenderness, mercy, and self-denial for the sake of others. They remembered Christ's sermon on the mount, his unbounded compassion for sinners, his forgiveness of all, his love of little children, his humility, his readiness to be the servant of his followers, his teachings, fastings, prayers, and sufferings for all. These were ever present in their minds. They knew and felt that, guided by the spirit and precepts of the Gospel, by the conduct of its Author, and by the preachings and examples of his apostles, true Christians could not be otherwise than tolerant, forgiving, just, and affectionate towards one another.

The general conduct of Christians before the age of Constantine was in conformity with those maxims. They believed what they professed; and they practised what they believed. Upon this head the writings of the early Fathers are all but unanimous. We could cite a volume-full of exemplifications; but the fact, as an historical one, is notorious beyond the necessity for proof.

Up to the time of Constantine the progress of Christianity was