the indulgence which you extend to every other sect? But look at the effects of Christianity, and you will be forced to confess that it is something more than a species of philosophy; how otherwise can you account for the altered lives and morals of its professors-a change which philosophy has never yet produced in its votaries?"

The 76 conclusion of the Apology points out to us one cause of the rapid growth of Christianity, which has been overlooked by Mosheim-the admirable courage and constancy with which the Christians bore the torments inflicted upon them by their persecutors. "Proceed," says Tertullian to the provincial governors, "proceed in your career of cruelty; but do not suppose that you will thus accomplish your purpose of extinguishing the hated sect. We are like the grass; which more luxuriantly, the oftener it is mown.

76

grows

the

c. 50. In the Scorpiace our author argues, as if sufferings voluntarily endured in the defence of a religion, prove not merely the sincerity of the sufferer's persuasion, but also the truth of the religion. Cæterum pati oportebat omnem Dei prædicatorem et cultorem qui ad Idololatriam provocatus negâsset obsequium, secundum illius quoque rationis statum, qua et præsentibus tunc et posteris deinceps commendari veritatem oportebat, pro quâ fidem diceret passio ipsorum Defensorum ejus, quia nemo voluisset occidi, nisi compos veritatis,

c. 8.

The blood of Christians is the seed of Chris

tianity. Your Your philosophers taught men to despise pain and death by words; but how few their converts compared with those of the Christians, who teach by example? The very obstinacy with which you upbraid us is the great propagator of our doctrines. 77 For who can behold it, and not enquire into the nature of that faith which inspires such supernatural courage? Who can enquire into that faith, and not embrace it? who can embrace it, and not desire himself to undergo the same sufferings, in order that he may thus secure a participation in the fulness of the divine favour?"

78

*

I cannot quit this part of my subject without briefly noticing Gibbon's remarks on the Apologies published by the early Christians, in behalf of themselves and their religion. He admits that they expose with ability the absurdities of Polytheism; and describe with eloquence and force, the innocence and sufferings of their brethren. But when they attempt to demonstrate the divine origin of Christianity, then in his opinion they entirely fail; and the only feeling, which they excite in the mind of the reader, is regret that the

eause was not defended by abler advocates. He particularly blames them for insisting more strongly upon the predictions which announced, 79 than upon the miracles which accompanied the appearance of the Messiah. But in these remarks the Historian seems to me to proceed upon the erroneous supposition, that the Apology of Tertullian, and other works of a similar nature, were designed to be regular expositions of the evidences of Christianity.

Such

an idea never entered into the writer's mind. His immediate business was to defend Christianity against the attacks of its enemies-to correct their misrepresentations, and to refute their calumnies-to persuade them that it was not that combination of folly and crime which they supposed it to be that in a word they were bound to examine, before they condemned it. The object, therefore, at which he principally aimed was, not to marshal its evidences, but to give a full and perspicuous account of its doctrines and moral precepts. Yet

79

In the third Book against Marcion, Tertullian assigns the reason why he considers the evidence of miracles, as not alone sufficient to establish the truth of Christianity. Christ himself, he says, warned his Disciples that many should come in his name, shewing signs and wonders. (Matt. xxiv. 24.) It was, therefore, necessary to the complete establishment of his pretensions, that he should not only work miracles, but should in all respects fulfil the predictions of the prophets respecting his character and office, c. 3.

when he explains the notion of the Supreme Being, entertained by the Christians, he adverts, though concisely, to the grounds on which their belief was founded. 80 He shews that the testimony, borne to the existence of an Almighty Creator of the Universe, by his visible works without, and by the voice of conscience within us, is confirmed by the Jewish Scriptures; the claims of which to be received as a divine revelation he rests upon their superior antiquity, not only to the literature, but even to the gods of Greece, and upon the actual accomplishment of many of the prophecies contained in them. When again he proceeds to explain those doctrines which are more peculiarly Christian, he says that Christ was proved to be the Word of God, as well by the miserable state to which, agreeably to the prophecies of the Old Testament, the Jewish nation was reduced in consequence of its rejection of him, as by the miracles which he wrought during his residence upon earth. I know not what further evidence of the divine origin of Christianity Tertullian could be expected to produce, in a work designed to explain what it was, not to prove whence it

80

81

Apology, cc. 17, 18, 19, 20.

was derived. But had the latter been his professed object, are we competent to decide upon the train of reasoning which he ought to have pursued in order most readily to accomplish it? Arguments, which appear to us the most forcible, might have been thrown away upon the persons whom he was addressing; and we may surely give him credit for knowing by what means he was most likely to produce conviction in their minds. He has frequent recourse to the argument ad hominem; which, however lightly it may weigh in the estimation of the dispassionate and reflecting reader of the present day, was not without its effect in silencing the clamours of malice and of ignorance. They who think with 82 Daillé, that the exquisite wisdom and transcendant beauty of the rule of life prescribed in the Gospel constitute the strongest and surest proof of its divine origin, will also think that Tertullian, by simply stating the doctrines of Christianity, and appealing to the Scriptures in confirmation of his statement, adopted the most efficacious mode of extending its influence.

82 La Sagesse exquise et l'inestimable beauté de la discipline même de Jesus Christ, est, je l'avoue, le plus fort et le plus sûr argument de sa Verité. Quoted by Dr. Hey in his Lectures, Book I. end of c. 13.