wife, all this oversets the manners and customs, and strikes at the religion and laws of the country.' L'Esprit des Loix, xvi. 2. xvii. 6. xix. 18. This acute author is of opinion that Christianity, humanly speaking, can never get footing and ground in the eastern countries, the nature of the climate, the constitution and complexion of the inhabitants, and their temper and manners and laws being repugnant to some precepts of the gospel. I ask then, How came it to pass that in the first and second centuries Christianity found admission and made a progress in those countries, notwithstanding these, and many other difficulties and impediments besides these? Must we not ascribe its success either to miracles wrought in its behalf, or to an extraordinary influence of the Spirit of God upon the minds of those who embraced it?' See Discourse iii. on the Christian Religion.' 6 ABOUT A. D. 150, flourished Justin, the first Christian author, after those who are called apostolical, a virtuous, pious, honest man, and incapable of wilfully deceiving, but a hasty writer, and of a warm and credulous temper. He was highly and justly esteemed by the antient Christians, and Eusebius makes honourable mention of him, as of one ἐν τῷ καθ ̓ ἡμᾶς διαπρέψας λόγῳ, qui inter religionis nostræ sectatores maxime floruit ;' and he speaks of his two Apologies, his Dialogue with Trypho, and some other treatises, and produces some passages from that Dialogue, which show that he had it as we have it now. , He wanted neither learning nor vivacity, nor an unartificial eloquence. The love of truth was his predominant passion, to which he sacrificed all worldly considerations, and for which he laid down his life with great resolution; and therefore whosoever loves truth, should love him and his memory. 'Galen,' says our amiable writer John Hales, Galen, that great physician, speaks thus of himself; Í know not how, even from my youth up, in a wonderful manner, whether by Divine inspiration, or by fury and possession, or however you may please to style it, I have much contemned the opinion of the many; but truth and knowledge I have above measure affected, verily persuading my self that a fairer, a more divine fortune could never befall a man. Some title, some little claim I may justly lay to the words of this excellent person; for the pursuit of truth hath been my only care ever since I understood the meaning of the word. For this I have forsaken all hopes, all friends, all desires, which might bias me, and hinder me from driving right at what I aimed. For this I have spent my money, my means, my youth, my age, and all that I have. If with all this cost and pains my purchase is but error, I may safely say, To err hath cost me more than it has many to find the truth and truth shall give me this testimony at last, that if I have missed of her, it is not my fault but my misfortune.' Justin would not perhaps have expressed himself upon this subject with the same strength and elegance; but he had the same heart and the same turn of mind. In the first Apology, he says to the emperors, 'We desire a fair trial, and no favour: if we be guilty, punish us; if we be innocent, protect us. We do not desire you to punish our calumniators: their own wickedness and ignorance is punishment enough. Οὐ γὰρ τοὺς κατηγοροῦντας κολάζειν ὑμᾶς ἀξιώσομεν· ἀρκοῦνται γὰρ τῇ προσούσῃ πονηρίᾳ, καὶ τῇ τῶν καλῶν ἀγνεία. Cicero had a thought of the same kind, but he spoiled it; he says somewhere, 'Odi hominem, et odero. Utinam ulcisci possem; sed ulciscentur illum mores sui.' We are slain with the sword,' says Justin, we are crucified, we are cast to the wild beasts, we are bound with chains, tortured, and burned; and yet we are not only constant to our profession, but we increase and multiply: the more we are persecuted and destroyed, the more are added to our numbers. As a vine by being pruned and cut close puts forth new shoots, and bears a greater abundance of fruit, so is it with us who are the vine which God and his Christ have planted. Ὁποῖον ἐὰν ἀμπέλου τὶς ἐκτέμη τὰ καρποφορήσαντα μέρη, εἰς τὸ ἀναβλαστῆσαι ἑτέρους κλάδους καὶ εὐθαλεῖς καὶ καρποφόρους ἀναδίδωσι τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον καὶ ἐφ' ἡμῖν γίνεται ἡ γὰρ φυτευθεῖσα ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἄμπελος, καὶ σωτῆρος Χριστοῦ, ὁ λαὸς αὐτοῦ ἐστι. Horace : Duris ut ilex tonsa bipennibus, Per damna, per cædes, ab ipso The account which Justin gives of himself, as seeking truth among the Philosophers, the Stoics, the Peripatetics, Pythagoreans, and Platonics, and finding it in Christianity, is spritely and entertaining, and so is the manner in which he censures the Jews. It was foretold of you,' says he to Trypho, that you should be as the sand of the sea-shore; and so indeed you are, if as numerous, as barren likewise, and as unfruitful of all that is good, ever ready to receive the refreshing dews and rain of heaven, and never willing and disposed to make any return.' p. 394. ed. Thirl. I shall not undertake the vindication of Justin concerning the celebrated statue erected to Simon Magus: I am inclined to think that he was mistaken, and that the proud Romans would never have deified a Samaritan knave, and a strolling magician. It seems more probable that they would have sent him to the house of correction, or have bestowed transportation upon him, or a a stone-doublet sooner than a statue. Dr. Thirlby, who pleads Justin's cause, concludes thus: Si quis autem quærat quid de hac re ipse sentiam, patroni me potius quam judicis partes egisse, negare non possum, quæque dixi, non tam veritatis gratia, quam Justini dixisse, cujus mihi cum editione defensio ex veteri more necessario suscipienda erat, etc.' It is easy enough to know what this means, though some persons have made a shift to misunderstand it. In behalf of Justin it might be said, that as worthless men as Simon had religious respect paid to them about the time when Justin wrote, or not long after. Alexander (the impostor perhaps and false prophet) and Peregrinus, called Proteus, another knave, both of whom Lucian has satirically celebrated, and of whom the latter burned himself publicly, and one Neryllinus, an obscure mortal, had statues erected to them at Troas and Parium in the time of Marcus Aurelius, and when Neryllinus was living, to which statues - λάϊνον χιτῶνα. Το επι ~ divine honours were paid, and which were said to give oracles, and to work miracles. So cheap was deification in those days! This we learn from Athenagoras. Τρωάς και Πάριον ἡ μὲν Νερυλλίνου εἰκόνας ἔχει, ὡς ἀνὴρ τῶν καθ ̓ ἡμᾶς τὸ δὲ Πάριον, Αλεξάνδρου καὶ Πρωτέος. Του ̓Αλεξάνδρου ἔτι ἐπὶ τῆς ἀγορᾶς καὶ ὁ τάφος, καὶ ἡ εἰκών. Οἱ μὲν οὖν ἄλ λοι ανδριάντες του Νηρυλλίνου, κόσμημά εἰσι δημόσιον—εἷς δὲ αὐτῶν καὶ χρηματίζειν καὶ ἰᾶσθαι νοσοῦντας νομίζεται καὶ θύουσί τε δι ̓ αὐτὰ, καὶ χρύσῳ περιαλείφουσι, καὶ στεφανοῦσι τὸν ἀνδριάντα, οἱ Τρωαδεῖς· ὁ δὲ τοῦ ̓Αλεξάνδρου, καὶ ὁ τοῦ Πρωτέως—ὁ μὲν καὶ αὐτὸς λέγεται χρηματίζειν τῷ δὲ τοῦ Αλεξάνδρου-δημοτελεῖς ἄγονται θυσίαι καὶ ἑορταὶ, ὡς ἐπηκόῳ θερ • Troas et Parium. Habet enim illa imagines Neryllini, viri qui nostro seculo vixit : Parium vero, Alexandri et Protei. Alexandri quidem etiamnum in foro et sepulcrum et simulacrum est. Porro Neryllini cæteræ quidem statuæ ornatus sunt publicus,-una vero ex illis tum consulentibus respondere, tum medicari dicitur. Quamobrem et sacra ei faciunt, et auro illinunt, et coronant statuam Troadenses. Protei vero statua-similiter responsa dare perhibetur. Alexandri vero statuæ-sacrificia publice et festa peragunt, tanquam propitio et exaudienti Deo.' p. 122. Ed. Ox. Epiphanes, the son of the heretic Carpocrates, and a heretic as well as his father, was deified about the middle of the second century, or the time when Justin wrote. The account is remarkable: Ἐπιφανὴς, οὗ καὶ τὰ συγγράμματα κομίζεται, ὑιὸς ἦν Καρποκράτους- τὰ μὲν πρὸς πατρὸς ̓Αλεξανδρεύς· ἀπὸ δὲ μητρὸς Κεφαλληνεὺς ἔζησε δὲ τὰ πάντα δέ ἔτη ἑπτακαίδεκα, καὶ Θεὸς ἐν Σάμη τῆς Κεφαλληνίας τετίμη ται· ἔνθα αὐτῷ ἱερὸν ῥυτῶν λίθων, βωμοί, τεμένη, μουσεῖον ᾠκο δόμηταί τε καὶ καθιέρωται καὶ συνιόντες εἰς τὸ ἱερὸν οἱ Κεφαλλήνες κατὰ νουμηνίαν, γενέθλιον ἀποθέωσιν θύουσιν Ἐπιφάνει σπένδουσί τε καὶ εὐωχοῦνται, καὶ ὕμνοι λέγονται. • Epiphanes, cujus etiam scripta feruntur, filius erat Carpocratis, ex patre quidem Alexandrinus, ex matre vero Cephalleneus. Vixit autem solum septendecim annis, et Samæ, quæ est urbs Cephalleniæ, ut Deus est honore affectus. Quo in loco templum ex ingentibus lapidibus, altaria, delubra, museum, ædificatum est et consecratum ; et cum est nova luna, convenientes Cephallenei, diem nata lem, quo in Deos relatus est Epiphanes, sacrificant, libantque et convivantur, et hymnos canunt.' Clemens Alex. Strom. iii. p. 511. Here is the canonization, or apotheosis, of a young heretic, performed in an exact and ample manner by these Cephallenean blockheads. Now Simon, it may be said, might have acquired such honours as easily as Epiphanes, who, though he were ingenious, was but a boy. If any one think that these examples tend to support Justin, they are at his service. Dr. Thirlby, when I once mentioned them to him, thought them observable, and fit to be produced on this subject. We have the acts of Justin's martyrdom, which seem in the main to be genuine, and to contain a true narration of his courageous behaviour, and of his sufferings. Without detracting from the merits of this worthy man, we ought to acknowledge what truth and plain matter of fact extort from us, that he and the rest of the Fathers are often poor and insufficient guides in things of judgment and criticism, and in the interpretation of the Scriptures, and sometimes in points of morality also and of doctrine, as Daillé, Whitby, Barbeyrac, and others have fully showed. The men themselves usually deserve much respect, and their writings are highly useful on several accounts; but it is better to defer too little, than too much, to their decisions, and to the authority of Antiquity, that handmaid to Scripture, as she is called. She is like Briareus, and has a hundred hands, and these hands often clash and beat one another. The genuineness of Justin's Dialogue hath been called in question by Christianus Gotlieb Kochius, Gothofredus Wagnerus, and I know not who, whose names, if Fabricius and Thirlby had not preserved them from oblivion, would have been lost long ago. Father Harduin also, though for a time he thought fit to spare this valuable treatise, yet afterwards, I think, did it the honour to reject it, along with the rest of Justin's works; which is one argument, and not a bad one, in its favour. a The learned defender of Dr. Chapman's Charge hath pointed out their utility, p. 40, &c. |