maintaining their allegiance to him as their only Lord and Saviour, their interests for eternity were secure, Matt. x. 22.

His apostles and immediate followers found the case to be precisely as he had apprised them, of which we have numerous instances in the Acts of the Apostles; for no sooner had he left the earth, and they began to set up his kingdom, by the preaching of his Gospel, baptizing disciples, and forming them into churches, in a state of separation from the unbelieving world, than they experienced the truth of all he had told them concerning the reception they should meet with. Allow me to remind you, in this place, of a few things which they have left us upon record touching this matter. Paul writing to the Romans, ch. viii. 36, quotes the words of the Psalmist and applies them to the case of himself and fellow Christians: "For thy sake, we are killed all the day long-we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter." And to the Corinthians he says, "I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were appointed to death; for we are made a spectacle unto the world, to angels, and to men," 1 Cor. iv. 9. He commends the brethren of Thessalonica, in that "they became followers of the churches of God which in Judæa were in Christ Jesus; for," says he, "ye also have suffered like things of your own countrymen, even as they have of the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us—and they please not God and are contrary to all men; forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway-for which the wrath (of God) is come upon them to the uttermost," 1 Thess. ii. 14-16. To the Hebrews he says, "Call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions. Partly whilst ye were made a gazing stock, both by reproaches and afflictions; and partly whilst ye became companions of them that were so used for ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance," ch. x. 32---34.

It were easy to produce additional attestations of what the primitive disciples had to undergo in maintaining their attachment to Christ and his cause; but these are sufficient for my present purpose---which is to impress upon you this fact, that,

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in those days, the Christian profession was not made at so cheap a rate as it is done in the age in which our lot is cast. Those among the Jews who were heartily attached to Jesus, as the Messiah, went forth to him "without the camp of Israel, bearing his reproach--while the Gentile converts had to come out from all religious fellowship with their idolatrous kindred and neighbours---to touch not the unclean thing--to take up the cross daily-following the footsteps of their divine Master "through evil report and good report"—and laying their account with the loss of all things for his sake. This often put their faith and confidence to the test. Their case much resembles that of the apostle Peter, of which we have an account in Matt. xiv. 22-28. The circumstances were these:-The disciples of the Saviour had taken ship to cross the sea of Gennesareth; but while they were on board the night came on-a violent storm arose, and the disciples were at their wits' end what to do. In this extremity, Jesus appeared to them, walking upon the troubled waves; and Peter, seeing him, called out, "Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee upon the waters: and he said come." Accordingly Peter committed himself to the sea, and began to go to Jesus, but looking around him, and viewing the swelling surges and rolling billows, his heart failed him, and, beginning to sink, he cried, "Lord save me." It would be difficult to find language which could furnish us with a more striking description of the state of the Christian profession at the period on the history of which we are about to enter, and to which we shall now proceed :

At the beginning of the second century of the Christian æra the sceptre of Imperial Rome was swayed by Trajan, who ascended the throne of the Cæsars in the year 98. Between him and the tyrant Domitian there had indeed intervened the short but brilliant reign of Nerva, which lasted only sixteen months and eight days, when the empire had to deplore the untimely death of one of the best monarchs with which Rome had ever been favoured. Under his mild administration of the laws, the people were every where contented and happy. He extended his clemency to all who were imprisoned for treason; called home all that had been banished during the tyrannical reign of his predecessor; restored the sequestrated estates; punished in

formers, and, to the utmost of his power, redressed the grievances of every description of his subjects. To Christians he allowed the freest toleration, not permittiug any to persecute either them or the Jews, though the former were generally regarded as Atheists, having neither temples, altars, nor sacrifices, which the Heathen considered as essential to a profession of religion.

Mr. Gibbon, the celebrated historian, has remarked, concerning this period, that "were a man called to fix upon an epoch in the history of the world during which the condition of the human race was the most happy and prosperous, he would without hesitation name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus," namely, from the year 98 to 193, a period of about a century. "The vast extent of the Roman empire," says he, "was governed by absolute power, under the guidance of virtue and wisdom. The armies were restrained by the firm but gentle hand of four successive emperors, whose character and authority commanded involuntary respect. The public administration was conducted by the virtues and abilities of Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the Antonines, who delighted in the image of liberty, and were pleased with considering themselves as the accountable ministers of the law."

This is an enchanting picture of the political state of the empire; but we must keep in mind that the government was Heathen, and that Paganism was the established religion. Had the Gospel allowed its friends to indulge in that intercommunity of worship which was a leading feature of Polytheism, we cannot doubt that the rulers and magistrates would have cheerfully extended to them the same toleration that was afforded to other professions. Such, however, was not the case. The Jews had been separated from all other nations, to maintain the worship of the true God; and though they were often seduced from their allegiance, and fell into the idolatrous practices of the surrounding nations, they never failed to be chastised for it, as an infraction of the covenant that God had entered into with their forefathers. Their unsociable spirit, however, drew down upon them the scorn and hatred of the more polished Greeks and Romans. "If the Jews," "If the Jews," says Celsus, "adhere to their own law, it is not for that they are to

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blame. I rather blame those who forsake their own country religion to embrace the Jewish; but if those people give themselves airs of sublimer wisdom than the rest of the world, and on that score refuse all communion with it, as not equally pure, I must tell them that it is not to be believed that they are more agreeable to God than other nations." Hence among the Pagans the Jews came to be distinguished from all other people by the title of " a race of men odious to the gods." Such was the case with the Jews, and an attention to it may help us to account for many things connected with the reception which Christianity first obtained among the Romans.

In whatever relates to the worship of the one living and true God, as well as in their opposition to the worship of all idols, the most intimate relationship exists between Judaism and Christianity. The latter arose upon the foundation—or, if you will, on the ruins of the former. The great author of Christanity not only recognized the existence of one eternal Jehovah, the first cause of all things, and the alone object of religious worship, but he showed the utmost zeal against transferring to any other the glory which is exclusively due to him. So far was the Gospel from relaxing the rigorous bonds of Judaism on this point, that, if possible, it carried the rule of duty still higher. It inculcated the necessity of all men forsaking their own national religions, and turning from the worship of dumb idols to serve the living and true God.; and hence it brought upon itself that indignation and hatred of the Pagan world which led to a series of persecutions, and deluged the empire for two centuries with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Jesus. Hence we see how it came to pass that such mild and tolerant emperors as Trajan and Mark Antony came to be found in the first rank of persecutors. The true reason is, that Christianity forbade its friends to pour out libations or throw a grain of incense on the Pagan altars; and this unsociable, uncommunicable temper, in matters of religious worship, could be regarded by the best of them in no other light than as arising from an aversion to mankind. Universal prejudice had brought men to regard a refusal of this intercommunity as a vice which ought to be punished by the civil magistrate, though supported by the uniform testimony of Scripture.

Trajan became emperor in the year 98, and soon afterwards

conferred the government of the province of Bithynia on his friend, the ingenious and celebrated Pliny, one of the finest characters that ancient history can boast. In the exercise of his office as Proconsul, the Christians, against whom the severe edicts which had been issued by Nero and Domitian were still in force, were brought before his tribunal. As Pliny had never had occasion to be present at any such examinations before, the immense number of the accused, and the severity of the laws that were in force against them, appear to have struck him with surprise, and caused him to doubt how far it was proper to enforce them, without first consulting the emperor on the subject. The letter which he wrote to Trajan on this occasion, and the emperor's reply to it, have been preserved, and are among the most valuable monuments of antiquity, for the light which they pour upon the state of Christianity at the beginning of the second century. The following is Pliny's letter, which seems to have been written in the year 106 or 107:

66 SIRE,

PLINY TO THE EMPEROR TRAJAN.

" It is my usual custom to consult you on every point of difficulty; for, where my own judgment hesitates, who can be more competent to direct me than yourself, or to instruct me where I am uninformed?

"I never had occasion to be present at an examination of the Christians before I came into this province: I am, therefore, ignorant to what extent it is usual to inflict punishment, or urge prosecution. I have also hesitated whether there should not be some distinction made between the young and the old, the tender and the robust; whether pardon ought not to be offered to penitence, or whether the guilt of an avowed profession of Christianity can be expiated by the most unequivocal retractationwhether the profession itself is to be regarded as a crime, however innocent in other respects the professor may be: or whether the crimes attached to the name must be proved, before they become liable to punishment.

"In the mean time, the method I have hitherto observed with the Christians, who have been accused as such, has been as fol