comprehended almost the whole of the civilized world, and thus included
within it nations whose habits, customs, and sentiments essentially
differed, and whom it required the most dexterous policy to unite in one
community, or to subject to one government. The most effectual method by
which, during the commonwealth, and at the rise of the empire, this had
been accomplished, was a politic respect to the religious opinions which
all these nations entertained. Not only were their modes of worship
treated with scrupulous reverence, but their gods, in conformity with
the genius of Paganism, were incorporated or associated with the deities
of Rome, and they were thus joined to their conquerors by the strongest
ties by which the affections can be secured. At all times religion had
been an object of prominent interest with the Romans: at the foundation
of the city, Romulus had professed to be directed by Heaven: during the
whole period of the republic, the most sacred attention had been paid to
the rites and ceremonies sanctioned by the prevailing superstition, the
prosperity of the state was invariably ascribed to the protection of the
gods, and the most impressive solemnities, combined with the richest
splendour and magnificence, cast around polytheism a mysterious
sanctity, which even the philosophers affected to revere. Precautions
accordingly had been early taken to prevent innovations upon the
established ritual; foreign rites were prohibited till they had obtained
the sanction of the senate; and when the solicitation of this sanction
was neglected, the persons guilty of the neglect were frequently
punished. From the nature of Paganism, it was perfectly consistent with
its spirit to conjoin, with any particular mode of it, the forms which
elsewhere prevailed. These additions left all which had been previously
honoured in unimpaired vigour and influence, and, in fact, only
increased the appearance of profound regard for religion, which the
Romans so long assumed. But this part of the political constitution,
lightly as it affected other religions, at once struck at the root of
Christianity, which, unlike the prevailing modifications of idolatry,
prohibited the worship of all the deities before whose altars mankind
had for ages bent, and required, as essential for obtaining the divine
favour, that they who believed in it should pay undivided homage to the
one God, whose existence it revealed. The extension of the Gospel thus
necessarily carried with it opposition to the most ancient and most
revered law of the empire, and it was impossible for those who judged of
it merely from this circumstance, without investigating its nature and
tendency, to hesitate in directing against it the statutes which the
zeal of their fathers had provided, to prevent such a revolution as
would be produced by so thorough and so alarming a change in their
religious principles. No sooner, however, had the message of salvation
been addressed indiscriminately to all men, and, from the evidence by
which it was accompanied, had brought numbers to acknowledge the
heavenly source from which it is derived, than the detestation of it
previously entertained burst forth in all its violence; and it is
apparent that this had been widely and openly expressed before any
imperial edicts were directed against the Christians. Tacitus, in the
celebrated passage in which he mentions the disciples of Jesus, and
which refers to a period not more than thirty years distant from the
ascension, represents it as notorious in Rome, that Christ, during the
reign of Tiberius, had been put to death as a criminal; he asserts that
his adherents had long been odious on account of their enormities; he
laments that their destructive superstition had found its way to the
capital of the empire; and he attributes the melancholy fate to which
they were condemned to the general persuasion, that they were actuated
by hatred to the whole human race. It is necessary to keep this fact
steadily in view, to form an accurate idea of that opposition which
Christianity had to encounter. This opposition is not to be estimated
merely by reference to particular statutes, or even to be considered as
fully exhibited when we have gathered together the public proceedings
which have been recorded in history, or deplored in the writings of
those who sought to avert them. It is to be remembered that even when
the laws which the frantic zeal of some of the emperors had enacted were
repealed, the general law of the empire was still in force; that it was
competent for every one who had the cruelty to do so, to turn it against
the Christians; and that the firm, though mistaken, conviction that the
Christian profession involved in it the most revolting impiety, the most
tremendous guilt, and the most dangerous hostility to the best interests
of the state, would lead numbers to indulge their antipathy, when little
notice was taken of the sufferers, and would keep the disciples of the
hated faith in a state of unceasing alarm. (See _Persecution_.) What was
the effect of this depressing situation? Did it check the dissemination
of the Gospel, or confine it to the men by whom it was preached? So far
was this from being the case, that from the period of the death, and, as
it must here he termed, the alleged resurrection of Jesus, it was
embraced by immense numbers in all the countries to which it was
conveyed; and even while they were contemplating the sacrifices and the
trials to which, by attaching themselves to it, they would be exposed,
they did not hesitate to relinquish the religion in which they had been
educated, and to exchange for misery and death all the comforts which
the strongest feelings and propensities of our nature lead men to value
and to pursue. Finally, imperial Rome bowed to the religion it had
persecuted, and the emperor Constantine became a Christian.
3. The propagation of Christianity assumes a new aspect after it became
the religion of the empire, and was guarded by the protection and
surrounded by the munificence of imperial power. The causes which, in
the first stage of its existence, had most powerfully acted against it,
were now turned to its support; and all the motives by which men are
usually guided led them to enter with, at least, apparent conviction
into its sanctuaries. Not only was persecution, after the reign of
Constantine, at an end, but with the exception of the short reign of
Julian, who, having apostatized from Christianity, and become
intoxicated with the fascinating speculations of the Platonic
philosophy, was eager to raise the temples which his predecessor had
laid in ruins, promotion and wealth and honour could be most effectually
secured by transferring to the Gospel the zeal which had been in vain
exhausted to preserve the sinking fabric of Paganism and idolatry. The
emperors, who had displayed their zeal and their attachment to the
religion of Jesus, by forcing their own subjects to profess it,
conceived it to be their duty to communicate so great a blessing to all
the nations which they could influence; and when they found it necessary
to declare war against the savage tribes which pressed upon the
frontiers, or forced themselves within the precincts of the empire, they
carried on hostilities with the view of rendering these instrumental no
less to the diffusion of their religious tenets, than to the vindication
of their authority, and the security of their dominions. The vanquished
invaders felt little reluctance to purchase the forbearance or the
clemency of their conquerors, by submitting to receive their religion;
and this species of conversion, so little connected with the great
objects which revelation was designed to accomplish, leaving, in fact,
all the gross superstitious practices and all the immoral abominations
which had previously existed, was boastfully held forth as a decisive
proof of the triumph of the Gospel.
4. The foundation of the empire, not long after the days of Constantine,
began to be shaken: and it experienced numberless assaults and
convulsions, till it was finally divided into the eastern and western
empires. The luxury and wealth which had enervated their possessors, and
destroyed the heroism and intrepidity by which their ancestors had been
distinguished, presented the most powerful temptations to the lawless
bands which, driven from the sterile regions of the north of Europe, had
pressed forward to seek for new and more favoured habitations. The
feeble attempts to turn aside, by bribery, these ferocious barbarians
increased the danger which they were intended to remove; and the history
of Europe presents, for several ages, the disgusting spectacle of war,
conducted with an atrocity eclipsing the stern virtues which sometimes
were strikingly displayed. But although the insubordination of this
turbulent and sanguinary period was little favourable to the mild
influence of genuine Christianity, it did not prove so fatal to it as
might have been apprehended; and it was even instrumental in extending
its nominal dominion. Mankind, when scarcely emerged from barbarism, and
attached to no particular country, but seeking wherever it can be found
the food necessary for themselves and the flocks upon which they in a
great measure depend, although they entertain those sentiments with
regard to religion which seem almost interwoven with our nature, feel
little attachment to any one system of superstition, and are open to the
reception of new doctrines, which an association with what they value
may have led them to venerate. When, accordingly, the tribes which
finally overran the Roman empire had ceased from the destructive
contests by which they got possession of the regions that had long been
blessed with civilization and enlightened by science, they surveyed with
amazement and with admiration the people whom they had conquered; they
were delighted with the luxuries which abounded among them; they were
charmed with their manners and customs; and they eagerly conformed to
institutions from which they hoped that they should reap what the
original inhabitants of their settlement had enjoyed. The religion of
the vanquished they contemplated with reverence; they connected it with
the wealth, the refinement, and the power which they saw spread around
them; and they easily exchanged the rude and careless worship of their
native deities, for the polished and splendid devotional rites, which,
with the most imposing solemnity, were celebrated by the Christians.
Hence, they soon embraced the religion by which it was believed that
these rites were prescribed; and they communicated it to the nations
with whom they still maintained an alliance. There is no doubt that
motives very little connected with the conviction of the understanding
led to the progress of Christianity now described; and, in fact, that
progress was occasioned by causes so different from those which should
have produced it, that, had circumstances been changed, and had the
religion of Jesus been continued to be persecuted by the most powerful
states, multitudes who affected to revere it would, upon the same ground
on which their veneration rested, have exerted themselves to deride its
tenets, and to exterminate its professors.
5. But it was not the secular arm alone that was stretched forth to lead
men to the reception of Christianity. The church, after it had been
firmly established, and had, amidst the riches and honours with which it
was endowed, forgotten that it should not have been of this world,
conceived it incumbent, as an evidence of its zeal, or, as was too often
the case, for extending its power and its influence, to make attempts to
substitute the cross of Christ for the emblems of Paganism. In
accomplishing this object, it employed different means. But although the
conversions which took place, from the establishment of Christianity
till the restoration of learning, or the reformation, which forms a new
æra in the dissemination of the Gospel, were often unfortunately very
far from planting the word of life in the hearts of those to whom it was
conveyed, they were very extensive. They reached to almost every country
in Europe; to Arabia, China, Judea, and many other parts of Asia; and
the obscure tribes, to whom no missionaries were despatched, gradually
conformed to the religion of those more powerful states upon which they
depended, or to which they looked with respect or veneration.
6. Mohammedanism, however, arrested the progress of Christianity in some
of these countries, and humbled it and oppressed it in others; but since
the reformation, and especially within the last century, it has been
extended, not so much by conquest, as by the legitimate means of
colonization, and by missions and education, to the most distant and
important parts of the world, to China, India, Africa, the American
Islands, and those of the Pacific Ocean. The zeal, self-denial, and
successes, of those missionaries, who have been sent forth within a few
years by various Protestant societies, and their great successes form,
indeed, a splendid section in the modern history of the church. They
have sown the seed in almost every land, and the fruit has spread itself
throughout the world.
CHRONICLES, _Books of_. This name is given to two historical books of
Scripture, which the Hebrews call _Dibri-Jamim_, “Words of Days,” that
is, “Diaries,” or “Journals.” They are called in the LXX,
_Paralipomena_, which signifies, “things omitted;” as if these books
were a supplement of what had been omitted, or too much abridged, in the
books of Kings, and other historical books of Scripture. And, indeed, we
find in them many particulars which are not extant elsewhere: but it
must not be thought that these are the records, or books of the acts, of
the kings of Judah and Israel, so often referred to. Those ancient
registers were much more extensive than these are; and the books of
Chronicles themselves refer to those original memoirs, and make long
extracts from them. They were compiled, and probably by Ezra, from the
ancient chronicles of the kings of Judah and Israel just now mentioned,
and they may be considered as a kind of supplement to the preceding
books of Scripture. The former part of the first book of Chronicles
contains a great variety of genealogical tables, beginning with Adam;
and in particular gives a circumstantial account of the twelve tribes,
which must have been very valuable to the Jews after their return from
captivity. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David, from all
of whom it was predicted that the Saviour of the world should be born,
are here marked with precision. These genealogies occupy the first nine
chapters, and in the tenth is recorded the death of Saul From the
eleventh chapter to the end of the book, we have a history of the reign
of David, with a detailed statement of his preparation for the building
of the temple, of his regulations respecting the priests and Levites,
and his appointment of musicians for the public service of religion. The
second book of Chronicles contains a brief sketch of the Jewish history,
from the accession of Solomon to the return from the Babylonian
captivity, being a period of four hundred and eighty years; and in both
these books we find many particulars not noticed in the other historical
books of Scripture.
CHRYSOLITE, Rev. xxi, 20, a precious stone of a golden colour. Schroder
says it is the gem now called the Indian topaz, which is of a yellowish
green colour, and very beautiful.
CHRYSOPRASUS, Rev. xxi, 20, a precious stone, which Pliny classes among
the beryls; the best of which, he says, are of a sea-green colour; after
these he mentions the chrysoberyls, which are a little paler, inclining
to golden colour; and next, a sort still paler, and by some reckoned a
distinct species, and called chrysoprasus.
CHURCH. The Greek word ἐκκλησία, so rendered, denotes an assembly met
about business, whether spiritual or temporal, Acts xix, 32, 39. It is
understood also of the collective body of Christians, or all those over
the face of the earth who profess to believe in Christ, and acknowledge
him to be the Saviour of mankind; this is called the visible church. But
by the word _church_, we are more strictly to understand the whole body
of God’s true people, in every period of time: this is the invisible or
spiritual church. The people of God on earth are called the church
militant, and those in heaven the church triumphant. It has been
remarked by Dr. John Owen, that sin having entered into the world, God
was pleased to found his church (the catholic or universal church) in
the promise of the Messiah given to Adam; that this promise contained in
it something of the nature of a covenant, including the grace which God
designed to show to sinners in the Messiah, and the obedience which he
required from them; and that consequently, from its first promulgation,
that promise became the sole foundation of the church and of the whole
worship of God therein. Prior to the days of Abraham, this church,
though scattered up and down the world, and subject to many changes in
its worship through the addition of new revelations, was still but one
and the same, because founded in the same covenant, and interested
thereby in all the benefits or privileges that God had granted, or would
at any time grant. In process of time, God was pleased to restrict his
church, as far as visible acknowledgment went, in a great measure, to
the seed of Abraham. With the latter he renewed his covenant, requiring
that he should walk before him and be upright. He also constituted him
the father of the faithful, or of all them that believe, and the “heir
of the world.” So that since the days of Abraham, the church has, in
every age, been founded upon the covenant made with that patriarch, and
on the work of redemption which was to be performed according to that
covenant. Now wheresoever this covenant made with Abraham is, and with
whomsoever it is established, with them is the church of God, and to
them all the promises and privileges of the church really belong. Hence
we may learn that at the coming of the Messiah, there was not one church
taken away and another set up in its room; but the church continued the
same, in those that were the children of Abraham, according to the
faith. It is common with divines to speak of the Jewish and the
Christian churches, as though they were two distinct and totally
different things; but that is not a correct view of the matter. The
Christian church is not another church, but the very same that was
before the coming of Christ, having the same faith with it, and
interested in the same covenant. Great alterations indeed were made in
the outward state and condition of the church, by the coming of the
Messiah. The carnal privilege of the Jews, in their separation from
other nations to give birth to the Messiah, then failed, and with that
also their claim on that account to be the children of Abraham. The
ordinances of worship suited to that state of things then expired, and
came to an end. New ordinances of worship were appointed, suitable to
the new light and grace which were then bestowed upon the church. The
Gentiles came into the faith of Abraham along with the Jews, being made
joint partakers with them in his blessing. But none of these things, nor
the whole collectively, did make such an alteration in the church, but
that it was still one and the same. The olive tree was still the same,
only some branches were broken off, and others grafted into it. The Jews
fell, and the Gentiles came in their room. And this may enable us to
determine the difference between the Jews and Christians relative to the
Old Testament promises. They are all made to the church. No individual
has any interest in them except by virtue of his membership with the
church. The church is, and always was, one and the same. The Jewish
plea, is, that the church is with them, because they are the children of
Abraham according to the flesh. Christians reply, that their privilege
on that ground was of another nature, and ended with the coming of the
Messiah: that the church of God, unto whom all the promises belong, are
only those who are heirs of the faith of Abraham, believing as he did,
and are consequently interested in his covenant. These are Zion,
Jerusalem, Israel, Jacob, the temple, or church of God.
2. By a particular church we understand an assembly of Christians united
together, and meeting in one place, for the solemn worship of God. To
this agrees the definition given by the compilers of the Thirty-nine
Articles of the Church of England: “A congregation of faithful men, in
which the true word of God is preached, and the sacraments duly
administered according to Christ’s ordinances, in all those things that
of necessity are requisite to the same,” Acts ix, 31; xx, 17; Gal. i, 2,
22; 1 Cor. xiv, 34; Col. iv, 15. The word is now also used to denote any
particular denomination of Christians, distinguished by particular
doctrines, ceremonies, &c, as the Romish church, the Greek church, the
English church, &c.
3. On the subject of the church, opinions as opposite or varying as
possible have been held, from that of the Papists, who contend for its
visible unity throughout the world under a visible head, down to that of
the Independents, who consider the universal church as composed of
congregational churches, each perfect in itself, and entirely
independent of every other. The first opinion is manifestly contradicted
by the language of the Apostles, who, while they teach that there is but
one church, composed of believers throughout the world, think it not at
all inconsistent with this to speak of “the churches of Judea,” “of
Achaia,” “the seven churches of Asia,” “the church at Ephesus,” &c.
Among themselves the Apostles had no common head; but planted churches
and gave directions for their government, in most cases without any
apparent correspondence with each other. The Popish doctrine is
certainly not found in their writings; and so far were they from making
provision for the government of this one supposed church, by the
appointment of one visible and exclusive head, that they provide for the
future government of the respective churches raised up by them in a
totally different manner, that is, by the ordination of ministers for
each church, who are indifferently called bishops, and presbyters, and
pastors. The only unity of which they speak is the unity of the whole
church in Christ, the invisible head, by faith; and the unity produced
by “fervent love toward each other.” Nor has the Popish doctrine of the
visible unity of the church any countenance from early antiquity. The
best ecclesiastical historians have showed, that, through the greater
part of the second century, the Christian churches were independent of
each other. “Each Christian assembly,” says Mosheim, “was a little state
governed by its own laws, which were either enacted, or at least
approved, by the society. But in process of time, all the churches of a
province were formed into one large ecclesiastical body, which, like
confederate states, assembled at certain times in order to deliberate
about the common interests of the whole.” So far indeed this union of
churches appears to have been a wise and useful arrangement, although
afterward it was carried to an injurious extreme, until finally it gave
birth to the assumptions of the bishop of Rome, as universal bishop; a
claim, however, which, when most successful, was but partially submitted
to, the eastern churches having, for the most part, always maintained
their independence. No very large association of churches of any kind
existed till toward the close of the second century, which sufficiently
refutes the papal argument from antiquity. The independence of the early
Christian churches does not, however, appear to have resembled that of
the churches which, in modern times, are called Independent. During the
lives of the Apostles and Evangelists they were certainly subject to
their counsel and control, which proves that the independency of
separate societies was not the first form of the church. It may, indeed,
be allowed, that some of the smaller and more insulated churches might,
after the death of the Apostles and Evangelists, retain this form for
some considerable time; but the larger churches, in the chief cities,
and those planted in populous neighbourhoods, had many presbyters, and,
as the members multiplied, they had several separate assemblies or
congregations, yet all under the same common government. And when
churches were raised up in the neighbourhood of cities, the appointment
of _chorepiscopi_, or country bishops, and of visiting presbyters, both
acting under the presbytery of the city, with the bishop at its head, is
sufficiently in proof, that the ancient churches, especially the larger
and more prosperous of them, existed in that form which, in modern
times, we should call a religious connection, subject to a common
government. This appears to have arisen out of the very circumstance of
the increase of the church, through the zeal of the first Christians;
and it was doubtless much more in the spirit of the very first
discipline exercised by the Apostles and Evangelists, (when none of the
churches were independent, but remained under the government of those
who had been chiefly instrumental in raising them up,) to place
themselves under a common inspection, and to unite the weak with the
strong, and the newly converted with those who were “in Christ before
them.” There was also in this, greater security afforded both for the
continuance of wholesome doctrine, and of godly discipline.
4. Church members are those who compose or belong to the visible church.
As to the real church, the true members of it are such as come out from
the world, 2 Cor. vi, 17; who are born again, 1 Peter i, 23; or made new
creatures, 2 Cor. v, 17; whose faith works by love to God and all
mankind, Gal. v, 6; James ii, 14, 26; who walk in all the ordinances of
the Lord blameless. None but such are members of the true church; nor
should any be admitted into any particular church without some evidence
of their earnestly seeking this state of salvation.
5. Church fellowship is the communion that the members enjoy one with
another. The ends of church fellowship are, the maintenance and
exhibition of a system of sound doctrine; the support of the ordinances
of evangelical worship in their purity and simplicity; the impartial
exercise of church government and discipline; the promotion of holiness
in all manner of conversation. The more particular duties are, earnest
study to keep peace and unity; bearing of one another’s burdens, Gal.
vi, 1, 2; earnest endeavours to prevent each other’s stumbling, 1 Cor.
x, 23–33; Heb. x, 24–27; Rom. xiv, 13; steadfast continuance in the
faith and worship of the Gospel, Acts ii, 42; praying for and
sympathizing with each other, 1 Sam. xii, 23; Eph. vi, 18. The
advantages are, peculiar incitement to holiness; the right to some
promises applicable to none but those who attend the ordinances of God,
and hold communion with the saints, Psalm xcii, 13; cxxxii, 13, 16;
xxxvi, 8; Jer. xxxi, 12; the being placed under the watchful eye of
pastors, Heb. xiii, 7; that they may restore each other if they fall,
Gal. vi, 1; and the more effectually promote the cause of true religion.