More than this, Aurelian appreciated the value of the episcopate which had Rome for its centre as a conservative and patriotic element in the state; for when a quarrel was raging at Antioch as to the ecclesiastical party to which the church buildings, and consequently the church property, belonged of right, he ignored the theoretical disqualifications of the church before the law and decided that possession was due to that party which was “in epistolary correspondence with the bishops of Italy and the city of Rome.” That is to say, he was already using the church to reinforce the Roman spirit in the East. But what warrant had he to interfere? Thus much: the disputant parties in the church had themselves applied to him to decide their quarrel. Thus, forty years before the time of Constantine the church had appealed to the emperor to arbitrate in a question of canon law, and the emperor had practically acknowledged the existence of the church and its value as a pillar of imperial authority.
If, in addition to this, we consider that the church already possessed buildings, land, and property in every province of the empire; that the clergy, in the large towns, at least, were very numerous and represented a strictly organised scale of hierarchical degrees; that by their assistance the bishops directed and superintended all the affairs of the communities in even the most trivial details; that each community was likewise an effective organisation for the relief of the poor; and, finally, that in many provinces the country districts were overspread by a close network of provincial bishoprics and parishes, we shall no longer be surprised that even the emperor Alexander regarded the system of church government with envious eyes.
The civil and military system of the empire was falling into decay, the legions were permanent centres of revolution, the generals born pretenders; but the milites Christi were everywhere united in compact squadrons, and, though many internal dissensions might prevail amongst these troops, they confronted the state as a single army. The state had no other alternative than to try and destroy this army, as Decius, Valerian, Diocletian, and Maximinus Daza would fain have done, or to enter into alliance with it, as Constantine did. After the middle of the third century a policy of laissez-aller or weak toleration was an impossibility. The church seems also to have been numerically strong—though this is a point which has not been exhaustively examined as yet. As early as the year 251 the Roman bishop Cornelius wrote: “Besides the one bishop, there are at Rome forty-six priests, seven deacons, seven sub-deacons, forty-two acolytes, fifty-two exorcists, lectors, and ostiarii, and more than fifteen hundred widows and needy persons, all of whom are maintained by the grace and goodness of the Lord.”
(2) During the last decades of the third century Christian life underwent a virtual amalgamation with that of the world. The Christian who desired to live a life apart from the world became a member of a distinct class, the ascetics, or withdrew into the desert; the rest—i.e., the vast majority, had come to terms with the world. There was no class, from senators to artisans, in which Christians were not to be found, and in each class they fulfilled the obligations of their station. They were, indeed, bound to eschew certain callings (e.g., municipal appointments, which were all too closely bound up with “idolatry,” the theatrical profession, etc.), but the admonitions and penalties which were promulgated and denounced against the infringement of these prohibitions show that they were not always regarded. Certain facts, such as that, in the year 255, a Christian bishop in Spain was at the same time a member of a pagan society and had his children interred in the burying-ground of the said society; that a Syrian presbyter was director of the imperial purple-dye factory at Tyre; that a metropolitan bishop of Antioch was a ducenarius; that not a few of the clergy engaged in trade and travelled to the annual fairs—give us a clear insight into the amalgamation of Christian life with the life of the world. And it is very significant that Origen, in his pamphlet against Celsus, draws a comparison between Christian and municipal communities in order to commend the moral advantage of the former, and merely demands an admission of their superiority. That is, he insists on a difference of degree only, and refrains from contrasting the Christian communities with the municipal communities, like light with darkness.
Thus Christianity was no longer separated from the “world” in practical life, as every persecution made abundantly plain, for at first the number of apostates always exceeded that of confessors. The Christians only gathered strength as the persecutions proceeded. They were practically “exclusive” no longer, except in matters of religion in the strict sense of the word. Why should not the state tolerate them? The malicious aspersions on their moral character had died away into silence. Was it not madness on the part of the government to continue to persecute people, who were more conscientious and peaceable citizens than many others, and did not disturb the organisation and functions of public life? If they would not give up their exclusive faith, then the government must give them leave to hold it—a way out of the difficulty so simple that it would have been adopted long before the time of Constantine if the Christians, on their part, had not stipulated for certain conditions. Their God was not to be merely tolerated, he was to reign alone in the sphere of belief. With the world they had already come to terms.
(3) With regard to doctrine, the astounding labours of Origen brought the preparatory work of earlier Christian theologians to a kind of conclusion in the East; in the West, doctrine and learning never played more than a subordinate part. Origen worked the doctrines of Christianity up into a religious system which was able to vie with the systems of the neo-Platonists and give them battle upon equal terms. His schools at Alexandria and Cæsarea were attended by even pagan young men, and continued to flourish after his death; his pupils and their pupils occupied the episcopal sees of the most important cities. It was no longer possible to esteem Christianity a religion for mechanics, slaves, and old women. The Christian “mythology” which gave so much offence was not actually altered, but it was spiritualised by the application of the allegoric method. In this form the majority of philosophers and men of culture found it endurable; for they were accustomed to employ the allegoric method in the interpretation of their own religious traditions, and to transmute base images and repulsive tales into sublime conceptions and the history of ideas. Even the solemn confession of Jesus Christ was so expressed by philosophical bishops that it sounded like a brief philosophical dissertation.
Strictly speaking, there were only three points on which Christian dogma differed essentially from the neo-Platonic which was then in the ascendant; the former taught the creation of the world in time, the incarnation of the Logos, and the resurrection of the flesh; the latter rejected all these three doctrines. Nevertheless the pupils of Origen conceived of these theological propositions in such wise that the assertion was very like a denial, and they made common cause with the neo-Platonists in their contest with the dualistic-pessimistic school of philosophy. Christian philosophy was in the mid-current of the intellectual movement, and it was therefore a singular anachronism that the state could not as yet bring itself to place those who professed it upon the same footing as other citizens.
(4) The literature produced and read by Christians was by this time hardly to be distinguished from literature in general. It differed only in name; the spirit was the same, if we leave out of consideration the texts of Scripture which the Christians interwove in their books. The legends of Apostles and Martyrs took the place of the old stories of gods and heroes, and adopted from the latter whatever element of fiction they could make serve their turn. The forms of epistolary and literary correspondence had already won full acceptance among Christians; their dedications, plots, titles, and headings were those of pagan literature. In this last connection we note particularly how ceremonious the “brethren” have become. Finally, educated Christians were familiar with the whole body of profane scholastic literature, derived their culture from it and used it for example and quotation. The shoot of Christian literature had been grafted on the stock of Hellenism, and the sap of it streamed through the new branch.
(5) With regard to public worship we note the following changes during the sixty years before the time of Constantine. In the first place the ritual became more solemn and mysterious; the prayers more studied and rhetorical; symbols and symbolic acts were multiplied; and secondly, there was an increased tendency to meet halfway the polytheistic leanings which swayed the Christian masses. This is indicated, on the one hand, by the constantly increasing importance attached to “intercessors” (angels, saints, and martyrs) both in public worship and in private life; and, on the other, by the “naturalisation” and differentiation of religious rites after the manner of pagan ceremonials. An observer watching a Christian religious service about the year 300 would hardly have realised that these Christians were monotheists, and in words proudly professed their monotheism and spiritual worship. Except the bloody sacrifice, they had adopted almost every part and form of pagan ritual ceremonial; and, in fact, the bloody sacrifice was not lacking, for the death of Christ and the celebration of the Lord’s Supper were dealt with in materialistic fashion as bloody sacrifices. They were fond of appealing to the Old Testament to warrant the innovations, and in virtue of this appeal nearly the whole pagan system of worship could be dragged into the church.