2.

issued, forbidding their punishment, unless for crimes against the State; nor was their profession of Christianity to be considered as such.

2. Yet this was not sufficient to secure them from the malicious vigilance of their enemies; for at this time, some earthquakes, which happened in Asia, afforded a pretext for persecution. The impiety of the Christians was considered as a provocation to the gods, and the cause of these calamities. The generous Antoninus, informed of these things, published an edict, ordaining, that if any one accused a Christian of a crime that he was not able to prove, the accuser himself shall be obnoxious to capital punishment.

MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS.

HE countenanced accusations against the Christians under any form; and the most flagrant perjuries were admitted to effect their ruin. Under his reign, the glory of Christianity appeared amidst the most barbarous and diabolical modes of torture. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, added new credit to the cause of Christ, by his triumphant martyrdom. When the pro-consul offered him his release if he would speak reproachfully of Christ, he replied, " Eighty and six years I have served him, and he never did me an injury; how, then, can I blaspheme my King, who is my Saviour ?"

2. When commanded, as the term of pardon, to swear by the fortune of Cesar, he nobly answered, "Hear me plainly, I am a Christian." When threatened to be thrown to the wild beasts, he said, "Bring out the lions !" Being then condemned to be burnt, he told the pro-consul, "You threaten me with fire that burns for an hour, but are ignorant of that eternal fire, which is reserved for the impious. But why do you delay ? Order what you will." The hoary saint was carried to the stake, exuited in the flames, and rose to glory.

3. The renowned apologist, Justin Pothenus, Bishop of Lyons, and many other emineut men, suffered martyrdom in this reign.

COMMODUS.

PEACE generally reigned throughout the Churches, and many characters of the first consequence were added to the Lord, particularly at Rome. But here Appellonius, a senator, was accused of Christianity, and with much eloquence and boldness defended his profession before the senate; for which he was condemned to death.

SEVERUS.

PERSECUTION now appeared in its most tremenlous form; and seas of sacred blood were shed in Asia and Egypt: but at Alexandria (which Eusebius calls the noblest stadium of God) the greatest number of victims fell. Some were fastened to crosses; others torn to pieces with nails of iron; some were beheaded, as the mildest death; others were exposed to wild beasts; and others burnt alive. And thus closed the second century, amidst the infernal triumphs of persecution.

2. Amongst a great number of renowned sufferers are to be reckoned Leonides, the father of Origen. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, and a celebrated Christian lady, named Potamiæna, who gained immortal dignity by suf fering. Her whole body being torn by scourges, hot scalding pitch was by little and little poured from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet; whilst Divine grace shone with peculiar lustre, in her patience, and fortitude, amidst such studied, cruel torments.

3. Tertullian, a native of Carthage, stood up as an apologist for the Christians at this time, and essentially contributed to the advancement of the best of canses ; a cause which, "though the kings of the earth, and the rulers thereof, have taken counsel together to destroy," Omnipotence has been employed to preserve; and it remains to the present day an illustrious name, and a praise among all people of the earth.

THE INTRODUCTION OF THE GOSPEL INTO BRITAIN.

IT would be a pleasing circumstance, and doubtless contribute much to the gratification of every serious thinking mind, if we were capable of traeing the footsteps of Divine Providence, in its first advances toward the island of Great Britain, to introduce that religion which constitutes the supreme dignity of any nation.

2. Upon this, as well as upon various other occasions, we have to lament the fruitlessness of our researches. Those records which might have given light to the subject, were probably destroyed amidst the desolations made by those barbarous northern neighbours, in their early and frequent ravages of this island. And the probability is increased, by a certainty that those Pagan invaders manifested more than common rage against every thing which had the most distant affinity to the Christian name. A few fragments, some of them of doubtful authority, are the testimonies to which we must appeal; and thereby substitute probability for certainty.

3. How or when this island was first peopled, we know not; but it is likely that the people of England owe their origin to the prolific sons of Japheth, who, after the destruction of the old world, inhabited the continental part of Europe, and so might easily have passed from the Gallic or Belgic shore to this country. However, this is certain, that, in common with all the gentile world besides, for time immemorial " thick darkness had covered our land.”

4. The religion of our rude forefathers was called Druidism, Druid being the title of their priests: a particular account of which may be seen in Cesar's Commentaries, lib. 6. The custom of those idolaters mentioned in Scripture, particularly obtained here. "Under every thick oak did they offer sweet sacrifice to all their idols," Ezek. vi. 13. According to the abomination of Moloch, they sacrificed human victims to appease their gods.

5. In the fifty-fifth year before the birth of Christ, Julius Cesar, under the dominion of his prevailing passion, a desire of false glory, invaded this country, and

subjugated a part of its inhabitants. Hereby, though he knew it not, he made way for the establishment of an empire, which has seen the glory of Rome set in eternal night; and which, according to the appointment of Him who cannot err, shall survive all the dominions of the world.

6. The precise point of time when the banner of the cross was displayed in Britain we know not; but various testimonies concur in giving it a very early date; nor are such to be rejected, which intimate that some of the apostles, and even Paul himself, had been employed in the great work. Those who wish to see those evidences collected, may consult Archbishop Usher's Britannicarum Ecclesiarum Antiquitates, cap. 1.

7. When St. Paul was at Rome it is clear that he was acquainted with a fady named Claudia (2 Tim. iv. 21.) which person we have reason to suppose, was a native of Britain, and wife of Pudens, mentioned in the same place.* Whether she had been converted in her native country, or having married an officer in the Roman army, then in Britain, and returning with him to Rome, were received the Gospel of salvation, it is impossible to ascertain.

8. If we admit the latter circumstance, it is reasonable to suppose, that, sensible of the value of her own soul, she would have commiserated the wretched situation of her lost countrymen, and solicitously importuned her apostolic friend to convey to them the tidings of mercy through a Saviour's blood. If he, who was eminently the apostle of the Gentiles, did not in his own person engage in the benevolent design, it is probable he might have procured some of his companions," men who hazarded their lives for the name of Jesus Christ," to diffuse the light of life to those who were sitting in "the region of the shadow of death ;" and hereby have erected an altar to the true God.

9. But, allowing this to have been the case, it is certain that the polluted system of Pagan idolatry prevailed in general for many years afterwards. Christianity was only as the gleaning of a vintage till the year 176,

* Compare Martial, Epigram 54, lib. 2, and Epigram 13, lib. 4.

when Lucius, a British king, bowed to the Redeemer's name. This event was favourable to the Gospel; hereby it made a considerable progress, and, possibly, in reference to which Tertullian spoke, Britannorum loca Romanis inaccessa, Christo vero subdita: "The doctrine of Christ was more prevalent in Britain than the arms of Cesar." The first Christian king in the world was a Briton.

10. In short, though these conclusions may receive some prejudice from the imputation of monkish superstition, yet, when we candidly review all the evidences deducible, it must be confessed, that whilst an inscrutable Providence passed by vast multitudes of the fallen race, and suffered many of them to continue to the present day without a knowledge of his law, this country was very early distinguished by his gracious attention, "who giveth not account of any of his matters."

11. Now for more than 1600 years the Gospel of the Son of God has been preached in Great Britain, and though oppositions of various kinds have been made to it, every attempt for its destruction has been defeated. It has spread by persecution, and gained vigour by resistance. In the present day it raises its majestic head on high; and though its best friends have to lament that so few comparatively have really believed the record which God has given of his Son, yet they rejoice that, collectively, a great number of the inhabitants of that land are found on the Lord's side, who are not ashamed of his Gospel, but have experimentally proved it to be "his power to their salvation.”

THE STATE OF CHRISTIANITY IN THE THIRD
CENTURY.

AS a certain consequence of that authority which the Roman power still maintained in the world, it must evidently appear, that the state of Christianity would have been dependent thereon in a considerable degree, as both at Rome, and all its provinces, the Christians were to be found in great numbers. The lenity with which