upon
temporary missions. This explains the obscurity in which the majority of
the members of the central council remained. Very few of them had a
_role_. This council was a kind of sacred college or senate, destined
only to represent tradition and a spirit of conservatism. It finished by
being relieved of every active function, so that its members had nothing
to do but to preach and pray; but as yet the brilliant feats of
preaching had not fallen to their lot. Their names were hardly known
outside Jerusalem, and about the year 70 or 80 the lists which were
given of these chosen Twelve agreed only in the principal names.

The "Brothers of the Lord" appear often by the side of the "apostles,"
although they were distinct from them. Their authority, however, was
equal to that of the apostles. Here two groups constituted, in the
nascent Church, a sort of aristocracy founded solely on the more or less
intimate relations that their members had had with the Master. These
were the men whom Paul denominated "the pillars" of the Church at
Jerusalem. For the rest, we see that no distinctions in the
ecclesiastical hierarchy yet existed. The title was nothing; the
personal authority was everything. The principle of ecclesiastical
celibacy was already established, but it required time to bring all
these germs to their complete development. Peter and Philip were married
and had sons and daughters.

The term used to designate the assembly of the faithful was the Hebrew
_Kahal_, which was rendered by the essentially democratic word
_Ecclesia_, which is the convocation of the people in the ancient
Grecian cities, the summons to the Pnyx or the _Agora_. Commencing with
the second or the third century before Jesus Christ, the words of the
Athenian democracy became a sort of common law in Hellenic language;
many of these terms, on account of their having been used in the Greek
confraternities, entered into the Christian vocabulary. It was, in
reality, the popular life, which, restrained for centuries, resumed its
power under forms altogether different. The primitive Church was, in its
way, a little democracy.

The power which was ascribed to the Church assembled and to its chiefs
was enormous. The Church conferred every mission, and was guided solely
in its choice by the signs given by the Spirit. Its authority went as
far as decreeing death. It is recorded that at the voice of Peter
several delinquents had fallen back and expired immedi