progress. It numbered several thousand of the
faithful. It was already easy to foresee that its conquests would be
effected chiefly among the Hellenists and proselytes. The Galilean group
which had listened to the Master, though preserving always its
precedence, seemed as if swamped by the floods of newcomers speaking
Greek. One could already perceive that the principal parts were to be
played by the latter. At the time at which we are arrived no pagan, that
is to say, no man without some anterior connection with Judaism, had
entered into the Church. Proselytes, however, performed very important
functions in it. The circle _de provenance_ of the disciples had
likewise largely extended; it is no longer a simple little college of
Palestineans; we can count in it people from Cyprus, Antioch, and
Cyrene, and from almost all the points of the eastern coasts of the
Mediterranean, where Jewish colonies had been established. Egypt alone
was wanting in the primitive Church, and for a long time continued to be
so.

It was inevitable that the preachings of the new sect, although
delivered with so much reserve, should revive the animosities which had
accumulated against its Founder, and eventually brought about his death.
The Sadducee family of Hanan, who had caused the death of Jesus, was
still reigning. Joseph Caiaphas occupied, up to 36, the sovereign
pontificate, the effective power of which he gave over to his
father-in-law Hanan, and to his relatives, John and Alexander. These
arrogant and pitiless men viewed with impatience a troop of good and
holy people, without official title, winning the favor of the multitude.
Once or twice Peter, John, and the principal members of the apostolic
college were put in prison and condemned to flagellation. This was the
chastisement inflicted on heretics. The authorization of the Romans was
not necessary in order to apply it. As we might indeed suppose, these
brutalities only served to inflame the ardor of the apostles. They came
forth from the Sanhedrim, where they had just undergone flagellation,
rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Him whom
they loved. Eternal puerility of penal repressions applied to things of
the soul! They were regarded, no doubt, as men of order, as models of
prudence and wisdom; these blunderers, who seriously believed in the
year 36 to gain the upper hand of Christianity by means of a few strokes
of a whip!

These outrages proceeded chiefly