s us how to use all the good gifts of God; and whilst
celibacy and protracted fasting may only generate misanthropy and
melancholy, faith, walking in the ways of obedience, can purify the
heart, and induce the peace that passeth all understanding.

CHAPTER V.

THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH.

For some time after the apostolic age, the doctrine of the Church
remained unchanged. Those who had been taught the gospel by the lips of
its inspired heralds could not have been readily induced to relinquish
any of its distinctive principles. It must, indeed, be admitted that the
purity of the evangelical creed was soon deteriorated by the admixture
of dogmas suggested by bigotry and superstition; but, it may safely be
asserted that, throughout the whole of the period now before us, its
elementary articles were substantially maintained by almost all the
Churches of the Empire.

Though there was still a pretty general agreement respecting the
cardinal points of Christianity, it is not to be thought strange that
the early writers occasionally expressed themselves in a way which would
now be considered loose or inaccurate. Errorists, by the controversies
they awakened, not unfrequently created much perplexity and confusion;
but, in general, the truth eventually issued from discussion with
renovated credit; for, in due time, acute and able advocates came
forward to prove that the articles assailed rested on an impregnable
foundation. During these debates it was found necessary to distinguish
the different shades of doctrine by the establishment of a fixed
terminology. The disputants were obliged to define with precision the
expressions they employed; and thus various forms of speech ceased to
have an equivocal meaning. But, in the second or third century, theology
had not assumed a scientific form; and the language of orthodoxy was, as
yet, unsettled. Hence, when treating of doctrinal questions, those whose
views were substantially correct sometimes gave their sanction to the
use of phrases which were afterwards condemned as the symbols of
heterodoxy. [446:1]

About the beginning of the third century all adults who were admitted to
baptism were required to make a declaration of their faith by assenting
to some such formula as that now called "The Apostles' Creed;" [446:2]
and though no general council had yet been held, the chief pastors of
the largest and most influential Churches maintained, by letters, an
official corre