ixing process, a plain proof that the setting up of
dogmatic formulae has always been the support of new formations. But the
example set by the Gnostics was the very thing that rendered the problem
difficult. Where was a beginning to be made? "There is a kind of
unconscious logic in the minds of masses of men when great questions are
abroad, which some one thinker throws into suitable form."[33] There
could be no doubt that the needful thing was to fix what was
"apostolic," for the one certain thing was that Christianity was based
on a divine revelation which had been transmitted through the medium of
the Apostles to the Churches of the whole earth. It certainly was not a
single individual who hit on the expedient of affirming the fixed forms
employed by the Churches in their solemn transactions to be apostolic in
the strict sense. It must have come about by a natural process. But the
confession of the Father, Son, and Spirit and the _kerygma_ of Jesus
Christ had the most prominent place among these forms. The special
emphasising of these articles, in opposition to the Gnostic and
Marcionite undertakings, may also be viewed as the result of the "common
sense" of all those who clung to the belief that the Father of Jesus
Christ was the creator of the world, and that the Son of God really
appeared in the flesh. But that was not everywhere sufficient, for, even
admitting that about the period between 150 and 180 A.D. all the
Churches had a fixed creed which they regarded as apostolic in the
strict sense--and this cannot be proved,--the most dangerous of all
Gnostic schools, viz., those of Valentinus, could recognise this creed,
since they already possessed the art of explaining a given text in
whatever way they chose. What was needed was an apostolic creed
_definitely interpreted_; for it was only by the aid of a definite
interpretation that the creed could be used to repel the Gnostic
speculations and the Marcionite conception of Christianity.

In this state of matters the Church of Rome, the proceedings of which
are known to us through Irenaeus and Tertullian, took, with regard to the
fixed Roman baptismal confession ascribed to the Apostles, the following
step: The Antignostic interpretation required by the necessities of the
times was proclaimed as its self-evident content; the confession, thus
explained, was designated as the "Catholic faith" ("fides catholica"),
that is the rule of truth for the faith; and its accepta