first comes under our notice
in the year 190,[661] but we know that the struggle of the Church with
heresy was concluded in Alexandria at a later period than in the West.
We know further that the school of catechists extended its labours to
Palestine and Cappadocia as early as the year 200, and, to all
appearance, originated or encouraged scientific pursuits there.[662]
Finally, we know that the existence of this school was threatened in the
fourth decade of the third century; but Heraclas was shrewd enough to
reconcile the ecclesiastical and scientific interests.[663] In the
Alexandrian school of catechists the whole of Greek science was taught
and made to serve the purpose of Christian apologetics. Its first
teacher, who is well known to us from the writings he has left, is
_Clement of Alexandria_.[664] His main work is epoch-making. "Clement's
intention is nothing less than an introduction to Christianity, or,
speaking more correctly and in accordance with the spirit of his work,
an initiation into it. The task that Clement sets himself is an
introduction to what is inmost and highest in Christianity itself. He
aims, so to speak, at first making Christians perfect Christians by
means of a work of literature. By means of such a work he wished not
merely to repeat to the Christian what life has already done for him as
it is, but to elevate him to something still higher than what has been
revealed to him by the forms of initiation that the Church has created
for herself in the course of a history already dating back a century and
a half." To Clement therefore Gnosis, that is, the (Greek) philosophy of
religion, is not only a means of refuting heathenism and heresy, but at
the same time of ascertaining and setting forth what is highest and
inmost in Christianity. He views it as such, however, because, apart
from evangelical sayings, the Church tradition, both collectively and in
its details, is something foreign to him; he has subjected himself to
its authority, but he can only make it intellectually his own after
subjecting it to a scientific and philosophical treatment.[665] His
great work, which has rightly been called the boldest literary
undertaking in the history of the Church,[666] is consequently the first
attempt to use Holy Scripture and the Church tradition together with the
assumption that Christ as the Reason of the world is the source of all
truth, as the basis of a presentation of Christianity which at once