that the
exalted name which described that unity should be transferred to the
communities in different places which shared the life, the privileges,
and the responsibilities of the whole, and in many ways stood to those
who composed them severally for the whole. The divisions between these
communities were local only. They arose from the limitations to
intercourse and common action which distance imposed. Or, in cases where
the Church in some Christian's house is referred to, they were due to
the necessity, or the great convenience, of meeting in small numbers,
owing to the want of buildings for Christian worship, or the hostility
of the surrounding population. Moreover these local bodies were not
suffered to forget the ties which bound them all together. Those in the
Greek-speaking world were required to send alms to the Churches in
Judaea. Again an individual Church was not free to disregard the judgment
of the rest. After St Paul has reasoned with the Corinthians on the
subject of a practice which he deemed inexpedient, he clinches the
matter by declaring, "we have no such custom neither the Churches of
God[12]." Lastly, the Apostles, and preeminently St Paul, through their
mission which, if not world-wide, at least extended over large
districts, and the care of the Churches which they exercised, and the
authority which they claimed in the name of Christ, and which was
conceded to them, were a unifying power.

Thus the plural "the Churches" has in important respects a different
connotation in the New Testament from that which it has in modern times.
In the Apostolic Age the distinction between the Church and the Churches
is connected only with the different degrees to which a common life
could be realised according to geographical proximity. By a division of
this nature the idea of One Universal Church was not compromised. The
local body of Christians in point of fact rightly regarded itself as
representative of the whole body. The Christians in that place were the
Church so far as it extended there.

The preservation of unity within the Church of each place where it was
imperilled by rivalries and jealousies and misunderstandings, such as
are too apt to shew themselves when men are in close contact with one
another, and of unity between the Churches of regions remote from one
another, in which case the sense of it is likely to be weak through want
of knowledge and consequently of sympathy--these appear as twin-aim