[341] the heretics
produced a multitude of histories, in which the actions and discourses
of Christ and of his apostles were adapted to their respective tenets.
[35] The success of the Gnostics was rapid and extensive. [36] They
covered Asia and Egypt, established themselves in Rome, and sometimes
penetrated into the provinces of the West. For the most part they arose
in the second century, flourished during the third, and were suppressed
in the fourth or fifth, by the prevalence of more fashionable
controversies, and by the superior ascendant of the reigning power.
Though they constantly disturbed the peace, and frequently disgraced the
name, of religion, they contributed to assist rather than to retard
the progress of Christianity. The Gentile converts, whose strongest
objections and prejudices were directed against the law of Moses, could
find admission into many Christian societies, which required not from
their untutored mind any belief of an antecedent revelation. Their faith
was insensibly fortified and enlarged, and the church was ultimately
benefited by the conquests of its most inveterate enemies. [37]

[Footnote 31: Hegesippus, ap. Euseb. l. iii. 32, iv. 22. Clemens
Alexandrin Stromat. vii. 17. * Note: The assertion of Hegesippus is not
so positive: it is sufficient to read the whole passage in Eusebius, to
see that the former part is modified by the matter. Hegesippus adds,
that up to this period the church had remained pure and immaculate as a
virgin. Those who labored to corrupt the doctrines of the gospel worked
as yet in obscurity--G]

[Footnote 32: In the account of the Gnostics of the second and third
centuries, Mosheim is ingenious and candid; Le Clerc dull, but exact;
Beausobre almost always an apologist; and it is much to be feared that
the primitive fathers are very frequently calumniators. * Note The
Histoire du Gnosticisme of M. Matter is at once the fairest and most
complete account of these sects.--M.]

[Footnote 33: See the catalogues of Irenaeus and Epiphanius. It must
indeed be allowed, that those writers were inclined to multiply the
number of sects which opposed the unity of the church.]

[Footnote 34: Eusebius, l. iv. c. 15. Sozomen, l. ii. c. 32. See in
Bayle, in the article of Marcion, a curious detail of a dispute on that
subject. It should seem that some of the Gnostics (the Basilidians)
declined, and even refused the honor of Martyrdom. Their reasons were
singular and abstruse. S