fidence could not be very frequent,
and the general uses to which their liberality was applied reflected
honor on the religious society. A decent portion was reserved for the
maintenance of the bishop and his clergy; a sufficient sum was allotted
for the expenses of the public worship, of which the feasts of love, the
agapoe, as they were called, constituted a very pleasing part. The
whole remainder was the sacred patrimony of the poor. According to
the discretion of the bishop, it was distributed to support widows and
orphans, the lame, the sick, and the aged of the community; to comfort
strangers and pilgrims, and to alleviate the misfortunes of prisoners
and captives, more especially when their sufferings had been occasioned
by their firm attachment to the cause of religion. [141] A generous
intercourse of charity united the most distant provinces, and the
smaller congregations were cheerfully assisted by the alms of their more
opulent brethren. [142] Such an institution, which paid less regard to
the merit than to the distress of the object, very materially conduced
to the progress of Christianity. The Pagans, who were actuated by a
sense of humanity, while they derided the doctrines, acknowledged the
benevolence, of the new sect. [143] The prospect of immediate relief and
of future protection allured into its hospitable bosom many of those
unhappy persons whom the neglect of the world would have abandoned to
the miseries of want, of sickness, and of old age. There is some reason
likewise to believe that great numbers of infants, who, according to the
inhuman practice of the times, had been exposed by their parents, were
frequently rescued from death, baptized, educated, and maintained by the
piety of the Christians, and at the expense of the public treasure. [144]

[Footnote 139: Constitut. Apostol. ii. 35.]

[Footnote 140: Cyprian de Lapsis, p. 89. Epistol. 65. The charge is
confirmed by the 19th and 20th canon of the council of Illiberis.]

[Footnote 141: See the apologies of Justin, Tertullian, &c.]

[Footnote 142: The wealth and liberality of the Romans to their most distant
brethren is gratefully celebrated by Dionysius of Corinth, ap. Euseb. l.
iv. c. 23.]

[Footnote 143: See Lucian iu Peregrin. Julian (Epist. 49) seems
mortified that the Christian charity maintains not only their own, but
likewise the heathen poor.]

[Footnote 144: Such, at least, has been the laudable conduct of more
modern missionari