s, of Berea or Aleppo,
and of Antioch. The prophetic introduction of the Apocalypse has
described and immortalized the seven churches of Asia; Ephesus, Smyrna,
Pergamus, Thyatira, [154] Sardes, Laodicea and Philadelphia; and their
colonies were soon diffused over that populous country. In a very early
period, the islands of Cyprus and Crete, the provinces of Thrace and
Macedonia, gave a favorable reception to the new religion; and Christian
republics were soon founded in the cities of Corinth, of Sparta, and of
Athens. [155] The antiquity of the Greek and Asiatic churches allowed a
sufficient space of time for their increase and multiplication; and
even the swarms of Gnostics and other heretics serve to display the
flourishing condition of the orthodox church, since the appellation of
hereties has always been applied to the less numerous party. To these
domestic testimonies we may add the confession, the complaints, and the
apprehensions of the Gentiles themselves. From the writings of Lucian, a
philosopher who had studied mankind, and who describes their manners in
the most lively colors, we may learn that, under the reign of Commodus,
his native country of Pontus was filled with Epicureans and Christians.
[156] Within fourscore years after the death of Christ, [157] the humane
Pliny laments the magnitude of the evil which he vainly attempted
to eradicate. In his very curious epistle to the emperor Trajan, he
affirms, that the temples were almost deserted, that the sacred victims
scarcely found any purchasers, and that the superstition had not only
infected the cities, but had even spread itself into the villages
and the open country of Pontus and Bithynia. [158]

[Footnote 154: The Alogians (Epiphanius de Haeres. 51) disputed the
genuineness of the Apocalypse, because the church of Thyatira was not
yet founded. Epiphanius, who allows the fact, extricates himself from
the difficulty by ingeniously supposing that St. John wrote in the
spirit of prophecy. See Abauzit, Discours sur l'Apocalypse.]

[Footnote 155: The epistles of Ignatius and Dionysius (ap. Euseb. iv.
23) point out many churches in Asia and Greece. That of Athens seems to
have been one of the least flourishing.]

[Footnote 156: Lucian in Alexandro, c. 25. Christianity however, must
have been very unequally diffused over Pontus; since, in the middle of
the third century, there was no more than seventeen believers in
the extensive diocese of Neo-Caesarea. S