pt, and impossible state religion wherever the Roman
Empire was established and into the homes of purer and sterner faiths,
faiths that had belonged to the people through all the years of
conquest and settlement, migration and resettlement, wherever the
empire of Rome had not become established.

Until the advent of Christianity into Britain the Celtic peoples
possessed their own customs, their own religious beliefs, their own
usages. Until the Anglo-Saxons came into contact with Christianity in
their new settlements in England, they also possessed their own
customs, usages, and beliefs. So far as Celt and Teuton were
responsible for continuing or allowing to continue the still older
faiths, the faiths of savagery as we have accustomed ourselves to
term them, they brought these faiths also into contact with
Christianity, and Christianity dealt with the problem thus presented
exactly as it dealt with the Celtic and Teutonic faiths, namely, by
treating all alike as pagan, all equally to be set aside or used in
any fashion that circumstances might demand. Let it be particularly
noted that Christianity did not distinguish between the various shades
of paganism. All that was not Christian was pagan.

Christianity was both antagonistic to and tolerant of pagan custom and
belief. In principle and purpose it was antagonistic. In practice it
was tolerant where it could tolerate safely. At the centre it aimed at
purity of Christian doctrine, locally it permitted pagan practices to
be continued under Christian auspices. In the earliest days it set
itself against all forms of idolatry and non-Christian practices; in
later days, after the fifth century, says Gibbon,[444] it accepted
both pagan practice and pagan ritual.

The relationship of Christianity to paganism is, therefore, a very
complex subject, and it would not be possible in this place to work
out one tithe of it. Nor is it needed. The two cardinal facts with
which we are now concerned are the principle of antagonism and the
practice of toleration. As to the former there need not be any
discussion on the fact. Everywhere throughout Europe its effect is to
be seen. It formed the most solid and systematic arresting force
against the natural development of pagan belief and practice, and it
is this fact of arrested development in pagan belief and practice
which is of great importance. We can ascertain the point of stoppage,
note the stage of arrested development, and trace