nes of the patristic eschatology were firmly
established.1

In seeking to understand and to give an exposition of this scheme
of faith, we have, besides various collateral aids, three chief
guidances. First, we possess the symbols or confessions of faith
put forth by several of the leading theologians of those times, or
by general councils, and openly adopted as authority in many of
the churches, the creed falsely called the Apostles', extant as
early as the close of the third century, the creed of Arius, that
of Cyril, the Nicene creed, the creed falsely named the
Athanasian, and others. Secondly, we have the valuable assistance
afforded by the treatises of Irenaus, Tertullian, Epiphanius,
Augustine, and others still later, on the heresies that had arisen
in the Church, treatises which make it easy to infer, by contrast
and construction, what was considered orthodox from the statement
of what was acknowledged heretical. And, thirdly, abundant
resources are afforded us in the extant theological dissertations,
and historical documents of the principal ecclesiastical authors
of the time in review, a cycle of well known names, sweeping from
Theophilus of Antioch to Photius of Byzantium, from Cyprian of
Carthage to Maurus of Mentz. We think that any candid person,
mastering these sources of information in the illustrating and
discriminating light of a sufficient knowledge of the previous and
the succeeding related opinions, will recognise in the following
abstract a fair representation of the doctrine of a future life as
it was held by the orthodox Fathers of the Christian Church in the
period extending from the first to the tenth century.

Before proceeding to set forth the common patristic scheme, a few
preliminary remarks are necessary in relation to some of the
peculiar, prominent features of Origen's theology, and in relation
to the rival systems of Augustine and Pelagius. Origen was a man
of vast learning, passionately fond of philosophy; and he
modifyingly mingled a great many Oriental and Platonic notions
with his theology. He imagined that innumerable worlds like this
had existed and perished before it, and that innumerable others
will do so after it in endless succession.2 He held that all souls
whether devils, men, angels, or of whatever rank were of the same
nature; that all who exist in material bodies are imprisoned in
them as a punishment for sins committed in a previous state; the
fig leaves in which Ada