A very extraordinary example of such popular credulity he gives at length in his account of a charlatan whom he had personally known-viz., Alexander of Abonotichus [Abonotichus stood on the shore of the Black Sea]. He tells, in a series of vivid and romantic incidents, how Alexander practised quack-niedicine and sleight-of-hand; and set up as an oracle, pretending that he had dug up brass plates inscribed with a prophecy of his advent as Æsculapius. His flowing hair, handsome face, purple tunic, and white cloak, his shining falchion, and the incantations which he muttered, filled the country-folk with admiration. From a goose's egg he made believe to hatch a serpent—a harmless snake which he had kept concealed till the auspicious moment. "I am the light of the world," the new-born serpent was alleged to have whispered. Alexander and his serpent dwelt in a specially-built temple. Crowds flocked from far and near to ask questions of the god. Profuse gifts flowed in upon the prophet. Rutilian, a Roman senator, became a dupe. Lucian was a friend of the senator, and determined to expose the prophet. Though possessed of convincing proofs of Alexander's deceptions, Lucian could not dissuade Rutilian from his folly. Returning from his errand by water, he narrowly escaped death, the crew having been hired by Alexander to throw Lucian overboard. The prophet lived to a good old age. The educated classes scorned him; and the Christians rejected his claims. Towards both his enmity was so marked that, at the opening of the mock-mysteries which he instituted, the proclamation was made to the people: "If any atheist, or Christian, or Epicurean be come as a spy, in a treacherous design, to these celebrations, let him depart hence !"*

Celsus lived and wrote (so the very scanty evidence seems to show) in the latter part of the second century. He issued a criticism of the Christian religion under the title of Alethes Logos; or, The True Word. The famous Origen (died 254) replied to Celsus in an essay containing eight books; and he has preserved numerous quotations which enable us to form an adequate notion of the character and

*Article in "Encyclopædia Britannica ;" article by J. A. Froude in Nineteenth Century, September, 1879; and translation of Lucian's works, published in 1820, by William Tooke.

contents of "The True Word." Celsus opens his discourse by putting on the stage of argument a Jew, who attacks the new religion from a Hebrew standpoint, and to this imaginary disputant Origen continually refers as "this Jew of Celsus." The Jew repeats the story, already given (pp. 133, 134) of the illegitimate birth of Jesus. He reproaches Jesus for not performing at the Temple, in the sight of the public, works which would have proved his divinity; and contemns him for having attempted to conceal himself from danger, and for having failed to awaken sufficient loyalty in his disciples to prevent the treason of Judas. The Jew rejects the resurrection-legend. Who saw the supposed risen Jesus? A "half-frantic woman," dreamers, impostors. "If Jesus," urges the critic, "desired to show that his power was really divine, he ought to have appeared to those who had ill-treated him, and to him who had condemned him, and to all men universally." Then Celsus, dropping his fictitious Jew, speaks in his own name. He points out that Christianity, which split off from Jewdom as the Jews had abandoned Egypt, showed a tendency to divide into sects and heresies. Only a low grade of intelligence, he avers, accepts the Christian myth. "We see, indeed, in

private houses workers in wool and leather, and fullers, and persons of the most uninstructed and rustic character, not venturing to utter a word in the presence of their elders and wiser masters; but when they get hold of the children privately, and certain women as ignorant as themselves, they pour forth wonderful statements to the effect that they ought not to give heed to their father and to their teachers, but should obey them [the Christian expounders]; that the former are foolish and stupid, and neither know nor can perform anything that is really good, being pre-occupied with empty trifles; that they alone know how men ought to live, and that, if the children obey them, they will both be happy themselves, and will make their home happy also. And while thus speaking, if they see one of the instructors of youth approaching, or one of the more intelligent class, or even the father himself, the more timid among them become afraid, while the more forward incite the children to throw off the yoke," etc. Celsus suspects the Christian doctrine of sin and conversion. "To change nature is an exceedingly difficult thing," he observes. And he objects

to the over-tenderness which the gospel exhibits towards the erring. Why, he proceeds, did God descend to the earth at all? God, he pleads, was "good, beautiful, and blessed, and that in the best and most beautiful degree." Such a God could not take on an imperfect incarnation; and to have assumed a mortal form in appearance only would have been a lie and deceit. He pours scorn on the Jews and Christians who, like bats or ants or frogs, imagine, with contemptible arrogance, that to them the great God has awarded a special and peculiar revelation of himself. Man is but an item in the cosmos. "All things were not made for man, any more than they were made for lions or eagles or dolphins, but that this world, as being God's work, might be perfect and entire in all respects. For this reason all things have been adjusted, not with reference to each other, but with regard to their bearing upon the whole. And God takes care of the whole, and his providence will never forsake it; and it does not become worse; nor does God after a time bring it back to himself; nor is he angry on account of men any more than on account of apes or flies; nor does he threaten these beings, each one of which has received its appointed lot in its proper place." Celsus considers the Platonic philosophy superior to the gospel. Plato did not set up supernatural claims, nor give minute descriptions of God's attributes, nor assert that God had a son on earth. The critic goes on to expose the inconsistency of a creed which admits the power of Satan in counterworking the designs of God himself. And if God, he remarks with sternness, really wished to reveal himself to mankind, would he choose so gross a method as Christians believed in? Would he have breathed his spirit into the body of a woman? Would he not have created a figure distinguished for grandeur, beauty, strength, and winsomeness? But Jesus was inconspicuous, ill-favoured, ignoble. Celsus beseeches these "body-loving Christians" to abandon such anthropomorphic ideas. If, turning away the eye of the body, you open the eye of the mind, thus, and thus only, will you be able to see God." To miss this divine intuition, and yearn after visible signs and tokens, was to walk as cripples and lead a merely animal life. latter pages of his "True Word " Celsus engages in a curious controversy on the subject of the gods or dæmons who

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presided over the changes of nature, the fruits of the earth, the course of life. To ignore these dæmons, who were the ministers of the Supreme, was to deny the divine government; and Christians might as well cut themselves off from the interests of life, abstain from marriage, and hasten to die. Origen replied by separating the spirits into evil demons, to whom no worship was due; and good angels, who claimed grateful recognition, but not adoration. Celsus, indeed, has a political end in view, as well as theological. For, after inviting the Christians to conform with the State ritual "if anyone commands you to celebrate the sun, or to sing a joyful triumphal song in praise of Minerva, you will, by celebrating their praises, seem to render the higher praise to God"-he expresses a fear lest Christian indifference may prove to be a danger to the Empire, and asks the followers of Jesus to "take office in the government of the country, if that is required for the maintenance of the laws and the support of religion."*

28. The Later Gnostics.-The Ophites, those strange religious groups who made tame serpents a central feature in their ceremonies, and whose doctrines had arisen earlier than the gospel of Jesus, naturally borrowed traditions and conceptions from the Christian creed. Four main sects

may be noticed. (1) The Naasenes, who esteemed the serpent as the emblem of that intellectual power which had lifted the first human pair to the possession of divine knowledge. (2) The Peratæ, who believed that the Son took the shape of a serpent; he redeemed men from the power of the bad Archon who rules the world; and it was he whom Moses represented by the serpent of brass. With this school were connected the Cainites, who sought to find a soul of good in evil things; thus they glorified Cain as a martyr who opposed the will of the tyrant Yahveh of the Old Testament; and they gave praise to Judas Iscariot as a hero who ingeniously contrived to bring Jesus to the blessed (3) The Sethites looked upon man's nature as threefold-the material, as in Cain; the psychical, as in Abel;

cross.

*

"Baur's "Church History," vol. ii.; the essay,

"Against Celsus,'

وو

in vols. x. and xxiii. of "The Ante-Nicene Christian Library;" article in "Encyclopædia Britannica."

the pneumatic, as in holy Seth, who was the first Gnostic. Seth had endeavoured to save an elect race in the ark of Noah, but wicked Ham crept in, and spoilt the plan of redemption; but, in after ages, Seth took the form of Christ, and achieved the noble work. (4) The followers of Justin [not Justin Martyr]. Justin gives the history of a long historic duel between the good angel, Baruch, and the malicious spirit, Naas. Baruch dwelt in the Edenic tree of life; Naas in the fatal tree of knowledge. Naas tempted Eve to her fall; Baruch inspired prophets to call mankind to the way of life. At length Baruch became incarnated in Jesus; Naas caused the tragedy of the crucifixion; the spirit of Jesus escaped to heaven, leaving his body and soul in the hands of the evil powers.

*

Towards the middle of the second century the opinion arose among certain Gnostic thinkers that the Christ to whom the Saints looked for salvation had never been embodied in true flesh and blood, but, as a phantom, had walked the earth and borne the suffering of Calvary. This doctrine of illusion is known as Docetism.†

Valentinus, whose name stands in the first rank of the Gnostics, went to Rome about 140, and taught his system for some twenty years. He developed a cosmogony, or plan of the universe, which dazzles with its complexity, and touches our sympathy by its profound aspirations. The Father of all, the Absolute Being, dwelt in silence. From this divine source pairs of Æons, male and female, came into existence, their names-Mind, Truth, Word, Life, Man, Church, etc.-indicating their symbolic character. The Eons, twenty-eight in number, constituted the august circle of the Pleroma. The youngest on is Sophia. She is a type of the restless desire of man after hidden wisdom. She tears herself from the company of the Pleroma, and flings herself into the awful Bythos, or Depth, wherein the Absolute resides. The union only produced an abortion; and Sophia, prostrate with grief and shame, was received back into the Pleroma by the compassionate Æons. The great Father now created two new Eons, the Christ and the Holy Spirit. The abortive offspring of Sophia becomes the

* Mansel's "Gnostics," lecture vii.; Kurtz's "History," section 27. + Baur's "Church History," vol. ii., part iii.