apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

POLYCARP THE ELDER. 465
divers creeds and cults was Asia Minor. In the earlier part
of the
second century
it is
probable that Polycarp may have witnessed in proconsular
Asia, what Pliny describes as taking place in the neighbouring
regions of Pontus and Bithynia — large and rapid accessions to the
Church of Christ from all ranks and ages, threatening to empty the
heathen temples and to starve the heathen rites'. But soon after he
would find himself face to face with a movement which, if
his faith had
failed him, must have filled him with apprehension. Already, before the
close of the first
century of the Christian era, signs were visible of a
reaction against the philosophic and worldly scepticism which for
some
generations had been undermining the popular religions and threatened
to reduce them to a heap of crumbling ruins. The contrast between
the elder and the younger Pliny marks the period of transition. The
avowed disbelief of the uncle is
replaced by the religious activity of the
nephev.-'. With the second century the pagan reaction set in vigorously,
and in the age of the Antonines — at the epoch of Polycarp's death — it
was at its height. A sceptical philosophy had failed to satisfy the
cravings of the educated classes, and it had never touched, except superficially,
the lower ranks of society. The erection of temples, the
establishment of new priesthoods, the multiplication of religious rites
and festivals, all bear testimony to this fact. 'We are too forgetful,' says
Renan, ' that the second century had a veritable pagan propaganda
(predication) parallel to that of Christianity and in many respects in
accord withit^'. From various motives the pagan revival was promoted
by the reigning sovereigns. The political and truly Roman instincts of
Trajan were not more friendly to it than the archaeological tastes, the
cosmopolitan interests, and the theological levity of Hadrian. Prom
their immediate successors, Antoninus Pius and 2vlarcus Aurelius, it
received even more solid and efficient support. Stoicism— whatever
might be its faults — was intensely religious after its own lights ;
and
Stoicism was seated next to the throne and upon the throne. M.
Aurelius managed to incorporate into his Stoicism the popular mythology
Kaiserzeit I. ii.
p. 679 sq (1883), Renan
UAglise Chretienne pp. i sq, 31 sq, 290
sq, 304 sq (1879), Marc-Aurile pp. i sq,
32 sq, 345 sq (1S82), Capes Age of the
Antonines pp. 129 sq, 150 sq (1880).
Of these Friedlander's account is the
most complete. See also Dollinger Heideithttm
ti.
Judenthuvi (1857) passim.
^
Traj. et Plin. Epist. 96, given above,
p. 50 sq.
-'
He
himself mentions building one
temple {Epist. iv. i) and restoring and
enlarging another (Epist. i.\. 39) with his
own money. His language on the latter
occasion is worth quoting; 'Videor ergo
munifice simul religioseque faclurus, si
aedem quam pulcherrimam exstruxero,
addidero porticus aedi ;
illam ad usum
deae, has ad honiinum.'
^
Marc-Aurele p. 45.
30
IGN. I,