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Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

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254 THE SECOND AGE OF THE MARTYR CHURCH.soils and temperatures; but in them all it grew.It had its distinct experiences, encountering manya withering heat and many a stormy blast, andwatered full <strong>of</strong>t with blood, but in them all theseed, dropped so imperceptibly that the mightiestand most jealous <strong>of</strong> empires was unconscious <strong>of</strong>what was cast into its bosom, became a tree. Itwas an organic growth <strong>of</strong> vital power. Christianity,during the ten ages <strong>of</strong> persecution, is theupspringing <strong>of</strong> several hundred such communities,distinct as we see here, and as described above byS. Ignatius, but at the same time coinherent, aswe saw in the beginning, and as we shall findpresently. As, then, all the cities <strong>of</strong> the Romanempire had a secular political and social life, anda municipal government <strong>of</strong> their own, so had theChristian Faith in each <strong>of</strong> them a correspondinglife <strong>of</strong> spiritual government and inward thoughtand if we had the materials to construct the his-tory <strong>of</strong> this Faith in any one, it would give us awonderful insight into the course <strong>of</strong> that prodigiousvictory over the world which the whole resultpresents. We cannot do so. <strong>The</strong> data for itnot exist, and because they do not, we alludto this first mode <strong>of</strong> growth made by thChristian Faith.Its second mode was thus. <strong>The</strong> ApostolicalChurches, as they severally grew, scattered fromtheir bosoms a seed as prolific as their own. <strong>The</strong>ysent out those who founded communities such as

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