PART II. 



THE ARREST OF INQUIRY. 

 A. D. 5O-A. D. 400. 



i. From the Early Christian Period to the Time of 

 Augustine. 



" A revealed dogma is always opposed to the free research that may 

 contradict it. The result of science is not to banish the divine 

 altogether, but ever to place it at a greater distance from the 

 world of particular facts in which men once believed they saw 

 it." RENAN, Essay on Islamism and Science. 



A DETAILED account of the rise and progress of 

 the Christian religion is not within the scope of this 

 book. But as that religion, more especially in the 

 elaborated theological form which it ultimately as- 

 sumed, became the chief barrier to the development 

 of Greek ideas; except, as has been remarked, in 

 the degree that these were represented by Aristotle, 

 and brought into harmony with it; a short survey 

 of its origin and early stages is necessary to the con- 

 tinuity of our story. 



The history of that great movement is told ac- 

 cording to the bias of the writers. They explain 

 its rapid diffusion and its ultimate triumph over 

 Paganism as due either to its Divine origin and 

 guidance ; or to the favourable conditions of the time 

 of its early propagation, and to that wise adaptation 

 to circumstances which linked its fortunes with those 

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