ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 21 1 



ral death. Such was the firft ftate of the Chrif- 

 tian church after its foundation by Jcfus (Thrift. 

 We are likewife to examine, in this firft age, 

 called Apoftolic, how, when, where, and by 

 whom, the books of the New Teftamcnt, that 

 is, the Four Evangel! lls, the Acts of the Apof- 

 tles, the F.piftles or Letters of St. Paul and the 

 other apoftlcs, and the Apocalyple, were writ- 

 ten ; and by what methods the certainty or their 

 dates, and their authenticity, are eftabLfhed. 



IV. The firft ages of Chriftianity were im- 

 brued with blood. We find every where accounts 

 of the troubles, pcrkcutions anJ punifhrnents 

 which they fuffcred who embraced the Chriftian 

 doftrinc. k/cems as if the fovereigns and rulers 

 of the earth had combined to opprefs this reli- 

 gion, and to exterminate its firft profcfibrs : but 

 Providence was plcaicd to confound the malice 

 and cruelty of man, and even to make the 

 church of Chrift fiourifh by the blood of the 

 martyrs ;' to become conftantly more victorious, 

 and at laft triumphant, in the fourth century, 

 under the emperor Conftantine the Great. We 

 learn therefore, in the ecclefiaftical hiftory of the 

 iirft three a^es, that ot the great perjecutions* 

 which the emperors and p;:g.m princes made the 

 ^ liri; ndcrgo; and that of the martyrs* 



who lealed t :h with their bloody 



and whole names the church has collected in LJ 

 martyrol 



O2 V. That 



