52 MANUAL OF INSTRUCTION 



succession of Bishops of Rome down to his day, 

 and his testimony as to the Books of Scripture 

 which the early Church deemed sacred. It must 

 be remembered that there were many written 

 accounts of our Lord's life, and many epistles 

 written to the different congregations of the 

 Church, and it was important to know which were 

 inspired and which were not. Irenaeus records 

 the judgment of the early Church upon this 

 point, and helps settle the important question as 

 we now receive the list. Under an edict of the 

 emperor Severus, Irenaeus, with many others, 

 met death. The date of his martyrdom was a. d. 



202. 



Tertullian. — A man of a severer spirit, who be- 

 came prominent in the early part of the third cen- 

 tury, was Tertullian. He was born in Carthage, 

 was noted for his great and varied learning, and 

 became a Christian after the most diligent investi- 

 gation of its principles and its claims. He was 

 a very bold, soldierly disciple. At the time of the 

 deepest peril to the Christians he wrote to the 

 martyrs in prison, and encouraged them to re- 

 main firm, and was especially severe upon those 

 who fled to other places to secure safety. Tertul- 

 lian's record was blemished by his accepting the 

 errors of the Montanists. 



This was a party in the Church of that day that 

 insisted upon a particularly rigid discipline. 



