172 UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO STUDIES 



possession of the race ; though the conceptions in which men picture 

 that rule of art to themselves must change from time to time as their 

 conception of the world changes. 



The persistence of the Christian faith through the Christian cen- 

 turies has been of a similar order. What has persisted has not been 

 the conceptions of the primitive church. The fact that nearly all 

 churches, more or less, retain ancient formulas must not deceive us. 

 No man today, however orthodox, conceives the faith as the apostles 

 conceived it. The conceptions were adjusted to the Weltanschauung 

 of the Jews of the first century. That Weltanschauung has passed 

 away and with it the conceptions of the Christian faith which pre- 

 supposed it. 



To illustrate by but one aspect of one Christian belief: The primi- 

 tive conception of the ascension of Jesus we have already outlined. 

 It was that he rose through the clouds and the heavenly hemispheres 

 to the zenith, there to sit at the right hand of a literal throne of God. 

 That conception presupposes astronomical conceptions which have 

 passed away. No intelligent Christian can any longer hold it. 



At the very time that the Nicene Creed was being framed these 

 astronomical conceptions were already being disputed. Christianity 

 was already penetrating into upper classes in society and was coming 

 into contact with Greek philosophy. Greek philosophy had long ago 

 learned that the earth is not flat but round. A new conception of the 

 universe was therefore demanded. There was a bitter conflict in the 

 church between the two cosmogonies. The conflict outlasted the 

 Reformation; but many theologians as early as the fourth century 

 accepted the rotundity of the earth. "It is a matter of no interest 

 to us," declared Basil of Caesarea (329-379 a.d.) "whether the earth 

 is a sphere or a disk or concave in the middle like a fan." A new con- 

 ception of the universe was eventually evolved, the conception usually 

 known as the Ptolemaic. According to this conception the earth is 

 round and surrounded by ten transparent revolving spheres; eight of 

 them carrying respectively the moon. Mercury, Venus, the sun, Mars, 

 Jupiter, Saturn, and the fixed stars; the ninth being the primum 

 mobile which carries the others around; and the tenth, the Empyrean, 



