50 PIONEERS OF EVOLUTION. 



tianity levelled all distinctions : it welcomed the mas- 

 ter and his slave, the outcast and the pure : it treated 

 woman as the spiritual equal of man: it held out to 

 each the hope of a future life. Thus far, all was to 

 the good, although the old Mithraic religion had 

 done well-nigh as much. But Christianity held aloof 

 from the common social life, putting itself out of 

 touch with the manifold activity of Rome. It sought 

 to apply certain maxims of Jesus literally; it dis- 

 couraged marriage, it brought disunion into family 

 life; it counselled avoidance of service in the army 

 or acceptance of any public office. This general 

 attitude was wholly due to the belief that with the 

 return of Jesus, the end of the world was at hand. 

 For Jesus had foretold his second coming, and the 

 earliest epistles of the apostles bade the faithful pre- 

 pare for it. Here there was no continuing city; citi- 

 zenship was in heaven, for the kingdom of Christ 

 was not of this world. Therefore to give thought to 

 the earthly and fleeting was folly and impiety, for 

 who would care to heap up wealth, to strive for place 

 or to pursue pleasure, or to search after what men 

 called " wisdom," when these imperilled the soul, 

 and blocked the way to heaven? 



The prejudice created by this belief, expressed in 

 such direct action as refusal to worship the guardian 

 gods and the " genius " of the Emperor, was deep- 

 ened by ugly, although baseless, rumours as to the 

 cruel and immoral things done by the Christians at 

 their secret meetings. And so it came to pass that 



