Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

142 THE FORMATION OF CHRISTENDOMas the friend of Trajan and Hadrian in the Romavernment while in literature he is the exact contemporaryof Tacitus and the younger Plin, as wellas of Epictetus. He was a young man when St. Petedied, and the sphere of his mental activity extendedthe Pontificates of six successors to the Primacy,St. Linus, St. Anacletus, St. Clement, St. EvaristSt. Alexander and St Sistus. About the time whhe was lecturing at Home Domitian was pthe Church, and he outlived by many years the martydom of St. Ignatius.He is the first representative we have remthe Neopythagorean or Platonising tone of thought.He fully and exactly reflects it and his whole view ofthe world is framed upon it. It is this. At thehead of the universe as its author and orderer is themind and will of the Supreme God. Under him therulers and administrators of human affairs in generalare the heavenly and visible gods, as the sun, moon,stars, planets, with which are identified the gods ofthe Greek mythology. Subordinate to these are the" demons," as " watchers and inspectors " of things inparticular, and lower yet, but superior to men, thesouls of heroes.Let us specifiy these somewhat more exactly.First, as to the Supreme God, Plutarch expresseshimself thus : l " What is that which really is ? Thatwhich is everlasting, unproduced, and incorrupt, towhich time brings no change. For time is somethingsubject to motion, and forming itself into the appearancesof matter in motion, always in a flux and neverholding in its contents, like a vessel of corruption andproduction ; in which the very terms c before ' and1 Tlepl roi^Ei tv AeX^ots. 19, 20.