In such a work the reader will not, of course, expect to find any full and detailed account of so vast a subject as Pre-Reformation Church History. Its object is rather to sketch out the historical truth about each Church, and to indicate the general principles on which further inquiry may be conducted by those who have the opportunity of making it. It is hoped that those whose circumstances do not admit of an extended study of the subject will find in the following pages a clear, though condensed, view of the periods and Churches treated of; and that those whose reading is of a less limited range will be put in possession of certain definite lines of thought, by which they may be guided in reading the statements of more elaborate histories. It may be added, that the writer's stand-point throughout has been that of a loyal attachment to the Church of England, as the authorized exponent and upholder of Catholic doctrine for English people. M. F. B. P. _July_, 1869. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. THE FOUNDATION OF THE CHURCH AMONG THE JEWS . . . . . 1 II. THE FOUNDATION OF THE CHURCH AMONG THE HEATHEN . . . 25 III. THE EXTENSION OF THE CHURCH THROUGHOUT THE WORLD . . 30 IV. FINAL SETTLEMENT OF THE CHURCH BY ST. JOHN . . . . . 45 V. THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 VI. THE CHURCH UNDER THE ROMAN EMPIRE . . . . . . . . . . 66 VII. THE EARLY HISTORY OF PARTICULAR CHURCHES . . . . . . 73 VIII. THE INROADS OF MAHOMETANISM . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 IX. THE DIVISION BETWEEN EAST AND WEST . . . . . . . . . 94 X. THE CHURCH OF THE MIDDLE AGES . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 XI. THE MEDIAEVAL HISTORY OF CONTINENTAL CHURCHES . . . . 120 XII. THE MEDIAEVAL CHURCH IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND . . 142 INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 {1} CHAPTER I The foundation of the Church among the Jews A.D. 33-A.D. 38 Before entering upon an account of the Foundation and After-History of the Christian Church, it may be well to consider what that Church really is. Section 1. _Definition of the Church._ [Sidenote: Twofold nature of the Church.] The Church may be regarded in a twofold aspect, as an external Corporation, and as a spiritual Body. [Sidenote: 1. An external Kingdom.] In the first light it is a Kingdom, in the world, though not of the world, extending through different and widely-separated countries, often seemingly divided by outward circumstances, but, in reality, having all its parts subject to the same Invisible King, governed by laws which He has given, and by means of those whom He has appointed to be His representatives on earth. [Sidenote: 2. A spiritual Body.]