But the following facts must not be overlooked:--First, the new conception of the Church was not yet a hierarchical one. Secondly, the idea of the union and unity of all believers found here magnificent expression. Thirdly, the development of the communities into one solid Church also represents the creative power of the Christian spirit. Fourthly, through the consolidation effected in the Church by the rule of faith the Christian religion was in some measure preserved from enthusiastic extravagancies and arbitrary misinterpretation. Fifthly, in consequence of the regard for a Church founded on the doctrine of faith the specific significance of redemption by Christ, as distinguished from natural religion and that of the Old Testament, could no longer be lost to believers. Sixthly, the independence of each individual community had a wide scope not only at the end of the second but also in the third century.[150] Consequently, though the revolution which led to the Catholic Church was a result of the situation of the communities in the world in general and of the struggle with the Gnostics and Marcion in particular, and though it was a fatal error to identify the Catholic and apostolic Churches, this change did not take place without an exalting of the Christian spirit and an awakening of its self-consciousness. But there was never a time in history when the conception of the Church, as nothing else than the visible communion of those holding the correct apostolic doctrine, was clearly grasped or exclusively emphasised. In Irenaeus and Tertullian we rather find, on the one hand, that the old theory of the Church was still to a great extent preserved and, on the other, that the hierarchical notion was already making its appearance. As to the first point, Irenaeus frequently asserts that the Spirit and the Church, that is, the Christian people, are inseparable; that the Spirit in divers ways continually effects whatever she needs; that she is the totality of all true believers, that all the faithful have the rank of priests; that outside the holy Church there is no salvation, etc.; in fact these doctrines form the very essence of his teaching. But, since she was also regarded as the visible institution for objectively preserving and communicating the truth, and since the idea of the Church in contradistinction to heresy was necessarily exhausted in this as far as Irenaeus was concerned, the old theories of the matter could not operate correctively, but in the end only served to glorify the earthly Catholic Church.[151] The proposition that truth is only to be found in the Church and that she and the Holy Spirit are inseparable must be understood in Irenaeus as already referring to the Catholic Church in contradistinction to every other calling itself Christian.[152] As to the second point, it cannot be denied that, though Irenaeus desires to maintain that the only essential part of the idea of