From the time Paul commenced his labors, to the latter part of the second century, we can trace three eras or periods in the state and character of Christianity, as marked and distinct as the various strata of the earth which indicate the different ages of their formation. First, the Pauline; second, the Philo-Alexandrian, which includes the time of the first three Gospels; third, the Incarnation, which includes the fourth Gospel. As we approach the end of the third century, we may include a fourth period--that of the Trinity. We have stated elsewhere, that the distinguishing feature between the Logos of Philo and the Christ of Paul was, that the former was coexistent in point of time with the Creator or Father, while in case of the latter, there was a time he did not exist. There was still another difference: the Logos was begotten in heaven, but Christ was born on the earth, of earthly parents. Through the influence of the Alexandrian Jews, who had been converted to Christianity by the preaching of Paul, the Christ of Paul was made to give way, in time, to the Logos of Philo. This change can be traced in the forgeries which are found interlarded through the epistles of Paul, and the writings of the early fathers. We trace the gradual and stealthy departure from the first to the second stages of Christianity in the use of terms in Paul's epistles which were employed among the Gnostics and others in the early part of the second century. The epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians have been pronounced by able critics to be spurious, because of some verse which have an Alexandrian look; when it is easy to discover that these verses are mere insertions into the original text. The term _pleroma_, or _fulness_, was a favorite phrase among the Gnostics, and now we find it scattered here and there through the epistles: "For it pleased the Father, _that in him_ should all fulness dwell." (Col. i. 19.) "For in him dwelleth all the _fulness_ of the Godhead bodily." (Col. ii. 9.) "And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head of all things to the church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all." (Eph. i. 22, 23.) "And to know the love of Christ, which passeth all knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God." (Eph. iii. 19.) The preexistence of Christ, and his rank as God, is now openly avowed. "For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him. And he is before all things, and by him all things consist." (Col. i. 16, 17.) Here the Christ of Paul disappears, like the great Apostle himself. The works of the fathers are now mutilated by the same ruthless hand, to maintain the new phase which Christianity is forced to assume. "Ignatius, who is called Theophorus to the church which is at Ephesus in Asia, deservedly happy,