extinction of prophecy. For the view that every one of these results was desirable, reason might be shown in the vagaries of life and speculation which the age knew, but it was obviously a departure from the ideas of Jesus. [Sidenote: The new life] The rise of the church was accompanied by the rise of mysteries. There is a growing consensus of opinion among independent scholars that Jesus instituted no sacraments, yet Paul found the rudiments of them among the Christians and believed he had the warrant of Jesus for the heightening which he gave to them. Ignatius speaks of the Ephesians "breaking one bread, which is the medicine of immortality (_pharkmakon athanasias_) and the antidote that we should not die"--the former phrase reappearing in Clement of Alexandria.[49] That such ideas should emerge in the Christian community is natural enough, when we consider its environment--a world without natural science, steeped in belief in every kind of magic and enchantment, and full of public and private religious societies, every one of which had its mysteries and miracles and its blood-bond with its peculiar deity. It was from such a world {159} and such societies that most of the converts came and brought with them the thoughts and instincts of countless generations, who had never conceived of a religion without rites and mysteries. Baptism similarly took on a miraculous colour--men were baptized for the dead in Paul's time--and before long it bore the names familiarly given by the world to all such rituals of admission--enlightenment (_photismos_) and initiation; and with the names came many added symbolic practices in its administration. The Christians readily recognized the parallel between their rites and those of the heathen, but no one seems to have perceived the real connexion between them. Quite naively they suggest the exact opposite--it was the daemons, who foresaw what the Christian rites (_hiera_) would be, and forestalled them with all sorts of pagan parodies.[50]