Thus did Christianity develop out of the secret associations of the ancient world. The early Christians themselves constituted, at least while under persecution, a sort of secret society. Their worship was mystical, but not because Jesus so taught;--rather because of their environment and traditions. The practice of baptism, the last supper and the doctrines of incarnation and resurrection have been as certainly added to the Nazarene's sublime code of ethics as to them in turn, in the centuries to follow, were added every conceivable notion, mystery and stupid absurdity which the diseased minds of men could imagine, and which have been the cause of more departure from Christ's original teachings, and of more strife and bloodshed than any other feature in the history of mankind. Indeed it is one of the greatest inconsistencies of history that the doctrines of love, unity and peace, taught by the Founder of Christianity, should have been the greatest of all factors to rend mankind apart, beget feelings of hatred, and result in the death, from this cause, of millions of men such as Jesus himself most loved. VI THE KNIGHTS HOSPITALLER OF ST. JOHN OF JERUSALEM The three great militant, mendicant and monastic orders of the middle ages were the Knights Hospitaller of St. John, the Knights Templar, and the Teutonic Order. In addition were numerous others, smaller, shorter lived, less important in every respect, scarcely mentioned in even the larger histories, like the knights of Calatrava, Alcantara, Santiago de Compostella, and the English Knights of the Holy Sepulchre. These orders were the immediate as well as the indirect outgrowth of mediaeval conditions for which both the Church and the State were responsible. The secret tenets of the Christians had been made public, and those who held to them had for some time ceased to be a secret society; their faith was now a part of that church which was essentially the State, and which occupied a goodly part of Europe. Sad to say the Church was rent, and the State suffered accordingly from constant strife between sects and parties, who contested, even to the death, over interpretations to be given to the scriptures, and the matter of creeds. Thus while discussing at point of the sword whether the soul is to be saved by good works, or by grace of God, they disregarded the very essence of the simple teachings of Jesus, and brought upon theology, even in those days, the contempt and ridicule of the liberal minded and the non-believer, so that even to-day it suffers because of the unfortunate light in which it was made to appear. That theology should lead to war is the antithesis of the Christian doctrine, yet no wars have been so fierce and bloody as those waged in "spreading the cross" and propagating a misinterpreted gospel. And so theology suffered doubly from the Monks who perverted it, and from the Knights and the State that inculcated it with fire and sword.