doubted, it was one that did no-way affect the Christian Faith, and therefore did not deserve such a severe Condemnation: but as it thwarted the favourable Opinions then entertained in the Church concerning Virginity, it is no Wonder that it should meet with so rough a Treatment[N35]. ----- Footnote N35: That the Virgin _Mary_ had other Children besides Christ, was not a new Opinion. It was taught by _Helvidius_ in 383. and long before him by _Tertullian_, as _Jerom_ himself is forced to own in the Treatise which he wrote against _Helvidius_: nay, in the Time of _Epiphanius_, who flourished from the Year 366. to 403. that Opinion universally prevailed in _Arabia_, as appears from the Letter which he wrote in Confutation of it, and addressed to all the Christians dwelling in _Arabia_, from the Presbyters down to the Catechumens. In that Letter he styles those who denied the perpetual Virginity of the Virgin _Mary_, _Antidicomarianites_; and ranks them, though their Opinion had not yet been condemned by the Church, sometimes among the Heretics, and sometimes among the Schismatics. But in the same Letter he censures, with no less Severity, those who adored her, styling the Worship that was paid her _an idolatrous Heresy_; which was taxing those who paid it both with Heresy and Idolatry; and from neither will the unmeaning Terms of _Latria_, _Dulia_, _Hyperdulia_, &c. invented and used by the Schoolmen to express different Degrees of Worship, excuse the present Practice of the Church of _Rome_. _Epiphanius_ was unacquainted with such Terms, as well as with the different Degrees of Worship answering them; and therefore called the Meeting of certain Women, on a stated Day, to offer a Cake to the Virgin _Mary_, and eat it together in her Honour (whence they had the Name of _Collyridians_), _a Folly repugnant to Religion, an Illusion of the Devil, a robbing God of the Honour that was due to him, an idolatrous Heresy_[N35.1]. These Women came from the Northern Provinces of _Scythia_ into _Thrace_, probably about the Year 372. when _Athanaric_ King of the _Goths_ drove all the Christians out of his Dominions. From _Thrace_ they wandered into _Arabia_; and there, in Opposition to the _Antidicomarianites_, introduced the above-mentioned idolatrous Practice. This is the first Instance of any Worship paid to the Virgin _Mary_; and to those Women the extravagant Worship that is still paid her by the Church of _Rome_, owes its Rise. Some of these Women took upon them to act, at their Meetings, as Priestesses. This _Epiphanius_ styles an abominable Abuse, Women being so utterly incapable, says he, of performing any Ecclesiastical Functions, that our Saviour did not grant even to his Mother the Power of baptizing[N35.2]. Footnote N35.1: Epiph. hær. 78, 79. Footnote N35.2: Idem ibid. -----