Under the influence so widely diffused from this source, and that of the heresies above referred to, the Church passed into the dark cloud of Popish superstition, ignorance, and imposture. The era of inspiration and miracles had passed. The idolatrous forms of paganism were transferred from the heathen to the so-called Christian temples. The theory of religion then, combining elements from Judaism, Oriental philosophy, Paganism, and Christianity, was practically accommodated to the heart of man in his natural state. Modes of interpretation were introduced, by which truth, so far as it was admitted, was made to serve all the ends and purposes of error. The Popish system, for example, while it retains, in terms, the doctrine of the Trinity, denies all those collateral and dependent truths which render that doctrine of any value in the affair of man's salvation. It allows the Divinity of Jesus Christ, but supersedes him in respect to his sacerdotal and regal offices, and in effect denies his personality. In place of his atonement, it substitutes the Mass. To supersede or obviate his personal mediation, it offers, like Paganism, a thousand creature mediators. To nullify his personality, and the admission of his Divinity, it professes even to create him. The subjects of controversy to which these heresies gave rise were such as, under the influence of certain controlling circumstances, unavoidably to change or modify the faith, in respect to some doctrines, of those who continued to be in the main evangelical. The circumstances referred to resulted from the nationalization of the Church, the assumption by the civil power of legislative authority over its doctrines and all its concerns, and the consequent prescription, under the severest penalties, of entire uniformity of faith and worship. Hence, when heresies arose and spread, Councils were called to suppress them, and to prescribe the rule of faith which was to be enforced. Their determinations, of course, must be in conformity not only with the opinions of a majority of those convened, but with the sentiments of the reigning emperor. Whenever he and the majority of those summoned to a Council were inclined to Arianism, image worship, and the like, those who held the primitive faith had to choose between a surrender of their principles and deposition, banishment, or death. The tendency of this course of things to drive the true confessors of Christ into the wilderness, and to induce the best of those who remained in the so-called Catholic Church to dissemble, and to adopt the sentiments and phraseology of those whom they deemed to be in error, is too apparent to require any illustration.