PAGANISM SURVIVING
IN CHRISTIANITY
BY
ABRAM HERBERT LEWIS, D.D.
AUTHOR OF “BIBLICAL TEACHINGS CONCERNING THE SABBATH AND THE SUNDAY,”
“A CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE SABBATH AND THE SUNDAY IN THE
CHRISTIAN CHURCH,” “A CRITICAL HISTORY OF SUNDAY
LEGISLATION FROM 321 TO 1888, A.D.,” ETC.
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
The Knickerbocker Press
1892
COPYRIGHT, 1892
BY
ABRAM HERBERT LEWIS
Electrotyped, Printed, and Bound by
The Knickerbocker Press, New York
G. P. Putnam’s Sons
TO
GEORGE H. BABCOCK
CO-WORKER IN HISTORIC RESEARCH AND FRIEND
THROUGH MANY YEARS, THIS VOLUME
IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED
The Author
PREFACE.
He who judges the first century by the nineteenthwill fall into countless errors. Hewho thinks that the Christianity of the fourth centurywas identical with that of the New-Testamentperiod, will go widely astray. He who does notlook carefully into the history of religions beforethe time of Christ, and into the pagan influenceswhich surrounded infant Christianity, cannot understandits subsequent history. He who cannot riseabove denominational limitations and credal restrictionscannot become a successful student ofearly Church history, nor of present tendencies,nor of future developments. History is a series ofresults, not a medley of happenings. It is thestory of the struggle between right and wrong; therecord of God’s dealing with men. The “historicargument” is invaluable, because history preservesGod’s verdicts concerning human choices andactions. Events and epochs, transitions andculminations, are the organized causes and effectswhich create the never-ceasing movement, and theorganic unity called history. Hence we learn that[vi]ideas and principles, like apples, have their timefor development and ripening; that the stains ofsin, the weakness of error, and the influence oftruth commingle and perdure through the centuries;that good and evil, sin and righteousness,persist, or are eliminated, in proportion as menheed God’s voice, and listen to His verdicts.
The scientific study of history reveals the normby which ideas, creeds, movements, and methodsare to be tested. Such a standard, when contrastedwith the speculations of philosophy, isgranite, compared with sand. God’s universal law,enunciated by Christ, is: “By their fruits ye shallknow them.”
The efforts of p