Roman education, must have been beneficial to the British youth; while, on the other, it must be confessed, that the simplicity of their former habits was in danger of being exchanged for that corruption of manners which always prevails among a great people. But civilization must be allowed, upon the whole, to be more favourable to the diffusion of Christian truth, than a state of savage barbarity and ignorance.

The ready communication between different parts of the islands, which was opened by means of their great roads, would tend to promote various other improvements; and would in particular, by conveying the Roman troops to various parts of the island, be the means of facilitating an intercourse between the Roman and the British Christians. Many of the Britons became incorporated as auxiliaries in the Roman armies, and many others lived intermingled with the Roman citizens in their towns. Of the many thousands who fell in that dreadful massacre in the revolt under Boadicea, a great part must be considered as allies of the Romans.

In proportion, therefore, as the Roman province extended its limits, it would, in several respects, be the means of eventually making straight in the desert a high-way for the Lord; and perhaps we may venture to affirm that the final prevalence of Christianity was more indebted, humanly speaking, to Romans than to Britons.

We have, among ancient writers, some réferences to the state of Christianity, or rather to the existence of it, in Britain during the first and the early part of the second century; but I am disposed to think that there were but few who openly professed the religion of Christ. If, indeed, it had flourished, and there were Christian churches settled after the manner of other countries, the diligent and learned Eusebius would

have been able to afford us some particulars to satisfy our inquiries. But the state of religion in Britain was not such as to attract the particular notice of foreign churches.

In the writings of the Fathers of the second century, we have but very few references to the state of Christianity in Britain. By the middle of that century the Christians were become very numerous in most parts of the Roman empire, and their churches flourished during the reign of the two Antonines. Gildas says that, although the Christian faith was but coolly received by the Britons, yet that it continued to be maintained by some in its purity, until the time of Dioclesian: yet there have not been wanting persons who deny the existence of Christianity in this country before the middle of the second century, that is, the time of Lucius.

Bede makes no mention of Christianity in Britain until he gives us an account of King Lucius's writing to Rome for Christian teachers. This author was well acquainted with Gildas, as his history contains many passages taken verbatim from him; and it seems unaccountable why he should omit Gildas's account of the Gospel being brought to Britain in the time of Nero. In Gildas, we have nothing respecting King Lucius; as, owing to the confusion of the times in which he lived, he was unable to procure an exact account of the state of things, from the first propagation of Christianity until the Dioclesian persecution.*

The history of Lucius, as given in Bede, is very concise, and not attended with those circumstances of the marvellous which we have in the British Chronicle.

*It is possible that our present existing copies of Gildas are mutilated; and that the original Gildas contained some notice of Lucius.

He states, "That, in the year 156, in the time of Marcus Antoninus Verus, and Aurelius Commodus, when Eleutherius presided over the Roman see, Lucius, king of the Britons, sent a letter to that bishop, requesting that, by his mandate, he might be admitted into the Christian church. His pious request, (adds the Anglo-Saxon historian,) was presently granted him; and the faith, thus received, was maintained inviolate among the Britons, in profound peace, until the time of Dioclesian."

From this succinct statement we are to infer that there was a native prince exercising royal authority in Britain; and that he was under the necessity of sending to Rome, in order that a person of his dignity might be admitted into the Christian church. It is not expressly stated there was no Christian church here at that time; but Bede does not chuse to tell us there was any.

But it is in the British Chronicle we find a more enlarged and splendid account of this transaction. King Lucius, we are informed, succeeded his father Coil, in the kingdom of Britain; and, having heard of the miracles performed by the disciples of Christ, he sent messengers to Rome, making request that Pope Eleutherius would send over some faithful persons proper to instruct him, that he might believe in Christ. Two persons, of the name of Dwyvan and Fagan, were sent to Britain, who preached Christ to him: by these the king was baptized, and all his people followed his example. And after these holy men had administered baptism to the people, and abolished idolatry throughout the whole isle of Britain, the temples devoted to the worship of false deities were consecrated to the true God and His saints. In those temples a number of persons were duly ordained to perform Divine service. At that time there were eight and twenty dioceses formed in the Isle

of Britain; and three archbishops were constituted, to' whom the twenty-eight bishops were all subject. The three archbishoprics pertained to the three principal cities of the kingdom: namely, London; Caer Evorac, (York); and Caerleon on the Usk. In the division of the different provinces, Deira and Bernicia, or the countries to the north of the Humber, pertained to York; to the archbishopric of London belonged all Lloegr and Cornwall, as separated by the Severn from Cymbria, or Wales; which had Caerleon for its metropolitan seat: all these were richly endowed by the king. And King Lucius died in the city of Claudius, (or Gloucester,) in the 136th year of the Christian æra; or, according to a different copy, in the year 156.

That a whole kingdom, consisting of all the districts of South Britain, should thus, as in an instant, be converted from Paganism to Christianity, cannot soon be credited, even if there were no obstacles arising from the peculiar circumstances of the time to render this legend absolutely inconsistent with real history. "An astonishing revolution indeed," exclaims Dr. Henry; and the more astonishing that it should be brought about by the influence of a British king, at a time there could be no such king over the smallest territory in all South Britain, who was not in a state of entire dependence on the Romans. But the authority, which it attributes to the Pope of Rome, even in that early age, sufficiently shews from whence this marvellous legend took its rise. But while we allow that nothing can be more preposterous than the account thus magnified; before, with Baxter, we deny the utter existence of Lucius, let us see whether we can discover a more simple and rational account of what Lucius did for the promotion of Christianity within his own territory.

Archbishop Usher has found in an old Saxon Chro

the celebration of religious services, and thus became a nursing father to the church.

Farther than this it is not unreasonable to suppose that this eminent character would be anxious to obtain a supply of teachers and pastors into his territory; men of greater ability and of greater renown than could be found among the Silures. Some of the Druids, when they had renounced heathenism, might be admitted as teachers of Christianity'; and, according to the opinion of some antiquaries, several of the old British clergy were taken from among that order of men.

As to sending to Rome, this might have been done, although not from the motives the Romanists contend for. The Bishop of Rome, at that time, was no more than Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, or any other Bishop of an eminent Christian Church. It was from Rome, as we have already shewn, that the Christian religion was first brought to Britain; and it was natural to infer, that there it was still to be found in its purity; and that there every instruction might be obtained, and able divines might be procured to revive the cause of Truth, which perhaps was now beginning to decline and languish among the Britons.

LLANDAFF became a place of some considerable note among the British Christians; and it is there we find the seat of the first Diocesan Bishop, before CAERLEON was made the metropolitan see of all Britannia Secunda, for we read of Dubricius as the first bishop of Landaff, before we find a metropolitan at Caerleon.

The account we have now given of Lucius, as a Silurian prince, having afforded his aid and influence in the advancement of religion within his territory, agrees with the most respectable tradition, and carries with it no air of fiction or romance, nothing that contradicts authentic