believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God." But as Christianity spread, and converts from among the Jews and heathen became more numerous, it was found advisable, for the sake of greater unity, purity, and intelligence in the Church, to give candidates for baptism more extended instruction. This instruction, which extended from a few months to three years, was given by a special Church officer under the name of catechist, and embraced the fundamental truths and doctrines of Christianity. The candidates, called catechumens, or learners, studied the ten commandments, the Lord's prayer, and other portions of Scripture, as well as a short confession of faith containing the chief articles of Christian belief. The instruction was at first imparted privately at some convenient place, but afterward in the church or schoolbuildings.

SCHOOL OF ALEXANDRIA.-The most celebrated of the catechetical schools was that of Alexandria, founded in the second century. It was in this city that Christianity came into closest contact with heathen culture. Many of the candidates applying for admission into the Church were representatives of heathen learning. In preparing them for baptism it was necessary that the instruction assume a more complete and scientific form. In addition to this, the Alexandrian school devoted itself to the education of Christian teachers. It became, in fact, a theological seminary of high order, in which, along with specifically Christian instruction, philology, rhetoric, mathematics, and philosophy were studied. The attitude of this school toward heathen learning is thus expressed by Clement, one of its earliest and most distinguished teachers: "The Mosaic law and heathen philosophy do not stand in direct opposition to each other, but are

related like fragments of a single truth, like the pieces, as it were, of a shattered whole. Both prepared the way, but in a different manner, for Christianity." The school had no public buildings, and the teachers, several of whom were very distinguished, taught in their private houses. They received no fixed salary, but were supported by gifts from their pupils. Alexandria was the birthplace of scientific Christian theology.

5. EDUCATION DURING THE MIDDLE AGES

ASCETICISM. It is necessary to notice a peculiar tendency in the Church which exerted for nearly a thousand years an important influence upon education. This was the ascetic tendency, which disdains the present world in the interests of the world to come. This tendency has been forcibly characterized by George Eliot as "otherworldliness." It fails to grasp the great truth that human life is an organic unity; that eternal life is but a continuation of temporal life; and that on earth, as well as in heaven, we are in the presence and service of God. Asceticism, which manifested itself in various forms of self-abnegation or physical torture, was based upon the idea that the body is the seat of sin. Hence it was concluded that by imposing restraints and suffering upon the body, by which its natural force was weakened, the soul was enabled to attain to a higher degree of sanctity. The two principal classes of ascetics were the hermits, who withdrew from society to live in solitude, and the monks, who lived together in monasteries under the vow of poverty, chastity, and obedience. The latter was by far the more numerous class, and its existence has been perpetuated to the present.

ORIGIN AND RESULTS.-Traces of the ascetic spirit are to be found in the primitive Church; but it was not till late in the fourth century that it reached a complete development. It then remained dominant throughout the middle ages. Perhaps it was a phase of human development necessary in the zigzag march of progress, and indispensable to the ultimate attainment of truth. At all events it was a natural one. The heathen world had long been attaching too much relative importance to the earthly life. By a natural reaction the Church, when it came to assert itself in opposition to prevailing beliefs and customs, unduly contemned the present world in magnifying the world to come.

"In the first stage of its development," profoundly observes Karl Schmidt, in speaking of the Church, "it was religion especially that dominated all intellectual interests. The religious impulse in Christianity was so powerful and weighty that the human spirit found in it and its exemplification complete satisfaction. There was a great withdrawal of man within himself, into that part of his nature that unites him to God, and that belongs, not to the perishable, but to the imperishable; not to the visible, but to the invisible world. The supernatural laid hold of men's minds with mighty energy. Man, as the son of heaven, became a stranger upon this earth, and esteemed the splendor of this world as of little value. The world in all its beauty had been tested by antiquity, and had not afforded the lasting peace promised of it. Heaven now took its place, and the citizen of heaven displaced in a measure the citizen of earth. This one-sided apprehension of man as a heavenly being, this complete sway of the transcendental, forms the leading characteristic of the world before the Reformation, in which period

Christianity appeared as an abnegation of the world. Only the world of religion is truth. The natural world. is destitute of worth, and escape from it is the end of life. Hence the world-disowning asceticism, fasting, celibacy." VIEWS OF THE CHURCH FATHERS.-This ascetic, transcendental movement very soon found advocates among the most influential of the Church fathers. Says Chrysos tom, who lived in the fourth century: "Mothers ought to care for the bodies of their children, but it is necessary also that they inspire their offspring with love for the good and with fear toward God. And fathers will not limit themselves to giving their children an earthly vocation, but will interest themselves also in their heavenly calling. The most beautiful heritage that can be given children is to teach them to govern their passions. Never ought they to hear licentious conversation at home. Let us take care to develop modesty in them, for nothing torments youth so much as what is contrary thereto. Let us have for our children the same fear that we have for our houses when servants go with a light into places where there is inflammable material, as hay or straw. They should not be permitted to go where the fire of impurity may be kindled in their hearts and do them an irreparable injury. A knowledge of the Scriptures is an antidote against the unreasonable inclinations of youth and against the reading of pagan authors, in which heroes, the slaves of every passion, are lauded. The lessons of the Bible are springs that water the soul. As our children are everywhere surrounded with bad examples, the monastic schools are the best for their education. Bad habits once contracted can not be got rid of. This is the reason God conducted Israel into the wilderness, as into a monastery, that the vices of the Egyptians might

be unlearned. And yet the Israelites were continually falling into their old habits! Now our children are surrounded by vice in our cities and are unable there to resist bad examples. In the monasteries they do not see bad examples; they lead there a holy life in peace and tranquillity. Let us take care of the souls of our children that they may be formed for virtue, and not be degraded by vice."

The ascetic tendency found an ardent representative in St. Augustine, who has been called the Paul of the fifth century. With great vehemence he rejected all heathen science in Christian education. "Those endless and godless fables," he says, "with which the productions of conceited poets swarm, by no means accord with our freedom; neither do the bombastic and polished falsehoods of the orator, nor finally the wordy subtleties of the philosopher. God forbid that trifles and foolishness, windy buffoonery, and inflated falsehood, should ever be properly called science!" Again he says: "A young man exclaims, in reading a scene of Terence, 'What! is it not permitted us to do what the gods dare to do?' This reasoning is carried on by many young people. learned beautiful words in our authors, but we learned more easily to commit bad actions. Intoxicated pagan masters made us drink in the cup of error, and beat us when we refused. Was there then no other means to teach us our language and to cultivate our mind?"

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It would be a mistake, however, to suppose that all the fathers of the Church shared this narrow spirit. There were not wanting those who held broader and juster views, and who advocated an education that comprehended the valuable elements of heathen culture. For example, Basil the Great, of the fourth century, says: "In the