Compared with the Emperor and the Sultan I. As the representative of Christian antiquity. Page 13, eleven lines from bottom, for imposed read impressed. "6 33, fifteen lines from top, for is read in. 40, thirteen lines from bottom, for their read this. 48, four lines from bottom, for obedniac read obednia. 66 51, note, for ἀνείλεσε read ἀνέπεσε. 66 91, fifteen lines from bottom, for still read shall. " 326, note, for Lecture xiii. read Lecture xiv. CHRISTIAN INSTITUTIONS. CHAPTER I. BAPTISM. the Apos WHAT was Baptism in the Apostolic age? It coincided with a vast religious change both of individuals and of nations. Multitudes of men and women were Baptism in seized with one common impulse, and aban- tolic age. doned, by the irresistible conviction of a day, an hour, a moment, their former habits, friends, associates, to be enrolled in a new society under the banner of a new faith. That new society was intended to be a society of "brothers; " bound by ties closer than any earthly brotherhood, filled with life and energy such as fall to the lot of none but the most ardent enthusiasts, yet tempered by a moderation and a wisdom such as enthusiasts have rarely possessed. It was moreover a society swayed by the presence of men whose words even now cause the heart to burn, and by the recent recollections of One, whom "not seeing they loved with love unspeakable." Into this society they passed by an act as natural as it was expressive. The plunge into the bath of purification, long known among the Jewish nation as the symbol of a change of life, had been revived with a fresh energy by the Essenes, and it received a definite signification and impulse from the austere prophet who derived his name from the ordinance.1 This rite was retained as the pledge 1 For John the Baptist, see Lectures on the Jewish Church, iii. 399. |