CHRISTIAN CHTTRCH 483 CHRISTIAN CHURCH and the Church made great advance in numbers and territory. The Council of Nice (A. D. 325) was a great triumph for orthodoxy. It declared the essential Trinity of the Godhead, and settled for all time the divinity of Christ as a funda- mental doctrine of Christian faith. The heresy of Arius was condemned, Per- secution ceased, through the synipathy of the Emperor Constantine, who, in 313, removed all disabilities from Christians, and in 323 made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire. Monas- ticism, a reaction against worldliness, increased rapidly. Leo the Great, Bishop of Rome, extended the authority of the Western Church in opposition to the 2laims of the patriarch of Constanti- nople. Mohammedanism paralyzed the Eastern Church for a time in the 7th and 8th centuries. Mohammedanism was arrested in western Europe by Charles Martel, by the victory of Tours, in 732. Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome, ruled from 590 to 604. He mag- nified the Romish pretensions, organized monkish orders, elaborated the church festivals, and established purgatory as a Roman Catholic doctrine. He organized a mission among the Anglo-Saxons. The Gospel spread rapidly through Britain and Germany. Christian art was pat- ronized liberally by the Roman bishops. The close of the ancient period found the Latin or Western Church very vigorous and aggressive, but the Eastern Church in a stagnant condition. Mediaeval Period, A. D. 750-1517.-^ This period falls into three great divi- sions: From Charlemagne to Gregory VIL (750-1073) ; from Gregory VII. to removal of Papal See to France (1073- 1305) ; from removal of Papal See to Reformation (1305-1517). The Middle Ages were the transition from the ancient to the modern period. The most impor- tant political events, all of which had a bearing on the Church, were the end of the Greek exarchate in Italy; the destruc- tion of the Lombard kingdom, the organi- zation of the Frank Empire under Pepin, rise of the new Germanic Church, divi- sion of the Mohammedan caliphate, de- cline of the Greek Empire, and develop- ment of the new Roman Empire in the west. Charlemagne was the greatest mediaeval ruler. He was victorious over many northern tribes, and increased the territory of the Church to vast propor- tions. He was a liberal patron of learn- ing, and authorized a Latin version of the Scriptures. Alfred the Great of Eng- land reigned from 871 to 901, and was as distinguished for learning as for his power to rule. The Russian monarchy was founded by Ruric in the middle of tlie 9th century. At this time the evan- gelization of heathen nations progressed rapidly. The Hungarians, Bulgarians, Bohemians, Moravians, Wends, and Scan- dinavians accepted Christianity. Corrup- tion increased rapidly in the Roman Church ; the papacy was at the service of the highest bidder; and indulgences and transubstantiation were cardinal forces in the new Romanism. The violent rule of the Mohammedans over Palestine ex- cited the wrath of western Europe, and crusades were organized for the rescue of the country from the Moslems. There were seven crusades, extending from 1096 to 1272. Christian Europe failed, finally, to hold the country, but the general ef- fect of the crusades was beneficial in the development of commerce, introduction of Oriental thought, and the growth of popular liberty. Reformatory movements were inaugurated through the Waldenses (1170); Wyclif (1324); John Huss (1373) ; the Moravian Brethren (1417) ; the Mystics (Tauler, Suso, Ruysbroek, Groot, Thomas a Kempis) and Savona- rola (1480-1497). Mendicant orders were established. The Inquisition, established to arrest reform, was decreed in 1215. The Modern Period, 1517 to the Present. — The Church was in a corrupt and superstitious condition. All the at- tempts at reform had been unsuccessful. Martin Luther, born 1483, began the Geneva reformation by publishing 95 theses against Rome. He translated the scriptures into German, gained the co- operation of the German princes, and published sermons and other works against the errors of Romanism. Me- lanchthon was the chief doctrinal wi'iter of the Reformation. Erasmus labored in the department of New Testament criti- cism. The leading Swiss Reformers were Zwingli in eastern Switzerland, and the learned and pure Calvin in western. Farel stood next to Calvin in Geneva. The English Reformation had King Henry VIII. on its side, through no pious motives, but because the Pope would not sanction his frequent marriages. _ This was the great opportunity for which the Reformers of England had been waiting. Protestant sentiment grew rapidly, but in the next reign Ridley, Latimer, Cran- mer. Hooper, Taylor fell victims to Queen Mary's Romanism. Under Elizabeth the Reformation was placed on a firm foun- dation. The Puritans were a reaction against Romanism and sympathy with it in the Church of England. Arminius, born 1560, in Holland, opposed the chief tenets of Calvinism. The Synod of Dort resulted in the political triumph of the Calvinists, and the expulsion of the Re- monstrants, until the death of Maurice (1630). The Thirty Years' War (1618- 1648) was confined to the Continent, and
