CREECH. 554 CREEDS AND CONFESSIONS. College, Oxford, elected fellow of All Saints Col- le^'O in 1GS:5, and was head master of Sherborne Scliool from 1094 to 1006. He afterward returned tn Oxford, and, in a state of melancholy, com- mitted suicide. Creech was a man of solid learn- ing. He translated Lucretius (1G82); Horace (1084) ; elegies of Ovid, two eclogues of Vergil, some of Plutarch's Lives, Theocritus, thirteenth satire of Juvenal, etc. The Lucretius was long ranked by the side of Dryden's Vergil and Pope's Honier. CREECH, WiiLlAM (1745-1815). A Scottish publisher and author. He was born in Edinburgh, and in 1770 was the traveling companion of Lord Kilniaurs, afterwards Earl of Glencairn, on the tour of that nobleman through central and west- ern Europe. His publisher's shop in Edinburgh was nnicli frequented by men interested in liter- ary pursuits, and his morning 'levees,' at which he was accustomed to entertain the most distin- guished authors of the Scottish capital, became exceedingly popular. Among the works pub- lished by him were those of Burns, Blair, Beattie, Cullen, Mackenzie, and other notables of the time. Burns's well-known poem Willie's Awa' was addressed to him. CREEDE. A citj' and county-seat of Mineral County. Col., about 300 miles southwest of Den- ver: on the Denver and Eio Grande Railroad (ilap: Colorado, D .3). It is in a narrow gulch on Willow- Creek, high up among the mountains, and is engaged exclusively in mining, having a number of highly productive silver-mines. Wagon Wheel Gap, Hot Springs, and Antelope Springs are of scenic interest, and make the region at tractive for tourists. Creede was founded in 1890 by N. C. Creede, who had established a min- ing claim there the previous year. Numerous successive strikes of amazingly rich silver depos- its gave the city a Avide reputation for a time. It was nearly destroyed by fire in 1892, the year of its incorporation. Population, in 1900. 958. CREED'MOOR. A village on Long Island, now included in New York City, 13 miles east of the borough of JIanhattan (Map: Greater New York, K 5). The rifle-range located here was founded as a private enterprise by the National Rifle Association, and was later ac- quired by the State of New Y'ork. It is now used by the National Guard for target practice. CREEDS AND CONFESSIONS (AS. creda, OF., Fr., Prov., Port.. Sp.. It. credo, creed, from Lat. eredo. I believe, the first word of the Apos- tles' and Nicene creeds) . The names given to the authorized expressions of the doctrine of the Cluirch at large, or of the several main sections into which it is divided. Such statements of doctrine sprang up naturally in the course of the Church's progress. As the simple truths taught by Christ in an informal and concrete form be- came the siibject of thought, of argument, of con- troversy, they coidd not fail to receive a more definite intellectual expression, and to be drawn out into more precise dogmatic statements. Men's minds could not be exercised on subjects of such vast importance to them without this result ; and the great creeds, as they rise in succession before lis. and mark (he climax of successive contro- versial epochs in the Church, are nothing else than the varying expressions of the Christian eonsriousness and reason, in their eft'orts more completely to realize, comprehend, and express the originall.y simple elements of truth as they are recorded in Scripture. The study of the creeds would be nothing else tluin the study of theology in its highfst historical development. — in its reflex settlements after the great agitations of Christian thought had run their course. Corres]ionding to this view, we find that the creeds of Christendom grow in complexity, in elab- orate analysis andprecision of doctrinal statement, as they succeed ohe another. The first are compara- tively brief and simple in sense and form; the last are jn'olix and largel.v didactic. From the Apostles' Creed to the decrees of the Council of Trent, or the chapters of the Westminster Con- fession of Faith, there is a wide change, during which the Christian consciousness has grown from a childlike faith to a body of comprehensive criti- cal opinions. What has been called the Apostles' Creed has been referred by tradition to the Apostles them- selves. The present text may be traced back to about the year 500, but evidently depends u]ion a still earlier and simpler form. This earlier form, which is called by scholars 'The Old Roman SATubol,' was in use in the Roman Cluirch be- tween the years 150 and 175, and was originally written in Greek. According to McGiffert {The Jpo.s/Zfs' Creed, New York, 1902), it ran as fol- lows: "I believe in God the Father Almighty and in Clirist Jesus His Son, who was born of Alary the Virgin, was crucified under Pontius Pilate and buried: on the third day rose from the dead, ascended into Heaven, sitteth on the right hand of the Father, from whence He cometh to judge the quick and the dead: and in the Holy Ghost, and resurrection of the flesh." This shorter Roman symbol appears to be the root from which the later-received Roman te.xt sprang, as well as the numerous other texts which are found, with various differences, greater or smaller, among the other Churches of the Occident. The inter- esting question as to its relation with the Oriental texts throws light on its own origin. The dis- tinction nuist at once be made between various forms of confession used at baptism, and the proper, nuich briefer, 'rule of faith,' or creed. Oriental confessions display great variety of form, and great freedom in the choice of matter. The Eastern churches had no tradition, such as was prevalent at Rome, that the Apostles them- selves composed the creed, and hence felt at liberty to modify it as was convenient. Hence, historical portions were replaced by dogmatic, additions were made here and there, various heresies were noted. All, therefore, became sub- jective, reflective, dogmatic in character, though in different degrees. Yet at the basis of all the forms there lay a single ori,ginal, W'hieh agreed substantially with the shorter Roman text. The two chief forms, Oriental and Occidental, are twin forms, with unessential variations. Carry- ing the investigation now still further back, by the study of the forms of the baptismal confes- sions found in Ireuieus, Tertullian. Hippolytus, and Cyprian, we find that the earliest creed must have had all three of the members of the present creed, must have been thought of as an enlarge- ment of the command in Matthew (xx'iii. 19) to baptise all nations, and must have contained the portions as to the 'Church,' the 'resurrec- tion of the flesh,' the 'return to judgment,' and the 'crucifixion under Pontius Pilate.' but no anti-gnostic passages. We must put the date
