this discontent is largely due to the attitude of the professional politicians, who unfortunately retain their influence over the more ignorant sections of the population. It is too early yet to say what may be the effect of the discord which prevailed during the 14th Zionist Congress held in Vienna at the end of August, but those responsible for the Jewish policy of the future must remember that widespread harm was done by the declarations of the agitators a few years ago and that everything is to be gained by moderation. The regeneration of the country is furthered and facilitated by the Zionist effort and by Zionist money, and, were it not for this assistance, the British would either have to withdraw from Palestine or the home taxpayer would be called upon to shoulder a greater financial responsibility than that which falls to his lot. If the Government can bring an increasing prosperity and the extremists on both sides may be persuaded to avoid excesses, these developments should work wonders towards the solution of many an economic difficulty and the healing of many a sore political difference. Unjustifiable complaints against a vastly improved situation are merely vexatious. Constructive criticism, combined with honest support, should have early good results.

H. CHARLES WOODS.

Art. 11.-THE APOSTLES IN ROME.

1. Petrus and Paulus in Rom. By Hans Lietzmann. Bonn, 1915.

2. Ursprung und Anfänge des Christentums. By Eduard Meyer. Stuttgart and Berlin: Cotta, 1923.

3. Essays in Early Christian History. By Elmer Truesdell Merrill. Macmillan, 1924.

4. Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità. Rome, 1923.

And other works.

IT is a welcome sign of the times that the early history of the Christian Church and its relations with the Imperial Government of Rome should attract increasing attention from students of the Early Empire. Thirtyfive years ago a famous article by Mommsen brought the problem of the legal basis of the persecutions of the Church into the foreground, and stimulated Dr E. G. Hardy to publish an admirable treatise on the subject,* to which all who are interested in the matter must still turn, although the writings of Sir William Ramsay and a host of other scholars, English and foreign, have thrown fresh light on some aspects of the question. But the criticism of the narratives of the Apostolic preaching in the West, which led to the clash between Empire and Church, has been in the main left to the theologians, since the extra-canonical sources called for a special study for which historians mainly concerned with the vast mass of fresh inscriptional material available for the reconstruction of the Imperial administrative system could not spare the time. In quite recent times, however, the problem has been attacked from the historical side by two scholars whose works are named at the head of this article, and with surprisingly discordant results. Prof. Eduard Meyer, who in his study of general ancient history is approaching the unification of the Mediterranean world by Rome, has written a critical account of the beginnings of Christianity on an ample scale; and he expresses the following view (vol. III, p. 500):

'In any case Peter, the rock of the Church, wielded apostolic authority in Rome for a considerable length of

* 'Christianity and the Roman Government,' ed. 2, 1905.

time; all the probabilities are in favour of his having been already there when Paul arrived in Rome in the spring of A.D. 62.'

Prof. Merrill, on the other hand, concludes his study with the following pronouncement (p. 332):

'The end of the present task has thus been reached. The late (and perfectly ingenuous) origin of the belief that connected St Peter with Rome has been pointed out, along with the gradual accretion thereto of additional details, more of them the longer the time that had elapsed since the alleged events concerned. The story bears every mark of a myth. It is entirely lacking in support by historical evidence. The only reason why it has not been universally rejected by all competent scholars except those who are bound on their allegiance to accept and support it, is merely that it has come to be a doctrine so tremendously imposing by the agelong repetition of millions of voices, and by the grandeur of the structure that has been erected upon it.'

No one can read these passages in juxtaposition without feeling that the canons of historical criticism used by students of the Græco-Roman period must lack the fixity and ease of application which the historian requires.

It is easy to agree with Prof. Merrill in much that he writes on the necessity of a critical attitude in face of traditional statements. That those who practise the 'inductive' method in order to reconstruct the history of a period from later conditions are tempted to ignore the hypothetical character of their results and the possibility that other theories may explain the known facts, to make the most of scraps of evidence of relatively late date, and to postulate the existence of a trustworthy oral tradition (forgetting that the onus probandi rests on those who assume it) no one will deny. That no amount of repetition by later writers adds any value to a statement if each successive writer had apparently nothing but the statement of his predecessor or predecessors upon which to found his own' is a truism. But that the early Christians were 'for the most part very simple and uneducated folk,' interested not in history but in propaganda, is scarcely a half-truth; for Prof. Merrill does not question the fact that under the Flavian dynasty

the new religion found adherents in the Imperial household, and the Acts of the Apostles, at any rate, is the work of a trained historical writer (as Eduard Meyer, summing up the results of much recent research, is at pains to emphasise), and was in all probability intended for the use of Romans of rank and education. Prof. Merrill does well, however, to set out the texts with which the historical critic must deal in their chronological sequence-allowing for the doubts which inevitably arise with regard to documents whose date and authorship are themselves objects of dispute-and in general to leave out of account those which are later than the date (let us say A.D. 200) at which the connexion of SS. Peter and Paul with the Church in Rome may be said to have acquired a vested interest, and (as the luxuriant crop of legend garnered in the PseudoClementine literature too plainly shows) the imagination of the faithful ran riot unchecked by the historical

sense.

So much being granted, we find it hard to take the next step with Prof. Merrill, who subjects each of the documents and passages with which he is concerned to an investigation conducted in the spirit of a counsel cross-examining a hostile witness, with a view to showing that, taken severally, they are patient of an explanation differing from that placed upon them by the upholders of the Christian tradition. Now, it is true that the historian must always exercise caution in estimating the value of cumulative evidence. He must not merely sum the weights of slight probabilities in order to turn his scales. Rather he should seek for the general principle which gives greatest coherence to the facts as interpreted, and herein lies the test of his critical judgment. He should, moreover, be quick to note whether the progress of research in independent fieldse.g. the criticism of documents and the study of archeological material-tends to convergent results. Prof. Merrill seems to fall short in both respects. The hypothesis which governs his criticism of the documentsviz. that the connexion of St Peter with the Christian community in Rome was an interested invention of about A.D. 150-is in itself gratuitous and leads to a strained interpretation of the evidence; and as he is not

an archæologist, he does not attach to the results of excavation the importance which they merit.*

Let us deal first with the literary tradition. It may probably be assumed that St Paul's presence in Rome is sufficiently attested by the narrative of Acts, the subject of which is the 'march on Rome' of the new religion. We need not, therefore, examine the ingenious web of theories which recent critics have spun round the Pastoral Epistles, which they suppose to have grown about a nucleus supplied by genuine fragments of St Paul's private letters, written at various times and places during his closing years. Nor is it necessary to discuss the question of the Apostle's release and subsequent retrial, and his supposed visit to Spain. But we may note in passing that while Eduard Schwartz wrote in 1907 that the execution of St Paul in A.D. 57 or 58 was 'a certain and indubitable fact,' † Meyer, taking as his starting-point the proconsulate of Gallio, which is fixed by an inscription found at Delphi to A.D. 51-52, argues cogently for the arrival of the Apostle in Rome in A.D. 62, so that the period of two years named in the closing verse of Acts ends in A.D. 64, the date of the Neronian persecution.

The canonical writings give us much less help with regard to the later life of St Peter. The First Epistle which bears his name has naturally passed through the fires of the higher criticism, and to assume its genuineness in controversy argues a lack of caution. Yet this is just what Prof. Merrill does, because it suits his book to take 'Babylon'-whence the epistle is professedly written in the literal sense, which seems very unlikely. In Acts we hear nothing of the later years of his ministry. The tradition that he went to Rome in

* It is fair to say that he speaks of the discoveries in the Catacomb of Domitilla as affording a 'stronger witness than the solitary affirmation in Eusebius' to her membership of the Christian Church (p. 168), but this utterance stands almost alone. Meyer is, of course, no specialist in archaology; but he attaches full weight to the evidence of excavation (to be mentioned later) regarding the burial-place of the Apostles (vol. III, p. 498n.). + Nachrichten der göttinger Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften,' 1907, p. 284.

1

The Jewish use of 'Babylon' = Rome is found in the passage relating to Nero in the fifth book of the 'Sibylline Oracles' and in the Apocalypse known as '2 Baruch.' Both probably belong to the first century A.D.