discord, and addicted to many other vices that cast an undeserved
reproach upon the holy religion of which they were the unworthy
professors and ministers. This is testified in such an ample manner by
the repeated complaints of many of the most respectable writers of this
age, that truth will not permit us to spread the veil which we should
otherwise be desirous to cast over such enormities among an order so
sacred.... The example of the bishops was ambitiously imitated by the
presbyters, who, neglecting the sacred duties of their station,
abandoned themselves to the indolence and delicacy of an effeminate and
luxurious life. The deacons, beholding the presbyters deserting thus
their functions, boldly usurped their rights and privileges; and the
effects of a corrupt ambition were spread through every rank of the
sacred order" (p. 73). During this century also we find much scandal
caused by the pretended celibacy of the clergy, for the
people--regarding celibacy as purer than marriage, and considering that
"they, who took wives, were of all others the most subject to the
influence of malignant demons"--urged their clergy to remain celibate,
"and many of the sacred order, especially in Africa, consented to
satisfy the desires of the people, and endeavoured to do this in such a
manner as not to offer an entire violence to their own inclinations. For
this purpose, they formed connections with those women who had made vows
of perpetual chastity; and it was an ordinary thing for an ecclesiastic
to admit one of these fair saints to the participation of his bed, but
still under the most solemn declarations, that nothing passed in this
commerce that was contrary to the rules of chastity and virtue" (p. 73).
Such was the morality of the clergy as early as the third century!

The doctrine of the Church in these primitive times was as confused as
its morality was impure. In the first century (during which we really
know nothing of the Christian Church), Dr. Mosheim, in dealing with