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Excerpt from Christian Charity in the Ancient Church Our Lord calls the commandment of love which He gave to His disciples a new commandment (John xiii, 34). And such indeed it was, for the world before Christ came was a world without love. Lactantius, writing at the time when, after a struggle which had lasted for centuries, Christianity had at length obtained the upper hand, lays great emphasis upon this difference between the Christian and the heathen world, saying: Compassion and humanity are virtues peculiar to the righteous and to the worshippers of God. Philosophy teaches us nothing of them. And should this witness, as coming from one who was himself a Christian, appear suspicious, there is still quite trustworthy evidence in the astonishment with which the heathen regarded the charitableness of the Christians, which seemed so strange to them; and a still stronger witness may be seen in the endeavour of the Emperor Julian to introduce into heathendom this new thing, which he could not but recognise as a peculiarity of Christianity. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.