" (Clem. AI. Strora.
lib. vi. ad fin.) Origen, who follows Tertullian at the distance of only
thirty years, delivers nearly the same account: "In every part of the
world," says he, "throughout all Greece, and in all other nations, there
are innumerable and immense multitudes, who, having left the laws of
their country, and those whom they esteemed gods, have given themselves
up to the law of Moses, and the religion of Christ: and this
not without the bitterest resentment from the idolaters, by whom they
were frequently put to torture, and sometimes to death: and it is
wonderful to observe how, in so short a time, the religion has
increased, amidst punishment and death, and every kind of torture."
(Orig. in Cels. lib. i.) In another passage, Origen draws the following
candid comparison between the state of Christianity in his time and the
condition of its more primitive ages: "By the good providence of God,
the Christian religion has so flourished and increased continually that
it is now preached freely without molestation, although there were a
thousand obstacles to the spreading of the doctrine of Jesus in the
world.
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