Chapter V: The Primitive Church

A.D. 100-A.D. 312

[Sidenote: Persecution increases round the Church.]

We have already had occasion to notice the beginnings of the persecution which the Church was to undergo for the sake of her Head and Spouse, not only those of a local and unorganized character, which are spoken of in the Book of Acts, but also some of a more cruel and systematic nature under the Roman Emperors Nero and Domitian. From the death of the last of the Apostles to the conversion of the Emperor Constantine, A.D. 312, the Church passed through a succession of fierce trials, in which her members were called to undergo similar sufferings to those which had been borne by the holy Apostles St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John, and their fellow-martyrs[1].