of a church at Babylon; Paul proposed a journey to Spain, and it is
generally believed he went there, and likewise came to France and
Britain. Andrew preached to the Scythians, north of the Black Sea.
John is said to have preached in India, and we know that he was at the
Isle of Patmos, in the Archipelago. Philip is reported to have
preached in upper Asia, Scythia, and Phrygia; Bartholomew in India, on
this side the Ganges, Phrygia, and Armenia; Matthew in Arabia, or
Asiatic Ethiopia, and Parthia; Thomas in India, as far as the coast of
Coromandel, and some say in the island of Ceylon; Simon, the
Canaanite, in Egypt, Cyrene, Mauritania, Lybia, and other parts of
Africa, and from thence to have come to Britain; and Jude is said to
have been principally engaged in the lesser Asia, and Greece. Their
labours were evidently very extensive, and very successful; so that
Pliny, the younger, who lived soon after the death of the apostles, in
a letter to the emperor, Trajan, observed that Christianity had
spread, not only through towns and cities, but also through whole
countries. Indeed before this, in the time of Nero, it was so
prevalent that it was thought necessary to oppose it by an Imperial
Edict, and accordingly the proconsuls, and other governors, were
commissioned to destroy it.

Justin Martyr, who lived about the middle of the second century, in
his dialogue with Trypho, observed that there was no part of mankind,
whether greeks or barbarians, or any others, by what name soever they
were called, whether the Sarmatians, or the Nomades, who had no
houses, or the Scenites of Arabia Petrea, who lived in tents among
their cattle, where supplications and thanksgivings are not offered up
to the Father, and maker of all things, through the name of Jesus
Christ. Irenaeus, who lived about the year 170, speaks of churches
that were founded in Germany, Spain, France, the eastern countries,