from moral corruption, shows that the spirit of true faith was not
extinct. These seekers after righteousness may be described as "a dismal
and fanatical set of men, overlooking the practical aims of life," but
it is a fair question to ask, "if they had not abandoned the world to
its fate would they not have shared that fate?" "The glory of that age,"
says Professor Dill, "is the number of those who were capable of such
self-surrender; and an age should be judged by its ideals, not by the
mediocrity of conventional religion masking worldly self-indulgence.
This we have always with us; the other we have not always."

Yet the sad fact remains that the transforming power of Christianity was
practically helpless before the surging floods of vice and superstition.
The noble struggles of a few saints were as straws in a hurricane. The
church had all she could do to save herself.

"When Christianity itself was in such need of reform," says Lord, "when
Christians could scarcely be distinguished from pagans in love of
display, and in egotistical ends, how could it reform the world? When it
was a pageant, a ritualism, an arm of the state, a vain philosophy, a
superstition, a formula, how could it save, if ever so dominant? The
corruptions of the church in the fourth century are as well
authenticated as the purity and moral elevation of Christians in the
second century." Even in the early days of Christianity the ruin of Rome
was impending, but, at that time, the adherents of the Christian
religion were few and poor. They did not possess enough power and
influence to save the state. When monasticism came to Rome, the lords of
the church were getting ready to sit upon the thrones of princes, but
the dazzling victory of the church was not a spiritual conquest of sin,
so the last ray of hope for the Empire was extinguished. Her fall was
inevitable.