AND THE CLOSE OF THE APOSTOLIC AGE BY THE ABBÉ CONSTANT FOUARD MEMBER OF THE BIBLICAL COMMISSION Authorised Translation LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. NOTE. GOD has called away the distinguished Author of The Christ, the Son of God and The Beginnings of the Church. The Abbé Fouard is dead, on the eve of the appearance of his work on Saint John, wherein he sets forth the condition of the Church during the period in which the Apostle's writings first saw the light. In conformity with his intentions, we publish his manuscript, which will give his readers fresh cause to regret the premature end of a man whose works and whose life had but the single end in view of glorifying Jesus. God has paid the wage of this good workman in advance. To-day his eyes behold the divine countenance of the Christ, Whom he has depicted so lovingly and made to live again in so many hearts. After the example of Saint Thomas, when the Lord says to him, "Thou hast written well concerning me; what willst thou for thy reward?" doubtless his answer will be: "Naught save Thyself, O my God!" From the Paris Edition, 1904. 66 INTRODUCTION. Up to this stage in the series on "The Beginnings of the Church " I have confined myself to the purely historical narrative, not dwelling on controverted points. As was said in the very first lines of "The Christ the Son of God," my only wish is to make the Saviour better known and loved." "" 1 With this end in view, the several studies of the Apostolic Missions followed in natural sequence. The work now before us, born of the same spirit, is intended to furnish the reader with a picture of religious conditions toward the close of the first century, at the period when the Fourth Gospel was composed by Saint John, who had outlived all his brethren in the Apostolate, and had attained a very advanced age. Men had even come to believe that death would spare that hallowed head, basing this opinion on a single saying of Jesus which seemed to imply that the dearly beloved disciple was to await the Master's coming here on earth. With charming candor the holy patriarch protested, The Lord did not say this: what He did say has no such meaning. He was greatly exercised lest any one be misled; but who could doubt his word, since he alone was left of "those who had seen Jesus?" 2 This divine memory rested like an aureole over his snowy locks, and invested his person, not merely with a venerableness well-nigh universally acknowledged, but with an authority unquestioned in the Church. Accordingly his name, as formerly the names of the great Apostles Peter and Paul, would seem appropriate to represent the period wherein his closing years were spent, a period over which, by his deeds as well as by his writings, he exercised so profound an influence. Of the life of Saint John all we shall 1 The Christ, the Son of God, vol. i., Preface. 2 John xxi. 23. |