For over seventeen hundred years on the eastern hemisphere, and for more than fourteen centuries on the western, there appears to have been silence between the heavens and the earth. Of direct revelation from God to man during this long interval, we have no authentic record. As already shown, the period of apostolic ministry on theEastern continent probably terminated before the dawn of the second century of the Christian era. The passing of the apostles was followed by the rapid development of a universal apostasy as had been foreseen and predicted. In the accomplishment of this great falling away, external and internal causes cooperated. Among the disintegrating forces acting from without, the most effective was the persistent persecution to which the saints were subjected, incident to both Judaistic

Vast numbers who had professed membership and many who had been officers in the ministry deserted the Church; while a few were stimulated to greater zeal under the scourge of persecution. Judaism was the earliest oppressor of Christianity, and became the instigator and abettor of the succeeding atrocities incident to pagan persecution. Open and vigorous hostility of the Roman powers against the Christian Church became general during the reign of Nero, (beginning about 64 A.D.), and continued with occasional respites of a few months or even years at a time to the close of Diocletian's reign.

The inhuman cruelty and savage barbarity to which were subjected those who dared profess the name of Christ during these centuries of heathen domination are matters of accepted history. When Constantine the Great came to the throne in the first quarter of the fourth century, a radical change was inaugurated in the attitude of the state toward the church. The emperor straightway made the so-called Christianity of the time the religion of his realm. But the church was already in great measure an apostate institution and even in crude outline of organization and service bore but remote resemblance to the Church of Jesus Christ, founded by the Savior and builded through the instrumentality of the apostles.

The emperor, even though unbaptized, made himself the head of the church, and priestly office was more sought after than military rank or state preferment. The bishop of Rome had already asserted supremacy over his fellows in the episcopate; but when the emperor made Byzantium his capital, and renamed it in his own honor, Constantinople, the bishop of that city claimed equality with the Roman pontiff. The spirit of apostasy, by which the church had become permeated before Constantine threw about it the mantle of imperial protection and emblazoned it with the insignia of state, now was roused to increased activity as the leaven of Satan's own culture flourished under the conditions most favorable for such fung

The claim was contested; the ensuing dissension divided the church. The disruption has persisted until the present day, as is evidenced by the existing distinction between the Roman Catholic and the Greek Catholic churches. The arrogant assumptions of the Church of Rome were not less extravagant in spiritual than in secular administration. The Roman church became the despotic potentate of nations, and an autocrat above all secular states. Yet this church, reeking with the stench of worldly ambition and lust of dominance, audaciously claimed to be the Church established by Him who affirmed: "My kingdom is not of this world"

In her loudly asserted control over the spiritual destinies of the souls of men, she blasphemously pretended to forgive or retain individual sins, and to inflict or remit penalties both on earth and beyond the grave. She sold permission to commit sin and bartered for gold charters of indulgent forgiveness for sins already done. Her pope, proclaiming himself the vicar of God, sat in state to judge as God Himself. By such blasphemy fulfilled the prophecy of Paul following his warning in relation to the awful conditions antecedent to the second coming of the Christ. "Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed,

In her unrestrained abandon to the license of arrogated authority, the Church of Rome hesitated not to transgress the law of God, change the ordinances essential to salvation, and ruthlessly break the everlasting covenant, thereby defiling the earth even as Isaiah had foretold.

She altered the ordinance of baptism, destroying its symbolism and associating with it imitations of pagan rites. She promoted idolatry in most seductive and pernicious forms. She enjoined an unnatural state of celibacy upon her clergy. She revelled in unholy union with the theories and sophistries of men, and so adulterated the simple doctrines of the gospel of Christ as to produce a creed rank with superstition and heresy. She proclaimed it an act of virtue insuring rich reward to lie and deceive if thereby her own interests might be subserved. She so thoroughly departed from the original plan of Church organization as to make of herself a spectacle of ornate display, fabricated by the caprice of man.

The most important of the internal causes by which the apostasy of the Primitive Church was brought about may be summarized. The corrupting of the simple doctrines of the gospel of Christ by admixture with so-called philosophic systems. Unauthorized additions to the prescribed rites of the Church and the introduction of vital alterations in essential ordinances. Under the tyrannous repression incident to usurped and unrighteous domination by the Roman church, civilization was retarded and for centuries was practically halted in its course. The period of retrogression is known in history as the Dark Ages. The fifteenth century witnessed the movement known as the Renaissance or Revival of Learning. There was a general and significantly rapid awakening among men, and a determined effort to shake off

The revival has been regarded as an unconscious and spontaneous prompting of the "spirit of the times" It was a development predetermined in the Mind of God to illumine the benighted minds of men in preparation for the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ, which was appointed to be accomplished some centuries later. With the renewal of intellectual activity and effort in material betterment, there came, as a natural and inevitable accompaniment, protest and revolt against the ecclesiastical tyranny of the age. The Albigenses in France had risen in insurrection against churchly despotism during the thirteenth century. John Wickliffe of Oxford University had boldly denounced the corruption of the Roman church and clergy, and particularly the restrictions imposed by the pap

The Albigenses had been subjected to inhuman cruelties and unrestrained slaughter. Wickliffe was the subject of severe and persistent persecution. John Huss and Jerome of Prague were prominent on the continent of Europe in agitation against papal despotism. Both fell martyrs to the cause. A notable revolt against the papacy occurred in the sixteenth century, and is known as the Reformation. This movement was begun in 1517 by Martin Luther, a German monk; and it spread so rapidly as soon as soon to involve the whole domain of popedom.

Formal protests against the despotism of the papal church were formulated at a diet or general council held at Spires A.D. 1529. An independent church was proposed by John, Elector of Saxony, a constitution for which was prepared at his instance by Luther and his colleague, Melanchthon. The Protestants were discordant. Being devoid of divine authority to guide them in matters of church organization and doctrine, they followed the diverse ways of men, and were rent within while assailed from without. The Roman church, confronted by determined opponents, hesitated at no extreme of cruelty.

The court of the Inquisition, established in the latter part of the fifteenth century under the infamously sacrilegious name of the "Holy Office," became intoxicated with the lust of barbarous cruelty. In the early stages of the Reformation instigated by Luther, the king of England, Henry VIII, declared himself a supporter of the pope, and was rewarded by a papal bestowal of the distinguishing title "Defender of the Faith" Within a few years, this same British sovereign was excommunicated from the Roman church. The British parliament, in 1534, passed the Act of Supremacy, by which the nation was declared free from all allegiance to papal authority.

By Act of Parliament the king was made the head of the church within his own dominions. Thus was born the Church of England, a direct result of the licentious amours of a debauched and infamous king. With blasphemous indifference to the absence of divine commission, with no semblance of priestly succession, an adulterous sovereign created a church. The zeal of their respective adherents, their professed love of God and devotion to Christ's service, were chiefly signalized by the sword, the ax, and the stake.

Revelling in the realization of at least a partial emancipation from the tyranny of priestcraft, men and nations debauched their newly acquired liberty of thought, speech, and action, in a riot of abhorrent excess. The mis-called Age of Reason, and the atheistical abominations culminating in the French Revolution stand as ineffaceable testimony of what man may become when glorying in his denial of God. Is it to be wondered at, that from the sixteenth century, churches of man's contriving have multiplied with phenomenal rapidity? Churches and churchly organizations professing Christianity as their creed have come to be numbered by hundreds. On every side is heard in this day, "Lo, here is

There are sects named from the circumstances of their origin—as the Church of England. The only organization called a church existing at that time and venturing to assert claim to authority by succession was the Catholic church. If the "mother church" be without a valid priesthood, and devoid of spiritual power, how can her offspring derive from her the right to officiate in the things of God? Who would dare to affirm that man can originate a priesthood which God is bound to honor and acknowledge?

Granted that men may and do create among themselves societies, associations, sects, and even "churches" if they choose so to designate their organizations. granted that they may prescribe rules, formulate laws, and devize plans of operation, discipline, and government, and that all such laws, rules, and schemes of administration are binding upon those who assume membership. Whence can such human institutions derive the authority of the Holy Priesthood, without which there can be no Church of Christ? The apostate condition of Christendom has been frankly admitted by many eminent and conscientious representatives of the several churches, and by churches as institutions.

Even the Church of England acknowledges the awful fact in her official declaration of degeneracy. Let it not be concluded that through the night of the universal apostasy, long and dark as it was, God had forgotten the world. The Spirit of God was operative so far as the unbelief of men permitted. John the apostle, and the Three Nephite disciples, were ministering among men, though unknown.

But through the centuries of spiritual darkness men lived and died without the administration of a contemporary apostle, prophet, elder, bishop, priest, teacher, or deacon. Whatever of the form of Godliness existed in the churches of human establishment was destitute of divine power. The time foreseen by the inspired apostle had fully come. Mankind in general refused to endure sound doctrine, but, having itching ears, did they heap to themselves teachers, after their own lusts, and verily had they turned away their ears from the truth to follow after fables.

The first quarter of the nineteenth century witnessed the cumulative fulfilment of the conditions predicted through the prophet Amos. Throughout the period of apostasy the windows of heaven had been shut toward the world, so as to preclude all direct revelation from God, and particularly any personal ministration or theophany of the Christ. "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord: And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east"

Mankind had ceased to know God; and had invested the utterances of prophets and apostles of old, who had known Him, with a pall of mystery and fancy. But it had been determined in the councils of heaven, that after many centuries of benighted ignorance the world should be illumined anew by the light of truth. Through the operation of the genius of intelligence, which is the Spirit of Truth, the soul of the race had been undergoing a preparation, like unto the deep plowing of a field, for the planting of the gospel afresh. The principle of the mariner's compass was revealed by the Spirit; the material embodiment thereof was invented by man; and by its aid the unknown oceans were explored.

Toward the end of the fifteenth century Columbus was led by the inspiration of God to the discovery of the New World. In due time the good ships Mayflower and Speedwell brought to the western world the Pilgrim Fathers. The coming of Columbus and the later immigration of the Puritan Pilgrims had been predicted nearly six hundred years before Christ. Their respective missions had been as truly appointed as has been the sending of any prophet with a message to deliver and a work to do.

The war between the American Colonies and the Mother Country had been foretold as further steps in preparation for the restoration of the gospel. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the embodiment of liberty; it is the truth that shall make free every man and every nation who will accept and obey its precepts. It was not meet that the precious seed of the restored gospel be thrown upon unplowed soil, hardened by intolerance, and fit to produce only thorns of bigotry and rank weeds of mental and spiritual serfdom.

At the appointed time, the Eternal Father and His Son Jesus the Christ appeared to man upon the earth, and inaugurated the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times. "The thoughtful student cannot fail to see in the progress of the great apostasy and its results the existence of an overruling power operating toward eventual good, however mysterious its methods" "The eastern world had lost this knowledge of the Lord earlier than the western hemisphere. Upon the land of North America, four hundred years after the birth of our Savior and Master, there stood at least one man who knew the Lord God Almighty as a distinct personality"

The heart-rending persecutions to which the saints were subjected in the early centuries of our era were foreknown to the Lord. While we cannot say or believe that such exhibitions of human depravity and blasphemy of heart were in accordance with the divine will, certainly God willed to permit full scope to the free agency of man. Not less marked is the divine permission in the revolts and rebellions, in the revolutions and reformations, that developed in opposition to the darkening influence of the apostate church. Some won the martyr's crown, and others filled the flagon of their iniquity to overflowing.

Henry VIII in his arrogant assumption of priestly authority, John Knox in Scotland, Roger Williams in America. Their efforts laid in part the foundation of the structure of religious freedom and liberty of conscience. This in preparation for the restoration of the gospel as had been divinely predicted. The Great Apostasy, 10:19, 20. 3. Declaration of a General Apostasy by the Church of England. —The Book of Homilies , from which the quotation given in the text is taken, was published about the middle of the sixteenth century. The official proclamation of a universal apostasy was made prominently current, for the Homilies were "appointed to be read in churches" in lieu of sermons under certain conditions

In the statement cited, the Church of England solemnly avers that a state of apostasy affecting all ages, sects, and degrees throughout whole Christendom, had prevailed for eight hundred years prior to the establishment of the church making the declaration. That this affirmation remains effective today, as both confession and profession, appears from the fact that the homily "Against Peril of Idolatry" and certain other homilies are specifically ratified and endorsed. See "Articles of Religion" xxxv, in current issues of Church of. England, Book of Common Prayer.

The Creed of Saint Athanasius is one of the oldest Christian dogmas. It was written in the first century of the Church of England. The creed has a place in the ritual of some of the Protestant churches. "We worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity," it says.

The Father is eternal, the Son eternal: and the Holy Ghost eternal. And yet they are not three eternals: but one eternal. So likewise the Father is Almighty, the son Almighty: and Holy Ghost Almighty. And Yet they areNot three Almighties: butOne Almighty. So the Father, Son, and HolyGhost are God, Lord, and Lord; but not three Lords, but one Lord. "For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity: to acknowledge every Person by himself to be God and Lord, so are we forbidden by the Catholick Religion: to say, There be three Gods, or three Lords." 5. The Mission of Columbus and Its Results.

Nephi, son of Lehi, was shown the future of his people, including the degeneracy of a branch thereof, afterward known as Lamanites. The coming of a man from among the Gentiles, across the deep waters, was revealed in such plainness as to positively identify that man with Columbus. And the coming of other Gentiles to this land, out of captivity, is equally explicit. The revelation is thus recorded by Nephi to whom it was given: "And it came to pass that I looked and beheld many waters"

No extended account of the apostasy of the Primitive Church can be attempted here. The reader is referred to special works treating this important subject. See the author's "The Great Apostasy, considered in the Light of Scriptural and Secular History," a work of 176 pages.

The false doctrine of "transubstantiation" is to the effect that the bread and wine administered as emblems of Christ's flesh and blood in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper are transmuted by priestly consecration. See "The Great Apostasy," 8:16-19. For comprehensive treatment of the subject see chapters 6 to 9 inclusive.