Early Church History, Volume 1, First to Third Century by Edward Backhouse & Charles Tylor and published by Classics.
The period covered in this book was one of the utmost importance in early Church's life. Peter and Paul were martyred about AD 67, and except in Proconsular Asia, where John's life was prolonged for another generation, this date may be said to have closed the Apostolic age. Justin Martyr's First Apology is referred to about the year 148, and his martyrdom to 165 ; Irenseus became Bishop of Lyons 177, and died 202 ; the conversion of Tertullian is placed about 185, and his death in the year 220. These dates give us two distinct epochs, separated by an interval of about a century more or less - ample time for abuses and superstitions to find their way into the Church. How rapid the growth of error was even in the Apostle Paul's lifetime, in the Churches founded by himself, is manifest in his epistles - for example, that to Galatians.
The authors venture to think that if the influence and bearing of this silent period succeeding the age of the Apostles were more fully recognised by Church historians and critics, some of the strictures on the present work would not have been written. The primitive stage of Christianity is no fiction, nor is it in any wise invalidated by the existence of ritualism a century after the close of the New Testament.
