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The justification for assuming that the Church at Rome probably had Adoptionist proclivities is the undeniable fact that early in the second century Hermas held this view, and there is no evidence that he was an innovator.
She bore the utmost torture without flinching, only once she called out the name of her son Hermas; then I turned to look at her, and saw her gazing up to Heaven with wide open eyes and trembling lips-living, but already with the Lord on the rack, and yet in bliss. My stronger body clung to the earth; she found deliverance at the first blow of the torturer.
Hermas had often been carried on those "Tides of music's golden sea Setting toward eternity." But to-day his heart was a rock that stood motionless. The flood passed by and left him unmoved. Looking out from his place at the foot of the pillar, he saw a man standing far off in the lofty bema.
Ringing words against all forms of lying were spoken by some of the Christian Fathers. Says the Shepherd of Hermas: "Love the truth, and let nothing but truth proceed from your mouth, that the spirit which God has placed in your flesh may be found truthful before all men; and the Lord, who dwelleth in you, will be glorified, because the Lord is truthful in every word, and in him is no falsehood.
The historical character of Christian life and thought is surely evidence that Jesus Christ has accomplished something real; and when we get a better hold of that, the problem of his person should be more within our reach. The gaiety of the Early Church in its union with Jesus Christ rings through the New Testament and the Christian fathers from Hermas to Augustine.
Paulus was still sitting on his bed, and after they had prayed together, he gave him the jar which Hermas had filled with fresh water before going down to the oasis. "I feel quite strong," said the old man. "The medicine is good; I have slept well and dreamed sweetly; but you look pale and as if you had not slept." "I," said Paulus, "I lay down there on the bed.
"Not even your father's?" asked Paulus, and he looked at the boy with such an astonished and enquiring air, that Hermas turned away his eyes in confusion. "It is not right at any rate to trouble the last remnant of life of that very man who longs to live for your sake only." "I should have been very willing to be still, for I love my father as well as any one else."
Many a one has spoken fair words to me or given me flowers, and sent old women to my house to win me for them, but even if one has happened to please me better than another, still I have never found it hard to send them home again as was fitting." "Till Hermas laid his love at your feet," said Paulus. "He is a bold lad " "A pretty, inexperienced boy," said Sirona, "neither more nor less.
Early in that morning when he had taken upon himself Hermas' guilt he had abjured wearing his sheepskin; now his body, accustomed to the warm wrap, suffered severely, and his blood coursed with fevered haste through his veins since the efforts, night-watches, and excitement of the last few days.
He could have shouted in his new and delicious sense of freedom, and the boy at the stern shook his head in astonishment when he saw Hermas wield the oars he had entrusted to him, unskilfully it is true, but with mighty strokes. "The wind is in our favor," he called out to the anchorite as he hauled round the sail with the rope in his hand, "we shall get on without your working so hard.
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