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When a man rises in his aims and looks at the weal of the universe, and the harmony of the soul with God, then we feel that extinction would be grievous." And it is just this uplift into a new outlook that men find in Jesus Christ. A Second Century Christian, writing to his friend, Diognetus, characterizes Christianity as "this new interest which has entered into life."
The apostolic fathers Clement of Rome, Ignatius, the Pastor of Hermas, Papias, and the unknown author of the Epistle to Diognetus all these lived and wrote during that transitional period, and they could have told us much, but they have told us little. We can not but admire the beautiful spirit in which they wrote, and their style is earnest and vital.
The journals of Beton and Diognetus, the voyage of Nearchus, and the works of Ptolemy, afterwards king of Egypt, and Aristobulus, who accompanied Alexander in his expedition and wrote his life, all prove that the authority or the example of the sovereign influenced the pursuits of his officers and attendants; and it is highly to the credit of their diligence and accuracy, that every increase of geographical knowledge tends to confirm what they relate respecting the general appearance and features of the countries they traversed, as well as the position of cities, rivers, and mountains.
From my tutor I learned not to identify myself with popular sporting interests, but to work hard, endure fatigue, and not to meddle with other people's affairs. Diognetus taught me to bear freedom and plain dealing in others, and gave me a taste for philosophy.
Then the divine Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Julius Capitolinus, says how he learned to paint, Diognetus being his teacher; and even Ælius Lampridius relates that the Emperor Severus Alexander, who was an exceedingly powerful prince, himself painted his genealogy to show that he descended from the lineage of the Metelos.
For Diognetus was a Rhodian architect, to whom, as an honour, was granted out of the public treasury a fixed annual payment commensurate with the dignity of his art.
And so the Rhodians, in the same manner, deceived by the same reasoning, inflicted injury and insult on Diognetus.
Therefore, when they saw the enemy stubbornly hostile, slavery threatening them because of the machine which had been built to take the city, and that they must look forward to the destruction of their state, they fell at the feet of Diognetus, begging him to come to the aid of the fatherland. He at first refused.
It appears from Strabo and Pliny, in whose time the surveys drawn by Beton and Diognetus were extant, that they reduced the provinces through which they passed, as well as the marches of the army, to actual measurement; and thus, the distances being accurately set down, and journals faithfully kept, the principles of geographical science, next in importance and utility to astronomical observations, were established.
In the mind of the author of the Epistle to Diognetus, the grand central thought is the incarnation and the spiritual presence of Christ in redeemed humanity, by which they are led to the "free imitation of God," as a result of which they become to the world what the soul is to the body its life and the means of holding it together.
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