sometimes extremely slow in their
operation. The forces they have to overcome are strongly intrenched. But
slow as may seem the progress, the power of right steadily gains and the
temporary success of evil is soon past. The ways in which the triumph of
the Christian ideal has been brought nearer have been at times very
varied. At one time it may seem that the leaders in the cause of social
regeneration have been wholly blind to the full significance of the
faith they professed. Fantastic forms of asceticism have banished women
from the society of those who were trying to lead the perfect life. But
the more sympathetic study of the extravagances of religious enthusiasm
has been able to discover that even in ages in which ideals seemed to be
wholly opposed to those of latter ages, there has been the same
fundamental conception which has been constantly striving for
realization in the world.

In the light of subsequent history, it appears fortunate that the
position of woman in the new society was not more fully and carefully
defined by the teachers of the new religion. If the early Christian
teachers had given their followers minute rules regulating their life
and conduct, there might easily have been a return to a legalism that
would have been disastrous for the new faith. Even the few regulations
that are to be found in connection with matters of order and discipline
in the Apostolic Church, so far as they have concerned women, have been
frequently misunderstood and misapplied. They have been made of lasting
obligation by many, rather than considered as the expression for the
times and circumstances in which the early Church was placed, of
principles of propriety which might be very different from, if not
indeed contrary to, the sentiments of another age. But by leaving the
whole question open, with but a very few exceptions, the great working
out of the freedom of the new faith was possible. Woman has been
recognized by the world as man's helpmate. She is not his toy or his
slave, but a sharer with him in the highest privileges of human nature.
An appreciation of the tremendous responsibilities that have been put
upon her by the fact of her womanhood has not separated her from man,
but both are seen standing side by side in the New Kingdom.

JOSEPH CULLEN AYER, JR.

_Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge._

PREFACE

Christianity introduced a new moral epoch i