the Church
were educated, was founded and carefully organized by Ptolemy two
centuries before the Christian era. For six hundred years it exerted a
great influence on the youth who gathered from all parts of the
civilized world to receive instruction from its eminent professors.

Roman colleges likewise exerted a wholesome influence in their day.
They began during the life-time of Quintilian, in the second century,
and it continued to be the deliberate policy of Augustus, Vespasian
and Hadrian to multiply and extend the influence of endowed schools in
Rome and provincial towns. Their object, says Merivale, was to
"restore the tone of society and infuse into the national mind
healthier sentiments." These Romano-Hellenic schools were so tenacious
of life that they continued to flourish down to the fifth century.
Owing to the decline of personal morality and the low conceptions of
the ends of human life, and other general influences which led to the
downfall of the empire, these schools finally degenerated and could no
longer survive.

"Some great new spiritual force," says Professor Laurie, "was needed
to reform society and the education of the young. That force was at
hand in Christianity; and if it very early assumed a negative, if not
a prohibitory, attitude to the old learning, it may be conceded that
this was an inevitable step in the development of a new ethical idea."

The Christian system of education gradually superseded the pagan
system. Christianity fortified the sense of personality and introduced
the idea of a broader and deeper sentiment of human brotherhood, which
helped to diffuse the spirit of education among the people and awaken
in the human mind a sense of its native dignity and power.

There were in the first century such men as Clemens, Ignatius and
Polycarp, who employed their talent to build up Christianity and
encourage the education of the people. In the second century, "the
number of the learned men increased considerably, the majority of whom
were philosophers attached to the elective system." It was at the
close of this century (181 A. D.) that the first Christian
catechetical school was established at Alexandria, in accord with
Christian requirements. Such schools soon became numerous and
efficient, and were under the superintendence of the Bishops. The
priests, as well as the laity, were educated in them. At the end of
the fourth century they had entirely superseded the schools of the
_