ABSTRACT
BEFORE we enter upon the history of ecclesiastical affairs during the reign of Constantine it will be well once more to look round the world-arena and see what opponents Christianity had to face. The disappearance of persecution and the cessation of all obligation to Caesarworship made the fundamental issues all the clearer. We shall find that the Church had serious rivals to its claims as an institution, as an intellectual system, and as a school of morals. For an example of the first we shall take the Mystery Cults, of the second Neo-platonism, and of the third Manicheism.
