Note 46 — Chapter VII · ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY AND ITS OPPONENTS
Reading edition
“Gnosis was an attempt to convert Christianity into philosophy; to place it in its widest relation to the universe, and to incorporate with it the ideas and feelings approved by the best intelligence of the times.” Mackay, Rise and Progress of Christianity, p. 109. But cp. the per contra on p. 110: “it was but a philosophy in fetters, an effort of the mind to form for itself a more systematic belief in its own prejudices.” Again (p. 115): “a reaction towards freethought was the essence of Gnosis.” So also Robins, A Defence of the Faith, 1862, pt. i, pp. 4–5, 153. ↑