Note 535 — Chapter XXIII · THE PAPACY AND THE TEMPORAL POWERS IN THE LATER MIDDLE AGES

Manichæus was a learned Persian who, in the third century, worked out a system of doctrine which sought to combine the principles of Christianity with others taken over from the Persian and kindred Oriental religions. The most prominent feature of the resulting creed was the conception of an absolute dualism running throughout the universe—light and darkness, good and evil, soul and body—which existed from the beginning and should exist forever. The Manichæan sect spread from Persia into Asia Minor North Africa, Sicily, and Italy. Though persecuted by Diocletian, and afterwards by some of the Christian emperors, it had many adherents as late as the sixth century, and certain of its ideas appeared under new names at still later times, notably among the Albigenses in southern France in the twelfth century.