ATH.	65
it dilated, it being in itself an excellent system of the doctrines for which Athanasius contended concerning the Trinity and the Incarnation of jesus christ, principally in opposition to the Arians, Macedonians, and Apollinarians,, The reception of this Creed in the Western Church was highly favourable. The name of Athanasius, together with the intrinsic value of the form itself, caused it to be received into the public offices of the churches in France, as an orthodox formulary or system of belief, about the year 670. In Spain it was known and approved as a rule of faith about the year 633; and was soon after taken into the offices of the Spanish Church. In Germany it was received, at the latest, about the year 787. In South Britain it was well known and approved about the year 800, and was alternately sung in our churches in the tenth century. About eighty years afterwards it was received in Italy : and in Rome itself (which Church was always more desirous of imposing her own offices upon other churches than of receiving any from them), it was received in the tenth century, and probably about the year 930, since which time this confession of faith has been publicly recited in the Church-offices all over the West, and, it seems, also in some parts of the Eastern or Greek Church, particularly in Russia, Servia, Bulgaria, and Constantinople; even Luther, Calvin, and Beza, at the Reformation, made 'it their profession of faith. Not only does the Church of England require it to be repeated/but the eighth of the thirty-nine articles, to which every Clergyman subscribes, states—" The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed ; for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture/' To those who desire to advocate the cause of the English Church as a civil establishment, and who would represent it as perfectly accordant with the tolerable and tolerant spirit of the age, this creed affords much perplexity : and it is curious to observe how anxious they are to evade the force of the words; but this is an age when we are laudably warned by the highest authority, that no evasions can be per-