Excerpt from The Creeds: An Historical and Doctrinal Exposition of the Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds Among the characteristics which distinguish Christianity from all other religions Of the world, one Of the most prominent is its possession of a Creed and Of a system of dogmatic theology. Long before the Church of Jesus Christ was founded the world had its religions; for the religious instinct is universal in human nature. But, with the exception Of Judaism, Of which Christianity was the Offspring, all religions differed from Christianity in that they had no Creed, no Rule Of Faith, no theology. Ancient peoples worshipped their gods with religious ceremonies;1 they Offered sacrifices, they recognised a priesthood, they speculated about the immortality of the soul and the life beyond the grave, and they had their rules Of conduct by which they strove to guide and restrain man in this present life; but they had no Creed and no theology. The history Of their gods was interwoven with strange legends and with myths which presented in an attractive form the operations Of the powers Of nature; but whether these nature powers or a personal God was the true Object of their worship probably few inquired, and to those who asked no definite or authoritative answer could be given. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.