It was about one hundred and fifty years after Philo that St. Clement of Alexandria tried to do for Christianity what Philo had tried to do for Judaism.  His aim is nothing less than to construct a philosophy of religion—­a Gnosis, “knowledge,” he calls it—­which shall “initiate” the educated Christian into the higher “mysteries” of his creed.  The Logos doctrine, according to which Christ is the universal Reason,[116] the Light that lighteth every man, here asserts its full rights.  Reasoned belief is the superstructure of which faith[117] is the foundation.

“Knowledge,” says Clement, “is more than faith.”  “Faith is a summary knowledge of urgent truths, suitable for people who are in a hurry; but knowledge is scientific faith.”  “If the Gnostic (the philosophical Christian) had to choose between the knowledge of God and eternal salvation, and it were possible to separate two things so inseparably connected, he would choose without the slightest hesitation the knowledge of God.”  On the wings of this “knowledge” the soul rises above all earthly passions and desires, filled with a calm disinterested love of God.  In this state a man can distinguish truth from falsehood, pure gold from base metal, in matters of belief; he can see the connexion of the various dogmas, and their harmony with reason; and in reading Scripture he can penetrate beneath the literal to the spiritual meaning.  But when Clement speaks of reason or knowledge, he does not mean merely intellectual training.  “He who would enter the shrine must be pure,” he says, “and purity is to think holy things.”  And again, “The more a man loves, the more deeply does he penetrate into God.”  Purity and love, to which he adds diligent study of the Scriptures, are all that is necessary to the highest life, though mental cultivation may be and ought to be a great help.[118]

History exhibits a progressive training of mankind by the Logos.  “There is one river of truth,” he says, “which receives tributaries from every side.”

All moral evil is caused either by ignorance or by weakness of will.  The cure for the one is knowledge, the cure for the other is discipline.[119]

In his doctrine of God we find that he has fallen a victim to the unfortunate negative method, which he calls “analysis.”  It is the method which starts with the assertion that since God is exalted above Being, we cannot say what He is, but only what He is not.  Clement apparently objects to saying that God is above Being, but he strips Him of all attributes and qualities till nothing is left but a nameless point; and this, too, he would eliminate, for a point is a numerical unit, and God is above the idea of the Monad.  We shall encounter this argument far too often in our survey of Mysticism, and in writers more logical than Clement, who allowed it to dominate their whole theology and ethics.

The Son is the Consciousness of God.  The Father only sees the world as reflected in the Son.  This bold and perhaps dangerous doctrine seems to be Clement’s own.