Resistance to the inroads of the barbarians was no longer possible. Rome was sacked successively by different nations of Central Europe, and at length the kingdom of the Goths in Italy was established under Theodoric, A.D. 493. [Sidenote: Arianism of barbarian conquerors.] These rude nations, though professing Christianity, had received with it the heretical doctrines of Anus, owing to their teachers having belonged to those eastern portions of Europe, which, from their nearness to Asia, were most infected with this heresy.
The CHURCH OF FRANCE was probably founded by St. Paul, but we have no certain account of its early history. [Sidenote: Asiatic origin of Early French Bishops,] "Trophimus the Ephesian" is believed to have been the first Bishop of Arles, and Pothinus, another Greek Asiatic, occupied the see of Lyons at the time of the persecution under Marcus Aurelius, A.D. 161-A.D. 180, during which he suffered martyrdom. His { 78} successor was St. Irenaeus, a native, probably, of Smyrna, who was martyred under Severus, A.D. 202. This long-continued connexion with the Churches of Asia Minor left its traces on the liturgy and customs of the Church of France, and through it of Britain and Ireland, these latter Churches adhering to the Eastern mode of computing Easter even after the Western reckoning had been adopted in France. [Sidenote: and of French Liturgy.] The liturgy used in France, as well as in Britain and Spain, is known to have been founded on that used in Ephesus and in the other Asiatic cities, which was almost certainly that used by St. John himself.
[Sidenote: Intercourse between English and French Churches.]
A Council was summoned by Constantine, A.D. 314, at the French city of Arles, and one French Bishop at least was present at the great Nicaean Council, A.D. 323. About a century later (A.D. 429), St. Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, and St. Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, were sent over to Britain to assist in combating the errors of Pelagius, the neighbour Churches of England and France maintaining apparently very friendly relations. Many of the barbarian tribes who overran France in the beginning of the fifth century, though professing Christianity, were deeply infected with the Arian heresy. The Franks, however, who were heathens at their first entrance into the country, embraced the orthodox faith, and eventually became masters of the kingdom under Clovis, A.D. 486.