SPREAD OF JOACHITIC IDEAS. 17 . should realize the glad promises so constantly held out before them and so miserably withheld in the performance. Joachim himself might seek to evade these deductions from his premises, yet others could not fail to make them, and nothing could be more auda- ciously subversive of the established spiritual and temporal order of the Church. Yet for a time his speculations attracted little attention and no animadversion. It is possible that the condemnation of his theory of the Trinity may have cast a shadow over his exegetical works and prevented their general dissemination, but they were treasured by kindred spirits, and copies of them were carried into various lands and carefully preserved. Curiously enough, the first response which they elicited was from the bold heretics known as the Amaurians, whose ruthless suppression in Paris, about the year 1210, we have already considered. Among their errors was enumerated that of the three Eras, which was evidently derived from Joachim, with the difference that the third Era had already commenced. The power of the Father only lasted under the Mo- saic Law ; with the advent of Christ all the sacraments of the Old Testament were superseded. The reign of Christ has lasted till the present time, but now commences the sovereignty of the Holy Ghost ; the sacraments of the New Testament — baptism, the Eu- charist, penitence, and the rest — are obsolete and to be discarded, and the power of the Holy Ghost will operate through the per- sons in whom it is incarnated. The Amaurians, as we have seen, promptly disappeared, and the derivative sects — the Ortlibenses, and the Brethren of the Free Spirit — seem to have omitted this feature of the heresy. At all events, we hear nothing more of it in that quarter.* Gradually, however, the writings of Joachim obtained currency, and with the ascription to him of the false prophecies which ap- peared towards the middle of the century his name became more widely known and of greater authority. In Provence and Lan- guedoc, especially, his teachings found eager reception. Harried successively by the crusades and the Inquisition, and scarce as yet fairly reunited with the Church, those regions furnished an
- Rigord. de Gest. Phil. Aug. arm. 1210. — Guillel. Nangiac. arm. 1210. — Caesar.
Hcisterb. dist. v. c. xxii. III.— 2
