usually celebrated by the earliest Christians in connection with the Lord's Supper. The ricli Christians presented their poorer brethren in the faith with gifts, and all ate together, in token of their equality before God and their brotherly liarmony. The meetings were opened and closed with prayer, and dining the feast spiritual songs ^•ere sung. At first, a bishop or ])resbyter pre- sided, who read a portion of the Scripture, pro- po.sed questions upon it. and received the various answers of the brethren. Afterward, whatever information had been obtained regarding the other churches was read — such as the clhcial letters of overseers, or private communications from eminent members; and thus a spirit of practical sympathy was engendered. Before the conclusion of the proceedings money was collected for widows, orplians. the poor, prisoners, and those who had suffered shipwreck. Then the members gave one another the holy kiss and the feast was ended with a "philanthropic prayer." Generally the feast of the agape preceded the celebration of the Lord's Supper, but during the period of the persecutions, when the Christians had often to hold divine .service before dawn, the agapiB were, for the most part, delayed till the evening. Later, a formal separation was made between the two rites. In the third and fourth centuries the agape had degenerated into a common banquet, where the deaths of relatives and the anniversaries of the niartTs were com- memorated, and where the clergA' and the poor were guests; but with the increase of wealth and the decay of religious earnestness and purity in the Christian Church, these agapa> became occa- sions of great riotousness and debauchery. Councils declared against them, forbade the clergy to take any share in their celebration, and finally banished them from the Church. At the same time, it must be admitted that the heathens ignorantly calumniated the practices of the Christians in these agap;c. and that the defense made by Tertullian. Slinueius Felix. Origen, etc., is eminently convincing. The Mora- vians have attempted to revive these agapse, and hold solemn festivals with prayer and praise, where tea is drunk and wheaten bread, called love-bread, is used. Somewhat similar are the agapse of the Church foinided by Wesley. See Love-Feasts.
AG'APEM'ONE (modern compound from Gk.
aya-T), iiiiiijir. li>ve. + /Jov'/, monc, a staying,
stopping-place). A conventual establishment of
a singular kind, consisting of persons of both
sexes, founded at Charlynch, near Bridgewater.
England, by Mr. Henry .Tames Prince, formerly a
clergyman of the Church of England. The in-
mates belong to a new religious sect orig-
inating with jIr. Prince and a Mr. Starkey.
also a clergj'nian, and are sometimes called
Lampeter Brethren, from the place where Prince
was educated, and where, while a student, he
formed a revival society also. Community of goods
being insisted upon, the leaders acquired consid-
erable property, and fitted uj) in luxuriois style
a dwelling near Charlynch. Prince, who was
styled "The Lord," affirmed ill his publications
that he was sinless and was sent to redeem the
Iiody, "to conclude the day of grace, and to in-
troduce the day of judgment." See Hepworth
Dixon, fipi ri t lui I ^Virrf: (London. 18C8), and the
article by Jliss Edith Sellers in The Xrirhcrii
House Magazine (London, November, 1891), re-
printed in Maga-iiic of Cliristiaii Literature
( Kew York, December, 1S91).
It would appear that a society similar in its aims and character, though not conventual in its form, existed in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It was called "The Fam- ily of Love." Its founder is geneially supposed to have been Heinrich Nikolaus, who was born at iliinster, in Westphalia, .January!l or 10, 1501 or 1502, but who lived a considerable time in Holland. He held himself to be greater than Moses or Christ, for the former onlj' taught men to 7io/)r, and the latter to helieve, while he first announced the doctrine of love. He founded his sect, "The House," or "Family of Love," i^ Em- den, East Friesland, about 1540, and died in 1570. In the reign of Edward VI. the sect ap- peared in England. By 1578, they had appar- ently increased in numbers considerably, for in that year one John Rogers published a work against them, entitled The Displaying of an Horrible Secle of Grosse and Wicked Heretigues, naming themselves the Familie of Love, with the Lives of their Atithours, and ivhat Doctrine the;/ teach in Corners (second edition. 1579). In 1580, Queen Elizabeth issued a proclamation for the hunting out and punishing of the "damnable sect." The family of love, "or lust, rather." as old Fuller has it, tried to insinuate themselves into the good graces of King James by present- ing a petition casting aspersions on the Puri- tans. It had a brief pros]ierity, and was revived in the seventeenth century, when it was con- founded with the Friends, but quickly died. Its name in New England in the seventeenth century Avas a])plied to some dissenters, but there is no evidence that there were any Familists there. Their doctrines seem to have been a species of pseudo-spiritual sentimentalism resulting in gross impurity. Consult Thomas, The Faniili/ of Love, "Haverford College Studies," No. 12 (Bos- ton. 1893). See MrcKERS.
AG'APE'TÆ (fem. form of Agapeti). Early Christian virgins who lived, generally in all purity, in the same house with men bound to strict celibacy. See Agap.e.
AG'APE'TI ( nom. pi, of Gk. aya-nriTnQ, agapetos,
beloved). Early Christian men who lived in the
same iiouse with deaconesses, both being celi-
bates. The growth of ascetic notions in the
Church led to the supposition that all contact
between the sexes, except in marriage, must lead
to immoral conduct, and so in the fifth and sixth
centuries the practice was condemned bj' the
Cluiich and liy the civil power.
AG'APE'TUS. The name of two popes. Agapetus I. Pope of Rome from 535 to 536. The fear of an invasion of Italy by Justinian led Theodatus. the King of the Goths in Italy, to send Agapetus to Constantinople in 536 to sue for peace from the Emperor. Though unsuccessful in this mission, Agapetus persuaded Justinian to depose Anthimus fiom the patriarchal see of Constantinople. He died at Constantinople. His festival is celebrated on the twentieth of September by the Roman Catholic Church. Agapetus II. Pope of Rome from 940 to 955; a Roman by birth. His first act was to establish his political rule over the churches of the empire. Against Berenger II., King of Italy, who was a troublesome neighbor to the little pontifical state, he invoked the aid of Otto I.
