The Arians of the Fourth Century was a revolutionary contribution to church history, challenging many of the assumptions of earlier Anglican scholars. John Henry Newman's account of the great struggle over Christian doctrine in the fourth century shows the first signs of his later views on development. It was also in many ways a "tract for the times" -- a warning to the Anglican Church of the 1830s of the dangers of state interference in religious debate and of the need for theologically educated leadership.This book is taken from Newman's 1871 revision of the text. It contains some additional material and a fuller apparatus of references.

This present edition also includes an introduction and notes which attempt to put the work into its context in the nineteenth century Church, but also to explain how scholarship has altered our view of the subject matter. The Arians of the Fourth Century remains a startlingly original essay on the methods of intellectual history within the Christian church, and a powerful statement by Newman of a vision of the church that is not yet fully in tune with Roman Catholic teaching, yet is also at odds with much of the traditional theology of the Church of England.