Even our Saviour preached liberty and equality.
In the next chapter Irenaeus speaks of Menander, who was also a Samaritan, as the successor of Simon, and as having, like him, attained to the highest pitch of magic. His doctrine is represented as being the same as that of Simon, only that it was he this time who was the saviour of the world.
With the view of directing the thoughts of Christians to the first coming of Christ as Saviour, and to his second coming as Judge, special lessons are prescribed for the four Sundays in Advent.
Enlightened, - and then he could return to them not only as husband and father, but as teacher and saviour.
The most extravagant estimate of all was that of Whiston, who calls them "the most sacred standard of Christianity, equal in authority to the Gospels themselves, and superior in authority to the epistles of single apostles, some parts of them being our Saviour's own original laws delivered to the apostles, and the other parts the public acts of the apostles" (Historical preface to Primitive Christianity Revived, pp. 85-86).