To Timothy were give the earliest instructions for orderly arrangement in the church, these instructions being of the simplest nature, and, as Dean Alford well observes with regard to the Pastoral Epistles as a whole, the directions given 'are altogether of an ethical, not of an hierarchical kind'. These directions afford no warrant whatever for the widespread organizations of the "churches" as carried on today. Even in the earliest period the increasing heresies are much in evidence. Some there were who had swerved and turned aside altogether; others denied vital truth and thus overthrew "the faith of some". Hence Paul's constant warnings against such, and instructions to enlighten the opposers, "if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth". How the leaven spread is only to plainly shown in Paul's second epistle, which has been aptly termed a picture of the ruin of the church through departure from the apostolic doctrine.