each, could not be expected in the present work. This would rather belong to those who were eye-witnesses of the facts. Those, indeed, at which I myself was present, I shall publish for the benefit of posterity in another work.

In the present work, however, I shall, to the abovementioned facts, add the revocation issued by our persecutors, as also those events that occurred at the beginning of the persecution, believing that they will be read not without profit. To tell the state of the Roman empire before the war was waged against us, how long the emperors continued friendly and peaceable towards us, and how great was the abundance and prosperity of the empire, what description would suffice? Then, indeed, those who held the supreme command, who had been at the head of government ten and twenty years, passed their time in festivities and shows, and joyous feasts and entertainments in peace and tranquillity. And in this state of uninterrupted and increasing prosperity and power, they suddenly changed our peaceful condition, and excited against us a most unjust and nefarious war. Scarcely had the second year of this war been passed, when a revolution taking place in the whole government, it was completely overturned. A disease of a most

obstinate nature attacked the chief of the above-mentioned emperors, by which he was reduced to a state of insanity, together with him that was honoured with the second rank, and thus betook himself to a private life. These things had scarcely happened, when the whole empire was divided, a circumstance which, in the annals of history, never happened before, any where. It was not long before the emperor Constantius, who was all his life most kindly and favourably disposed towards his subjects, and also most favourably disposed toward the divine word, departed this life, leaving his son Constantine, a true copy of himself, as emperor and Augustus, his successor. He was the first of these emperors that was

ranked among the gods* by them, having every honour conferred upon him, after death, that was due to an emperor. He was the kindest and mildest of the emperors, and indeed the only one of them in our times, that passed his life consistently with the imperial dignity, and who likewise in all other respects exhibited the greatest condescension and benevolence to all, and had no share in the hostility raised against us, but even preserved and protected those pious persons under him free from harm and calumny. Neither did he demolish the churches, nor devise any other mischief against us, and at length he enjoyed a most happy and blessed death, being the only one who, at his decease, did peaceably and gloriously leave the government to his own son, as his successor; a prince who in all respects was endowed with the greatest moderation and piety. His son Constantine, therefore, in the very commencement, being proclaimed supreme emperor and Augustus by the soldiers, and. much longer before this, by the universal sovereign God, resolved to tread in the footsteps of his father, with respect to our faith. And such, indeed, was he. But Licinius after this was appointed emperor and Augustus, by a common vote of the emperors. Maximinus was greatly offended at this, since he had yet received only the title of Cesar from all. He, therefore, being particularly of a tyrannical temper, arrogating to himself the dignity, was created Augustus by himself. In the mean time, being detected in a conspiracy against the life of Constantine, the same (Maximian) that we have mentioned as having resumed the imperial dignity after his resignation, was carried off by a most disgraceful death.

It was the custom of the Roman senate to deify the emperors at their death. Our author, without intending to commend the practice, simply states the fact as a proof of the popularity of Constantius; as the honour was not indiscriminately conferred. Otherwise, in regard to this deification, our author, in the midst of his commendations, almost appears a little ironical upon the practice, how much soever he honoured the memory of Constantius. We are here forcibly reminded of the humorous strife between Esculapius and Hercules, in Lucian's dialogues, where Jupiter at last decides the dispute about priority, by assigning it to Æsculapius, because he died first.

And he was the first of these emperors whose statues and public monuments were demolished as commemorative of an impious and execrable man.

CHAPTER XIV.'

THE MORALS OF THE PERSECUTORS.

*

MAXENTIUS, the son of Maximian, who had established his government at Rome, in the commencement, pretended indeed, by a species of accommodation and flattery towards the Romans, that he was of our faith. He, therefore, commanded his subjects to desist from persecuting the Christians, pretending to piety with a view to appear much more mild and merciful than the former rulers. But he by no means proved to be in his actions such as he was expected. He sunk into every kind of wickedness, leaving no impurity or licentiousness untouched; committing every species of adultery and fornication, separating wives from their lawful husbands, and after abusing these, sending them thus most shamefully violated back again to their husbands. And these things he perpetrated not upon mean and obscure individuals, but insulting more particularly the most prominent of those that were most distinguished in the senate. Whilst he was thus dreaded by all, both people and magistrates, high and low were galled with a most grievous oppression; and though they bore this severe tyranny quietly, and without rebellion, it produced no relief from his murderous cruelty. On a certain very slight occasion, he gave up the people to be slaughtered by the prætorian guards, and thus multitudes of the Roman people were slain in the very heart of the city,

There were at this time six emperors.-In the West, Constantine, who succeeded his father Constantius in 306; Maximian the colleague of Diocletian, who after resigning the purple, again assumed it; and Maxentius his son, who married the daughter of Galerius, and was proclaimed emperor in 306. In the East, Galerius, Licinius, and Maximinus. The names of those emperors are given on the top of the page, to whose administration chiefly, the events in the text relate.

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not with the arrows and spears of the Scythians or barbarians, but of their own fellow-citizens. It would be impossible to tell what slaughter was made of the senators merely for the sake of their wealth, thousands being destroyed on a variety of pretexts and fictitious crimes. But when these evils had reached their greatest height, the tyrant was induced to resort to the mummery of magic. At one time he would cut open pregnant females, at another he would examine the bowels of new-born babes; sometimes he was slaughtering lions and performing every kind of execrable acts, to invoke the dæmons, and to avert the impending war. For all his hope now was that victory would be secured to him by these means. It is impossible then to say, in what different ways this cruel tyrant oppressed his subjects, so that they were already reduced to such extreme want and scarcity, such as they say has never happened at Rome, or elsewhere in our time. But Maximinus, who was sovereign of the east, as he had secretly formed an alliance with Maxentius, his true brother in wickedness at Rome, designed to conceal his designs as long as possible. But being at length detected, he suffered the deserved punishment. It was wonderful how nearly allied, and similar, rather how vastly beyond the tyranny of the Roman, were the cruelties and crimes of this tyrant. The first of impostors and jugglers, were honoured by him with the highest rank. He became so extremely timorous and superstitious, and valued the delusion and supposed influence of dæmons above all, so that he was hardly able to move his finger, one might say, or undertake any thing without soothsayers and oracles. Hence, also, he assailed us with a more violent and incessant persecution than those before him. He ordered temples to be erected in every city, and those that had been demolished by time, he commanded in his zeal to be renewed. Priests of the idols he established in every place and city; and over these a high priest in every province, some one of those who had been par

ticularly distinguished for his skill in the management of political affairs, adding a military guard. He granted to all his jugglers the same reverence as if they were the most pious and acceptable to the gods, freely bestowing on them governments, and the greatest privileges.

And from this time forth he began to vex, not merely a single city or region, but all the provinces under him, by exactions of silver and gold and money, by the most oppressive seizures and confiscations of property, in different ways and on various pretexts. Despoiling the wealthy of the substance inherited from their fathers, he bestowed vast wealth and heaps of money upon the flatterers around him. And he had now advanced to such a pitch of rashness, and was so addicted to intoxication, that, in his drunken frolics he was frequently deranged and deprived of his reason, like a madman; so that what he commanded when he was intoxicated, he afterwards regretted when he became sober. But determined to leave no one his superior in surfeiting and gluttony, he presented himself a fit master of iniquity to the rulers and subjects around him; initiating the soldiers, by luxury and intemperance, into every species of dissipation and revelling, encouraging the governors and generals, by rapacity and avarice, to proceed with their oppressions against their subjects, with almost the power of associate tyrants. Why should I mention the degrading and foul lust of the man? Or why mention his innumerable adulteries? There was not a city that he passed through in which he did not commit violence upon females. And in these he succeeded against all but the Christians. For they, despising death, valued his power but little.

The men bore fire, sword, and crucifixions, savage beasts, and the depths of the sea, the maiming of limbs, and searing with red hot iron, pricking and digging out the eyes, and the mutilations of the whole body. Also hunger, and mines, and prisons; and after all, they chose these sufferings for the sake of religion, rather than transfer that veneration and worship to idols which is