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The Project Gutenberg Etext of History Of The Decline And Fall Of The
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#2 in our format series by Edward Gibbon, Esq. With notes by the Rev. H.
H. Milman


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History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire Volume 2


by Edward Gibbon, Esq. With notes by the Rev. H. H. Milman

April, 1997  [Etext # 891]


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This is volume two of the six volumes of Edward Gibbon's History Of The
Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire. If you find any errors please feel
free to notify me of them. I want to make this the best etext edition
possible for both scholars and the general public. I would like to thank
those who have helped in making this text better. Especially Dale R.
Fredrickson who has hand entered the Greek characters in the footnotes
and who has suggested retaining the conjoined ae character in the text.
[e-mail] and [e-mail] are my email addresses for now.
Please feel free to send me your comments and I hope you enjoy this.

David Reed

History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire

Edward Gibbon, Esq.  With notes by the Rev. H. H. Milman  Vol. 2  1782
(Written), 1845 (Revised)

Chapter XVI * Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
Part I.

The Conduct Of The Roman Government Towards The Christians, From The
Reign Of Nero To That Of Constantine.

If we seriously consider the purity of the Christian religion, the
sanctity of its moral precepts, and the innocent as well as austere
lives of the greater number of those who during the first ages embraced
the faith of the gospel, we should naturally suppose, that so benevolent
a doctrine would have been received with due reverence, even by the
unbelieving world; that the learned and the polite, however they may
deride the miracles, would have esteemed the virtues, of the new sect;
and that the magistrates, instead of persecuting, would have protected
an order of men who yielded the most passive obedience to the laws,
though they declined the active cares of war and government. If, on the
other hand, we recollect the universal toleration of Polytheism, as it
was invariably maintained by the faith of the people, the incredulity of
philosophers, and the policy of the Roman senate and emperors, we are at
a loss to discover what new offence the Christians had committed, what
new provocation could exasperate the mild indifference of antiquity, and
what new motives could urge the Roman princes, who beheld without
concern a thousand forms of religion subsisting in peace under their
gentle sway, to inflict a severe punishment on any part of their
subjects, who had chosen for themselves a singular but an inoffensive
mode of faith and worship.

The religious policy of the ancient world seems to have assumed a more
stern and intolerant character, to oppose the progress of Christianity.
About fourscore years after the death of Christ, his innocent disciples
were punished with death by the sentence of a proconsul of the most
amiable and philosophic character, and according to the laws of an
emperor distinguished by the wisdom and justice of his general
administration. The apologies which were repeatedly addressed to the
successors of Trajan are filled with the most pathetic complaints, that
the Christians, who obeyed the dictates, and solicited the liberty, of
conscience, were alone, among all the subjects of the Roman empire,
excluded from the common benefits of their auspicious government. The
deaths of a few eminent martyrs have been recorded with care; and from
the time that Christianity was invested with the supreme power, the
governors of the church have been no less diligently employed in
displaying the cruelty, than in imitating the conduct, of their Pagan
adversaries. To separate (if it be possible) a few authentic as well as
interesting facts from an undigested mass of fiction and error, and to
relate, in a clear and rational manner, the causes, the extent, the
duration, and the most important circumstances of the persecutions to
which the first Christians were exposed, is the design of the present
chapter. *

The sectaries of a persecuted religion, depressed by fear animated with
resentment, and perhaps heated by enthusiasm, are seldom in a proper
temper of mind calmly to investigate, or candidly to appreciate, the
motives of their enemies, which often escape the impartial and
discerning view even of those who are placed at a secure distance from
the flames of persecution. A reason has been assigned for the conduct of
the emperors towards the primitive Christians, which may appear the more
specious and probable as it is drawn from the acknowledged genius of
Polytheism. It has already been observed, that the religious concord of
the world was principally supported by the implicit assent and reverence
which the nations of antiquity expressed for their respective traditions
and ceremonies. It might therefore be expected, that they would unite
with indignation against any sect or people which should separate itself
from the communion of mankind, and claiming the exclusive possession of
divine knowledge, should disdain every form of worship, except its own,
as impious and idolatrous. The rights of toleration were held by mutual
indulgence: they were justly forfeited by a refusal of the accustomed
tribute. As the payment of this tribute was inflexibly refused by the
Jews, and by them alone, the consideration of the treatment which they
experienced from the Roman magistrates, will serve to explain how far
these speculations are justified by facts, and will lead us to discover
the true causes of the persecution of Christianity.

Without repeating what has already been mentioned of the reverence of
the Roman princes and governors for the temple of Jerusalem, we shall
only observe, that the destruction of the temple and city was
accompanied and followed by every circumstance that could exasperate the
minds of the conquerors, and authorize religious persecution by the most
specious arguments of political justice and the public safety. From the
reign of Nero to that of Antoninus Pius, the Jews discovered a fierce
impatience of the dominion of Rome, which repeatedly broke out in the
most furious massacres and insurrections. Humanity is shocked at the
recital of the horrid cruelties which they committed in the cities of
Egypt, of Cyprus, and of Cyrene, where they dwelt in treacherous
friendship with the unsuspecting natives;  and we are tempted to applaud
the severe retaliation which was exercised by the arms of the legions
against a race of fanatics, whose dire and credulous superstition seemed
to render them the implacable enemies not only of the Roman government,
but of human kind.  The enthusiasm of the Jews was supported by the
opinion, that it was unlawful for them to pay taxes to an idolatrous
master; and by the flattering promise which they derived from their
ancient oracles, that a conquering Messiah would soon arise, destined to
break their fetters, and to invest the favorites of heaven with the
empire of the earth. It was by announcing himself as their long-expected
deliverer, and by calling on all the descendants of Abraham to assert
the hope of Isræl, that the famous Barchochebas collected a formidable
army, with which he resisted during two years the power of the emperor
Hadrian.

Notwithstanding these repeated provocations, the resentment of the Roman
princes expired after the victory; nor were their apprehensions
continued beyond the period of war and danger. By the general indulgence
of polytheism, and by the mild temper of Antoninus Pius, the Jews were
restored to their ancient privileges, and once more obtained the
permission of circumcising their children, with the easy restraint, that
they should never confer on any foreign proselyte that distinguishing
mark of the Hebrew race.  The numerous remains of that people, though
they were still excluded from the precincts of Jerusalem, were permitted
to form and to maintain considerable establishments both in Italy and in
the provinces, to acquire the freedom of Rome, to enjoy municipal
honors, and to obtain at the same time an exemption from the burdensome
and expensive offices of society. The moderation or the contempt of the
Romans gave a legal sanction to the form of ecclesiastical police which
was instituted by the vanquished sect. The patriarch, who had fixed his
residence at Tiberias, was empowered to appoint his subordinate
ministers and apostles, to exercise a domestic jurisdiction, and to
receive from his dispersed brethren an annual contribution.  New
synagogues were frequently erected in the principal cities of the
empire; and the sabbaths, the fasts, and the festivals, which were
either commanded by the Mosaic law, or enjoined by the traditions of the
Rabbis, were celebrated in the most solemn and public manner.  Such
gentle treatment insensibly assuaged the stern temper of the Jews.
Awakened from their dream of prophecy and conquest, they assumed the
behavior of peaceable and industrious subjects. Their irreconcilable
hatred of mankind, instead of flaming out in acts of blood and violence,
evaporated in less dangerous gratifications. They embraced every
opportunity of overreaching the idolaters in trade; and they pronounced
secret and ambiguous imprecations against the haughty kingdom of Edom.

Since the Jews, who rejected with abhorrence the deities adored by their
sovereign and by their fellow-subjects, enjoyed, however, the free
exercise of their unsocial religion, there must have existed some other
cause, which exposed the disciples of Christ to those severities from
which the posterity of Abraham was exempt. The difference between them
is simple and obvious; but, according to the sentiments of antiquity, it
was of the highest importance. The Jews were a nation; the Christians
were a sect: and if it was natural for every community to respect the
sacred institutions of their neighbors, it was incumbent on them to
persevere in those of their ancestors. The voice of oracles, the
precepts of philosophers, and the authority of the laws, unanimously
enforced this national obligation. By their lofty claim of superior
sanctity the Jews might provoke the Polytheists to consider them as an
odious and impure race. By disdaining the intercourse of other nations,
they might deserve their contempt. The laws of Moses might be for the
most part frivolous or absurd; yet, since they had been received during
many ages by a large society, his followers were justified by the
example of mankind; and it was universally acknowledged, that they had a
right to practise what it would have been criminal in them to neglect.
But this principle, which protected the Jewish synagogue, afforded not
any favor or security to the primitive church. By embracing the faith of
the gospel, the Christians incurred the supposed guilt of an unnatural
and unpardonable offence. They dissolved the sacred ties of custom and
education, violated the religious institutions of their country, and
presumptuously despised whatever their fathers had believed as true, or
had reverenced as sacred. Nor was this apostasy (if we may use the
expression) merely of a partial or local kind; since the pious deserter
who withdrew himself from the temples of Egypt or Syria, would equally
disdain to seek an asylum in those of Athens or Carthage. Every
Christian rejected with contempt the superstitions of his family, his
city, and his province. The whole body of Christians unanimously refused
to hold any communion with the gods of Rome, of the empire, and of
mankind. It was in vain that the oppressed believer asserted the
inalienable rights of conscience and private judgment. Though his
situation might excite the pity, his arguments could never reach the
understanding, either of the philosophic or of the believing part of the
Pagan world. To their apprehensions, it was no less a matter of
surprise, that any individuals should entertain scruples against
complying with the established mode of worship, than if they had
conceived a sudden abhorrence to the manners, the dress, or the language
of their native country.  *

The surprise of the Pagans was soon succeeded by resentment; and the
most pious of men were exposed to the unjust but dangerous imputation of
impiety. Malice and prejudice concurred in representing the Christians
as a society of atheists, who, by the most daring attack on the
religious constitution of the empire, had merited the severest
animadversion of the civil magistrate. They had separated themselves
(they gloried in the confession) from every mode of superstition which
was received in any part of the globe by the various temper of
polytheism: but it was not altogether so evident what deity, or what
form of worship, they had substituted to the gods and temples of
antiquity. The pure and sublime idea which they entertained of the
Supreme Being escaped the gross conception of the Pagan multitude, who
were at a loss to discover a spiritual and solitary God, that was
neither represented under any corporeal figure or visible symbol, nor
was adored with the accustomed pomp of libations and festivals, of
altars and sacrifices.  The sages of Greece and Rome, who had elevated
their minds to the contemplation of the existence and attributes of the
First Cause, were induced by reason or by vanity to reserve for
themselves and their chosen disciples the privilege of this
philosophical devotion.  They were far from admitting the prejudices of
mankind as the standard of truth, but they considered them as flowing
from the original disposition of human nature; and they supposed that
any popular mode of faith and worship which presumed to disclaim the
assistance of the senses, would, in proportion as it receded from
superstition, find itself incapable of restraining the wanderings of the
fancy, and the visions of fanaticism. The careless glance which men of
wit and learning condescended to cast on the Christian revelation,
served only to confirm their hasty opinion, and to persuade them that
the principle, which they might have revered, of the Divine Unity, was
defaced by the wild enthusiasm, and annihilated by the airy
speculations, of the new sectaries. The author of a celebrated dialogue,
which has been attributed to Lucian, whilst he affects to treat the
mysterious subject of the Trinity in a style of ridicule and contempt,
betrays his own ignorance of the weakness of human reason, and of the
inscrutable nature of the divine perfections.

It might appear less surprising, that the founder of Christianity should
not only be revered by his disciples as a sage and a prophet, but that
he should be adored as a God. The Polytheists were disposed to adopt
every article of faith, which seemed to offer any resemblance, however
distant or imperfect, with the popular mythology; and the legends of
Bacchus, of Hercules, and of Æsculapius, had, in some measure, prepared
their imagination for the appearance of the Son of God under a human
form.  But they were astonished that the Christians should abandon the
temples of those ancient heroes, who, in the infancy of the world, had
invented arts, instituted laws, and vanquished the tyrants or monsters
who infested the earth, in order to choose for the exclusive object of
their religious worship an obscure teacher, who, in a recent age, and
among a barbarous people, had fallen a sacrifice either to the malice of
his own countrymen, or to the jealousy of the Roman government. The
Pagan multitude, reserving their gratitude for temporal benefits alone,
rejected the inestimable present of life and immortality, which was
offered to mankind by Jesus of Nazareth. His mild constancy in the midst
of cruel and voluntary sufferings, his universal benevolence, and the
sublime simplicity of his actions and character, were insufficient, in
the opinion of those carnal men, to compensate for the want of fame, of
empire, and of success; and whilst they refused to acknowledge his
stupendous triumph over the powers of darkness and of the grave, they
misrepresented, or they insulted, the equivocal birth, wandering life,
and ignominious death, of the divine Author of Christianity.

The personal guilt which every Christian had contracted, in thus
preferring his private sentiment to the national religion, was
aggravated in a very high degree by the number and union of the
criminals. It is well known, and has been already observed, that Roman
policy viewed with the utmost jealousy and distrust any association
among its subjects; and that the privileges of private corporations,
though formed for the most harmless or beneficial purposes, were
bestowed with a very sparing hand.  The religious assemblies of the
Christians who had separated themselves from the public worship,
appeared of a much less innocent nature; they were illegal in their
principle, and in their consequences might become dangerous; nor were
the emperors conscious that they violated the laws of justice, when, for
the peace of society, they prohibited those secret and sometimes
nocturnal meetings.  The pious disobedience of the Christians made their
conduct, or perhaps their designs, appear in a much more serious and
criminal light; and the Roman princes, who might perhaps have suffered
themselves to be disarmed by a ready submission, deeming their honor
concerned in the execution of their commands, sometimes attempted, by
rigorous punishments, to subdue this independent spirit, which boldly
acknowledged an authority superior to that of the magistrate. The extent
and duration of this spiritual conspiracy seemed to render it everyday
more deserving of his animadversion. We have already seen that the
active and successful zeal of the Christians had insensibly diffused
them through every province and almost every city of the empire. The new
converts seemed to renounce their family and country, that they might
connect themselves in an indissoluble band of union with a peculiar
society, which every where assumed a different character from the rest
of mankind. Their gloomy and austere aspect, their abhorrence of the
common business and pleasures of life, and their frequent predictions of
impending calamities,  inspired the Pagans with the apprehension of some
danger, which would arise from the new sect, the more alarming as it was
the more obscure. "Whatever," says Pliny, "may be the principle of their
conduct, their inflexible obstinacy appeared deserving of punishment."

The precautions with which the disciples of Christ performed the offices
of religion were at first dictated by fear and necessity; but they were
continued from choice. By imitating the awful secrecy which reigned in
the Eleusinian mysteries, the Christians had flattered themselves that
they should render their sacred institutions more respectable in the
eyes of the Pagan world.  But the event, as it often happens to the
operations of subtile policy, deceived their wishes and their
expectations. It was concluded, that they only concealed what they would
have blushed to disclose. Their mistaken prudence afforded an
opportunity for malice to invent, and for suspicious credulity to
believe, the horrid tales which described the Christians as the most
wicked of human kind, who practised in their dark recesses every
abomination that a depraved fancy could suggest, and who solicited the
favor of their unknown God by the sacrifice of every moral virtue. There
were many who pretended to confess or to relate the ceremonies of this
abhorred society. It was asserted, "that a new-born infant, entirely
covered over with flour, was presented, like some mystic symbol of
initiation, to the knife of the proselyte, who unknowingly inflicted
many a secret and mortal wound on the innocent victim of his error; that
as soon as the cruel deed was perpetrated, the sectaries drank up the
blood, greedily tore asunder the quivering members, and pledged
themselves to eternal secrecy, by a mutual consciousness of guilt. It
was as confidently affirmed, that this inhuman sacrifice was succeeded
by a suitable entertainment, in which intemperance served as a
provocative to brutal lust; till, at the appointed moment, the lights
were suddenly extinguished, shame was banished, nature was forgotten;
and, as accident might direct, the darkness of the night was polluted by
the incestuous commerce of sisters and brothers, of sons and of
mothers."

But the perusal of the ancient apologies was sufficient to remove even
the slightest suspicion from the mind of a candid adversary. The
Christians, with the intrepid security of innocence, appeal from the
voice of rumor to the equity of the magistrates. They acknowledge, that
if any proof can be produced of the crimes which calumny has imputed to
them, they are worthy of the most severe punishment. They provoke the
punishment, and they challenge the proof. At the same time they urge,
with equal truth and propriety, that the charge is not less devoid of
probability, than it is destitute of evidence; they ask, whether any one
can seriously believe that the pure and holy precepts of the gospel,
which so frequently restrain the use of the most lawful enjoyments,
should inculcate the practice of the most abominable crimes; that a
large society should resolve to dishonor itself in the eyes of its own
members; and that a great number of persons of either sex, and every age
and character, insensible to the fear of death or infamy, should consent
to violate those principles which nature and education had imprinted
most deeply in their minds.  Nothing, it should seem, could weaken the
force or destroy the effect of so unanswerable a justification, unless
it were the injudicious conduct of the apologists themselves, who
betrayed the common cause of religion, to gratify their devout hatred to
the domestic enemies of the church. It was sometimes faintly insinuated,
and sometimes boldly asserted, that the same bloody sacrifices, and the
same incestuous festivals, which were so falsely ascribed to the
orthodox believers, were in reality celebrated by the Marcionites, by
the Carpocratians, and by several other sects of the Gnostics, who,
notwithstanding they might deviate into the paths of heresy, were still
actuated by the sentiments of men, and still governed by the precepts of
Christianity.  Accusations of a similar kind were retorted upon the
church by the schismatics who had departed from its communion,  and it
was confessed on all sides, that the most scandalous licentiousness of
manners prevailed among great numbers of those who affected the name of
Christians. A Pagan magistrate, who possessed neither leisure nor
abilities to discern the almost imperceptible line which divides the
orthodox faith from heretical pravity, might easily have imagined that
their mutual animosity had extorted the discovery of their common guilt.
It was fortunate for the repose, or at least for the reputation, of the
first Christians, that the magistrates sometimes proceeded with more
temper and moderation than is usually consistent with religious zeal,
and that they reported, as the impartial result of their judicial
inquiry, that the sectaries, who had deserted the established worship,
appeared to them sincere in their professions, and blameless in their
manners; however they might incur, by their absurd and excessive
superstition, the censure of the laws.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part II.

History, which undertakes to record the transactions of the past, for
the instruction of future ages, would ill deserve that honorable office,
if she condescended to plead the cause of tyrants, or to justify the
maxims of persecution. It must, however, be acknowledged, that the
conduct of the emperors who appeared the least favorable to the
primitive church, is by no means so criminal as that of modern
sovereigns, who have employed the arm of violence and terror against the
religious opinions of any part of their subjects. From their
reflections, or even from their own feelings, a Charles V. or a Lewis
XIV. might have acquired a just knowledge of the rights of conscience,
of the obligation of faith, and of the innocence of error. But the
princes and magistrates of ancient Rome were strangers to those
principles which inspired and authorized the inflexible obstinacy of the
Christians in the cause of truth, nor could they themselves discover in
their own breasts any motive which would have prompted them to refuse a
legal, and as it were a natural, submission to the sacred institutions
of their country. The same reason which contributes to alleviate the
guilt, must have tended to abate the vigor, of their persecutions. As
they were actuated, not by the furious zeal of bigots, but by the
temperate policy of legislators, contempt must often have relaxed, and
humanity must frequently have suspended, the execution of those laws
which they enacted against the humble and obscure followers of Christ.
From the general view of their character and motives we might naturally
conclude: I. That a considerable time elapsed before they considered the
new sectaries as an object deserving of the attention of government. II.
That in the conviction of any of their subjects who were accused of so
very singular a crime, they proceeded with caution and reluctance. III.
That they were moderate in the use of punishments; and, IV. That the
afflicted church enjoyed many intervals of peace and tranquility.
Notwithstanding the careless indifference which the most copious and the
most minute of the Pagan writers have shown to the affairs of the
Christians,  it may still be in our power to confirm each of these
probable suppositions, by the evidence of authentic facts.

1. By the wise dispensation of Providence, a mysterious veil was cast
over the infancy of the church, which, till the faith of the Christians
was matured, and their numbers were multiplied, served to protect them
not only from the malice but even from the knowledge of the Pagan world.
The slow and gradual abolition of the Mosaic ceremonies afforded a safe
and innocent disguise to the more early proselytes of the gospel. As
they were, for the greater part, of the race of Abraham, they were
distinguished by the peculiar mark of circumcision, offered up their
devotions in the Temple of Jerusalem till its final destruction, and
received both the Law and the Prophets as the genuine inspirations of
the Deity. The Gentile converts, who by a spiritual adoption had been
associated to the hope of Isræl, were likewise confounded under the garb
and appearance of Jews,  and as the Polytheists paid less regard to
articles of faith than to the external worship, the new sect, which
carefully concealed, or faintly announced, its future greatness and
ambition, was permitted to shelter itself under the general toleration
which was granted to an ancient and celebrated people in the Roman
empire. It was not long, perhaps, before the Jews themselves, animated
with a fiercer zeal and a more jealous faith, perceived the gradual
separation of their Nazarene brethren from the doctrine of the
synagogue; and they would gladly have extinguished the dangerous heresy
in the blood of its adherents. But the decrees of Heaven had already
disarmed their malice; and though they might sometimes exert the
licentious privilege of sedition, they no longer possessed the
administration of criminal justice; nor did they find it easy to infuse
into the calm breast of a Roman magistrate the rancor of their own zeal
and prejudice. The provincial governors declared themselves ready to
listen to any accusation that might affect the public safety; but as
soon as they were informed that it was a question not of facts but of
words, a dispute relating only to the interpretation of the Jewish laws
and prophecies, they deemed it unworthy of the majesty of Rome seriously
to discuss the obscure differences which might arise among a barbarous
and superstitious people. The innocence of the first Christians was
protected by ignorance and contempt; and the tribunal of the Pagan
magistrate often proved their most assured refuge against the fury of
the synagogue.  If indeed we were disposed to adopt the traditions of a
too credulous antiquity, we might relate the distant peregrinations, the
wonderful achievements, and the various deaths of the twelve apostles:
but a more accurate inquiry will induce us to doubt, whether any of
those persons who had been witnesses to the miracles of Christ were
permitted, beyond the limits of Palestine, to seal with their blood the
truth of their testimony.  From the ordinary term of human life, it may
very naturally be presumed that most of them were deceased before the
discontent of the Jews broke out into that furious war, which was
terminated only by the ruin of Jerusalem. During a long period, from the
death of Christ to that memorable rebellion, we cannot discover any
traces of Roman intolerance, unless they are to be found in the sudden,
the transient, but the cruel persecution, which was exercised by Nero
against the Christians of the capital, thirty-five years after the
former, and only two years before the latter, of those great events. The
character of the philosophic historian, to whom we are principally
indebted for the knowledge of this singular transaction, would alone be
sufficient to recommend it to our most attentive consideration.

In the tenth year of the reign of Nero, the capital of the empire was
afflicted by a fire which raged beyond the memory or example of former
ages.  The monuments of Grecian art and of Roman virtue, the trophies of
the Punic and Gallic wars, the most holy temples, and the most splendid
palaces, were involved in one common destruction. Of the fourteen
regions or quarters into which Rome was divided, four only subsisted
entire, three were levelled with the ground, and the remaining seven,
which had experienced the fury of the flames, displayed a melancholy
prospect of ruin and desolation. The vigilance of government appears not
to have neglected any of the precautions which might alleviate the sense
of so dreadful a calamity. The Imperial gardens were thrown open to the
distressed multitude, temporary buildings were erected for their
accommodation, and a plentiful supply of corn and provisions was
distributed at a very moderate price.  The most generous policy seemed
to have dictated the edicts which regulated the disposition of the
streets and the construction of private houses; and as it usually
happens, in an age of prosperity, the conflagration of Rome, in the
course of a few years, produced a new city, more regular and more
beautiful than the former. But all the prudence and humanity affected by
Nero on this occasion were insufficient to preserve him from the popular
suspicion. Every crime might be imputed to the assassin of his wife and
mother; nor could the prince who prostituted his person and dignity on
the theatre be deemed incapable of the most extravagant folly. The voice
of rumor accused the emperor as the incendiary of his own capital; and
as the most incredible stories are the best adapted to the genius of an
enraged people, it was gravely reported, and firmly believed, that Nero,
enjoying the calamity which he had occasioned, amused himself with
singing to his lyre the destruction of ancient Troy.  To divert a
suspicion, which the power of despotism was unable to suppress, the
emperor resolved to substitute in his own place some fictitious
criminals. "With this view," continues Tacitus, "he inflicted the most
exquisite tortures on those men, who, under the vulgar appellation of
Christians, were already branded with deserved infamy. They derived
their name and origin from Christ, who in the reign of Tiberius had
suffered death by the sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate.  For a
while this dire superstition was checked; but it again burst forth; *
and not only spread itself over Judæa, the first seat of this
mischievous sect, but was even introduced into Rome, the common asylum
which receives and protects whatever is impure, whatever is atrocious.
The confessions of those who were seized discovered a great multitude of
their accomplices, and they were all convicted, not so much for the
crime of setting fire to the city, as for their hatred of human kind.
They died in torments, and their torments were imbittered by insult and
derision. Some were nailed on crosses; others sewn up in the skins of
wild beasts, and exposed to the fury of dogs; others again, smeared over
with combustible materials, were used as torches to illuminate the
darkness of the night. The gardens of Nero were destined for the
melancholy spectacle, which was accompanied with a horse-race and
honored with the presence of the emperor, who mingled with the populace
in the dress and attitude of a charioteer. The guilt of the Christians
deserved indeed the most exemplary punishment, but the public abhorrence
was changed into commiseration, from the opinion that those unhappy
wretches were sacrificed, not so much to the public welfare, as to the
cruelty of a jealous tyrant."  Those who survey with a curious eye the
revolutions of mankind, may observe, that the gardens and circus of Nero
on the Vatican, which were polluted with the blood of the first
Christians, have been rendered still more famous by the triumph and by
the abuse of the persecuted religion. On the same spot,  a temple, which
far surpasses the ancient glories of the Capitol, has been since erected
by the Christian Pontiffs, who, deriving their claim of universal
dominion from an humble fisherman of Galilee, have succeeded to the
throne of the Cæsars, given laws to the barbarian conquerors of Rome,
and extended their spiritual jurisdiction from the coast of the Baltic
to the shores of the Pacific Ocean.

But it would be improper to dismiss this account of Nero's persecution,
till we have made some observations that may serve to remove the
difficulties with which it is perplexed, and to throw some light on the
subsequent history of the church.

1. The most sceptical criticism is obliged to respect the truth of this
extraordinary fact, and the integrity of this celebrated passage of
Tacitus. The former is confirmed by the diligent and accurate Suetonius,
who mentions the punishment which Nero inflicted on the Christians, a
sect of men who had embraced a new and criminal superstition.  The
latter may be proved by the consent of the most ancient manuscripts; by
the inimitable character of the style of Tacitus by his reputation,
which guarded his text from the interpolations of pious fraud; and by
the purport of his narration, which accused the first Christians of the
most atrocious crimes, without insinuating that they possessed any
miraculous or even magical powers above the rest of mankind.  2.
Notwithstanding it is probable that Tacitus was born some years before
the fire of Rome,  he could derive only from reading and conversation
the knowledge of an event which happened during his infancy. Before he
gave himself to the public, he calmly waited till his genius had
attained its full maturity, and he was more than forty years of age,
when a grateful regard for the memory of the virtuous Agricola extorted
from him the most early of those historical compositions which will
delight and instruct the most distant posterity. After making a trial of
his strength in the life of Agricola and the description of Germany, he
conceived, and at length executed, a more arduous work; the history of
Rome, in thirty books, from the fall of Nero to the accession of Nerva.
The administration of Nerva introduced an age of justice and propriety,
which Tacitus had destined for the occupation of his old age;  but when
he took a nearer view of his subject, judging, perhaps, that it was a
more honorable or a less invidious office to record the vices of past
tyrants, than to celebrate the virtues of a reigning monarch, he chose
rather to relate, under the form of annals, the actions of the four
immediate successors of Augustus. To collect, to dispose, and to adorn a
series of fourscore years, in an immortal work, every sentence of which
is pregnant with the deepest observations and the most lively images,
was an undertaking sufficient to exercise the genius of Tacitus himself
during the greatest part of his life. In the last years of the reign of
Trajan, whilst the victorious monarch extended the power of Rome beyond
its ancient limits, the historian was describing, in the second and
fourth books of his annals, the tyranny of Tiberius;  and the emperor
Hadrian must have succeeded to the throne, before Tacitus, in the
regular prosecution of his work, could relate the fire of the capital,
and the cruelty of Nero towards the unfortunate Christians. At the
distance of sixty years, it was the duty of the annalist to adopt the
narratives of contemporaries; but it was natural for the philosopher to
indulge himself in the description of the origin, the progress, and the
character of the new sect, not so much according to the knowledge or
prejudices of the age of Nero, as according to those of the time of
Hadrian. 3Tacitus very frequently trusts to the curiosity or reflection
of his readers to supply those intermediate circumstances and ideas,
which, in his extreme conciseness, he has thought proper to suppress. We
may therefore presume to imagine some probable cause which could direct
the cruelty of Nero against the Christians of Rome, whose obscurity, as
well as innocence, should have shielded them from his indignation, and
even from his notice. The Jews, who were numerous in the capital, and
oppressed in their own country, were a much fitter object for the
suspicions of the emperor and of the people: nor did it seem unlikely
that a vanquished nation, who already discovered their abhorrence of the
Roman yoke, might have recourse to the most atrocious means of
gratifying their implacable revenge. But the Jews possessed very
powerful advocates in the palace, and even in the heart of the tyrant;
his wife and mistress, the beautiful Poppæa, and a favorite player of
the race of Abraham, who had already employed their intercession in
behalf of the obnoxious people.  In their room it was necessary to offer
some other victims, and it might easily be suggested that, although the
genuine followers of Moses were innocent of the fire of Rome, there had
arisen among them a new and pernicious sect of Galilæans, which was
capable of the most horrid crimes. Under the appellation of Galilæans,
two distinctions of men were confounded, the most opposite to each other
in their manners and principles; the disciples who had embraced the
faith of Jesus of Nazareth,  and the zealots who had followed the
standard of Judas the Gaulonite.  The former were the friends, the
latter were the enemies, of human kind; and the only resemblance between
them consisted in the same inflexible constancy, which, in the defence
of their cause, rendered them insensible of death and tortures. The
followers of Judas, who impelled their countrymen into rebellion, were
soon buried under the ruins of Jerusalem; whilst those of Jesus, known
by the more celebrated name of Christians, diffused themselves over the
Roman empire. How natural was it for Tacitus, in the time of Hadrian, to
appropriate to the Christians the guilt and the sufferings, * which he
might, with far greater truth and justice, have attributed to a sect
whose odious memory was almost extinguished! 4. Whatever opinion may be
entertained of this conjecture, (for it is no more than a conjecture,)
it is evident that the effect, as well as the cause, of Nero's
persecution, was confined to the walls of Rome,   that the religious
tenets of the Galilæans or Christians, were never made a subject of
punishment, or even of inquiry; and that, as the idea of their
sufferings was for a long time connected with the idea of cruelty and
injustice, the moderation of succeeding princes inclined them to spare a
sect, oppressed by a tyrant, whose rage had been usually directed
against virtue and innocence.

It is somewhat remarkable that the flames of war consumed, almost at the
same time, the temple of Jerusalem and the Capitol of Rome;  and it
appears no less singular, that the tribute which devotion had destined
to the former, should have been converted by the power of an assaulting
victor to restore and adorn the splendor of the latter.  The emperors
levied a general capitation tax on the Jewish people; and although the
sum assessed on the head of each individual was inconsiderable, the use
for which it was designed, and the severity with which it was exacted,
were considered as an intolerable grievance.  Since the officers of the
revenue extended their unjust claim to many persons who were strangers
to the blood or religion of the Jews, it was impossible that the
Christians, who had so often sheltered themselves under the shade of the
synagogue, should now escape this rapacious persecution. Anxious as they
were to avoid the slightest infection of idolatry, their conscience
forbade them to contribute to the honor of that dæmon who had assumed
the character of the Capitoline Jupiter. As a very numerous though
declining party among the Christians still adhered to the law of Moses,
their efforts to dissemble their Jewish origin were detected by the
decisive test of circumcision;  nor were the Roman magistrates at
leisure to inquire into the difference of their religious tenets. Among
the Christians who were brought before the tribunal of the emperor, or,
as it seems more probable, before that of the procurator of Judæa, two
persons are said to have appeared, distinguished by their extraction,
which was more truly noble than that of the greatest monarchs. These
were the grandsons of St. Jude the apostle, who himself was the brother
of Jesus Christ.  Their natural pretensions to the throne of David might
perhaps attract the respect of the people, and excite the jealousy of
the governor; but the meanness of their garb, and the simplicity of
their answers, soon convinced him that they were neither desirous nor
capable of disturbing the peace of the Roman empire. They frankly
confessed their royal origin, and their near relation to the Messiah;
but they disclaimed any temporal views, and professed that his kingdom,
which they devoutly expected, was purely of a spiritual and angelic
nature. When they were examined concerning their fortune and occupation,
they showed their hands, hardened with daily labor, and declared that
they derived their whole subsistence from the cultivation of a farm near
the village of Cocaba, of the extent of about twenty-four English acres,
and of the value of nine thousand drachms, or three hundred pounds
sterling. The grandsons of St. Jude were dismissed with compassion and
contempt.

But although the obscurity of the house of David might protect them from
the suspicions of a tyrant, the present greatness of his own family
alarmed the pusillanimous temper of Domitian, which could only be
appeased by the blood of those Romans whom he either feared, or hated,
or esteemed. Of the two sons of his uncle Flavius Sabinus,  the elder
was soon convicted of treasonable intentions, and the younger, who bore
the name of Flavius Clemens, was indebted for his safety to his want of
courage and ability.  The emperor for a long time, distinguished so
harmless a kinsman by his favor and protection, bestowed on him his own
niece Domitilla, adopted the children of that marriage to the hope of
the succession, and invested their father with the honors of the
consulship.

But he had scarcely finished the term of his annual magistracy, when, on
a slight pretence, he was condemned and executed; Domitilla was banished
to a desolate island on the coast of Campania;  and sentences either of
death or of confiscation were pronounced against a great number of who
were involved in the same accusation. The guilt imputed to their charge
was that of Atheismand Jewish manners;  a singular association of ideas,
which cannot with any propriety be applied except to the Christians, as
they were obscurely and imperfectly viewed by the magistrates and by the
writers of that period. On the strength of so probable an
interpretation, and too eagerly admitting the suspicions of a tyrant as
an evidence of their honorable crime, the church has placed both Clemens
and Domitilla among its first martyrs, and has branded the cruelty of
Domitian with the name of the second persecution. But this persecution
(if it deserves that epithet) was of no long duration. A few months
after the death of Clemens, and the banishment of Domitilla, Stephen, a
freedman belonging to the latter, who had enjoyed the favor, but who had
not surely embraced the faith, of his mistress, * assassinated the
emperor in his palace.  The memory of Domitian was condemned by the
senate; his acts were rescinded; his exiles recalled; and under the
gentle administration of Nerva, while the innocent were restored to
their rank and fortunes, even the most guilty either obtained pardon or
escaped punishment.

II. About ten years afterwards, under the reign of Trajan, the younger
Pliny was intrusted by his friend and master with the government of
Bithynia and Pontus. He soon found himself at a loss to determine by
what rule of justice or of law he should direct his conduct in the
execution of an office the most repugnant to his humanity. Pliny had
never assisted at any judicial proceedings against the Christians, with
whose lame alone he seems to be acquainted; and he was totally
uninformed with regard to the nature of their guilt, the method of their
conviction, and the degree of their punishment. In this perplexity he
had recourse to his usual expedient, of submitting to the wisdom of
Trajan an impartial, and, in some respects, a favorable account of the
new superstition, requesting the emperor, that he would condescend to
resolve his doubts, and to instruct his ignorance.  The life of Pliny
had been employed in the acquisition of learning, and in the business of
the world. Since the age of nineteen he had pleaded with distinction in
the tribunals of Rome,  filled a place in the senate, had been invested
with the honors of the consulship, and had formed very numerous
connections with every order of men, both in Italy and in the provinces.
From his ignorance therefore we may derive some useful information. We
may assure ourselves, that when he accepted the government of Bithynia,
there were no general laws or decrees of the senate in force against the
Christians; that neither Trajan nor any of his virtuous predecessors,
whose edicts were received into the civil and criminal jurisprudence,
had publicly declared their intentions concerning the new sect; and that
whatever proceedings had been carried on against the Christians, there
were none of sufficient weight and authority to establish a precedent
for the conduct of a Roman magistrate.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part III.

The answer of Trajan, to which the Christians of the succeeding age have
frequently appealed, discovers as much regard for justice and humanity
as could be reconciled with his mistaken notions of religious policy.
Instead of displaying the implacable zeal of an inquisitor, anxious to
discover the most minute particles of heresy, and exulting in the number
of his victims, the emperor expresses much more solicitude to protect
the security of the innocent, than to prevent the escape of the guilty.
He acknowledged the difficulty of fixing any general plan; but he lays
down two salutary rules, which often afforded relief and support to the
distressed Christians. Though he directs the magistrates to punish such
persons as are legally convicted, he prohibits them, with a very humane
inconsistency, from making any inquiries concerning the supposed
criminals. Nor was the magistrate allowed to proceed on every kind of
information. Anonymous charges the emperor rejects, as too repugnant to
the equity of his government; and he strictly requires, for the
conviction of those to whom the guilt of Christianity is imputed, the
positive evidence of a fair and open accuser. It is likewise probable,
that the persons who assumed so invidiuous an office, were obliged to
declare the grounds of their suspicions, to specify (both in respect to
time and place) the secret assemblies, which their Christian adversary
had frequented, and to disclose a great number of circumstances, which
were concealed with the most vigilant jealousy from the eye of the
profane. If they succeeded in their prosecution, they were exposed to
the resentment of a considerable and active party, to the censure of the
more liberal portion of mankind, and to the ignominy which, in every age
and country, has attended the character of an informer. If, on the
contrary, they failed in their proofs, they incurred the severe and
perhaps capital penalty, which, according to a law published by the
emperor Hadrian, was inflicted on those who falsely attributed to their
fellow-citizens the crime of Christianity. The violence of personal or
superstitious animosity might sometimes prevail over the most natural
apprehensions of disgrace and danger but it cannot surely be imagined,
that accusations of so unpromising an appearance were either lightly or
frequently undertaken by the Pagan subjects of the Roman empire.  *

The expedient which was employed to elude the prudence of the laws,
affords a sufficient proof how effectually they disappointed the
mischievous designs of private malice or superstitious zeal. In a large
and tumultuous assembly, the restraints of fear and shame, so forcible
on the minds of individuals, are deprived of the greatest part of their
influence. The pious Christian, as he was desirous to obtain, or to
escape, the glory of martyrdom, expected, either with impatience or with
terror, the stated returns of the public games and festivals. On those
occasions the inhabitants of the great cities of the empire were
collected in the circus or the theatre, where every circumstance of the
place, as well as of the ceremony, contributed to kindle their devotion,
and to extinguish their humanity. Whilst the numerous spectators,
crowned with garlands, perfumed with incense, purified with the blood of
victims, and surrounded with the altars and statues of their tutelar
deities, resigned themselves to the enjoyment of pleasures, which they
considered as an essential part of their religious worship, they
recollected, that the Christians alone abhorred the gods of mankind, and
by their absence and melancholy on these solemn festivals, seemed to
insult or to lament the public felicity. If the empire had been
afflicted by any recent calamity, by a plague, a famine, or an
unsuccessful war; if the Tyber had, or if the Nile had not, risen beyond
its banks; if the earth had shaken, or if the temperate order of the
seasons had been interrupted, the superstitious Pagans were convinced
that the crimes and the impiety of the Christians, who were spared by
the excessive lenity of the government, had at length provoked the
divine justice. It was not among a licentious and exasperated populace,
that the forms of legal proceedings could be observed; it was not in an
amphitheatre, stained with the blood of wild beasts and gladiators, that
the voice of compassion could be heard. The impatient clamors of the
multitude denounced the Christians as the enemies of gods and men,
doomed them to the severest tortures, and venturing to accuse by name
some of the most distinguished of the new sectaries, required with
irresistible vehemence that they should be instantly apprehended and
cast to the lions.  The provincial governors and magistrates who
presided in the public spectacles were usually inclined to gratify the
inclinations, and to appease the rage, of the people, by the sacrifice
of a few obnoxious victims. But the wisdom of the emperors protected the
church from the danger of these tumultuous clamors and irregular
accusations, which they justly censured as repugnant both to the
firmness and to the equity of their administration. The edicts of
Hadrian and of Antoninus Pius expressly declared, that the voice of the
multitude should never be admitted as legal evidence to convict or to
punish those unfortunate persons who had embraced the enthusiasm of the
Christians.

III. Punishment was not the inevitable consequence of conviction, and
the Christians, whose guilt was the most clearly proved by the testimony
of witnesses, or even by their voluntary confession, still retained in
their own power the alternative of life or death. It was not so much the
past offence, as the actual resistance, which excited the indignation of
the magistrate. He was persuaded that he offered them an easy pardon,
since, if they consented to cast a few grains of incense upon the altar,
they were dismissed from the tribunal in safety and with applause. It
was esteemed the duty of a humane judge to endeavor to reclaim, rather
than to punish, those deluded enthusiasts. Varying his tone according to
the age, the sex, or the situation of the prisoners, he frequently
condescended to set before their eyes every circumstance which could
render life more pleasing, or death more terrible; and to solicit, nay,
to entreat, them, that they would show some compassion to themselves, to
their families, and to their friends.  If threats and persuasions proved
ineffectual, he had often recourse to violence; the scourge and the rack
were called in to supply the deficiency of argument, and every art of
cruelty was employed to subdue such inflexible, and, as it appeared to
the Pagans, such criminal, obstinacy. The ancient apologists of
Christianity have censured, with equal truth and severity, the irregular
conduct of their persecutors who, contrary to every principle of
judicial proceeding, admitted the use of torture, in order to obtain,
not a confession, but a denial, of the crime which was the object of
their inquiry.  The monks of succeeding ages, who, in their peaceful
solitudes, entertained themselves with diversifying the deaths and
sufferings of the primitive martyrs, have frequently invented torments
of a much more refined and ingenious nature. In particular, it has
pleased them to suppose, that the zeal of the Roman magistrates,
disdaining every consideration of moral virtue or public decency,
endeavored to seduce those whom they were unable to vanquish, and that
by their orders the most brutal violence was offered to those whom they
found it impossible to seduce. It is related, that females, who were
prepared to despise death, were sometimes condemned to a more severe
trial,  and called upon to determine whether they set a higher value on
their religion or on their chastity. The youths to whose licentious
embraces they were abandoned, received a solemn exhortation from the
judge, to exert their most strenuous efforts to maintain the honor of
Venus against the impious virgin who refused to burn incense on her
altars. Their violence, however, was commonly disappointed, and the
seasonable interposition of some miraculous power preserved the chaste
spouses of Christ from the dishonor even of an involuntary defeat. We
should not indeed neglect to remark, that the more ancient as well as
authentic memorials of the church are seldom polluted with these
extravagant and indecent fictions.

The total disregard of truth and probability in the representation of
these primitive martyrdoms was occasioned by a very natural mistake. The
ecclesiastical writers of the fourth or fifth centuries ascribed to the
magistrates of Rome the same degree of implacable and unrelenting zeal
which filled their own breasts against the heretics or the idolaters of
their own times. It is not improbable that some of those persons who
were raised to the dignities of the empire, might have imbibed the
prejudices of the populace, and that the cruel disposition of others
might occasionally be stimulated by motives of avarice or of personal
resentment.  But it is certain, and we may appeal to the grateful
confessions of the first Christians, that the greatest part of those
magistrates who exercised in the provinces the authority of the emperor,
or of the senate, and to whose hands alone the jurisdiction of life and
death was intrusted, behaved like men of polished manners and liberal
education, who respected the rules of justice, and who were conversant
with the precepts of philosophy. They frequently declined the odious
task of persecution, dismissed the charge with contempt, or suggested to
the accused Christian some legal evasion, by which he might elude the
severity of the laws.  Whenever they were invested with a discretionary
power,  they used it much less for the oppression, than for the relief
and benefit of the afflicted church. They were far from condemning all
the Christians who were accused before their tribunal, and very far from
punishing with death all those who were convicted of an obstinate
adherence to the new superstition. Contenting themselves, for the most
part, with the milder chastisements of imprisonment, exile, or slavery
in the mines,  they left the unhappy victims of their justice some
reason to hope, that a prosperous event, the accession, the marriage, or
the triumph of an emperor, might speedily restore them, by a general
pardon, to their former state. The martyrs, devoted to immediate
execution by the Roman magistrates, appear to have been selected from
the most opposite extremes. They were either bishops and presbyters, the
persons the most distinguished among the Christians by their rank and
influence, and whose example might strike terror into the whole sect;
or else they were the meanest and most abject among them, particularly
those of the servile condition, whose lives were esteemed of little
value, and whose sufferings were viewed by the ancients with too
careless an indifference.  The learned Origen, who, from his experience
as well as reading, was intimately acquainted with the history of the
Christians, declares, in the most express terms, that the number of
martyrs was very inconsiderable.  His authority would alone be
sufficient to annihilate that formidable army of martyrs, whose relics,
drawn for the most part from the catacombs of Rome, have replenished so
many churches,  and whose marvellous achievements have been the subject
of so many volumes of Holy Romance.  But the general assertion of Origen
may be explained and confirmed by the particular testimony of his friend
Dionysius, who, in the immense city of Alexandria, and under the
rigorous persecution of Decius, reckons only ten men and seven women who
suffered for the profession of the Christian name.

During the same period of persecution, the zealous, the eloquent, the
ambitious Cyprian governed the church, not only of Carthage, but even of
Africa. He possessed every quality which could engage the reverence of
the faithful, or provoke the suspicions and resentment of the Pagan
magistrates. His character as well as his station seemed to mark out
that holy prelate as the most distinguished object of envy and danger.
The experience, however, of the life of Cyprian, is sufficient to prove
that our fancy has exaggerated the perilous situation of a Christian
bishop; and the dangers to which he was exposed were less imminent than
those which temporal ambition is always prepared to encounter in the
pursuit of honors. Four Roman emperors, with their families, their
favorites, and their adherents, perished by the sword in the space of
ten years, during which the bishop of Carthage guided by his authority
and eloquence the councils of the African church. It was only in the
third year of his administration, that he had reason, during a few
months, to apprehend the severe edicts of Decius, the vigilance of the
magistrate and the clamors of the multitude, who loudly demanded, that
Cyprian, the leader of the Christians, should be thrown to the lions.
Prudence suggested the necessity of a temporary retreat, and the voice
of prudence was obeyed. He withdrew himself into an obscure solitude,
from whence he could maintain a constant correspondence with the clergy
and people of Carthage; and, concealing himself till the tempest was
past, he preserved his life, without relinquishing either his power or
his reputation. His extreme caution did not, however, escape the censure
of the more rigid Christians, who lamented, or the reproaches of his
personal enemies, who insulted, a conduct which they considered as a
pusillanimous and criminal desertion of the most sacred duty.  The
propriety of reserving himself for the future exigencies of the church,
the example of several holy bishops,  and the divine admonitions, which,
as he declares himself, he frequently received in visions and ecstacies,
were the reasons alleged in his justification.  But his best apology may
be found in the cheerful resolution, with which, about eight years
afterwards, he suffered death in the cause of religion. The authentic
history of his martyrdom has been recorded with unusual candor and
impartiality. A short abstract, therefore, of its most important
circumstances, will convey the clearest information of the spirit, and
of the forms, of the Roman persecutions.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part IV.

When Valerian was consul for the third, and Gallienus for the fourth
time, Paternus, proconsul of Africa, summoned Cyprian to appear in his
private council-chamber. He there acquainted him with the Imperial
mandate which he had just received,  that those who had abandoned the
Roman religion should immediately return to the practice of the
ceremonies of their ancestors. Cyprian replied without hesitation, that
he was a Christian and a bishop, devoted to the worship of the true and
only Deity, to whom he offered up his daily supplications for the safety
and prosperity of the two emperors, his lawful sovereigns. With modest
confidence he pleaded the privilege of a citizen, in refusing to give
any answer to some invidious and indeed illegal questions which the
proconsul had proposed. A sentence of banishment was pronounced as the
penalty of Cyprian's disobedience; and he was conducted without delay to
Curubis, a free and maritime city of Zeugitania, in a pleasant
situation, a fertile territory, and at the distance of about forty miles
from Carthage.  The exiled bishop enjoyed the conveniences of life and
the consciousness of virtue. His reputation was diffused over Africa and
Italy; an account of his behavior was published for the edification of
the Christian world;  and his solitude was frequently interrupted by the
letters, the visits, and the congratulations of the faithful. On the
arrival of a new proconsul in the province the fortune of Cyprian
appeared for some time to wear a still more favorable aspect. He was
recalled from banishment; and though not yet permitted to return to
Carthage, his own gardens in the neighborhood of the capital were
assigned for the place of his residence.

At length, exactly one year  after Cyprian was first apprehended,
Galerius Maximus, proconsul of Africa, received the Imperial warrant for
the execution of the Christian teachers. The bishop of Carthage was
sensible that he should be singled out for one of the first victims; and
the frailty of nature tempted him to withdraw himself, by a secret
flight, from the danger and the honor of martyrdom; * but soon
recovering that fortitude which his character required, he returned to
his gardens, and patiently expected the ministers of death. Two officers
of rank, who were intrusted with that commission, placed Cyprian between
them in a chariot, and as the proconsul was not then at leisure, they
conducted him, not to a prison, but to a private house in Carthage,
which belonged to one of them. An elegant supper was provided for the
entertainment of the bishop, and his Christian friends were permitted
for the last time to enjoy his society, whilst the streets were filled
with a multitude of the faithful, anxious and alarmed at the approaching
fate of their spiritual father.  In the morning he appeared before the
tribunal of the proconsul, who, after informing himself of the name and
situation of Cyprian, commanded him to offer sacrifice, and pressed him
to reflect on the consequences of his disobedience. The refusal of
Cyprian was firm and decisive; and the magistrate, when he had taken the
opinion of his council, pronounced with some reluctance the sentence of
death. It was conceived in the following terms: "That Thascius Cyprianus
should be immediately beheaded, as the enemy of the gods of Rome, and as
the chief and ringleader of a criminal association, which he had seduced
into an impious resistance against the laws of the most holy emperors,
Valerian and Gallienus."  The manner of his execution was the mildest
and least painful that could be inflicted on a person convicted of any
capital offence; nor was the use of torture admitted to obtain from the
bishop of Carthage either the recantation of his principles or the
discovery of his accomplices.

As soon as the sentence was proclaimed, a general cry of "We will die
with him," arose at once among the listening multitude of Christians who
waited before the palace gates. The generous effusions of their zeal and
their affection were neither serviceable to Cyprian nor dangerous to
themselves. He was led away under a guard of tribunes and centurions,
without resistance and without insult, to the place of his execution, a
spacious and level plain near the city, which was already filled with
great numbers of spectators. His faithful presbyters and deacons were
permitted to accompany their holy bishop. * They assisted him in laying
aside his upper garment, spread linen on the ground to catch the
precious relics of his blood, and received his orders to bestow
five-and-twenty pieces of gold on the executioner. The martyr then
covered his face with his hands, and at one blow his head was separated
from his body. His corpse remained during some hours exposed to the
curiosity of the Gentiles: but in the night it was removed, and
transported in a triumphal procession, and with a splendid illumination,
to the burial-place of the Christians. The funeral of Cyprian was
publicly celebrated without receiving any interruption from the Roman
magistrates; and those among the faithful, who had performed the last
offices to his person and his memory, were secure from the danger of
inquiry or of punishment. It is remarkable, that of so great a multitude
of bishops in the province of Africa, Cyprian was the first who was
esteemed worthy to obtain the crown of martyrdom.

It was in the choice of Cyprian, either to die a martyr, or to live an
apostate; but on the choice depended the alternative of honor or infamy.
Could we suppose that the bishop of Carthage had employed the profession
of the Christian faith only as the instrument of his avarice or
ambition, it was still incumbent on him to support the character he had
assumed;  and if he possessed the smallest degree of manly fortitude,
rather to expose himself to the most cruel tortures, than by a single
act to exchange the reputation of a whole life, for the abhorrence of
his Christian brethren, and the contempt of the Gentile world. But if
the zeal of Cyprian was supported by the sincere conviction of the truth
of those doctrines which he preached, the crown of martyrdom must have
appeared to him as an object of desire rather than of terror. It is not
easy to extract any distinct ideas from the vague though eloquent
declamations of the Fathers, or to ascertain the degree of immortal
glory and happiness which they confidently promised to those who were so
fortunate as to shed their blood in the cause of religion.  They
inculcated with becoming diligence, that the fire of martyrdom supplied
every defect and expiated every sin; that while the souls of ordinary
Christians were obliged to pass through a slow and painful purification,
the triumphant sufferers entered into the immediate fruition of eternal
bliss, where, in the society of the patriarchs, the apostles, and the
prophets, they reigned with Christ, and acted as his assessors in the
universal judgment of mankind. The assurance of a lasting reputation
upon earth, a motive so congenial to the vanity of human nature, often
served to animate the courage of the martyrs. The honors which Rome or
Athens bestowed on those citizens who had fallen in the cause of their
country, were cold and unmeaning demonstrations of respect, when
compared with the ardent gratitude and devotion which the primitive
church expressed towards the victorious champions of the faith. The
annual commemoration of their virtues and sufferings was observed as a
sacred ceremony, and at length terminated in religious worship. Among
the Christians who had publicly confessed their religious principles,
those who (as it very frequently happened) had been dismissed from the
tribunal or the prisons of the Pagan magistrates, obtained such honors
as were justly due to their imperfect martyrdom and their generous
resolution. The most pious females courted the permission of imprinting
kisses on the fetters which they had worn, and on the wounds which they
had received. Their persons were esteemed holy, their decisions were
admitted with deference, and they too often abused, by their spiritual
pride and licentious manners, the preeminence which their zeal and
intrepidity had acquired.  Distinctions like these, whilst they display
the exalted merit, betray the inconsiderable number of those who
suffered, and of those who died, for the profession of Christianity.

The sober discretion of the present age will more readily censure than
admire, but can more easily admire than imitate, the fervor of the first
Christians, who, according to the lively expressions of Sulpicius
Severus, desired martyrdom with more eagerness than his own
contemporaries solicited a bishopric.  The epistles which Ignatius
composed as he was carried in chains through the cities of Asia, breathe
sentiments the most repugnant to the ordinary feelings of human nature.
He earnestly beseeches the Romans, that when he should be exposed in the
amphitheatre, they would not, by their kind but unseasonable
intercession, deprive him of the crown of glory; and he declares his
resolution to provoke and irritate the wild beasts which might be
employed as the instruments of his death.  Some stories are related of
the courage of martyrs, who actually performed what Ignatius had
intended; who exasperated the fury of the lions, pressed the executioner
to hasten his office, cheerfully leaped into the fires which were
kindled to consume them, and discovered a sensation of joy and pleasure
in the midst of the most exquisite tortures. Several examples have been
preserved of a zeal impatient of those restraints which the emperors had
provided for the security of the church. The Christians sometimes
supplied by their voluntary declaration the want of an accuser, rudely
disturbed the public service of paganism,  and rushing in crowds round
the tribunal of the magistrates, called upon them to pronounce and to
inflict the sentence of the law. The behavior of the Christians was too
remarkable to escape the notice of the ancient philosophers; but they
seem to have considered it with much less admiration than astonishment.
Incapable of conceiving the motives which sometimes transported the
fortitude of believers beyond the bounds of prudence or reason, they
treated such an eagerness to die as the strange result of obstinate
despair, of stupid insensibility, or of superstitious frenzy.  "Unhappy
men!" exclaimed the proconsul Antoninus to the Christians of Asia;
"unhappy men! if you are thus weary of your lives, is it so difficult
for you to find ropes and precipices?"  He was extremely cautious (as it
is observed by a learned and pious historian) of punishing men who had
found no accusers but themselves, the Imperial laws not having made any
provision for so unexpected a case: condemning therefore a few as a
warning to their brethren, he dismissed the multitude with indignation
and contempt.  Notwithstanding this real or affected disdain, the
intrepid constancy of the faithful was productive of more salutary
effects on those minds which nature or grace had disposed for the easy
reception of religious truth. On these melancholy occasions, there were
many among the Gentiles who pitied, who admired, and who were converted.
The generous enthusiasm was communicated from the sufferer to the
spectators; and the blood of martyrs, according to a well-known
observation, became the seed of the church.

But although devotion had raised, and eloquence continued to inflame,
this fever of the mind, it insensibly gave way to the more natural hopes
and fears of the human heart, to the love of life, the apprehension of
pain, and the horror of dissolution. The more prudent rulers of the
church found themselves obliged to restrain the indiscreet ardor of
their followers, and to distrust a constancy which too often abandoned
them in the hour of trial.  As the lives of the faithful became less
mortified and austere, they were every day less ambitious of the honors
of martyrdom; and the soldiers of Christ, instead of distinguishing
themselves by voluntary deeds of heroism, frequently deserted their
post, and fled in confusion before the enemy whom it was their duty to
resist. There were three methods, however, of escaping the flames of
persecution, which were not attended with an equal degree of guilt:
first, indeed, was generally allowed to be innocent; the second was of a
doubtful, or at least of a venial, nature; but the third implied a
direct and criminal apostasy from the Christian faith.

I. A modern inquisitor would hear with surprise, that whenever an
information was given to a Roman magistrate of any person within his
jurisdiction who had embraced the sect of the Christians, the charge was
communicated to the party accused, and that a convenient time was
allowed him to settle his domestic concerns, and to prepare an answer to
the crime which was imputed to him.  If he entertained any doubt of his
own constancy, such a delay afforded him the opportunity of preserving
his life and honor by flight, of withdrawing himself into some obscure
retirement or some distant province, and of patiently expecting the
return of peace and security. A measure so consonant to reason was soon
authorized by the advice and example of the most holy prelates; and
seems to have been censured by few except by the Montanists, who
deviated into heresy by their strict and obstinate adherence to the
rigor of ancient discipline.  II. The provincial governors, whose zeal
was less prevalent than their avarice, had countenanced the practice of
selling certificates, (or libels, as they were called,) which attested,
that the persons therein mentioned had complied with the laws, and
sacrificed to the Roman deities. By producing these false declarations,
the opulent and timid Christians were enabled to silence the malice of
an informer, and to reconcile in some measure their safety with their
religion. A slight penance atoned for this profane dissimulation.  *
III. In every persecution there were great numbers of unworthy
Christians who publicly disowned or renounced the faith which they had
professed; and who confirmed the sincerity of their abjuration, by the
legal acts of burning incense or of offering sacrifices. Some of these
apostates had yielded on the first menace or exhortation of the
magistrate; whilst the patience of others had been subdued by the length
and repetition of tortures. The affrighted countenances of some betrayed
their inward remorse, while others advanced with confidence and alacrity
to the altars of the gods.  But the disguise which fear had imposed,
subsisted no longer than the present danger. As soon as the severity of
the persecution was abated, the doors of the churches were assailed by
the returning multitude of penitents who detested their idolatrous
submission, and who solicited with equal ardor, but with various
success, their readmission into the society of Christians.

IV. Notwithstanding the general rules established for the conviction and
punishment of the Christians, the fate of those sectaries, in an
extensive and arbitrary government, must still in a great measure, have
depended on their own behavior, the circumstances of the times, and the
temper of their supreme as well as subordinate rulers. Zeal might
sometimes provoke, and prudence might sometimes avert or assuage, the
superstitious fury of the Pagans. A variety of motives might dispose the
provincial governors either to enforce or to relax the execution of the
laws; and of these motives the most forcible was their regard not only
for the public edicts, but for the secret intentions of the emperor, a
glance from whose eye was sufficient to kindle or to extinguish the
flames of persecution. As often as any occasional severities were
exercised in the different parts of the empire, the primitive Christians
lamented and perhaps magnified their own sufferings; but the celebrated
number of ten persecutions has been determined by the ecclesiastical
writers of the fifth century, who possessed a more distinct view of the
prosperous or adverse fortunes of the church, from the age of Nero to
that of Diocletian. The ingenious parallels of the ten plagues of Egypt,
and of the ten horns of the Apocalypse, first suggested this calculation
to their minds; and in their application of the faith of prophecy to the
truth of history, they were careful to select those reigns which were
indeed the most hostile to the Christian cause.  But these transient
persecutions served only to revive the zeal and to restore the
discipline of the faithful; and the moments of extraordinary rigor were
compensated by much longer intervals of peace and security. The
indifference of some princes, and the indulgence of others, permitted
the Christians to enjoy, though not perhaps a legal, yet an actual and
public, toleration of their religion.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part V.

The apology of Tertullian contains two very ancient, very singular, but
at the same time very suspicious, instances of Imperial clemency; the
edicts published by Tiberius, and by Marcus Antoninus, and designed not
only to protect the innocence of the Christians, but even to proclaim
those stupendous miracles which had attested the truth of their
doctrine. The first of these examples is attended with some difficulties
which might perplex a sceptical mind.  We are required to believe,
thatPontius Pilate informed the emperor of the unjust sentence of death
which he had pronounced against an innocent, and, as it appeared, a
divine, person; and that, without acquiring the merit, he exposed
himself to the danger of martyrdom; thatTiberius, who avowed his
contempt for all religion, immediately conceived the design of placing
the Jewish Messiah among the gods of Rome; thathis servile senate
ventured to disobey the commands of their master; thatTiberius, instead
of resenting their refusal, contented himself with protecting the
Christians from the severity of the laws, many years before such laws
were enacted, or before the church had assumed any distinct name or
existence; and lastly, thatthe memory of this extraordinary transaction
was preserved in the most public and authentic records, which escaped
the knowledge of the historians of Greece and Rome, and were only
visible to the eyes of an African Christian, who composed his apology
one hundred and sixty years after the death of Tiberius. The edict of
Marcus Antoninus is supposed to have been the effect of his devotion and
gratitude for the miraculous deliverance which he had obtained in the
Marcomannic war. The distress of the legions, the seasonable tempest of
rain and hail, of thunder and of lightning, and the dismay and defeat of
the barbarians, have been celebrated by the eloquence of several Pagan
writers. If there were any Christians in that army, it was natural that
they should ascribe some merit to the fervent prayers, which, in the
moment of danger, they had offered up for their own and the public
safety. But we are still assured by monuments of brass and marble, by
the Imperial medals, and by the Antonine column, that neither the prince
nor the people entertained any sense of this signal obligation, since
they unanimously attribute their deliverance to the providence of
Jupiter, and to the interposition of Mercury. During the whole course of
his reign, Marcus despised the Christians as a philosopher, and punished
them as a sovereign.  *

By a singular fatality, the hardships which they had endured under the
government of a virtuous prince, immediately ceased on the accession of
a tyrant; and as none except themselves had experienced the injustice of
Marcus, so they alone were protected by the lenity of Commodus. The
celebrated Marcia, the most favored of his concubines, and who at length
contrived the murder of her Imperial lover, entertained a singular
affection for the oppressed church; and though it was impossible that
she could reconcile the practice of vice with the precepts of the
gospel, she might hope to atone for the frailties of her sex and
profession by declaring herself the patroness of the Christians.  Under
the gracious protection of Marcia, they passed in safety the thirteen
years of a cruel tyranny; and when the empire was established in the
house of Severus, they formed a domestic but more honorable connection
with the new court. The emperor was persuaded, that in a dangerous
sickness, he had derived some benefit, either spiritual or physical,
from the holy oil, with which one of his slaves had anointed him. He
always treated with peculiar distinction several persons of both sexes
who had embraced the new religion. The nurse as well as the preceptor of
Caracalla were Christians; * and if that young prince ever betrayed a
sentiment of humanity, it was occasioned by an incident, which, however
trifling, bore some relation to the cause of Christianity.  Under the
reign of Severus, the fury of the populace was checked; the rigor of
ancient laws was for some time suspended; and the provincial governors
were satisfied with receiving an annual present from the churches within
their jurisdiction, as the price, or as the reward, of their moderation.
The controversy concerning the precise time of the celebration of
Easter, armed the bishops of Asia and Italy against each other, and was
considered as the most important business of this period of leisure and
tranquillity.  Nor was the peace of the church interrupted, till the
increasing numbers of proselytes seem at length to have attracted the
attention, and to have alienated the mind of Severus. With the design of
restraining the progress of Christianity, he published an edict, which,
though it was designed to affect only the new converts, could not be
carried into strict execution, without exposing to danger and punishment
the most zealous of their teachers and missionaries. In this mitigated
persecution we may still discover the indulgent spirit of Rome and of
Polytheism, which so readily admitted every excuse in favor of those who
practised the religious ceremonies of their fathers.

But the laws which Severus had enacted soon expired with the authority
of that emperor; and the Christians, after this accidental tempest,
enjoyed a calm of thirty-eight years.  Till this period they had usually
held their assemblies in private houses and sequestered places. They
were now permitted to erect and consecrate convenient edifices for the
purpose of religious worship;  to purchase lands, even at Rome itself,
for the use of the community; and to conduct the elections of their
ecclesiastical ministers in so public, but at the same time in so
exemplary a manner, as to deserve the respectful attention of the
Gentiles.  This long repose of the church was accompanied with dignity.
The reigns of those princes who derived their extraction from the
Asiatic provinces, proved the most favorable to the Christians; the
eminent persons of the sect, instead of being reduced to implore the
protection of a slave or concubine, were admitted into the palace in the
honorable characters of priests and philosophers; and their mysterious
doctrines, which were already diffused among the people, insensibly
attracted the curiosity of their sovereign. When the empress Mammæa
passed through Antioch, she expressed a desire of conversing with the
celebrated Origen, the fame of whose piety and learning was spread over
the East. Origen obeyed so flattering an invitation, and though he could
not expect to succeed in the conversion of an artful and ambitious
woman, she listened with pleasure to his eloquent exhortations, and
honorably dismissed him to his retirement in Palestine.  The sentiments
of Mammæa were adopted by her son Alexander, and the philosophic
devotion of that emperor was marked by a singular but injudicious regard
for the Christian religion. In his domestic chapel he placed the statues
of Abraham, of Orpheus, of Apollonius, and of Christ, as an honor justly
due to those respectable sages who had instructed mankind in the various
modes of addressing their homage to the supreme and universal Deity.  A
purer faith, as well as worship, was openly professed and practised
among his household. Bishops, perhaps for the first time, were seen at
court; and, after the death of Alexander, when the inhuman Maximin
discharged his fury on the favorites and servants of his unfortunate
benefactor, a great number of Christians of every rank and of both
sexes, were involved the promiscuous massacre, which, on their account,
has improperly received the name of Persecution.  *

Notwithstanding the cruel disposition of Maximin, the effects of his
resentment against the Christians were of a very local and temporary
nature, and the pious Origen, who had been proscribed as a devoted
victim, was still reserved to convey the truths of the gospel to the ear
of monarchs.  He addressed several edifying letters to the emperor
Philip, to his wife, and to his mother; and as soon as that prince, who
was born in the neighborhood of Palestine, had usurped the Imperial
sceptre, the Christians acquired a friend and a protector. The public
and even partial favor of Philip towards the sectaries of the new
religion, and his constant reverence for the ministers of the church,
gave some color to the suspicion, which prevailed in his own times, that
the emperor himself was become a convert to the faith;  and afforded
some grounds for a fable which was afterwards invented, that he had been
purified by confession and penance from the guilt contracted by the
murder of his innocent predecessor.  the fall of Philip introduced, with
the change of masters, a new system of government, so oppressive to the
Christians, that their former condition, ever since the time of
Domitian, was represented as a state of perfect freedom and security, if
compared with the rigorous treatment which they experienced under the
short reign of Decius.  The virtues of that prince will scarcely allow
us to suspect that he was actuated by a mean resentment against the
favorites of his predecessor; and it is more reasonable to believe, that
in the prosecution of his general design to restore the purity of Roman
manners, he was desirous of delivering the empire from what he condemned
as a recent and criminal superstition. The bishops of the most
considerable cities were removed by exile or death: the vigilance of the
magistrates prevented the clergy of Rome during sixteen months from
proceeding to a new election; and it was the opinion of the Christians,
that the emperor would more patiently endure a competitor for the
purple, than a bishop in the capital.  Were it possible to suppose that
the penetration of Decius had discovered pride under the disguise of
humility, or that he could foresee the temporal dominion which might
insensibly arise from the claims of spiritual authority, we might be
less surprised, that he should consider the successors of St. Peter, as
the most formidable rivals to those of Augustus.

The administration of Valerian was distinguished by a levity and
inconstancy ill suited to the gravity of the Roman Censor. In the first
part of his reign, he surpassed in clemency those princes who had been
suspected of an attachment to the Christian faith. In the last three
years and a half, listening to the insinuations of a minister addicted
to the superstitions of Egypt, he adopted the maxims, and imitated the
severity, of his predecessor Decius.  The accession of Gallienus, which
increased the calamities of the empire, restored peace to the church;
and the Christians obtained the free exercise of their religion by an
edict addressed to the bishops, and conceived in such terms as seemed to
acknowledge their office and public character.  The ancient laws,
without being formally repealed, were suffered to sink into oblivion;
and (excepting only some hostile intentions which are attributed to the
emperor Aurelian ) the disciples of Christ passed above forty years in a
state of prosperity, far more dangerous to their virtue than the
severest trials of persecution.

The story of Paul of Samosata, who filled the metropolitan see of
Antioch, while the East was in the hands of Odenathus and Zenobia, may
serve to illustrate the condition and character of the times. The wealth
of that prelate was a sufficient evidence of his guilt, since it was
neither derived from the inheritance of his fathers, nor acquired by the
arts of honest industry. But Paul considered the service of the church
as a very lucrative profession.  His ecclesiastical jurisdiction was
venal and rapacious; he extorted frequent contributions from the most
opulent of the faithful, and converted to his own use a considerable
part of the public revenue. By his pride and luxury, the Christian
religion was rendered odious in the eyes of the Gentiles. His council
chamber and his throne, the splendor with which he appeared in public,
the suppliant crowd who solicited his attention, the multitude of
letters and petitions to which he dictated his answers, and the
perpetual hurry of business in which he was involved, were circumstances
much better suited to the state of a civil magistrate,  than to the
humility of a primitive bishop. When he harangued his people from the
pulpit, Paul affected the figurative style and the theatrical gestures
of an Asiatic sophist, while the cathedral resounded with the loudest
and most extravagant acclamations in the praise of his divine eloquence.
Against those who resisted his power, or refused to flatter his vanity,
the prelate of Antioch was arrogant, rigid, and inexorable; but he
relaxed the discipline, and lavished the treasures of the church on his
dependent clergy, who were permitted to imitate their master in the
gratification of every sensual appetite. For Paul indulged himself very
freely in the pleasures of the table, and he had received into the
episcopal palace two young and beautiful women as the constant
companions of his leisure moments.

Notwithstanding these scandalous vices, if Paul of Samosata had
preserved the purity of the orthodox faith, his reign over the capital
of Syria would have ended only with his life; and had a seasonable
persecution intervened, an effort of courage might perhaps have placed
him in the rank of saints and martyrs. * Some nice and subtle errors,
which he imprudently adopted and obstinately maintained, concerning the
doctrine of the Trinity, excited the zeal and indignation of the Eastern
churches.  From Egypt to the Euxine Sea, the bishops were in arms and in
motion. Several councils were held, confutations were published,
excommunications were pronounced, ambiguous explanations were by turns
accepted and refused, treaties were concluded and violated, and at
length Paul of Samosata was degraded from his episcopal character, by
the sentence of seventy or eighty bishops, who assembled for that
purpose at Antioch, and who, without consulting the rights of the clergy
or people, appointed a successor by their own authority. The manifest
irregularity of this proceeding increased the numbers of the
discontented faction; and as Paul, who was no stranger to the arts of
courts, had insinuated himself into the favor of Zenobia, he maintained
above four years the possession of the episcopal house and office. * The
victory of Aurelian changed the face of the East, and the two contending
parties, who applied to each other the epithets of schism and heresy,
were either commanded or permitted to plead their cause before the
tribunal of the conqueror. This public and very singular trial affords a
convincing proof that the existence, the property, the privileges, and
the internal policy of the Christians, were acknowledged, if not by the
laws, at least by the magistrates, of the empire. As a Pagan and as a
soldier, it could scarcely be expected that Aurelian should enter into
the discussion, whether the sentiments of Paul or those of his
adversaries were most agreeable to the true standard of the orthodox
faith. His determination, however, was founded on the general principles
of equity and reason. He considered the bishops of Italy as the most
impartial and respectable judges among the Christians, and as soon as he
was informed that they had unanimously approved the sentence of the
council, he acquiesced in their opinion, and immediately gave orders
that Paul should be compelled to relinquish the temporal possessions
belonging to an office, of which, in the judgment of his brethren, he
had been regularly deprived. But while we applaud the justice, we should
not overlook the policy, of Aurelian, who was desirous of restoring and
cementing the dependence of the provinces on the capital, by every means
which could bind the interest or prejudices of any part of his subjects.

Amidst the frequent revolutions of the empire, the Christians still
flourished in peace and prosperity; and notwithstanding a celebrated æra
of martyrs has been deduced from the accession of Diocletian,  the new
system of policy, introduced and maintained by the wisdom of that
prince, continued, during more than eighteen years, to breathe the
mildest and most liberal spirit of religious toleration. The mind of
Diocletian himself was less adapted indeed to speculative inquiries,
than to the active labors of war and government. His prudence rendered
him averse to any great innovation, and though his temper was not very
susceptible of zeal or enthusiasm, he always maintained an habitual
regard for the ancient deities of the empire. But the leisure of the two
empresses, of his wife Prisca, and of Valeria, his daughter, permitted
them to listen with more attention and respect to the truths of
Christianity, which in every age has acknowledged its important
obligations to female devotion.  The principal eunuchs, Lucian  and
Dorotheus, Gorgonius and Andrew, who attended the person, possessed the
favor, and governed the household of Diocletian, protected by their
powerful influence the faith which they had embraced. Their example was
imitated by many of the most considerable officers of the palace, who,
in their respective stations, had the care of the Imperial ornaments, of
the robes, of the furniture, of the jewels, and even of the private
treasury; and, though it might sometimes be incumbent on them to
accompany the emperor when he sacrificed in the temple,  they enjoyed,
with their wives, their children, and their slaves, the free exercise of
the Christian religion. Diocletian and his colleagues frequently
conferred the most important offices on those persons who avowed their
abhorrence for the worship of the gods, but who had displayed abilities
proper for the service of the state. The bishops held an honorable rank
in their respective provinces, and were treated with distinction and
respect, not only by the people, but by the magistrates themselves.
Almost in every city, the ancient churches were found insufficient to
contain the increasing multitude of proselytes; and in their place more
stately and capacious edifices were erected for the public worship of
the faithful. The corruption of manners and principles, so forcibly
lamented by Eusebius,  may be considered, not only as a consequence, but
as a proof, of the liberty which the Christians enjoyed and abused under
the reign of Diocletian. Prosperity had relaxed the nerves of
discipline. Fraud, envy, and malice prevailed in every congregation. The
presbyters aspired to the episcopal office, which every day became an
object more worthy of their ambition. The bishops, who contended with
each other for ecclesiastical preeminence, appeared by their conduct to
claim a secular and tyrannical power in the church; and the lively faith
which still distinguished the Christians from the Gentiles, was shown
much less in their lives, than in their controversial writings.

Notwithstanding this seeming security, an attentive observer might
discern some symptoms that threatened the church with a more violent
persecution than any which she had yet endured. The zeal and rapid
progress of the Christians awakened the Polytheists from their supine
indifference in the cause of those deities, whom custom and education
had taught them to revere. The mutual provocations of a religious war,
which had already continued above two hundred years, exasperated the
animosity of the contending parties. The Pagans were incensed at the
rashness of a recent and obscure sect, which presumed to accuse their
countrymen of error, and to devote their ancestors to eternal misery.
The habits of justifying the popular mythology against the invectives of
an implacable enemy, produced in their minds some sentiments of faith
and reverence for a system which they had been accustomed to consider
with the most careless levity. The supernatural powers assumed by the
church inspired at the same time terror and emulation. The followers of
the established religion intrenched themselves behind a similar
fortification of prodigies; invented new modes of sacrifice, of
expiation, and of initiation;  attempted to revive the credit of their
expiring oracles;  and listened with eager credulity to every impostor,
who flattered their prejudices by a tale of wonders.  Both parties
seemed to acknowledge the truth of those miracles which were claimed by
their adversaries; and while they were contented with ascribing them to
the arts of magic, and to the power of dæmons, they mutually concurred
in restoring and establishing the reign of superstition.  Philosophy,
her most dangerous enemy, was now converted into her most useful ally.
The groves of the academy, the gardens of Epicurus, and even the portico
of the Stoics, were almost deserted, as so many different schools of
scepticism or impiety;  and many among the Romans were desirous that the
writings of Cicero should be condemned and suppressed by the authority
of the senate.  The prevailing sect of the new Platonicians judged it
prudent to connect themselves with the priests, whom perhaps they
despised, against the Christians, whom they had reason to fear. These
fashionable Philosophers prosecuted the design of extracting allegorical
wisdom from the fictions of the Greek poets; instituted mysterious rites
of devotion for the use of their chosen disciples; recommended the
worship of the ancient gods as the emblems or ministers of the Supreme
Deity, and composed against the faith of the gospel many elaborate
treatises,  which have since been committed to the flames by the
prudence of orthodox emperors.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part VI.

Although the policy of Diocletian and the humanity of Constantius
inclined them to preserve inviolate the maxims of toleration, it was
soon discovered that their two associates, Maximian and Galerius,
entertained the most implacable aversion for the name and religion of
the Christians. The minds of those princes had never been enlightened by
science; education had never softened their temper. They owed their
greatness to their swords, and in their most elevated fortune they still
retained their superstitious prejudices of soldiers and peasants. In the
general administration of the provinces they obeyed the laws which their
benefactor had established; but they frequently found occasions of
exercising within their camp and palaces a secret persecution,  for
which the imprudent zeal of the Christians sometimes offered the most
specious pretences. A sentence of death was executed upon Maximilianus,
an African youth, who had been produced by his own father *before the
magistrate as a sufficient and legal recruit, but who obstinately
persisted in declaring, that his conscience would not permit him to
embrace the profession of a soldier.  It could scarcely be expected that
any government should suffer the action of Marcellus the Centurion to
pass with impunity. On the day of a public festival, that officer threw
away his belt, his arms, and the ensigns of his office, and exclaimed
with a loud voice, that he would obey none but Jesus Christ the eternal
King, and that he renounced forever the use of carnal weapons, and the
service of an idolatrous master. The soldiers, as soon as they recovered
from their astonishment, secured the person of Marcellus. He was
examined in the city of Tingi by the president of that part of
Mauritania; and as he was convicted by his own confession, he was
condemned and beheaded for the crime of desertion.  Examples of such a
nature savor much less of religious persecution than of martial or even
civil law; but they served to alienate the mind of the emperors, to
justify the severity of Galerius, who dismissed a great number of
Christian officers from their employments; and to authorize the opinion,
that a sect of enthusiastics, which avowed principles so repugnant to
the public safety, must either remain useless, or would soon become
dangerous, subjects of the empire.

After the success of the Persian war had raised the hopes and the
reputation of Galerius, he passed a winter with Diocletian in the palace
of Nicomedia; and the fate of Christianity became the object of their
secret consultations.  The experienced emperor was still inclined to
pursue measures of lenity; and though he readily consented to exclude
the Christians from holding any employments in the household or the
army, he urged in the strongest terms the danger as well as cruelty of
shedding the blood of those deluded fanatics. Galerius at length
extorted  from him the permission of summoning a council, composed of a
few persons the most distinguished in the civil and military departments
of the state. The important question was agitated in their presence, and
those ambitious courtiers easily discerned, that it was incumbent on
them to second, by their eloquence, the importunate violence of the
Cæsar. It may be presumed, that they insisted on every topic which might
interest the pride, the piety, or the fears, of their sovereign in the
destruction of Christianity. Perhaps they represented, that the glorious
work of the deliverance of the empire was left imperfect, as long as an
independent people was permitted to subsist and multiply in the heart of
the provinces. The Christians, (it might specially be alleged,)
renouncing the gods and the institutions of Rome, had constituted a
distinct republic, which might yet be suppressed before it had acquired
any military force; but which was already governed by its own laws and
magistrates, was possessed of a public treasure, and was intimately
connected in all its parts by the frequent assemblies of the bishops, to
whose decrees their numerous and opulent congregations yielded an
implicit obedience. Arguments like these may seem to have determined the
reluctant mind of Diocletian to embrace a new system of persecution; but
though we may suspect, it is not in our power to relate, the secret
intrigues of the palace, the private views and resentments, the jealousy
of women or eunuchs, and all those trifling but decisive causes which so
often influence the fate of empires, and the councils of the wisest
monarchs.

The pleasure of the emperors was at length signified to the Christians,
who, during the course of this melancholy winter, had expected, with
anxiety, the result of so many secret consultations. The twenty-third of
February, which coincided with the Roman festival of the Terminalia,
was appointed (whether from accident or design) to set bounds to the
progress of Christianity. At the earliest dawn of day, the Prætorian
præfect,  accompanied by several generals, tribunes, and officers of the
revenue, repaired to the principal church of Nicomedia, which was
situated on an eminence in the most populous and beautiful part of the
city. The doors were instantly broke open; they rushed into the
sanctuary; and as they searched in vain for some visible object of
worship, they were obliged to content themselves with committing to the
flames the volumes of the holy Scripture. The ministers of Diocletian
were followed by a numerous body of guards and pioneers, who marched in
order of battle, and were provided with all the instruments used in the
destruction of fortified cities. By their incessant labor, a sacred
edifice, which towered above the Imperial palace, and had long excited
the indignation and envy of the Gentiles, was in a few hours levelled
with the ground.

The next day the general edict of persecution was published;  and though
Diocletian, still averse to the effusion of blood, had moderated the
fury of Galerius, who proposed, that every one refusing to offer
sacrifice should immediately be burnt alive, the penalties inflicted on
the obstinacy of the Christians might be deemed sufficiently rigorous
and effectual. It was enacted, that their churches, in all the provinces
of the empire, should be demolished to their foundations; and the
punishment of death was denounced against all who should presume to hold
any secret assemblies for the purpose of religious worship. The
philosophers, who now assumed the unworthy office of directing the blind
zeal of persecution, had diligently studied the nature and genius of the
Christian religion; and as they were not ignorant that the speculative
doctrines of the faith were supposed to be contained in the writings of
the prophets, of the evangelists, and of the apostles, they most
probably suggested the order, that the bishops and presbyters should
deliver all their sacred books into the hands of the magistrates; who
were commanded, under the severest penalties, to burn them in a public
and solemn manner. By the same edict, the property of the church was at
once confiscated; and the several parts of which it might consist were
either sold to the highest bidder, united to the Imperial domain,
bestowed on the cities and corporations, or granted to the solicitations
of rapacious courtiers. After taking such effectual measures to abolish
the worship, and to dissolve the government of the Christians, it was
thought necessary to subject to the most intolerable hardships the
condition of those perverse individuals who should still reject the
religion of nature, of Rome, and of their ancestors. Persons of a
liberal birth were declared incapable of holding any honors or
employments; slaves were forever deprived of the hopes of freedom, and
the whole body of the people were put out of the protection of the law.
The judges were authorized to hear and to determine every action that
was brought against a Christian. But the Christians were not permitted
to complain of any injury which they themselves had suffered; and thus
those unfortunate sectaries were exposed to the severity, while they
were excluded from the benefits, of public justice. This new species of
martyrdom, so painful and lingering, so obscure and ignominious, was,
perhaps, the most proper to weary the constancy of the faithful: nor can
it be doubted that the passions and interest of mankind were disposed on
this occasion to second the designs of the emperors. But the policy of a
well-ordered government must sometimes have interposed in behalf of the
oppressed Christians; * nor was it possible for the Roman princes
entirely to remove the apprehension of punishment, or to connive at
every act of fraud and violence, without exposing their own authority
and the rest of their subjects to the most alarming dangers.

This edict was scarcely exhibited to the public view, in the most
conspicuous place of Nicomedia, before it was torn down by the hands of
a Christian, who expressed at the same time, by the bitterest
invectives, his contempt as well as abhorrence for such impious and
tyrannical governors. His offence, according to the mildest laws,
amounted to treason, and deserved death. And if it be true that he was a
person of rank and education, those circumstances could serve only to
aggravate his guilt. He was burnt, or rather roasted, by a slow fire;
and his executioners, zealous to revenge the personal insult which had
been offered to the emperors, exhausted every refinement of cruelty,
without being able to subdue his patience, or to alter the steady and
insulting smile which in his dying agonies he still preserved in his
countenance. The Christians, though they confessed that his conduct had
not been strictly conformable to the laws of prudence, admired the
divine fervor of his zeal; and the excessive commendations which they
lavished on the memory of their hero and martyr, contributed to fix a
deep impression of terror and hatred in the mind of Diocletian.

His fears were soon alarmed by the view of a danger from which he very
narrowly escaped. Within fifteen days the palace of Nicomedia, and even
the bed-chamber of Diocletian, were twice in flames; and though both
times they were extinguished without any material damage, the singular
repetition of the fire was justly considered as an evident proof that it
had not been the effect of chance or negligence. The suspicion naturally
fell on the Christians; and it was suggested, with some degree of
probability, that those desperate fanatics, provoked by their present
sufferings, and apprehensive of impending calamities, had entered into a
conspiracy with their faithful brethren, the eunuchs of the palace,
against the lives of two emperors, whom they detested as the
irreconcilable enemies of the church of God. Jealousy and resentment
prevailed in every breast, but especially in that of Diocletian. A great
number of persons, distinguished either by the offices which they had
filled, or by the favor which they had enjoyed, were thrown into prison.
Every mode of torture was put in practice, and the court, as well as
city, was polluted with many bloody executions.  But as it was found
impossible to extort any discovery of this mysterious transaction, it
seems incumbent on us either to presume the innocence, or to admire the
resolution, of the sufferers. A few days afterwards Galerius hastily
withdrew himself from Nicomedia, declaring, that if he delayed his
departure from that devoted palace, he should fall a sacrifice to the
rage of the Christians. The ecclesiastical historians, from whom alone
we derive a partial and imperfect knowledge of this persecution, are at
a loss how to account for the fears and dangers of the emperors. Two of
these writers, a prince and a rhetorician, were eye-witnesses of the
fire of Nicomedia. The one ascribes it to lightning, and the divine
wrath; the other affirms, that it was kindled by the malice of Galerius
himself.

As the edict against the Christians was designed for a general law of
the whole empire, and as Diocletian and Galerius, though they might not
wait for the consent, were assured of the concurrence, of the Western
princes, it would appear more consonant to our ideas of policy, that the
governors of all the provinces should have received secret instructions
to publish, on one and the same day, this declaration of war within
their respective departments. It was at least to be expected, that the
convenience of the public highways and established posts would have
enabled the emperors to transmit their orders with the utmost despatch
from the palace of Nicomedia to the extremities of the Roman world; and
that they would not have suffered fifty days to elapse, before the edict
was published in Syria, and near four months before it was signified to
the cities of Africa.  This delay may perhaps be imputed to the cautious
temper of Diocletian, who had yielded a reluctant consent to the
measures of persecution, and who was desirous of trying the experiment
under his more immediate eye, before he gave way to the disorders and
discontent which it must inevitably occasion in the distant provinces.
At first, indeed, the magistrates were restrained from the effusion of
blood; but the use of every other severity was permitted, and even
recommended to their zeal; nor could the Christians, though they
cheerfully resigned the ornaments of their churches, resolve to
interrupt their religious assemblies, or to deliver their sacred books
to the flames. The pious obstinacy of Felix, an African bishop, appears
to have embarrassed the subordinate ministers of the government. The
curator of his city sent him in chains to the proconsul. The proconsul
transmitted him to the Prætorian præfect of Italy; and Felix, who
disdained even to give an evasive answer, was at length beheaded at
Venusia, in Lucania, a place on which the birth of Horace has conferred
fame.  This precedent, and perhaps some Imperial rescript, which was
issued in consequence of it, appeared to authorize the governors of
provinces, in punishing with death the refusal of the Christians to
deliver up their sacred books. There were undoubtedly many persons who
embraced this opportunity of obtaining the crown of martyrdom; but there
were likewise too many who purchased an ignominious life, by discovering
and betraying the holy Scripture into the hands of infidels. A great
number even of bishops and presbyters acquired, by this criminal
compliance, the opprobrious epithet of Traditors; and their offence was
productive of much present scandal and of much future discord in the
African church.

The copies as well as the versions of Scripture, were already so
multiplied in the empire, that the most severe inquisition could no
longer be attended with any fatal consequences; and even the sacrifice
of those volumes, which, in every congregation, were preserved for
public use, required the consent of some treacherous and unworthy
Christians. But the ruin of the churches was easily effected by the
authority of the government, and by the labor of the Pagans. In some
provinces, however, the magistrates contented themselves with shutting
up the places of religious worship. In others, they more literally
complied with the terms of the edict; and after taking away the doors,
the benches, and the pulpit, which they burnt as it were in a funeral
pile, they completely demolished the remainder of the edifice.  It is
perhaps to this melancholy occasion that we should apply a very
remarkable story, which is related with so many circumstances of variety
and improbability, that it serves rather to excite than to satisfy our
curiosity. In a small town in Phrygia, of whose names as well as
situation we are left ignorant, it should seem that the magistrates and
the body of the people had embraced the Christian faith; and as some
resistance might be apprehended to the execution of the edict, the
governor of the province was supported by a numerous detachment of
legionaries. On their approach the citizens threw themselves into the
church, with the resolution either of defending by arms that sacred
edifice, or of perishing in its ruins. They indignantly rejected the
notice and permission which was given them to retire, till the soldiers,
provoked by their obstinate refusal, set fire to the building on all
sides, and consumed, by this extraordinary kind of martyrdom, a great
number of Phrygians, with their wives and children.

Some slight disturbances, though they were suppressed almost as soon as
excited, in Syria and the frontiers of Armenia, afforded the enemies of
the church a very plausible occasion to insinuate, that those troubles
had been secretly fomented by the intrigues of the bishops, who had
already forgotten their ostentatious professions of passive and
unlimited obedience.  The resentment, or the fears, of Diocletian, at
length transported him beyond the bounds of moderation, which he had
hitherto preserved, and he declared, in a series of cruel edicts,  his
intention of abolishing the Christian name. By the first of these
edicts, the governors of the provinces were directed to apprehend all
persons of the ecclesiastical order; and the prisons, destined for the
vilest criminals, were soon filled with a multitude of bishops,
presbyters, deacons, readers, and exorcists. By a second edict, the
magistrates were commanded to employ every method of severity, which
might reclaim them from their odious superstition, and oblige them to
return to the established worship of the gods. This rigorous order was
extended, by a subsequent edict, to the whole body of Christians, who
were exposed to a violent and general persecution.  Instead of those
salutary restraints, which had required the direct and solemn testimony
of an accuser, it became the duty as well as the interest of the
Imperial officers to discover, to pursue, and to torment the most
obnoxious among the faithful. Heavy penalties were denounced against all
who should presume to save a prescribed sectary from the just
indignation of the gods, and of the emperors. Yet, notwithstanding the
severity of this law, the virtuous courage of many of the Pagans, in
concealing their friends or relations, affords an honorable proof, that
the rage of superstition had not extinguished in their minds the
sentiments of nature and humanity.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part VII.

Diocletian had no sooner published his edicts against the Christians,
than, as if he had been desirous of committing to other hands the work
of persecution, he divested himself of the Imperial purple. The
character and situation of his colleagues and successors sometimes urged
them to enforce and sometimes inclined them to suspend, the execution of
these rigorous laws; nor can we acquire a just and distinct idea of this
important period of ecclesiastical history, unless we separately
consider the state of Christianity, in the different parts of the
empire, during the space of ten years, which elapsed between the first
edicts of Diocletian and the final peace of the church.

The mild and humane temper of Constantius was averse to the oppression
of any part of his subjects. The principal offices of his palace were
exercised by Christians. He loved their persons, esteemed their
fidelity, and entertained not any dislike to their religious principles.
But as long as Constantius remained in the subordinate station of Cæsar,
it was not in his power openly to reject the edicts of Diocletian, or to
disobey the commands of Maximian. His authority contributed, however, to
alleviate the sufferings which he pitied and abhorred. He consented with
reluctance to the ruin of the churches; but he ventured to protect the
Christians themselves from the fury of the populace, and from the rigor
of the laws. The provinces of Gaul (under which we may probably include
those of Britain) were indebted for the singular tranquillity which they
enjoyed, to the gentle interposition of their sovereign.  But Datianus,
the president or governor of Spain, actuated either by zeal or policy,
chose rather to execute the public edicts of the emperors, than to
understand the secret intentions of Constantius; and it can scarcely be
doubted, that his provincial administration was stained with the blood
of a few martyrs.  The elevation of Constantius to the supreme and
independent dignity of Augustus, gave a free scope to the exercise of
his virtues, and the shortness of his reign did not prevent him from
establishing a system of toleration, of which he left the precept and
the example to his son Constantine. His fortunate son, from the first
moment of his accession, declaring himself the protector of the church,
at length deserved the appellation of the first emperor who publicly
professed and established the Christian religion. The motives of his
conversion, as they may variously be deduced from benevolence, from
policy, from conviction, or from remorse, and the progress of the
revolution, which, under his powerful influence and that of his sons,
rendered Christianity the reigning religion of the Roman empire, will
form a very interesting and important chapter in the present volume of
this history. At present it may be sufficient to observe, that every
victory of Constantine was productive of some relief or benefit to the
church.

The provinces of Italy and Africa experienced a short but violent
persecution. The rigorous edicts of Diocletian were strictly and
cheerfully executed by his associate Maximian, who had long hated the
Christians, and who delighted in acts of blood and violence. In the
autumn of the first year of the persecution, the two emperors met at
Rome to celebrate their triumph; several oppressive laws appear to have
issued from their secret consultations, and the diligence of the
magistrates was animated by the presence of their sovereigns., After
Diocletian had divested himself of the purple, Italy and Africa were
administered under the name of Severus, and were exposed, without
defence, to the implacable resentment of his master Galerius. Among the
martyrs of Rome, Adauctus deserves the notice of posterity. He was of a
noble family in Italy, and had raised himself, through the successive
honors of the palace, to the important office of treasurer of the
private Jemesnes. Adauctus is the more remarkable for being the only
person of rank and distinction who appears to have suffered death,
during the whole course of this general persecution.

The revolt of Maxentius immediately restored peace to the churches of
Italy and Africa; and the same tyrant who oppressed every other class of
his subjects, showed himself just, humane, and even partial, towards the
afflicted Christians. He depended on their gratitude and affection, and
very naturally presumed, that the injuries which they had suffered, and
the dangers which they still apprehended from his most inveterate enemy,
would secure the fidelity of a party already considerable by their
numbers and opulence.  Even the conduct of Maxentius towards the bishops
of Rome and Carthage may be considered as the proof of his toleration,
since it is probable that the most orthodox princes would adopt the same
measures with regard to their established clergy. Marcellus, the former
of these prelates, had thrown the capital into confusion, by the severe
penance which he imposed on a great number of Christians, who, during
the late persecution, had renounced or dissembled their religion. The
rage of faction broke out in frequent and violent seditions; the blood
of the faithful was shed by each other's hands, and the exile of
Marcellus, whose prudence seems to have been less eminent than his zeal,
was found to be the only measure capable of restoring peace to the
distracted church of Rome.  The behavior of Mensurius, bishop of
Carthage, appears to have been still more reprehensible. A deacon of
that city had published a libel against the emperor. The offender took
refuge in the episcopal palace; and though it was somewhat early to
advance any claims of ecclesiastical immunities, the bishop refused to
deliver him up to the officers of justice. For this treasonable
resistance, Mensurius was summoned to court, and instead of receiving a
legal sentence of death or banishment, he was permitted, after a short
examination, to return to his diocese.  Such was the happy condition of
the Christian subjects of Maxentius, that whenever they were desirous of
procuring for their own use any bodies of martyrs, they were obliged to
purchase them from the most distant provinces of the East. A story is
related of Aglæ, a Roman lady, descended from a consular family, and
possessed of so ample an estate, that it required the management of
seventy-three stewards. Among these Boniface was the favorite of his
mistress; and as Aglæmixed love with devotion, it is reported that he
was admitted to share her bed. Her fortune enabled her to gratify the
pious desire of obtaining some sacred relics from the East. She
intrusted Boniface with a considerable sum of gold, and a large quantity
of aromatics; and her lover, attended by twelve horsemen and three
covered chariots, undertook a remote pilgrimage, as far as Tarsus in
Cilicia.

The sanguinary temper of Galerius, the first and principal author of the
persecution, was formidable to those Christians whom their misfortunes
had placed within the limits of his dominions; and it may fairly be
presumed that many persons of a middle rank, who were not confined by
the chains either of wealth or of poverty, very frequently deserted
their native country, and sought a refuge in the milder climate of the
West.  As long as he commanded only the armies and provinces of
Illyricum, he could with difficulty either find or make a considerable
number of martyrs, in a warlike country, which had entertained the
missionaries of the gospel with more coldness and reluctance than any
other part of the empire.  But when Galerius had obtained the supreme
power, and the government of the East, he indulged in their fullest
extent his zeal and cruelty, not only in the provinces of Thrace and
Asia, which acknowledged his immediate jurisdiction, but in those of
Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, where Maximin gratified his own
inclination, by yielding a rigorous obedience to the stern commands of
his benefactor.  The frequent disappointments of his ambitious views,
the experience of six years of persecution, and the salutary reflections
which a lingering and painful distemper suggested to the mind of
Galerius, at length convinced him that the most violent efforts of
despotism are insufficient to extirpate a whole people, or to subdue
their religious prejudices. Desirous of repairing the mischief that he
had occasioned, he published in his own name, and in those of Licinius
and Constantine, a general edict, which, after a pompous recital of the
Imperial titles, proceeded in the following manner: --

"Among the important cares which have occupied our mind for the utility
and preservation of the empire, it was our intention to correct and
reestablish all things according to the ancient laws and public
discipline of the Romans. We were particularly desirous of reclaiming
into the way of reason and nature, the deluded Christians who had
renounced the religion and ceremonies instituted by their fathers; and
presumptuously despising the practice of antiquity, had invented
extravagant laws and opinions, according to the dictates of their fancy,
and had collected a various society from the different provinces of our
empire. The edicts, which we have published to enforce the worship of
the gods, having exposed many of the Christians to danger and distress,
many having suffered death, and many more, who still persist in their
impious folly, being left destitute of anypublic exercise of religion,
we are disposed to extend to those unhappy men the effects of our wonted
clemency. We permit them therefore freely to profess their private
opinions, and to assemble in their conventicles without fear or
molestation, provided always that they preserve a due respect to the
established laws and government. By another rescript we shall signify
our intentions to the judges and magistrates; and we hope that our
indulgence will engage the Christians to offer up their prayers to the
Deity whom they adore, for our safety and prosperity for their own, and
for that of the republic."  It is not usually in the language of edicts
and manifestos that we should search for the real character or the
secret motives of princes; but as these were the words of a dying
emperor, his situation, perhaps, may be admitted as a pledge of his
sincerity.

When Galerius subscribed this edict of toleration, he was well assured
that Licinius would readily comply with the inclinations of his friend
and benefactor, and that any measures in favor of the Christians would
obtain the approbation of Constantine. But the emperor would not venture
to insert in the preamble the name of Maximin, whose consent was of the
greatest importance, and who succeeded a few days afterwards to the
provinces of Asia. In the first six months, however, of his new reign,
Maximin affected to adopt the prudent counsels of his predecessor; and
though he never condescended to secure the tranquillity of the church by
a public edict, Sabinus, his Prætorian præfect, addressed a circular
letter to all the governors and magistrates of the provinces,
expatiating on the Imperial clemency, acknowledging the invincible
obstinacy of the Christians, and directing the officers of justice to
cease their ineffectual prosecutions, and to connive at the secret
assemblies of those enthusiasts. In consequence of these orders, great
numbers of Christians were released from prison, or delivered from the
mines. The confessors, singing hymns of triumph, returned into their own
countries; and those who had yielded to the violence of the tempest,
solicited with tears of repentance their readmission into the bosom of
the church.

But this treacherous calm was of short duration; nor could the
Christians of the East place any confidence in the character of their
sovereign. Cruelty and superstition were the ruling passions of the soul
of Maximin. The former suggested the means, the latter pointed out the
objects of persecution. The emperor was devoted to the worship of the
gods, to the study of magic, and to the belief of oracles. The prophets
or philosophers, whom he revered as the favorites of Heaven, were
frequently raised to the government of provinces, and admitted into his
most secret councils. They easily convinced him that the Christians had
been indebted for their victories to their regular discipline, and that
the weakness of polytheism had principally flowed from a want of union
and subordination among the ministers of religion. A system of
government was therefore instituted, which was evidently copied from the
policy of the church. In all the great cities of the empire, the temples
were repaired and beautified by the order of Maximin, and the
officiating priests of the various deities were subjected to the
authority of a superior pontiff destined to oppose the bishop, and to
promote the cause of paganism. These pontiffs acknowledged, in their
turn, the supreme jurisdiction of the metropolitans or high priests of
the province, who acted as the immediate vicegerents of the emperor
himself. A white robe was the ensign of their dignity; and these new
prelates were carefully selected from the most noble and opulent
families. By the influence of the magistrates, and of the sacerdotal
order, a great number of dutiful addresses were obtained, particularly
from the cities of Nicomedia, Antioch, and Tyre, which artfully
represented the well-known intentions of the court as the general sense
of the people; solicited the emperor to consult the laws of justice
rather than the dictates of his clemency; expressed their abhorrence of
the Christians, and humbly prayed that those impious sectaries might at
least be excluded from the limits of their respective territories. The
answer of Maximin to the address which he obtained from the citizens of
Tyre is still extant. He praises their zeal and devotion in terms of the
highest satisfaction, descants on the obstinate impiety of the
Christians, and betrays, by the readiness with which he consents to
their banishment, that he considered himself as receiving, rather than
as conferring, an obligation. The priests as well as the magistrates
were empowered to enforce the execution of his edicts, which were
engraved on tables of brass; and though it was recommended to them to
avoid the effusion of blood, the most cruel and ignominious punishments
were inflicted on the refractory Christians.

The Asiatic Christians had every thing to dread from the severity of a
bigoted monarch who prepared his measures of violence with such
deliberate policy. But a few months had scarcely elapsed before the
edicts published by the two Western emperors obliged Maximin to suspend
the prosecution of his designs: the civil war which he so rashly
undertook against Licinius employed all his attention; and the defeat
and death of Maximin soon delivered the church from the last and most
implacable of her enemies.

In this general view of the persecution, which was first authorized by
the edicts of Diocletian, I have purposely refrained from describing the
particular sufferings and deaths of the Christian martyrs. It would have
been an easy task, from the history of Eusebius, from the declamations
of Lactantius, and from the most ancient acts, to collect a long series
of horrid and disgustful pictures, and to fill many pages with racks and
scourges, with iron hooks and red-hot beds, and with all the variety of
tortures which fire and steel, savage beasts, and more savage
executioners, could inflict upon the human body. These melancholy scenes
might be enlivened by a crowd of visions and miracles destined either to
delay the death, to celebrate the triumph, or to discover the relics of
those canonized saints who suffered for the name of Christ. But I cannot
determine what I ought to transcribe, till I am satisfied how much I
ought to believe. The gravest of the ecclesiastical historians, Eusebius
himself, indirectly confesses, that he has related whatever might
redound to the glory, and that he has suppressed all that could tend to
the disgrace, of religion.  Such an acknowledgment will naturally excite
a suspicion that a writer who has so openly violated one of the
fundamental laws of history, has not paid a very strict regard to the
observance of the other; and the suspicion will derive additional credit
from the character of Eusebius, * which was less tinctured with
credulity, and more practised in the arts of courts, than that of almost
any of his contemporaries. On some particular occasions, when the
magistrates were exasperated by some personal motives of interest or
resentment, the rules of prudence, and perhaps of decency, to overturn
the altars, to pour out imprecations against the emperors, or to strike
the judge as he sat on his tribunal, it may be presumed, that every mode
of torture which cruelty could invent, or constancy could endure, was
exhausted on those devoted victims.  Two circumstances, however, have
been unwarily mentioned, which insinuate that the general treatment of
the Christians, who had been apprehended by the officers of justice, was
less intolerable than it is usually imagined to have been. 1. The
confessors who were condemned to work in the mines were permitted by the
humanity or the negligence of their keepers to build chapels, and freely
to profess their religion in the midst of those dreary habitations.  2.
The bishops were obliged to check and to censure the forward zeal of the
Christians, who voluntarily threw themselves into the hands of the
magistrates. Some of these were persons oppressed by poverty and debts,
who blindly sought to terminate a miserable existence by a glorious
death. Others were allured by the hope that a short confinement would
expiate the sins of a whole life; and others again were actuated by the
less honorable motive of deriving a plentiful subsistence, and perhaps a
considerable profit, from the alms which the charity of the faithful
bestowed on the prisoners.  After the church had triumphed over all her
enemies, the interest as well as vanity of the captives prompted them to
magnify the merit of their respective sufferings. A convenient distance
of time or place gave an ample scope to the progress of fiction; and the
frequent instances which might be alleged of holy martyrs, whose wounds
had been instantly healed, whose strength had been renewed, and whose
lost members had miraculously been restored, were extremely convenient
for the purpose of removing every difficulty, and of silencing every
objection. The most extravagant legends, as they conduced to the honor
of the church, were applauded by the credulous multitude, countenanced
by the power of the clergy, and attested by the suspicious evidence of
ecclesiastical history.

Chapter XVI: Conduct Towards The Christians, From Nero To Constantine.
-- Part VIII.

The vague descriptions of exile and imprisonment, of pain and torture,
are so easily exaggerated or softened by the pencil of an artful orator,
* that we are naturally induced to inquire into a fact of a more
distinct and stubborn kind; the number of persons who suffered death in
consequence of the edicts published by Diocletian, his associates, and
his successors. The recent legendaries record whole armies and cities,
which were at once swept away by the undistinguishing rage of
persecution. The more ancient writers content themselves with pouring
out a liberal effusion of loose and tragical invectives, without
condescending to ascertain the precise number of those persons who were
permitted to seal with their blood their belief of the gospel. From the
history of Eusebius, it may, however, be collected, that only nine
bishops were punished with death; and we are assured, by his particular
enumeration of the martyrs of Palestine, that no more than ninety-two
Christians were entitled to that honorable appellation.   As we are
unacquainted with the degree of episcopal zeal and courage which
prevailed at that time, it is not in our power to draw any useful
inferences from the former of these facts: but the latter may serve to
justify a very important and probable conclusion. According to the
distribution of Roman provinces, Palestine may be considered as the
sixteenth part of the Eastern empire:  and since there were some
governors, who from a real or affected clemency had preserved their
hands unstained with the blood of the faithful,  it is reasonable to
believe, that the country which had given birth to Christianity,
produced at least the sixteenth part of the martyrs who suffered death
within the dominions of Galerius and Maximin; the whole might
consequently amount to about fifteen hundred, a number which, if it is
equally divided between the ten years of the persecution, will allow an
annual consumption of one hundred and fifty martyrs. Allotting the same
proportion to the provinces of Italy, Africa, and perhaps Spain, where,
at the end of two or three years, the rigor of the penal laws was either
suspended or abolished, the multitude of Christians in the Roman empire,
on whom a capital punishment was inflicted by a judicial, sentence, will
be reduced to somewhat less than two thousand persons. Since it cannot
be doubted that the Christians were more numerous, and their enemies
more exasperated, in the time of Diocletian, than they had ever been in
any former persecution, this probable and moderate computation may teach
us to estimate the number of primitive saints and martyrs who sacrificed
their lives for the important purpose of introducing Christianity into
the world.

We shall conclude this chapter by a melancholy truth, which obtrudes
itself on the reluctant mind; that even admitting, without hesitation or
inquiry, all that history has recorded, or devotion has feigned, on the
subject of martyrdoms, it must still be acknowledged, that the
Christians, in the course of their intestine dissensions, have inflicted
far greater severities on each other, than they had experienced from the
zeal of infidels. During the ages of ignorance which followed the
subversion of the Roman empire in the West, the bishops of the Imperial
city extended their dominion over the laity as well as clergy of the
Latin church. The fabric of superstition which they had erected, and
which might long have defied the feeble efforts of reason, was at length
assaulted by a crowd of daring fanatics, who from the twelfth to the
sixteenth century assumed the popular character of reformers. The church
of Rome defended by violence the empire which she had acquired by fraud;
a system of peace and benevolence was soon disgraced by proscriptions,
war, massacres, and the institution of the holy office. And as the
reformers were animated by the love of civil as well as of religious
freedom, the Catholic princes connected their own interest with that of
the clergy, and enforced by fire and the sword the terrors of spiritual
censures. In the Netherlands alone, more than one hundred thousand of
the subjects of Charles V. are said to have suffered by the hand of the
executioner; and this extraordinary number is attested by Grotius,  a
man of genius and learning, who preserved his moderation amidst the fury
of contending sects, and who composed the annals of his own age and
country, at a time when the invention of printing had facilitated the
means of intelligence, and increased the danger of detection. If we are
obliged to submit our belief to the authority of Grotius, it must be
allowed, that the number of Protestants, who were executed in a single
province and a single reign, far exceeded that of the primitive martyrs
in the space of three centuries, and of the Roman empire. But if the
improbability of the fact itself should prevail over the weight of
evidence; if Grotius should be convicted of exaggerating the merit and
sufferings of the Reformers;  we shall be naturally led to inquire what
confidence can be placed in the doubtful and imperfect monuments of
ancient credulity; what degree of credit can be assigned to a courtly
bishop, and a passionate declaimer, * who, under the protection of
Constantine, enjoyed the exclusive privilege of recording the
persecutions inflicted on the Christians by the vanquished rivals or
disregarded predecessors of their gracious sovereign.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople.

Part I.

Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Political System Constantine, And His
Successors. -- Military Discipline. -- The Palace. -- The Finances.

The unfortunate Licinius was the last rival who opposed the greatness,
and the last captive who adorned the triumph, of Constantine. After a
tranquil and prosperous reign, the conqueror bequeathed to his family
the inheritance of the Roman empire; a new capital, a new policy, and a
new religion; and the innovations which he established have been
embraced and consecrated by succeeding generations. The age of the great
Constantine and his sons is filled with important events; but the
historian must be oppressed by their number and variety, unless he
diligently separates from each other the scenes which are connected only
by the order of time. He will describe the political institutions that
gave strength and stability to the empire, before he proceeds to relate
the wars and revolutions which hastened its decline. He will adopt the
division unknown to the ancients of civil and ecclesiastical affairs:
the victory of the Christians, and their intestine discord, will supply
copious and distinct materials both for edification and for scandal.

After the defeat and abdication of Licinius, his victorious rival
proceeded to lay the foundations of a city destined to reign in future
times, the mistress of the East, and to survive the empire and religion
of Constantine. The motives, whether of pride or of policy, which first
induced Diocletian to withdraw himself from the ancient seat of
government, had acquired additional weight by the example of his
successors, and the habits of forty years. Rome was insensibly
confounded with the dependent kingdoms which had once acknowledged her
supremacy; and the country of the Cæsars was viewed with cold
indifference by a martial prince, born in the neighborhood of the
Danube, educated in the courts and armies of Asia, and invested with the
purple by the legions of Britain. The Italians, who had received
Constantine as their deliverer, submissively obeyed the edicts which he
sometimes condescended to address to the senate and people of Rome; but
they were seldom honored with the presence of their new sovereign.
During the vigor of his age, Constantine, according to the various
exigencies of peace and war, moved with slow dignity, or with active
diligence, along the frontiers of his extensive dominions; and was
always prepared to take the field either against a foreign or a domestic
enemy. But as he gradually reached the summit of prosperity and the
decline of life, he began to meditate the design of fixing in a more
permanent station the strength as well as majesty of the throne. In the
choice of an advantageous situation, he preferred the confines of Europe
and Asia; to curb with a powerful arm the barbarians who dwelt between
the Danube and the Tanais; to watch with an eye of jealousy the conduct
of the Persian monarch, who indignantly supported the yoke of an
ignominious treaty. With these views, Diocletian had selected and
embellished the residence of Nicomedia: but the memory of Diocletian was
justly abhorred by the protector of the church: and Constantine was not
insensible to the ambition of founding a city which might perpetuate the
glory of his own name. During the late operations of the war against
Licinius, he had sufficient opportunity to contemplate, both as a
soldier and as a statesman, the incomparable position of Byzantium; and
to observe how strongly it was guarded by nature against a hostile
attack, whilst it was accessible on every side to the benefits of
commercial intercourse. Many ages before Constantine, one of the most
judicious historians of antiquity  had described the advantages of a
situation, from whence a feeble colony of Greeks derived the command of
the sea, and the honors of a flourishing and independent republic.

If we survey Byzantium in the extent which it acquired with the august
name of Constantinople, the figure of the Imperial city may be
represented under that of an unequal triangle. The obtuse point, which
advances towards the east and the shores of Asia, meets and repels the
waves of the Thracian Bosphorus. The northern side of the city is
bounded by the harbor; and the southern is washed by the Propontis, or
Sea of Marmara. The basis of the triangle is opposed to the west, and
terminates the continent of Europe. But the admirable form and division
of the circumjacent land and water cannot, without a more ample
explanation, be clearly or sufficiently understood.

The winding channel through which the waters of the Euxine flow with a
rapid and incessant course towards the Mediterranean, received the
appellation of Bosphorus, a name not less celebrated in the history,
than in the fables, of antiquity.  A crowd of temples and of votive
altars, profusely scattered along its steep and woody banks, attested
the unskilfulness, the terrors, and the devotion of the Grecian
navigators, who, after the example of the Argonauts, explored the
dangers of the inhospitable Euxine. On these banks tradition long
preserved the memory of the palace of Phineus, infested by the obscene
harpies;  and of the sylvan reign of Amycus, who defied the son of Leda
to the combat of the cestus.  The straits of the Bosphorus are
terminated by the Cyanean rocks, which, according to the description of
the poets, had once floated on the face of the waters; and were destined
by the gods to protect the entrance of the Euxine against the eye of
profane curiosity.  From the Cyanean rocks to the point and harbor of
Byzantium, the winding length of the Bosphorus extends about sixteen
miles,  and its most ordinary breadth may be computed at about one mile
and a half. The newcastles of Europe and Asia are constructed, on either
continent, upon the foundations of two celebrated temples, of Serapis
and of Jupiter Urius. The oldcastles, a work of the Greek emperors,
command the narrowest part of the channel in a place where the opposite
banks advance within five hundred paces of each other. These fortresses
were destroyed and strengthened by Mahomet the Second, when he meditated
the siege of Constantinople:  but the Turkish conqueror was most
probably ignorant, that near two thousand years before his reign,
continents by a bridge of boats.  At a small distance from the old
castles we discover the little town of Chrysopolis, or Scutari, which
may almost be considered as the Asiatic suburb of Constantinople. The
Bosphorus, as it begins to open into the Propontis, passes between
Byzantium and Chalcedon. The latter of those cities was built by the
Greeks, a few years before the former; and the blindness of its
founders, who overlooked the superior advantages of the opposite coast,
has been stigmatized by a proverbial expression of contempt.

The harbor of Constantinople, which may be considered as an arm of the
Bosphorus, obtained, in a very remote period, the denomination of the
Golden Horn. The curve which it describes might be compared to the horn
of a stag, or as it should seem, with more propriety, to that of an ox.
The epithet of goldenwas expressive of the riches which every wind
wafted from the most distant countries into the secure and capacious
port of Constantinople. The River Lycus, formed by the conflux of two
little streams, pours into the harbor a perpetual supply of fresh water,
which serves to cleanse the bottom, and to invite the periodical shoals
of fish to seek their retreat in that convenient recess. As the
vicissitudes of tides are scarcely felt in those seas, the constant
depth of the harbor allows goods to be landed on the quays without the
assistance of boats; and it has been observed, that in many places the
largest vessels may rest their prows against the houses, while their
sterns are floating in the water.  From the mouth of the Lycus to that
of the harbor, this arm of the Bosphorus is more than seven miles in
length. The entrance is about five hundred yards broad, and a strong
chain could be occasionally drawn across it, to guard the port and city
from the attack of a hostile navy.

Between the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, the shores of Europe and Asia,
receding on either side, enclose the sea of Marmara, which was known to
the ancients by the denomination of Propontis. The navigation from the
issue of the Bosphorus to the entrance of the Hellespont is about one
hundred and twenty miles. Those who steer their westward course through
the middle of the Propontis, amt at once descry the high lands of Thrace
and Bithynia, and never lose sight of the lofty summit of Mount Olympus,
covered with eternal snows.  They leave on the left a deep gulf, at the
bottom of which Nicomedia was seated, the Imperial residence of
Diocletian; and they pass the small islands of Cyzicus and Proconnesus
before they cast anchor at Gallipoli; where the sea, which separates
Asia from Europe, is again contracted into a narrow channel.

The geographers who, with the most skilful accuracy, have surveyed the
form and extent of the Hellespont, assign about sixty miles for the
winding course, and about three miles for the ordinary breadth of those
celebrated straits.  But the narrowest part of the channel is found to
the northward of the old Turkish castles between the cities of Sestus
and Abydus. It was here that the adventurous Leander braved the passage
of the flood for the possession of his mistress.  It was here likewise,
in a place where the distance between the opposite banks cannot exceed
five hundred paces, that Xerxes imposed a stupendous bridge of boats,
for the purpose of transporting into Europe a hundred and seventy
myriads of barbarians.  A sea contracted within such narrow limits may
seem but ill to deserve the singular epithet of broad, which Homer, as
well as Orpheus, has frequently bestowed on the Hellespont. * But our
ideas of greatness are of a relative nature: the traveller, and
especially the poet, who sailed along the Hellespont, who pursued the
windings of the stream, and contemplated the rural scenery, which
appeared on every side to terminate the prospect, insensibly lost the
remembrance of the sea; and his fancy painted those celebrated straits,
with all the attributes of a mighty river flowing with a swift current,
in the midst of a woody and inland country, and at length, through a
wide mouth, discharging itself into the Ægean or Archipelago.  Ancient
Troy,  seated on a an eminence at the foot of Mount Ida, overlooked the
mouth of the Hellespont, which scarcely received an accession of waters
from the tribute of those immortal rivulets the Simois and Scamander.
The Grecian camp had stretched twelve miles along the shore from the
Sigæan to the Rhætean promontory; and the flanks of the army were
guarded by the bravest chiefs who fought under the banners of Agamemnon.
The first of those promontories was occupied by Achilles with his
invincible myrmidons, and the dauntless Ajax pitched his tents on the
other. After Ajax had fallen a sacrifice to his disappointed pride, and
to the ingratitude of the Greeks, his sepulchre was erected on the
ground where he had defended the navy against the rage of Jove and of
Hector; and the citizens of the rising town of Rhæteum celebrated his
memory with divine honors.  Before Constantine gave a just preference to
the situation of Byzantium, he had conceived the design of erecting the
seat of empire on this celebrated spot, from whence the Romans derived
their fabulous origin. The extensive plain which lies below ancient
Troy, towards the Rhætean promontory and the tomb of Ajax, was first
chosen for his new capital; and though the undertaking was soon
relinquished the stately remains of unfinished walls and towers
attracted the notice of all who sailed through the straits of the
Hellespont.

We are at present qualified to view the advantageous position of
Constantinople; which appears to have been formed by nature for the
centre and capital of a great monarchy. Situated in the forty-first
degree of latitude, the Imperial city commanded, from her seven hills,
the opposite shores of Europe and Asia; the climate was healthy and
temperate, the soil fertile, the harbor secure and capacious; and the
approach on the side of the continent was of small extent and easy
defence. The Bosphorus and the Hellespont may be considered as the two
gates of Constantinople; and the prince who possessed those important
passages could always shut them against a naval enemy, and open them to
the fleets of commerce. The preservation of the eastern provinces may,
in some degree, be ascribed to the policy of Constantine, as the
barbarians of the Euxine, who in the preceding age had poured their
armaments into the heart of the Mediterranean, soon desisted from the
exercise of piracy, and despaired of forcing this insurmountable
barrier. When the gates of the Hellespont and Bosphorus were shut, the
capital still enjoyed within their spacious enclosure every production
which could supply the wants, or gratify the luxury, of its numerous
inhabitants. The sea-coasts of Thrace and Bithynia, which languish under
the weight of Turkish oppression, still exhibit a rich prospect of
vineyards, of gardens, and of plentiful harvests; and the Propontis has
ever been renowned for an inexhaustible store of the most exquisite
fish, that are taken in their stated seasons, without skill, and almost
without labor.  But when the passages of the straits were thrown open
for trade, they alternately admitted the natural and artificial riches
of the north and south, of the Euxine, and of the Mediterranean.
Whatever rude commodities were collected in the forests of Germany and
Scythia, and far as the sources of the Tanais and the Borysthenes;
whatsoever was manufactured by the skill of Europe or Asia; the corn of
Egypt, and the gems and spices of the farthest India, were brought by
the varying winds into the port of Constantinople, which for many ages
attracted the commerce of the ancient world.

[See Basilica Of Constantinople]

The prospect of beauty, of safety, and of wealth, united in a single
spot, was sufficient to justify the choice of Constantine. But as some
decent mixture of prodigy and fable has, in every age, been supposed to
reflect a becoming majesty on the origin of great cities,  the emperor
was desirous of ascribing his resolution, not so much to the uncertain
counsels of human policy, as to the infallible and eternal decrees of
divine wisdom. In one of his laws he has been careful to instruct
posterity, that in obedience to the commands of God, he laid the
everlasting foundations of Constantinople:  and though he has not
condescended to relate in what manner the celestial inspiration was
communicated to his mind, the defect of his modest silence has been
liberally supplied by the ingenuity of succeeding writers; who describe
the nocturnal vision which appeared to the fancy of Constantine, as he
slept within the walls of Byzantium. The tutelar genius of the city, a
venerable matron sinking under the weight of years and infirmities, was
suddenly transformed into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned
with all the symbols of Imperial greatness.  The monarch awoke,
interpreted the auspicious omen, and obeyed, without hesitation, the
will of Heaven The day which gave birth to a city or colony was
celebrated by the Romans with such ceremonies as had been ordained by a
generous superstition;  and though Constantine might omit some rites
which savored too strongly of their Pagan origin, yet he was anxious to
leave a deep impression of hope and respect on the minds of the
spectators. On foot, with a lance in his hand, the emperor himself led
the solemn procession; and directed the line, which was traced as the
boundary of the destined capital: till the growing circumference was
observed with astonishment by the assistants, who, at length, ventured
to observe, that he had already exceeded the most ample measure of a
great city. "I shall still advance," replied Constantine, "till He, the
invisible guide who marches before me, thinks proper to stop."  Without
presuming to investigate the nature or motives of this extraordinary
conductor, we shall content ourselves with the more humble task of
describing the extent and limits of Constantinople.

In the actual state of the city, the palace and gardens of the Seraglio
occupy the eastern promontory, the first of the seven hills, and cover
about one hundred and fifty acres of our own measure. The seat of
Turkish jealousy and despotism is erected on the foundations of a
Grecian republic; but it may be supposed that the Byzantines were
tempted by the conveniency of the harbor to extend their habitations on
that side beyond the modern limits of the Seraglio. The new walls of
Constantine stretched from the port to the Propontis across the enlarged
breadth of the triangle, at the distance of fifteen stadia from the
ancient fortification; and with the city of Byzantium they enclosed five
of the seven hills, which, to the eyes of those who approach
Constantinople, appear to rise above each other in beautiful order.
About a century after the death of the founder, the new buildings,
extending on one side up the harbor, and on the other along the
Propontis, already covered the narrow ridge of the sixth, and the broad
summit of the seventh hill. The necessity of protecting those suburbs
from the incessant inroads of the barbarians engaged the younger
Theodosius to surround his capital with an adequate and permanent
enclosure of walls.  From the eastern promontory to the golden gate, the
extreme length of Constantinople was about three Roman miles;  the
circumference measured between ten and eleven; and the surface might be
computed as equal to about two thousand English acres. It is impossible
to justify the vain and credulous exaggerations of modern travellers,
who have sometimes stretched the limits of Constantinople over the
adjacent villages of the European, and even of the Asiatic coast.  But
the suburbs of Pera and Galata, though situate beyond the harbor, may
deserve to be considered as a part of the city;  and this addition may
perhaps authorize the measure of a Byzantine historian, who assigns
sixteen Greek (about fourteen Roman) miles for the circumference of his
native city.  Such an extent may not seem unworthy of an Imperial
residence. Yet Constantinople must yield to Babylon and Thebes,  to
ancient Rome, to London, and even to Paris.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Part II.

The master of the Roman world, who aspired to erect an eternal monument
of the glories of his reign could employ in the prosecution of that
great work, the wealth, the labor, and all that yet remained of the
genius of obedient millions. Some estimate may be formed of the expense
bestowed with Imperial liberality on the foundation of Constantinople,
by the allowance of about two millions five hundred thousand pounds for
the construction of the walls, the porticos, and the aqueducts.  The
forests that overshadowed the shores of the Euxine, and the celebrated
quarries of white marble in the little island of Proconnesus, supplied
an inexhaustible stock of materials, ready to be conveyed, by the
convenience of a short water carriage, to the harbor of Byzantium.  A
multitude of laborers and artificers urged the conclusion of the work
with incessant toil: but the impatience of Constantine soon discovered,
that, in the decline of the arts, the skill as well as numbers of his
architects bore a very unequal proportion to the greatness of his
designs. The magistrates of the most distant provinces were therefore
directed to institute schools, to appoint professors, and by the hopes
of rewards and privileges, to engage in the study and practice of
architecture a sufficient number of ingenious youths, who had received a
liberal education.  The buildings of the new city were executed by such
artificers as the reign of Constantine could afford; but they were
decorated by the hands of the most celebrated masters of the age of
Pericles and Alexander. To revive the genius of Phidias and Lysippus,
surpassed indeed the power of a Roman emperor; but the immortal
productions which they had bequeathed to posterity were exposed without
defence to the rapacious vanity of a despot. By his commands the cities
of Greece and Asia were despoiled of their most valuable ornaments.  The
trophies of memorable wars, the objects of religious veneration, the
most finished statues of the gods and heroes, of the sages and poets, of
ancient times, contributed to the splendid triumph of Constantinople;
and gave occasion to the remark of the historian Cedrenus,  who
observes, with some enthusiasm, that nothing seemed wanting except the
souls of the illustrious men whom these admirable monuments were
intended to represent. But it is not in the city of Constantine, nor in
the declining period of an empire, when the human mind was depressed by
civil and religious slavery, that we should seek for the souls of Homer
and of Demosthenes.

During the siege of Byzantium, the conqueror had pitched his tent on the
commanding eminence of the second hill. To perpetuate the memory of his
success, he chose the same advantageous position for the principal
Forum;  which appears to have been of a circular, or rather elliptical
form. The two opposite entrances formed triumphal arches; the porticos,
which enclosed it on every side, were filled with statues; and the
centre of the Forum was occupied by a lofty column, of which a mutilated
fragment is now degraded by the appellation of the burnt pillar. This
column was erected on a pedestal of white marble twenty feet high; and
was composed of ten pieces of porphyry, each of which measured about ten
feet in height, and about thirty-three in circumference.  On the summit
of the pillar, above one hundred and twenty feet from the ground, stood
the colossal statue of Apollo. It was a bronze, had been transported
either from Athens or from a town of Phrygia, and was supposed to be the
work of Phidias. The artist had represented the god of day, or, as it
was afterwards interpreted, the emperor Constantine himself, with a
sceptre in his right hand, the globe of the world in his left, and a
crown of rays glittering on his head.  The Circus, or Hippodrome, was a
stately building about four hundred paces in length, and one hundred in
breadth.  The space between the two met or goals were filled with
statues and obelisks; and we may still remark a very singular fragment
of antiquity; the bodies of three serpents, twisted into one pillar of
brass. Their triple heads had once supported the golden tripod which,
after the defeat of Xerxes, was consecrated in the temple of Delphi by
the victorious Greeks.  The beauty of the Hippodrome has been long since
defaced by the rude hands of the Turkish conquerors;  but, under the
similar appellation of Atmeidan, it still serves as a place of exercise
for their horses. From the throne, whence the emperor viewed the
Circensian games, a winding staircase  descended to the palace; a
magnificent edifice, which scarcely yielded to the residence of Rome
itself, and which, together with the dependent courts, gardens, and
porticos, covered a considerable extent of ground upon the banks of the
Propontis between the Hippodrome and the church of St. Sophia.  We might
likewise celebrate the baths, which still retained the name of
Zeuxippus, after they had been enriched, by the munificence of
Constantine, with lofty columns, various marbles, and above threescore
statues of bronze.  But we should deviate from the design of this
history, if we attempted minutely to describe the different buildings or
quarters of the city. It may be sufficient to observe, that whatever
could adorn the dignity of a great capital, or contribute to the benefit
or pleasure of its numerous inhabitants, was contained within the walls
of Constantinople. A particular description, composed about a century
after its foundation, enumerates a capitol or school of learning, a
circus, two theatres, eight public, and one hundred and fifty-three
private baths, fifty-two porticos, five granaries, eight aqueducts or
reservoirs of water, four spacious halls for the meetings of the senate
or courts of justice, fourteen churches, fourteen palaces, and four
thousand three hundred and eighty-eight houses, which, for their size or
beauty, deserved to be distinguished from the multitude of plebeian
inhabitants.

The populousness of his favored city was the next and most serious
object of the attention of its founder. In the dark ages which succeeded
the translation of the empire, the remote and the immediate consequences
of that memorable event were strangely confounded by the vanity of the
Greeks and the credulity of the Latins.  It was asserted, and believed,
that all the noble families of Rome, the senate, and the equestrian
order, with their innumerable attendants, had followed their emperor to
the banks of the Propontis; that a spurious race of strangers and
plebeians was left to possess the solitude of the ancient capital; and
that the lands of Italy, long since converted into gardens, were at once
deprived of cultivation and inhabitants.  In the course of this history,
such exaggerations will be reduced to their just value: yet, since the
growth of Constantinople cannot be ascribed to the general increase of
mankind and of industry, it must be admitted that this artificial colony
was raised at the expense of the ancient cities of the empire. Many
opulent senators of Rome, and of the eastern provinces, were probably
invited by Constantine to adopt for their country the fortunate spot,
which he had chosen for his own residence. The invitations of a master
are scarcely to be distinguished from commands; and the liberality of
the emperor obtained a ready and cheerful obedience. He bestowed on his
favorites the palaces which he had built in the several quarters of the
city, assigned them lands and pensions for the support of their dignity,
and alienated the demesnes of Pontus and Asia to grant hereditary
estates by the easy tenure of maintaining a house in the capital.  But
these encouragements and obligations soon became superfluous, and were
gradually abolished. Wherever the seat of government is fixed, a
considerable part of the public revenue will be expended by the prince
himself, by his ministers, by the officers of justice, and by the
domestics of the palace. The most wealthy of the provincials will be
attracted by the powerful motives of interest and duty, of amusement and
curiosity. A third and more numerous class of inhabitants will
insensibly be formed, of servants, of artificers, and of merchants, who
derive their subsistence from their own labor, and from the wants or
luxury of the superior ranks. In less than a century, Constantinople
disputed with Rome itself the preeminence of riches and numbers. New
piles of buildings, crowded together with too little regard to health or
convenience, scarcely allowed the intervals of narrow streets for the
perpetual throng of men, of horses, and of carriages. The allotted space
of ground was insufficient to contain the increasing people; and the
additional foundations, which, on either side, were advanced into the
sea, might alone have composed a very considerable city.

The frequent and regular distributions of wine and oil, of corn or
bread, of money or provisions, had almost exempted the poorest citizens
of Rome from the necessity of labor. The magnificence of the first
Cæsars was in some measure imitated by the founder of Constantinople:
but his liberality, however it might excite the applause of the people,
has in curred the censure of posterity. A nation of legislators and
conquerors might assert their claim to the harvests of Africa, which had
been purchased with their blood; and it was artfully contrived by
Augustus, that, in the enjoyment of plenty, the Romans should lose the
memory of freedom. But the prodigality of Constantine could not be
excused by any consideration either of public or private interest; and
the annual tribute of corn imposed upon Egypt for the benefit of his new
capital, was applied to feed a lazy and insolent populace, at the
expense of the husbandmen of an industrious province.  * Some other
regulations of this emperor are less liable to blame, but they are less
deserving of notice. He divided Constantinople into fourteen regions or
quarters,  dignified the public council with the appellation of senate,
communicated to the citizens the privileges of Italy,  and bestowed on
the rising city the title of Colony, the first and most favored daughter
of ancient Rome. The venerable parent still maintained the legal and
acknowledged supremacy, which was due to her age, her dignity, and to
the remembrance of her former greatness.

As Constantine urged the progress of the work with the impatience of a
lover, the walls, the porticos, and the principal edifices were
completed in a few years, or, according to another account, in a few
months;  but this extraordinary diligence should excite the less
admiration, since many of the buildings were finished in so hasty and
imperfect a manner, that under the succeeding reign, they were preserved
with difficulty from impending ruin.  But while they displayed the vigor
and freshness of youth, the founder prepared to celebrate the dedication
of his city.  The games and largesses which crowned the pomp of this
memorable festival may easily be supposed; but there is one circumstance
of a more singular and permanent nature, which ought not entirely to be
overlooked. As often as the birthday of the city returned, the statute
of Constantine, framed by his order, of gilt wood, and bearing in his
right hand a small image of the genius of the place, was erected on a
triumphal car. The guards, carrying white tapers, and clothed in their
richest apparel, accompanied the solemn procession as it moved through
the Hippodrome. When it was opposite to the throne of the reigning
emperor, he rose from his seat, and with grateful reverence adored the
memory of his predecessor.  At the festival of the dedication, an edict,
engraved on a column of marble, bestowed the title of Second or New Rome
on the city of Constantine.  But the name of Constantinople  has
prevailed over that honorable epithet; and after the revolution of
fourteen centuries, still perpetuates the fame of its author.

The foundation of a new capital is naturally connected with the
establishment of a new form of civil and military administration. The
distinct view of the complicated system of policy, introduced by
Diocletian, improved by Constantine, and completed by his immediate
successors, may not only amuse the fancy by the singular picture of a
great empire, but will tend to illustrate the secret and internal causes
of its rapid decay. In the pursuit of any remarkable institution, we may
be frequently led into the more early or the more recent times of the
Roman history; but the proper limits of this inquiry will be included
within a period of about one hundred and thirty years, from the
accession of Constantine to the publication of the Theodosian code;
from which, as well as from the Notitia* of the East and West,  we
derive the most copious and authentic information of the state of the
empire. This variety of objects will suspend, for some time, the course
of the narrative; but the interruption will be censured only by those
readers who are insensible to the importance of laws and manners, while
they peruse, with eager curiosity, the transient intrigues of a court,
or the accidental event of a battle.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Part III.

The manly pride of the Romans, content with substantial power, had left
to the vanity of the East the forms and ceremonies of ostentatious
greatness.  But when they lost even the semblance of those virtues which
were derived from their ancient freedom, the simplicity of Roman manners
was insensibly corrupted by the stately affectation of the courts of
Asia. The distinctions of personal merit and influence, so conspicuous
in a republic, so feeble and obscure under a monarchy, were abolished by
the despotism of the emperors; who substituted in their room a severe
subordination of rank and office from the titled slaves who were seated
on the steps of the throne, to the meanest instruments of arbitrary
power. This multitude of abject dependants was interested in the support
of the actual government from the dread of a revolution, which might at
once confound their hopes and intercept the reward of their services. In
this divine hierarchy (for such it is frequently styled) every rank was
marked with the most scrupulous exactness, and its dignity was displayed
in a variety of trifling and solemn ceremonies, which it was a study to
learn, and a sacrilege to neglect.  The purity of the Latin language was
debased, by adopting, in the intercourse of pride and flattery, a
profusion of epithets, which Tully would scarcely have understood, and
which Augustus would have rejected with indignation. The principal
officers of the empire were saluted, even by the sovereign himself, with
the deceitful titles of your Sincerity, your Gravity, your Excellency,
your Eminence, your sublime and wonderful Magnitude, your illustrious
and magnificent Highness.  The codicils or patents of their office were
curiously emblazoned with such emblems as were best adapted to explain
its nature and high dignity; the image or portrait of the reigning
emperors; a triumphal car; the book of mandates placed on a table,
covered with a rich carpet, and illuminated by four tapers; the
allegorical figures of the provinces which they governed; or the
appellations and standards of the troops whom they commanded Some of
these official ensigns were really exhibited in their hall of audience;
others preceded their pompous march whenever they appeared in public;
and every circumstance of their demeanor, their dress, their ornaments,
and their train, was calculated to inspire a deep reverence for the
representatives of supreme majesty. By a philosophic observer, the
system of the Roman government might have been mistaken for a splendid
theatre, filled with players of every character and degree, who repeated
the language, and imitated the passions, of their original model.

All the magistrates of sufficient importance to find a place in the
general state of the empire, were accurately divided into three classes.
1. The Illustrious. 2. The Spectabiles, or Respectable. And, 3. the
Clarissimi; whom we may translate by the word Honorable. In the times of
Roman simplicity, the last-mentioned epithet was used only as a vague
expression of deference, till it became at length the peculiar and
appropriated title of all who were members of the senate,  and
consequently of all who, from that venerable body, were selected to
govern the provinces. The vanity of those who, from their rank and
office, might claim a superior distinction above the rest of the
senatorial order, was long afterwards indulged with the new appellation
of Respectable; but the title of Illustriouswas always reserved to some
eminent personages who were obeyed or reverenced by the two subordinate
classes. It was communicated only, I. To the consuls and patricians; II.
To the Prætorian præfects, with the præfects of Rome and Constantinople;
III. To the masters-general of the cavalry and the infantry; and IV. To
the seven ministers of the palace, who exercised their sacredfunctions
about the person of the emperor.  Among those illustrious magistrates
who were esteemed coordinate with each other, the seniority of
appointment gave place to the union of dignities.  By the expedient of
honorary codicils, the emperors, who were fond of multiplying their
favors, might sometimes gratify the vanity, though not the ambition, of
impatient courtiers.

I. As long as the Roman consuls were the first magistrates of a free
state, they derived their right to power from the choice of the people.
As long as the emperors condescended to disguise the servitude which
they imposed, the consuls were still elected by the real or apparent
suffrage of the senate. From the reign of Diocletian, even these
vestiges of liberty were abolished, and the successful candidates who
were invested with the annual honors of the consulship, affected to
deplore the humiliating condition of their predecessors. The Scipios and
the Catos had been reduced to solicit the votes of plebeians, to pass
through the tedious and expensive forms of a popular election, and to
expose their dignity to the shame of a public refusal; while their own
happier fate had reserved them for an age and government in which the
rewards of virtue were assigned by the unerring wisdom of a gracious
sovereign.  In the epistles which the emperor addressed to the two
consuls elect, it was declared, that they were created by his sole
authority.  Their names and portraits, engraved on gilt tables of ivory,
were dispersed over the empire as presents to the provinces, the cities,
the magistrates, the senate, and the people.  Their solemn inauguration
was performed at the place of the Imperial residence; and during a
period of one hundred and twenty years, Rome was constantly deprived of
the presence of her ancient magistrates. On the morning of the first of
January, the consuls assumed the ensigns of their dignity. Their dress
was a robe of purple, embroidered in silk and gold, and sometimes
ornamented with costly gems.  On this solemn occasion they were attended
by the most eminent officers of the state and army, in the habit of
senators; and the useless fasces, armed with the once formidable axes,
were borne before them by the lictors.  The procession moved from the
palace  to the Forum or principal square of the city; where the consuls
ascended their tribunal, and seated themselves in the curule chairs,
which were framed after the fashion of ancient times. They immediately
exercised an act of jurisdiction, by the manumission of a slave, who was
brought before them for that purpose; and the ceremony was intended to
represent the celebrated action of the elder Brutus, the author of
liberty and of the consulship, when he admitted among his
fellow-citizens the faithful Vindex, who had revealed the conspiracy of
the Tarquins.  The public festival was continued during several days in
all the principal cities in Rome, from custom; in Constantinople, from
imitation in Carthage, Antioch, and Alexandria, from the love of
pleasure, and the superfluity of wealth.  In the two capitals of the
empire the annual games of the theatre, the circus, and the
amphitheatre,  cost four thousand pounds of gold, (about) one hundred
and sixty thousand pounds sterling: and if so heavy an expense surpassed
the faculties or the inclinations of the magistrates themselves, the sum
was supplied from the Imperial treasury.  As soon as the consuls had
discharged these customary duties, they were at liberty to retire into
the shade of private life, and to enjoy, during the remainder of the
year, the undisturbed contemplation of their own greatness. They no
longer presided in the national councils; they no longer executed the
resolutions of peace or war. Their abilities (unless they were employed
in more effective offices) were of little moment; and their names served
only as the legal date of the year in which they had filled the chair of
Marius and of Cicero. Yet it was still felt and acknowledged, in the
last period of Roman servitude, that this empty name might be compared,
and even preferred, to the possession of substantial power. The title of
consul was still the most splendid object of ambition, the noblest
reward of virtue and loyalty. The emperors themselves, who disdained the
faint shadow of the republic, were conscious that they acquired an
additional splendor and majesty as often as they assumed the annual
honors of the consular dignity.

The proudest and most perfect separation which can be found in any age
or country, between the nobles and the people, is perhaps that of the
Patricians and the Plebeians, as it was established in the first age of
the Roman republic. Wealth and honors, the offices of the state, and the
ceremonies of religion, were almost exclusively possessed by the former
who, preserving the purity of their blood with the most insulting
jealousy,  held their clients in a condition of specious vassalage. But
these distinctions, so incompatible with the spirit of a free people,
were removed, after a long struggle, by the persevering efforts of the
Tribunes. The most active and successful of the Plebeians accumulated
wealth, aspired to honors, deserved triumphs, contracted alliances, and,
after some generations, assumed the pride of ancient nobility.  The
Patrician families, on the other hand, whose original number was never
recruited till the end of the commonwealth, either failed in the
ordinary course of nature, or were extinguished in so many foreign and
domestic wars, or, through a want of merit or fortune, insensibly
mingled with the mass of the people.  Very few remained who could derive
their pure and genuine origin from the infancy of the city, or even from
that of the republic, when Cæsar and Augustus, Claudius and Vespasian,
created from the body of the senate a competent number of new Patrician
families, in the hope of perpetuating an order, which was still
considered as honorable and sacred.  But these artificial supplies (in
which the reigning house was always included) were rapidly swept away by
the rage of tyrants, by frequent revolutions, by the change of manners,
and by the intermixture of nations.  Little more was left when
Constantine ascended the throne, than a vague and imperfect tradition,
that the Patricians had once been the first of the Romans. To form a
body of nobles, whose influence may restrain, while it secures the
authority of the monarch, would have been very inconsistent with the
character and policy of Constantine; but had he seriously entertained
such a design, it might have exceeded the measure of his power to
ratify, by an arbitrary edict, an institution which must expect the
sanction of time and of opinion. He revived, indeed, the title of
Patricians, but he revived it as a personal, not as an hereditary
distinction. They yielded only to the transient superiority of the
annual consuls; but they enjoyed the pre-eminence over all the great
officers of state, with the most familiar access to the person of the
prince. This honorable rank was bestowed on them for life; and as they
were usually favorites, and ministers who had grown old in the Imperial
court, the true etymology of the word was perverted by ignorance and
flattery; and the Patricians of Constantine were reverenced as the
adopted Fathersof the emperor and the republic.

II. The fortunes of the Prætorian præfects were essentially different
from those of the consuls and Patricians. The latter saw their ancient
greatness evaporate in a vain title. The former, rising by degrees from
the most humble condition, were invested with the civil and military
administration of the Roman world. From the reign of Severus to that of
Diocletian, the guards and the palace, the laws and the finances, the
armies and the provinces, were intrusted to their superintending care;
and, like the Viziers of the East, they held with one hand the seal, and
with the other the standard, of the empire. The ambition of the
præfects, always formidable, and sometimes fatal to the masters whom
they served, was supported by the strength of the Prætorian bands; but
after those haughty troops had been weakened by Diocletian, and finally
suppressed by Constantine, the præfects, who survived their fall, were
reduced without difficulty to the station of useful and obedient
ministers. When they were no longer responsible for the safety of the
emperor's person, they resigned the jurisdiction which they had hitherto
claimed and exercised over all the departments of the palace. They were
deprived by Constantine of all military command, as soon as they had
ceased to lead into the field, under their immediate orders, the flower
of the Roman troops; and at length, by a singular revolution, the
captains of the guards were transformed into the civil magistrates of
the provinces. According to the plan of government instituted by
Diocletian, the four princes had each their Prætorian præfect; and after
the monarchy was once more united in the person of Constantine, he still
continued to create the same number of Four Præfects, and intrusted to
their care the same provinces which they already administered. 1. The
præfect of the East stretched his ample jurisdiction into the three
parts of the globe which were subject to the Romans, from the cataracts
of the Nile to the banks of the Phasis, and from the mountains of Thrace
to the frontiers of Persia. 2. The important provinces of Pannonia,
Dacia, Macedonia, and Greece, once acknowledged the authority of the
præfect of Illyricum. 3. The power of the præfect of Italy was not
confined to the country from whence he derived his title; it extended
over the additional territory of Rhætia as far as the banks of the
Danube, over the dependent islands of the Mediterranean, and over that
part of the continent of Africa which lies between the confines of
Cyrene and those of Tingitania. 4. The præfect of the Gauls comprehended
under that plural denomination the kindred provinces of Britain and
Spain, and his authority was obeyed from the wall of Antoninus to the
foot of Mount Atlas.

After the Prætorian præfects had been dismissed from all military
command, the civil functions which they were ordained to exercise over
so many subject nations, were adequate to the ambition and abilities of
the most consummate ministers. To their wisdom was committed the supreme
administration of justice and of the finances, the two objects which, in
a state of peace, comprehend almost all the respective duties of the
sovereign and of the people; of the former, to protect the citizens who
are obedient to the laws; of the latter, to contribute the share of
their property which is required for the expenses of the state. The
coin, the highways, the posts, the granaries, the manufactures, whatever
could interest the public prosperity, was moderated by the authority of
the Prætorian præfects. As the immediate representatives of the Imperial
majesty, they were empowered to explain, to enforce, and on some
occasions to modify, the general edicts by their discretionary
proclamations. They watched over the conduct of the provincial
governors, removed the negligent, and inflicted punishments on the
guilty. From all the inferior jurisdictions, an appeal in every matter
of importance, either civil or criminal, might be brought before the
tribunal of the præfect; but hissentence was final and absolute; and the
emperors themselves refused to admit any complaints against the judgment
or the integrity of a magistrate whom they honored with such unbounded
confidence.  His appointments were suitable to his dignity;  and if
avarice was his ruling passion, he enjoyed frequent opportunities of
collecting a rich harvest of fees, of presents, and of perquisites.
Though the emperors no longer dreaded the ambition of their præfects,
they were attentive to counterbalance the power of this great office by
the uncertainty and shortness of its duration.

From their superior importance and dignity, Rome and Constantinople were
alone excepted from the jurisdiction of the Prætorian præfects. The
immense size of the city, and the experience of the tardy, ineffectual
operation of the laws, had furnished the policy of Augustus with a
specious pretence for introducing a new magistrate, who alone could
restrain a servile and turbulent populace by the strong arm of arbitrary
power.  Valerius Messalla was appointed the first præfect of Rome, that
his reputation might countenance so invidious a measure; but, at the end
of a few days, that accomplished citizen  resigned his office,
declaring, with a spirit worthy of the friend of Brutus, that he found
himself incapable of exercising a power incompatible with public
freedom.  As the sense of liberty became less exquisite, the advantages
of order were more clearly understood; and the præfect, who seemed to
have been designed as a terror only to slaves and vagrants, was
permitted to extend his civil and criminal jurisdiction over the
equestrian and noble families of Rome. The prætors, annually created as
the judges of law and equity, could not long dispute the possession of
the Forum with a vigorous and permanent magistrate, who was usually
admitted into the confidence of the prince. Their courts were deserted,
their number, which had once fluctuated between twelve and eighteen,
was gradually reduced to two or three, and their important functions
were confined to the expensive obligation  of exhibiting games for the
amusement of the people. After the office of the Roman consuls had been
changed into a vain pageant, which was rarely displayed in the capital,
the præfects assumed their vacant place in the senate, and were soon
acknowledged as the ordinary presidents of that venerable assembly. They
received appeals from the distance of one hundred miles; and it was
allowed as a principle of jurisprudence, that all municipal authority
was derived from them alone.  In the discharge of his laborious
employment, the governor of Rome was assisted by fifteen officers, some
of whom had been originally his equals, or even his superiors. The
principal departments were relative to the command of a numerous watch,
established as a safeguard against fires, robberies, and nocturnal
disorders; the custody and distribution of the public allowance of corn
and provisions; the care of the port, of the aqueducts, of the common
sewers, and of the navigation and bed of the Tyber; the inspection of
the markets, the theatres, and of the private as well as the public
works. Their vigilance insured the three principal objects of a regular
police, safety, plenty, and cleanliness; and as a proof of the attention
of government to preserve the splendor and ornaments of the capital, a
particular inspector was appointed for the statues; the guardian, as it
were, of that inanimate people, which, according to the extravagant
computation of an old writer, was scarcely inferior in number to the
living inhabitants of Rome. About thirty years after the foundation of
Constantinople, a similar magistrate was created in that rising
metropolis, for the same uses and with the same powers. A perfect
equality was established between the dignity of the two municipal, and
that of the fourPrætorian præfects.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Part IV.

Those who, in the imperial hierarchy, were distinguished by the title of
Respectable, formed an intermediate class between the
illustriouspræfects, and the honorablemagistrates of the provinces. In
this class the proconsuls of Asia, Achaia, and Africa, claimed a
preëminence, which was yielded to the remembrance of their ancient
dignity; and the appeal from their tribunal to that of the præfects was
almost the only mark of their dependence.  But the civil government of
the empire was distributed into thirteen great Dioceses, each of which
equalled the just measure of a powerful kingdom. The first of these
dioceses was subject to the jurisdiction of the countof the east; and we
may convey some idea of the importance and variety of his functions, by
observing, that six hundred apparitors, who would be styled at present
either secretaries, or clerks, or ushers, or messengers, were employed
in his immediate office.  The place of Augustal prfectof Egypt was no
longer filled by a Roman knight; but the name was retained; and the
extraordinary powers which the situation of the country, and the temper
of the inhabitants, had once made indispensable, were still continued to
the governor. The eleven remaining dioceses, of Asiana, Pontica, and
Thrace; of Macedonia, Dacia, and Pannonia, or Western Illyricum; of
Italy and Africa; of Gaul, Spain, and Britain; were governed by twelve
vicarsor vice-prfects,  whose name sufficiently explains the nature and
dependence of their office. It may be added, that the
lieutenant-generals of the Roman armies, the military counts and dukes,
who will be hereafter mentioned, were allowed the rank and title of
Respectable.

As the spirit of jealousy and ostentation prevailed in the councils of
the emperors, they proceeded with anxious diligence to divide the
substance and to multiply the titles of power. The vast countries which
the Roman conquerors had united under the same simple form of
administration, were imperceptibly crumbled into minute fragments; till
at length the whole empire was distributed into one hundred and sixteen
provinces, each of which supported an expensive and splendid
establishment. Of these, three were governed by proconsuls, thirty-seven
by consulars, five by correctors, and seventy-one by presidents. The
appellations of these magistrates were different; they ranked in
successive order, the ensigns of and their situation, from accidental
circumstances, might be more or less agreeable or advantageous. But they
were all (excepting only the pro-consuls) alike included in the class of
honorablepersons; and they were alike intrusted, during the pleasure of
the prince, and under the authority of the præfects or their deputies,
with the administration of justice and the finances in their respective
districts. The ponderous volumes of the Codes and Pandects  would
furnish ample materials for a minute inquiry into the system of
provincial government, as in the space of six centuries it was approved
by the wisdom of the Roman statesmen and lawyers. It may be sufficient
for the historian to select two singular and salutary provisions,
intended to restrain the abuse of authority. 1. For the preservation of
peace and order, the governors of the provinces were armed with the
sword of justice. They inflicted corporal punishments, and they
exercised, in capital offences, the power of life and death. But they
were not authorized to indulge the condemned criminal with the choice of
his own execution, or to pronounce a sentence of the mildest and most
honorable kind of exile. These prerogatives were reserved to the
præfects, who alone could impose the heavy fine of fifty pounds of gold:
their vicegerents were confined to the trifling weight of a few ounces.
This distinction, which seems to grant the larger, while it denies the
smaller degree of authority, was founded on a very rational motive. The
smaller degree was infinitely more liable to abuse. The passions of a
provincial magistrate might frequently provoke him into acts of
oppression, which affected only the freedom or the fortunes of the
subject; though, from a principle of prudence, perhaps of humanity, he
might still be terrified by the guilt of innocent blood. It may likewise
be considered, that exile, considerable fines, or the choice of an easy
death, relate more particularly to the rich and the noble; and the
persons the most exposed to the avarice or resentment of a provincial
magistrate, were thus removed from his obscure persecution to the more
august and impartial tribunal of the Prætorian præfect. 2. As it was
reasonably apprehended that the integrity of the judge might be biased,
if his interest was concerned, or his affections were engaged, the
strictest regulations were established, to exclude any person, without
the special dispensation of the emperor, from the government of the
province where he was born;  and to prohibit the governor or his son
from contracting marriage with a native, or an inhabitant;  or from
purchasing slaves, lands, or houses, within the extent of his
jurisdiction.  Notwithstanding these rigorous precautions, the emperor
Constantine, after a reign of twenty-five years, still deplores the
venal and oppressive administration of justice, and expresses the
warmest indignation that the audience of the judge, his despatch of
business, his seasonable delays, and his final sentence, were publicly
sold, either by himself or by the officers of his court. The
continuance, and perhaps the impunity, of these crimes, is attested by
the repetition of impotent laws and ineffectual menaces.

All the civil magistrates were drawn from the profession of the law. The
celebrated Institutes of Justinian are addressed to the youth of his
dominions, who had devoted themselves to the study of Roman
jurisprudence; and the sovereign condescends to animate their diligence,
by the assurance that their skill and ability would in time be rewarded
by an adequate share in the government of the republic.  The rudiments
of this lucrative science were taught in all the considerable cities of
the east and west; but the most famous school was that of Berytus,  on
the coast of Phnicia; which flourished above three centuries from the
time of Alexander Severus, the author perhaps of an institution so
advantageous to his native country. After a regular course of education,
which lasted five years, the students dispersed themselves through the
provinces, in search of fortune and honors; nor could they want an
inexhaustible supply of business great empire, already corrupted by the
multiplicity of laws, of arts, and of vices. The court of the Prætorian
præfect of the east could alone furnish employment for one hundred and
fifty advocates, sixty-four of whom were distinguished by peculiar
privileges, and two were annually chosen, with a salary of sixty pounds
of gold, to defend the causes of the treasury. The first experiment was
made of their judicial talents, by appointing them to act occasionally
as assessors to the magistrates; from thence they were often raised to
preside in the tribunals before which they had pleaded. They obtained
the government of a province; and, by the aid of merit, of reputation,
or of favor, they ascended, by successive steps, to the
illustriousdignities of the state.  In the practice of the bar, these
men had considered reason as the instrument of dispute; they interpreted
the laws according to the dictates of private interest and the same
pernicious habits might still adhere to their characters in the public
administration of the state. The honor of a liberal profession has
indeed been vindicated by ancient and modern advocates, who have filled
the most important stations, with pure integrity and consummate wisdom:
but in the decline of Roman jurisprudence, the ordinary promotion of
lawyers was pregnant with mischief and disgrace. The noble art, which
had once been preserved as the sacred inheritance of the patricians, was
fallen into the hands of freedmen and plebeians,  who, with cunning
rather than with skill, exercised a sordid and pernicious trade. Some of
them procured admittance into families for the purpose of fomenting
differences, of encouraging suits, and of preparing a harvest of gain
for themselves or their brethren. Others, recluse in their chambers,
maintained the dignity of legal professors, by furnishing a rich client
with subtleties to confound the plainest truths, and with arguments to
color the most unjustifiable pretensions. The splendid and popular class
was composed of the advocates, who filled the Forum with the sound of
their turgid and loquacious rhetoric. Careless of fame and of justice,
they are described, for the most part, as ignorant and rapacious guides,
who conducted their clients through a maze of expense, of delay, and of
disappointment; from whence, after a tedious series of years, they were
at length dismissed, when their patience and fortune were almost
exhausted.

III. In the system of policy introduced by Augustus, the governors,
those at least of the Imperial provinces, were invested with the full
powers of the sovereign himself. Ministers of peace and war, the
distribution of rewards and punishments depended on them alone, and they
successively appeared on their tribunal in the robes of civil
magistracy, and in complete armor at the head of the Roman legions.  The
influence of the revenue, the authority of law, and the command of a
military force, concurred to render their power supreme and absolute;
and whenever they were tempted to violate their allegiance, the loyal
province which they involved in their rebellion was scarcely sensible of
any change in its political state. From the time of Commodus to the
reign of Constantine, near one hundred governors might be enumerated,
who, with various success, erected the standard of revolt; and though
the innocent were too often sacrificed, the guilty might be sometimes
prevented, by the suspicious cruelty of their master.  To secure his
throne and the public tranquillity from these formidable servants,
Constantine resolved to divide the military from the civil
administration, and to establish, as a permanent and professional
distinction, a practice which had been adopted only as an occasional
expedient. The supreme jurisdiction exercised by the Prætorian præfects
over the armies of the empire, was transferred to the two
masters-generalwhom he instituted, the one for the cavalry, the other
for the infantry; and though each of these illustriousofficers was more
peculiarly responsible for the discipline of those troops which were
under his immediate inspection, they both indifferently commanded in the
field the several bodies, whether of horse or foot, which were united in
the same army.  Their number was soon doubled by the division of the
east and west; and as separate generals of the same rank and title were
appointed on the four important frontiers of the Rhine, of the Upper and
the Lower Danube, and of the Euphrates, the defence of the Roman empire
was at length committed to eight masters-general of the cavalry and
infantry. Under their orders, thirty-five military commanders were
stationed in the provinces: three in Britain, six in Gaul, one in Spain,
one in Italy, five on the Upper, and four on the Lower Danube; in Asia,
eight, three in Egypt, and four in Africa. The titles of counts, and
dukes,  by which they were properly distinguished, have obtained in
modern languages so very different a sense, that the use of them may
occasion some surprise. But it should be recollected, that the second of
those appellations is only a corruption of the Latin word, which was
indiscriminately applied to any military chief. All these provincial
generals were therefore dukes; but no more than ten among them were
dignified with the rank of countsor companions, a title of honor, or
rather of favor, which had been recently invented in the court of
Constantine. A gold belt was the ensign which distinguished the office
of the counts and dukes; and besides their pay, they received a liberal
allowance sufficient to maintain one hundred and ninety servants, and
one hundred and fifty-eight horses. They were strictly prohibited from
interfering in any matter which related to the administration of justice
or the revenue; but the command which they exercised over the troops of
their department, was independent of the authority of the magistrates.
About the same time that Constantine gave a legal sanction to the
ecclesiastical order, he instituted in the Roman empire the nice balance
of the civil and the military powers. The emulation, and sometimes the
discord, which reigned between two professions of opposite interests and
incompatible manners, was productive of beneficial and of pernicious
consequences. It was seldom to be expected that the general and the
civil governor of a province should either conspire for the disturbance,
or should unite for the service, of their country. While the one delayed
to offer the assistance which the other disdained to solicit, the troops
very frequently remained without orders or without supplies; the public
safety was betrayed, and the defenceless subjects were left exposed to
the fury of the Barbarians. The divided administration which had been
formed by Constantine, relaxed the vigor of the state, while it secured
the tranquillity of the monarch.

The memory of Constantine has been deservedly censured for another
innovation, which corrupted military discipline and prepared the ruin of
the empire. The nineteen years which preceded his final victory over
Licinius, had been a period of license and intestine war. The rivals who
contended for the possession of the Roman world, had withdrawn the
greatest part of their forces from the guard of the general frontier;
and the principal cities which formed the boundary of their respective
dominions were filled with soldiers, who considered their countrymen as
their most implacable enemies. After the use of these internal garrisons
had ceased with the civil war, the conqueror wanted either wisdom or
firmness to revive the severe discipline of Diocletian, and to suppress
a fatal indulgence, which habit had endeared and almost confirmed to the
military order. From the reign of Constantine, a popular and even legal
distinction was admitted between the Palatinesand the Borderers; the
troops of the court, as they were improperly styled, and the troops of
the frontier. The former, elevated by the superiority of their pay and
privileges, were permitted, except in the extraordinary emergencies of
war, to occupy their tranquil stations in the heart of the provinces.
The most flourishing cities were oppressed by the intolerable weight of
quarters. The soldiers insensibly forgot the virtues of their
profession, and contracted only the vices of civil life. They were
either degraded by the industry of mechanic trades, or enervated by the
luxury of baths and theatres. They soon became careless of their martial
exercises, curious in their diet and apparel; and while they inspired
terror to the subjects of the empire, they trembled at the hostile
approach of the Barbarians.  The chain of fortifications which
Diocletian and his colleagues had extended along the banks of the great
rivers, was no longer maintained with the same care, or defended with
the same vigilance. The numbers which still remained under the name of
the troops of the frontier, might be sufficient for the ordinary
defence; but their spirit was degraded by the humiliating reflection,
that theywho were exposed to the hardships and dangers of a perpetual
warfare, were rewarded only with about two thirds of the pay and
emoluments which were lavished on the troops of the court. Even the
bands or legions that were raised the nearest to the level of those
unworthy favorites, were in some measure disgraced by the title of honor
which they were allowed to assume. It was in vain that Constantine
repeated the most dreadful menaces of fire and sword against the
Borderers who should dare desert their colors, to connive at the inroads
of the Barbarians, or to participate in the spoil.  The mischiefs which
flow from injudicious counsels are seldom removed by the application of
partial severities; and though succeeding princes labored to restore the
strength and numbers of the frontier garrisons, the empire, till the
last moment of its dissolution, continued to languish under the mortal
wound which had been so rashly or so weakly inflicted by the hand of
Constantine.

The same timid policy, of dividing whatever is united, of reducing
whatever is eminent, of dreading every active power, and of expecting
that the most feeble will prove the most obedient, seems to pervade the
institutions of several princes, and particularly those of Constantine.
The martial pride of the legions, whose victorious camps had so often
been the scene of rebellion, was nourished by the memory of their past
exploits, and the consciousness of their actual strength. As long as
they maintained their ancient establishment of six thousand men, they
subsisted, under the reign of Diocletian, each of them singly, a visible
and important object in the military history of the Roman empire. A few
years afterwards, these gigantic bodies were shrunk to a very diminutive
size; and when seven legions, with some auxiliaries, defended the city
of Amida against the Persians, the total garrison, with the inhabitants
of both sexes, and the peasants of the deserted country, did not exceed
the number of twenty thousand persons.  From this fact, and from similar
examples, there is reason to believe, that the constitution of the
legionary troops, to which they partly owed their valor and discipline,
was dissolved by Constantine; and that the bands of Roman infantry,
which still assumed the same names and the same honors, consisted only
of one thousand or fifteen hundred men.  The conspiracy of so many
separate detachments, each of which was awed by the sense of its own
weakness, could easily be checked; and the successors of Constantine
might indulge their love of ostentation, by issuing their orders to one
hundred and thirty-two legions, inscribed on the muster-roll of their
numerous armies. The remainder of their troops was distributed into
several hundred cohorts of infantry, and squadrons of cavalry. Their
arms, and titles, and ensigns, were calculated to inspire terror, and to
display the variety of nations who marched under the Imperial standard.
And not a vestige was left of that severe simplicity, which, in the ages
of freedom and victory, had distinguished the line of battle of a Roman
army from the confused host of an Asiatic monarch.  A more particular
enumeration, drawn from the Notitia, might exercise the diligence of an
antiquary; but the historian will content himself with observing, that
the number of permanent stations or garrisons established on the
frontiers of the empire, amounted to five hundred and eighty-three; and
that, under the successors of Constantine, the complete force of the
military establishment was computed at six hundred and forty-five
thousand soldiers.  An effort so prodigious surpassed the wants of a
more ancient, and the faculties of a later, period.

In the various states of society, armies are recruited from very
different motives. Barbarians are urged by the love of war; the citizens
of a free republic may be prompted by a principle of duty; the subjects,
or at least the nobles, of a monarchy, are animated by a sentiment of
honor; but the timid and luxurious inhabitants of a declining empire
must be allured into the service by the hopes of profit, or compelled by
the dread of punishment. The resources of the Roman treasury were
exhausted by the increase of pay, by the repetition of donatives, and by
the invention of new emolument and indulgences, which, in the opinion of
the provincial youth might compensate the hardships and dangers of a
military life. Yet, although the stature was lowered,  although slaves,
least by a tacit connivance, were indiscriminately received into the
ranks, the insurmountable difficulty of procuring a regular and adequate
supply of volunteers, obliged the emperors to adopt more effectual and
coercive methods. The lands bestowed on the veterans, as the free reward
of their valor were henceforward granted under a condition which contain
the first rudiments of the feudal tenures; that their sons, who
succeeded to the inheritance, should devote themselves to the profession
of arms, as soon as they attained the age of manhood; and their cowardly
refusal was punished by the lose of honor, of fortune, or even of life.
But as the annual growth of the sons of the veterans bore a very small
proportion to the demands of the service, levies of men were frequently
required from the provinces, and every proprietor was obliged either to
take up arms, or to procure a substitute, or to purchase his exemption
by the payment of a heavy fine. The sum of forty-two pieces of gold, to
which it was reduced, ascertains the exorbitant price of volunteers, and
the reluctance with which the government admitted of this alterative.
Such was the horror for the profession of a soldier, which had affected
the minds of the degenerate Romans, that many of the youth of Italy and
the provinces chose to cut off the fingers of their right hand, to
escape from being pressed into the service; and this strange expedient
was so commonly practised, as to deserve the severe animadversion of the
laws,  and a peculiar name in the Latin language.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Part V.

The introduction of Barbarians into the Roman armies became every day
more universal, more necessary, and more fatal. The most daring of the
Scythians, of the Goths, and of the Germans, who delighted in war, and
who found it more profitable to defend than to ravage the provinces,
were enrolled, not only in the auxiliaries of their respective nations,
but in the legions themselves, and among the most distinguished of the
Palatine troops. As they freely mingled with the subjects of the empire,
they gradually learned to despise their manners, and to imitate their
arts. They abjured the implicit reverence which the pride of Rome had
exacted from their ignorance, while they acquired the knowledge and
possession of those advantages by which alone she supported her
declining greatness. The Barbarian soldiers, who displayed any military
talents, were advanced, without exception, to the most important
commands; and the names of the tribunes, of the counts and dukes, and of
the generals themselves, betray a foreign origin, which they no longer
condescended to disguise. They were often intrusted with the conduct of
a war against their countrymen; and though most of them preferred the
ties of allegiance to those of blood, they did not always avoid the
guilt, or at least the suspicion, of holding a treasonable
correspondence with the enemy, of inviting his invasion, or of sparing
his retreat. The camps and the palace of the son of Constantine were
governed by the powerful faction of the Franks, who preserved the
strictest connection with each other, and with their country, and who
resented every personal affront as a national indignity.  When the
tyrant Caligula was suspected of an intention to invest a very
extraordinary candidate with the consular robes, the sacrilegious
profanation would have scarcely excited less astonishment, if, instead
of a horse, the noblest chieftain of Germany or Britain had been the
object of his choice. The revolution of three centuries had produced so
remarkable a change in the prejudices of the people, that, with the
public approbation, Constantine showed his successors the example of
bestowing the honors of the consulship on the Barbarians, who, by their
merit and services, had deserved to be ranked among the first of the
Romans.  But as these hardy veterans, who had been educated in the
ignorance or contempt of the laws, were incapable of exercising any
civil offices, the powers of the human mind were contracted by the
irreconcilable separation of talents as well as of professions. The
accomplished citizens of the Greek and Roman republics, whose characters
could adapt themselves to the bar, the senate, the camp, or the schools,
had learned to write, to speak, and to act with the same spirit, and
with equal abilities.

IV. Besides the magistrates and generals, who at a distance from the
court diffused their delegated authority over the provinces and armies,
the emperor conferred the rank of Illustriouson seven of his more
immediate servants, to whose fidelity he intrusted his safety, or his
counsels, or his treasures. 1. The private apartments of the palace were
governed by a favorite eunuch, who, in the language of that age, was
styled the prpositus, or præfect of the sacred bed-chamber. His duty was
to attend the emperor in his hours of state, or in those of amusement,
and to perform about his person all those menial services, which can
only derive their splendor from the influence of royalty. Under a prince
who deserved to reign, the great chamberlain (for such we may call him)
was a useful and humble domestic; but an artful domestic, who improves
every occasion of unguarded confidence, will insensibly acquire over a
feeble mind that ascendant which harsh wisdom and uncomplying virtue can
seldom obtain. The degenerate grandsons of Theodosius, who were
invisible to their subjects, and contemptible to their enemies, exalted
the præfects of their bed-chamber above the heads of all the ministers
of the palace;  and even his deputy, the first of the splendid train of
slaves who waited in the presence, was thought worthy to rank before the
respectableproconsuls of Greece or Asia. The jurisdiction of the
chamberlain was acknowledged by the counts, or superintendents, who
regulated the two important provinces of the magnificence of the
wardrobe, and of the luxury of the Imperial table.  2. The principal
administration of public affairs was committed to the diligence and
abilities of the master of the offices.  He was the supreme magistrate
of the palace, inspected the discipline of the civil and military
schools, and received appeals from all parts of the empire, in the
causes which related to that numerous army of privileged persons, who,
as the servants of the court, had obtained for themselves and families a
right to decline the authority of the ordinary judges. The
correspondence between the prince and his subjects was managed by the
four scrinia, or offices of this minister of state. The first was
appropriated to memorials, the second to epistles, the third to
petitions, and the fourth to papers and orders of a miscellaneous kind.
Each of these was directed by an inferior master of respectabledignity,
and the whole business was despatched by a hundred and forty-eight
secretaries, chosen for the most part from the profession of the law, on
account of the variety of abstracts of reports and references which
frequently occurred in the exercise of their several functions. From a
condescension, which in former ages would have been esteemed unworthy
the Roman majesty, a particular secretary was allowed for the Greek
language; and interpreters were appointed to receive the ambassadors of
the Barbarians; but the department of foreign affairs, which constitutes
so essential a part of modern policy, seldom diverted the attention of
the master of the offices. His mind was more seriously engaged by the
general direction of the posts and arsenals of the empire. There were
thirty-four cities, fifteen in the East, and nineteen in the West, in
which regular companies of workmen were perpetually employed in
fabricating defensive armor, offensive weapons of all sorts, and
military engines, which were deposited in the arsenals, and occasionally
delivered for the service of the troops. 3. In the course of nine
centuries, the office of quæstorhad experienced a very singular
revolution. In the infancy of Rome, two inferior magistrates were
annually elected by the people, to relieve the consuls from the
invidious management of the public treasure;  a similar assistant was
granted to every proconsul, and to every prætor, who exercised a
military or provincial command; with the extent of conquest, the two
quæstors were gradually multiplied to the number of four, of eight, of
twenty, and, for a short time, perhaps, of forty;  and the noblest
citizens ambitiously solicited an office which gave them a seat in the
senate, and a just hope of obtaining the honors of the republic. Whilst
Augustus affected to maintain the freedom of election, he consented to
accept the annual privilege of recommending, or rather indeed of
nominating, a certain proportion of candidates; and it was his custom to
select one of these distinguished youths, to read his orations or
epistles in the assemblies of the senate.  The practice of Augustus was
imitated by succeeding princes; the occasional commission was
established as a permanent office; and the favored quæstor, assuming a
new and more illustrious character, alone survived the suppression of
his ancient and useless colleagues.  As the orations which he composed
in the name of the emperor,  acquired the force, and, at length, the
form, of absolute edicts, he was considered as the representative of the
legislative power, the oracle of the council, and the original source of
the civil jurisprudence. He was sometimes invited to take his seat in
the supreme judicature of the Imperial consistory, with the Prætorian
præfects, and the master of the offices; and he was frequently requested
to resolve the doubts of inferior judges: but as he was not oppressed
with a variety of subordinate business, his leisure and talents were
employed to cultivate that dignified style of eloquence, which, in the
corruption of taste and language, still preserves the majesty of the
Roman laws.  In some respects, the office of the Imperial quæstor may be
compared with that of a modern chancellor; but the use of a great seal,
which seems to have been adopted by the illiterate barbarians, was never
introduced to attest the public acts of the emperors. 4. The
extraordinary title of count of the sacred largesseswas bestowed on the
treasurer-general of the revenue, with the intention perhaps of
inculcating, that every payment flowed from the voluntary bounty of the
monarch. To conceive the almost infinite detail of the annual and daily
expense of the civil and military administration in every part of a
great empire, would exceed the powers of the most vigorous imagination.
The actual account employed several hundred persons, distributed into
eleven different offices, which were artfully contrived to examine and
control their respective operations. The multitude of these agents had a
natural tendency to increase; and it was more than once thought
expedient to dismiss to their native homes the useless supernumeraries,
who, deserting their honest labors, had pressed with too much eagerness
into the lucrative profession of the finances.  Twenty-nine provincial
receivers, of whom eighteen were honored with the title of count,
corresponded with the treasurer; and he extended his jurisdiction over
the mines from whence the precious metals were extracted, over the
mints, in which they were converted into the current coin, and over the
public treasuries of the most important cities, where they were
deposited for the service of the state. The foreign trade of the empire
was regulated by this minister, who directed likewise all the linen and
woollen manufactures, in which the successive operations of spinning,
weaving, and dyeing were executed, chiefly by women of a servile
condition, for the use of the palace and army. Twenty-six of these
institutions are enumerated in the West, where the arts had been more
recently introduced, and a still larger proportion may be allowed for
the industrious provinces of the East.  5. Besides the public revenue,
which an absolute monarch might levy and expend according to his
pleasure, the emperors, in the capacity of opulent citizens, possessed a
very extensive property, which was administered by the countor treasurer
of the private estate. Some part had perhaps been the ancient demesnes
of kings and republics; some accessions might be derived from the
families which were successively invested with the purple; but the most
considerable portion flowed from the impure source of confiscations and
forfeitures. The Imperial estates were scattered through the provinces,
from Mauritania to Britain; but the rich and fertile soil of Cappadocia
tempted the monarch to acquire in that country his fairest possessions,
and either Constantine or his successors embraced the occasion of
justifying avarice by religious zeal. They suppressed the rich temple of
Comana, where the high priest of the goddess of war supported the
dignity of a sovereign prince; and they applied to their private use the
consecrated lands, which were inhabited by six thousand subjects or
slaves of the deity and her ministers.  But these were not the valuable
inhabitants: the plains that stretch from the foot of Mount Argæus to
the banks of the Sarus, bred a generous race of horses, renowned above
all others in the ancient world for their majestic shape and
incomparable swiftness. These sacred animals, destined for the service
of the palace and the Imperial games, were protected by the laws from
the profanation of a vulgar master.  The demesnes of Cappadocia were
important enough to require the inspection of a count;  officers of an
inferior rank were stationed in the other parts of the empire; and the
deputies of the private, as well as those of the public, treasurer were
maintained in the exercise of their independent functions, and
encouraged to control the authority of the provincial magistrates.  6,
7. The chosen bands of cavalry and infantry, which guarded the person of
the emperor, were under the immediate command of the two counts of the
domestics. The whole number consisted of three thousand five hundred
men, divided into seven schools, or troops, of five hundred each; and in
the East, this honorable service was almost entirely appropriated to the
Armenians. Whenever, on public ceremonies, they were drawn up in the
courts and porticos of the palace, their lofty stature, silent order,
and splendid arms of silver and gold, displayed a martial pomp not
unworthy of the Roman majesty.  From the seven schools two companies of
horse and foot were selected, of the protectors, whose advantageous
station was the hope and reward of the most deserving soldiers. They
mounted guard in the interior apartments, and were occasionally
despatched into the provinces, to execute with celerity and vigor the
orders of their master.  The counts of the domestics had succeeded to
the office of the Prætorian præfects; like the præfects, they aspired
from the service of the palace to the command of armies.

The perpetual intercourse between the court and the provinces was
facilitated by the construction of roads and the institution of posts.
But these beneficial establishments were accidentally connected with a
pernicious and intolerable abuse. Two or three hundred agents or
messengers were employed, under the jurisdiction of the master of the
offices, to announce the names of the annual consuls, and the edicts or
victories of the emperors. They insensibly assumed the license of
reporting whatever they could observe of the conduct either of
magistrates or of private citizens; and were soon considered as the eyes
of the monarch,  and the scourge of the people. Under the warm influence
of a feeble reign, they multiplied to the incredible number of ten
thousand, disdained the mild though frequent admonitions of the laws,
and exercised in the profitable management of the posts a rapacious and
insolent oppression. These official spies, who regularly corresponded
with the palace, were encouraged by favor and reward, anxiously to watch
the progress of every treasonable design, from the faint and latent
symptoms of disaffection, to the actual preparation of an open revolt.
Their careless or criminal violation of truth and justice was covered by
the consecrated mask of zeal; and they might securely aim their poisoned
arrows at the breast either of the guilty or the innocent, who had
provoked their resentment, or refused to purchase their silence. A
faithful subject, of Syria perhaps, or of Britain, was exposed to the
danger, or at least to the dread, of being dragged in chains to the
court of Milan or Constantinople, to defend his life and fortune against
the malicious charge of these privileged informers. The ordinary
administration was conducted by those methods which extreme necessity
can alone palliate; and the defects of evidence were diligently supplied
by the use of torture.

The deceitful and dangerous experiment of the criminal quæstion, as it
is emphatically styled, was admitted, rather than approved, in the
jurisprudence of the Romans. They applied this sanguinary mode of
examination only to servile bodies, whose sufferings were seldom weighed
by those haughty republicans in the scale of justice or humanity; but
they would never consent to violate the sacred person of a citizen, till
they possessed the clearest evidence of his guilt.  The annals of
tyranny, from the reign of Tiberius to that of Domitian,
circumstantially relate the executions of many innocent victims; but, as
long as the faintest remembrance was kept alive of the national freedom
and honor, the last hours of a Roman were secured from the danger of
ignominious torture.  The conduct of the provincial magistrates was not,
however, regulated by the practice of the city, or the strict maxims of
the civilians. They found the use of torture established not only among
the slaves of oriental despotism, but among the Macedonians, who obeyed
a limited monarch; among the Rhodians, who flourished by the liberty of
commerce; and even among the sage Athenians, who had asserted and
adorned the dignity of human kind.  The acquiescence of the provincials
encouraged their governors to acquire, or perhaps to usurp, a
discretionary power of employing the rack, to extort from vagrants or
plebeian criminals the confession of their guilt, till they insensibly
proceeded to confound the distinction of rank, and to disregard the
privileges of Roman citizens. The apprehensions of the subjects urged
them to solicit, and the interest of the sovereign engaged him to grant,
a variety of special exemptions, which tacitly allowed, and even
authorized, the general use of torture. They protected all persons of
illustrious or honorable rank, bishops and their presbyters, professors
of the liberal arts, soldiers and their families, municipal officers,
and their posterity to the third generation, and all children under the
age of puberty.  But a fatal maxim was introduced into the new
jurisprudence of the empire, that in the case of treason, which included
every offence that the subtlety of lawyers could derive from a hostile
intentiontowards the prince or republic,  all privileges were suspended,
and all conditions were reduced to the same ignominious level. As the
safety of the emperor was avowedly preferred to every consideration of
justice or humanity, the dignity of age and the tenderness of youth were
alike exposed to the most cruel tortures; and the terrors of a malicious
information, which might select them as the accomplices, or even as the
witnesses, perhaps, of an imaginary crime, perpetually hung over the
heads of the principal citizens of the Roman world.

These evils, however terrible they may appear, were confined to the
smaller number of Roman subjects, whose dangerous situation was in some
degree compensated by the enjoyment of those advantages, either of
nature or of fortune, which exposed them to the jealousy of the monarch.
The obscure millions of a great empire have much less to dread from the
cruelty than from the avarice of their masters, and theirhumble
happiness is principally affected by the grievance of excessive taxes,
which, gently pressing on the wealthy, descend with accelerated weight
on the meaner and more indigent classes of society. An ingenious
philosopher  has calculated the universal measure of the public
impositions by the degrees of freedom and servitude; and ventures to
assert, that, according to an invariable law of nature, it must always
increase with the former, and diminish in a just proportion to the
latter. But this reflection, which would tend to alleviate the miseries
of despotism, is contradicted at least by the history of the Roman
empire; which accuses the same princes of despoiling the senate of its
authority, and the provinces of their wealth. Without abolishing all the
various customs and duties on merchandises, which are imperceptibly
discharged by the apparent choice of the purchaser, the policy of
Constantine and his successors preferred a simple and direct mode of
taxation, more congenial to the spirit of an arbitrary government.

Chapter XVII: Foundation Of Constantinople. -- Part VI.

The name and use of the indictions,  which serve to ascertain the
chronology of the middle ages, were derived from the regular practice of
the Roman tributes.  The emperor subscribed with his own hand, and in
purple ink, the solemn edict, or indiction, which was fixed up in the
principal city of each diocese, during two months previous to the first
day of September. And by a very easy connection of ideas, the word
indictionwas transferred to the measure of tribute which it prescribed,
and to the annual term which it allowed for the payment. This general
estimate of the supplies was proportioned to the real and imaginary
wants of the state; but as often as the expense exceeded the revenue, or
the revenue fell short of the computation, an additional tax, under the
name of superindiction, was imposed on the people, and the most valuable
attribute of sovereignty was communicated to the Prætorian præfects,
who, on some occasions, were permitted to provide for the unforeseen and
extraordinary exigencies of the public service. The execution of these
laws (which it would be tedious to pursue in their minute and intricate
detail) consisted of two distinct operations: the resolving the general
imposition into its constituent parts, which were assessed on the
provinces, the cities, and the individuals of the Roman world; and the
collecting the separate contributions of the individuals, the cities,
and the provinces, till the accumulated sums were poured into the
Imperial treasuries. But as the account between the monarch and the
subject was perpetually open, and as the renewal of the demand
anticipated the perfect discharge of the preceding obligation, the
weighty machine of the finances was moved by the same hands round the
circle of its yearly revolution. Whatever was honorable or important in
the administration of the revenue, was committed to the wisdom of the
præfects, and their provincial. representatives; the lucrative functions
were claimed by a crowd of subordinate officers, some of whom depended
on the treasurer, others on the governor of the province; and who, in
the inevitable conflicts of a perplexed jurisdiction, had frequent
opportunities of disputing with each other the spoils of the people. The
laborious offices, which could be productive only of envy and reproach,
of expense and danger, were imposed on the Decurions, who formed the
corporations of the cities, and whom the severity of the Imperial laws
had condemned to sustain the burdens of civil society.  The whole landed
property of the empire (without excepting the patrimonial estates of the
monarch) was the object of ordinary taxation; and every new purchaser
contracted the obligations of the former proprietor. An accurate census,
or survey, was the only equitable mode of ascertaining the proportion
which every citizen should be obliged to contribute for the public
service; and from the well-known period of the indictions, there is
reason to believe that this difficult and expensive operation was
repeated at the regular distance of fifteen years. The lands were
measured by surveyors, who were sent into the provinces; their nature,
whether arable or pasture, or vineyards or woods, was distinctly
reported; and an estimate was made of their common value from the
average produce of five years. The numbers of slaves and of cattle
constituted an essential part of the report; an oath was administered to
the proprietors, which bound them to disclose the true state of their
affairs; and their attempts to prevaricate, or elude the intention of
the legislator, were severely watched, and punished as a capital crime,
which included the double guilt of treason and sacrilege.  A large
portion of the tribute was paid in money; and of the current coin of the
empire, gold alone could be legally accepted.  The remainder of the
taxes, according to the proportions determined by the annual indiction,
was furnished in a manner still more direct, and still more oppressive.
According to the different nature of lands, their real produce in the
various articles of wine or oil, corn or barley, wood or iron, was
transported by the labor or at the expense of the provincials * to the
Imperial magazines, from whence they were occasionally distributed for
the use of the court, of the army, and of two capitals, Rome and
Constantinople. The commissioners of the revenue were so frequently
obliged to make considerable purchases, that they were strictly
prohibited from allowing any compensation, or from receiving in money
the value of those supplies which were exacted in kind. In the primitive
simplicity of small communities, this method may be well adapted to
collect the almost voluntary offerings of the people; but it is at once
susceptible of the utmost latitude, and of the utmost strictness, which
in a corrupt and absolute monarchy must introduce a perpetual contest
between the power of oppression and the arts of fraud.  The agriculture
of the Roman provinces was insensibly ruined, and, in the progress of
despotism which tends to disappoint its own purpose, the emperors were
obliged to derive some merit from the forgiveness of debts, or the
remission of tributes, which their subjects were utterly incapable of
paying. According to the new division of Italy, the fertile and happy
province of Campania, the scene of the early victories and of the
delicious retirements of the citizens of Rome, extended between the sea
and the Apennine, from the Tiber to the Silarus. Within sixty years
after the death of Constantine, and on the evidence of an actual survey,
an exemption was granted in favor of three hundred and thirty thousand
English acres of desert and uncultivated land; which amounted to one
eighth of the whole surface of the province. As the footsteps of the
Barbarians had not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing
desolation, which is recorded in the laws, can be ascribed only to the
administration of the Roman emperors.

Either from design or from accident, the mode of assessment seemed to
unite the substance of a land tax with the forms of a capitation.  The
returns which were sent of every province or district, expressed the
number of tributary subjects, and the amount of the public impositions.
The latter of these sums was divided by the former; and the estimate,
that such a province contained so many capita, or heads of tribute; and
that each headwas rated at such a price, was universally received, not
only in the popular, but even in the legal computation. The value of a
tributary head must have varied, according to many accidental, or at
least fluctuating circumstances; but some knowledge has been preserved
of a very curious fact, the more important, since it relates to one of
the richest provinces of the Roman empire, and which now flourishes as
the most splendid of the European kingdoms. The rapacious ministers of
Constantius had exhausted the wealth of Gaul, by exacting twenty-five
pieces of gold for the annual tribute of every head. The humane policy
of his successor reduced the capitation to seven pieces.  A moderate
proportion between these opposite extremes of extraordinary oppression
and of transient indulgence, may therefore be fixed at sixteen pieces of
gold, or about nine pounds sterling, the common standard, perhaps, of
the impositions of Gaul.  But this calculation, or rather, indeed, the
facts from whence it is deduced, cannot fail of suggesting two
difficulties to a thinking mind, who will be at once surprised by the
equality, and by the enormity, of the capitation. An attempt to explain
them may perhaps reflect some light on the interesting subject of the
finances of the declining empire.

I. It is obvious, that, as long as the immutable constitution of human
nature produces and maintains so unequal a division of property, the
most numerous part of the community would be deprived of their
subsistence, by the equal assessment of a tax from which the sovereign
would derive a very trifling revenue. Such indeed might be the theory of
the Roman capitation; but in the practice, this unjust equality was no
longer felt, as the tribute was collected on the principle of a real,
not of a personalimposition. * Several indigent citizens contributed to
compose a single head, or share of taxation; while the wealthy
provincial, in proportion to his fortune, alone represented several of
those imaginary beings. In a poetical request, addressed to one of the
last and most deserving of the Roman princes who reigned in Gaul,
Sidonius Apollinaris personifies his tribute under the figure of a
triple monster, the Geryon of the Grecian fables, and entreats the new
Hercules that he would most graciously be pleased to save his life by
cutting off three of his heads.  The fortune of Sidonius far exceeded
the customary wealth of a poet; but if he had pursued the allusion, he
might have painted many of the Gallic nobles with the hundred heads of
the deadly Hydra, spreading over the face of the country, and devouring
the substance of a hundred families. II. The difficulty of allowing an
annual sum of about nine pounds sterling, even for the average of the
capitation of Gaul, may be rendered more evident by the comparison of
the present state of the same country, as it is now governed by the
absolute monarch of an industrious, wealthy, and affectionate people.
The taxes of France cannot be magnified, either by fear or by flattery,
beyond the annual amount of eighteen millions sterling, which ought
perhaps to be shared among four and twenty millions of inhabitants.
Seven millions of these, in the capacity of fathers, or brothers, or
husbands, may discharge the obligations of the remaining multitude of
women and children; yet the equal proportion of each tributary subject
will scarcely rise above fifty shillings of our money, instead of a
proportion almost four times as considerable, which was regularly
imposed on their Gallic ancestors. The reason of this difference may be
found, not so much in the relative scarcity or plenty of gold and
silver, as in the different state of society, in ancient Gaul and in
modern France. In a country where personal freedom is the privilege of
every subject, the whole mass of taxes, whether they are levied on
property or on consumption, may be fairly divided among the whole body
of the nation. But the far greater part of the lands of ancient Gaul, as
well as of the other provinces of the Roman world, were cultivated by
slaves, or by peasants, whose dependent condition was a less rigid
servitude.  In such a state the poor were maintained at the expense of
the masters who enjoyed the fruits of their labor; and as the rolls of
tribute were filled only with the names of those citizens who possessed
the means of an honorable, or at least of a decent subsistence, the
comparative smallness of their numbers explains and justifies the high
rate of their capitation. The truth of this assertion may be illustrated
by the following example: The Ædui, one of the most powerful and
civilized tribes or citiesof Gaul, occupied an extent of territory,
which now contains about five hundred thousand inhabitants, in the two
ecclesiastical dioceses of Autun and Nevers;  and with the probable
accession of those of Chalons and Macon,  the population would amount to
eight hundred thousand souls. In the time of Constantine, the territory
of the Ædui afforded no more than twenty-five thousand headsof
capitation, of whom seven thousand were discharged by that prince from
the intolerable weight of tribute.  A just analogy would seem to
countenance the opinion of an ingenious historian,  that the free and
tributary citizens did not surpass the number of half a million; and if,
in the ordinary administration of government, their annual payments may
be computed at about four millions and a half of our money, it would
appear, that although the share of each individual was four times as
considerable, a fourth part only of the modern taxes of France was
levied on the Imperial province of Gaul. The exactions of Constantius
may be calculated at seven millions sterling, which were reduced to two
millions by the humanity or the wisdom of Julian.

But this tax, or capitation, on the proprietors of land, would have
suffered a rich and numerous class of free citizens to escape. With the
view of sharing that species of wealth which is derived from art or
labor, and which exists in money or in merchandise, the emperors imposed
a distinct and personal tribute on the trading part of their subjects.
Some exemptions, very strictly confined both in time and place, were
allowed to the proprietors who disposed of the produce of their own
estates. Some indulgence was granted to the profession of the liberal
arts: but every other branch of commercial industry was affected by the
severity of the law. The honorable merchant of Alexandria, who imported
the gems and spices of India for the use of the western world; the
usurer, who derived from the interest of money a silent and ignominious
profit; the ingenious manufacturer, the diligent mechanic, and even the
most obscure retailer of a sequestered village, were obliged to admit
the officers of the revenue into the partnership of their gain; and the
sovereign of the Roman empire, who tolerated the profession, consented
to share the infamous salary, of public prostitutes.  As this general
tax upon industry was collected every fourth year, it was styled the
Lustral Contribution: and the historian Zosimus  laments that the
approach of the fatal period was announced by the tears and terrors of
the citizens, who were often compelled by the impending scourge to
embrace the most abhorred and unnatural methods of procuring the sum at
which their property had been assessed. The testimony of Zosimus cannot
indeed be justified from the charge of passion and prejudice; but, from
the nature of this tribute it seems reasonable to conclude, that it was
arbitrary in the distribution, and extremely rigorous in the mode of
collecting. The secret wealth of commerce, and the precarious profits of
art or labor, are susceptible only of a discretionary valuation, which
is seldom disadvantageous to the interest of the treasury; and as the
person of the trader supplies the want of a visible and permanent
security, the payment of the imposition, which, in the case of a land
tax, may be obtained by the seizure of property, can rarely be extorted
by any other means than those of corporal punishments. The cruel
treatment of the insolvent debtors of the state, is attested, and was
perhaps mitigated by a very humane edict of Constantine, who,
disclaiming the use of racks and of scourges, allots a spacious and airy
prison for the place of their confinement.

These general taxes were imposed and levied by the absolute authority of
the monarch; but the occasional offerings of the coronary goldstill
retained the name and semblance of popular consent. It was an ancient
custom that the allies of the republic, who ascribed their safety or
deliverance to the success of the Roman arms, and even the cities of
Italy, who admired the virtues of their victorious general, adorned the
pomp of his triumph by their voluntary gifts of crowns of gold, which
after the ceremony were consecrated in the temple of Jupiter, to remain
a lasting monument of his glory to future ages. The progress of zeal and
flattery soon multiplied the number, and increased the size, of these
popular donations; and the triumph of Cæsar was enriched with two
thousand eight hundred and twenty-two massy crowns, whose weight
amounted to twenty thousand four hundred and fourteen pounds of gold.
This treasure was immediately melted down by the prudent dictator, who
was satisfied that it would be more serviceable to his soldiers than to
the gods: his example was imitated by his successors; and the custom was
introduced of exchanging these splendid ornaments for the more
acceptable present of the current gold coin of the empire.  The
spontaneous offering was at length exacted as the debt of duty; and
instead of being confined to the occasion of a triumph, it was supposed
to be granted by the several cities and provinces of the monarchy, as
often as the emperor condescended to announce his accession, his
consulship, the birth of a son, the creation of a Cæsar, a victory over
the Barbarians, or any other real or imaginary event which graced the
annals of his reign. The peculiar free gift of the senate of Rome was
fixed by custom at sixteen hundred pounds of gold, or about sixty-four
thousand pounds sterling. The oppressed subjects celebrated their own
felicity, that their sovereign should graciously consent to accept this
feeble but voluntary testimony of their loyalty and gratitude.

A people elated by pride, or soured by discontent, are seldom qualified
to form a just estimate of their actual situation. The subjects of
Constantine were incapable of discerning the decline of genius and manly
virtue, which so far degraded them below the dignity of their ancestors;
but they could feel and lament the rage of tyranny, the relaxation of
discipline, and the increase of taxes. The impartial historian, who
acknowledges the justice of their complaints, will observe some
favorable circumstances which tended to alleviate the misery of their
condition. The threatening tempest of Barbarians, which so soon
subverted the foundations of Roman greatness, was still repelled, or
suspended, on the frontiers. The arts of luxury and literature were
cultivated, and the elegant pleasures of society were enjoyed, by the
inhabitants of a considerable portion of the globe. The forms, the pomp,
and the expense of the civil administration contributed to restrain the
irregular license of the soldiers; and although the laws were violated
by power, or perverted by subtlety, the sage principles of the Roman
jurisprudence preserved a sense of order and equity, unknown to the
despotic governments of the East. The rights of mankind might derive
some protection from religion and philosophy; and the name of freedom,
which could no longer alarm, might sometimes admonish, the successors of
Augustus, that they did not reign over a nation of Slaves or Barbarians.

Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His Sons. Part I.

Character Of Constantine. -- Gothic War. -- Death Of Constantine. --
Division Of The Empire Among His Three Sons. -- Persian War. -- Tragic
Deaths Of Constantine The Younger And Constans. -- Usurpation Of
Magnentius. -- Civil War. -- Victory Of Constantius.

The character of the prince who removed the seat of empire, and
introduced such important changes into the civil and religious
constitution of his country, has fixed the attention, and divided the
opinions, of mankind. By the grateful zeal of the Christians, the
deliverer of the church has been decorated with every attribute of a
hero, and even of a saint; while the discontent of the vanquished party
has compared Constantine to the most abhorred of those tyrants, who, by
their vice and weakness, dishonored the Imperial purple. The same
passions have in some degree been perpetuated to succeeding generations,
and the character of Constantine is considered, even in the present age,
as an object either of satire or of panegyric. By the impartial union of
those defects which are confessed by his warmest admirers, and of those
virtues which are acknowledged by his most-implacable enemies, we might
hope to delineate a just portrait of that extraordinary man, which the
truth and candor of history should adopt without a blush.  But it would
soon appear, that the vain attempt to blend such discordant colors, and
to reconcile such inconsistent qualities, must produce a figure
monstrous rather than human, unless it is viewed in its proper and
distinct lights, by a careful separation of the different periods of the
reign of Constantine.

The person, as well as the mind, of Constantine, had been enriched by
nature with her choices endowments. His stature was lofty, his
countenance majestic, his deportment graceful; his strength and activity
were displayed in every manly exercise, and from his earliest youth, to
a very advanced season of life, he preserved the vigor of his
constitution by a strict adherence to the domestic virtues of chastity
and temperance. He delighted in the social intercourse of familiar
conversation; and though he might sometimes indulge his disposition to
raillery with less reserve than was required by the severe dignity of
his station, the courtesy and liberality of his manners gained the
hearts of all who approached him. The sincerity of his friendship has
been suspected; yet he showed, on some occasions, that he was not
incapable of a warm and lasting attachment. The disadvantage of an
illiterate education had not prevented him from forming a just estimate
of the value of learning; and the arts and sciences derived some
encouragement from the munificent protection of Constantine. In the
despatch of business, his diligence was indefatigable; and the active
powers of his mind were almost continually exercised in reading,
writing, or meditating, in giving audiences to ambassadors, and in
examining the complaints of his subjects. Even those who censured the
propriety of his measures were compelled to acknowledge, that he
possessed magnanimity to conceive, and patience to execute, the most
arduous designs, without being checked either by the prejudices of
education, or by the clamors of the multitude. In the field, he infused
his own intrepid spirit into the troops, whom he conducted with the
talents of a consummate general; and to his abilities, rather than to
his fortune, we may ascribe the signal victories which he obtained over
the foreign and domestic foes of the republic. He loved glory as the
reward, perhaps as the motive, of his labors. The boundless ambition,
which, from the moment of his accepting the purple at York, appears as
the ruling passion of his soul, may be justified by the dangers of his
own situation, by the character of his rivals, by the consciousness of
superior merit, and by the prospect that his success would enable him to
restore peace and order to tot the distracted empire. In his civil wars
against Maxentius and Licinius, he had engaged on his side the
inclinations of the people, who compared the undissembled vices of those
tyrants with the spirit of wisdom and justice which seemed to direct the
general tenor of the administration of Constantine.

Had Constantine fallen on the banks of the Tyber, or even in the plains
of Hadrianople, such is the character which, with a few exceptions, he
might have transmitted to posterity. But the conclusion of his reign
(according to the moderate and indeed tender sentence of a writer of the
same age) degraded him from the rank which he had acquired among the
most deserving of the Roman princes.  In the life of Augustus, we behold
the tyrant of the republic, converted, almost by imperceptible degrees,
into the father of his country, and of human kind. In that of
Constantine, we may contemplate a hero, who had so long inspired his
subjects with love, and his enemies with terror, degenerating into a
cruel and dissolute monarch, corrupted by his fortune, or raised by
conquest above the necessity of dissimulation. The general peace which
he maintained during the last fourteen years of his reign, was a period
of apparent splendor rather than of real prosperity; and the old age of
Constantine was disgraced by the opposite yet reconcilable vices of
rapaciousness and prodigality. The accumulated treasures found in the
palaces of Maxentius and Licinius, were lavishly consumed; the various
innovations introduced by the conqueror, were attended with an
increasing expense; the cost of his buildings, his court, and his
festivals, required an immediate and plentiful supply; and the
oppression of the people was the only fund which could support the
magnificence of the sovereign.  His unworthy favorites, enriched by the
boundless liberality of their master, usurped with impunity the
privilege of rapine and corruption.  A secret but universal decay was
felt in every part of the public administration, and the emperor
himself, though he still retained the obedience, gradually lost the
esteem, of his subjects. The dress and manners, which, towards the
decline of life, he chose to affect, served only to degrade him in the
eyes of mankind. The Asiatic pomp, which had been adopted by the pride
of Diocletian, assumed an air of softness and effeminacy in the person
of Constantine. He is represented with false hair of various colors,
laboriously arranged by the skilful artists to the times; a diadem of a
new and more expensive fashion; a profusion of gems and pearls, of
collars and bracelets, and a variegated flowing robe of silk, most
curiously embroidered with flowers of gold. In such apparel, scarcely to
be excused by the youth and folly of Elagabalus, we are at a loss to
discover the wisdom of an aged monarch, and the simplicity of a Roman
veteran.  A mind thus relaxed by prosperity and indulgence, was
incapable of rising to that magnanimity which disdains suspicion, and
dares to forgive. The deaths of Maximian and Licinius may perhaps be
justified by the maxims of policy, as they are taught in the schools of
tyrants; but an impartial narrative of the executions, or rather
murders, which sullied the declining age of Constantine, will suggest to
our most candid thoughts the idea of a prince who could sacrifice
without reluctance the laws of justice, and the feelings of nature, to
the dictates either of his passions or of his interest.

The same fortune which so invariably followed the standard of
Constantine, seemed to secure the hopes and comforts of his domestic
life. Those among his predecessors who had enjoyed the longest and most
prosperous reigns, Augustus Trajan, and Diocletian, had been
disappointed of posterity; and the frequent revolutions had never
allowed sufficient time for any Imperial family to grow up and multiply
under the shade of the purple. But the royalty of the Flavian line,
which had been first ennobled by the Gothic Claudius, descended through
several generations; and Constantine himself derived from his royal
father the hereditary honors which he transmitted to his children. The
emperor had been twice married. Minervina, the obscure but lawful object
of his youthful attachment,  had left him only one son, who was called
Crispus. By Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, he had three daughters,
and three sons known by the kindred names of Constantine, Constantius,
and Constans. The unambitious brothers of the great Constantine, Julius
Constantius, Dalmatius, and Hannibalianus,  were permitted to enjoy the
most honorable rank, and the most affluent fortune, that could be
consistent with a private station. The youngest of the three lived
without a name, and died without posterity. His two elder brothers
obtained in marriage the daughters of wealthy senators, and propagated
new branches of the Imperial race. Gallus and Julian afterwards became
the most illustrious of the children of Julius Constantius, the
Patrician. The two sons of Dalmatius, who had been decorated with the
vain title of Censor, were named Dalmatius and Hannibalianus. The two
sisters of the great Constantine, Anastasia and Eutropia, were bestowed
on Optatus and Nepotianus, two senators of noble birth and of consular
dignity. His third sister, Constantia, was distinguished by her
preeminence of greatness and of misery. She remained the widow of the
vanquished Licinius; and it was by her entreaties, that an innocent boy,
the offspring of their marriage, preserved, for some time, his life, the
title of Cæsar, and a precarious hope of the succession. Besides the
females, and the allies of the Flavian house, ten or twelve males, to
whom the language of modern courts would apply the title of princes of
the blood, seemed, according to the order of their birth, to be destined
either to inherit or to support the throne of Constantine. But in less
than thirty years, this numerous and increasing family was reduced to
the persons of Constantius and Julian, who alone had survived a series
of crimes and calamities, such as the tragic poets have deplored in the
devoted lines of Pelops and of Cadmus.

Crispus, the eldest son of Constantine, and the presumptive heir of the
empire, is represented by impartial historians as an amiable and
accomplished youth. The care of his education, or at least of his
studies, was intrusted to Lactantius, the most eloquent of the
Christians; a preceptor admirably qualified to form the taste, and the
excite the virtues, of his illustrious disciple.  At the age of
seventeen, Crispus was invested with the title of Cæsar, and the
administration of the Gallic provinces, where the inroads of the Germans
gave him an early occasion of signalizing his military prowess. In the
civil war which broke out soon afterwards, the father and son divided
their powers; and this history has already celebrated the valor as well
as conduct displayed by the latter, in forcing the straits of the
Hellespont, so obstinately defended by the superior fleet of Licinius.
This naval victory contributed to determine the event of the war; and
the names of Constantine and of Crispus were united in the joyful
acclamations of their eastern subjects; who loudly proclaimed, that the
world had been subdued, and was now governed, by an emperor endowed with
every virtue; and by his illustrious son, a prince beloved of Heaven,
and the lively image of his father's perfections. The public favor,
which seldom accompanies old age, diffused its lustre over the youth of
Crispus. He deserved the esteem, and he engaged the affections, of the
court, the army, and the people. The experienced merit of a reigning
monarch is acknowledged by his subjects with reluctance, and frequently
denied with partial and discontented murmurs; while, from the opening
virtues of his successor, they fondly conceive the most unbounded hopes
of private as well as public felicity.

This dangerous popularity soon excited the attention of Constantine,
who, both as a father and as a king, was impatient of an equal. Instead
of attempting to secure the allegiance of his son by the generous ties
of confidence and gratitude, he resolved to prevent the mischiefs which
might be apprehended from dissatisfied ambition. Crispus soon had reason
to complain, that while his infant brother Constantius was sent, with
the title of Cæsar, to reign over his peculiar department of the Gallic
provinces,  he, a prince of mature years, who had performed such recent
and signal services, instead of being raised to the superior rank of
Augustus, was confined almost a prisoner to his father's court; and
exposed, without power or defence, to every calumny which the malice of
his enemies could suggest. Under such painful circumstances, the royal
youth might not always be able to compose his behavior, or suppress his
discontent; and we may be assured, that he was encompassed by a train of
indiscreet or perfidious followers, who assiduously studied to inflame,
and who were perhaps instructed to betray, the unguarded warmth of his
resentment. An edict of Constantine, published about this time,
manifestly indicates his real or affected suspicions, that a secret
conspiracy had been formed against his person and government. By all the
allurements of honors and rewards, he invites informers of every degree
to accuse without exception his magistrates or ministers, his friends or
his most intimate favorites, protesting, with a solemn asseveration,
that he himself will listen to the charge, that he himself will revenge
his injuries; and concluding with a prayer, which discovers some
apprehension of danger, that the providence of the Supreme Being may
still continue to protect the safety of the emperor and of the empire.

The informers, who complied with so liberal an invitation, were
sufficiently versed in the arts of courts to select the friends and
adherents of Crispus as the guilty persons; nor is there any reason to
distrust the veracity of the emperor, who had promised an ample measure
of revenge and punishment. The policy of Constantine maintained,
however, the same appearances of regard and confidence towards a son,
whom he began to consider as his most irreconcilable enemy. Medals were
struck with the customary vows for the long and auspicious reign of the
young Cæsar;  and as the people, who were not admitted into the secrets
of the palace, still loved his virtues, and respected his dignity, a
poet who solicits his recall from exile, adores with equal devotion the
majesty of the father and that of the son.  The time was now arrived for
celebrating the august ceremony of the twentieth year of the reign of
Constantine; and the emperor, for that purpose, removed his court from
Nicomedia to Rome, where the most splendid preparations had been made
for his reception. Every eye, and every tongue, affected to express
their sense of the general happiness, and the veil of ceremony and
dissimulation was drawn for a while over the darkest designs of revenge
and murder.  In the midst of the festival, the unfortunate Crispus was
apprehended by order of the emperor, who laid aside the tenderness of a
father, without assuming the equity of a judge. The examination was
short and private;  and as it was thought decent to conceal the fate of
the young prince from the eyes of the Roman people, he was sent under a
strong guard to Pola, in Istria, where, soon afterwards, he was put to
death, either by the hand of the executioner, or by the more gentle
operations of poison.  The Cæsar Licinius, a youth of amiable manners,
was involved in the ruin of Crispus:  and the stern jealousy of
Constantine was unmoved by the prayers and tears of his favorite sister,
pleading for the life of a son, whose rank was his only crime, and whose
loss she did not long survive. The story of these unhappy princes, the
nature and evidence of their guilt, the forms of their trial, and the
circumstances of their death, were buried in mysterious obscurity; and
the courtly bishop, who has celebrated in an elaborate work the virtues
and piety of his hero, observes a prudent silence on the subject of
these tragic events.  Such haughty contempt for the opinion of mankind,
whilst it imprints an indelible stain on the memory of Constantine, must
remind us of the very different behavior of one of the greatest monarchs
of the present age. The Czar Peter, in the full possession of despotic
power, submitted to the judgment of Russia, of Europe, and of posterity,
the reasons which had compelled him to subscribe the condemnation of a
criminal, or at least of a degenerate son.

The innocence of Crispus was so universally acknowledged, that the
modern Greeks, who adore the memory of their founder, are reduced to
palliate the guilt of a parricide, which the common feelings of human
nature forbade them to justify. They pretend, that as soon as the
afflicted father discovered the falsehood of the accusation by which his
credulity had been so fatally misled, he published to the world his
repentance and remorse; that he mourned forty days, during which he
abstained from the use of the bath, and all the ordinary comforts of
life; and that, for the lasting instruction of posterity, he erected a
golden statue of Crispus, with this memorable inscription: To my son,
whom I unjustly condemned.  A tale so moral and so interesting would
deserve to be supported by less exceptionable authority; but if we
consult the more ancient and authentic writers, they will inform us,
that the repentance of Constantine was manifested only in acts of blood
and revenge; and that he atoned for the murder of an innocent son, by
the execution, perhaps, of a guilty wife. They ascribe the misfortunes
of Crispus to the arts of his step-mother Fausta, whose implacable
hatred, or whose disappointed love, renewed in the palace of Constantine
the ancient tragedy of Hippolitus and of Phædra.  Like the daughter of
Minos, the daughter of Maximian accused her son-in-law of an incestuous
attempt on the chastity of his father's wife; and easily obtained, from
the jealousy of the emperor, a sentence of death against a young prince,
whom she considered with reason as the most formidable rival of her own
children. But Helena, the aged mother of Constantine, lamented and
revenged the untimely fate of her grandson Crispus; nor was it long
before a real or pretended discovery was made, that Fausta herself
entertained a criminal connection with a slave belonging to the Imperial
stables.  Her condemnation and punishment were the instant consequences
of the charge; and the adulteress was suffocated by the steam of a bath,
which, for that purpose, had been heated to an extraordinary degree.  By
some it will perhaps be thought, that the remembrance of a conjugal
union of twenty years, and the honor of their common offspring, the
destined heirs of the throne, might have softened the obdurate heart of
Constantine, and persuaded him to suffer his wife, however guilty she
might appear, to expiate her offences in a solitary prison. But it seems
a superfluous labor to weigh the propriety, unless we could ascertain
the truth, of this singular event, which is attended with some
circumstances of doubt and perplexity. Those who have attacked, and
those who have defended, the character of Constantine, have alike
disregarded two very remarkable passages of two orations pronounced
under the succeeding reign. The former celebrates the virtues, the
beauty, and the fortune of the empress Fausta, the daughter, wife,
sister, and mother of so many princes.  The latter asserts, in explicit
terms, that the mother of the younger Constantine, who was slain three
years after his father's death, survived to weep over the fate of her
son.  Notwithstanding the positive testimony of several writers of the
Pagan as well as of the Christian religion, there may still remain some
reason to believe, or at least to suspect, that Fausta escaped the blind
and suspicious cruelty of her husband. * The deaths of a son and a
nephew, with the execution of a great number of respectable, and perhaps
innocent friends,  who were involved in their fall, may be sufficient,
however, to justify the discontent of the Roman people, and to explain
the satirical verses affixed to the palace gate, comparing the splendid
and bloody reigns of Constantine and Nero.

Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His Sons. -- Part II.

By the death of Crispus, the inheritance of the empire seemed to devolve
on the three sons of Fausta, who have been already mentioned under the
names of Constantine, of Constantius, and of Constans. These young
princes were successively invested with the title of Cæsar; and the
dates of their promotion may be referred to the tenth, the twentieth,
and the thirtieth years of the reign of their father.  This conduct,
though it tended to multiply the future masters of the Roman world,
might be excused by the partiality of paternal affection; but it is not
so easy to understand the motives of the emperor, when he endangered the
safety both of his family and of his people, by the unnecessary
elevation of his two nephews, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus. The former
was raised, by the title of Cæsar, to an equality with his cousins. In
favor of the latter, Constantine invented the new and singular
appellation of Nobilissimus;  to which he annexed the flattering
distinction of a robe of purple and gold. But of the whole series of
Roman princes in any age of the empire, Hannibalianus alone was
distinguished by the title of King; a name which the subjects of
Tiberius would have detested, as the profane and cruel insult of
capricious tyranny. The use of such a title, even as it appears under
the reign of Constantine, is a strange and unconnected fact, which can
scarcely be admitted on the joint authority of Imperial medals and
contemporary writers.

The whole empire was deeply interested in the education of these five
youths, the acknowledged successors of Constantine. The exercise of the
body prepared them for the fatigues of war and the duties of active
life. Those who occasionally mention the education or talents of
Constantius, allow that he excelled in the gymnastic arts of leaping and
running that he was a dexterous archer, a skilful horseman, and a master
of all the different weapons used in the service either of the cavalry
or of the infantry.  The same assiduous cultivation was bestowed, though
not perhaps with equal success, to improve the minds of the sons and
nephews of Constantine.  The most celebrated professors of the Christian
faith, of the Grecian philosophy, and of the Roman jurisprudence, were
invited by the liberality of the emperor, who reserved for himself the
important task of instructing the royal youths in the science of
government, and the knowledge of mankind. But the genius of Constantine
himself had been formed by adversity and experience. In the free
intercourse of private life, and amidst the dangers of the court of
Galerius, he had learned to command his own passions, to encounter those
of his equals, and to depend for his present safety and future greatness
on the prudence and firmness of his personal conduct. His destined
successors had the misfortune of being born and educated in the imperial
purple. Incessantly surrounded with a train of flatterers, they passed
their youth in the enjoyment of luxury, and the expectation of a throne;
nor would the dignity of their rank permit them to descend from that
elevated station from whence the various characters of human nature
appear to wear a smooth and uniform aspect. The indulgence of
Constantine admitted them, at a very tender age, to share the
administration of the empire; and they studied the art of reigning, at
the expense of the people intrusted to their care. The younger
Constantine was appointed to hold his court in Gaul; and his brother
Constantius exchanged that department, the ancient patrimony of their
father, for the more opulent, but less martial, countries of the East.
Italy, the Western Illyricum, and Africa, were accustomed to revere
Constans, the third of his sons, as the representative of the great
Constantine. He fixed Dalmatius on the Gothic frontier, to which he
annexed the government of Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece. The city of
Cæsarea was chosen for the residence of Hannibalianus; and the provinces
of Pontus, Cappadocia, and the Lesser Armenia, were destined to form the
extent of his new kingdom. For each of these princes a suitable
establishment was provided. A just proportion of guards, of legions, and
of auxiliaries, was allotted for their respective dignity and defence.
The ministers and generals, who were placed about their persons, were
such as Constantine could trust to assist, and even to control, these
youthful sovereigns in the exercise of their delegated power. As they
advanced in years and experience, the limits of their authority were
insensibly enlarged: but the emperor always reserved for himself the
title of Augustus; and while he showed the Cæsarsto the armies and
provinces, he maintained every part of the empire in equal obedience to
its supreme head.  The tranquillity of the last fourteen years of his
reign was scarcely interrupted by the contemptible insurrection of a
camel-driver in the Island of Cyprus,  or by the active part which the
policy of Constantine engaged him to assume in the wars of the Goths and
Sarmatians.

Among the different branches of the human race, the Sarmatians form a
very remarkable shade; as they seem to unite the manners of the Asiatic
barbarians with the figure and complexion of the ancient inhabitants of
Europe. According to the various accidents of peace and war, of alliance
or conquest, the Sarmatians were sometimes confined to the banks of the
Tanais; and they sometimes spread themselves over the immense plains
which lie between the Vistula and the Volga.  The care of their numerous
flocks and herds, the pursuit of game, and the exercises of war, or
rather of rapine, directed the vagrant motions of the Sarmatians. The
movable camps or cities, the ordinary residence of their wives and
children, consisted only of large wagons drawn by oxen, and covered in
the form of tents. The military strength of the nation was composed of
cavalry; and the custom of their warriors, to lead in their hand one or
two spare horses, enabled them to advance and to retreat with a rapid
diligence, which surprised the security, and eluded the pursuit, of a
distant enemy.  Their poverty of iron prompted their rude industry to
invent a sort of cuirass, which was capable of resisting a sword or
javelin, though it was formed only of horses' hoofs, cut into thin and
polished slices, carefully laid over each other in the manner of scales
or feathers, and strongly sewed upon an under garment of coarse linen.
The offensive arms of the Sarmatians were short daggers, long lances,
and a weighty bow vow with a quiver of arrows. They were reduced to the
necessity of employing fish-bones for the points of their weapons; but
the custom of dipping them in a venomous liquor, that poisoned the
wounds which they inflicted, is alone sufficient to prove the most
savage manners, since a people impressed with a sense of humanity would
have abhorred so cruel a practice, and a nation skilled in the arts of
war would have disdained so impotent a resource.  Whenever these
Barbarians issued from their deserts in quest of prey, their shaggy
beards, uncombed locks, the furs with which they were covered from head
to foot, and their fierce countenances, which seemed to express the
innate cruelty of their minds, inspired the more civilized provincials
of Rome with horror and dismay.

The tender Ovid, after a youth spent in the enjoyment of fame and
luxury, was condemned to a hopeless exile on the frozen banks of the
Danube, where he was exposed, almost without defence, to the fury of
these monsters of the desert, with whose stern spirits he feared that
his gentle shade might hereafter be confounded. In his pathetic, but
sometimes unmanly lamentations,  he describes in the most lively colors
the dress and manners, the arms and inroads, of the Getæand Sarmatians,
who were associated for the purposes of destruction; and from the
accounts of history there is some reason to believe that these
Sarmatians were the Jazygæ, one of the most numerous and warlike tribes
of the nation. The allurements of plenty engaged them to seek a
permanent establishment on the frontiers of the empire. Soon after the
reign of Augustus, they obliged the Dacians, who subsisted by fishing on
the banks of the River Teyss or Tibiscus, to retire into the hilly
country, and to abandon to the victorious Sarmatians the fertile plains
of the Upper Hungary, which are bounded by the course of the Danube and
the semicircular enclosure of the Carpathian Mountains.  In this
advantageous position, they watched or suspended the moment of attack,
as they were provoked by injuries or appeased by presents; they
gradually acquired the skill of using more dangerous weapons, and
although the Sarmatians did not illustrate their name by any memorable
exploits, they occasionally assisted their eastern and western
neighbors, the Goths and the Germans, with a formidable body of cavalry.
They lived under the irregular aristocracy of their chieftains:  but
after they had received into their bosom the fugitive Vandals, who
yielded to the pressure of the Gothic power, they seem to have chosen a
king from that nation, and from the illustrious race of the Astingi, who
had formerly dwelt on the shores of the northern ocean.

This motive of enmity must have inflamed the subjects of contention,
which perpetually arise on the confines of warlike and independent
nations. The Vandal princes were stimulated by fear and revenge; the
Gothic kings aspired to extend their dominion from the Euxine to the
frontiers of Germany; and the waters of the Maros, a small river which
falls into the Teyss, were stained with the blood of the contending
Barbarians. After some experience of the superior strength and numbers
of their adversaries, the Sarmatians implored the protection of the
Roman monarch, who beheld with pleasure the discord of the nations, but
who was justly alarmed by the progress of the Gothic arms. As soon as
Constantine had declared himself in favor of the weaker party, the
haughty Araric, king of the Goths, instead of expecting the attack of
the legions, boldly passed the Danube, and spread terror and devastation
through the province of Mæsia. To oppose the inroad of this destroying
host, the aged emperor took the field in person; but on this occasion
either his conduct or his fortune betrayed the glory which he had
acquired in so many foreign and domestic wars. He had the mortification
of seeing his troops fly before an inconsiderable detachment of the
Barbarians, who pursued them to the edge of their fortified camp, and
obliged him to consult his safety by a precipitate and ignominious
retreat. * The event of a second and more successful action retrieved
the honor of the Roman name; and the powers of art and discipline
prevailed, after an obstinate contest, over the efforts of irregular
valor. The broken army of the Goths abandoned the field of battle, the
wasted province, and the passage of the Danube: and although the eldest
of the sons of Constantine was permitted to supply the place of his
father, the merit of the victory, which diffused universal joy, was
ascribed to the auspicious counsels of the emperor himself.

He contributed at least to improve this advantage, by his negotiations
with the free and warlike people of Chersonesus,  whose capital, situate
on the western coast of the Tauric or Crimæan peninsula, still retained
some vestiges of a Grecian colony, and was governed by a perpetual
magistrate, assisted by a council of senators, emphatically styled the
Fathers of the City. The Chersonites were animated against the Goths, by
the memory of the wars, which, in the preceding century, they had
maintained with unequal forces against the invaders of their country.
They were connected with the Romans by the mutual benefits of commerce;
as they were supplied from the provinces of Asia with corn and
manufactures, which they purchased with their only productions, salt,
wax, and hides. Obedient to the requisition of Constantine, they
prepared, under the conduct of their magistrate Diogenes, a considerable
army, of which the principal strength consisted in cross-bows and
military chariots. The speedy march and intrepid attack of the
Chersonites, by diverting the attention of the Goths, assisted the
operations of the Imperial generals. The Goths, vanquished on every
side, were driven into the mountains, where, in the course of a severe
campaign, above a hundred thousand were computed to have perished by
cold and hunger Peace was at length granted to their humble
supplications; the eldest son of Araric was accepted as the most
valuable hostage; and Constantine endeavored to convince their chiefs,
by a liberal distribution of honors and rewards, how far the friendship
of the Romans was preferable to their enmity. In the expressions of his
gratitude towards the faithful Chersonites, the emperor was still more
magnificent. The pride of the nation was gratified by the splendid and
almost royal decorations bestowed on their magistrate and his
successors. A perpetual exemption from all duties was stipulated for
their vessels which traded to the ports of the Black Sea. A regular
subsidy was promised, of iron, corn, oil, and of every supply which
could be useful either in peace or war. But it was thought that the
Sarmatians were sufficiently rewarded by their deliverance from
impending ruin; and the emperor, perhaps with too strict an economy,
deducted some part of the expenses of the war from the customary
gratifications which were allowed to that turbulent nation.

Exasperated by this apparent neglect, the Sarmatians soon forgot, with
the levity of barbarians, the services which they had so lately
received, and the dangers which still threatened their safety. Their
inroads on the territory of the empire provoked the indignation of
Constantine to leave them to their fate; and he no longer opposed the
ambition of Geberic, a renowned warrior, who had recently ascended the
Gothic throne. Wisumar, the Vandal king, whilst alone, and unassisted,
he defended his dominions with undaunted courage, was vanquished and
slain in a decisive battle, which swept away the flower of the Sarmatian
youth. * The remainder of the nation embraced the desperate expedient of
arming their slaves, a hardy race of hunters and herdsmen, by whose
tumultuary aid they revenged their defeat, and expelled the invader from
their confines. But they soon discovered that they had exchanged a
foreign for a domestic enemy, more dangerous and more implacable.
Enraged by their former servitude, elated by their present glory, the
slaves, under the name of Limigantes, claimed and usurped the possession
of the country which they had saved. Their masters, unable to withstand
the ungoverned fury of the populace, preferred the hardships of exile to
the tyranny of their servants. Some of the fugitive Sarmatians solicited
a less ignominious dependence, under the hostile standard of the Goths.
A more numerous band retired beyond the Carpathian Mountains, among the
Quadi, their German allies, and were easily admitted to share a
superfluous waste of uncultivated land. But the far greater part of the
distressed nation turned their eyes towards the fruitful provinces of
Rome. Imploring the protection and forgiveness of the emperor, they
solemnly promised, as subjects in peace, and as soldiers in war, the
most inviolable fidelity to the empire which should graciously receive
them into its bosom. According to the maxims adopted by Probus and his
successors, the offers of this barbarian colony were eagerly accepted;
and a competent portion of lands in the provinces of Pannonia, Thrace,
Macedonia, and Italy, were immediately assigned for the habitation and
subsistence of three hundred thousand Sarmatians.

By chastising the pride of the Goths, and by accepting the homage of a
suppliant nation, Constantine asserted the majesty of the Roman empire;
and the ambassadors of Æthiopia, Persia, and the most remote countries
of India, congratulated the peace and prosperity of his government.  If
he reckoned, among the favors of fortune, the death of his eldest son,
of his nephew, and perhaps of his wife, he enjoyed an uninterrupted flow
of private as well as public felicity, till the thirtieth year of his
reign; a period which none of his predecessors, since Augustus, had been
permitted to celebrate. Constantine survived that solemn festival about
ten months; and at the mature age of sixty-four, after a short illness,
he ended his memorable life at the palace of Aquyrion, in the suburbs of
Nicomedia, whither he had retired for the benefit of the air, and with
the hope of recruiting his exhausted strength by the use of the warm
baths. The excessive demonstrations of grief, or at least of mourning,
surpassed whatever had been practised on any former occasion.
Notwithstanding the claims of the senate and people of ancient Rome, the
corpse of the deceased emperor, according to his last request, was
transported to the city, which was destined to preserve the name and
memory of its founder. The body of Constantine adorned with the vain
symbols of greatness, the purple and diadem, was deposited on a golden
bed in one of the apartments of the palace, which for that purpose had
been splendidly furnished and illuminated. The forms of the court were
strictly maintained. Every day, at the appointed hours, the principal
officers of the state, the army, and the household, approaching the
person of their sovereign with bended knees and a composed countenance,
offered their respectful homage as seriously as if he had been still
alive. From motives of policy, this theatrical representation was for
some time continued; nor could flattery neglect the opportunity of
remarking that Constantine alone, by the peculiar indulgence of Heaven,
had reigned after his death.

But this reign could subsist only in empty pageantry; and it was soon
discovered that the will of the most absolute monarch is seldom obeyed,
when his subjects have no longer anything to hope from his favor, or to
dread from his resentment. The same ministers and generals, who bowed
with such referential awe before the inanimate corpse of their deceased
sovereign, were engaged in secret consultations to exclude his two
nephews, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus, from the share which he had
assigned them in the succession of the empire. We are too imperfectly
acquainted with the court of Constantine to form any judgment of the
real motives which influenced the leaders of the conspiracy; unless we
should suppose that they were actuated by a spirit of jealousy and
revenge against the præfect Ablavius, a proud favorite, who had long
directed the counsels and abused the confidence of the late emperor. The
arguments, by which they solicited the concurrence of the soldiers and
people, are of a more obvious nature; and they might with decency, as
well as truth, insist on the superior rank of the children of
Constantine, the danger of multiplying the number of sovereigns, and the
impending mischiefs which threatened the republic, from the discord of
so many rival princes, who were not connected by the tender sympathy of
fraternal affection. The intrigue was conducted with zeal and secrecy,
till a loud and unanimous declaration was procured from the troops, that
they would suffer none except the sons of their lamented monarch to
reign over the Roman empire.  The younger Dalmatius, who was united with
his collateral relations by the ties of friendship and interest, is
allowed to have inherited a considerable share of the abilities of the
great Constantine; but, on this occasion, he does not appear to have
concerted any measure for supporting, by arms, the just claims which
himself and his royal brother derived from the liberality of their
uncle. Astonished and overwhelmed by the tide of popular fury, they seem
to have remained, without the power of flight or of resistance, in the
hands of their implacable enemies. Their fate was suspended till the
arrival of Constantius, the second,  and perhaps the most favored, of
the sons of Constantine.

Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His Sons. -- Part III.

The voice of the dying emperor had recommended the care of his funeral
to the piety of Constantius; and that prince, by the vicinity of his
eastern station, could easily prevent the diligence of his brothers, who
resided in their distant government of Italy and Gaul. As soon as he had
taken possession of the palace of Constantinople, his first care was to
remove the apprehensions of his kinsmen, by a solemn oath which he
pledged for their security. His next employment was to find some
specious pretence which might release his conscience from the obligation
of an imprudent promise. The arts of fraud were made subservient to the
designs of cruelty; and a manifest forgery was attested by a person of
the most sacred character. From the hands of the Bishop of Nicomedia,
Constantius received a fatal scroll, affirmed to be the genuine
testament of his father; in which the emperor expressed his suspicions
that he had been poisoned by his brothers; and conjured his sons to
revenge his death, and to consult their own safety, by the punishment of
the guilty.  Whatever reasons might have been alleged by these
unfortunate princes to defend their life and honor against so incredible
an accusation, they were silenced by the furious clamors of the
soldiers, who declared themselves, at once, their enemies, their judges,
and their executioners. The spirit, and even the forms of legal
proceedings were repeatedly violated in a promiscuous massacre; which
involved the two uncles of Constantius, seven of his cousins, of whom
Dalmatius and Hannibalianus were the most illustrious, the Patrician
Optatus, who had married a sister of the late emperor, and the Præfect
Ablavius, whose power and riches had inspired him with some hopes of
obtaining the purple. If it were necessary to aggravate the horrors of
this bloody scene, we might add, that Constantius himself had espoused
the daughter of his uncle Julius, and that he had bestowed his sister in
marriage on his cousin Hannibalianus. These alliances, which the policy
of Constantine, regardless of the public prejudice,  had formed between
the several branches of the Imperial house, served only to convince
mankind, that these princes were as cold to the endearments of conjugal
affection, as they were insensible to the ties of consanguinity, and the
moving entreaties of youth and innocence. Of so numerous a family,
Gallus and Julian alone, the two youngest children of Julius
Constantius, were saved from the hands of the assassins, till their
rage, satiated with slaughter, had in some measure subsided. The emperor
Constantius, who, in the absence of his brothers, was the most obnoxious
to guilt and reproach, discovered, on some future occasions, a faint and
transient remorse for those cruelties which the perfidious counsels of
his ministers, and the irresistible violence of the troops, had extorted
from his unexperienced youth.

The massacre of the Flavian race was succeeded by a new division of the
provinces; which was ratified in a personal interview of the three
brothers. Constantine, the eldest of the Cæsars, obtained, with a
certain preeminence of rank, the possession of the new capital, which
bore his own name and that of his father. Thrace, and the countries of
the East, were allotted for the patrimony of Constantius; and Constans
was acknowledged as the lawful sovereign of Italy, Africa, and the
Western Illyricum. The armies submitted to their hereditary right; and
they condescended, after some delay, to accept from the Roman senate the
title of Augustus. When they first assumed the reins of government, the
eldest of these princes was twenty-one, the second twenty, and the third
only seventeen, years of age.

While the martial nations of Europe followed the standards of his
brothers, Constantius, at the head of the effeminate troops of Asia, was
left to sustain the weight of the Persian war. At the decease of
Constantine, the throne of the East was filled by Sapor, son of Hormouz,
or Hormisdas, and grandson of Narses, who, after the victory of
Galerius, had humbly confessed the superiority of the Roman power.
Although Sapor was in the thirtieth year of his long reign, he was still
in the vigor of youth, as the date of his accession, by a very strange
fatality, had preceded that of his birth. The wife of Hormouz remained
pregnant at the time of her husband's death; and the uncertainty of the
sex, as well as of the event, excited the ambitious hopes of the princes
of the house of Sassan. The apprehensions of civil war were at length
removed, by the positive assurance of the Magi, that the widow of
Hormouz had conceived, and would safely produce a son. Obedient to the
voice of superstition, the Persians prepared, without delay, the
ceremony of his coronation. A royal bed, on which the queen lay in
state, was exhibited in the midst of the palace; the diadem was placed
on the spot, which might be supposed to conceal the future heir of
Artaxerxes, and the prostrate satraps adored the majesty of their
invisible and insensible sovereign.  If any credit can be given to this
marvellous tale, which seems, however, to be countenanced by the manners
of the people, and by the extraordinary duration of his reign, we must
admire not only the fortune, but the genius, of Sapor. In the soft,
sequestered education of a Persian harem, the royal youth could discover
the importance of exercising the vigor of his mind and body; and, by his
personal merit, deserved a throne, on which he had been seated, while he
was yet unconscious of the duties and temptations of absolute power. His
minority was exposed to the almost inevitable calamities of domestic
discord; his capital was surprised and plundered by Thair, a powerful
king of Yemen, or Arabia; and the majesty of the royal family was
degraded by the captivity of a princess, the sister of the deceased
king. But as soon as Sapor attained the age of manhood, the presumptuous
Thair, his nation, and his country, fell beneath the first effort of the
young warrior; who used his victory with so judicious a mixture of rigor
and clemency, that he obtained from the fears and gratitude of the Arabs
the title of Dhoulacnaf, or protector of the nation.

The ambition of the Persian, to whom his enemies ascribe the virtues of
a soldier and a statesman, was animated by the desire of revenging the
disgrace of his fathers, and of wresting from the hands of the Romans
the five provinces beyond the Tigris. The military fame of Constantine,
and the real or apparent strength of his government, suspended the
attack; and while the hostile conduct of Sapor provoked the resentment,
his artful negotiations amused the patience of the Imperial court. The
death of Constantine was the signal of war,  and the actual condition of
the Syrian and Armenian frontier seemed to encourage the Persians by the
prospect of a rich spoil and an easy conquest. The example of the
massacres of the palace diffused a spirit of licentiousness and sedition
among the troops of the East, who were no longer restrained by their
habits of obedience to a veteran commander. By the prudence of
Constantius, who, from the interview with his brothers in Pannonia,
immediately hastened to the banks of the Euphrates, the legions were
gradually restored to a sense of duty and discipline; but the season of
anarchy had permitted Sapor to form the siege of Nisibis, and to occupy
several of the most important fortresses of Mesopotamia.  In Armenia,
the renowned Tiridates had long enjoyed the peace and glory which he
deserved by his valor and fidelity to the cause of Rome.  The firm
alliance which he maintained with Constantine was productive of
spiritual as well as of temporal benefits; by the conversion of
Tiridates, the character of a saint was applied to that of a hero, the
Christian faith was preached and established from the Euphrates to the
shores of the Caspian, and Armenia was attached to the empire by the
double ties of policy and religion. But as many of the Armenian nobles
still refused to abandon the plurality of their gods and of their wives,
the public tranquillity was disturbed by a discontented faction, which
insulted the feeble age of their sovereign, and impatiently expected the
hour of his death. He died at length after a reign of fifty-six years,
and the fortune of the Armenian monarchy expired with Tiridates. His
lawful heir was driven into exile, the Christian priests were either
murdered or expelled from their churches, the barbarous tribes of
Albania were solicited to descend from their mountains; and two of the
most powerful governors, usurping the ensigns or the powers of royalty,
implored the assistance of Sapor, and opened the gates of their cities
to the Persian garrisons. The Christian party, under the guidance of the
Archbishop of Artaxata, the immediate successor of St. Gregory the
Illuminator, had recourse to the piety of Constantius. After the
troubles had continued about three years, Antiochus, one of the officers
of the household, executed with success the Imperial commission of
restoring Chosroes, * the son of Tiridates, to the throne of his
fathers, of distributing honors and rewards among the faithful servants
of the house of Arsaces, and of proclaiming a general amnesty, which was
accepted by the greater part of the rebellious satraps. But the Romans
derived more honor than advantage from this revolution. Chosroes was a
prince of a puny stature and a pusillanimous spirit. Unequal to the
fatigues of war, averse to the society of mankind, he withdrew from his
capital to a retired palace, which he built on the banks of the River
Eleutherus, and in the centre of a shady grove; where he consumed his
vacant hours in the rural sports of hunting and hawking. To secure this
inglorious ease, he submitted to the conditions of peace which Sapor
condescended to impose; the payment of an annual tribute, and the
restitution of the fertile province of Atropatene, which the courage of
Tiridates, and the victorious arms of Galerius, had annexed to the
Armenian monarchy.

During the long period of the reign of Constantius, the provinces of the
East were afflicted by the calamities of the Persian war.  The irregular
incursions of the light troops alternately spread terror and devastation
beyond the Tigris and beyond the Euphrates, from the gates of Ctesiphon
to those of Antioch; and this active service was performed by the Arabs
of the desert, who were divided in their interest and affections; some
of their independent chiefs being enlisted in the party of Sapor, whilst
others had engaged their doubtful fidelity to the emperor.  The more
grave and important operations of the war were conducted with equal
vigor; and the armies of Rome and Persia encountered each other in nine
bloody fields, in two of which Constantius himself commanded in person.
The event of the day was most commonly adverse to the Romans, but in the
battle of Singara, heir imprudent valor had almost achieved a signal and
decisive victory. The stationary troops of Singara * retired on the
approach of Sapor, who passed the Tigris over three bridges, and
occupied near the village of Hilleh an advantageous camp, which, by the
labor of his numerous pioneers, he surrounded in one day with a deep
ditch and a lofty rampart. His formidable host, when it was drawn out in
order of battle, covered the banks of the river, the adjacent heights,
and the whole extent of a plain of above twelve miles, which separated
the two armies. Both were alike impatient to engage; but the Barbarians,
after a slight resistance, fled in disorder; unable to resist, or
desirous to weary, the strength of the heavy legions, who, fainting with
heat and thirst, pursued them across the plain, and cut in pieces a line
of cavalry, clothed in complete armor, which had been posted before the
gates of the camp to protect their retreat. Constantius, who was hurried
along in the pursuit, attempted, without effect, to restrain the ardor
of his troops, by representing to them the dangers of the approaching
night, and the certainty of completing their success with the return of
day. As they depended much more on their own valor than on the
experience or the abilities of their chief, they silenced by their
clamors his timid remonstrances; and rushing with fury to the charge,
filled up the ditch, broke down the rampart, and dispersed themselves
through the tents to recruit their exhausted strength, and to enjoy the
rich harvest of their labors. But the prudent Sapor had watched the
moment of victory. His army, of which the greater part, securely posted
on the heights, had been spectators of the action, advanced in silence,
and under the shadow of the night; and his Persian archers, guided by
the illumination of the camp, poured a shower of arrows on a disarmed
and licentious crowd. The sincerity of history  declares, that the
Romans were vanquished with a dreadful slaughter, and that the flying
remnant of the legions was exposed to the most intolerable hardships.
Even the tenderness of panegyric, confessing that the glory of the
emperor was sullied by the disobedience of his soldiers, chooses to draw
a veil over the circumstances of this melancholy retreat. Yet one of
those venal orators, so jealous of the fame of Constantius, relates,
with amazing coolness, an act of such incredible cruelty, as, in the
judgment of posterity, must imprint a far deeper stain on the honor of
the Imperial name. The son of Sapor, the heir of his crown, had been
made a captive in the Persian camp. The unhappy youth, who might have
excited the compassion of the most savage enemy, was scourged, tortured,
and publicly executed by the inhuman Romans.

Whatever advantages might attend the arms of Sapor in the field, though
nine repeated victories diffused among the nations the fame of his valor
and conduct, he could not hope to succeed in the execution of his
designs, while the fortified towns of Mesopotamia, and, above all, the
strong and ancient city of Nisibis, remained in the possession of the
Romans. In the space of twelve years, Nisibis, which, since the time of
Lucullus, had been deservedly esteemed the bulwark of the East,
sustained three memorable sieges against the power of Sapor; and the
disappointed monarch, after urging his attacks above sixty, eighty, and
a hundred days, was thrice repulsed with loss and ignominy.  This large
and populous city was situate about two days' journey from the Tigris,
in the midst of a pleasant and fertile plain at the foot of Mount
Masius. A treble enclosure of brick walls was defended by a deep ditch;
and the intrepid resistance of Count Lucilianus, and his garrison, was
seconded by the desperate courage of the people. The citizens of Nisibis
were animated by the exhortations of their bishop,  inured to arms by
the presence of danger, and convinced of the intentions of Sapor to
plant a Persian colony in their room, and to lead them away into distant
and barbarous captivity. The event of the two former sieges elated their
confidence, and exasperated the haughty spirit of the Great King, who
advanced a third time towards Nisibis, at the head of the united forces
of Persia and India. The ordinary machines, invented to batter or
undermine the walls, were rendered ineffectual by the superior skill of
the Romans; and many days had vainly elapsed, when Sapor embraced a
resolution worthy of an eastern monarch, who believed that the elements
themselves were subject to his power. At the stated season of the
melting of the snows in Armenia, the River Mygdonius, which divides the
plain and the city of Nisibis, forms, like the Nile,  an inundation over
the adjacent country. By the labor of the Persians, the course of the
river was stopped below the town, and the waters were confined on every
side by solid mounds of earth. On this artificial lake, a fleet of armed
vessels filled with soldiers, and with engines which discharged stones
of five hundred pounds weight, advanced in order of battle, and engaged,
almost upon a level, the troops which defended the ramparts. *The
irresistible force of the waters was alternately fatal to the contending
parties, till at length a portion of the walls, unable to sustain the
accumulated pressure, gave way at once, and exposed an ample breach of
one hundred and fifty feet. The Persians were instantly driven to the
assault, and the fate of Nisibis depended on the event of the day. The
heavy-armed cavalry, who led the van of a deep column, were embarrassed
in the mud, and great numbers were drowned in the unseen holes which had
been filled by the rushing waters. The elephants, made furious by their
wounds, increased the disorder, and trampled down thousands of the
Persian archers. The Great King, who, from an exalted throne, beheld the
misfortunes of his arms, sounded, with reluctant indignation, the signal
of the retreat, and suspended for some hours the prosecution of the
attack. But the vigilant citizens improved the opportunity of the night;
and the return of day discovered a new wall of six feet in height,
rising every moment to fill up the interval of the breach.
Notwithstanding the disappointment of his hopes, and the loss of more
than twenty thousand men, Sapor still pressed the reduction of Nisibis,
with an obstinate firmness, which could have yielded only to the
necessity of defending the eastern provinces of Persia against a
formidable invasion of the Massagetæ.  Alarmed by this intelligence, he
hastily relinquished the siege, and marched with rapid diligence from
the banks of the Tigris to those of the Oxus. The danger and
difficulties of the Scythian war engaged him soon afterwards to
conclude, or at least to observe, a truce with the Roman emperor, which
was equally grateful to both princes; as Constantius himself, after the
death of his two brothers, was involved, by the revolutions of the West,
in a civil contest, which required and seemed to exceed the most
vigorous exertion of his undivided strength.

After the partition of the empire, three years had scarcely elapsed
before the sons of Constantine seemed impatient to convince mankind that
they were incapable of contenting themselves with the dominions which
they were unqualified to govern. The eldest of those princes soon
complained, that he was defrauded of his just proportion of the spoils
of their murdered kinsmen; and though he might yield to the superior
guilt and merit of Constantius, he exacted from Constans the cession of
the African provinces, as an equivalent for the rich countries of
Macedonia and Greece, which his brother had acquired by the death of
Dalmatius. The want of sincerity, which Constantine experienced in a
tedious and fruitless negotiation, exasperated the fierceness of his
temper; and he eagerly listened to those favorites, who suggested to him
that his honor, as well as his interest, was concerned in the
prosecution of the quarrel. At the head of a tumultuary band, suited for
rapine rather than for conquest, he suddenly broke onto the dominions of
Constans, by the way of the Julian Alps, and the country round Aquileia
felt the first effects of his resentment. The measures of Constans, who
then resided in Dacia, were directed with more prudence and ability. On
the news of his brother's invasion, he detached a select and disciplined
body of his Illyrian troops, proposing to follow them in person, with
the remainder of his forces. But the conduct of his lieutenants soon
terminated the unnatural contest. By the artful appearances of flight,
Constantine was betrayed into an ambuscade, which had been concealed in
a wood, where the rash youth, with a few attendants, was surprised,
surrounded, and slain. His body, after it had been found in the obscure
stream of the Alsa, obtained the honors of an Imperial sepulchre; but
his provinces transferred their allegiance to the conqueror, who,
refusing to admit his elder brother Constantius to any share in these
new acquisitions, maintained the undisputed possession of more than two
thirds of the Roman empire.

Chapter XVIII: Character Of Constantine And His Sons. -- Part IV.

The fate of Constans himself was delayed about ten years longer, and the
revenge of his brother's death was reserved for the more ignoble hand of
a domestic traitor. The pernicious tendency of the system introduced by
Constantine was displayed in the feeble administration of his sons; who,
by their vices and weakness, soon lost the esteem and affections of
their people. The pride assumed by Constans, from the unmerited success
of his arms, was rendered more contemptible by his want of abilities and
application. His fond partiality towards some German captives,
distinguished only by the charms of youth, was an object of scandal to
the people;  and Magnentius, an ambitious soldier, who was himself of
Barbarian extraction, was encouraged by the public discontent to assert
the honor of the Roman name.  The chosen bands of Jovians and
Herculians, who acknowledged Magnentius as their leader, maintained the
most respectable and important station in the Imperial camp. The
friendship of Marcellinus, count of the sacred largesses, supplied with
a liberal hand the means of seduction. The soldiers were convinced by
the most specious arguments, that the republic summoned them to break
the bonds of hereditary servitude; and, by the choice of an active and
vigilant prince, to reward the same virtues which had raised the
ancestors of the degenerate Constans from a private condition to the
throne of the world. As soon as the conspiracy was ripe for execution,
Marcellinus, under the pretence of celebrating his son's birthday, gave
a splendid entertainment to the illustriousand honorablepersons of the
court of Gaul, which then resided in the city of Autun. The intemperance
of the feast was artfully protracted till a very late hour of the night;
and the unsuspecting guests were tempted to indulge themselves in a
dangerous and guilty freedom of conversation. On a sudden the doors were
thrown open, and Magnentius, who had retired for a few moments, returned
into the apartment, invested with the diadem and purple. The
conspirators instantly saluted him with the titles of Augustus and
Emperor. The surprise, the terror, the intoxication, the ambitious
hopes, and the mutual ignorance of the rest of the assembly, prompted
them to join their voices to the general acclamation. The guards
hastened to take the oath of fidelity; the gates of the town were shut;
and before the dawn of day, Magnentius became master of the troops and
treasure of the palace and city of Autun. By his secrecy and diligence
he entertained some hopes of surprising the person of Constans, who was
pursuing in the adjacent forest his favorite amusement of hunting, or
perhaps some pleasures of a more private and criminal nature. The rapid
progress of fame allowed him, however, an instant for flight, though the
desertion of his soldiers and subjects deprived him of the power of
resistance. Before he could reach a seaport in Spain, where he intended
to embark, he was overtaken near Helena,  at the foot of the Pyrenees,
by a party of light cavalry, whose chief, regardless of the sanctity of
a temple, executed his commission by the murder of the son of
Constantine.

As soon as the death of Constans had decided this easy but important
revolution, the example of the court of Autun was imitated by the
provinces of the West. The authority of Magnentius was acknowledged
through the whole extent of the two great præfectures of Gaul and Italy;
and the usurper prepared, by every act of oppression, to collect a
treasure, which might discharge the obligation of an immense donative,
and supply the expenses of a civil war. The martial countries of
Illyricum, from the Danube to the extremity of Greece, had long obeyed
the government of Vetranio, an aged general, beloved for the simplicity
of his manners, and who had acquired some reputation by his experience
and services in war.  Attached by habit, by duty, and by gratitude, to
the house of Constantine, he immediately gave the strongest assurances
to the only surviving son of his late master, that he would expose, with
unshaken fidelity, his person and his troops, to inflict a just revenge
on the traitors of Gaul. But the legions of Vetranio were seduced,
rather than provoked, by the example of rebellion; their leader soon
betrayed a want of firmness, or a want of sincerity; and his ambition
derived a specious pretence from the approbation of the princess
Constantina. That cruel and aspiring woman, who had obtained from the
great Constantine, her father, the rank of Augusta, placed the diadem
with her own hands on the head of the Illyrian general; and seemed to
expect from his victory the accomplishment of those unbounded hopes, of
which she had been disappointed by the death of her husband
Hannibalianus. Perhaps it was without the consent of Constantina, that
the new emperor formed a necessary, though dishonorable, alliance with
the usurper of the West, whose purple was so recently stained with her
brother's blood.

The intelligence of these important events, which so deeply affected the
honor and safety of the Imperial house, recalled the arms of Constantius
from the inglorious prosecution of the Persian war. He recommended the
care of the East to his lieutenants, and afterwards to his cousin
Gallus, whom he raised from a prison to a throne; and marched towards
Europe, with a mind agitated by the conflict of hope and fear, of grief
and indignation. On his arrival at Heraclea in Thrace, the emperor gave
audience to the ambassadors of Magnentius and Vetranio. The first author
of the conspiracy Marcellinus, who in some measure had bestowed the
purple on his new master, boldly accepted this dangerous commission; and
his three colleagues were selected from the illustrious personages of
the state and army. These deputies were instructed to soothe the
resentment, and to alarm the fears, of Constantius. They were empowered
to offer him the friendship and alliance of the western princes, to
cement their union by a double marriage; of Constantius with the
daughter of Magnentius, and of Magnentius himself with the ambitious
Constantina; and to acknowledge in the treaty the preeminence of rank,
which might justly be claimed by the emperor of the East. Should pride
and mistaken piety urge him to refuse these equitable conditions, the
ambassadors were ordered to expatiate on the inevitable ruin which must
attend his rashness, if he ventured to provoke the sovereigns of the
West to exert their superior strength; and to employ against him that
valor, those abilities, and those legions, to which the house of
Constantine had been indebted for so many triumphs. Such propositions
and such arguments appeared to deserve the most serious attention; the
answer of Constantius was deferred till the next day; and as he had
reflected on the importance of justifying a civil war in the opinion of
the people, he thus addressed his council, who listened with real or
affected credulity: "Last night," said he, "after I retired to rest, the
shade of the great Constantine, embracing the corpse of my murdered
brother, rose before my eyes; his well-known voice awakened me to
revenge, forbade me to despair of the republic, and assured me of the
success and immortal glory which would crown the justice of my arms."
The authority of such a vision, or rather of the prince who alleged it,
silenced every doubt, and excluded all negotiation. The ignominious
terms of peace were rejected with disdain. One of the ambassadors of the
tyrant was dismissed with the haughty answer of Constantius; his
colleagues, as unworthy of the privileges of the law of nations, were
put in irons; and the contending powers prepared to wage an implacable
war.

Such was the conduct, and such perhaps was the duty, of the brother of
Constans towards the perfidious usurper of Gaul. The situation and
character of Vetranio admitted of milder measures; and the policy of the
Eastern emperor was directed to disunite his antagonists, and to
separate the forces of Illyricum from the cause of rebellion. It was an
easy task to deceive the frankness and simplicity of Vetranio, who,
fluctuating some time between the opposite views of honor and interest,
displayed to the world the insincerity of his temper, and was insensibly
engaged in the snares of an artful negotiation. Constantius acknowledged
him as a legitimate and equal colleague in the empire, on condition that
he would renounce his disgraceful alliance with Magnentius, and appoint
a place of interview on the frontiers of their respective provinces;
where they might pledge their friendship by mutual vows of fidelity, and
regulate by common consent the future operations of the civil war. In
consequence of this agreement, Vetranio advanced to the city of Sardica,
at the head of twenty thousand horse, and of a more numerous body of
infantry; a power so far superior to the forces of Constantius, that the
Illyrian emperor appeared to command the life and fortunes of his rival,
who, depending on the success of his private negotiations, had seduced
the troops, and undermined the throne, of Vetranio. The chiefs, who had
secretly embraced the party of Constantius, prepared in his favor a
public spectacle, calculated to discover and inflame the passions of the
multitude.  The united armies were commanded to assemble in a large
plain near the city. In the centre, according to the rules of ancient
discipline, a military tribunal, or rather scaffold, was erected, from
whence the emperors were accustomed, on solemn and important occasions,
to harangue the troops. The well-ordered ranks of Romans and Barbarians,
with drawn swords, or with erected spears, the squadrons of cavalry, and
the cohorts of infantry, distinguished by the variety of their arms and
ensigns, formed an immense circle round the tribunal; and the attentive
silence which they preserved was sometimes interrupted by loud bursts of
clamor or of applause. In the presence of this formidable assembly, the
two emperors were called upon to explain the situation of public
affairs: the precedency of rank was yielded to the royal birth of
Constantius; and though he was indifferently skilled in the arts of
rhetoric, he acquitted himself, under these difficult circumstances,
with firmness, dexterity, and eloquence. The first part of his oration
seemed to be pointed only against the tyrant of Gaul; but while he
tragically lamented the cruel murder of Constans, he insinuated, that
none, except a brother, could claim a right to the succession of his
brother. He displayed, with some complacency, the glories of his
Imperial race; and recalled to the memory of the troops the valor, the
triumphs, the liberality of the great Constantine, to whose sons they
had engaged their allegiance by an oath of fidelity, which the
ingratitude of his most favored servants had tempted them to violate.
The officers, who surrounded the tribunal, and were instructed to act
their part in this extraordinary scene, confessed the irresistible power
of reason and eloquence, by saluting the emperor Constantius as their
lawful sovereign. The contagion of loyalty and repentance was
communicated from rank to rank; till the plain of Sardica resounded with
the universal acclamation of "Away with these upstart usurpers! Long
life and victory to the son of Constantine! Under his banners alone we
will fight and conquer." The shout of thousands, their menacing
gestures, the fierce clashing of their arms, astonished and subdued the
courage of Vetranio, who stood, amidst the defection of his followers,
in anxious and silent suspense. Instead of embracing the last refuge of
generous despair, he tamely submitted to his fate; and taking the diadem
from his head, in the view of both armies fell prostrate at the feet of
his conqueror. Constantius used his victory with prudence and
moderation; and raising from the ground the aged suppliant, whom he
affected to style by the endearing name of Father, he gave him his hand
to descend from the throne. The city of Prusa was assigned for the exile
or retirement of the abdicated monarch, who lived six years in the
enjoyment of ease and affluence. He often expressed his grateful sense
of the goodness of Constantius, and, with a very amiable simplicity,
advised his benefactor to resign the sceptre of the world, and to seek
for content (where alone it could be found) in the peaceful obscurity of
a private condition.

The behavior of Constantius on this memorable occasion was celebrated
with some appearance of justice; and his courtiers compared the studied
orations which a Pericles or a Demosthenes addressed to the populace of
Athens, with the victorious eloquence which had persuaded an armed
multitude to desert and depose the object of their partial choice.  The
approaching contest with Magnentius was of a more serious and bloody
kind. The tyrant advanced by rapid marches to encounter Constantius, at
the head of a numerous army, composed of Gauls and Spaniards, of Franks
and Saxons; of those provincials who supplied the strength of the
legions, and of those barbarians who were dreaded as the most formidable
enemies of the republic. The fertile plains  of the Lower Pannonia,
between the Drave, the Save, and the Danube, presented a spacious
theatre; and the operations of the civil war were protracted during the
summer months by the skill or timidity of the combatants.  Constantius
had declared his intention of deciding the quarrel in the fields of
Cibalis, a name that would animate his troops by the remembrance of the
victory, which, on the same auspicious ground, had been obtained by the
arms of his father Constantine. Yet by the impregnable fortifications
with which the emperor encompassed his camp, he appeared to decline,
rather than to invite, a general engagement. It was the object of
Magnentius to tempt or to compel his adversary to relinquish this
advantageous position; and he employed, with that view, the various
marches, evolutions, and stratagems, which the knowledge of the art of
war could suggest to an experienced officer. He carried by assault the
important town of Siscia; made an attack on the city of Sirmium, which
lay in the rear of the Imperial camp, attempted to force a passage over
the Save into the eastern provinces of Illyricum; and cut in pieces a
numerous detachment, which he had allured into the narrow passes of
Adarne. During the greater part of the summer, the tyrant of Gaul showed
himself master of the field. The troops of Constantius were harassed and
dispirited; his reputation declined in the eye of the world; and his
pride condescended to solicit a treaty of peace, which would have
resigned to the assassin of Constans the sovereignty of the provinces
beyond the Alps. These offers were enforced by the eloquence of Philip
the Imperial ambassador; and the council as well as the army of
Magnentius were disposed to accept them. But the haughty usurper,
careless of the remonstrances of his friends, gave orders that Philip
should be detained as a captive, or, at least, as a hostage; while he
despatched an officer to reproach Constantius with the weakness of his
reign, and to insult him by the promise of a pardon if he would
instantly abdicate the purple. "That he should confide in the justice of
his cause, and the protection of an avenging Deity," was the only answer
which honor permitted the emperor to return. But he was so sensible of
the difficulties of his situation, that he no longer dared to retaliate
the indignity which had been offered to his representative. The
negotiation of Philip was not, however, ineffectual, since he determined
Sylvanus the Frank, a general of merit and reputation, to desert with a
considerable body of cavalry, a few days before the battle of Mursa.

The city of Mursa, or Essek, celebrated in modern times for a bridge of
boats, five miles in length, over the River Drave, and the adjacent
morasses,  has been always considered as a place of importance in the
wars of Hungary. Magnentius, directing his march towards Mursa, set fire
to the gates, and, by a sudden assault, had almost scaled the walls of
the town. The vigilance of the garrison extinguished the flames; the
approach of Constantius left him no time to continue the operations of
the siege; and the emperor soon removed the only obstacle that could
embarrass his motions, by forcing a body of troops which had taken post
in an adjoining amphitheatre. The field of battle round Mursa was a
naked and level plain: on this ground the army of Constantius formed,
with the Drave on their right; while their left, either from the nature
of their disposition, or from the superiority of their cavalry, extended
far beyond the right flank of Magnentius.  The troops on both sides
remained under arms, in anxious expectation, during the greatest part of
the morning; and the son of Constantine, after animating his soldiers by
an eloquent speech, retired into a church at some distance from the
field of battle, and committed to his generals the conduct of this
decisive day.  They deserved his confidence by the valor and military
skill which they exerted. They wisely began the action upon the left;
and advancing their whole wing of cavalry in an oblique line, they
suddenly wheeled it on the right flank of the enemy, which was
unprepared to resist the impetuosity of their charge. But the Romans of
the West soon rallied, by the habits of discipline; and the Barbarians
of Germany supported the renown of their national bravery. The
engagement soon became general; was maintained with various and singular
turns of fortune; and scarcely ended with the darkness of the night. The
signal victory which Constantius obtained is attributed to the arms of
his cavalry. His cuirassiers are described as so many massy statues of
steel, glittering with their scaly armor, and breaking with their
ponderous lances the firm array of the Gallic legions. As soon as the
legions gave way, the lighter and more active squadrons of the second
line rode sword in hand into the intervals, and completed the disorder.
In the mean while, the huge bodies of the Germans were exposed almost
naked to the dexterity of the Oriental archers; and whole troops of
those Barbarians were urged by anguish and despair to precipitate
themselves into the broad and rapid stream of the Drave.  The number of
the slain was computed at fifty-four thousand men, and the slaughter of
the conquerors was more considerable than that of the vanquished;  a
circumstance which proves the obstinacy of the contest, and justifies
the observation of an ancient writer, that the forces of the empire were
consumed in the fatal battle of Mursa, by the loss of a veteran army,
sufficient to defend the frontiers, or to add new triumphs to the glory
of Rome.  Notwithstanding the invectives of a servile orator, there is
not the least reason to believe that the tyrant deserted his own
standard in the beginning of the engagement. He seems to have displayed
the virtues of a general and of a soldier till the day was irrecoverably
lost, and his camp in the possession of the enemy. Magnentius then
consulted his safety, and throwing away the Imperial ornaments, escaped
with some difficulty from the pursuit of the light horse, who
incessantly followed his rapid flight from the banks of the Drave to the
foot of the Julian Alps.

The approach of winter supplied the indolence of Constantius with
specious reasons for deferring the prosecution of the war till the
ensuing spring. Magnentius had fixed his residence in the city of
Aquileia, and showed a seeming resolution to dispute the passage of the
mountains and morasses which fortified the confines of the Venetian
province. The surprisal of a castle in the Alps by the secret march of
the Imperialists, could scarcely have determined him to relinquish the
possession of Italy, if the inclinations of the people had supported the
cause of their tyrant.  But the memory of the cruelties exercised by his
ministers, after the unsuccessful revolt of Nepotian, had left a deep
impression of horror and resentment on the minds of the Romans. That
rash youth, the son of the princess Eutropia, and the nephew of
Constantine, had seen with indignation the sceptre of the West usurped
by a perfidious barbarian. Arming a desperate troop of slaves and
gladiators, he overpowered the feeble guard of the domestic tranquillity
of Rome, received the homage of the senate, and assuming the title of
Augustus, precariously reigned during a tumult of twenty-eight days. The
march of some regular forces put an end to his ambitious hopes: the
rebellion was extinguished in the blood of Nepotian, of his mother
Eutropia, and of his adherents; and the proscription was extended to all
who had contracted a fatal alliance with the name and family of
Constantine.  But as soon as Constantius, after the battle of Mursa,
became master of the sea-coast of Dalmatia, a band of noble exiles, who
had ventured to equip a fleet in some harbor of the Adriatic, sought
protection and revenge in his victorious camp. By their secret
intelligence with their countrymen, Rome and the Italian cities were
persuaded to display the banners of Constantius on their walls. The
grateful veterans, enriched by the liberality of the father, signalized
their gratitude and loyalty to the son. The cavalry, the legions, and
the auxiliaries of Italy, renewed their oath of allegiance to
Constantius; and the usurper, alarmed by the general desertion, was
compelled, with the remains of his faithful troops, to retire beyond the
Alps into the provinces of Gaul. The detachments, however, which were
ordered either to press or to intercept the flight of Magnentius,
conducted themselves with the usual imprudence of success; and allowed
him, in the plains of Pavia, an opportunity of turning on his pursuers,
and of gratifying his despair by the carnage of a useless victory.

The pride of Magnentius was reduced, by repeated misfortunes, to sue,
and to sue in vain, for peace. He first despatched a senator, in whose
abilities he confided, and afterwards several bishops, whose holy
character might obtain a more favorable audience, with the offer of
resigning the purple, and the promise of devoting the remainder of his
life to the service of the emperor. But Constantius, though he granted
fair terms of pardon and reconciliation to all who abandoned the
standard of rebellion,  avowed his inflexible resolution to inflict a
just punishment on the crimes of an assassin, whom he prepared to
overwhelm on every side by the effort of his victorious arms. An
Imperial fleet acquired the easy possession of Africa and Spain,
confirmed the wavering faith of the Moorish nations, and landed a
considerable force, which passed the Pyrenees, and advanced towards
Lyons, the last and fatal station of Magnentius.  The temper of the
tyrant, which was never inclined to clemency, was urged by distress to
exercise every act of oppression which could extort an immediate supply
from the cities of Gaul.  Their patience was at length exhausted; and
Treves, the seat of Prætorian government, gave the signal of revolt, by
shutting her gates against Decentius, who had been raised by his brother
to the rank either of Cæsar or of Augustus.  From Treves, Decentius was
obliged to retire to Sens, where he was soon surrounded by an army of
Germans, whom the pernicious arts of Constantius had introduced into the
civil dissensions of Rome.  In the mean time, the Imperial troops forced
the passages of the Cottian Alps, and in the bloody combat of Mount
Seleucus irrevocably fixed the title of rebels on the party of
Magnentius.  He was unable to bring another army into the field; the
fidelity of his guards was corrupted; and when he appeared in public to
animate them by his exhortations, he was saluted with a unanimous shout
of "Long live the emperor Constantius!" The tyrant, who perceived that
they were preparing to deserve pardon and rewards by the sacrifice of
the most obnoxious criminal, prevented their design by falling on his
sword;  a death more easy and more honorable than he could hope to
obtain from the hands of an enemy, whose revenge would have been colored
with the specious pretence of justice and fraternal piety. The example
of suicide was imitated by Decentius, who strangled himself on the news
of his brother's death. The author of the conspiracy, Marcellinus, had
long since disappeared in the battle of Mursa,  and the public
tranquillity was confirmed by the execution of the surviving leaders of
a guilty and unsuccessful faction. A severe inquisition was extended
over all who, either from choice or from compulsion, had been involved
in the cause of rebellion. Paul, surnamed Catena from his superior skill
in the judicial exercise of tyranny, * was sent to explore the latent
remains of the conspiracy in the remote province of Britain. The honest
indignation expressed by Martin, vice-præfect of the island, was
interpreted as an evidence of his own guilt; and the governor was urged
to the necessity of turning against his breast the sword with which he
had been provoked to wound the Imperial minister. The most innocent
subjects of the West were exposed to exile and confiscation, to death
and torture; and as the timid are always cruel, the mind of Constantius
was inaccessible to mercy.

Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. Part I.

Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Elevation And Death Of Gallus. -- Danger
And Elevation Of Julian. -- Sarmatian And Persian Wars. -- Victories Of
Julian In Gaul.

The divided provinces of the empire were again united by the victory of
Constantius; but as that feeble prince was destitute of personal merit,
either in peace or war; as he feared his generals, and distrusted his
ministers; the triumph of his arms served only to establish the reign of
the eunuchs over the Roman world. Those unhappy beings, the ancient
production of Oriental jealousy and despotism,  were introduced into
Greece and Rome by the contagion of Asiatic luxury.  Their progress was
rapid; and the eunuchs, who, in the time of Augustus, had been abhorred,
as the monstrous retinue of an Egyptian queen,  were gradually admitted
into the families of matrons, of senators, and of the emperors
themselves.  Restrained by the severe edicts of Domitian and Nerva,
cherished by the pride of Diocletian, reduced to an humble station by
the prudence of Constantine,  they multiplied in the palaces of his
degenerate sons, and insensibly acquired the knowledge, and at length
the direction, of the secret councils of Constantius. The aversion and
contempt which mankind had so uniformly entertained for that imperfect
species, appears to have degraded their character, and to have rendered
them almost as incapable as they were supposed to be, of conceiving any
generous sentiment, or of performing any worthy action.  But the eunuchs
were skilled in the arts of flattery and intrigue; and they alternately
governed the mind of Constantius by his fears, his indolence, and his
vanity.  Whilst he viewed in a deceitful mirror the fair appearance of
public prosperity, he supinely permitted them to intercept the
complaints of the injured provinces, to accumulate immense treasures by
the sale of justice and of honors; to disgrace the most important
dignities, by the promotion of those who had purchased at their hands
the powers of oppression,  and to gratify their resentment against the
few independent spirits, who arrogantly refused to solicit the
protection of slaves. Of these slaves the most distinguished was the
chamberlain Eusebius, who ruled the monarch and the palace with such
absolute sway, that Constantius, according to the sarcasm of an
impartial historian, possessed some credit with this haughty favorite.
By his artful suggestions, the emperor was persuaded to subscribe the
condemnation of the unfortunate Gallus, and to add a new crime to the
long list of unnatural murders which pollute the honor of the house of
Constantine.

When the two nephews of Constantine, Gallus and Julian, were saved from
the fury of the soldiers, the former was about twelve, and the latter
about six, years of age; and, as the eldest was thought to be of a
sickly constitution, they obtained with the less difficulty a precarious
and dependent life, from the affected pity of Constantius, who was
sensible that the execution of these helpless orphans would have been
esteemed, by all mankind, an act of the most deliberate cruelty.  *
Different cities of Ionia and Bithynia were assigned for the places of
their exile and education; but as soon as their growing years excited
the jealousy of the emperor, he judged it more prudent to secure those
unhappy youths in the strong castle of Macellum, near Cæsarea. The
treatment which they experienced during a six years' confinement, was
partly such as they could hope from a careful guardian, and partly such
as they might dread from a suspicious tyrant.  Their prison was an
ancient palace, the residence of the kings of Cappadocia; the situation
was pleasant, the buildings of stately, the enclosure spacious. They
pursued their studies, and practised their exercises, under the tuition
of the most skilful masters; and the numerous household appointed to
attend, or rather to guard, the nephews of Constantine, was not unworthy
of the dignity of their birth. But they could not disguise to themselves
that they were deprived of fortune, of freedom, and of safety; secluded
from the society of all whom they could trust or esteem, and condemned
to pass their melancholy hours in the company of slaves devoted to the
commands of a tyrant who had already injured them beyond the hope of
reconciliation. At length, however, the emergencies of the state
compelled the emperor, or rather his eunuchs, to invest Gallus, in the
twenty-fifth year of his age, with the title of Cæsar, and to cement
this political connection by his marriage with the princess Constantina.
After a formal interview, in which the two princes mutually engaged
their faith never to undertake any thing to the prejudice of each other,
they repaired without delay to their respective stations. Constantius
continued his march towards the West, and Gallus fixed his residence at
Antioch; from whence, with a delegated authority, he administered the
five great dioceses of the eastern præfecture.  In this fortunate
change, the new Cæsar was not unmindful of his brother Julian, who
obtained the honors of his rank, the appearances of liberty, and the
restitution of an ample patrimony.

The writers the most indulgent to the memory of Gallus, and even Julian
himself, though he wished to cast a veil over the frailties of his
brother, are obliged to confess that the Cæsar was incapable of
reigning. Transported from a prison to a throne, he possessed neither
genius nor application, nor docility to compensate for the want of
knowledge and experience. A temper naturally morose and violent, instead
of being corrected, was soured by solitude and adversity; the
remembrance of what he had endured disposed him to retaliation rather
than to sympathy; and the ungoverned sallies of his rage were often
fatal to those who approached his person, or were subject to his power.
Constantina, his wife, is described, not as a woman, but as one of the
infernal furies tormented with an insatiate thirst of human blood.
Instead of employing her influence to insinuate the mild counsels of
prudence and humanity, she exasperated the fierce passions of her
husband; and as she retained the vanity, though she had renounced, the
gentleness of her sex, a pearl necklace was esteemed an equivalent price
for the murder of an innocent and virtuous nobleman.  The cruelty of
Gallus was sometimes displayed in the undissembled violence of popular
or military executions; and was sometimes disguised by the abuse of law,
and the forms of judicial proceedings. The private houses of Antioch,
and the places of public resort, were besieged by spies and informers;
and the Cæsar himself, concealed in a plebeian habit, very frequently
condescended to assume that odious character. Every apartment of the
palace was adorned with the instruments of death and torture, and a
general consternation was diffused through the capital of Syria. The
prince of the East, as if he had been conscious how much he had to fear,
and how little he deserved to reign, selected for the objects of his
resentment the provincials accused of some imaginary treason, and his
own courtiers, whom with more reason he suspected of incensing, by their
secret correspondence, the timid and suspicious mind of Constantius. But
he forgot that he was depriving himself of his only support, the
affection of the people; whilst he furnished the malice of his enemies
with the arms of truth, and afforded the emperor the fairest pretence of
exacting the forfeit of his purple, and of his life.

As long as the civil war suspended the fate of the Roman world,
Constantius dissembled his knowledge of the weak and cruel
administration to which his choice had subjected the East; and the
discovery of some assassins, secretly despatched to Antioch by the
tyrant of Gaul, was employed to convince the public, that the emperor
and the Cæsar were united by the same interest, and pursued by the same
enemies.  But when the victory was decided in favor of Constantius, his
dependent colleague became less useful and less formidable. Every
circumstance of his conduct was severely and suspiciously examined, and
it was privately resolved, either to deprive Gallus of the purple, or at
least to remove him from the indolent luxury of Asia to the hardships
and dangers of a German war. The death of Theophilus, consular of the
province of Syria, who in a time of scarcity had been massacred by the
people of Antioch, with the connivance, and almost at the instigation,
of Gallus, was justly resented, not only as an act of wanton cruelty,
but as a dangerous insult on the supreme majesty of Constantius. Two
ministers of illustrious rank, Domitian the Oriental præfect, and
Montius, quæstor of the palace, were empowered by a special commission *
to visit and reform the state of the East. They were instructed to
behave towards Gallus with moderation and respect, and, by the gentlest
arts of persuasion, to engage him to comply with the invitation of his
brother and colleague. The rashness of the præfect disappointed these
prudent measures, and hastened his own ruin, as well as that of his
enemy. On his arrival at Antioch, Domitian passed disdainfully before
the gates of the palace, and alleging a slight pretence of
indisposition, continued several days in sullen retirement, to prepare
an inflammatory memorial, which he transmitted to the Imperial court.
Yielding at length to the pressing solicitations of Gallus, the præfect
condescended to take his seat in council; but his first step was to
signify a concise and haughty mandate, importing that the Cæsar should
immediately repair to Italy, and threatening that he himself would
punish his delay or hesitation, by suspending the usual allowance of his
household. The nephew and daughter of Constantine, who could ill brook
the insolence of a subject, expressed their resentment by instantly
delivering Domitian to the custody of a guard. The quarrel still
admitted of some terms of accommodation. They were rendered
impracticable by the imprudent behavior of Montius, a statesman whose
arts and experience were frequently betrayed by the levity of his
disposition.  The quæstor reproached Gallus in a haughty language, that
a prince who was scarcely authorized to remove a municipal magistrate,
should presume to imprison a Prætorian præfect; convoked a meeting of
the civil and military officers; and required them, in the name of their
sovereign, to defend the person and dignity of his representatives. By
this rash declaration of war, the impatient temper of Gallus was
provoked to embrace the most desperate counsels. He ordered his guards
to stand to their arms, assembled the populace of Antioch, and
recommended to their zeal the care of his safety and revenge. His
commands were too fatally obeyed. They rudely seized the præfect and the
quæstor, and tying their legs together with ropes, they dragged them
through the streets of the city, inflicted a thousand insults and a
thousand wounds on these unhappy victims, and at last precipitated their
mangled and lifeless bodies into the stream of the Orontes.

After such a deed, whatever might have been the designs of Gallus, it
was only in a field of battle that he could assert his innocence with
any hope of success. But the mind of that prince was formed of an equal
mixture of violence and weakness. Instead of assuming the title of
Augustus, instead of employing in his defence the troops and treasures
of the East, he suffered himself to be deceived by the affected
tranquillity of Constantius, who, leaving him the vain pageantry of a
court, imperceptibly recalled the veteran legions from the provinces of
Asia. But as it still appeared dangerous to arrest Gallus in his
capital, the slow and safer arts of dissimulation were practised with
success. The frequent and pressing epistles of Constantius were filled
with professions of confidence and friendship; exhorting the Cæsar to
discharge the duties of his high station, to relieve his colleague from
a part of the public cares, and to assist the West by his presence, his
counsels, and his arms. After so many reciprocal injuries, Gallus had
reason to fear and to distrust. But he had neglected the opportunities
of flight and of resistance; he was seduced by the flattering assurances
of the tribune Scudilo, who, under the semblance of a rough soldier,
disguised the most artful insinuation; and he depended on the credit of
his wife Constantina, till the unseasonable death of that princess
completed the ruin in which he had been involved by her impetuous
passions.

Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part II.

After a long delay, the reluctant Cæsar set forwards on his journey to
the Imperial court. From Antioch to Hadrianople, he traversed the wide
extent of his dominions with a numerous and stately train; and as he
labored to conceal his apprehensions from the world, and perhaps from
himself, he entertained the people of Constantinople with an exhibition
of the games of the circus. The progress of the journey might, however,
have warned him of the impending danger. In all the principal cities he
was met by ministers of confidence, commissioned to seize the offices of
government, to observe his motions, and to prevent the hasty sallies of
his despair. The persons despatched to secure the provinces which he
left behind, passed him with cold salutations, or affected disdain; and
the troops, whose station lay along the public road, were studiously
removed on his approach, lest they might be tempted to offer their
swords for the service of a civil war.  After Gallus had been permitted
to repose himself a few days at Hadrianople, he received a mandate,
expressed in the most haughty and absolute style, that his splendid
retinue should halt in that city, while the Cæsar himself, with only ten
post-carriages, should hasten to the Imperial residence at Milan. In
this rapid journey, the profound respect which was due to the brother
and colleague of Constantius, was insensibly changed into rude
familiarity; and Gallus, who discovered in the countenances of the
attendants that they already considered themselves as his guards, and
might soon be employed as his executioners, began to accuse his fatal
rashness, and to recollect, with terror and remorse, the conduct by
which he had provoked his fate. The dissimulation which had hitherto
been preserved, was laid aside at Petovio, * in Pannonia. He was
conducted to a palace in the suburbs, where the general Barbatio, with a
select band of soldiers, who could neither be moved by pity, nor
corrupted by rewards, expected the arrival of his illustrious victim. In
the close of the evening he was arrested, ignominiously stripped of the
ensigns of Cæsar, and hurried away to Pola, in Istria, a sequestered
prison, which had been so recently polluted with royal blood. The horror
which he felt was soon increased by the appearance of his implacable
enemy the eunuch Eusebius, who, with the assistance of a notary and a
tribune, proceeded to interrogate him concerning the administration of
the East. The Cæsar sank under the weight of shame and guilt, confessed
all the criminal actions and all the treasonable designs with which he
was charged; and by imputing them to the advice of his wife, exasperated
the indignation of Constantius, who reviewed with partial prejudice the
minutes of the examination. The emperor was easily convinced, that his
own safety was incompatible with the life of his cousin: the sentence of
death was signed, despatched, and executed; and the nephew of
Constantine, with his hands tied behind his back, was beheaded in prison
like the vilest malefactor.  Those who are inclined to palliate the
cruelties of Constantius, assert that he soon relented, and endeavored
to recall the bloody mandate; but that the second messenger, intrusted
with the reprieve, was detained by the eunuchs, who dreaded the
unforgiving temper of Gallus, and were desirous of reuniting to
theirempire the wealthy provinces of the East.

Besides the reigning emperor, Julian alone survived, of all the numerous
posterity of Constantius Chlorus. The misfortune of his royal birth
involved him in the disgrace of Gallus. From his retirement in the happy
country of Ionia, he was conveyed under a strong guard to the court of
Milan; where he languished above seven months, in the continual
apprehension of suffering the same ignominious death, which was daily
inflicted almost before his eyes, on the friends and adherents of his
persecuted family. His looks, his gestures, his silence, were
scrutinized with malignant curiosity, and he was perpetually assaulted
by enemies whom he had never offended, and by arts to which he was a
stranger.  But in the school of adversity, Julian insensibly acquired
the virtues of firmness and discretion. He defended his honor, as well
as his life, against the insnaring subtleties of the eunuchs, who
endeavored to extort some declaration of his sentiments; and whilst he
cautiously suppressed his grief and resentment, he nobly disdained to
flatter the tyrant, by any seeming approbation of his brother's murder.
Julian most devoutly ascribes his miraculous deliverance to the
protection of the gods, who had exempted his innocence from the sentence
of destruction pronounced by their justice against the impious house of
Constantine.  As the most effectual instrument of their providence, he
gratefully acknowledges the steady and generous friendship of the
empress Eusebia,  a woman of beauty and merit, who, by the ascendant
which she had gained over the mind of her husband, counterbalanced, in
some measure, the powerful conspiracy of the eunuchs. By the
intercession of his patroness, Julian was admitted into the Imperial
presence: he pleaded his cause with a decent freedom, he was heard with
favor; and, notwithstanding the efforts of his enemies, who urged the
danger of sparing an avenger of the blood of Gallus, the milder
sentiment of Eusebia prevailed in the council. But the effects of a
second interview were dreaded by the eunuchs; and Julian was advised to
withdraw for a while into the neighborhood of Milan, till the emperor
thought proper to assign the city of Athens for the place of his
honorable exile. As he had discovered, from his earliest youth, a
propensity, or rather passion, for the language, the manners, the
learning, and the religion of the Greeks, he obeyed with pleasure an
order so agreeable to his wishes. Far from the tumult of arms, and the
treachery of courts, he spent six months under the groves of the
academy, in a free intercourse with the philosophers of the age, who
studied to cultivate the genius, to encourage the vanity, and to inflame
the devotion of their royal pupil. Their labors were not unsuccessful;
and Julian inviolably preserved for Athens that tender regard which
seldom fails to arise in a liberal mind, from the recollection of the
place where it has discovered and exercised its growing powers. The
gentleness and affability of manners, which his temper suggested and his
situation imposed, insensibly engaged the affections of the strangers,
as well as citizens, with whom he conversed. Some of his fellow-students
might perhaps examine his behavior with an eye of prejudice and
aversion; but Julian established, in the schools of Athens, a general
prepossession in favor of his virtues and talents, which was soon
diffused over the Roman world.

Whilst his hours were passed in studious retirement, the empress,
resolute to achieve the generous design which she had undertaken, was
not unmindful of the care of his fortune. The death of the late Cæsar
had left Constantius invested with the sole command, and oppressed by
the accumulated weight, of a mighty empire. Before the wounds of civil
discord could be healed, the provinces of Gaul were overwhelmed by a
deluge of Barbarians. The Sarmatians no longer respected the barrier of
the Danube. The impunity of rapine had increased the boldness and
numbers of the wild Isaurians: those robbers descended from their craggy
mountains to ravage the adjacent country, and had even presumed, though
without success, to besiege the important city of Seleucia, which was
defended by a garrison of three Roman legions. Above all, the Persian
monarch, elated by victory, again threatened the peace of Asia, and the
presence of the emperor was indispensably required, both in the West and
in the East. For the first time, Constantius sincerely acknowledged,
that his single strength was unequal to such an extent of care and of
dominion.  Insensible to the voice of flattery, which assured him that
his all-powerful virtue, and celestial fortune, would still continue to
triumph over every obstacle, he listened with complacency to the advice
of Eusebia, which gratified his indolence, without offending his
suspicious pride. As she perceived that the remembrance of Gallus dwelt
on the emperor's mind, she artfully turned his attention to the opposite
characters of the two brothers, which from their infancy had been
compared to those of Domitian and of Titus.  She accustomed her husband
to consider Julian as a youth of a mild, unambitious disposition, whose
allegiance and gratitude might be secured by the gift of the purple, and
who was qualified to fill with honor a subordinate station, without
aspiring to dispute the commands, or to shade the glories, of his
sovereign and benefactor. After an obstinate, though secret struggle,
the opposition of the favorite eunuchs submitted to the ascendency of
the empress; and it was resolved that Julian, after celebrating his
nuptials with Helena, sister of Constantius, should be appointed, with
the title of Cæsar, to reign over the countries beyond the Alps.

Although the order which recalled him to court was probably accompanied
by some intimation of his approaching greatness, he appeals to the
people of Athens to witness his tears of undissembled sorrow, when he
was reluctantly torn away from his beloved retirement.  He trembled for
his life, for his fame, and even for his virtue; and his sole confidence
was derived from the persuasion, that Minerva inspired all his actions,
and that he was protected by an invisible guard of angels, whom for that
purpose she had borrowed from the Sun and Moon. He approached, with
horror, the palace of Milan; nor could the ingenuous youth conceal his
indignation, when he found himself accosted with false and servile
respect by the assassins of his family. Eusebia, rejoicing in the
success of her benevolent schemes, embraced him with the tenderness of a
sister; and endeavored, by the most soothing caresses, to dispel his
terrors, and reconcile him to his fortune. But the ceremony of shaving
his beard, and his awkward demeanor, when he first exchanged the cloak
of a Greek philosopher for the military habit of a Roman prince, amused,
during a few days, the levity of the Imperial court.

The emperors of the age of Constantine no longer deigned to consult with
the senate in the choice of a colleague; but they were anxious that
their nomination should be ratified by the consent of the army. On this
solemn occasion, the guards, with the other troops whose stations were
in the neighborhood of Milan, appeared under arms; and Constantius
ascended his lofty tribunal, holding by the hand his cousin Julian, who
entered the same day into the twenty-fifth year of his age.  In a
studied speech, conceived and delivered with dignity, the emperor
represented the various dangers which threatened the prosperity of the
republic, the necessity of naming a Cæsar for the administration of the
West, and his own intention, if it was agreeable to their wishes, of
rewarding with the honors of the purple the promising virtues of the
nephew of Constantine. The approbation of the soldiers was testified by
a respectful murmur; they gazed on the manly countenance of Julian, and
observed with pleasure, that the fire which sparkled in his eyes was
tempered by a modest blush, on being thus exposed, for the first time,
to the public view of mankind. As soon as the ceremony of his
investiture had been performed, Constantius addressed him with the tone
of authority which his superior age and station permitted him to assume;
and exhorting the new Cæsar to deserve, by heroic deeds, that sacred and
immortal name, the emperor gave his colleague the strongest assurances
of a friendship which should never be impaired by time, nor interrupted
by their separation into the most distant climes. As soon as the speech
was ended, the troops, as a token of applause, clashed their shields
against their knees;  while the officers who surrounded the tribunal
expressed, with decent reserve, their sense of the merits of the
representative of Constantius.

The two princes returned to the palace in the same chariot; and during
the slow procession, Julian repeated to himself a verse of his favorite
Homer, which he might equally apply to his fortune and to his fears.
The four-and-twenty days which the Cæsar spent at Milan after his
investiture, and the first months of his Gallic reign, were devoted to a
splendid but severe captivity; nor could the acquisition of honor
compensate for the loss of freedom.  His steps were watched, his
correspondence was intercepted; and he was obliged, by prudence, to
decline the visits of his most intimate friends. Of his former
domestics, four only were permitted to attend him; two pages, his
physician, and his librarian; the last of whom was employed in the care
of a valuable collection of books, the gift of the empress, who studied
the inclinations as well as the interest of her friend. In the room of
these faithful servants, a household was formed, such indeed as became
the dignity of a Cæsar; but it was filled with a crowd of slaves,
destitute, and perhaps incapable, of any attachment for their new
master, to whom, for the most part, they were either unknown or
suspected. His want of experience might require the assistance of a wise
council; but the minute instructions which regulated the service of his
table, and the distribution of his hours, were adapted to a youth still
under the discipline of his preceptors, rather than to the situation of
a prince intrusted with the conduct of an important war. If he aspired
to deserve the esteem of his subjects, he was checked by the fear of
displeasing his sovereign; and even the fruits of his marriage-bed were
blasted by the jealous artifices of Eusebia  herself, who, on this
occasion alone, seems to have been unmindful of the tenderness of her
sex, and the generosity of her character. The memory of his father and
of his brothers reminded Julian of his own danger, and his apprehensions
were increased by the recent and unworthy fate of Sylvanus. In the
summer which preceded his own elevation, that general had been chosen to
deliver Gaul from the tyranny of the Barbarians; but Sylvanus soon
discovered that he had left his most dangerous enemies in the Imperial
court. A dexterous informer, countenanced by several of the principal
ministers, procured from him some recommendatory letters; and erasing
the whole of the contents, except the signature, filled up the vacant
parchment with matters of high and treasonable import. By the industry
and courage of his friends, the fraud was however detected, and in a
great council of the civil and military officers, held in the presence
of the emperor himself, the innocence of Sylvanus was publicly
acknowledged. But the discovery came too late; the report of the
calumny, and the hasty seizure of his estate, had already provoked the
indignant chief to the rebellion of which he was so unjustly accused. He
assumed the purple at his head-quarters of Cologne, and his active
powers appeared to menace Italy with an invasion, and Milan with a
siege. In this emergency, Ursicinus, a general of equal rank, regained,
by an act of treachery, the favor which he had lost by his eminent
services in the East. Exasperated, as he might speciously allege, by the
injuries of a similar nature, he hastened with a few followers to join
the standard, and to betray the confidence, of his too credulous friend.
After a reign of only twenty-eight days, Sylvanus was assassinated: the
soldiers who, without any criminal intention, had blindly followed the
example of their leader, immediately returned to their allegiance; and
the flatterers of Constantius celebrated the wisdom and felicity of the
monarch who had extinguished a civil war without the hazard of a battle.

The protection of the Rhætian frontier, and the persecution of the
Catholic church, detained Constantius in Italy above eighteen months
after the departure of Julian. Before the emperor returned into the
East, he indulged his pride and curiosity in a visit to the ancient
capital.  He proceeded from Milan to Rome along the Æmilian and
Flaminian ways, and as soon as he approached within forty miles of the
city, the march of a prince who had never vanquished a foreign enemy,
assumed the appearance of a triumphal procession. His splendid train was
composed of all the ministers of luxury; but in a time of profound
peace, he was encompassed by the glittering arms of the numerous
squadrons of his guards and cuirassiers. Their streaming banners of
silk, embossed with gold, and shaped in the form of dragons, waved round
the person of the emperor. Constantius sat alone in a lofty car,
resplendent with gold and precious gems; and, except when he bowed his
head to pass under the gates of the cities, he affected a stately
demeanor of inflexible, and, as it might seem, of insensible gravity.
The severe discipline of the Persian youth had been introduced by the
eunuchs into the Imperial palace; and such were the habits of patience
which they had inculcated, that during a slow and sultry march, he was
never seen to move his hand towards his face, or to turn his eyes either
to the right or to the left. He was received by the magistrates and
senate of Rome; and the emperor surveyed, with attention, the civil
honors of the republic, and the consular images of the noble families.
The streets were lined with an innumerable multitude. Their repeated
acclamations expressed their joy at beholding, after an absence of
thirty-two years, the sacred person of their sovereign, and Constantius
himself expressed, with some pleasantry, he affected surprise that the
human race should thus suddenly be collected on the same spot. The son
of Constantine was lodged in the ancient palace of Augustus: he presided
in the senate, harangued the people from the tribunal which Cicero had
so often ascended, assisted with unusual courtesy at the games of the
Circus, and accepted the crowns of gold, as well as the Panegyrics which
had been prepared for the ceremony by the deputies of the principal
cities. His short visit of thirty days was employed in viewing the
monuments of art and power which were scattered over the seven hills and
the interjacent valleys. He admired the awful majesty of the Capitol,
the vast extent of the baths of Caracalla and Diocletian, the severe
simplicity of the Pantheon, the massy greatness of the amphitheatre of
Titus, the elegant architecture of the theatre of Pompey and the Temple
of Peace, and, above all, the stately structure of the Forum and column
of Trajan; acknowledging that the voice of fame, so prone to invent and
to magnify, had made an inadequate report of the metropolis of the
world. The traveller, who has contemplated the ruins of ancient Rome,
may conceive some imperfect idea of the sentiments which they must have
inspired when they reared their heads in the splendor of unsullied
beauty.

[See The Pantheon: The severe simplicity of the Pantheon]

The satisfaction which Constantius had received from this journey
excited him to the generous emulation of bestowing on the Romans some
memorial of his own gratitude and munificence. His first idea was to
imitate the equestrian and colossal statue which he had seen in the
Forum of Trajan; but when he had maturely weighed the difficulties of
the execution,  he chose rather to embellish the capital by the gift of
an Egyptian obelisk. In a remote but polished age, which seems to have
preceded the invention of alphabetical writing, a great number of these
obelisks had been erected, in the cities of Thebes and Heliopolis, by
the ancient sovereigns of Egypt, in a just confidence that the
simplicity of their form, and the hardness of their substance, would
resist the injuries of time and violence.  Several of these
extraordinary columns had been transported to Rome by Augustus and his
successors, as the most durable monuments of their power and victory;
but there remained one obelisk, which, from its size or sanctity,
escaped for a long time the rapacious vanity of the conquerors. It was
designed by Constantine to adorn his new city;  and, after being removed
by his order from the pedestal where it stood before the Temple of the
Sun at Heliopolis, was floated down the Nile to Alexandria. The death of
Constantine suspended the execution of his purpose, and this obelisk was
destined by his son to the ancient capital of the empire. A vessel of
uncommon strength and capaciousness was provided to convey this enormous
weight of granite, at least a hundred and fifteen feet in length, from
the banks of the Nile to those of the Tyber. The obelisk of Constantius
was landed about three miles from the city, and elevated, by the efforts
of art and labor, in the great Circus of Rome.

The departure of Constantius from Rome was hastened by the alarming
intelligence of the distress and danger of the Illyrian provinces. The
distractions of civil war, and the irreparable loss which the Roman
legions had sustained in the battle of Mursa, exposed those countries,
almost without defence, to the light cavalry of the Barbarians; and
particularly to the inroads of the Quadi, a fierce and powerful nation,
who seem to have exchanged the institutions of Germany for the arms and
military arts of their Sarmatian allies.  The garrisons of the frontiers
were insufficient to check their progress; and the indolent monarch was
at length compelled to assemble, from the extremities of his dominions,
the flower of the Palatine troops, to take the field in person, and to
employ a whole campaign, with the preceding autumn and the ensuing
spring, in the serious prosecution of the war. The emperor passed the
Danube on a bridge of boats, cut in pieces all that encountered his
march, penetrated into the heart of the country of the Quadi, and
severely retaliated the calamities which they had inflicted on the Roman
province. The dismayed Barbarians were soon reduced to sue for peace:
they offered the restitution of his captive subjects as an atonement for
the past, and the noblest hostages as a pledge of their future conduct.
The generous courtesy which was shown to the first among their
chieftains who implored the clemency of Constantius, encouraged the more
timid, or the more obstinate, to imitate their example; and the Imperial
camp was crowded with the princes and ambassadors of the most distant
tribes, who occupied the plains of the Lesser Poland, and who might have
deemed themselves secure behind the lofty ridge of the Carpathian
Mountains. While Constantius gave laws to the Barbarians beyond the
Danube, he distinguished, with specious compassion, the Sarmatian
exiles, who had been expelled from their native country by the rebellion
of their slaves, and who formed a very considerable accession to the
power of the Quadi. The emperor, embracing a generous but artful system
of policy, released the Sarmatians from the bands of this humiliating
dependence, and restored them, by a separate treaty, to the dignity of a
nation united under the government of a king, the friend and ally of the
republic. He declared his resolution of asserting the justice of their
cause, and of securing the peace of the provinces by the extirpation, or
at least the banishment, of the Limigantes, whose manners were still
infected with the vices of their servile origin. The execution of this
design was attended with more difficulty than glory. The territory of
the Limigantes was protected against the Romans by the Danube, against
the hostile Barbarians by the Teyss. The marshy lands which lay between
those rivers, and were often covered by their inundations, formed an
intricate wilderness, pervious only to the inhabitants, who were
acquainted with its secret paths and inaccessible fortresses. On the
approach of Constantius, the Limigantes tried the efficacy of prayers,
of fraud, and of arms; but he sternly rejected their supplications,
defeated their rude stratagems, and repelled with skill and firmness the
efforts of their irregular valor. One of their most warlike tribes,
established in a small island towards the conflux of the Teyss and the
Danube, consented to pass the river with the intention of surprising the
emperor during the security of an amicable conference. They soon became
the victims of the perfidy which they meditated. Encompassed on every
side, trampled down by the cavalry, slaughtered by the swords of the
legions, they disdained to ask for mercy; and with an undaunted
countenance, still grasped their weapons in the agonies of death. After
this victory, a considerable body of Romans was landed on the opposite
banks of the Danube; the Taifalæ, a Gothic tribe engaged in the service
of the empire, invaded the Limigantes on the side of the Teyss; and
their former masters, the free Sarmatians, animated by hope and revenge,
penetrated through the hilly country, into the heart of their ancient
possessions. A general conflagration revealed the huts of the
Barbarians, which were seated in the depth of the wilderness; and the
soldier fought with confidence on marshy ground, which it was dangerous
for him to tread. In this extremity, the bravest of the Limigantes were
resolved to die in arms, rather than to yield: but the milder sentiment,
enforced by the authority of their elders, at length prevailed; and the
suppliant crowd, followed by their wives and children, repaired to the
Imperial camp, to learn their fate from the mouth of the conqueror.
After celebrating his own clemency, which was still inclined to pardon
their repeated crimes, and to spare the remnant of a guilty nation,
Constantius assigned for the place of their exile a remote country,
where they might enjoy a safe and honorable repose. The Limigantes
obeyed with reluctance; but before they could reach, at least before
they could occupy, their destined habitations, they returned to the
banks of the Danube, exaggerating the hardships of their situation, and
requesting, with fervent professions of fidelity, that the emperor would
grant them an undisturbed settlement within the limits of the Roman
provinces. Instead of consulting his own experience of their incurable
perfidy, Constantius listened to his flatterers, who were ready to
represent the honor and advantage of accepting a colony of soldiers, at
a time when it was much easier to obtain the pecuniary contributions
than the military service of the subjects of the empire. The Limigantes
were permitted to pass the Danube; and the emperor gave audience to the
multitude in a large plain near the modern city of Buda. They surrounded
the tribunal, and seemed to hear with respect an oration full of
mildness and dignity when one of the Barbarians, casting his shoe into
the air, exclaimed with a loud voice, Marha! Marha!* a word of defiance,
which was received as a signal of the tumult. They rushed with fury to
seize the person of the emperor; his royal throne and golden couch were
pillaged by these rude hands; but the faithful defence of his guards,
who died at his feet, allowed him a moment to mount a fleet horse, and
to escape from the confusion. The disgrace which had been incurred by a
treacherous surprise was soon retrieved by the numbers and discipline of
the Romans; and the combat was only terminated by the extinction of the
name and nation of the Limigantes. The free Sarmatians were reinstated
in the possession of their ancient seats; and although Constantius
distrusted the levity of their character, he entertained some hopes that
a sense of gratitude might influence their future conduct. He had
remarked the lofty stature and obsequious demeanor of Zizais, one of the
noblest of their chiefs. He conferred on him the title of King; and
Zizais proved that he was not unworthy to reign, by a sincere and
lasting attachment to the interests of his benefactor, who, after this
splendid success, received the name of Sarmaticusfrom the acclamations
of his victorious army.

Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part III.

While the Roman emperor and the Persian monarch, at the distance of
three thousand miles, defended their extreme limits against the
Barbarians of the Danube and of the Oxus, their intermediate frontier
experienced the vicissitudes of a languid war, and a precarious truce.
Two of the eastern ministers of Constantius, the Prætorian præfect
Musonian, whose abilities were disgraced by the want of truth and
integrity, and Cassian, duke of Mesopotamia, a hardy and veteran
soldier, opened a secret negotiation with the satrap Tamsapor.   These
overtures of peace, translated into the servile and flattering language
of Asia, were transmitted to the camp of the Great King; who resolved to
signify, by an ambassador, the terms which he was inclined to grant to
the suppliant Romans. Narses, whom he invested with that character, was
honorably received in his passage through Antioch and Constantinople: he
reached Sirmium after a long journey, and, at his first audience,
respectfully unfolded the silken veil which covered the haughty epistle
of his sovereign. Sapor, King of Kings, and Brother of the Sun and Moon,
(such were the lofty titles affected by Oriental vanity,) expressed his
satisfaction that his brother, Constantius Cæsar, had been taught wisdom
by adversity. As the lawful successor of Darius Hystaspes, Sapor
asserted, that the River Strymon, in Macedonia, was the true and ancient
boundary of his empire; declaring, however, that as an evidence of his
moderation, he would content himself with the provinces of Armenia and
Mesopotamia, which had been fraudulently extorted from his ancestors. He
alleged, that, without the restitution of these disputed countries, it
was impossible to establish any treaty on a solid and permanent basis;
and he arrogantly threatened, that if his ambassador returned in vain,
he was prepared to take the field in the spring, and to support the
justice of his cause by the strength of his invincible arms. Narses, who
was endowed with the most polite and amiable manners, endeavored, as far
as was consistent with his duty, to soften the harshness of the message.
Both the style and substance were maturely weighed in the Imperial
council, and he was dismissed with the following answer: "Constantius
had a right to disclaim the officiousness of his ministers, who had
acted without any specific orders from the throne: he was not, however,
averse to an equal and honorable treaty; but it was highly indecent, as
well as absurd, to propose to the sole and victorious emperor of the
Roman world, the same conditions of peace which he had indignantly
rejected at the time when his power was contracted within the narrow
limits of the East: the chance of arms was uncertain; and Sapor should
recollect, that if the Romans had sometimes been vanquished in battle,
they had almost always been successful in the event of the war." A few
days after the departure of Narses, three ambassadors were sent to the
court of Sapor, who was already returned from the Scythian expedition to
his ordinary residence of Ctesiphon. A count, a notary, and a sophist,
had been selected for this important commission; and Constantius, who
was secretly anxious for the conclusion of the peace, entertained some
hopes that the dignity of the first of these ministers, the dexterity of
the second, and the rhetoric of the third,  would persuade the Persian
monarch to abate of the rigor of his demands. But the progress of their
negotiation was opposed and defeated by the hostile arts of Antoninus,
a Roman subject of Syria, who had fled from oppression, and was admitted
into the councils of Sapor, and even to the royal table, where,
according to the custom of the Persians, the most important business was
frequently discussed.  The dexterous fugitive promoted his interest by
the same conduct which gratified his revenge. He incessantly urged the
ambition of his new master to embrace the favorable opportunity when the
bravest of the Palatine troops were employed with the emperor in a
distant war on the Danube. He pressed Sapor to invade the exhausted and
defenceless provinces of the East, with the numerous armies of Persia,
now fortified by the alliance and accession of the fiercest Barbarians.
The ambassadors of Rome retired without success, and a second embassy,
of a still more honorable rank, was detained in strict confinement, and
threatened either with death or exile.

The military historian,  who was himself despatched to observe the army
of the Persians, as they were preparing to construct a bridge of boats
over the Tigris, beheld from an eminence the plain of Assyria, as far as
the edge of the horizon, covered with men, with horses, and with arms.
Sapor appeared in the front, conspicuous by the splendor of his purple.
On his left hand, the place of honor among the Orientals, Grumbates,
king of the Chionites, displayed the stern countenance of an aged and
renowned warrior. The monarch had reserved a similar place on his right
hand for the king of the Albanians, who led his independent tribes from
the shores of the Caspian. * The satraps and generals were distributed
according to their several ranks, and the whole army, besides the
numerous train of Oriental luxury, consisted of more than one hundred
thousand effective men, inured to fatigue, and selected from the bravest
nations of Asia. The Roman deserter, who in some measure guided the
councils of Sapor, had prudently advised, that, instead of wasting the
summer in tedious and difficult sieges, he should march directly to the
Euphrates, and press forwards without delay to seize the feeble and
wealthy metropolis of Syria. But the Persians were no sooner advanced
into the plains of Mesopotamia, than they discovered that every
precaution had been used which could retard their progress, or defeat
their design. The inhabitants, with their cattle, were secured in places
of strength, the green forage throughout the country was set on fire,
the fords of the rivers were fortified by sharp stakes; military engines
were planted on the opposite banks, and a seasonable swell of the waters
of the Euphrates deterred the Barbarians from attempting the ordinary
passage of the bridge of Thapsacus. Their skilful guide, changing his
plan of operations, then conducted the army by a longer circuit, but
through a fertile territory, towards the head of the Euphrates, where
the infant river is reduced to a shallow and accessible stream. Sapor
overlooked, with prudent disdain, the strength of Nisibis; but as he
passed under the walls of Amida, he resolved to try whether the majesty
of his presence would not awe the garrison into immediate submission.
The sacrilegious insult of a random dart, which glanced against the
royal tiara, convinced him of his error; and the indignant monarch
listened with impatience to the advice of his ministers, who conjured
him not to sacrifice the success of his ambition to the gratification of
his resentment. The following day Grumbates advanced towards the gates
with a select body of troops, and required the instant surrender of the
city, as the only atonement which could be accepted for such an act of
rashness and insolence. His proposals were answered by a general
discharge, and his only son, a beautiful and valiant youth, was pierced
through the heart by a javelin, shot from one of the balistæ. The
funeral of the prince of the Chionites was celebrated according to the
rites of the country; and the grief of his aged father was alleviated by
the solemn promise of Sapor, that the guilty city of Amida should serve
as a funeral pile to expiate the death, and to perpetuate the memory, of
his son.

The ancient city of Amid or Amida,  which sometimes assumes the
provincial appellation of Diarbekir,  is advantageously situate in a
fertile plain, watered by the natural and artificial channels of the
Tigris, of which the least inconsiderable stream bends in a semicircular
form round the eastern part of the city. The emperor Constantius had
recently conferred on Amida the honor of his own name, and the
additional fortifications of strong walls and lofty towers. It was
provided with an arsenal of military engines, and the ordinary garrison
had been reenforced to the amount of seven legions, when the place was
invested by the arms of Sapor.  His first and most sanguine hopes
depended on the success of a general assault. To the several nations
which followed his standard, their respective posts were assigned; the
south to the Vertæ; the north to the Albanians; the east to the
Chionites, inflamed with grief and indignation; the west to the
Segestans, the bravest of his warriors, who covered their front with a
formidable line of Indian elephants.  The Persians, on every side,
supported their efforts, and animated their courage; and the monarch
himself, careless of his rank and safety, displayed, in the prosecution
of the siege, the ardor of a youthful soldier. After an obstinate
combat, the Barbarians were repulsed; they incessantly returned to the
charge; they were again driven back with a dreadful slaughter, and two
rebel legions of Gauls, who had been banished into the East, signalized
their undisciplined courage by a nocturnal sally into the heart of the
Persian camp. In one of the fiercest of these repeated assaults, Amida
was betrayed by the treachery of a deserter, who indicated to the
Barbarians a secret and neglected staircase, scooped out of the rock
that hangs over the stream of the Tigris. Seventy chosen archers of the
royal guard ascended in silence to the third story of a lofty tower,
which commanded the precipice; they elevated on high the Persian banner,
the signal of confidence to the assailants, and of dismay to the
besieged; and if this devoted band could have maintained their post a
few minutes longer, the reduction of the place might have been purchased
by the sacrifice of their lives. After Sapor had tried, without success,
the efficacy of force and of stratagem, he had recourse to the slower
but more certain operations of a regular siege, in the conduct of which
he was instructed by the skill of the Roman deserters. The trenches were
opened at a convenient distance, and the troops destined for that
service advanced under the portable cover of strong hurdles, to fill up
the ditch, and undermine the foundations of the walls. Wooden towers
were at the same time constructed, and moved forwards on wheels, till
the soldiers, who were provided with every species of missile weapons,
could engage almost on level ground with the troops who defended the
rampart. Every mode of resistance which art could suggest, or courage
could execute, was employed in the defence of Amida, and the works of
Sapor were more than once destroyed by the fire of the Romans. But the
resources of a besieged city may be exhausted. The Persians repaired
their losses, and pushed their approaches; a large preach was made by
the battering-ram, and the strength of the garrison, wasted by the sword
and by disease, yielded to the fury of the assault. The soldiers, the
citizens, their wives, their children, all who had not time to escape
through the opposite gate, were involved by the conquerors in a
promiscuous massacre.

But the ruin of Amida was the safety of the Roman provinces. As soon as
the first transports of victory had subsided, Sapor was at leisure to
reflect, that to chastise a disobedient city, he had lost the flower of
his troops, and the most favorable season for conquest.  Thirty thousand
of his veterans had fallen under the walls of Amida, during the
continuance of a siege, which lasted seventy-three days; and the
disappointed monarch returned to his capital with affected triumph and
secret mortification. It is more than probable, that the inconstancy of
his Barbarian allies was tempted to relinquish a war in which they had
encountered such unexpected difficulties; and that the aged king of the
Chionites, satiated with revenge, turned away with horror from a scene
of action where he had been deprived of the hope of his family and
nation. The strength as well as the spirit of the army with which Sapor
took the field in the ensuing spring was no longer equal to the
unbounded views of his ambition. Instead of aspiring to the conquest of
the East, he was obliged to content himself with the reduction of two
fortified cities of Mesopotamia, Singara and Bezabde;  the one situate
in the midst of a sandy desert, the other in a small peninsula,
surrounded almost on every side by the deep and rapid stream of the
Tigris. Five Roman legions, of the diminutive size to which they had
been reduced in the age of Constantine, were made prisoners, and sent
into remote captivity on the extreme confines of Persia. After
dismantling the walls of Singara, the conqueror abandoned that solitary
and sequestered place; but he carefully restored the fortifications of
Bezabde, and fixed in that important post a garrison or colony of
veterans; amply supplied with every means of defence, and animated by
high sentiments of honor and fidelity. Towards the close of the
campaign, the arms of Sapor incurred some disgrace by an unsuccessful
enterprise against Virtha, or Tecrit, a strong, or, as it was
universally esteemed till the age of Tamerlane, an impregnable fortress
of the independent Arabs.

The defence of the East against the arms of Sapor required and would
have exercised, the abilities of the most consummate general; and it
seemed fortunate for the state, that it was the actual province of the
brave Ursicinus, who alone deserved the confidence of the soldiers and
people. In the hour of danger,  Ursicinus was removed from his station
by the intrigues of the eunuchs; and the military command of the East
was bestowed, by the same influence, on Sabinian, a wealthy and subtle
veteran, who had attained the infirmities, without acquiring the
experience, of age. By a second order, which issued from the same
jealous and inconstant councils, Ursicinus was again despatched to the
frontier of Mesopotamia, and condemned to sustain the labors of a war,
the honors of which had been transferred to his unworthy rival. Sabinian
fixed his indolent station under the walls of Edessa; and while he
amused himself with the idle parade of military exercise, and moved to
the sound of flutes in the Pyrrhic dance, the public defence was
abandoned to the boldness and diligence of the former general of the
East. But whenever Ursicinus recommended any vigorous plan of
operations; when he proposed, at the head of a light and active army, to
wheel round the foot of the mountains, to intercept the convoys of the
enemy, to harass the wide extent of the Persian lines, and to relieve
the distress of Amida; the timid and envious commander alleged, that he
was restrained by his positive orders from endangering the safety of the
troops. Amida was at length taken; its bravest defenders, who had
escaped the sword of the Barbarians, died in the Roman camp by the hand
of the executioner: and Ursicinus himself, after supporting the disgrace
of a partial inquiry, was punished for the misconduct of Sabinian by the
loss of his military rank. But Constantius soon experienced the truth of
the prediction which honest indignation had extorted from his injured
lieutenant, that as long as such maxims of government were suffered to
prevail, the emperor himself would find it is no easy task to defend his
eastern dominions from the invasion of a foreign enemy. When he had
subdued or pacified the Barbarians of the Danube, Constantius proceeded
by slow marches into the East; and after he had wept over the smoking
ruins of Amida, he formed, with a powerful army, the siege of Bezabde.
The walls were shaken by the reiterated efforts of the most enormous of
the battering-rams; the town was reduced to the last extremity; but it
was still defended by the patient and intrepid valor of the garrison,
till the approach of the rainy season obliged the emperor to raise the
siege, and ingloriously to retreat into his winter quarters at Antioch.
The pride of Constantius, and the ingenuity of his courtiers, were at a
loss to discover any materials for panegyric in the events of the
Persian war; while the glory of his cousin Julian, to whose military
command he had intrusted the provinces of Gaul, was proclaimed to the
world in the simple and concise narrative of his exploits.

In the blind fury of civil discord, Constantius had abandoned to the
Barbarians of Germany the countries of Gaul, which still acknowledged
the authority of his rival. A numerous swarm of Franks and Alemanni were
invited to cross the Rhine by presents and promises, by the hopes of
spoil, and by a perpetual grant of all the territories which they should
be able to subdue.  But the emperor, who for a temporary service had
thus imprudently provoked the rapacious spirit of the Barbarians, soon
discovered and lamented the difficulty of dismissing these formidable
allies, after they had tasted the richness of the Roman soil. Regardless
of the nice distinction of loyalty and rebellion, these undisciplined
robbers treated as their natural enemies all the subjects of the empire,
who possessed any property which they were desirous of acquiring
Forty-five flourishing cities, Tongres, Cologne, Treves, Worms, Spires,
Strasburgh, &c., besides a far greater number of towns and villages,
were pillaged, and for the most part reduced to ashes. The Barbarians of
Germany, still faithful to the maxims of their ancestors, abhorred the
confinement of walls, to which they applied the odious names of prisons
and sepulchres; and fixing their independent habitations on the banks of
rivers, the Rhine, the Moselle, and the Meuse, they secured themselves
against the danger of a surprise, by a rude and hasty fortification of
large trees, which were felled and thrown across the roads. The Alemanni
were established in the modern countries of Alsace and Lorraine; the
Franks occupied the island of the Batavians, together with an extensive
district of Brabant, which was then known by the appellation of
Toxandria,  and may deserve to be considered as the original seat of
their Gallic monarchy.  From the sources, to the mouth, of the Rhine,
the conquests of the Germans extended above forty miles to the west of
that river, over a country peopled by colonies of their own name and
nation: and the scene of their devastations was three times more
extensive than that of their conquests. At a still greater distance the
open towns of Gaul were deserted, and the inhabitants of the fortified
cities, who trusted to their strength and vigilance, were obliged to
content themselves with such supplies of corn as they could raise on the
vacant land within the enclosure of their walls. The diminished legions,
destitute of pay and provisions, of arms and discipline, trembled at the
approach, and even at the name, of the Barbarians.

Chapter XIX: Constantius Sole Emperor. -- Part IV.

Under these melancholy circumstances, an unexperienced youth was
appointed to save and to govern the provinces of Gaul, or rather, as he
expressed it himself, to exhibit the vain image of Imperial greatness.
The retired scholastic education of Julian, in which he had been more
conversant with books than with arms, with the dead than with the
living, left him in profound ignorance of the practical arts of war and
government; and when he awkwardly repeated some military exercise which
it was necessary for him to learn, he exclaimed with a sigh, "O Plato,
Plato, what a task for a philosopher!" Yet even this speculative
philosophy, which men of business are too apt to despise, had filled the
mind of Julian with the noblest precepts and the most shining examples;
had animated him with the love of virtue, the desire of fame, and the
contempt of death. The habits of temperance recommended in the schools,
are still more essential in the severe discipline of a camp. The simple
wants of nature regulated the measure of his food and sleep. Rejecting
with disdain the delicacies provided for his table, he satisfied his
appetite with the coarse and common fare which was allotted to the
meanest soldiers. During the rigor of a Gallic winter, he never suffered
a fire in his bed-chamber; and after a short and interrupted slumber, he
frequently rose in the middle of the night from a carpet spread on the
floor, to despatch any urgent business, to visit his rounds, or to steal
a few moments for the prosecution of his favorite studies.  The precepts
of eloquence, which he had hitherto practised on fancied topics of
declamation, were more usefully applied to excite or to assuage the
passions of an armed multitude: and although Julian, from his early
habits of conversation and literature, was more familiarly acquainted
with the beauties of the Greek language, he had attained a competent
knowledge of the Latin tongue.  Since Julian was not originally designed
for the character of a legislator, or a judge, it is probable that the
civil jurisprudence of the Romans had not engaged any considerable share
of his attention: but he derived from his philosophic studies an
inflexible regard for justice, tempered by a disposition to clemency;
the knowledge of the general principles of equity and evidence, and the
faculty of patiently investigating the most intricate and tedious
questions which could be proposed for his discussion. The measures of
policy, and the operations of war, must submit to the various accidents
of circumstance and character, and the unpractised student will often be
perplexed in the application of the most perfect theory. But in the
acquisition of this important science, Julian was assisted by the active
vigor of his own genius, as well as by the wisdom and experience of
Sallust, and officer of rank, who soon conceived a sincere attachment
for a prince so worthy of his friendship; and whose incorruptible
integrity was adorned by the talent of insinuating the harshest truths
without wounding the delicacy of a royal ear.

Immediately after Julian had received the purple at Milan, he was sent
into Gaul with a feeble retinue of three hundred and sixty soldiers. At
Vienna, where he passed a painful and anxious winter in the hands of
those ministers to whom Constantius had intrusted the direction of his
conduct, the Cæsar was informed of the siege and deliverance of Autun.
That large and ancient city, protected only by a ruined wall and
pusillanimous garrison, was saved by the generous resolution of a few
veterans, who resumed their arms for the defence of their country. In
his march from Autun, through the heart of the Gallic provinces, Julian
embraced with ardor the earliest opportunity of signalizing his courage.
At the head of a small body of archers and heavy cavalry, he preferred
the shorter but the more dangerous of two roads; * and sometimes
eluding, and sometimes resisting, the attacks of the Barbarians, who
were masters of the field, he arrived with honor and safety at the camp
near Rheims, where the Roman troops had been ordered to assemble. The
aspect of their young prince revived the drooping spirits of the
soldiers, and they marched from Rheims in search of the enemy, with a
confidence which had almost proved fatal to them. The Alemanni,
familiarized to the knowledge of the country, secretly collected their
scattered forces, and seizing the opportunity of a dark and rainy day,
poured with unexpected fury on the rear-guard of the Romans. Before the
inevitable disorder could be remedied, two legions were destroyed; and
Julian was taught by experience that caution and vigilance are the most
important lessons of the art of war. In a second and more successful
action, * he recovered and established his military fame; but as the
agility of the Barbarians saved them from the pursuit, his victory was
neither bloody nor decisive. He advanced, however, to the banks of the
Rhine, surveyed the ruins of Cologne, convinced himself of the
difficulties of the war, and retreated on the approach of winter,
discontented with the court, with his army, and with his own success.
The power of the enemy was yet unbroken; and the Cæsar had no sooner
separated his troops, and fixed his own quarters at Sens, in the centre
of Gaul, than he was surrounded and besieged, by a numerous host of
Germans. Reduced, in this extremity, to the resources of his own mind,
he displayed a prudent intrepidity, which compensated for all the
deficiencies of the place and garrison; and the Barbarians, at the end
of thirty days, were obliged to retire with disappointed rage.

The conscious pride of Julian, who was indebted only to his sword for
this signal deliverance, was imbittered by the reflection, that he was
abandoned, betrayed, and perhaps devoted to destruction, by those who
were bound to assist him, by every tie of honor and fidelity. Marcellus,
master-general of the cavalry in Gaul, interpreting too strictly the
jealous orders of the court, beheld with supine indifference the
distress of Julian, and had restrained the troops under his command from
marching to the relief of Sens. If the Cæsar had dissembled in silence
so dangerous an insult, his person and authority would have been exposed
to the contempt of the world; and if an action so criminal had been
suffered to pass with impunity, the emperor would have confirmed the
suspicions, which received a very specious color from his past conduct
towards the princes of the Flavian family. Marcellus was recalled, and
gently dismissed from his office.  In his room Severus was appointed
general of the cavalry; an experienced soldier, of approved courage and
fidelity, who could advise with respect, and execute with zeal; and who
submitted, without reluctance to the supreme command which Julian, by
the interest of his patroness Eusebia, at length obtained over the
armies of Gaul.  A very judicious plan of operations was adopted for the
approaching campaign. Julian himself, at the head of the remains of the
veteran bands, and of some new levies which he had been permitted to
form, boldly penetrated into the centre of the German cantonments, and
carefully reestablished the fortifications of Saverne, in an
advantageous post, which would either check the incursions, or intercept
the retreat, of the enemy. At the same time, Barbatio, general of the
infantry, advanced from Milan with an army of thirty thousand men, and
passing the mountains, prepared to throw a bridge over the Rhine, in the
neighborhood of Basil. It was reasonable to expect that the Alemanni,
pressed on either side by the Roman arms, would soon be forced to
evacuate the provinces of Gaul, and to hasten to the defence of their
native country. But the hopes of the campaign were defeated by the
incapacity, or the envy, or the secret instructions, of Barbatio; who
acted as if he had been the enemy of the Cæsar, and the secret ally of
the Barbarians. The negligence with which he permitted a troop of
pillagers freely to pass, and to return almost before the gates of his
camp, may be imputed to his want of abilities; but the treasonable act
of burning a number of boats, and a superfluous stock of provisions,
which would have been of the most essential service to the army of Gaul,
was an evidence of his hostile and criminal intentions. The Germans
despised an enemy who appeared destitute either of power or of
inclination to offend them; and the ignominious retreat of Barbatio
deprived Julian of the expected support; and left him to extricate
himself from a hazardous situation, where he could neither remain with
safety, nor retire with honor.

As soon as they were delivered from the fears of invasion, the Alemanni
prepared to chastise the Roman youth, who presumed to dispute the
possession of that country, which they claimed as their own by the right
of conquest and of treaties. They employed three days, and as many
nights, in transporting over the Rhine their military powers. The fierce
Chnodomar, shaking the ponderous javelin which he had victoriously
wielded against the brother of Magnentius, led the van of the
Barbarians, and moderated by his experience the martial ardor which his
example inspired.  He was followed by six other kings, by ten princes of
regal extraction, by a long train of high-spirited nobles, and by
thirty-five thousand of the bravest warriors of the tribes of Germany.
The confidence derived from the view of their own strength, was
increased by the intelligence which they received from a deserter, that
the Cæsar, with a feeble army of thirteen thousand men, occupied a post
about one-and-twenty miles from their camp of Strasburgh. With this
inadequate force, Julian resolved to seek and to encounter the Barbarian
host; and the chance of a general action was preferred to the tedious
and uncertain operation of separately engaging the dispersed parties of
the Alemanni. The Romans marched in close order, and in two columns; the
cavalry on the right, the infantry on the left; and the day was so far
spent when they appeared in sight of the enemy, that Julian was desirous
of deferring the battle till the next morning, and of allowing his
troops to recruit their exhausted strength by the necessary refreshments
of sleep and food. Yielding, however, with some reluctance, to the
clamors of the soldiers, and even to the opinion of his council, he
exhorted them to justify by their valor the eager impatience, which, in
case of a defeat, would be universally branded with the epithets of
rashness and presumption. The trumpets sounded, the military shout was
heard through the field, and the two armies rushed with equal fury to
the charge. The Cæsar, who conducted in person his right wing, depended
on the dexterity of his archers, and the weight of his cuirassiers. But
his ranks were instantly broken by an irregular mixture of light horse
and of light infantry, and he had the mortification of beholding the
flight of six hundred of his most renowned cuirassiers.  The fugitives
were stopped and rallied by the presence and authority of Julian, who,
careless of his own safety, threw himself before them, and urging every
motive of shame and honor, led them back against the victorious enemy.
The conflict between the two lines of infantry was obstinate and bloody.
The Germans possessed the superiority of strength and stature, the
Romans that of discipline and temper; and as the Barbarians, who served
under the standard of the empire, united the respective advantages of
both parties, their strenuous efforts, guided by a skilful leader, at
length determined the event of the day. The Romans lost four tribunes,
and two hundred and forty-three soldiers, in this memorable battle of
Strasburgh, so glorious to the Cæsar,  and so salutary to the afflicted
provinces of Gaul. Six thousand of the Alemanni were slain in the field,
without including those who were drowned in the Rhine, or transfixed
with darts while they attempted to swim across the river.  Chnodomar
himself was surrounded and taken prisoner, with three of his brave
companions, who had devoted themselves to follow in life or death the
fate of their chieftain. Julian received him with military pomp in the
council of his officers; and expressing a generous pity for the fallen
state, dissembled his inward contempt for the abject humiliation, of his
captive. Instead of exhibiting the vanquished king of the Alemanni, as a
grateful spectacle to the cities of Gaul, he respectfully laid at the
feet of the emperor this splendid trophy of his victory. Chnodomar
experienced an honorable treatment: but the impatient Barbarian could
not long survive his defeat, his confinement, and his exile.

After Julian had repulsed the Alemanni from the provinces of the Upper
Rhine, he turned his arms against the Franks, who were seated nearer to
the ocean, on the confines of Gaul and Germany; and who, from their
numbers, and still more from their intrepid valor, had ever been
esteemed the most formidable of the Barbarians.  Although they were
strongly actuated by the allurements of rapine, they professed a
disinterested love of war; which they considered as the supreme honor
and felicity of human nature; and their minds and bodies were so
completely hardened by perpetual action, that, according to the lively
expression of an orator, the snows of winter were as pleasant to them as
the flowers of spring. In the month of December, which followed the
battle of Strasburgh, Julian attacked a body of six hundred Franks, who
had thrown themselves into two castles on the Meuse.  In the midst of
that severe season they sustained, with inflexible constancy, a siege of
fifty-four days; till at length, exhausted by hunger, and satisfied that
the vigilance of the enemy, in breaking the ice of the river, left them
no hopes of escape, the Franks consented, for the first time, to
dispense with the ancient law which commanded them to conquer or to die.
The Cæsar immediately sent his captives to the court of Constantius,
who, accepting them as a valuable present,  rejoiced in the opportunity
of adding so many heroes to the choicest troops of his domestic guards.
The obstinate resistance of this handful of Franks apprised Julian of
the difficulties of the expedition which he meditated for the ensuing
spring, against the whole body of the nation. His rapid diligence
surprised and astonished the active Barbarians. Ordering his soldiers to
provide themselves with biscuit for twenty days, he suddenly pitched his
camp near Tongres, while the enemy still supposed him in his winter
quarters of Paris, expecting the slow arrival of his convoys from
Aquitain. Without allowing the Franks to unite or deliberate, he
skilfully spread his legions from Cologne to the ocean; and by the
terror, as well as by the success, of his arms, soon reduced the
suppliant tribes to implore the clemency, and to obey the commands, of
their conqueror. The Chamavians submissively retired to their former
habitations beyond the Rhine; but the Salians were permitted to possess
their new establishment of Toxandria, as the subjects and auxiliaries of
the Roman empire.  The treaty was ratified by solemn oaths; and
perpetual inspectors were appointed to reside among the Franks, with the
authority of enforcing the strict observance of the conditions. An
incident is related, interesting enough in itself, and by no means
repugnant to the character of Julian, who ingeniously contrived both the
plot and the catastrophe of the tragedy. When the Chamavians sued for
peace, he required the son of their king, as the only hostage on whom he
could rely. A mournful silence, interrupted by tears and groans,
declared the sad perplexity of the Barbarians; and their aged chief
lamented in pathetic language, that his private loss was now imbittered
by a sense of public calamity. While the Chamavians lay prostrate at the
foot of his throne, the royal captive, whom they believed to have been
slain, unexpectedly appeared before their eyes; and as soon as the
tumult of joy was hushed into attention, the Cæsar addressed the
assembly in the following terms: "Behold the son, the prince, whom you
wept. You had lost him by your fault. God and the Romans have restored
him to you. I shall still preserve and educate the youth, rather as a
monument of my own virtue, than as a pledge of your sincerity. Should
you presume to violate the faith which you have sworn, the arms of the
republic will avenge the perfidy, not on the innocent, but on the
guilty." The Barbarians withdrew from his presence, impressed with the
warmest sentiments of gratitude and admiration.

It was not enough for Julian to have delivered the provinces of Gaul
from the Barbarians of Germany. He aspired to emulate the glory of the
first and most illustrious of the emperors; after whose example, he
composed his own commentaries of the Gallic war.  Cæsar has related,
with conscious pride, the manner in which he twicepassed the Rhine.
Julian could boast, that before he assumed the title of Augustus, he had
carried the Roman eagles beyond that great river in threesuccessful
expeditions.  The consternation of the Germans, after the battle of
Strasburgh, encouraged him to the first attempt; and the reluctance of
the troops soon yielded to the persuasive eloquence of a leader, who
shared the fatigues and dangers which he imposed on the meanest of the
soldiers. The villages on either side of the Meyn, which were
plentifully stored with corn and cattle, felt the ravages of an invading
army. The principal houses, constructed with some imitation of Roman
elegance, were consumed by the flames; and the Cæsar boldly advanced
about ten miles, till his progress was stopped by a dark and
impenetrable forest, undermined by subterraneous passages, which
threatened with secret snares and ambush every step of the assailants.
The ground was already covered with snow; and Julian, after repairing an
ancient castle which had been erected by Trajan, granted a truce of ten
months to the submissive Barbarians. At the expiration of the truce,
Julian undertook a second expedition beyond the Rhine, to humble the
pride of Surmar and Hortaire, two of the kings of the Alemanni, who had
been present at the battle of Strasburgh. They promised to restore all
the Roman captives who yet remained alive; and as the Cæsar had procured
an exact account from the cities and villages of Gaul, of the
inhabitants whom they had lost, he detected every attempt to deceive
him, with a degree of readiness and accuracy, which almost established
the belief of his supernatural knowledge. His third expedition was still
more splendid and important than the two former. The Germans had
collected their military powers, and moved along the opposite banks of
the river, with a design of destroying the bridge, and of preventing the
passage of the Romans. But this judicious plan of defence was
disconcerted by a skilful diversion. Three hundred light-armed and
active soldiers were detached in forty small boats, to fall down the
stream in silence, and to land at some distance from the posts of the
enemy. They executed their orders with so much boldness and celerity,
that they had almost surprised the Barbarian chiefs, who returned in the
fearless confidence of intoxication from one of their nocturnal
festivals. Without repeating the uniform and disgusting tale of
slaughter and devastation, it is sufficient to observe, that Julian
dictated his own conditions of peace to six of the haughtiest kings of
the Alemanni, three of whom were permitted to view the severe discipline
and martial pomp of a Roman camp. Followed by twenty thousand captives,
whom he had rescued from the chains of the Barbarians, the Cæsar
repassed the Rhine, after terminating a war, the success of which has
been compared to the ancient glories of the Punic and Cimbric victories.

As soon as the valor and conduct of Julian had secured an interval of
peace, he applied himself to a work more congenial to his humane and
philosophic temper. The cities of Gaul, which had suffered from the
inroads of the Barbarians, he diligently repaired; and seven important
posts, between Mentz and the mouth of the Rhine, are particularly
mentioned, as having been rebuilt and fortified by the order of Julian.
The vanquished Germans had submitted to the just but humiliating
condition of preparing and conveying the necessary materials. The active
zeal of Julian urged the prosecution of the work; and such was the
spirit which he had diffused among the troops, that the auxiliaries
themselves, waiving their exemption from any duties of fatigue,
contended in the most servile labors with the diligence of the Roman
soldiers. It was incumbent on the Cæsar to provide for the subsistence,
as well as for the safety, of the inhabitants and of the garrisons. The
desertion of the former, and the mutiny of the latter, must have been
the fatal and inevitable consequences of famine. The tillage of the
provinces of Gaul had been interrupted by the calamities of war; but the
scanty harvests of the continent were supplied, by his paternal care,
from the plenty of the adjacent island. Six hundred large barks, framed
in the forest of the Ardennes, made several voyages to the coast of
Britain; and returning from thence, laden with corn, sailed up the
Rhine, and distributed their cargoes to the several towns and fortresses
along the banks of the river.  The arms of Julian had restored a free
and secure navigation, which Constantius had offered to purchase at the
expense of his dignity, and of a tributary present of two thousand
pounds of silver. The emperor parsimoniously refused to his soldiers the
sums which he granted with a lavish and trembling hand to the
Barbarians. The dexterity, as well as the firmness, of Julian was put to
a severe trial, when he took the field with a discontented army, which
had already served two campaigns, without receiving any regular pay or
any extraordinary donative.

A tender regard for the peace and happiness of his subjects was the
ruling principle which directed, or seemed to direct, the administration
of Julian.  He devoted the leisure of his winter quarters to the offices
of civil government; and affected to assume, with more pleasure, the
character of a magistrate than that of a general. Before he took the
field, he devolved on the provincial governors most of the public and
private causes which had been referred to his tribunal; but, on his
return, he carefully revised their proceedings, mitigated the rigor of
the law, and pronounced a second judgment on the judges themselves.
Superior to the last temptation of virtuous minds, an indiscreet and
intemperate zeal for justice, he restrained, with calmness and dignity,
the warmth of an advocate, who prosecuted, for extortion, the president
of the Narbonnese province. "Who will ever be found guilty," exclaimed
the vehement Delphidius, "if it be enough to deny?" "And who," replied
Julian, "will ever be innocent, if it be sufficient to affirm?" In the
general administration of peace and war, the interest of the sovereign
is commonly the same as that of his people; but Constantius would have
thought himself deeply injured, if the virtues of Julian had defrauded
him of any part of the tribute which he extorted from an oppressed and
exhausted country. The prince who was invested with the ensigns of
royalty, might sometimes presume to correct the rapacious insolence of
his inferior agents, to expose their corrupt arts, and to introduce an
equal and easier mode of collection. But the management of the finances
was more safely intrusted to Florentius, prætorian præfect of Gaul, an
effeminate tyrant, incapable of pity or remorse: and the haughty
minister complained of the most decent and gentle opposition, while
Julian himself was rather inclined to censure the weakness of his own
behavior. The Cæsar had rejected, with abhorrence, a mandate for the
levy of an extraordinary tax; a new superindiction, which the præfect
had offered for his signature; and the faithful picture of the public
misery, by which he had been obliged to justify his refusal, offended
the court of Constantius. We may enjoy the pleasure of reading the
sentiments of Julian, as he expresses them with warmth and freedom in a
letter to one of his most intimate friends. After stating his own
conduct, he proceeds in the following terms: "Was it possible for the
disciple of Plato and Aristotle to act otherwise than I have done? Could
I abandon the unhappy subjects intrusted to my care? Was I not called
upon to defend them from the repeated injuries of these unfeeling
robbers? A tribune who deserts his post is punished with death, and
deprived of the honors of burial. With what justice could I pronounce
hissentence, if, in the hour of danger, I myself neglected a duty far
more sacred and far more important? God has placed me in this elevated
post; his providence will guard and support me. Should I be condemned to
suffer, I shall derive comfort from the testimony of a pure and upright
conscience. Would to Heaven that I still possessed a counsellor like
Sallust! If they think proper to send me a successor, I shall submit
without reluctance; and had much rather improve the short opportunity of
doing good, than enjoy a long and lasting impunity of evil."  The
precarious and dependent situation of Julian displayed his virtues and
concealed his defects. The young hero who supported, in Gaul, the throne
of Constantius, was not permitted to reform the vices of the government;
but he had courage to alleviate or to pity the distress of the people.
Unless he had been able to revive the martial spirit of the Romans, or
to introduce the arts of industry and refinement among their savage
enemies, he could not entertain any rational hopes of securing the
public tranquillity, either by the peace or conquest of Germany. Yet the
victories of Julian suspended, for a short time, the inroads of the
Barbarians, and delayed the ruin of the Western Empire.

His salutary influence restored the cities of Gaul, which had been so
long exposed to the evils of civil discord, Barbarian war, and domestic
tyranny; and the spirit of industry was revived with the hopes of
enjoyment. Agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, again flourished
under the protection of the laws; and the curi, or civil corporations,
were again filled with useful and respectable members: the youth were no
longer apprehensive of marriage; and married persons were no longer
apprehensive of posterity: the public and private festivals were
celebrated with customary pomp; and the frequent and secure intercourse
of the provinces displayed the image of national prosperity.  A mind
like that of Julian must have felt the general happiness of which he was
the author; but he viewed, with particular satisfaction and complacency,
the city of Paris; the seat of his winter residence, and the object even
of his partial affection.  That splendid capital, which now embraces an
ample territory on either side of the Seine, was originally confined to
the small island in the midst of the river, from whence the inhabitants
derived a supply of pure and salubrious water. The river bathed the foot
of the walls; and the town was accessible only by two wooden bridges. A
forest overspread the northern side of the Seine, but on the south, the
ground, which now bears the name of the University, was insensibly
covered with houses, and adorned with a palace and amphitheatre, baths,
an aqueduct, and a field of Mars for the exercise of the Roman troops.
The severity of the climate was tempered by the neighborhood of the
ocean; and with some precautions, which experience had taught, the vine
and fig-tree were successfully cultivated. But in remarkable winters,
the Seine was deeply frozen; and the huge pieces of ice that floated
down the stream, might be compared, by an Asiatic, to the blocks of
white marble which were extracted from the quarries of Phrygia. The
licentiousness and corruption of Antioch recalled to the memory of
Julian the severe and simple manners of his beloved Lutetia;  where the
amusements of the theatre were unknown or despised. He indignantly
contrasted the effeminate Syrians with the brave and honest simplicity
of the Gauls, and almost forgave the intemperance, which was the only
stain of the Celtic character.  If Julian could now revisit the capital
of France, he might converse with men of science and genius, capable of
understanding and of instructing a disciple of the Greeks; he might
excuse the lively and graceful follies of a nation, whose martial spirit
has never been enervated by the indulgence of luxury; and he must
applaud the perfection of that inestimable art, which softens and
refines and embellishes the intercourse of social life.

Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. Part I.

The Motives, Progress, And Effects Of The Conversion Of Constantine. --
Legal Establishment And Constitution Of The Christian Or Catholic
Church.

The public establishment of Christianity may be considered as one of
those important and domestic revolutions which excite the most lively
curiosity, and afford the most valuable instruction. The victories and
the civil policy of Constantine no longer influence the state of Europe;
but a considerable portion of the globe still retains the impression
which it received from the conversion of that monarch; and the
ecclesiastical institutions of his reign are still connected, by an
indissoluble chain, with the opinions, the passions, and the interests
of the present generation.

In the consideration of a subject which may be examined with
impartiality, but cannot be viewed with indifference, a difficulty
immediately arises of a very unexpected nature; that of ascertaining the
real and precise date of the conversion of Constantine. The eloquent
Lactantius, in the midst of his court, seems impatient  to proclaim to
the world the glorious example of the sovereign of Gaul; who, in the
first moments of his reign, acknowledged and adored the majesty of the
true and only God.  The learned Eusebius has ascribed the faith of
Constantine to the miraculous sign which was displayed in the heavens
whilst he meditated and prepared the Italian expedition.  The historian
Zosimus maliciously asserts, that the emperor had imbrued his hands in
the blood of his eldest son, before he publicly renounced the gods of
Rome and of his ancestors.  The perplexity produced by these discordant
authorities is derived from the behavior of Constantine himself.
According to the strictness of ecclesiastical language, the first of the
Christianemperors was unworthy of that name, till the moment of his
death; since it was only during his last illness that he received, as a
catechumen, the imposition of hands,  and was afterwards admitted, by
the initiatory rites of baptism, into the number of the faithful.  The
Christianity of Constantine must be allowed in a much more vague and
qualified sense; and the nicest accuracy is required in tracing the slow
and almost imperceptible gradations by which the monarch declared
himself the protector, and at length the proselyte, of the church. It
was an arduous task to eradicate the habits and prejudices of his
education, to acknowledge the divine power of Christ, and to understand
that the truth of his revelation was incompatible with the worship of
the gods. The obstacles which he had probably experienced in his own
mind, instructed him to proceed with caution in the momentous change of
a national religion; and he insensibly discovered his new opinions, as
far as he could enforce them with safety and with effect. During the
whole course of his reign, the stream of Christianity flowed with a
gentle, though accelerated, motion: but its general direction was
sometimes checked, and sometimes diverted, by the accidental
circumstances of the times, and by the prudence, or possibly by the
caprice, of the monarch. His ministers were permitted to signify the
intentions of their master in the various language which was best
adapted to their respective principles;  and he artfully balanced the
hopes and fears of his subjects, by publishing in the same year two
edicts; the first of which enjoined the solemn observance of Sunday,
and the second directed the regular consultation of the Aruspices.
While this important revolution yet remained in suspense, the Christians
and the Pagans watched the conduct of their sovereign with the same
anxiety, but with very opposite sentiments. The former were prompted by
every motive of zeal, as well as vanity, to exaggerate the marks of his
favor, and the evidences of his faith. The latter, till their just
apprehensions were changed into despair and resentment, attempted to
conceal from the world, and from themselves, that the gods of Rome could
no longer reckon the emperor in the number of their votaries. The same
passions and prejudices have engaged the partial writers of the times to
connect the public profession of Christianity with the most glorious or
the most ignominious æra of the reign of Constantine.

Whatever symptoms of Christian piety might transpire in the discourses
or actions of Constantine, he persevered till he was near forty years of
age in the practice of the established religion;  and the same conduct
which in the court of Nicomedia might be imputed to his fear, could be
ascribed only to the inclination or policy of the sovereign of Gaul. His
liberality restored and enriched the temples of the gods; the medals
which issued from his Imperial mint are impressed with the figures and
attributes of Jupiter and Apollo, of Mars and Hercules; and his filial
piety increased the council of Olympus by the solemn apotheosis of his
father Constantius.  But the devotion of Constantine was more peculiarly
directed to the genius of the Sun, the Apollo of Greek and Roman
mythology; and he was pleased to be represented with the symbols of the
God of Light and Poetry. The unerring shafts of that deity, the
brightness of his eyes, his laurel wreath, immortal beauty, and elegant
accomplishments, seem to point him out as the patron of a young hero.
The altars of Apollo were crowned with the votive offerings of
Constantine; and the credulous multitude were taught to believe, that
the emperor was permitted to behold with mortal eyes the visible majesty
of their tutelar deity; and that, either walking or in a vision, he was
blessed with the auspicious omens of a long and victorious reign. The
Sun was universally celebrated as the invincible guide and protector of
Constantine; and the Pagans might reasonably expect that the insulted
god would pursue with unrelenting vengeance the impiety of his
ungrateful favorite.

As long as Constantine exercised a limited sovereignty over the
provinces of Gaul, his Christian subjects were protected by the
authority, and perhaps by the laws, of a prince, who wisely left to the
gods the care of vindicating their own honor. If we may credit the
assertion of Constantine himself, he had been an indignant spectator of
the savage cruelties which were inflicted, by the hands of Roman
soldiers, on those citizens whose religion was their only crime.  In the
East and in the West, he had seen the different effects of severity and
indulgence; and as the former was rendered still more odious by the
example of Galerius, his implacable enemy, the latter was recommended to
his imitation by the authority and advice of a dying father. The son of
Constantius immediately suspended or repealed the edicts of persecution,
and granted the free exercise of their religious ceremonies to all those
who had already professed themselves members of the church. They were
soon encouraged to depend on the favor as well as on the justice of
their sovereign, who had imbibed a secret and sincere reverence for the
name of Christ, and for the God of the Christians.

About five months after the conquest of Italy, the emperor made a solemn
and authentic declaration of his sentiments by the celebrated edict of
Milan, which restored peace to the Catholic church. In the personal
interview of the two western princes, Constantine, by the ascendant of
genius and power, obtained the ready concurrence of his colleague,
Licinius; the union of their names and authority disarmed the fury of
Maximin; and after the death of the tyrant of the East, the edict of
Milan was received as a general and fundamental law of the Roman world.

The wisdom of the emperors provided for the restitution of all the civil
and religious rights of which the Christians had been so unjustly
deprived. It was enacted that the places of worship, and public lands,
which had been confiscated, should be restored to the church, without
dispute, without delay, and without expense; and this severe injunction
was accompanied with a gracious promise, that if any of the purchasers
had paid a fair and adequate price, they should be indemnified from the
Imperial treasury. The salutary regulations which guard the future
tranquillity of the faithful are framed on the principles of enlarged
and equal toleration; and such an equality must have been interpreted by
a recent sect as an advantageous and honorable distinction. The two
emperors proclaim to the world, that they have granted a free and
absolute power to the Christians, and to all others, of following the
religion which each individual thinks proper to prefer, to which he has
addicted his mind, and which he may deem the best adapted to his own
use. They carefully explain every ambiguous word, remove every
exception, and exact from the governors of the provinces a strict
obedience to the true and simple meaning of an edict, which was designed
to establish and secure, without any limitation, the claims of religious
liberty. They condescend to assign two weighty reasons which have
induced them to allow this universal toleration: the humane intention of
consulting the peace and happiness of their people; and the pious hope,
that, by such a conduct, they shall appease and propitiate the Deity,
whose seat is in heaven. They gratefully acknowledge the many signal
proofs which they have received of the divine favor; and they trust that
the same Providence will forever continue to protect the prosperity of
the prince and people. From these vague and indefinite expressions of
piety, three suppositions may be deduced, of a different, but not of an
incompatible nature. The mind of Constantine might fluctuate between the
Pagan and the Christian religions. According to the loose and complying
notions of Polytheism, he might acknowledge the God of the Christians as
oneof the manydeities who compose the hierarchy of heaven. Or perhaps he
might embrace the philosophic and pleasing idea, that, notwithstanding
the variety of names, of rites, and of opinions, all the sects, and all
the nations of mankind, are united in the worship of the common Father
and Creator of the universe.

But the counsels of princes are more frequently influenced by views of
temporal advantage, than by considerations of abstract and speculative
truth. The partial and increasing favor of Constantine may naturally be
referred to the esteem which he entertained for the moral character of
the Christians; and to a persuasion, that the propagation of the gospel
would inculcate the practice of private and public virtue. Whatever
latitude an absolute monarch may assume in his own conduct, whatever
indulgence he may claim for his own passions, it is undoubtedly his
interest that all his subjects should respect the natural and civil
obligations of society. But the operation of the wisest laws is
imperfect and precarious. They seldom inspire virtue, they cannot always
restrain vice. Their power is insufficient to prohibit all that they
condemn, nor can they always punish the actions which they prohibit. The
legislators of antiquity had summoned to their aid the powers of
education and of opinion. But every principle which had once maintained
the vigor and purity of Rome and Sparta, was long since extinguished in
a declining and despotic empire. Philosophy still exercised her
temperate sway over the human mind, but the cause of virtue derived very
feeble support from the influence of the Pagan superstition. Under these
discouraging circumstances, a prudent magistrate might observe with
pleasure the progress of a religion which diffused among the people a
pure, benevolent, and universal system of ethics, adapted to every duty
and every condition of life; recommended as the will and reason of the
supreme Deity, and enforced by the sanction of eternal rewards or
punishments. The experience of Greek and Roman history could not inform
the world how far the system of national manners might be reformed and
improved by the precepts of a divine revelation; and Constantine might
listen with some confidence to the flattering, and indeed reasonable,
assurances of Lactantius. The eloquent apologist seemed firmly to
expect, and almost ventured to promise, thatthe establishment of
Christianity would restore the innocence and felicity of the primitive
age; thatthe worship of the true God would extinguish war and dissension
among those who mutually considered themselves as the children of a
common parent; thatevery impure desire, every angry or selfish passion,
would be restrained by the knowledge of the gospel; and thatthe
magistrates might sheath the sword of justice among a people who would
be universally actuated by the sentiments of truth and piety, of equity
and moderation, of harmony and universal love.

The passive and unresisting obedience, which bows under the yoke of
authority, or even of oppression, must have appeared, in the eyes of an
absolute monarch, the most conspicuous and useful of the evangelic
virtues.  The primitive Christians derived the institution of civil
government, not from the consent of the people, but from the decrees of
Heaven. The reigning emperor, though he had usurped the sceptre by
treason and murder, immediately assumed the sacred character of
vicegerent of the Deity. To the Deity alone he was accountable for the
abuse of his power; and his subjects were indissolubly bound, by their
oath of fidelity, to a tyrant, who had violated every law of nature and
society. The humble Christians were sent into the world as sheep among
wolves; and since they were not permitted to employ force even in the
defence of their religion, they should be still more criminal if they
were tempted to shed the blood of their fellow-creatures in disputing
the vain privileges, or the sordid possessions, of this transitory life.
Faithful to the doctrine of the apostle, who in the reign of Nero had
preached the duty of unconditional submission, the Christians of the
three first centuries preserved their conscience pure and innocent of
the guilt of secret conspiracy, or open rebellion. While they
experienced the rigor of persecution, they were never provoked either to
meet their tyrants in the field, or indignantly to withdraw themselves
into some remote and sequestered corner of the globe.  The Protestants
of France, of Germany, and of Britain, who asserted with such intrepid
courage their civil and religious freedom, have been insulted by the
invidious comparison between the conduct of the primitive and of the
reformed Christians.  Perhaps, instead of censure, some applause may be
due to the superior sense and spirit of our ancestors, who had convinced
themselves that religion cannot abolish the unalienable rights of human
nature.  Perhaps the patience of the primitive church may be ascribed to
its weakness, as well as to its virtue. A sect of unwarlike plebeians,
without leaders, without arms, without fortifications, must have
encountered inevitable destruction in a rash and fruitless resistance to
the master of the Roman legions. But the Christians, when they
deprecated the wrath of Diocletian, or solicited the favor of
Constantine, could allege, with truth and confidence, that they held the
principle of passive obedience, and that, in the space of three
centuries, their conduct had always been conformable to their
principles. They might add, that the throne of the emperors would be
established on a fixed and permanent basis, if all their subjects,
embracing the Christian doctrine, should learn to suffer and to obey.

In the general order of Providence, princes and tyrants are considered
as the ministers of Heaven, appointed to rule or to chastise the nations
of the earth. But sacred history affords many illustrious examples of
the more immediate interposition of the Deity in the government of his
chosen people. The sceptre and the sword were committed to the hands of
Moses, of Joshua, of Gideon, of David, of the Maccabees; the virtues of
those heroes were the motive or the effect of the divine favor, the
success of their arms was destined to achieve the deliverance or the
triumph of the church. If the judges of Isræl were occasional and
temporary magistrates, the kings of Judah derived from the royal unction
of their great ancestor an hereditary and indefeasible right, which
could not be forfeited by their own vices, nor recalled by the caprice
of their subjects. The same extraordinary providence, which was no
longer confined to the Jewish people, might elect Constantine and his
family as the protectors of the Christian world; and the devout
Lactantius announces, in a prophetic tone, the future glories of his
long and universal reign.  Galerius and Maximin, Maxentius and Licinius,
were the rivals who shared with the favorite of heaven the provinces of
the empire. The tragic deaths of Galerius and Maximin soon gratified the
resentment, and fulfilled the sanguine expectations, of the Christians.
The success of Constantine against Maxentius and Licinius removed the
two formidable competitors who still opposed the triumph of the second
David, and his cause might seem to claim the peculiar interposition of
Providence. The character of the Roman tyrant disgraced the purple and
human nature; and though the Christians might enjoy his precarious
favor, they were exposed, with the rest of his subjects, to the effects
of his wanton and capricious cruelty. The conduct of Licinius soon
betrayed the reluctance with which he had consented to the wise and
humane regulations of the edict of Milan. The convocation of provincial
synods was prohibited in his dominions; his Christian officers were
ignominiously dismissed; and if he avoided the guilt, or rather danger,
of a general persecution, his partial oppressions were rendered still
more odious by the violation of a solemn and voluntary engagement.
While the East, according to the lively expression of Eusebius, was
involved in the shades of infernal darkness, the auspicious rays of
celestial light warmed and illuminated the provinces of the West. The
piety of Constantine was admitted as an unexceptionable proof of the
justice of his arms; and his use of victory confirmed the opinion of the
Christians, that their hero was inspired, and conducted, by the Lord of
Hosts. The conquest of Italy produced a general edict of toleration; and
as soon as the defeat of Licinius had invested Constantine with the sole
dominion of the Roman world, he immediately, by circular letters,
exhorted all his subjects to imitate, without delay, the example of
their sovereign, and to embrace the divine truth of Christianity.

Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part II.

The assurance that the elevation of Constantine was intimately connected
with the designs of Providence, instilled into the minds of the
Christians two opinions, which, by very different means, assisted the
accomplishment of the prophecy. Their warm and active loyalty exhausted
in his favor every resource of human industry; and they confidently
expected that their strenuous efforts would be seconded by some divine
and miraculous aid. The enemies of Constantine have imputed to
interested motives the alliance which he insensibly contracted with the
Catholic church, and which apparently contributed to the success of his
ambition. In the beginning of the fourth century, the Christians still
bore a very inadequate proportion to the inhabitants of the empire; but
among a degenerate people, who viewed the change of masters with the
indifference of slaves, the spirit and union of a religious party might
assist the popular leader, to whose service, from a principle of
conscience, they had devoted their lives and fortunes.  The example of
his father had instructed Constantine to esteem and to reward the merit
of the Christians; and in the distribution of public offices, he had the
advantage of strengthening his government, by the choice of ministers or
generals, in whose fidelity he could repose a just and unreserved
confidence. By the influence of these dignified missionaries, the
proselytes of the new faith must have multiplied in the court and army;
the Barbarians of Germany, who filled the ranks of the legions, were of
a careless temper, which acquiesced without resistance in the religion
of their commander; and when they passed the Alps, it may fairly be
presumed, that a great number of the soldiers had already consecrated
their swords to the service of Christ and of Constantine.  The habits of
mankind and the interests of religion gradually abated the horror of war
and bloodshed, which had so long prevailed among the Christians; and in
the councils which were assembled under the gracious protection of
Constantine, the authority of the bishops was seasonably employed to
ratify the obligation of the military oath, and to inflict the penalty
of excommunication on those soldiers who threw away their arms during
the peace of the church.  While Constantine, in his own dominions,
increased the number and zeal of his faithful adherents, he could depend
on the support of a powerful faction in those provinces which were still
possessed or usurped by his rivals. A secret disaffection was diffused
among the Christian subjects of Maxentius and Licinius; and the
resentment, which the latter did not attempt to conceal, served only to
engage them still more deeply in the interest of his competitor. The
regular correspondence which connected the bishops of the most distant
provinces, enabled them freely to communicate their wishes and their
designs, and to transmit without danger any useful intelligence, or any
pious contributions, which might promote the service of Constantine, who
publicly declared that he had taken up arms for the deliverance of the
church.

The enthusiasm which inspired the troops, and perhaps the emperor
himself, had sharpened their swords while it satisfied their conscience.
They marched to battle with the full assurance, that the same God, who
had formerly opened a passage to the Isrælites through the waters of
Jordan, and had thrown down the walls of Jericho at the sound of the
trumpets of Joshua, would display his visible majesty and power in the
victory of Constantine. The evidence of ecclesiastical history is
prepared to affirm, that their expectations were justified by the
conspicuous miracle to which the conversion of the first Christian
emperor has been almost unanimously ascribed. The real or imaginary
cause of so important an event, deserves and demands the attention of
posterity; and I shall endeavor to form a just estimate of the famous
vision of Constantine, by a distinct consideration of the standard, the
dream, and the celestial sign; by separating the historical, the
natural, and the marvellous parts of this extraordinary story, which, in
the composition of a specious argument, have been artfully confounded in
one splendid and brittle mass.

I. An instrument of the tortures which were inflicted only on slaves and
strangers, became on object of horror in the eyes of a Roman citizen;
and the ideas of guilt, of pain, and of ignominy, were closely united
with the idea of the cross.  The piety, rather than the humanity, of
Constantine soon abolished in his dominions the punishment which the
Savior of mankind had condescended to suffer;  but the emperor had
already learned to despise the prejudices of his education, and of his
people, before he could erect in the midst of Rome his own statue,
bearing a cross in its right hand; with an inscription which referred
the victory of his arms, and the deliverance of Rome, to the virtue of
that salutary sign, the true symbol of force and courage.  The same
symbol sanctified the arms of the soldiers of Constantine; the cross
glittered on their helmet, was engraved on their shields, was interwoven
into their banners; and the consecrated emblems which adorned the person
of the emperor himself, were distinguished only by richer materials and
more exquisite workmanship.  But the principal standard which displayed
the triumph of the cross was styled the Labarum,  an obscure, though
celebrated name, which has been vainly derived from almost all the
languages of the world. It is described  as a long pike intersected by a
transversal beam. The silken veil, which hung down from the beam, was
curiously inwrought with the images of the reigning monarch and his
children. The summit of the pike supported a crown of gold which
enclosed the mysterious monogram, at once expressive of the figure of
the cross, and the initial letters, of the name of Christ.  The safety
of the labarum was intrusted to fifty guards, of approved valor and
fidelity; their station was marked by honors and emoluments; and some
fortunate accidents soon introduced an opinion, that as long as the
guards of the labarum were engaged in the execution of their office,
they were secure and invulnerable amidst the darts of the enemy. In the
second civil war, Licinius felt and dreaded the power of this
consecrated banner, the sight of which, in the distress of battle,
animated the soldiers of Constantine with an invincible enthusiasm, and
scattered terror and dismay through the ranks of the adverse legions.
The Christian emperors, who respected the example of Constantine,
displayed in all their military expeditions the standard of the cross;
but when the degenerate successors of Theodosius had ceased to appear in
person at the head of their armies, the labarum was deposited as a
venerable but useless relic in the palace of Constantinople.  Its honors
are still preserved on the medals of the Flavian family. Their grateful
devotion has placed the monogram of Christ in the midst of the ensigns
of Rome. The solemn epithets of, safety of the republic, glory of the
army, restoration of public happiness, are equally applied to the
religious and military trophies; and there is still extant a medal of
the emperor Constantius, where the standard of the labarum is
accompanied with these memorable words, By This Sign Thou Shalt Conquer.

II. In all occasions of danger and distress, it was the practice of the
primitive Christians to fortify their minds and bodies by the sign of
the cross, which they used, in all their ecclesiastical rites, in all
the daily occurrences of life, as an infallible preservative against
every species of spiritual or temporal evil.  The authority of the
church might alone have had sufficient weight to justify the devotion of
Constantine, who in the same prudent and gradual progress acknowledged
the truth, and assumed the symbol, of Christianity. But the testimony of
a contemporary writer, who in a formal treatise has avenged the cause of
religion, bestows on the piety of the emperor a more awful and sublime
character. He affirms, with the most perfect confidence, that in the
night which preceded the last battle against Maxentius, Constantine was
admonished in a dream * to inscribe the shields of his soldiers with the
celestial sign of God, the sacred monogram of the name of Christ; that
he executed the commands of Heaven, and that his valor and obedience
were rewarded by the decisive victory of the Milvian Bridge. Some
considerations might perhaps incline a sceptical mind to suspect the
judgment or the veracity of the rhetorician, whose pen, either from zeal
or interest, was devoted to the cause of the prevailing faction.  He
appears to have published his deaths of the persecutors at Nicomedia
about three years after the Roman victory; but the interval of a
thousand miles, and a thousand days, will allow an ample latitude for
the invention of declaimers, the credulity of party, and the tacit
approbation of the emperor himself who might listen without indignation
to a marvellous tale, which exalted his fame, and promoted his designs.
In favor of Licinius, who still dissembled his animosity to the
Christians, the same author has provided a similar vision, of a form of
prayer, which was communicated by an angel, and repeated by the whole
army before they engaged the legions of the tyrant Maximin. The frequent
repetition of miracles serves to provoke, where it does not subdue, the
reason of mankind;  but if the dream of Constantine is separately
considered, it may be naturally explained either by the policy or the
enthusiasm of the emperor. Whilst his anxiety for the approaching day,
which must decide the fate of the empire, was suspended by a short and
interrupted slumber, the venerable form of Christ, and the well-known
symbol of his religion, might forcibly offer themselves to the active
fancy of a prince who reverenced the name, and had perhaps secretly
implored the power, of the God of the Christians. As readily might a
consummate statesman indulge himself in the use of one of those military
stratagems, one of those pious frauds, which Philip and Sertorius had
employed with such art and effect.  The præternatural origin of dreams
was universally admitted by the nations of antiquity, and a considerable
part of the Gallic army was already prepared to place their confidence
in the salutary sign of the Christian religion. The secret vision of
Constantine could be disproved only by the event; and the intrepid hero
who had passed the Alps and the Apennine, might view with careless
despair the consequences of a defeat under the walls of Rome. The senate
and people, exulting in their own deliverance from an odious tyrant,
acknowledged that the victory of Constantine surpassed the powers of
man, without daring to insinuate that it had been obtained by the
protection of the Gods. The triumphal arch, which was erected about
three years after the event, proclaims, in ambiguous language, that by
the greatness of his own mind, and by an instinctor impulse of the
Divinity, he had saved and avenged the Roman republic.  The Pagan
orator, who had seized an earlier opportunity of celebrating the virtues
of the conqueror, supposes that he alone enjoyed a secret and intimate
commerce with the Supreme Being, who delegated the care of mortals to
his subordinate deities; and thus assigns a very plausible reason why
the subjects of Constantine should not presume to embrace the new
religion of their sovereign.

III. The philosopher, who with calm suspicion examines the dreams and
omens, the miracles and prodigies, of profane or even of ecclesiastical
history, will probably conclude, that if the eyes of the spectators have
sometimes been deceived by fraud, the understanding of the readers has
much more frequently been insulted by fiction. Every event, or
appearance, or accident, which seems to deviate from the ordinary course
of nature, has been rashly ascribed to the immediate action of the
Deity; and the astonished fancy of the multitude has sometimes given
shape and color, language and motion, to the fleeting but uncommon
meteors of the air.  Nazarius and Eusebius are the two most celebrated
orators, who, in studied panegyrics, have labored to exalt the glory of
Constantine. Nine years after the Roman victory, Nazarius  describes an
army of divine warriors, who seemed to fall from the sky: he marks their
beauty, their spirit, their gigantic forms, the stream of light which
beamed from their celestial armor, their patience in suffering
themselves to be heard, as well as seen, by mortals; and their
declaration that they were sent, that they flew, to the assistance of
the great Constantine. For the truth of this prodigy, the Pagan orator
appeals to the whole Gallic nation, in whose presence he was then
speaking; and seems to hope that the ancient apparitions  would now
obtain credit from this recent and public event. The Christian fable of
Eusebius, which, in the space of twenty-six years, might arise from the
original dream, is cast in a much more correct and elegant mould. In one
of the marches of Constantine, he is reported to have seen with his own
eyes the luminous trophy of the cross, placed above the meridian sun and
inscribed with the following words: By This Conquer. This amazing object
in the sky astonished the whole army, as well as the emperor himself,
who was yet undetermined in the choice of a religion: but his
astonishment was converted into faith by the vision of the ensuing
night. Christ appeared before his eyes; and displaying the same
celestial sign of the cross, he directed Constantine to frame a similar
standard, and to march, with an assurance of victory, against Maxentius
and all his enemies.  The learned bishop of Cæsarea appears to be
sensible, that the recent discovery of this marvellous anecdote would
excite some surprise and distrust among the most pious of his readers.
Yet, instead of ascertaining the precise circumstances of time and
place, which always serve to detect falsehood or establish truth;
instead of collecting and recording the evidence of so many living
witnesses who must have been spectators of this stupendous miracle;
Eusebius contents himself with alleging a very singular testimony; that
of the deceased Constantine, who, many years after the event, in the
freedom of conversation, had related to him this extraordinary incident
of his own life, and had attested the truth of it by a solemn oath. The
prudence and gratitude of the learned prelate forbade him to suspect the
veracity of his victorious master; but he plainly intimates, that in a
fact of such a nature, he should have refused his assent to any meaner
authority. This motive of credibility could not survive the power of the
Flavian family; and the celestial sign, which the Infidels might
afterwards deride,  was disregarded by the Christians of the age which
immediately followed the conversion of Constantine.  But the Catholic
church, both of the East and of the West, has adopted a prodigy which
favors, or seems to favor, the popular worship of the cross. The vision
of Constantine maintained an honorable place in the legend of
superstition, till the bold and sagacious spirit of criticism presumed
to depreciate the triumph, and to arraign the truth, of the first
Christian emperor.

The Protestant and philosophic readers of the present age will incline
to believe, that in the account of his own conversion, Constantine
attested a wilful falsehood by a solemn and deliberate perjury. They may
not hesitate to pronounce, that in the choice of a religion, his mind
was determined only by a sense of interest; and that (according to the
expression of a profane poet ) he used the altars of the church as a
convenient footstool to the throne of the empire. A conclusion so harsh
and so absolute is not, however, warranted by our knowledge of human
nature, of Constantine, or of Christianity. In an age of religious
fervor, the most artful statesmen are observed to feel some part of the
enthusiasm which they inspire, and the most orthodox saints assume the
dangerous privilege of defending the cause of truth by the arms of
deceit and falsehood. Personal interest is often the standard of our
belief, as well as of our practice; and the same motives of temporal
advantage which might influence the public conduct and professions of
Constantine, would insensibly dispose his mind to embrace a religion so
propitious to his fame and fortunes. His vanity was gratified by the
flattering assurance, that hehad been chosen by Heaven to reign over the
earth; success had justified his divine title to the throne, and that
title was founded on the truth of the Christian revelation. As real
virtue is sometimes excited by undeserved applause, the specious piety
of Constantine, if at first it was only specious, might gradually, by
the influence of praise, of habit, and of example, be matured into
serious faith and fervent devotion. The bishops and teachers of the new
sect, whose dress and manners had not qualified them for the residence
of a court, were admitted to the Imperial table; they accompanied the
monarch in his expeditions; and the ascendant which one of them, an
Egyptian or a Spaniard,  acquired over his mind, was imputed by the
Pagans to the effect of magic.  Lactantius, who has adorned the precepts
of the gospel with the eloquence of Cicero,  and Eusebius, who has
consecrated the learning and philosophy of the Greeks to the service of
religion,  were both received into the friendship and familiarity of
their sovereign; and those able masters of controversy could patiently
watch the soft and yielding moments of persuasion, and dexterously apply
the arguments which were the best adapted to his character and
understanding. Whatever advantages might be derived from the acquisition
of an Imperial proselyte, he was distinguished by the splendor of his
purple, rather than by the superiority of wisdom, or virtue, from the
many thousands of his subjects who had embraced the doctrines of
Christianity. Nor can it be deemed incredible, that the mind of an
unlettered soldier should have yielded to the weight of evidence, which,
in a more enlightened age, has satisfied or subdued the reason of a
Grotius, a Pascal, or a Locke. In the midst of the incessant labors of
his great office, this soldier employed, or affected to employ, the
hours of the night in the diligent study of the Scriptures, and the
composition of theological discourses; which he afterwards pronounced in
the presence of a numerous and applauding audience. In a very long
discourse, which is still extant, the royal preacher expatiates on the
various proofs still extant, the royal preacher expatiates on the
various proofs of religion; but he dwells with peculiar complacency on
the Sibylline verses,  and the fourth eclogue of Virgil.  Forty years
before the birth of Christ, the Mantuan bard, as if inspired by the
celestial muse of Isaiah, had celebrated, with all the pomp of oriental
metaphor, the return of the Virgin, the fall of the serpent, the
approaching birth of a godlike child, the offspring of the great
Jupiter, who should expiate the guilt of human kind, and govern the
peaceful universe with the virtues of his father; the rise and
appearance of a heavenly race, primitive nation throughout the world;
and the gradual restoration of the innocence and felicity of the golden
age. The poet was perhaps unconscious of the secret sense and object of
these sublime predictions, which have been so unworthily applied to the
infant son of a consul, or a triumvir;  but if a more splendid, and
indeed specious interpretation of the fourth eclogue contributed to the
conversion of the first Christian emperor, Virgil may deserve to be
ranked among the most successful missionaries of the gospel.

Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part III.

The awful mysteries of the Christian faith and worship were concealed
from the eyes of strangers, and even of catechumens, with an affected
secrecy, which served to excite their wonder and curiosity.  But the
severe rules of discipline which the prudence of the bishops had
instituted, were relaxed by the same prudence in favor of an Imperial
proselyte, whom it was so important to allure, by every gentle
condescension, into the pale of the church; and Constantine was
permitted, at least by a tacit dispensation, to enjoy mostof the
privileges, before he had contracted anyof the obligations, of a
Christian. Instead of retiring from the congregation, when the voice of
the deacon dismissed the profane multitude, he prayed with the faithful,
disputed with the bishops, preached on the most sublime and intricate
subjects of theology, celebrated with sacred rites the vigil of Easter,
and publicly declared himself, not only a partaker, but, in some
measure, a priest and hierophant of the Christian mysteries.  The pride
of Constantine might assume, and his services had deserved, some
extraordinary distinction: and ill-timed rigor might have blasted the
unripened fruits of his conversion; and if the doors of the church had
been strictly closed against a prince who had deserted the altars of the
gods, the master of the empire would have been left destitute of any
form of religious worship. In his last visit to Rome, he piously
disclaimed and insulted the superstition of his ancestors, by refusing
to lead the military procession of the equestrian order, and to offer
the public vows to the Jupiter of the Capitoline Hill.  Many years
before his baptism and death, Constantine had proclaimed to the world,
that neither his person nor his image should ever more be seen within
the walls of an idolatrous temple; while he distributed through the
provinces a variety of medals and pictures, which represented the
emperor in an humble and suppliant posture of Christian devotion.

The pride of Constantine, who refused the privileges of a catechumen,
cannot easily be explained or excused; but the delay of his baptism may
be justified by the maxims and the practice of ecclesiastical antiquity.
The sacrament of baptism  was regularly administered by the bishop
himself, with his assistant clergy, in the cathedral church of the
diocese, during the fifty days between the solemn festivals of Easter
and Pentecost; and this holy term admitted a numerous band of infants
and adult persons into the bosom of the church. The discretion of
parents often suspended the baptism of their children till they could
understand the obligations which they contracted: the severity of
ancient bishops exacted from the new converts a novitiate of two or
three years; and the catechumens themselves, from different motives of a
temporal or a spiritual nature, were seldom impatient to assume the
character of perfect and initiated Christians. The sacrament of baptism
was supposed to contain a full and absolute expiation of sin; and the
soul was instantly restored to its original purity, and entitled to the
promise of eternal salvation. Among the proselytes of Christianity,
there are many who judged it imprudent to precipitate a salutary rite,
which could not be repeated; to throw away an inestimable privilege,
which could never be recovered. By the delay of their baptism, they
could venture freely to indulge their passions in the enjoyments of this
world, while they still retained in their own hands the means of a sure
and easy absolution.  The sublime theory of the gospel had made a much
fainter impression on the heart than on the understanding of Constantine
himself. He pursued the great object of his ambition through the dark
and bloody paths of war and policy; and, after the victory, he abandoned
himself, without moderation, to the abuse of his fortune. Instead of
asserting his just superiority above the imperfect heroism and profane
philosophy of Trajan and the Antonines, the mature age of Constantine
forfeited the reputation which he had acquired in his youth. As he
gradually advanced in the knowledge of truth, he proportionally declined
in the practice of virtue; and the same year of his reign in which he
convened the council of Nice, was polluted by the execution, or rather
murder, of his eldest son. This date is alone sufficient to refute the
ignorant and malicious suggestions of Zosimus,  who affirms, that, after
the death of Crispus, the remorse of his father accepted from the
ministers of Christianity the expiation which he had vainly solicited
from the Pagan pontiffs. At the time of the death of Crispus, the
emperor could no longer hesitate in the choice of a religion; he could
no longer be ignorant that the church was possessed of an infallible
remedy, though he chose to defer the application of it till the approach
of death had removed the temptation and danger of a relapse. The bishops
whom he summoned, in his last illness, to the palace of Nicomedia, were
edified by the fervor with which he requested and received the sacrament
of baptism, by the solemn protestation that the remainder of his life
should be worthy of a disciple of Christ, and by his humble refusal to
wear the Imperial purple after he had been clothed in the white garment
of a Neophyte. The example and reputation of Constantine seemed to
countenance the delay of baptism.  Future tyrants were encouraged to
believe, that the innocent blood which they might shed in a long reign
would instantly be washed away in the waters of regeneration; and the
abuse of religion dangerously undermined the foundations of moral
virtue.

The gratitude of the church has exalted the virtues and excused the
failings of a generous patron, who seated Christianity on the throne of
the Roman world; and the Greeks, who celebrate the festival of the
Imperial saint, seldom mention the name of Constantine without adding
the title of equal to the Apostles.  Such a comparison, if it allude to
the character of those divine missionaries, must be imputed to the
extravagance of impious flattery. But if the parallel be confined to the
extent and number of their evangelic victories the success of
Constantine might perhaps equal that of the Apostles themselves. By the
edicts of toleration, he removed the temporal disadvantages which had
hitherto retarded the progress of Christianity; and its active and
numerous ministers received a free permission, a liberal encouragement,
to recommend the salutary truths of revelation by every argument which
could affect the reason or piety of mankind. The exact balance of the
two religions continued but a moment; and the piercing eye of ambition
and avarice soon discovered, that the profession of Christianity might
contribute to the interest of the present, as well as of a future life.
The hopes of wealth and honors, the example of an emperor, his
exhortations, his irresistible smiles, diffused conviction among the
venal and obsequious crowds which usually fill the apartments of a
palace. The cities which signalized a forward zeal by the voluntary
destruction of their temples, were distinguished by municipal
privileges, and rewarded with popular donatives; and the new capital of
the East gloried in the singular advantage that Constantinople was never
profaned by the worship of idols.  As the lower ranks of society are
governed by imitation, the conversion of those who possessed any
eminence of birth, of power, or of riches, was soon followed by
dependent multitudes.  The salvation of the common people was purchased
at an easy rate, if it be true that, in one year, twelve thousand men
were baptized at Rome, besides a proportionable number of women and
children, and that a white garment, with twenty pieces of gold, had been
promised by the emperor to every convert.  The powerful influence of
Constantine was not circumscribed by the narrow limits of his life, or
of his dominions. The education which he bestowed on his sons and
nephews secured to the empire a race of princes, whose faith was still
more lively and sincere, as they imbibed, in their earliest infancy, the
spirit, or at least the doctrine, of Christianity. War and commerce had
spread the knowledge of the gospel beyond the confines of the Roman
provinces; and the Barbarians, who had disdained as humble and
proscribed sect, soon learned to esteem a religion which had been so
lately embraced by the greatest monarch, and the most civilized nation,
of the globe.  The Goths and Germans, who enlisted under the standard of
Rome, revered the cross which glittered at the head of the legions, and
their fierce countrymen received at the same time the lessons of faith
and of humanity. The kings of Iberia and Armenia * worshipped the god of
their protector; and their subjects, who have invariably preserved the
name of Christians, soon formed a sacred and perpetual connection with
their Roman brethren. The Christians of Persia were suspected, in time
of war, of preferring their religion to their country; but as long as
peace subsisted between the two empires, the persecuting spirit of the
Magi was effectually restrained by the interposition of Constantine.
The rays of the gospel illuminated the coast of India. The colonies of
Jews, who had penetrated into Arabia and Ethiopia,  opposed the progress
of Christianity; but the labor of the missionaries was in some measure
facilitated by a previous knowledge of the Mosaic revelation; and
Abyssinia still reveres the memory of Frumentius, * who, in the time of
Constantine, devoted his life to the conversion of those sequestered
regions. Under the reign of his son Constantius, Theophilus,  who was
himself of Indian extraction, was invested with the double character of
ambassador and bishop. He embarked on the Red Sea with two hundred
horses of the purest breed of Cappadocia, which were sent by the emperor
to the prince of the Sabæans, or Homerites. Theophilus was intrusted
with many other useful or curious presents, which might raise the
admiration, and conciliate the friendship, of the Barbarians; and he
successfully employed several years in a pastoral visit to the churches
of the torrid zone.

The irresistible power of the Roman emperors was displayed in the
important and dangerous change of the national religion. The terrors of
a military force silenced the faint and unsupported murmurs of the
Pagans, and there was reason to expect, that the cheerful submission of
the Christian clergy, as well as people, would be the result of
conscience and gratitude. It was long since established, as a
fundamental maxim of the Roman constitution, that every rank of citizens
was alike subject to the laws, and that the care of religion was the
right as well as duty of the civil magistrate. Constantine and his
successors could not easily persuade themselves that they had forfeited,
by their conversion, any branch of the Imperial prerogatives, or that
they were incapable of giving laws to a religion which they had
protected and embraced. The emperors still continued to exercise a
supreme jurisdiction over the ecclesiastical order, and the sixteenth
book of the Theodosian code represents, under a variety of titles, the
authority which they assumed in the government of the Catholic church.

But the distinction of the spiritual and temporal powers,  which had
never been imposed on the free spirit of Greece and Rome, was introduced
and confirmed by the legal establishment of Christianity. The office of
supreme pontiff, which, from the time of Numa to that of Augustus, had
always been exercised by one of the most eminent of the senators, was at
length united to the Imperial dignity. The first magistrate of the
state, as often as he was prompted by superstition or policy, performed
with his own hands the sacerdotal functions;  nor was there any order of
priests, either at Rome or in the provinces, who claimed a more sacred
character among men, or a more intimate communication with the gods. But
in the Christian church, which intrusts the service of the altar to a
perpetual succession of consecrated ministers, the monarch, whose
spiritual rank is less honorable than that of the meanest deacon, was
seated below the rails of the sanctuary, and confounded with the rest of
the faithful multitude.  The emperor might be saluted as the father of
his people, but he owed a filial duty and reverence to the fathers of
the church; and the same marks of respect, which Constantine had paid to
the persons of saints and confessors, were soon exacted by the pride of
the episcopal order.  A secret conflict between the civil and
ecclesiastical jurisdictions embarrassed the operation of the Roman
government; and a pious emperor was alarmed by the guilt and danger of
touching with a profane hand the ark of the covenant. The separation of
men into the two orders of the clergy and of the laity was, indeed,
familiar to many nations of antiquity; and the priests of India, of
Persia, of Assyria, of Judea, of Æthiopia, of Egypt, and of Gaul,
derived from a celestial origin the temporal power and possessions which
they had acquired. These venerable institutions had gradually
assimilated themselves to the manners and government of their respective
countries;  but the opposition or contempt of the civil power served to
cement the discipline of the primitive church. The Christians had been
obliged to elect their own magistrates, to raise and distribute a
peculiar revenue, and to regulate the internal policy of their republic
by a code of laws, which were ratified by the consent of the people and
the practice of three hundred years. When Constantine embraced the faith
of the Christians, he seemed to contract a perpetual alliance with a
distinct and independent society; and the privileges granted or
confirmed by that emperor, or by his successors, were accepted, not as
the precarious favors of the court, but as the just and inalienable
rights of the ecclesiastical order.

The Catholic church was administered by the spiritual and legal
jurisdiction of eighteen hundred bishops;  of whom one thousand were
seated in the Greek, and eight hundred in the Latin, provinces of the
empire. The extent and boundaries of their respective dioceses had been
variously and accidentally decided by the zeal and success of the first
missionaries, by the wishes of the people, and by the propagation of the
gospel. Episcopal churches were closely planted along the banks of the
Nile, on the sea-coast of Africa, in the proconsular Asia, and through
the southern provinces of Italy. The bishops of Gaul and Spain, of
Thrace and Pontus, reigned over an ample territory, and delegated their
rural suffragans to execute the subordinate duties of the pastoral
office.  A Christian diocese might be spread over a province, or reduced
to a village; but all the bishops possessed an equal and indelible
character: they all derived the same powers and privileges from the
apostles, from the people, and from the laws. While the civiland
militaryprofessions were separated by the policy of Constantine, a new
and perpetual order of ecclesiasticalministers, always respectable,
sometimes dangerous, was established in the church and state. The
important review of their station and attributes may be distributed
under the following heads: I. Popular Election. II. Ordination of the
Clergy. III. Property. IV. Civil Jurisdiction. V. Spiritual censures.
VI. Exercise of public oratory. VII. Privilege of legislative
assemblies.

I. The freedom of election subsisted long after the legal establishment
of Christianity;  and the subjects of Rome enjoyed in the church the
privilege which they had lost in the republic, of choosing the
magistrates whom they were bound to obey. As soon as a bishop had closed
his eyes, the metropolitan issued a commission to one of his suffragans
to administer the vacant see, and prepare, within a limited time, the
future election. The right of voting was vested in the inferior clergy,
who were best qualified to judge of the merit of the candidates; in the
senators or nobles of the city, all those who were distinguished by
their rank or property; and finally in the whole body of the people,
who, on the appointed day, flocked in multitudes from the most remote
parts of the diocese,  and sometimes silenced by their tumultuous
acclamations, the voice of reason and the laws of discipline. These
acclamations might accidentally fix on the head of the most deserving
competitor; of some ancient presbyter, some holy monk, or some layman,
conspicuous for his zeal and piety. But the episcopal chair was
solicited, especially in the great and opulent cities of the empire, as
a temporal rather than as a spiritual dignity. The interested views, the
selfish and angry passions, the arts of perfidy and dissimulation, the
secret corruption, the open and even bloody violence which had formerly
disgraced the freedom of election in the commonwealths of Greece and
Rome, too often influenced the choice of the successors of the apostles.
While one of the candidates boasted the honors of his family, a second
allured his judges by the delicacies of a plentiful table, and a third,
more guilty than his rivals, offered to share the plunder of the church
among the accomplices of his sacrilegious hopes  The civil as well as
ecclesiastical laws attempted to exclude the populace from this solemn
and important transaction. The canons of ancient discipline, by
requiring several episcopal qualifications, of age, station, &c.,
restrained, in some measure, the indiscriminate caprice of the electors.
The authority of the provincial bishops, who were assembled in the
vacant church to consecrate the choice of the people, was interposed to
moderate their passions and to correct their mistakes. The bishops could
refuse to ordain an unworthy candidate, and the rage of contending
factions sometimes accepted their impartial mediation. The submission,
or the resistance, of the clergy and people, on various occasions,
afforded different precedents, which were insensibly converted into
positive laws and provincial customs;  but it was every where admitted,
as a fundamental maxim of religious policy, that no bishop could be
imposed on an orthodox church, without the consent of its members. The
emperors, as the guardians of the public peace, and as the first
citizens of Rome and Constantinople, might effectually declare their
wishes in the choice of a primate; but those absolute monarchs respected
the freedom of ecclesiastical elections; and while they distributed and
resumed the honors of the state and army, they allowed eighteen hundred
perpetual magistrates to receive their important offices from the free
suffrages of the people.  It was agreeable to the dictates of justice,
that these magistrates should not desert an honorable station from which
they could not be removed; but the wisdom of councils endeavored,
without much success, to enforce the residence, and to prevent the
translation, of bishops. The discipline of the West was indeed less
relaxed than that of the East; but the same passions which made those
regulations necessary, rendered them ineffectual. The reproaches which
angry prelates have so vehemently urged against each other, serve only
to expose their common guilt, and their mutual indiscretion.

II. The bishops alone possessed the faculty of spiritual generation: and
this extraordinary privilege might compensate, in some degree, for the
painful celibacy  which was imposed as a virtue, as a duty, and at
length as a positive obligation. The religions of antiquity, which
established a separate order of priests, dedicated a holy race, a tribe
or family, to the perpetual service of the gods.  Such institutions were
founded for possession, rather than conquest. The children of the
priests enjoyed, with proud and indolent security, their sacred
inheritance; and the fiery spirit of enthusiasm was abated by the cares,
the pleasures, and the endearments of domestic life. But the Christian
sanctuary was open to every ambitious candidate, who aspired to its
heavenly promises or temporal possessions. This office of priests, like
that of soldiers or magistrates, was strenuously exercised by those men,
whose temper and abilities had prompted them to embrace the
ecclesiastical profession, or who had been selected by a discerning
bishop, as the best qualified to promote the glory and interest of the
church. The bishops  (till the abuse was restrained by the prudence of
the laws) might constrain the reluctant, and protect the distressed; and
the imposition of hands forever bestowed some of the most valuable
privileges of civil society. The whole body of the Catholic clergy, more
numerous perhaps than the legions, was exempted * by the emperors from
all service, private or public, all municipal offices, and all personal
taxes and contributions, which pressed on their fellow-citizens with
intolerable weight; and the duties of their holy profession were
accepted as a full discharge of their obligations to the republic.  Each
bishop acquired an absolute and indefeasible right to the perpetual
obedience of the clerk whom he ordained: the clergy of each episcopal
church, with its dependent parishes, formed a regular and permanent
society; and the cathedrals of Constantinople  and Carthage  maintained
their peculiar establishment of five hundred ecclesiastical ministers.
Their ranks  and numbers were insensibly multiplied by the superstition
of the times, which introduced into the church the splendid ceremonies
of a Jewish or Pagan temple; and a long train of priests, deacons,
sub-deacons, acolythes, exorcists, readers, singers, and doorkeepers,
contributed, in their respective stations, to swell the pomp and harmony
of religious worship. The clerical name and privileges were extended to
many pious fraternities, who devoutly supported the ecclesiastical
throne.  Six hundred parabolani, or adventurers, visited the sick at
Alexandria; eleven hundred copiat, or grave-diggers, buried the dead at
Constantinople; and the swarms of monks, who arose from the Nile,
overspread and darkened the face of the Christian world.

Chapter XX: Conversion Of Constantine. -- Part IV.

III. The edict of Milan secured the revenue as well as the peace of the
church.  The Christians not only recovered the lands and houses of which
they had been stripped by the persecuting laws of Diocletian, but they
acquired a perfect title to all the possessions which they had hitherto
enjoyed by the connivance of the magistrate. As soon as Christianity
became the religion of the emperor and the empire, the national clergy
might claim a decent and honorable maintenance; and the payment of an
annual tax might have delivered the people from the more oppressive
tribute, which superstition imposes on her votaries. But as the wants
and expenses of the church increased with her prosperity, the
ecclesiastical order was still supported and enriched by the voluntary
oblations of the faithful. Eight years after the edict of Milan,
Constantine granted to all his subjects the free and universal
permission of bequeathing their fortunes to the holy Catholic church;
and their devout liberality, which during their lives was checked by
luxury or avarice, flowed with a profuse stream at the hour of their
death. The wealthy Christians were encouraged by the example of their
sovereign. An absolute monarch, who is rich without patrimony, may be
charitable without merit; and Constantine too easily believed that he
should purchase the favor of Heaven, if he maintained the idle at the
expense of the industrious; and distributed among the saints the wealth
of the republic. The same messenger who carried over to Africa the head
of Maxentius, might be intrusted with an epistle to Cæcilian, bishop of
Carthage. The emperor acquaints him, that the treasurers of the province
are directed to pay into his hands the sum of three thousand folles, or
eighteen thousand pounds sterling, and to obey his further requisitions
for the relief of the churches of Africa, Numidia, and Mauritania.  The
liberality of Constantine increased in a just proportion to his faith,
and to his vices. He assigned in each city a regular allowance of corn,
to supply the fund of ecclesiastical charity; and the persons of both
sexes who embraced the monastic life became the peculiar favorites of
their sovereign. The Christian temples of Antioch, Alexandria,
Jerusalem, Constantinople &c., displayed the ostentatious piety of a
prince, ambitious in a declining age to equal the perfect labors of
antiquity.  The form of these religious edifices was simple and oblong;
though they might sometimes swell into the shape of a dome, and
sometimes branch into the figure of a cross. The timbers were framed for
the most part of cedars of Libanus; the roof was covered with tiles,
perhaps of gilt brass; and the walls, the columns, the pavement, were
encrusted with variegated marbles. The most precious ornaments of gold
and silver, of silk and gems, were profusely dedicated to the service of
the altar; and this specious magnificence was supported on the solid and
perpetual basis of landed property. In the space of two centuries, from
the reign of Constantine to that of Justinian, the eighteen hundred
churches of the empire were enriched by the frequent and unalienable
gifts of the prince and people. An annual income of six hundred pounds
sterling may be reasonably assigned to the bishops, who were placed at
an equal distance between riches and poverty,  but the standard of their
wealth insensibly rose with the dignity and opulence of the cities which
they governed. An authentic but imperfect  rent-roll specifies some
houses, shops, gardens, and farms, which belonged to the three Basilicof
Rome, St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John Lateran, in the provinces of
Italy, Africa, and the East. They produce, besides a reserved rent of
oil, linen, paper, aromatics, &c., a clear annual revenue of twenty-two
thousand pieces of gold, or twelve thousand pounds sterling. In the age
of Constantine and Justinian, the bishops no longer possessed, perhaps
they no longer deserved, the unsuspecting confidence of their clergy and
people. The ecclesiastical revenues of each diocese were divided into
four parts for the respective uses of the bishop himself, of his
inferior clergy, of the poor, and of the public worship; and the abuse
of this sacred trust was strictly and repeatedly checked.  The patrimony
of the church was still subject to all the public compositions of the
state.  The clergy of Rome, Alexandria, Thessalonica, &c., might solicit
and obtain some partial exemptions; but the premature attempt of the
great council of Rimini, which aspired to universal freedom, was
successfully resisted by the son of Constantine.

IV. The Latin clergy, who erected their tribunal on the ruins of the
civil and common law, have modestly accepted, as the gift of
Constantine,  the independent jurisdiction, which was the fruit of time,
of accident, and of their own industry. But the liberality of the
Christian emperors had actually endowed them with some legal
prerogatives, which secured and dignified the sacerdotal character.  1.
Under a despotic government, the bishops alone enjoyed and asserted the
inestimable privilege of being tried only by their peers; and even in a
capital accusation, a synod of their brethren were the sole judges of
their guilt or innocence. Such a tribunal, unless it was inflamed by
personal resentment or religious discord, might be favorable, or even
partial, to the sacerdotal order: but Constantine was satisfied,  that
secret impunity would be less pernicious than public scandal: and the
Nicene council was edited by his public declaration, that if he
surprised a bishop in the act of adultery, he should cast his Imperial
mantle over the episcopal sinner. 2. The domestic jurisdiction of the
bishops was at once a privilege and a restraint of the ecclesiastical
order, whose civil causes were decently withdrawn from the cognizance of
a secular judge. Their venial offences were not exposed to the shame of
a public trial or punishment; and the gentle correction which the
tenderness of youth may endure from its parents or instructors, was
inflicted by the temperate severity of the bishops. But if the clergy
were guilty of any crime which could not be sufficiently expiated by
their degradation from an honorable and beneficial profession, the Roman
magistrate drew the sword of justice, without any regard to
ecclesiastical immunities. 3. The arbitration of the bishops was
ratified by a positive law; and the judges were instructed to execute,
without appeal or delay, the episcopal decrees, whose validity had
hitherto depended on the consent of the parties. The conversion of the
magistrates themselves, and of the whole empire, might gradually remove
the fears and scruples of the Christians. But they still resorted to the
tribunal of the bishops, whose abilities and integrity they esteemed;
and the venerable Austin enjoyed the satisfaction of complaining that
his spiritual functions were perpetually interrupted by the invidious
labor of deciding the claim or the possession of silver and gold, of
lands and cattle. 4. The ancient privilege of sanctuary was transferred
to the Christian temples, and extended, by the liberal piety of the
younger Theodosius, to the precincts of consecrated ground.  The
fugitive, and even guilty, suppliants were permitted to implore either
the justice, or the mercy, of the Deity and his ministers. The rash
violence of despotism was suspended by the mild interposition of the
church; and the lives or fortunes of the most eminent subjects might be
protected by the mediation of the bishop.

V. The bishop was the perpetual censor of the morals of his people The
discipline of penance was digested into a system of canonical
jurisprudence,  which accurately defined the duty of private or public
confession, the rules of evidence, the degrees of guilt, and the measure
of punishment. It was impossible to execute this spiritual censure, if
the Christian pontiff, who punished the obscure sins of the multitude,
respected the conspicuous vices and destructive crimes of the
magistrate: but it was impossible to arraign the conduct of the
magistrate, without, controlling the administration of civil government.
Some considerations of religion, or loyalty, or fear, protected the
sacred persons of the emperors from the zeal or resentment of the
bishops; but they boldly censured and excommunicated the subordinate
tyrants, who were not invested with the majesty of the purple. St.
Athanasius excommunicated one of the ministers of Egypt; and the
interdict which he pronounced, of fire and water, was solemnly
transmitted to the churches of Cappadocia.  Under the reign of the
younger Theodosius, the polite and eloquent Synesius, one of the
descendants of Hercules,  filled the episcopal seat of Ptolemais, near
the ruins of ancient Cyrene,  and the philosophic bishop supported with
dignity the character which he had assumed with reluctance.  He
vanquished the monster of Libya, the president Andronicus, who abused
the authority of a venal office, invented new modes of rapine and
torture, and aggravated the guilt of oppression by that of sacrilege.
After a fruitless attempt to reclaim the haughty magistrate by mild and
religious admonition, Synesius proceeds to inflict the last sentence of
ecclesiastical justice,  which devotes Andronicus, with his associates
and their families, to the abhorrence of earth and heaven. The
impenitent sinners, more cruel than Phalaris or Sennacherib, more
destructive than war, pestilence, or a cloud of locusts, are deprived of
the name and privileges of Christians, of the participation of the
sacraments, and of the hope of Paradise. The bishop exhorts the clergy,
the magistrates, and the people, to renounce all society with the
enemies of Christ; to exclude them from their houses and tables; and to
refuse them the common offices of life, and the decent rites of burial.
The church of Ptolemais, obscure and contemptible as she may appear,
addresses this declaration to all her sister churches of the world; and
the profane who reject her decrees, will be involved in the guilt and
punishment of Andronicus and his impious followers. These spiritual
terrors were enforced by a dexterous application to the Byzantine court;
the trembling president implored the mercy of the church; and the
descendants of Hercules enjoyed the satisfaction of raising a prostrate
tyrant from the ground.  Such principles and such examples insensibly
prepared the triumph of the Roman pontiffs, who have trampled on the
necks of kings.

VI. Every popular government has experienced the effects of rude or
artificial eloquence. The coldest nature is animated, the firmest reason
is moved, by the rapid communication of the prevailing impulse; and each
hearer is affected by his own passions, and by those of the surrounding
multitude. The ruin of civil liberty had silenced the demagogues of
Athens, and the tribunes of Rome; the custom of preaching which seems to
constitute a considerable part of Christian devotion, had not been
introduced into the temples of antiquity; and the ears of monarchs were
never invaded by the harsh sound of popular eloquence, till the pulpits
of the empire were filled with sacred orators, who possessed some
advantages unknown to their profane predecessors.  The arguments and
rhetoric of the tribune were instantly opposed with equal arms, by
skilful and resolute antagonists; and the cause of truth and reason
might derive an accidental support from the conflict of hostile
passions. The bishop, or some distinguished presbyter, to whom he
cautiously delegated the powers of preaching, harangued, without the
danger of interruption or reply, a submissive multitude, whose minds had
been prepared and subdued by the awful ceremonies of religion. Such was
the strict subordination of the Catholic church, that the same concerted
sounds might issue at once from a hundred pulpits of Italy or Egypt, if
they were tunedby the master hand of the Roman or Alexandrian primate.
The design of this institution was laudable, but the fruits were not
always salutary. The preachers recommended the practice of the social
duties; but they exalted the perfection of monastic virtue, which is
painful to the individual, and useless to mankind. Their charitable
exhortations betrayed a secret wish that the clergy might be permitted
to manage the wealth of the faithful, for the benefit of the poor. The
most sublime representations of the attributes and laws of the Deity
were sullied by an idle mixture of metaphysical subtleties, puerile
rites, and fictitious miracles: and they expatiated, with the most
fervent zeal, on the religious merit of hating the adversaries, and
obeying the ministers of the church. When the public peace was
distracted by heresy and schism, the sacred orators sounded the trumpet
of discord, and, perhaps, of sedition. The understandings of their
congregations were perplexed by mystery, their passions were inflamed by
invectives; and they rushed from the Christian temples of Antioch or
Alexandria, prepared either to suffer or to inflict martyrdom. The
corruption of taste and language is strongly marked in the vehement
declamations of the Latin bishops; but the compositions of Gregory and
Chrysostom have been compared with the most splendid models of Attic, or
at least of Asiatic, eloquence.

VII. The representatives of the Christian republic were regularly
assembled in the spring and autumn of each year; and these synods
diffused the spirit of ecclesiastical discipline and legislation through
the hundred and twenty provinces of the Roman world.  The archbishop or
metropolitan was empowered, by the laws, to summon the suffragan bishops
of his province; to revise their conduct, to vindicate their rights, to
declare their faith, and to examine the merits of the candidates who
were elected by the clergy and people to supply the vacancies of the
episcopal college. The primates of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Carthage,
and afterwards Constantinople, who exercised a more ample jurisdiction,
convened the numerous assembly of their dependent bishops. But the
convocation of great and extraordinary synods was the prerogative of the
emperor alone. Whenever the emergencies of the church required this
decisive measure, he despatched a peremptory summons to the bishops, or
the deputies of each province, with an order for the use of post-horses,
and a competent allowance for the expenses of their journey. At an early
period, when Constantine was the protector, rather than the proselyte,
of Christianity, he referred the African controversy to the council of
Arles; in which the bishops of York of Treves, of Milan, and of
Carthage, met as friends and brethren, to debate in their native tongue
on the common interest of the Latin or Western church.  Eleven years
afterwards, a more numerous and celebrated assembly was convened at Nice
in Bithynia, to extinguish, by their final sentence, the subtle disputes
which had arisen in Egypt on the subject of the Trinity. Three hundred
and eighteen bishops obeyed the summons of their indulgent master; the
ecclesiastics of every rank, and sect, and denomination, have been
computed at two thousand and forty-eight persons;  the Greeks appeared
in person; and the consent of the Latins was expressed by the legates of
the Roman pontiff. The session, which lasted about two months, was
frequently honored by the presence of the emperor. Leaving his guards at
the door, he seated himself (with the permission of the council) on a
low stool in the midst of the hall. Constantine listened with patience,
and spoke with modesty: and while he influenced the debates, he humbly
professed that he was the minister, not the judge, of the successors of
the apostles, who had been established as priests and as gods upon
earth.  Such profound reverence of an absolute monarch towards a feeble
and unarmed assembly of his own subjects, can only be compared to the
respect with which the senate had been treated by the Roman princes who
adopted the policy of Augustus. Within the space of fifty years, a
philosophic spectator of the vicissitudes of human affairs might have
contemplated Tacitus in the senate of Rome, and Constantine in the
council of Nice. The fathers of the Capitol and those of the church had
alike degenerated from the virtues of their founders; but as the bishops
were more deeply rooted in the public opinion, they sustained their
dignity with more decent pride, and sometimes opposed with a manly
spirit the wishes of their sovereign. The progress of time and
superstition erased the memory of the weakness, the passion, the
ignorance, which disgraced these ecclesiastical synods; and the Catholic
world has unanimously submitted  to the infallibledecrees of the general
councils.