written for them, such as a person of any religion might offer for the health of the emperor and the welfare of the state. They were required to go into the fields and repeat this, at the word of command. In this edict no allusion was made to the Sun's Day as connected with Christianity. The increasing humanity of the age, to which Christ, his Apostles, and those who reverenced their kind and gentle morality, had contributed so very largely, was indicated by one feature in the law: the courts were closed on that day for all purposes, except the manumission of slaves. Military exercises were also prohibited.

Licinius, who married the sister of Constantine, governed the Eastern part of the empire. Jealousy between the two emperors resulted in war. Licinius was defeated, and peace remained unbroken for several years. He is said to have been avaricious and sensual, while Constantine was generous, temperate, and virtuous, in all his habits. The strict morality enjoined by Christian bishops was probably an uncomfortable restraint upon the debaucheries of Licinius, while, at the same time, jealousy of Constantine's power led him to seek popularity with a large class of his subjects by throwing his whole influence in favour of the old religion. He allowed no one to retain rank in his army unless he consented to offer sacrifices to the gods. He confined bishops to the care of their own dioceses, and forbade them to meet in councils; probably fearing such opportunities might be used to his disadvantage. On the ground of salutary moral regulations, he ordered that women belonging to Christian communities should be religiously instructed only by deaconesses; that men and women should assemble for worship in the open air, and not meet together in churches. He forbade Christians access to the prisons, which they had been in the habit of visiting frequently for purposes of charity and devotion. Finally, he ordered their churches in the province of Pontus to be closed, and in some cases destroyed. Acts of personal violence, and even of martyrdom occurred. The terrified Christians fled from the cities, and hid themselves in woods and

A*

caves. In consequence of these outrages, Constantine again took up arms against his brother-in-law. Political rivalry was the real cause of strife, but, by force of circumstances, it became a struggle for mastery between the old and new religions. Licinius solemnly invoked the gods, offered sacrifices, and consulted oracles and divinations, from which he received promises of universal empire. Constantine marched to the contest with his standard of the cross, and accompanied by bishops. He gained the victory, which Christians attributed to the prayers of their bishops, and the presence of the holy Labarum. Eusebius declares that Constantine himself told him that one man, who, in terror, gave up the standard of the cross to another, was immediately transfixed by a spear in his flight, while the bearer of the cross passed on unhurt amid a shower of javelins, and not a man in its immediate neighbourhood was even wounded. This battle gave Constantine undivided mastery of the Roman world. He gave orders to spare the lives of his enemies, and offered rewards for all captives who were brought to him alive; an improvement on the old customs, probably owing to the humanizing influence of the bishops. Licinius was permitted to retire to private life, and it is said Constantine took a solemn oath to spare the life of his sister's husband; which, however, he failed to keep.

The adulation of the bishops was excessive; but much may be excused in men who had found an imperial protector, after such frequent and fierce storms of persecution. Eusebius of Cæsarea represents him as giving orders for battle under the influence of direct inspiration from heaven, in answer to his prayers. When the bishops in attendance upon him congratulated him as ruler over this world, and destined to reign with the Son of God in the world to come, he admonished them rather to pray for him, that he might be deemed worthy to be a servant of God, both in this world and the next.

He recalled the exiled Christians, restored their confiscated property, and the honours of those who had been

degraded in state or army. He rebuilt the churches at his own expense, and empowered the clergy to receive donations of land, as he had previously done in the Western parts of the empire. In the proclamations announcing these decrees, he expresses the conviction that the only true and Almighty God, had, by special interposition in his favour, given him victory over the Evil Powers, in order that his own worship might, by his means, become universally diffused. In one of them he says: "I invoke thee, Lord of the Universe, holy God! for by the leading of thy hand, have I undertaken and accomplished salutary things. Everywhere, preceded by thy sign, have I led on a victorious army. For this reason, I have consecrated to thee my soul, deeply imbued with love and with fear. I sincerely love thy name, I venerate thy power, which thou hast revealed to me by so many proofs, and by which thou hast confirmed my faith."

With regard to the adherents of the old worship, he says: "Let the followers of error enjoy the liberty of sharing peace and tranquillity with the faithful. The improving influence of intercourse may lead them into the way of truth. Let each act according to the dictates of his own soul. Let no one molest his neighbour concerning that which is according to his convictions. If possible, let him profit him by the knowledge he has gained; if not possible, he should allow him to go on in his own way. It is one thing to enter voluntarily into the contest for eternal life, and another to force one to it against his will. Let those who remain strangers to the holy laws of God retain their temples of falsehood, since they wish it." He adds that "the mighty dominion of error was too firmly rooted" to admit of the universal prevalence of Christianity.

The first instance in which he caused any temples to be destroyed, or old forms forcibly suppressed, was in the case of certain temples of Venus, where licentious rites were practised. The site of one of these, in Phoenicia, was occupied by a new church. There were no Christians in the place; but he sent bishops and a body of the clergy there,

and bestowed large sums on them for the support of the poor; on the ground that the people might be converted to the new faith by doing good to their bodies. The famous old Temple of Esculapius, at Æga, was destroyed, on the charge that impositions were practised on the people by cures pretended to be miraculous. He took many objects of Art from these temples to adorn the imperial palace, or bestow upon his friends. Some of the images were found to be so constructed that the priests could enter and speak through them. These were exhibited to convince the people of the deceptions that had been practised upon them. In order to advance Christians to office, a law was not long after passed forbidding public functionaries to sacrifice to the gods. The erection of any new images was likewise prohibited.

The letters and proclamations of Constantine, after his victory, generally betray that temporal success was to his mind the strongest evidence of the truth of Christianity. With this view of the subject, his recent good fortune could not do otherwise than increase his zeal for his adopted faith. He studied the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, delivered theological discourses, and considered himself competent to decide controverted points of doctrine. In this kind of warfare it may be fairly presumed that the successful soldier was guided by his bishops. In his discourses, he quoted the Sibylline Prophecies in proof of Christianity; and placed peculiar reliance upon the one purporting to be composed six hundred years after the Deluge, in the form of an acrostic, making the words, Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour.

Virgil, who died nineteen years before Christ, was a sort of poet laureate to the imperial family of Augustus, from whom he received munificent presents. The poets, from time immemorial, had sung of a Golden Age, under the reign of Saturn. They said when the Iron Age commenced, Astrea, Goddess of Justice, departed from this earth, and was placed in the Zodiac, as the constellation of the Virgin; they predicted that the reign of Saturn would

return, and the Virgin Astrea again live upon the earth. During the peaceful and prosperous reign of Augustus, Virgil wrote an Eclogue, dedicated to his friend Pollio, embodying this universal prophecy. He coupled it with the birth of a wonderful child; which scholars suppose to be a complimentary allusion to some infant about to be born in the imperial family. He says: "The last age, prophesied by the Cumaan Sibyl, comes. The great procession of centuries begins anew. Now the reign of Saturn and the Virgin returns. Now a new race is sent from the high heaven. Only be thou propitious, O chaste Lucina,* to the infant boy, by whom the Iron Age shall first cease, and the Golden shall begin throughout the world: then may we say thy own Apollo reigns. In thy consulship, Pollio, this grace of our time shall enter, and the great months shall set forward. * * * * * * He shall partake the life of the gods, shall see heroes and demi-gods associated, shall himself be seen by them, and shall rule the tranquillized world with his father's virtues. For thee, boy, the earth shall spread out her offerings. *** Goats shall of themselves bring home their distended udders, and herds shall not fear the huge lion. Thy cradle shall yield fragrant flowers. Serpents and treacherous herbs of poison shall perish. When thou shalt be able to read the deeds and praises of thy father, and know what virtue is, the plain shall become yellow with waving grain, purple grapes shall hang on the rough thorn, and rugged oaks distil honey, clear as the dew. * * Every land shall produce everything. The soil shall not feel the harrow, nor the vine the pruning-hook; the fleece shall no more cheat with artificial hues, but the ram shall imbue his wool with rich purple, or glowing saffron, and the grazing lambs shall be clothed with scarlet. The Fates have said to their distaffs: 'Run off these ages!' Loved offspring of the gods, great child of Jupiter, advance to the exalted honours! for the time is at hand."

*The goddess who presided over birth

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