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LACTANTIUS

OF THE MANNER IN WHICH THE PERSECUTORS DIED.(1)

ADDRESSED TO DONATUS.
[Translated by the Reverend William Fletcher, D.D.]

CHAP. I.

   THE Lord has heard those supplications which you, my best beloved
Donatus,(2) pour forth in His presence all the day long, and the
supplications of the rest of our brethren, who by a glorious confession
have obtained an everlasting crown, the reward of their faith. Behold, all
the adversaries are destroyed, and tranquillity having been re-established
throughout the Roman empire, the late oppressed Church arises again, and
the temple of God, overthrown by the hands of the wicked, is built with
more glory than before. For God has raised up princes to rescind the
impious and sanguinary edicts of the tyrants and provide for the welfare of
mankind; so that now the cloud of past times is dispelled, and peace and
serenity gladden all hearts. And after the, furious whirlwind and black
tempest, the heavens  are now become calm, and the wished-for light has
shone forth; and now God, the hearer of prayer, by His divine aid has
lifted His prostrate and afflicted servants from the ground, has brought to
an end the united devices of the wicked, and wiped off the tears from the
faces of those who mourned. They who insulted over the Divinity, lie low;
they who cast down the holy temple, are fallen with more tremendous ruin;
and the tormentors of just men have poured out their guilty souls amidst
plagues inflicted by Heaven, and amidst deserved tortures.  For God delayed
to punish them, that, by great  and marvellous examples, He might teach
posterity that He alone is God, and that with fit vengeance He executes
judgment on the proud, the impious, and the persecutors.(3)

   Of the end of those men I have thought good to publish a narrative,
that all who are afar off, and all who shall arise hereafter, may learn how
the Almighty manifested His power and sovereign greatness in rooting out
and utterly destroying the enemies of His name. And this will become
evident, when I relate who were the persecutors of the Church from the time
of its first constitution, and what were the punishments by which the
divine Judge, in His severity, took vengeance on them.

CHAP. II.

   In the latter days of the Emperor Tiberius, in the consulship of
Ruberius Geminus and Fufius Geminus, and on the tenth of the kalends of
April,(4) as I find it written, Jesus Christ was crucified by the Jews.(5)
After He bad risen again on the third day, He gathered together His
apostles, whom fear, at the time of His being laid hold on, had put to
flight; and while He sojourned with them forty days, He opened their
hearts, interpreted to them the Scripture, which hitherto had been wrapped
up in obscurity, ordained and fitted them for the preaching of His word and
doctrine, and regulated all things concerning the institutions of the New
Testament; and this having been accomplished, a cloud and whirlwind
enveloped Him, and caught Him up from the sight of men unto heaven.

   His apostles were at that time eleven in number, to whom were added
Matthias, in the room of the traitor Judas, and afterwards Paul. Then were
they dispersed throughout all the earth to preach the Gospel, as the Lord
their Master had commanded them; and during twenty-five years, and until
the beginning of the reign of the Emperor Nero, they occupied themselves in
laying the foundations of the Church in every province and city. And while
Nero reigned, the Apostle Peter came to Rome, and, through the power of God
committed unto him, wrought certain miracles, and, by turning many to the
true religion, built up a faithful and stedfast temple unto the Lord. When
Nero heard of those things, and observed that not only in Rome, but in
every other place, a great multitude revolted daily from the worship of
idols, and, condemning their old ways, went over to the new religion, he,
an execrable and pernicious tyrant, sprung forward to raze the heavenly
temple and destroy the true faith. He it was who first persecuted the
servants of God; he crucified Peter, and slew Paul:(1) nor did he escape
with impunity; for God looked on the affliction of His people; and
therefore the tyrant, bereaved of authority, and precipitated from the
height of empire, suddenly disappeared, and even the burial-place of that
noxious wild beast was nowhere to be seen. This has led some persons of
extravagant imagination to suppose that, having been conveyed to a distant
region, he is still reserved alive; and to him they apply the Sibylline
verses concerning

"The fugitive, who slew his own mother, being to come from the uttermost
boundaries of the earth;"

as if he who was the first should also be the last persecutor, and thus
prove the forerunner of Antichrist! But we ought not to believe those who,
affirming that the two prophets Enoch and Elias have been translated into
some remote place that they might attend our Lord when He shall come to
judgment,(2) also fancy that Nero is to appear hereafter as the forerunner
of the devil, when he shall come to lay waste the earth and overthrow
mankind.

CHAP. III.

   After an interval of some years from the death of Nero, there arose
another tyrant no less wicked (Domitian), who, although his government was
exceedingly odious, for a very long time oppressed his subjects, and
reigned in security, until at length he stretched forth his impious hands
against the Lord. Having been instigated by evil demons to persecute the
righteous people, he was then delivered into the power of his enemies, and
suffered due punishment. To be murdered in his own palace was not vengeance
ample enough: the very memory of his name was erased. For although he had
erected many admirable edifices, and rebuilt the Capitol, and left other
distinguished marks of his magnificence, yet the senate did so persecute
his name, as to leave no remains of his statues, or traces of the
inscriptions put up in honour of him; and by most solemn and severe decrees
it branded him, even after death, with perpetual infamy. Thus, the commands
of the tyrant having been rescinded, the Church was not only restored to
her former state, but she shone forth with additional splendour, and became
more and more  flourishing. And in the times that followed, while many
well-deserving princes guided the helm of the Roman empire, the Church
suffered  no violent assaults from her enemies, and she  extended her hands
unto the east and unto the west, insomuch that now there was not any the
most remote corner of the earth to which the divine religion had not
penetrated, or any nation of manners so barbarous that did not, by being
converted to the worship of God, become mild and gentle.(3)

CHAP. IV.

   This long peace,(4) however, was afterwards interrupted. Decius
appeared in the world, an accursed wild beast, to afflict the Church,-- and
who but a bad man would persecute religion? It seems as if he had been
raised to sovereign eminence, at once to rage against God, and at once to
fall; for, having undertaken an expedition against the Carpi, who had then
possessed themselves of Dacia and Moefia, he was suddenly surrounded by the
barbarians, and slain, together with great part of his army; nor could he
be honoured with the rites of sepulture, but, stripped and naked, he lay to
be devoured by wild beasts and birds,(5)--a fit end for the enemy of God.

CHAP. V.

   And presently Valerian also, in a mood alike frantic, lifted up his
impious hands to assault God, and, although his time was short, shed much
righteous blood. But God punished him in a new and extraordinary manner,
that it might be a lesson to future ages that the adversaries of Heaven
always receive the just recompense of their iniquities. He, having been
made prisoner by the Persians, lost not only that power which he had
exercised without moderation, but also the liberty of which be had deprived
others; and he wasted the remainder of his days in the vilest condition of
slavery: for Sapores, the king of the Persians, who had made him prisoner,
whenever he chose to get into his carriage or to mount on horseback,
commanded the Roman to stoop and present his back; then, setting his foot
on the shoulders of Valerian, he said, with a smile of reproach, "This is
true, and not what the Romans delineate on board or plaster." Valerian
lived for a considerable time under the well-merited insults of his
conqueror; so that the Roman name remained long the scoff and derision of
the barbarians: and this also was added to the severity of his punishment,
that although he had an emperor for his son, he found no one to revenge his
captivity and most abject and servile state; neither indeed was he ever
demanded  back Afterward, when he had finished this shameful life under so
great dishonour, he was flayed, and his skin, stripped from the flesh, was
dyed with vermilion, and placed in the temple of the gods of the
barbarians, that the remembrance of a triumph so signal might be
perpetuated, and that this spectacle might always be exhibited to our
ambassadors, as an admonition to the Romans, that, beholding the spoils of
their captived emperor in a Persian temple, they should not place too great
confidence in their own strength.

   Now since God so punished the sacrilegious, is it not strange that any
one should afterward have dared to do, or even to devise, aught against the
majesty of the one God, who governs and supports all things?

CHAP. VI.

   Aurelian might have recollected the fate of the captived emperor, yet,
being of a nature outrageous and headstrong, he forgot both his sin and its
punishment, and by deeds of cruelty irritated the divine wrath. He was not,
however, permitted to accomplish what he had devised; for just as he began
to give a loose to his rage, he was slain. His bloody edicts had not yet
reached the more distant provinces, when he himself lay all bloody on the
earth at Caenophrurium in Thrace, assassinated by his familiar friends, who
had taken up groundless suspicions against him.

   Examples of such a nature, and so numerous, ought to have deterred
succeeding tyrants; nevertheless they were not only not dismayed, but, in
their misdeeds against God, became more bold and presumptuous.

CHAP. VII.

   While Diocletian, that author of ill, and deviser of misery, was
ruining all things, he could not withhold his insults, not even against
God. This man, by avarice partly, and partly by timid counsels, overturned
the Roman empire. For he made choice of three persons to share the
government with him; and thus, the empire having been quartered, armies
were multiplied, and each of the four princes strove to maintain a much
more considerable military force than any sole emperor had done in times
past.(1) There began to be fewer men who paid taxes than there were who
received wages; so that the means of the husbandmen being exhausted by
enormous impositions, the farms were abandoned, cultivated grounds became
woodland, and universal dismay prevailed. Besides, the provinces were
divided into minute portions, and many presidents and a multitude of
inferior officers lay heavy on each territory, and almost on each city.
There were also many stewards of different degrees, and deputies of
presidents. Very few civil causes came before them: but there were
condemnations daily, and forfeitures frequently inflicted; taxes on
numberless commodities, and those not only often repeated, but perpetual,
and, in exacting them, intolerable wrongs.

   Whatever was laid on for the maintenance of the soldiery might have
been endured; but Diocletian, through his insatiable avarice, would never
allow the sums of money in his treasury to be diminished: he was constantly
heaping together extraordinary aids and free gifts, that his original
hoards might remain untouched and inviolable. He also, when by various
extortions he had made all things exceedingly dear, attempted by an
ordinance to limit their prices. Then much blood was shed for the veriest
trifles; men were afraid to expose aught to sale, and the scarcity became
more excessive and grievous than ever, until, in the end, the ordinance,
after having proved destructive to multitudes, was from mere necessity
abrogated. To this there were added a certain endless passion for building,
and on that account, endless exactions from the provinces for furnishing
wages to labourers and artificers, and supplying carriages and whatever
else was requisite to the works which he projected. Here public halls,
there a circus, here a mint, and there a workhouse for making implements of
war; in one place a habitation for his empress, and in another for his
daughter. Presently great part of the city was quitted, and all men removed
with their wives and children, as from a town taken by enemies; and when
those buildings were completed, to the destruction of whole provinces, he
said, "They are not right,

let them be done on another plan." Then they were to be pulled down, or
altered, to undergo perhaps a future demolition. By such folly was he
continually endeavouring to equal Nicomedia with the city Rome in
magnificence.

   I omit mentioning how many perished on account of their possessions or
wealth; for such evils were exceedingly frequent, and through their
frequency appeared almost lawful. But  this was peculiar to him, that
whenever he saw  a field remarkably well cultivated, or a house of uncommon
elegance, a false accusation and a capital punishment were straightway
prepared against the proprietor; so that it seemed as if Diocletian could
not be guilty of rapine without also shedding blood.

CHAP. VIII.

   What was the character of his brother in empire, Maximian, called
Herculius? Not unlike  to that of Diocletian; and, indeed, to render their
friendship so close and faithful as it was, there must have been in them a
sameness of inclinations and purposes, a corresponding will and unanimity
in judgment. Herein alone they were different, that Diocletian was more
avaricious and less resolute, and that Maximian, with less avarice, had a
bolder spirit, prone not to good, but to evil. For while he possessed
Italy, itself the chief seat of empire, and while other very opulent
provinces, such as Africa and Spain, were near at hand, he took little care
to preserve those treasures which he had such fair opportunities of
amassing. Whenever he stood in need of more, the richest senators were
presently charged, by suborned evidences, as guilty of aspiring to the
empire; so that the chief luminaries of the senate were daily extinguished.
And thus the treasury, delighting in blood, overflowed with ill-gotten
wealth.

   Add to all this the incontinency of that pestilent wretch, not only in
debauching males, which is hateful and abominable, but also in the
violation of the daughters of the principal men of the state; for wherever
he journeyed, virgins were suddenly torn from the presence of their
parents. In such enormities he placed his supreme delight, and to indulge
to the utmost his lust and flagitious desires was in his judgment the
felicity of his reign.

   I pass over Constantius, a prince unlike the others, and worthy to have
had the sole government of the empire.

CHAP. IX.

   But the other Maximian (Galerius), chosen by Diocletian for his son-in-
law, was worse, not only than those two princes whom our own times have
experienced, but worse than all the bad princes of former days. In this
wild beast there dwelt a native barbarity and a savageness foreign to Roman
blood; and no wonder, for his mother was born beyond the Danube, and it was
an inroad of the Carpi that obliged her to cross over and take refuge in
New Dacia. The form of Galerius corresponded with his manners. Of stature
tall, full of flesh, and swollen to a horrible bulk of corpulency; by his
speech, gestures, and looks, he made himself a terror to all that came near
him. His father-in-law, too, dreaded him excessively. The cause was this.
Narseus, king of the Persians, emulating the example set him by his
grandfather Sapores, assembled a great army, and aimed at becoming master
of the eastern provinces of the Roman empire. Diocletian, apt to be low-
spirited and timorous in every commotion, and fearing a fate like that of
Valerian, would not in person encounter Narseus; but he sent Galerius by
the way of Armenia, while he himself halted in the eastern provinces, and
anxiously watched the

event. It is a custom amongst the barbarians to take everything that
belongs to them into the field. Galerius laid an ambush for them, and
easily overthrew men embarrassed with the multitude of their followers and
with their baggage. Having put Narseus to flight, and returned with much
spoil, his own pride and Diocletian's fears were greatly increased. For
after this victory he rose to such a pitch of haughtiness as to reject the
appellation of Caesar;(1) and when he heard that appellation in letters
addressed to him, he cried out, with a stern look and terrible voice, "How
long am I to be Caesar?" Then he began to act extravagantly, insomuch that,
as if he had been a second Romulus, he wished to pass for and to be called
the offspring of Mars; and that he might appear the issue of a divinity, he
was willing that his mother Romula should be dishonoured with the name of
adulteress. But, not to confound the chronological order of events, I delay
the recital of his actions; for indeed afterwards, when Galerius got the
title of emperor, his father-in-law having been divested of the imperial
purple, he became altogether outrageous, and of unbounded arrogance.

   While by such a conduct, and with such associates, Diocles--for that
was the name of Diocletian before he attained sovereignty--occupied himself
in subverting the commonweal, there was no evil which his crimes did not
deserve: nevertheless he reigned most prosperously, as long as he forbore
to defile his hands with the blood of the just; and what cause he had for
persecuting them, I come now to explain.

CHAP. X.

   Diocletian, as being of a timorous disposition, was a searcher into
futurity, and during his abode in the East he began to slay victims, that
from their livers he might obtain a prognostic of events; and while he
sacrificed, some attendants of his, who were Christians, stood by, and they
put the immortal sign on their foreheads. At this the demons were chased
away, and the holy rites interrupted. The soothsayers trembled, unable to
investigate the wonted marks on the entrails of the victims. They
frequently repeated the sacrifices, as if the former had been unpropitious;
but the victims, slain from time to time, afforded no tokens for
divination. At length Tages, the chief of the soothsayers,(2) either from
guess or from his own observation, said, "There are profane persons here,
who obstruct the rites." Then Diocletian, in furious passion, ordered not
only all who were assisting at the holy ceremonies, but also all who
resided within the palace, to sacrifice, and, in case of their refusal, to
be scourged. And further, by letters to the commanding officers, he
enjoined that all soldiers should be forced to the like impiety, under pain
of being dismissed the service. Thus far his rage proceeded; but at that
season he did nothing more  against the law and religion of God. After an
interval of some time he went to winter in Bithynia; and presently Galerius
Caesar came thither, inflamed with furious resentment, and purposing to
excite the inconsiderate old man to carry on that persecution which he had
begun against the Christians. I have learned that the cause of his fury was
as follows.

CHAP. XI.

   The mother of Galerius, a woman exceedingly superstitious, was a votary
of the gods of the mountains. Being of such a character, she made
sacrifices almost every day, and she feasted her servants on the meat
offered to idols: but the Christians of her family would not partake of
those entertainments; and while she feasted with the Gentiles, they
continued in fasting and prayer. On this account she conceived ill-will
against the Christians, and by woman-like complaints instigated her son, no
less superstitious than herself, to destroy them. So, during the whole
winter, Diocletian and Galerius held councils together, at which no one
else assisted; and it was the universal opinion that their conferences
respected the most momentous affairs of the empire. The old man long
opposed the fury of Galerius, and showed how pernicious it would be to
raise disturbances throughout the world and to shed so much blood; that the
Christians  were wont with eagerness to meet death; and  that it would be
enough for him to exclude persons of that religion from the court(1) and
the  army. Yet he could not restrain the madness of that obstinate man. He
resolved, therefore, to take the opinion of his friends. Now this  was a
circumstance in the bad disposition of Diocletian, that whenever he
determined to do good, he did it without advice, that the praise might be
all his own; hut whenever he determined to do ill, which he was sensible
would be blamed, he called in many advisers, that his  own fault might be
imputed to other men: and therefore a few civil magistrates, and a few
military commanders, were admitted to give their counsel; and the question
was put to them according to priority of rank. Some, through personal ill-
will towards the Christians, were of opinion that they ought to be cut off,
as enemies  of the gods and adversaries of the established religious
ceremonies. Others thought differently, but, having understood the will of
Galerius, they, either from dread of displeasing or from a desire of
gratifying him, concurred in the opinion given against the Christians. Yet
not even then could the emperor be prevailed upon to yield his assent. He
determined above all to consult his gods; and to that end he despatched a
soothsayer to inquire of Apollo at Miletus, whose answer was such as might
be expected from an enemy of the divine religion. So Diocletian was drawn
over from his purpose. But although he could struggle no longer against his
friends, and against Caesar and Apollo, yet still he attempted to observe
such moderation as to command the business to be carried through without
bloodshed; whereas Galerius would have had all persons burnt alive who
refused to sacrifice.

CHAP. XII.

   A fit and auspicious day was sought out for the accomplishment of this
undertaking; and the festival of the god Terminus, celebrated on the sevens
of the kalends of March,(2) was chosen, in preference to all others, to
terminate, as it were, the Christian religion.

   "That day, the harbinger of death, arose,
   First cause of ill, and long enduring woes;"

of woes which befell not only the Christians, but the whole earth. When
that day dawned, in the eighth consulship of Diocletian and seventh of
Maximian, suddenly, while it was yet hardly light, the prefect, together
with chief commanders, tribunes, and officers of the treasury, came to the
church in Nicomedia, and the gates having been forced open, they searched
everywhere for an image of the Divinity. The books of the Holy Scriptures
were found, and they were committed to the flames; the utensils and
furniture of the church were abandoned to pillage: all was rapine,
confusion, tumult. That church, situated on rising ground, was within view
of the palace; and Diocletian and Galerius stood, as if on a watch-tower,
disputing long whether it ought to be set on fire. The sentiment of
Diocletian prevailed, who dreaded lest, so great a fire being once kindled,
some part of the city might he burnt; for there were many and large
buildings that surrounded the church. Then the Pretorian Guards came in
battle array, with axes and other iron instruments, and having been let
loose everywhere, they in a few hours levelled that very lofty edifice with
the ground.(3)

CHAP. XIII.

   Next day an edict was published, depriving the Christians of all
honours and dignities; ordaining also that, without any distinction of rank
or degree, they should be subjected to tortures, and that every suit at law
should be received against them; while, on the other hand, they were
debarred from being plaintiffs in questions of wrong, adultery, or theft;
and, finally, that they should neither be capable of freedom, nor have
right of suffrage. A certain person tore down this edict, and cut it in
pieces,  improperly indeed, but with high spirit, saying in scorn, "These
are the triumphs of Goths and Sarmatians." Having been instantly seized and
brought to judgment, he was not only tortured, but burnt alive, in the
forms of law; and having displayed admirable patience under sufferings, he
was consumed to ashes.

CHAP. XIV.

   But Galerius, not satisfied with the tenor of the edict, sought in
another way to gain on the emperor. That he might urge him to excess of
cruelty in persecution, he employed private emissaries to set the palace on
fire; and some part of it having been burnt, the blame was laid on the
Christians as public enemies; and the very appellation of Christian grew
odious(1) on account of that fire. It was said that the Christians, in
concert with the eunuchs, had plotted to destroy the princes; and that both
of the princes had well-nigh been burnt alive in their own palace.
Diocletian, shrewd and intelligent as he always chose to appear, suspected
nothing of the contrivance, but, inflamed with anger, immediately commanded
that all his own domestics should be tortured to force a confession of the
plot. He sat on his tribunal, and saw innocent men tormented by fire to
make discovery. All magistrates, and all who had superintendency in the
imperial palace, obtained special commissions to administer the torture;
and they strove with each other who should be first in bringing to light
the conspiracy. No circumstances, however, of the fact were detected
anywhere; for no one applied the torture to any domestics of Galerius. He
himself was ever with Diocletian, constantly urging him, and never allowing
the passions of the inconsiderate old man to cool.  Then, after an interval
of fifteen days, he attempted a second fire; but that was perceived
quickly, and extinguished. Still, however, its author remained unknown. On
that very day,  Galerius, who in the middle of winter bad prepared for his
departure, suddenly hurried out of  the city, protesting that he fled to
escape being burnt alive.

CHAP. XV.

   And now Diocletian raged, not only against his own domestics, but
indiscriminately against all; and he began by forcing his daughter Valeria
and his wife Prisca to be polluted by sacrificing. Eunuchs, once the most
powerful, and who had chief authority at court and with the emperor, were
slain. Presbyters and other officers of the Church were seized, without
evidence by witnesses or confession, condemned, and together with their
families led to execution. In burning alive, no distinction of sex or age
was regarded; and because of their great multitude, they were not burnt one
after another, but a herd of them were encircled with the same fire; and
servants, having millstones tied about their necks, were cast into the sea.
Nor was the persecution less grievous on the rest of the people of God; for
the judges, dispersed through all the temples, sought to compel every one
to sacrifice. The prisons were crowded; tortures, hitherto unheard of, were
invented; and lest justice should be inadvertently administered to a
Christian, altars were placed in the courts of justice, hard by the
tribunal, that every litigant might offer incense before his cause could be
heard. Thus judges were no otherwise approached than divinities. Mandates
also had gone to Maximian Herculius and Constantius, requiring their
concurrence in the execution of the edicts; for in matters even of such
mighty importance their opinion was never once asked. Herculius, a person
of no merciful temper, yielded ready obedience, and enforced the edicts
throughout his dominions of Italy. Constantius, on the other hand, lest he
should have seemed to dissent from the injunctions of his superiors,
permitted the demolition of churches,--mere walls, and capable of being
built up again,--but he preserved entire that true temple of God, which is
the human body.(2)

CHAP. XVI.

   Thus was all the earth afflicted; and from east to west, except in the
territories of Gaul, three ravenous wild beasts continued to rage.

   "Had I a hundred mouths, a hundred tongues,
   A voice of brass, and adamantine lungs,
   Not half the dreadful scene could I disclose,"

or recount the punishments inflicted by the rulers in every province on
religious and innocent men.

   But what need of a particular recital of those things, especially to
you, my best beloved Donatus,(3) who above all others was exposed to the
storm of that violent persecution? For when you had fallen into the hands
of the prefect Flaccinian, no puny murderer, and afterwards of Hierocles,
who from a deputy became president of Bithynia, the author and adviser of
the persecution, and last of all into the hands of his successor
Priscillian, you displayed to mankind a pattern of invincible magnanimity.
Having been nine times exposed to racks and diversified torments, nine
times by a glorious profession of your faith you foiled the adversary; in
nine  combats you subdued the devil and his chosen  soldiers; and by nine
victories you triumphed, over this world and its terrors. How pleasing the
spectacle to God, when He beheld you a conqueror, yoking in your chariot
not white horses, nor enormous elephants, but those very men who had led
captive the nations! After this sort to lord it over the lords of the earth
is triumph indeed! Now, by your valour were  they conquered, when you set
at defiance their flagitious edicts, and, through stedfast faith and the
fortitude of your soul, you routed all the vain terrors of tyrannical
authority. Against you neither scourges, nor iron claws, nor fire,  nor
sword, nor various kinds of torture, availed aught; and no violence could
bereave you of your fidelity and persevering resolution. This it is to be a
disciple of God, and this it is to be a soldier of Christ; a soldier whom
no enemy can dislodge, or wolf snatch, from the heavenly camp; no artifice
ensnare, or pain of body subdue, or torments overthrow. At length, after
those nine glorious combats, in which the  devil was vanquished by you, he
dared not to enter the lists again with one whom, by repeated trials, he
had found unconquerable; and he abstained from challenging you any more,
lest you  should have laid hold on the garland of victory already stretched
out to you; an unfading garland, which, although you have not at present
received it, is laid up in the kingdom of the Lord for your virtue and
deserts. But let us now return to the course of our narrative.

CHAP. XVII.

   The wicked plan having been carried into execution, Diocletian, whom
prosperity had now abandoned, set out instantly for Rome, there to
celebrate the commencement of the twentieth year of his reign. That
solemnity was performed on the twelfth of the kalends of December;(1) and
suddenly the emperor, unable to bear the Roman freedom of speech, peevishly
and impatiently burst away from the city. The kalends of January(2)
approached, at which day the consulship, for the ninth time, was to be
offered to him; yet, rather than continue thirteen days longer in Rome, he
chose that his first appearance as consul should be at Ravenna. Having,
however, begun his journey in winter, amidst intense cold and incessant
rains, he contracted a slight but lingering disease: it harassed him
without intermission, so that he was obliged for the most part to be
carried in a litter. Then, at the close of summer, he made a circuit along
the banks of the Danube, and so came to Nicomedia. His disease had now
become more grievous and oppressing; yet he caused himself to be brought
out, in order to dedicate that circus which, at the conclusion of the
twentieth year of his reign, he had erected. Immediately he grew so languid
and feeble, that prayers for his life were put up to all the gods. Then
suddenly, on the ides of December,(3) there was heard in the palace sorrow,
and weeping, and lamentation, and the courtiers ran to and fro; there was
silence throughout the city, and a report went of the death, and even of
the burial, of Diocletian: but early on the morrow it was suddenly rumoured
that he still lived. At this the countenance of his domestics and courtiers
changed from melancholy to gay. Nevertheless there were who suspected his
death to be kept secret until the arrival of Galerius Caesar, lest in the
meanwhile the soldiery should attempt some change in the government; and
this suspicion grew so universal, that no one would believe the emperor
alive, until, on the kalends of March,(4) he appeared in public, but so
wan, his illness having lasted almost a year, as hardly to be known again.
The fit of stupor, resembling death, happened on the ides of December; and
although he in some measure recovered, yet he never attained to perfect
health again, for he became disordered in his judgment, being at certain
times insane and at others of sound mind.

CHAP. XVIII.

   Within a few days Galerius Caesar arrived, not to congratulate his
father-in-law on the re-establishment of his health, but to force him to
resign the empire. Already he had urged Maximian Herculius to the like
purpose, and by the alarm of civil wars terrified the old man into
compliance; and he now assailed Diocletian. At first, in gentle and
friendly terms, he said that age and growing infirmities disabled
Diocletian for the charge of the commonweal, and that he had need to give
himself some repose after his labours. Galerius, in confirmation of his
argument, produced the example of Nerva, who laid the weight of empire on
Trajan.

   But Diocletian made answer, that it was unfit for one who had held a
rank, eminent above all others and conspicuous, to sink into the obscurity
of a low station; neither indeed was it safe, because in the course of so
long a reign he must unavoidably have made many enemies. That the case of
Nerva was very different: he, after having reigned a single year, felt
himself, either from age or from inexperience in business, unequal to
affairs so momentous, and therefore threw aside the helm of government, and
returned to that private life in which he had already grown old. But
Diocletian added, that if Galerius wished for the title of emperor, there
was nothing to hinder its being conferred on him and Constantius, as well
as on Maximian Herculius.

   Galerius, whose imagination already grasped at the whole empire, saw
that little but an unsubstantial name would accrue to him from this
proposal, and therefore replied that the settlement made by Diocletian
himself ought to be inviolable; a settlement which provided that there
should be two of higher rank vested with supreme power, and two others of
inferior, to assist them. Easily might concord be preserved between two
equals, never amongst four;(1) that he, if Diocletian would not resign,
must consult his own interests, so as to remain no longer in an inferior
rank, and the last of that rank; that for fifteen years past he had been
confined, as an exile, to Illyricum and the banks of the Danube,
perpetually struggling against barbarous nations, while others, at their
ease, governed dominions more extensive than his, and better civilized.

   Diocletian already knew, by letters from Maximian Herculius, all that
Galerius had spoken at their conference, and also that he was augmenting
his army; and now, on hearing his discourse, the spiritless old man burst
into tears, and said, "Be it as you will."

   It remained to choose Caesars by common consent. "But," said Galerius,
"why ask the advice of Maximian and Constantius, since they must needs
acquiesce in whatever we do?"--"Certainly they will," replied Diocletian,
"for we must elect their sons."

   Now Maximian Herculius had a son, Maxentius, married to the daughter of
Galerius, a man of bad and mischievous dispositions, and so proud and
stubborn withal, that he would never pay the wonted obeisance either to his
father or father-in-law, and on that account he was hated by them both.
Constantius also had a son, Constantine, a young man of very great worth,
and well meriting the high station of Caesar. The distinguished comeliness
of his figure, his strict attention to all military duties, his virtuous
demeanour and singular affability, had endeared him to the troops, and made
him the choice of every individual. He was then at court, having  long
before been created by Diocletian a tribune of the first order.

  "What is to be done?" said Galerius, "for that Maxentius deserves not
the office. He who, while yet a private man, has treated me with
contumely, how will he act when once he obtains power?"--"But Constantine
is amiable, and will so rule as hereafter, in the opinion of mankind, to
surpass the mild virtues of his father."--"Be it so, if my inclinations and
judgment are to be disregarded. Men ought to be appointed who are at my
disposal, who will dread me, and never do anything unless by my orders."--
"Whom then shall we appoint?"--"Severus."--"How! that dancer, that habitual
drunkard, who turns night into day, and day into night?"--"He deserves the
office, for he has approved himself a faithful paymaster and purveyor of
the army; and, indeed, I have already despatched him to receive the purple
from the hands of Maximian."--"Well, I consent; but whom else do you
suggest?"--"Him," said Galerius, pointing out Daia, a young man, half-
barbarian. Now Galerius had lately bestowed part of his own name on that
youth, and called him Maximin, in like manner as Diocletian formerly
bestowed on Galerius the name of Maximian, for the omen's sake, because
Maximian Herculius had served him with unshaken fidelity.--"Who is that you
present?"--"A kinsman of mine."--"Alas!" said Diocletian, heaving  a deep
sigh, "you do not propose men fit for the charge of public affairs!"--"I
have tried them."--"Then do you look to it, who are about to assume the
administration of the empire: as for me, while I continued emperor, long
and diligent have been my labours in providing for the security of the
commonweal; and now, should anything disastrous ensue, the blame will not
be mine."

CHAP. XIX.

   Matters having been thus concerted, Diocletian and Galerius went in
procession to publish the nomination of Caesars. Every one looked at
Constantine; for there was no doubt that the choice would fall on him. The
troops present, as well as the chief soldiers of the other legions, who had
been summoned to the solemnity, fixed their eyes on Constantine, exulted in
the hope of his approaching election, and occupied themselves in prayers
for his prosperity. Near three miles from Nicomedia there is an eminence,
on the summit of which Galerius formerly received the purple; and there a
pillar, with the statue of Jupiter, was placed. Thither the procession
went. An assembly of the soldiers was called. Diocletian, with tears,
harangued them, and said that he was become infirm, that he needed repose
after his fatigues, anti that he would resign the empire into hands more
vigorous and able, and at the same time appoint new Caesars. The
spectators, with the utmost earnestness, waited for the nomination.
Suddenly he declared that the Caesars were Severus and Maximin. The
amazement was universal. Constantine stood near in public view, and men
began to question amongst themselves whether his name too had not been
changed into Maximin; when, in the sight of all, Galerius, stretching back
his hand, put Constantine aside, and drew Daia forward, and, having
divested him of the garb of a private person, set him in the most
conspicuous place. All men wondered who he could be, and from whence he
came; but none ventured to interpose or move objections, so confounded were
their minds at the strange and unlooked-for event. Diocletian took off his
purple robe, put it on Daia, and resumed his own original name of Diocles.
He descended from the tribunal, and passed through Nicomedia in a chariot;
and then this old emperor, like a veteran soldier freed from military
service, was dismissed into his own country; while Daia, lately taken from
the tending of cattle in forests to serve as a common soldier, immediately
made one of the lifeguard, presently a tribune, and next day Caesar,
obtained authority to trample under foot and oppress the empire of the
East; a person ignorant alike of war and of civil affairs, and from a
herdsman become a leader of armies.

CHAP. XX.

   Galerius having effected the expulsion of the two old men, began to
consider himself alone as the sovereign of the Roman empire. Necessity had
required the appointment of Constantius to the first rank; but Galerius
made small account of one who was of an easy temper, and of health
declining and precarious. He looked for the speedy death of Constantius.
And although that prince should recover, it seemed not difficult to force
him to put off the imperial purple; for what else could he do, if pressed
by his three colleagues to abdicate? Galerius had Licinius ever about his
person, his old and intimate acquaintance, and his earliest companion in
arms, whose counsels he used in the management of all affairs; yet he would
not nominate Licinius to the dignity of Caesar, with the title of son, for
he purposed to nominate him, in the room of Constantius, to the dignity of
emperor, with the title of brother, while he himself might hold sovereign
authority, and rule over the whole globe with unbounded licence. After
that, he meant to have solemnized the vicennial festival; to have conferred
on his son Candidianus, then a boy of nine years of age, the office of
Caesar; and, in conclusion, to have resigned, as Diocletian had done. And
thus, Licinius and Severus being emperors, and Maximin and Candidianus in
the next station of Caesars, he fancied that, environed as it were by an
impregnable wall, he should lead an old age. of security and peace. Such
were his projects; but God, whom he had made his adversary, frustrated all
those imaginations.

CHAP. XXI.

   Having thus attained to the highest power, he bent his mind to afflict
that empire into which he had opened his way. It is the manner and practice
of the Persians for the people to yield themselves slaves to their kings,
and for the kings to treat their people as slaves. This flagitious man,
from the time of his victories over the Persians, was not ashamed
incessantly to extol such an institution, and he resolved to establish it
in the Roman dominions; and because he could not do this by an express law,
he so acted, in imitation of the Persian kings, as to bereave men of their
liberties. He first of all degraded those whom he meant to punish; and then
not only were inferior magistrates put to the torture by him, but also the
chief men in cities, and persons of the most eminent rank, and this too in
matters of little moment, and in civil questions. Crucifixion was the
punishment ready prepared in capital cases; and for lesser crimes, fetters.
Matrons of honourable station were dragged into workhouses; and when any
man was to be scourged, there were four posts fixed in the ground, and to
them he was tied, after a manner unknown in the chastisement of slaves.
What shall I say of his apartment for sport, and of his favourite
diversions? He kept bears, most resembling himself in fierceness and bulk,
whom he had collected together during the course of his reign. As often as
he chose to indulge his humour, he ordered some particular bear to be
brought in, and men were thrown to that savage animal, rather to be
swallowed up than devoured; and when their limbs were torn asunder, he
laughed with excessive complacency: nor did he ever sup without being
spectator of the effusion of human blood. Men of private station were
condemned to be burnt alive; and he began this mode of execution by edicts
against the Christians, commanding that, after torture and condemnation,
they should be burnt at a slow fire. They were fixed to a stake, and first
a moderate flame was applied to the soles of their feet, until the muscles,
contracted by burning, were torn from the bones; then torches, lighted and
put out again, were directed to all the members of their bodies, so that no
part had any exemption. Meanwhile cold water was continually poured on
their faces, and their mouths moistened, lest, by reason of their jaws
being parched, they should expire. At length they did expire, when, after
many hours, the violent heat had consumed their skin and penetrated into
their intestines. The dead carcases were laid on a funeral pile, and wholly
burnt; their bones were gathered, ground to powder, and thrown into the
river, or into the sea.

CHAP. XXII.

   And now that cruelty, which he had learned in torturing the Christians,
became habitual, and he exercised it against all men indiscriminately.(1)
He was not wont to inflict the slighter sorts of punishment, as to banish,
to imprison, or to send criminals to work in the mines; but to burn, to
crucify, to expose to wild beasts, were things done daily, and without
hesitation. For smaller offences, those of his own household and his
stewards were chastised with lances, instead of rods; and, in great
offences, to be beheaded was an indulgence shown to very few; and it seemed
as a favour, on account of old services, when one was permitted to die in
the easiest manner. But these were slight evils in the government of
Galerius, when compared with what follows. For eloquence was extinguished,
pleaders cut off, and the learned in the laws either exiled or slain.
Useful letters came to be viewed in the same light as magical and forbidden
arts; and all who possessed them were trampled upon and execrated, as if
they had been hostile to government, and public enemies. Law was dissolved,
and unbounded licence permitted to judges,--to judges chosen from amongst
the soldiery, rude and illiterate men, and let loose upon the provinces,
without assessors to guide or control them.

CHAP. XXIII.

   But that which gave rise to public and universal calamity, was the tax
imposed at once on each province and city. Surveyors having been spread
abroad, and occupied in a general and severe scrutiny, horrible scenes were
exhibited, like the outrages of victorious enemies, and the wretched state
of captives. Each spot of ground was measured, vines and fruit-trees
numbered, lists taken of animals of every kind, and a capitation-roll made
up. In cities, the common  people, whether residing within or without the
walls, were assembled, the market-places filled with crowds of families,
all attended with their children and slaves, the noise of torture and
scourges resounded, sons were hung on the rack to force discovery of the
effects of their fathers, the most trusty slaves compelled by pain to bear
witness against their masters, and wives to bear witness against their
husbands, In default of all other evidence, men were tortured to speak
against themselves; and no sooner did agony oblige them to acknowledge what
they had not, but those imaginary effects were noted down in the lists.
Neither youth, nor old age, nor sickness, afforded any exemption. The
diseased and the infirm were carried in; the age of each was estimated;
and, that the capitation-tax might be enlarged, years were added to the
young and struck off from the old. General lamentation and sorrow
prevailed. Whatever, by the laws of war, conquerors had done to the
conquered, the like did this man presume to perpetrate against Romans and
the subjects of Rome, because his forefathers had been made liable to a
like tax imposed by the victorious Trajan, as a penalty on the Dacians for
their frequent rebellions. After this, money was levied for each head, as
if a price had been paid for liberty to exist; yet full trust was not
reposed on the same set of surveyors, but others and others still were sent
round to make further discoveries; and thus the tributes were redoubled,
not because the new surveyors made any fresh discoveries, but because they
added at pleasure to the former rates, lest they should seem to have been
employed to no purpose. Meanwhile the number of animals decreased, and men
died; nevertheless taxes were paid even for the dead, so that no one could
either live or cease to live without being subject to impositions. There
remained mendicants alone, from whom nothing could be exacted, and whom
their misery and wretchedness secured from ill-treatment. But this pious
man had compassion on them, and determining that they should remain no
longer in indigence, he caused them all to be assembled, put on board
vessels, and sunk in the sea. So merciful was he in making provision that
under his administration no man should want! And thus, while he took
effectual measures that none, under the reigned pretext of poverty, should
elude the tax, he put to death a multitude of real wretches, in violation
of every law of humanity.

CHAP. XXIV.

   Already the judgment of God approached him, and that season ensued in
which his fortunes began to droop and to waste away. While occupied in the
manner that I have described above, he did not set himself to subvert or
expel Constantius, but waited for his death, not imagining, however, that
it was so nigh. Constantius, having become exceedingly ill, wrote to
Galerius, and requested that his son Constantine might be sent to see him.
He had made a like request long before, but in vain; for Galerius meant
nothing less than to grant it. On the contrary, he laid repeated snares for
the life of that young man, because he durst not use open violence, lest he
should stir up civil wars against himself, and incur that which he most
dreaded, the hate and resentment of the army. Under pretence of manly
exercise and recreation, he made him combat with wild beasts: but this
device was frustrated; for the power of God protected Constantine, and in
the very moment of jeopardy rescued him from the hands of Galerius. At
length, Galerius, when he could no longer avoid complying with the request
of Constantius, one evening gave Constantine a warrant to depart, and
commanded him to set out next morning with the imperial despatches.
Galerius meant either to find some pretext for detaining Constantine, or to
forward orders to Severus for arresting him on the road. Constantine
discerned his purpose; and therefore, after supper, when the emperor was
gone to rest, he hasted away, carried off from the principal stages all the
horses maintained at the public expense, and escaped. Next day the emperor,
having purposely remained in his bed-chamber until noon, ordered
Constantine to be called into his presence; but he learnt that Constantine
had set out immediately after supper. Outrageous with passion, he ordered
horses to be made ready, that Constantine might be pursued and dragged
back; and hearing that all the horses had been carried off from the great
road, he could hardly refrain from tears. Meanwhile Constantine, journeying
with incredible rapidity, reached his father, who was already about to
expire. Constantius recommended his son to the soldiers, delivered the
sovereign authority into his hands, and then died, as his wish had long
been, in peace and quiet.

   Constantine Augustus, having assumed the government, made it his first
care to restore the Christians to the exercise of their worship and to
their God; and so began his administration by reinstating(1) the holy
religion.

CHAP. XXV.

   Some few days after, the portrait of Constantine, adorned with laurels,
was brought to the pernicious wild beast, that, by receiving that symbol,
he might acknowledge Constantine in the quality of emperor. He hesitated
long whether to receive it or not, and he was about to commit both the
portrait and its bearer to the flames, but his confidants dissuaded him
from a resolution so frantic. They admonished him of the danger, and they
represented that, if Constantine came with an armed force, all the
soldiers, against whose inclination obscure or unknown Caesars had been
created, would acknowledge him, and crowd eagerly to his standard. So
Galerius, although with the utmost unwillingness, accepted the portrait,
and sent the imperial purple to Constantine, that he might seem of his own
accord to have received that prince into partnership of power with him. And
now his plans were deranged, and he could not, as he intended formerly,
admit Licinius, without exceeding the limited number of emperors. But this
he devised, that Severus, who was more advanced in life, should be named
emperor, and that Constantine, instead of the title of emperor, to which he
had been named, should receive that of Caesar in common with Maximin Daia,
and so be degraded from the second place to the fourth.

CHAP. XXVI.

   Things seemed to be arranged in some measure to the satisfaction of
Galerius, when another alarm was brought, that his son-in-law Maxentius had
been declared emperor at Rome. The cause was this: Galerius having resolved
by permanent taxes to devour the empire, soared to such extravagance in
folly, as not to allow an exemption from that thraldom even to the Roman
people. Tax-gatherers therefore were appointed to go to Rome, and make out
lists of the citizens. Much about the same time Galerius had reduced the
Pretorian Guards. There remained at Rome a few soldiers of that body, who,
profiting of the opportunity, put some magistrates to death, and, with the
acquiescence of the tumultuary populace, clothed Maxentius in the imperial
purple. Galerius, on receiving this news, was disturbed at the strangeness
of the event, but not much dismayed. He hated Maxentius, and he could not
bestow on him the dignity of Caesar already enjoyed by two (Daia and
Constantine); besides, he thought it enough for him to have once bestowed
that dignity against his inclination. So he sent for Severus, exhorted him
to regain his dominion and sovereignty, and he put under his command that
army which Maximian Herculius had formerly commanded, that he might attack
Maxentius at Rome. There the soldiers of Maximian had been oftentimes
received with every sort of luxurious accommodation, so that they were not
only interested to preserve the city, but they also longed to fix their
residence in it.

   Maxentius well knew the enormity of his own offences; and although he
had as it were an hereditary claim to the services of his father's army,
and might have hoped to draw it over to himself, yet he reflected that this
consideration might occur to Galerius also, and induce him to leave Severus
in Illyricum, and march in person with his own army against Rome. Under
such apprehensions, Maxentius sought to protect himself from the danger
that hung over him. To his father, who since his abdication resided in
Campania, he sent the purple, and saluted him again Augustus. Maximian,
given to change, eagerly resumed that purple of which he had unwillingly
divested himself. Meanwhile Severus marched on, and with his troops
approached the walls of the city. Presently the soldiers raised up their
ensigns, abandoned Severus, and yielded themselves to Maxentius, against
whom they had come. What remained but flight for Severus, thus deserted? He
was encountered by Maximian, who had resumed the imperial dignity. On this
he took refuge in Ravenna, and shut himself up there with a few soldiers.
But perceiving that he was about to be delivered up, he voluntarily
surrendered himself, and restored the purple to him from whom he had
received it; and after this he obtained no other grace but that of an easy
death, for he was compelled to open his veins, and in that gentle manner
expired.

CHAP. XXVII.

   But Maximian, who knew the outrageous temper of Galerius, began to
consider that, fired with rage on hearing of the death of Severus, he would
march into Italy, and that possibly he might be joined by Data, and so
bring into the field forces too powerful to be resisted. Having therefore
fortified Rome, and made diligent provision for a defensive war, Maximian
went into Gaul, that he might give his younger daughter Fausta in marriage
to Constantine, and thus win over that prince to his interest. Meantime
Galerius assembled his troops, invaded Italy, and advanced towards Rome,
resolving to extinguish the senate and put the whole people to the sword.
But he found everything shut and fortified against him. There was no hope
of carrying the place by storm, and to besiege it was an arduous
undertaking; for Galerius had not brought with him an army sufficient to
invest the walls. Probably, having never seen Rome, he imagined it to be
little superior in size to those cities with which be was acquainted. But
some of his legions, detesting the wicked enterprise of a father against
his son-in-law, and of Romans against Rome, renounced his authority, and
carried over their ensigns to the enemy. Already had his remaining soldiers
begun to waver, when Galerius, dreading a fate like that of Severus, and
having his haughty spirit broken and humiliated, threw himself at the feet
of his soldiers, and continued to beseech them that he might not be
delivered to the foe, until, by the promise of mighty largesses, he
prevailed on them. Then he retreated from Rome, and fled in great disorder.
Easily might he have been cut off in his flight, had any one pursued him
even with a small body of troops. He was aware of his danger, and allowed
his soldiers to disperse themselves, and to plunder and destroy far and
wide, that, if there were any pursuers, they might be deprived of all means
of subsistence in a mined country. So the parts of Italy through which that
pestilent band took its course were wasted, all things pillaged, matrons
forced, virgins violated, parents and husbands compelled by torture to
disclose where they had concealed their goods, and their wives and
daughters; flocks and herds of cattle were driven off like spoils taken
from barbarians. And thus did he, once a Roman emperor, but now the ravager
of Italy, retire into his own territories, after having afflicted all men
indiscriminately with the calamities of war. Long ago, indeed, and at the
very time of his obtaining sovereign power, he had avowed himself the enemy
of the Roman name; and he proposed that the empire should be called, not
the Roman, but the Dacian empire.

CHAP. XXVIII.

        After the flight of Galerius, Maximian, having returned from Gaul,
held authority in common with his son; but more obedience was yielded to
the young man than to the old: for Maxentius had most power, and had been
longest in possession of it; and it was to him that Maximian owed on this
occasion the imperial dignity. The old man was impatient at being denied
the exercise of uncontrolled sovereignty, and envied his son with a
childish spirit of rivalry; and therefore he began to consider how he might
expel Maxentius and resume his ancient dominion. This appeared easy,
because the soldiers who deserted Severus had originally served in his own
army. He called an assembly of the people of Rome, and of the soldiers, as
if he had been to make an harangue on the calamitous situation of public
affairs. After having spoken much on that subject, he stretched his hands
towards his son, charged him as author of all ills and prime cause of the
calamities of the state, and then tore the purple from his shoulders.
Maxentius, thus stripped, leaped headlong from the tribunal, and was
received into the arms of the soldiers. Their rage and clamour confounded
the unnatural old man, and, like another Tarquin the Proud, he was driven
from Rome.

CHAP. XXIX.

   Then Maximian returned into Gaul; and after having made some stay in
those quarters, he went to Galerius, the enemy of his son, that they might
confer together, as he pretended, about the settlement of the commonweal;
but his true purpose was, under colour of reconciliation, to find an
opportunity of murdering Galerius, and of seizing his share of the empire,
instead of his own, from which he had been everywhere excluded.

   Diocles was at the court of Galerius when Maximian arrived; for
Galerius, meaning now to invest Licinius with the ensigns of supreme power
in the room of Severus, had lately sent for Diocles to be present at the
solemnity. So it was performed in presence both of him and of Maximian; and
thus there were six who ruled the empire at one and the same time.(1)

   Now the designs of Maximian having been frustrated, he took flight, as
he had done twice before, and returned into Gaul, with a heart full of
wickedness, and intending by treacherous devices to overreach Constantine,
who was not only his own son-in-law, but also the child of his son-in-law;
and that he might the more successfully deceive, he laid aside the imperial
purple. The Franks had taken up arms. Maximian advised the unsuspecting
Constantine not  to lead all his troops against them, and he said that a
few soldiers would suffice to subdue those  barbarians. He gave this advice
that an army might be left for him to win over to himself, and that
Constantine, by reason of his scanty forces, might be overpowered. The
young prince believed the advice to be judicious, because given by an aged
and experienced commander; and  he followed it, because given by a father-
in-law.  He marched, leaving the most considerable part of his forces
behind. Maximian waited a few days; and as soon as, by his calculation,
Constantine had entered the territory of the barbarians, he suddenly
resumed the imperial purple, seized the public treasures, after his wont
made ample donatives to the soldiery, and feigned that such disasters had
befallen Constantine as soon after befell himself. Constantine was
presently informed of those events, and, by marches astonishingly rapid, he
flew back with his army. Maximian, not yet prepared to oppose him, was
overpowered at unawares, and the soldiers returned to their duty. Maximian
had possessed himself of Marseilles (he fled thither), and shut the gates.
Constantine drew nigh, and seeing  Maximian on the walls, addressed him in
no harsh or hostile language, and demanded what he meant, and what it was
that he wanted, and why he had acted in a way so peculiarly unbecoming him.
But Maximian from the walls incessantly uttered abuse and curses against
Constantine. Then, of a sudden, the gates on the opposite side having been
unbarred, the besiegers were admitted into the city. The rebel emperor, and
unnatural parent and a perfidious father-in-law, was dragged into the
presence of Constantine, heard a recital made of his crimes, was divested
of his imperial robe, and, after this reprimand, obtained his life.

CHAP. XXX.

   Maximian, having thus forfeited the respect due to an emperor and a
father-in-law, grew impatient at his abased condition, and, emboldened by
impunity, formed new plots against Constantine. He addressed himself to his
daughter Fausta, and, as well by entreaties as by the soothing of flattery,
solicited her to betray her husband. He promised to obtain for her a more
honourable alliance than that with Constantine; and he requested her to
allow the bed-chamber of the emperor to be left open, and to be slightly
guarded. Fausta undertook to do whatever he asked, and instantly revealed
the whole to her husband. A plan was laid for detecting Maximian in the
very execution of his crime. They placed a base eunuch to be murdered
instead of the emperor. At the dead of night Maximian arose, and perceived
all things to be favourable for his insidious purpose. There were few
soldiers on guard, and these too at some distance from the bed-chamber.
However, to prevent suspicion, he accosted them, and said that he had had a
dream which he wished to communicate to his son-in-law. He went in armed,
slew the eunuch, sprung forth exultingly, and avowed the murder. At that
moment Constantine showed himself on the opposite side with a band of
soldiers; the dead body was brought out of the bed-chamber; the murderer,
taken in the fact, all aghast,

   "Stood like a stone, silent and motionless;"

while Constantine upbraided him for his impiety and enormous guilt. At last
Maximian obtained leave that the manner of his death should be at his own
choice, and he strangled himself.

   Thus that mightiest sovereign of Rome--who ruled so long with exceeding
glory, and who celebrated his twentieth anniversary--thus that most haughty
man had his neck broken, and ended his detestable life by a death base and
ignominious.

CHAP. XXXI.

   From Maximian, God, the avenger of religion and of His people, turned
his eyes to Galerius, the author of the accursed persecution, that in his
punishment also He might manifest the power of His majesty. Galerius, too,
was purposing to celebrate his twentieth anniversary; and as, under that
pretext, he had, by new taxes payable in gold and silver, oppressed the
provinces, so now, that he might recompense them by celebrating. the
promised festival, he used the like pretext for repeating his oppressions.
Who can relate in fit terms the methods used to harass mankind in levying
the tax, and especially with regard to corn and the other fruits of the
earth? The officers, or rather the executioners, of all the different
magistrates, seized on each individual, and would never let go their hold.
No man knew to whom he ought to make payment first. There was no
dispensation given to those who had nothing; and they were required, under
pain of being variously tortured, instantly to pay, notwithstanding their
inability.  Many guards were set round, no breathing time was granted, or,
at any season of the year, the  least respite from exactions. Different
magistrates, or the officers of different magistrates, frequently contended
for the right of levying the tax from the same persons. No threshing-floor
without a tax-gatherer, no vintage without a watch, and nought left for the
sustenance of  the husbandman! That food should be snatched from the mouths
of those who had earned it by toil, was grievous: the hope, however, of
being afterwards relieved, might have made that grievance supportable; but
it was necessary for every one who appeared at the anniversary festival to
provide robes of various kinds, and gold and silver besides. And one might
have said," How shall I furnish myself with those things, O tyrant void of
understanding, if you carry off the whole fruits of my ground, and
violently seize its expected produce?" Thus, throughout the dominions of
Galerius, men were spoiled of their goods, and all was raked together into
the imperial treasury, that the emperor might be enabled to perform his vow
of celebrating a festival which he was doomed never to celebrate.

CHAP. XXXII.

   Maximin Daia was incensed at the nomination of Licinius to the dignity
of emperor, and he would no longer be called Caesar, or allow himself to be
ranked as third in authority. Galerius, by repeated messages, besought Daia
to yield, and to acquiesce in his arrangement, to give place to age, and to
reverence the grey hairs of Licinius. But Daia became more and more
insolent. He urged that, as it was he who first assumed the purple, so, by
possession, he had right to priority in rank; and he set at nought the
entreaties and the injunctions of Galerius. That brute animal was stung to
the quick, and bellowed when the mean creature whom he had made Caesar, in
expectation of his thorough obsequiousness, forgot the great favour
conferred on him, and impiously withstood the requests and will of his
benefactor. Galerius at length, overcome by the obstinacy of Daia,
abolished the subordinate title of Caesar, gave to himself and Licinius
that of the Augusti, and to Daia and Constantine that of sons of the
Augusti. Daia, some time after, in a letter to Galerius, took occasion to
observe, that at the last general muster he had been saluted by his army
under the title of Augustus. Galerius, vexed and grieved at this, commanded
that all the four should have the appellation of emperor.(1)

CHAP. XXXIII.

   And now, when Galerius was in the eighteenth year of his reign, God
struck him with an incurable plague. A malignant ulcer formed itself low
down in his secret parts, and spread by degrees. The physicians attempted
to eradicate it, and healed up the place affected. But the sore, after
having been skinned over, broke out again; a vein burst, and the blood
flowed in such quantity as to endanger his life. The blood, however, was
stopped, although with difficulty. The physicians had to undertake their
operations anew, and at length they cicatrized the wound. In consequence of
some slight motion of his body, Galerius received a hurt, and the blood
streamed more abundantly than before. He grew emaciated, pallid, and
feeble, and the bleeding then stanched. The ulcer began to be insensible to
the remedies applied, and a gangrene seized all the neighbouring parts. It
diffused itself the wider the more the corrupted flesh was cut away, and
everything employed as the means of cure served but to aggravate the
disease.

   "The masters of the healing art withdrew."

Then famous physicians were brought in from all quarters; but no human
means had any success. Apollo and Aesculapius were besought importunately
for remedies: Apollo did prescribe, and the distemper augmented. Already
approaching to its deadly crisis, it had occupied the lower regions of his
body: his bowels came out, and his whole seat putrefied. The luckless
physicians, although without hope of overcoming the malady, ceased not to
apply fomentations and administer medicines. The humours having been
repelled, the distemper attacked his intestines, anti worms were generated
in his body. The stench was so foul as to pervade not only the palace, but
even the whole city; and no wonder, for by that time the passages from his
bladder and bowels, having been devoured by the worms, became
indiscriminate, and his body, with intolerable anguish, was dissolved into
one mass of corruption.(2)

   "Stung to the soul, he bellowed with the pain,
   So roars the wounded bull."--PITT.

   They applied warm flesh of animals to the chief seat of the disease,
that the warmth might draw out those minute worms; and accordingly, when
the dressings were removed, there issued forth an innumerable swarm:
nevertheless the prolific disease had hatched swarms much more abundant to
prey upon and consume his intestines. Already, through a complication of
distempers, the different parts of his body had lost their natural form:
the superior part was dry, meagre, and haggard, and his ghastly-looking
skin had settled itself deep amongst his bones while the inferior,
distended like bladders, re rained no appearance of joints. These things
happened in the course of a complete year; and at length, overcome by
calamities, he was obliged to acknowledge God, and he cried aloud, in the
intervals of raging pain, that he would re-edify the Church which he had
demolished, and make atonement for his misdeeds; and when he was near his
end, he published an edict of the tenor following:--

CHAP. XXXIV.

   "Amongst our other regulations for the permanent advantage of the
commonweal, we have hitherto studied to reduce all things to a conformity
with the ancient laws and public discipline of the Romans.

   "It has been our aim in an especial manner, that the Christians also,
who had abandoned the religion of their forefathers, should return to right
opinions. For such wilfulness and folly had, we know not how, taken
possession of them, that instead of observing those ancient institutions,
which possibly their own forefathers had established, they, through
caprice, made laws to themselves, and drew together into different
societies many men of widely different persuasions.

   "After the publication of our edict, ordaining the Christians to betake
themselves to the observance of the ancient institutions, many of them were
subdued through the fear of danger, and moreover many of them were exposed
to jeopardy; nevertheless, because great numbers still persist in their
opinions, and because we  have perceived that at present they neither pay
reverence and due adoration to the gods, nor yet worship their own God,
therefore we, from our wonted clemency in bestowing pardon on all, have
judged it fit to extend our indulgence to those men, and to permit them
again to be Christians, and to establish the places of their religious
assemblies; yet so as that they offend not against good order.

   "By another mandate we purpose to signify unto magistrates how they
ought herein to demean themselves.

   "Wherefore it will be the duty of the Christians, in consequence of
this our toleration, to pray to their God for our welfare, and for that of
the public, and for their own; that the commonweal may continue safe in
every quarter, and that they themselves may live securely in their
habitations."

CHAP. XXXV.

   This edict was promulgated at Nicomedia on the day preceding the
kalends of May,(1) in the eighth consulship of Galerius, and the second of
Maximin Daia. Then the prison-gates having been thrown open, you, my best
beloved Donatus,(2) together with the other confessors for the faith, were
set at liberty from a jail, which had been your residence for six years.
Galerius, however, did not, by publication of this edict, obtain the divine
forgiveness. In a few days after he was consumed by the horrible disease
that had brought on an universal putrefaction. Dying, he recommended his
wife and son to Licinius, and delivered them over into his hands. This
event was known at Nicomedia before the end of the month.(3) His vicennial
anniversary was to have been celebrated on the ensuing kalends of March.(4)

CHAP. XXXVI.

   Daia, on receiving this news, hasted with relays of horses from the
East, to seize the dominions of Galerius, and, while Licinius lingered in
Europe, to arrogate to himself all the country as far as the narrow seas of
Chalcedon. On his entry into Bithynia, he, with the view of acquiring
immediate popularity, abolished Galerius' tax, to the great joy of all.
Dissension arose between the two emperors, and almost an open war. They
stood on the opposite shores with their armies. Peace, however, and amity
were established under certain conditions. Licinius and Daia met on the
narrow sees, concluded a treaty, and in token of friendship joined hands.
Then Daia, believing all things to be in security, returned (to Nicomedia),
and was in his new dominions what he had been in Syria and Egypt. First of
all, he took away the toleration and general protection granted by Galerius
to the Christians, and, for this end, he secretly procured addresses from
different cities, requesting that no Christian church might be built within
their walls; and thus he meant to make that which was his own choice appear
as if extorted from him by importunity. In compliance with those addresses,
he introduced a new mode of government in things respecting religion, and
for each city he created a high priest, chosen from among the persons of
most distinction. The office of those men was to make daily sacrifices to
all their gods, and, with the aid of the former priests, to prevent the
Christians from erecting churches, or from worshipping God either publicly
or in private; and he authorized them to compel the Christians to sacrifice
to idols, and, on their refusal, to bring them before the civil magistrate;
and, as if this had not been enough, in every province he established a
superintendent priest, one of chief eminence in the state; and he commanded
that all those priests newly instituted should appear in white habits, that
being the most honourable distinction of dress.(1) And as to the
Christians, he purposed to follow the course that he had followed in the
East, and, affecting the show of clemency, he forbade the slaying of God's
servants, but he gave command that they should be mutilated. So the
confessors for the faith had their ears and nostrils slit, their hands and
feet lopped off, and their eyes dug out of the sockets.

CHAP. XXXVII.

   While occupied in this plan, he received letters from Constantine which
deterred him from proceeding in its execution, so for a time he dissembled
his purpose; nevertheless any Christian that fell within his power was
privily thrown into the sea. Neither did he cease from his custom of
sacrificing every day in the palace. It was also an invention of his to
cause all animals used for food to be slaughtered, not by cooks, but by
priests at the altars.; so that nothing was ever served up, unless
foretasted, consecrated, and sprinkled with wine, according to the rites of
paganism; and whoever was invited to an entertainment must needs have
returned from it impure and defiled. In all things else he resembled his
preceptor Galerius. For if aught chanced to have been left untouched by
Diocles and Maximian, that did Daia greedily and shamelessly carry off. And
now the granaries, of each individual were shut, anti all warehouses sealed
up, and taxes, not yet due, were levied  by anticipation. Hence famine,
from neglect of cultivation, and the prices of all things enhanced beyond
measure. Herds and flocks were driven from their pasture for the daily
sacrifice. By gorging his soldiers with the flesh of sacrifices, he so
corrupted them, that they disdained their wonted pittance in corn, and
wantonly threw it away. Meanwhile Daia recompensed his bodyguards, who were
very numerous, with costly raiment and gold medals, made donatives in
silver to the common soldiers and recruits, and bestowed every sort of
largess on the barbarians who served in his army. As to grants of the
property of living persons, which he made to his favourites whenever they
chose to ask what belonged to another, I know not whether the same thanks
might not be due to him that are given to merciful robbers, who spoil
without murdering.

CHAP. XXXVIII.

   But that which distinguished his character, and in which he transcended
all former emperors, was his desire of debauching women. What else can I
call it but a blind and headstrong passion? Yet such epithets feebly
express my indignation in reciting his enormities. The magnitude of the
guilt overpowers my tongue, and makes it unequal to its office. Eunuchs and
panders made search everywhere, and no sooner was any comely face
discovered, than husbands and parents were obliged to withdraw. Matrons of
quality and virgins were stripped of their robes, and all their limbs were
inspected, lest any part should be unworthy of the bed of the emperor.
Whenever a woman resisted, death by drowning was inflicted on her; as if,
under the reign of this adulterer, chastity had been treason. Some men
there were, who, beholding the violation of wives whom for virtue and
fidelity they affectionately loved, could not endure their anguish of mind,
and so killed themselves. While this monster ruled, it was singular
deformity alone which could shield the honour of any female from his savage
desires. At length he introduced a custom prohibiting marriage unless with
the imperial permission; and he made this an instrument to serve the
purposes of his lewdness. After having debauched freeborn maidens, he gave
them for wives to his slaves. His conflicts also imitated the example of
the emperor, and violated with impunity the beds of their dependants. For
who was there to punish such offences? As for the daughters of men of
middle rank, any who were inclined took them by force. Ladies of quality,
who could not be taken by force, were petitioned for, and obtained from the
emperor by way of free gift. Nor could a father oppose this; for the
imperial warrant having been once signed, he had no alternative bat to die,
or to receive some barbarian as his son-in-law. For hardly was there any
person in the lifeguard except of those people, who, having been driven
from their habitations by the Goths in the twentieth year of Diocletian,
yielded themselves to Galerius. and entered into his service. It was ill
for humankind, that men who had fled from the bondage of barbarians should
thus come to lord it over the Romans. Environed by such guards, Daia
oppressed and insulted the Eastern empire.

CHAP. XXXIX.

   Now Daia, in gratifying his libidinous desires, made his own will the
standard of right; and therefore he would not refrain from soliciting the
widow of Galerius, the Empress Valeria, to whom he had lately given the
appellation of mother. After the death of her husband, she had repaired to
Daia, because she imagined that she might live with more security in his
dominions than elsewhere, especially as he was a married man; but the
flagitious creature became instantly inflamed with a passion for her.
Valeria was still in weeds, the time of her mourning not being yet expired.
He sent a message to her proposing marriage, and offering, on her
compliance, to put away his wife. She frankly returned an answer such as
she alone could dare to do: first, that she would not treat of marriage
while she was in weeds, and while the ashes of Galerius, her husband, and,
by adoption, the father of Daia, were yet warm; next, that he acted
impiously, in proposing to divorce a faithful wife to make room for
another, whom in her turn he would also cast off; and, lastly, that it was
indecent, unexampled, and unlawful for a woman of her title and dignity to
engage a second time in wedlock.(1) This bold answer having been reported
to Daia, presently his desires changed into rage and furious resentment. He
pronounced sentence of forfeiture against the princess, seized her goods,
removed her attendants, tortured her eunuchs to death, and banished her and
her mother Prisca: but he appointed no particular place for her residence
while in banishment; and hence he insultingly expelled her from every abode
that she took in the course of her wanderings; and, to complete  all, he
condemned the ladies who enjoyed most of her friendship and confidence to
die on a false accusation of adultery.

CHAP. XL.

   There was a certain matron of high rank who already had grandchildren
by more than one son. Her Valeria loved like a second mother, and Daia
suspected that her advice had produced that refusal which Valeria gave to
his matrimonial offers; and therefore he charged the president Eratineus to
have her put to death in a way that might injure her fame. To her  two
others, equally noble, were added. One of them, who had a daughter a Vestal
virgin at Rome, maintained an intercourse by stealth with the banished
Valeria. The other, married to a senator, was; intimately connected with
the empress. Excellent beauty and virtue proved the cause of their death.
They were dragged to the tribunal, not of an upright judge, but of a
robber. Neither indeed was there any accuser, until a certain Jew, one
charged with other offences, was induced, through hope of pardon, to give
false evidence against the innocent. The equitable and vigilant magistrate
conducted him out of the city under a guard, lest the populace should have
stoned him. This tragedy was acted at

Nicaea. The Jew was ordered to the torture till he should speak as he had
been instructed, while the torturers by blows prevented the women from
speaking in their own defence. The innocent were condemned to die. Then
there arose wailing and lamentation, not only of the senator, who attended
on his well-deserving consort, but amongst the spectators also, whom this
proceeding, scandalous and unheard of, had brought together; and, to
prevent the multitude from violently rescuing the condemned persons out of
the hands of the executioners, military commanders followed with light
infantry and archers. And thus, under a guard of armed soldiers, they were
led to punishment. Their domestics having been forced to flee, they would
have remained without burial, had not the compassion of friends interred
them by stealth. Nor was the promise of pardon made good to the feigned
adulterer, for he was fixed to a gibbet, and then he disclosed the whole
secret contrivance; and with his last breath he protested to all the
beholders that the women died innocent.

CHAP. XLI.

   But the empress, an exile in some desert region of Syria, secretly
informed her father Diocletian of the calamity that had befallen her. He
despatched messengers to Daia, requesting that his daughter might be sent
to him. He could not prevail. Again and again he entreated; yet she was not
sent. At length he employed a relation of his, a military man high in power
and authority, to implore Daia by the remembrance of past favours. This
messenger, equally unsuccessful in his negotiation as the others. reported
to Diocletian that his prayers were vain.

CHAP. XLII.

   At this time, by command of Constantine, the statues of Maximian
Herculius were thrown down, and his portraits removed; and, as the two old
emperors were generally delineated in one piece, the portraits of both were
removed at the same time. Thus Diocletian lived to see a disgrace which no
former emperor had ever seen, and, trader the double load of vexation of
spirit and bodily maladies, he resolved to die. Tossing to and fro, with
his soul agitated by grief, he could neither eat nor take rest. He sighed,
groaned, and wept often, and incessantly threw himself into various
postures, now on his couch, and now on the ground. So he, who for twenty
years was the most prosperous of emperors, having been cast down into the
obscurity of a private station, treated in the most contumelious manner,
and compelled to abhor life, became incapable of receiving nourishment,
and, worn out with anguish of mind, expired.

CHAP. XLIII.

   Of the adversaries of God there still remained one, whose overthrow and
end I am now to relate.

   Daia had entertained jealousy and ill-will against Licinius from the
time that the preference was given to him by Galerius; and those sentiments
still subsisted, notwithstanding the treaty of peace lately concluded
between them. When Daia heard that the sister of Constantine  was betrothed
to Licinius, he apprehended that the two emperors, by contracting this
affinity, meant to league against him; so he privily sent ambassadors to
Rome, desiring a friendly alliance with Maxentius: he also wrote to him in
terms of cordiality. The ambassadors were received courteously, friendship
established, and in token of it the effigies of Maxentius and Daia were
placed together in public view. Maxentius willingly embraced this, as if it
had been an aid from heaven; for he had already declared war against
Constantine, as if to revenge the death of his father Maximian. From this
appearance of filial piety a suspicion arose, that the detestable old man
had but feigned a quarrel with his son that he might have an opportunity to
destroy his rivals in power, and so make way for himself and his son to
possess the whole empire. This conjecture, however, had no foundation; for
his true purpose was to have destroyed his son and the others, and then to
have reinstated himself and Diocletian in sovereign authority.

CHAP. XLIV.

   And now a civil war broke out between Constantine and Maxentius.
Although Maxentius kept himself within Rome, because the soothsayers had
foretold that if he went out of it he should perish, yet he conducted the
military operations by able generals. In forces he exceeded his adversary;
for he had not only his father's army, which deserted from Severus, but
also his own, which he had lately drawn together out of Mauritania and
Italy. They fought, and the troops of Maxentius prevailed. At length
Constantine, with steady courage and a mind prepared for every event, led
his whole forces to the neighbourhood of Rome, and encamped them opposite
to the Milvian bridge. The anniversary of the reign of Maxentius
approached, that is, the sixth of the kalends of November,(1) and the fifth
year of his reign was drawing to an end.

   Constantine was directed in a dream to cause the heavenly sign to be
delineated on the shields of his soldiers, and so to proceed to battle. He
did as he had been commanded, and he marked on their shields the letter X,
with a perpendicular line drawn through it and turned round thus at the
top, being the cipher of CHRIST. Having this sign, his troops stood to
arms. The enemies advanced, but without their emperor, and they crossed the
bridge. The armies met, and fought with the utmost exertions of valour, and
firmly maintained their ground. In the meantime a sedition arose at Rome,
and Maxentius was reviled as one who had abandoned all concern for the
safety of the commonweal; and suddenly, while he exhibited the Circensian
games on the anniversary of his reign, the people cried with one voice,
"Constantine cannot be overcome!" Dismayed at this, Maxentius burst from
the assembly, and having called some senators together, ordered the
Sibylline books to be searched. In them it was found that:--

"On the same day the enemy of the Romans should perish."

Led by this response to the hopes of victory, he went to the field. The
bridge in his rear was broken down. At sight of that the battle grew
hotter. The hand of the Lord prevailed, and the forces of Maxentius were
routed. He fled towards the broken bridge; but the multitude pressing on
him, he was driven headlong into the Tiber.

   This destructive war being ended, Constantine was acknowledged as
emperor, with great rejoicings, by the senate and people of Rome. And now
he came to know the perfidy of Daia; for he found the letters written to
Maxentius, and saw the statues and portraits of the two associates which
had been set up together. The senate, in reward of the valour of
Constantine, decreed to him the title of Maximus (the Greatest), a title
which Daia had always arrogated to himself. Daia, when he heard that
Constantine was victorious and Rome freed, expressed as much sorrow as if
he himself had been vanquished; but afterwards, when he heard of the decree
of the senate, he grew outrageous, avowed enmity towards Constantine, and
made his title of the Greatest a theme of abuse and raillery.

CHAP. XLV.

   Constantine having settled all things at Rome, went to Milan about the
beginning of winter. Thither also Licinius came to receive his wife
Constantia. When Daia understood that they were busied in solemnizing the
nuptials, he moved out of Syria in the depth of a severe winter, and by
forced marches he came into Bithynia with an army much impaired; for he
lost all his beasts of burden, of whatever kind, in consequence of
excessive rains and snow, miry ways, cold and fatigue. Their carcases,
scattered about the roads, seemed an emblem of the calamities of the
impending war, and the presage of a like destruction that awaited the
soldiers. Daia did not halt in his own territories; but immediately crossed
the Thracian Bosphorus, and in a hostile manner approached the gates of
Byzantium. There was a garrison in the city, established by Licinius to
check any invasion that Daia might make. At first Daia attempted to entice
the soldiers by the promise of donatives, and then to intimidate them by
assault and storm. Yet neither promises nor force availed aught. After
eleven days had elapsed, within which time Licinius might have learned the
state of the garrison, the soldiers surrendered, not through treachery, but
because they were too weak to make a longer resistance. Then Daia moved on
to Heraclea (otherwise called Perinthus), and by delays of the like nature
before that place lost some days. And now Licinius by expeditious marches
had reached Adrianople, but with forces not numerous. Then Daia, having
taken Perinthus by capitulation, and remained there for a short space,
moved forwards eighteen miles to the first station. Here his progress was
stopped; for Licinius had already occupied the second station, at the
distance also of eighteen miles. Licinius, having assembled what forces he
could from the neighbouring quarters, advanced towards Daia rather indeed
to retard his operations than with any purpose of fighting, or hope of
victory: for Daia had an army of seventy thousand men, while he himself had
scarce thirty thousand; for his soldiers being dispersed in various
regions, there was not time, on that sudden emergency, to collect all Of
them together.

CHAP. XLVI.

   The armies thus approaching each other, seemed on the eve of a battle.
Then Daia made this vow to Jupiter, that if he obtained victory he would
extinguish and utterly efface the name of the Christians. And on the
following night an angel of the Lord seemed to stand before Licinius while
he was asleep, admonishing him to arise immediately, and with his whole
army to put up a prayer to the Supreme God, and assuring him that by so
doing he should obtain victory. Licinius fancied that, hearing this, he
arose, and that his monitor, who was nigh him, directed how be should pray,
and in what words. Awaking from sleep, he sent for one of his secretaries,
and dictated these words exactly as he had heard them:--

"Supreme God, we beseech Thee; Holy God, we beseech Thee; unto Thee we
commend all right; unto Thee we commend our safety; unto Thee we commend
our empire. By Thee we live, by Thee we are victorious and happy. Supreme
Holy God, hear our prayers; to Thee we stretch forth our arms. Hear, Holy
Supreme God."

Many copies were made of these words, and distributed amongst the principal
commanders, who were to teach them to the soldiers under their charge. At
this all men took fresh courage, in the confidence that victory bad been
announced to them from heaven. Licinius resolved to give battle on the
kalends of May;(1) for precisely eight years before Daia had received the
dignity of Caesar, and Licinius chose that day in hopes that Daia might be
vanquished on the anniversary of his reign, as Maxentius had been on his.
Daia, however, purposed to give battle earlier, to fight on the day before
those kalends,(2) and to triumph on the anniversary of his reign. Accounts
came that Daia was in motion; the soldiers of Licinius armed themselves;
and advanced. A barren and open plain, called Campus Serenus, lay between
the two armies. They were now in sight of one another. The soldiers of
Licinius placed their shields on the ground, took off their helmets, and,
following the example of their leaders, stretched forth their hands towards
heaven. Then the emperor uttered the prayer, and they all repeated it after
him. The host, doomed to speedy destruction, heard the murmur of the
prayers of their adversaries. And now, the ceremony having been thrice
performed, the soldiers of Licinius became full of courage, buckled on
their helmets  again, and resumed their shields. The two emperors advanced
to a conference: but Daia could not be brought to peace; for he held
Licinius in contempt, and imagined that the soldiers would presently
abandon an emperor parsimonious in his donatives, and enter into the
service of one liberal even to profusion. And indeed it was on this notion
that he began the war. He looked for the voluntary surrender of the armies
of Licinius; and, thus reinforced, he meant forthwith to have attacked
Constantine.

CHAP. XLVII.

   So the two armies drew nigh; the trumpets ave the signal; the military
ensigns advanced; the troops of Licinius charged. But the enemies, panic-
struck, could neither draw their swords nor yet throw their javelins. Daia
went about, and, alternately by entreaties and promises, attempted to
seduce the soldiers of Licinius. But he was not hearkened to in any
quarter, and they drove him back. Then were the troops of Daia slaughtered,
none making resistance; anti such numerous legions, and forces so mighty,
were mowed down by an inferior enemy. No one called to mind his reputation,
or former valour, or the honourable rewards which had been conferred on
him. The Supreme God did so place their necks under the sword of their
foes, that they seemed to have entered the field, not as combatants, but as
men devoted to death. After great numbers had fallen, Daia perceived that
everything went contrary to his hopes; and therefore he threw aside the
purple, and having put on the habit of a slave, hasted across the Thracian
Bosphorus. One half of his army perished in battle, and the rest either
surrendered to the victor or fled; for now that the emperor himself had
deserted, there seemed to be no shame in desertion Before the expiration of
the kalends of May, Daia arrived at Nicomedia, although distant one hundred
and sixty miles from the field of battle. So in the space of one day and
two nights he performed that journey. Having hurried away with his children
and wife, and a few officers of his court, he went towards Syria; but
having been joined by some troops from those quarters, and having collected
together a part of his fugitive forces, he halted in Cappadocia, and then
he resumed the imperial garb.

CHAP. XLVIII.

   Not many days after the victory, Licinius, having received part of the
soldiers of Daia into his service, and properly distributed them,
transported his army into Bithynia, and having made his entry into
Nicomedia, he returned thanks to God, through whose aid he had overcome;
and  on the ides of June,(1) while he and Constantine were consuls for the
third time, he commanded the following edict for the restoration of the
Church, directed to the president of the province, to be promulgated:--

   "When we, Constantine and Licinius, emperors, had an interview at
Milan, and conferred together with respect to the good and security of the
commonweal, it seemed to us that, amongst those things that are profitable
to mankind in general, the reverence paid to the Divinity merited our first
and chief attention, and that it was proper that the Christians and all
others should have liberty to follow that mode of religion which to each of
them appeared best; so that that God, who is seated in heaven, might be
benign and propitious to us, and to every one under our government. And
therefore we judged it a salutary measure, and one highly consonant to
right reason, that no man should be denied leave of attaching himself to
the rites of the Christians, or to whatever other religion his mind
directed him, that thus the supreme Divinity, to whose worship we freely
devote ourselves, might continue to vouchsafe His favour and beneficence to
us. And accordingly we give you to know that, without regard to any
provisos in our former orders to you concerning the Christians, all who
choose that religion are to be permitted, freely and absolutely, to remain
in it, and not to be disturbed any ways, or molested. And we thought fit to
be thus special in the things committed to your charge, that you might
understand that the indulgence which we have granted in matters of religion
to the Christians is ample and unconditional; and perceive at the same
tithe that the open and free exercise of their respective religions is
granted to all others, as well as to the Christians. For it befits the
well-ordered state and the tranquillity of our times that each individual
be allowed, according to his own choice, to worship the Divinity; and we
mean not to derogate aught from the honour due to any religion or its
votaries. Moreover, with respect to the Christians, we formerly gave
certain orders concerning the places appropriated for their religious
assemblies; but now we will that all persons who have purchased such
places, either from our exchequer or from any one else, do restore them to
the Christians, without money demanded or price claimed, and that this be
performed peremptorily and unambiguously; and we will also, that they who
have obtained any right to such places by form of gift do forthwith restore
them to the Christians: reserving always to such persons, who have either
purchased for a price, or gratuitously acquired them, to make application
to the judge of the district, if they look on themselves as entitled to any
equivalent from our beneficence.

   "All those places are, by your intervention, to be immediately restored
to the Christians. And because it appears that, besides the places
appropriated to religious worship, the Christians did possess other places,
which belonged not to individuals, but to their society in general, that
is, to their churches, we comprehend all such within the regulation
aforesaid, and we will that you cause them all to be restored to the
society or churches, and that without hesitation or controversy: Provided
always, that the persons making restitution without a price paid shall be
at liberty to seek indemnification from our bounty. In furthering all which
things for the behoof of the Christians, you are to use your utmost
diligence, to the end that our orders be speedily obeyed, and our gracious
purpose in securing the public tranquillity promoted. So shall that divine
favour which, in affairs of the mightiest importance, we have already
experienced, continue to give success to us, and in our successes make the
commonweal happy. And that the tenor of this our gracious ordinance may be
made known unto all, we will that you cause it by your authority to be
published everywhere."

   Licinius having issued this ordinance, made an harangue, in which he
exhorted the Christians to rebuild their religious edifices.

   And thus, from the overthrow of the Church until its restoration, there
was a space of ten years and about four months.

CHAP. XLIX.

   While Licinius pursued with his army, the fugitive tyrant retreated,
and again occupied the passes of mount Taurus; and there, by erecting
parapets and towers, attempted to stop the march of Licinius. But the
victorious troops, by an attack made on the right, broke through all
obstacles, and Daia at length fled to Tarsus. There, being hard pressed
both by sea and land, he despaired of finding any place for refuge; and  in
the anguish and dismay of his mind, he sought death as the only remedy of
those calamities that God had heaped on him. But first he gorged himself
with food, and large draughts of wine, as those are wont who believe that
they eat and drink for the last time; and so he swallowed poison. However,
the force of the poison, repelled by his full stomach, could not
immediately operate, but it produced a grievous disease, resembling the
pestilence; and his life was prolonged only that his sufferings might be
more severe. And now the poison began to rage, and to burn up everything
within him, so that he was driven to distraction with the intolerable pain;
and during a fit of frenzy, which lasted four days, he gathered handfuls of
earth, and greedily devoured it. Having undergone various and excruciating
torments, he dashed his forehead against the wall, and his eyes started out
of their sockets. And now, become blind, he imagined that he saw God, with
His servants arrayed in white robes, sitting in judgment on him. He roared
out as men on the rack are wont, and exclaimed that not he, but others,
were guilty. In the end, as if he had been racked into confession, he
acknowledged his own guilt, and lamentably implored Christ to have mercy
upon   him. Then, amidst groans, like those of one burnt alive, did he
breathe out his guilty soul in the most horrible kind of death.

CHAP. L.

   Thus did God subdue all those who persecuted His name,so  that neither
root nor branch of for Licinius, as soon as he was established in sovereign
authority, commanded that Valeria should be put to death. Daia, although
exasperated against her, never ventured to do this, not even after his
discomfiture and flight, and when he knew that his end approached. Licinius
commanded that Candidianus also should be put to death. He was the son of
Galerius by a concubine, and Valeria, having no children, had adopted him.
On the news of the death of Daia, she came in disguise to the court  of
Licinius, anxious to observe what might befall Candidianus. The youth,
presenting himself at Nicomedia, had an outward show of honour paid to him,
and, while he suspected no harm, was killed. Hearing of this catastrophe,
Valeria immediately fled. The Emperor Severus left a son, Severianus,
arrived at man's estate, who accompanied Daia in his flight from the field
of battle. Licinius caused him to be condemned and executed, under the
pretence that, on the death of Daia, he had intentions of assuming the
imperial purple. Long before this time, Candidianus and Severianus,
apprehending evil from Licinius, had chosen to remain with Daia; while
Valeria favoured Licinius, and was willing to bestow on him that which she
had denied to Daia, all rights accruing to her as the widow of Galerius.
Licinius also put to death Maximus, the son of Daia, a boy eight years old,
and a daughter of Daia, who was seven years old, and had been betrothed to
Candidianus. But before their death, their mother had been thrown into the
Orontes, in which river she herself had frequently commanded chaste women
to be drowned. So, by the unerring and just judgment of God, all the
implores received according to the deeds that they had done.

CHAP. LI.

   Valeria, too, who for fifteen months had wandered under a mean garb
from province to province, was at length discovered in Thessalonica, was
apprehended, together with her mother Prisca, and suffered capital
punishment. Both the ladies were conducted to execution; a fall from
grandeur which moved the pity of the multitude of beholders that the
strange sight had gathered together. They were beheaded, and their bodies
cast into the sea. Thus the chaste demeanour of Valeria, and the high rank
of her and her mother, proved fatal to both of them.(1)

CHAP. LII.

   I relate all those things on the authority of well-informed persons;
and I thought it proper to commit them to writing exactly as they happened,
lest the memory of events so important should perish, and lest any future
historian of the persecutors should corrupt the truth, either by
suppressing their offences against God, or the judgment of God against
them. To His everlasting mercy ought we to render thanks, that, having at
length looked on the earth, He deigned to collect again and to restore His
flock, partly laid waste by ravenous wolves, and partly scattered abroad,
and to extirpate those noxious wild beasts who had trod down its pastures,
and destroyed its resting-places.(2) Where now are the surnames of the
Jovii and the Herculii, once so glorious and renowned amongst the nations;
surnames insolently assumed at first by Diocles and Maximian, and
afterwards transferred to their successors? The Lord has blotted them out
and erased them from the earth. Let us therefore with exultation celebrate
the triumphs of God, and oftentimes with praises make mention of His
victory; let us in our prayers, by night and by day, beseech Him to confirm
for ever that peace which, after a warfare of ten years, He has bestowed on
His own: and do you, above all others, my best beloved Donatus, who so well
deserve to be heard, implore the Lord that it would please Him propitiously
and mercifully to continue His pity towards His servants, to protect His
people from the machinations and assaults of the devil, and to guard the
now flourishing churches in perpetual felicity.


Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland beginning in
1867. (ANF 7, Roberts and Donaldson). The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.

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