THE unfortunate Licinius was the last rival who opposed the greatness, and the last captive who adorned the triumph, of Constantine. After a tranquil and prosperous reign, the Conqueror bequeathed to his family the inheritance of the Roman Empire; a new capital, a new policy, and a new religion; and the innovations which he established have been embraced and consecrated by succeeding genera­tions. The age of the great Constantine and his sons is filled with important events; but the histo­rian must be oppressed by their number and va­riety, [Page 2] unless he diligently separates from each other the scenes which are connected only by the order of time. He will describe the political in­stitutions that gave strength and stability to the empire, before he proceeds to relate the wars and revolutions which hastened its decline. He will adopt the division unknown to the ancients, of civil and ecclesiastical affairs: the victory of the Christians, and their intestine discord, will sup­ply copious and distinct materials both for edifi­cation and for scandal.

After the defeat and abdication of Licinius, Design of a new ca­pital. his victorious rival proceeded to lay the founda­tions of a city, destined to reign, in future times, A. D. 324. the mistress of the East, and to survive the empire and religion of Constantine. The motives, whe­ther of pride or of policy, which first induced Diocletian to withdraw himself from the ancient seat of government, had acquired additional weight by the example of his successors, and the habits of forty years. Rome was insensibly con­founded with the dependent kingdoms which had once acknowledged her supremacy; and the country of the Caesars was viewed with cold in­difference by a martial prince, born in the neigh­bourhood of the Danube, educated in the courts and armies of Asia, and invested with the purple by the legions of Britain. The Italians, who had received Constantine as their deliverer, submis­sively obeyed the edicts which he sometimes con­descended to address to the senate and people of Rome; but they were seldom honoured with the presence of their new sovereign. During the vi­gour [Page 3] of his age, Constantine, according to the va­rious exigencies of peace and war, moved with slow dignity, or with active diligence, along the frontiers of his extensive dominions; and was al­ways prepared to take the field either against a foreign or a domestic enemy. But as he gradu­ally reached the summit of prosperity and the de­cline of life, he began to meditate the design of fixing in a more permanent station the strength as well as majesty of the throne. In the choice of an advantageous situation, he preferred the con­fines of Europe and Asia; to curb, with a power­ful arm, the barbarians who dwelt between the Danube and the Tanais; to watch with an eye of jealousy the conduct of the Persian monarch, who indignantly supported the yoke of an ignominious treaty. With these views, Diocletian had selected and embellished the residence of Nicomedia: but the memory of Diocletian was justly abhorred by the protector of the church; and Constantine was not insensible to the ambition of founding a city which might perpetuate the glory of his own name. During the late operations of the war against Licinius, he had sufficient opportunity to contemplate, both as a soldier and as a statesman, the incomparable position of Byzantium; and to Situation of Byzan­tium. observe how strongly it was guarded by nature against an hostile attack, whilst it was acces­sible on every side to the benefits of commercial intercourse. Many ages before Constantine, one of the most judicious historians of antiqui­ty ¹ [Page 4] had described the advantages of a situation, from whence a feeble colony of Greeks derived the command of the sea, and the honours of a flourishing and independent republic ².

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

The winding channel through which the waters The Bol­phorus. of the Euxine flow with a rapid and incessant course towards the Mediterranean, received the appellation of Bosphorus, a name not less cele­brated [Page 5] in the history, than in the fables, of an­tiquity ³. A crowd of temples and of votive al­tars, profusely scattered along its steep and woody banks, attested the unskilfulness, the terrors, and the devotion of the Grecian navigators, who, after the example of the Argonauts, explored the dan­gers of the inhospitable Euxine. On these banks tradition long preserved the memory of the palace of Phineus, infested by the obscene harpies ⁴; and of the sylvan reign of Amycus, who defied the son of Leda to the combat of the Cestus ⁵. The streights of the Bosphorus are terminated by the Cyanean rocks, which, according to the de­scription of the poets, had once floated on the face of the waters; and were destined by the gods to protect the entrance of the Euxine against the eye of profane curiosity ⁶. From the Cyanean rocks to the point and harbour of Byzantium, the [Page 6] winding length of the Bosphorus extends about sixteen miles ⁷, and its most ordinary breadth may be computed at about one mile and a half. The new castles of Europe and Asia are construct­ed, on either continent, upon the foundations of two celebrated temples, of Serapis and of Jupiter Urius. The old castles, a work of the Greek em­perors, command the narrowest part of the chan­nel, in a place where the opposite banks advance within five hundred paces of each other. These fortresses were restored and strengthened by Ma­homet the Second, when he meditated the siege of Constantinople ⁸: but the Turkish conqueror was most probably ignorant, that near two thou­sand years before his reign, Darius had chosen the same situation to connect the two continents by a bridge of boats ⁹. At a small distance from the old castles we discover the little town of Chryso­polis, or Scutari, which may almost be considered as the Asiatic suburb of Constantinople. The Bosphorus, as it begins to open into the Propon­tis, passes between Byzantium and Chalcedon. The latter of those cities was built by the Greeks, [Page 7] a few years before the former; and the blindness of its founders, who overlooked the superior ad­vantages of the opposite coast, has been stig­matized by a proverbial expression of contempt ¹⁰.

The harbour of Constantinople, which may be The port. considered as an arm of the Bosphorus, obtained, in a very remote period, the denomination of the Golden Horn. The curve which it describes might be compared to the horn of a stag, or, as it should seem, with more propriety, to that of an ox ¹¹. The epithet of golden was expressive of the riches which every wind wafted from the most distant countries into the secure and capacious port of Constantinople. The river Lycus, formed by the conflux of two little streams, pours into the harbour a perpetual supply of fresh water, which serves to cleanse the bottom, and to invite the pe­riodical shoals of fish to seek their retreat in that convenient recess. As the vicissitudes of tides are scarcely felt in those seas, the constant depth of the harbour allows goods to be landed on the quays without the assistance of boats; and it has been observed, that in many places the largest vessels may rest their prows against the houses, [Page 8] while their sterns are floating in the water ¹². From the mouth of the Lycus to that of the har­bour, this arm of the Bosphorus is more than se­ven miles in length. The entrance is about five hundred yards broad, and a strong chain could be occasionally drawn across it, to guard the port and city from the attack of an hostile navy ¹³.

Between the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, the The Pro­pontis. shores of Europe and Asia receding on either side inclose the sea of Marmara, which was known to the ancients by the denomination of Propontis. The navigation from the issue of the Bosphorus to the entrance of the Hellespont is about one hun­dred and twenty miles. Those who steer their westward course through the middle of the Pro­pontis, may at once descry the high lands of Thrace and Bithynia, and never lose sight of the lofty summit of Mount Olympus, covered with eternal snows ¹⁴. They leave on the lest a deep gulf, at the bottom of which Nicomedia was seated, the imperial residence of Diocletian; and [Page 9] they pass the small islands of Cyzicus and Procon­nesus before they cast anchor at Gallipoli: where the sea, which separates Asia from Europe, is again contracted into a narrow channel.

The geographers who, with the most skilful The Hel­lespont. accuracy, have surveyed the form and extent of the Hellespont, assign about sixty miles for the winding course, and about three miles for the ordinary breadth of those celebrated streights ¹⁵. But the narrowest part of the channel is sound to the northward of the old Turkish castles between the cities of Cestus and Abydus. It was here that the adventurous Leander braved the passage of the flood for the possession of his mistress ¹⁶. It was here likewise, in a place where the distance between the opposite banks cannot exceed five hundred paces, that Xerxes imposed a stupendous bridge of boats, for the purpose of transporting into Europe an hundred and seventy myriads of barbarians ¹⁷. A sea contracted within such nar­row [Page 10] limits, may seem but ill to deserve the sin­gular epithet of broad, which Homer, as well as Orpheus, has frequently bestowed on the Helle­spont. But our ideas of greatness are of a rela­tive nature: the traveller, and especially the poet, who sailed along the Hellespont, who pursued the windings of the stream, and contemplated the rural scenery, which appeared on every side to terminate the prospect, insensibly lost the re­membrance of the sea; and his fancy painted those celebrated streights, with all the attributes of a mighty river flowing with a swift current, in the midst of a woody and inland country, and at length through a wide mouth, discharging itself into the Aegean or Archipelago ¹⁸. Ancient Troy ¹⁹, seated on an eminence at the foot of Mount Ida, overlooked the mouth of the Helle­spont, which scarcely received an accession of waters from the tribute of those immortal rivu­lets the Simois and Scamander. The Grecian [Page 11] camp had stretched twelve miles along the shore from the Sigaean to the Rhaetean promontory; and the flanks of the army were guarded by the bravest chiefs who fought under the banners of Agamemnon. The first of those promontories was occupied by Achilles with his invincible Myrmidons, and the dauntless Ajax pitched his tents on the other. After Ajax had fallen a sacri­fice to his disappointed pride, and to the ingrati­tude of the Greeks, his sepulchre was erected on the ground where he had defended the navy against the rage of Jove and of Hector; and the citizens of the rising town of Rhaeteum celebrated his memory with divine honours ²⁰. Before Con­stantine gave a just preference to the situation of Byzantium, he had conceived the design of erect­ing the seat of empire on this celebrated spot, from whence the Romans derived their fabulous origin. The extensive plain which lies below ancient Troy, towards the Rhaetean promontory and the tomb of Ajax, was first chosen for his new capi­tal; and, though the undertaking was soon relin­quished, the stately remains of unfinished walls and towers attracted the notice of all who sailed through the streights of the Hellespont ²¹.

[Page 12] We are at present qualified to view the advan­tageous position of Constantinople; which ap­pears to have been formed by Nature for the Advan­tages of Constan­tinople. centre and capital of a great monarchy. Situated in the forty-first degree of latitude, the Imperial city commanded, from her seven hills ²², the op­posite shores of Europe and Asia; the climate was healthy and temperate, the soil fertile, the har­bour secure and capacious; and the approach on the side of the continent was of small extent and easy defence. The Bosphorus and the Hellespont may be considered as the two gates of Constanti­nople; and the prince who possessed those im­portant passages could always shut them against a naval enemy, and open them to the fleets of com­merce. The preservation of the eastern provinces may, in some degree, be ascribed to the policy of Constantine, as the Barbarians of the Euxine, who in the preceding age had poured their arma­ments into the heart of the Mediterranean, soon desisted from the exercise of piracy, and despaired of forcing this insurmountable barrier. When the gates of the Hellespont and Bosphorus were shut, the capital still enjoyed, within their spa­cious inclosure, every production which could supply the wants, or gratify the luxury of its nu­merous [Page 13] inhabitants. The sea-coasts of Thrace and Bithynia, which languish under the weight of Turkish oppression, still exhibit a rich prospect of vineyards, of gardens, and of plentiful har­vests; and the Propontis has ever been renowned for an inexhaustible store of the most exquisite fish, that are taken in their stated seasons, without skill, and almost without labour ²³. But when the passages of the Streights were thrown open for trade, they alternately admitted the natural and artificial riches of the north and south, of the Euxine, and of the Mediterranean. Whatever rude commodities were collected in the forests of Germany and Scythia, as far as the sources of the Tanais and the Borysthenes; whatsoever was manufactured by the skill of Europe or Asia; the corn of Egypt, and the gems and spices of the farthest India, were brought by the varying winds into the port of Constantinople, which, for many ages, attracted the commerce of the ancient world ²⁴.

The prospect of beauty, of safety, and of Founda­tion of the city. wealth, united in a single spot, was sufficient to justify the choice of Constantine. But as some decent mixture of prodigy and fable has, in every [Page 14] age, been supposed to reflect a becoming majesty on the origin of great cities ²⁵, the emperor was desirous of ascribing his resolution, not so much to the uncertain counsels of human policy, as to the infallible and eternal decrees of divine wis­dom. In one of his laws he has been careful to instruct posterity, that, in obedience to the com­mands of God, he laid the everlasting foundations of Constantinople ²⁶: and though he has not con­descended to relate in what manner the coelestial inspiration was communicated to his mind, the defect of his modest silence has been liberally sup­plied by the ingenuity of succeeding writers; who describe the nocturnal vision which appeared to the fancy of Constantine, as he slept within the walls of Byzantium. The tutelar genius of the city, a venerable matron sinking under the weight of years and infirmities, was suddenly transform­ed into a blooming maid, whom his own hands adorned with all the symbols of Imperial great­ness ²⁷. The monarch awoke, interpreted the auspicious omen, and obeyed, without hesitation, the will of heaven. The day which gave birth to a city or colony was celebrated by the Romans with such ceremonies as had been ordained by a [Page 15] generous superstition ²⁸; and though Constantine might omit some rites which savoured too strong­ly of their Pagan origin, yet he was anxious to leave a deep impression of hope and respect on the minds of the spectators. On foot, with a lance in his hand, the emperor himself led the solemn procession; and directed the line, which was traced as the boundary of the destined capital: till the growing circumference was observed with astonishment by the assistants, who, at length, ventured to observe, that he had already exceed­ed the most ample measure of a great city. ‘I shall still advance, replied Constantine, till HE, the invisible guide who marches before me, thinks proper to stop ²⁹.’ Without presuming to investigate the nature or motives of this extra­ordinary conductor, we shall content ourselves with the more humble task of describing the ex­tent and limits of Constantinople ³⁰.

In the actual state of the city, the palace and Extent. gardens of the Seraglio occupy the eastern pro­montory, the first of the seven hills, and cover [Page 16] about one hundred and fifty acres of our own measure. The seat of Turkish jealousy and de­spotism is erected on the foundations of a Grecian republic: but it may be supposed that the By­zantins were tempted by the conveniency of the harbour to extend their habitations on that side beyond the modern limits of the Seraglio. The new walls of Constantine stretched from the port to the Propontis across the enlarged breadth of the triangle, at the distance of fifteen stadia from the ancient fortification; and with the city of Byzantium they inclosed five of the seven hills, which, to the eyes of those who approach Con­stantinople, appear to rise above each other in beautiful order ³¹. About a century after the death of the founder, the new buildings, extend­ing on one side up the harbour, and on the other along the Propontis, already covered the narrow ridge of the sixth, and the broad summit of the seventh hill. The necessity of protecting those suburbs from the incessant inroads of the Barba­rians, engaged the younger Theodosius to sur­round his capital with an adequate and permanent inclosure of walls ³². From the eastern promon­tory to the golden gate, the extreme length of [Page 17] Constantinople was about three Roman miles ³³; the circumference measured between ten and eleven; and the surface might be computed as equal to about two thousand English acres. It is impossible to justify the vain and credulous ex­aggerations of modern travellers, who have some­times stretched the limits of Constantinople over the adjacent villages of the European, and even of the Asiatic coast ³⁴. But the suburbs of Pera and Galata, though situate beyond the harbour, may deserve to be considered as a part of the city ³⁵; and this addition may perhaps authorise the measure of a Byzantine historian, who assigns sixteen Greek (about fourteen Roman) miles for the circumference of his native city ³⁶. Such an extent may seem not unworthy of an Imperial re­sidence. [Page 18] Yet Constantinople must yield to Babylon and Thebes ³⁷, to ancient Rome, to London, and even to Paris ³⁸.

The master of the Roman world, who aspired Progress of the work. to erect an eternal monument of the glories of his reign, could employ in the prosecution of that great work the wealth, the labour, and all that yet remained of the genius of obedient millions. Some estimate may be formed of the expence bestowed with Imperial liberality on the found­ation of Constantinople, by the allowance of about two millions five hundred thousand pounds for the construction of the walls, the porticoes, and the aqueducts ³⁹. The forests that over­shadowed the shores of the Euxine, and the cele­brated quarries of white marble in the little island of Proconnesus, supplied an inexhaustible stock of materials, ready to be conveyed, by the conveni­ence of a short water-carriage, to the harbour of Byzantium ⁴⁰. A multitude of labourers and [Page 19] artificers urged the conclusion of the work with incessant toil: but the impatience of Constantine soon discovered, that, in the decline of the arts, the skill as well as numbers of his architects bore a very unequal proportion to the greatness of his designs. The magistrates of the most distant provinces were therefore directed to institute schools, to appoint professors, and, by the hopes of rewards and privileges, to engage in the study and practice of architecture a sufficient number of ingenious youths, who had received a liberal education ⁴¹. The buildings of the new city were executed by such artificers as the reign of Con­stantine could afford; but they were decorated by the hands of the most celebrated masters of the age of Pericles and Alexander. To revive the genius of Phidias and Lysippus, surpassed in­deed the power of a Roman emperor; but the immortal productions which they had bequeathed to posterity were exposed without defence to the rapacious vanity of a despot. By his commands the cities of Greece and Asia were despoiled of their most valuable ornaments ⁴². The trophies [Page 20] of memorable wars, the objects of religious ve­neration, the most finished statues of the gods and heroes, of the sages and poets of ancient times, contributed to the splendid triumph of Constan­tinople; and gave occasion to the remark of the historian Cedrenus ⁴³, who observes, with some enthusiasm, that nothing seemed wanting except the souls of the illustrious men whom those ad­mirable monuments were intended to represent. But it is not in the city of Constantine, nor in the declining period of an empire, when the human mind was depressed by civil and religious slavery, that we should seek for the souls of Homer and of Demosthenes.

During the siege of Byzantium, the conqueror Edifices. had pitched his tent on the commanding eminence of the second hill. To perpetuate the memory of his success, he chose the same advantageous position for the principal Forum ⁴⁴; which appears to have been of a circular, or rather elliptical form. The two opposite entrances formed tri­umphal arches; the porticoes, which inclosed it on every side, were filled with statues; and the centre of the Forum was occupied by a lofty column, of which a mutilated fragment is now degraded by the appellation of the burnt pillar. This column was erected on a pedestal of white [Page 21] marble twenty feet high; and was composed of ten pieces of porphyry, each of which measured about ten feet in height, and about thirty-three in circumference ⁴⁵. On the summit of the pillar, above one hundred and twenty feet from the ground, stood the colossal statue of Apollo. It was of bronze, had been transported either from Athens or from a town of Phrygia, and was sup­posed to be the work of Phidias. The artist had represented the god of day, or, as it was after­wards interpreted, the emperor Constantine him­self, with a sceptre in his right hand, the globe of the world in his left, and a crown of rays glit­tering on his head ⁴⁶. The Circus, or Hippo­drome, was a stately building about four hundred paces in length, and one hundred in breadth ⁴⁷. The space between the two metae or goals was filled with statues and obelisks: and we may still remark a very singular fragment of antiquity; the bodies of three serpents, twisted into one pillar of brass. Their triple heads had once sup­ported the golden tripod which, after the defeat of Xerxes, was consecrated in the temple of [Page 22] Delphi by the victorious Greeks ⁴⁸. The beauty of the Hippodrome has been long since defaced by the rude hands of the Turkish conquerors: but, under the similar appellation of Atmeidan, it still serves as a place of exercise for their horses. From the throne, whence the emperor viewed the Circensian games, a winding staircase ⁴⁹ de­scended to the palace; a magnificent edifice, which scarcely yielded to the residence of Rome itself, and which, together with the dependent courts, gardens, and porticoes, covered a con­siderable extent of ground upon the banks of the Propontis between the Hippodrome and the church of St. Sophia ⁵⁰. We might likewise [Page 23] celebrate the baths, which still retained the name of Zeuxippus, after they had been enriched, by the munificence of Constantine, with lofty co­lumns, various marbles, and above threescore statues of bronze ⁵¹. But we should deviate from the design of this history, if we attempted mi­nutely to describe the different buildings or quar­ters of the city. It may be sufficient to observe, that whatever could adorn the dignity of a great capital, or contribute to the benefit or pleasure of its numerous inhabitants, was contained within the walls of Constantinople. A particular de­scription, composed about a century after its foundation, enumerates a capitol or school of learning, a circus, two theatres, eight public, and one hundred and fifty-three private, baths, fifty-two porticoes, five granaries, eight aqueducts or reservoirs of water, four spacious halls for the meetings of the senate or courts of justice, four­teen churches, fourteen palaces, and four thou­sand three hundred and eighty-eight houses, which, for their size or beauty, deserved to be [Page 24] distinguished from the multitude of plebeian habitations ⁵².

The populousness of this favoured city was the Popula­tion. next and most serious object of the attention of its founder. In the dark ages which succeeded the translation of the empire, the remote and the immediate consequences of that memorable event were strangely confounded by the vanity of the Greeks, and the credulity of the Latins ⁵³. It was asserted, and believed, that all the noble families of Rome, the senate, and the equestrian order, with their innumerable attendants, had followed their emperor to the banks of the Propontis; that a spurious race of strangers and plebeians was left to possess the solitude of the ancient capital; and that the lands of Italy, long since converted into gardens, were at once deprived of cultivation and inhabitants ⁵⁴. In the course of this history, such exaggerations will be reduced to their just [Page 25] value: yet, since the growth of Constantinople cannot be ascribed to the general increase of man­kind and of industry, it must be admitted, that this artificial colony was raised at the expence of the ancient cities of the empire. Many opulent senators of Rome, and of the Eastern provinces, were probably invited by Constantine to adopt for their country the fortunate spot which he had chosen for his own residence. The invitations of a master are scarcely to be distinguished from commands; and the liberality of the emperor ob­tained a ready and cheerful obedience. He be­stowed on his favourites the palaces which he had built in the several quarters of the city, assigned them lands and pensions for the support of their dignity ⁵⁵, and alienated the demesnes of Pontus and Asia, to grant hereditary estates by the easy tenure of maintaining a house in the capital ⁵⁶. But these encouragements and obligations soon became superfluous, and were gradually abolish­ed. Wherever the seat of government is fixed, a [Page 26] considerable part of the public revenue will be expended by the prince himself, by his ministers, by the officers of justice, and by the domestics of the palace. The most wealthy of the provincials will be attracted by the powerful motives of inte­rest and duty, of amusement and curiosity. A third and more numerous class of inhabitants will insensibly be formed, of servants, of artificers, and of merchants, who derive their subsistence from their own labour, and from the wants or luxury of the superior ranks. In less than a cen­tury, Constantinople disputed with Rome itself the pre-eminence of riches and numbers. New piles of buildings, crowded together with too little regard to health or convenience, scarcely al­lowed the intervals of narrow streets for the per­petual throng of men, of horses, and of carriages. The allotted space of ground was insufficient to contain the increasing people; and the additional foundations, which, on either side, were advanc­ed into the sea, might alone have composed a very considerable city ⁵⁷.

The frequent and regular distributions of wine Privileges. and oil, of corn or bread, of money or provisions, had almost exempted the poorer citizens of Rome from the necessity of labour. The magnificence of the first Caesars was in some measure imitated [Page 27] by the founder of Constantinople ⁵⁸: but his libe­rality, however it might excite the applause of the people, has incurred the censure of posterity. A nation of legislators and conquerors might assert their claim to the harvests of Africa, which had been purchased with their blood; and it was art­fully contrived by Augustus, that, in the enjoy­ment of plenty, the Romans should lose the me­mory of freedom. But the prodigality of Con­stantine could not be excused by any consideration either of public or private interest; and the an­nual tribute of corn imposed upon Egypt for the benefit of his new capital, was applied to feed a lazy and insolent populace, at the expence of the husbandmen of an industrious province ⁵⁹. Some other regulations of this emperor are less liable to blame, but they are less deserving of notice. He divided Constantinople into fourteen regions or quarters ⁶⁰, dignified the public council with [Page 28] the appellation of Senate ⁶¹, communicated to the citizens the privileges of Italy ⁶², and bestowed on the rising city the title of Colony, the first and most favoured daughter of ancient Rome. The venerable parent still maintained the legal and ac­knowledged supremacy, which was due to her age, to her dignity, and to the remembrance of her former greatness ⁶³.

As Constantine urged the progress of the work Dedica­tion A. D. 330 or 334. with the impatience of a lover, the walls, the por­ticoes, and the principal edifices were completed in a few years, or, according to another account, in a few months ⁶⁴: but this extraordinary dili­gence [Page 29] should excite the less admiration, since many of the buildings were finished in so hasty and imperfect a manner, that, under the succeed­ing reign, they were preserved with difficulty from impending ruin ⁶⁵. But while they display­ed the vigour and freshness of youth, the founder prepared to celebrate the dedication of his city ⁶⁶. The games and largesses which crowned the pomp of this memorable festival may easily be supposed: but there is one circumstance of a more singular and permanent nature, which ought not entirely to be overlooked. As often as the birth-day of the city returned, the statue of Constantine, framed, by his order, of gilt wood, and bearing in its right-hand a small image of the genius of the place, was erected on a triumphal car. The guards, carrying white tapers, and clothed in their richest apparel, accompanied the solemn procession as it moved through the Hippodrome. [Page 30] When it was opposite to the throne of the reign­ing emperor, he rose from his seat, and with grateful reverence adored the memory of his pre­decessor ⁶⁷. At the festival of his dedication, an edict, engraved on a column of marble, be­stowed the title of SECOND or NEW ROME on the city of Constantine ⁶⁸. But the name of Constan­tinople ⁶⁹ has prevailed over that honourable epi­thet; and, after the revolution of fourteen cen­turies, still perpetuates the fame of its author ⁷⁰.

The foundation of a new capital is naturally Form of govern­ment. connected with the establishment of a new form of civil and military administration. The distinct view of the complicated system of policy, intro­duced by Diocletian, improved by Constantine, [Page 31] and completed by his immediate successors, may not only amuse the fancy by the singular picture of a great empire, but will tend to illustrate the secret and internal causes of its rapid decay. In the pursuit of any remarkable institution, we may be frequently led into the more early or the more recent times of the Roman history; but the pro­per limits of this enquiry will be included within a period of about one hundred and thirty years, from the accession of Constantine to the publica­tion of the Theodosian code ⁷¹; from which, as well as from the Notitia of the east and west ⁷², we derive the most copious and authentic infor­mation of the state of the empire. This variety of objects will suspend, for some time, the course of the narrative; but the interruption will be cen­sured only by those readers who are insensible to the importance of laws and manners, while they peruse, with eager curiosity, the transient in­trigues of a court, or the accidental event of a battle.

The manly pride of the Romans, content with Hierarchy of the state. substantial power, had left to the vanity of the east the forms and ceremonies of ostentatious [Page 32] greatness ⁷³. But when they lost even the sem­blance of those virtues which were derived from their ancient freedom, the simplicity of Roman manners was insensibly corrupted by the stately affectation of the courts of Asia. The distinc­tions of personal merit and influence, so conspicu­ous in a republic, so feeble and obscure under a monarchy, were abolished by the despotism of the emperors; who substituted in their room a severe subordination of rank and office, from the titled slaves who were seated on the steps of the throne, to the meanest instruments of arbitrary power. This multitude of abject dependents was interest­ed in the support of the actual government, from the dread of a revolution, which might at once confound their hopes, and intercept the reward of their services. In this divine hierarchy (for such it is frequently styled), every rank was marked with the most scrupulous exactness, and its dignity was displayed in a variety of trifling and solemn ceremonies, which it was a study to learn, and a sacrilege to neglect ⁷⁴. The purity of the Latin language was debased, by adopting, in the intercourse of pride and flattery, a profusion [Page 33] of epithets, which Tully would scarcely have un­derstood, and which Augustus would have re­jected with indignation. The principal officers of the empire were saluted, even by the sovereign himself, with the deceitful titles of your Sincerity, your Gravity, your Excellency, your Eminence, your sublime and wonderful Magnitude, your illustrious and magnificent Highness ⁷⁵. The codicils or patents of their office were curiously emblazoned with such emblems as were best adapted to explain its na­ture and high dignity; the image or portrait of the reigning emperors; a triumphal car; the book of mandates placed on a table, covered with a rich carpet, and illuminated by four tapers; the allegorical figures of the provinces which they governed; or the appellations and standards of the troops whom they commanded. Some of these official ensigns were really exhibited in their hall of audience; others preceded their pompous march whenever they appeared in public; and every circumstance of their demeanour, their dress, their ornaments, and their train, was cal­culated to inspire a deep reverence for the repre­sentatives of supreme majesty. By a philosophic observer, the system of the Roman government might have been mistaken for a splendid theatre, filled with players of every character and degree, who repeated the language, and imitated the pas­sions of their original model ⁷⁶.

[Page 34] All the magistrates of sufficient importance to find a place in the general state of the empire, were accurately divided into three classes. 1. The Three ranks of honour. Illustrious. 2. The Spectabiles, or Respectable: And 3. The Clarissimi; whom we may translate by the word Honourable. In the times of Roman simplicity, the last-mentioned epithet was used only as a vague expression of deference, till it be­came at length the peculiar and appropriated title of all who were members of the senate ⁷⁷, and consequently of all who, from that venerable body, were selected to govern the provinces. The va­nity of those who, from their rank and office, might claim a superior distinction above the rest of the senatorial order, was long afterwards in­dulged with the new appellation of Respectable: but the title of Illustrious was always reserved to some eminent personages who were obeyed or re­verenced by the two subordinate classes. It was communicated only, I. To the consuls and patri­cians; II. To the praetorian praefects, with the praefects of Rome and Constantinople; III. To the masters general of the cavalry and the in­fantry; and, IV. To the seven ministers of the palace, who exercised their sacred functions about the person of the emperor ⁷⁸. Among those illus­trious magistrates who were esteemed co-ordinate with each other, the seniority of appointment [Page 35] gave place to the union of dignities ⁷⁹. By the expedient of honorary codicils, the emperors, who were fond of multiplying their favours, might sometimes gratify the vanity, though not the am­bition, of impatient courtiers ⁸⁰.

I. As long as the Roman consuls were the first The con­suls. magistrates of a free state, they derived their right to power from the choice of the people. As long as the emperors condescended to disguise the ser­vitude which they imposed, the consuls were still elected by the real or apparent suffrage of the se­nate. From the reign of Diocletian, even these vestiges of liberty were abolished, and the suc­cessful candidates who were invested with the an­nual honours of the consulship, affected to de­plore the humiliating condition of their predeces­sors. The Scipios and Catos had been reduced to solicit the votes of plebeians, to pass through the tedious and expensive forms of a popular elec­tion, and to expose their dignity to the shame of a public refusal; while their own happier fate had reserved them for an age and government in which the rewards of virtue were assigned by the unerring wisdom of a gracious sovereign ⁸¹. In the epistles which the emperor addressed to the two consuls elect, it was declared, that they were [Page 36] created by his sole authority ⁸². Their names and portraits, engraved on gilt tablets of ivory, were dispersed over the empire as presents to the pro­vinces, the cities, the magistrates, the senate, and the people ⁸³. Their solemn inauguration was performed at the place of the Imperial residence; and during a period of one hundred and twenty years, Rome was constantly deprived of the pre­sence of her ancient magistrates ⁸⁴. On the morn­ing of the first of January, the consuls assumed the ensigns of their dignity. Their dress was a robe of purple, embroidered in silk and gold, and sometimes ornamented with costly gems ⁸⁵. [Page 37] On this solemn occasion they were attended by the most eminent officers of the state and army, in the habit of senators; and the useless fasces, armed with the once formidable axes, were borne before them by the lictors ⁸⁶. The procession moved from the palace ⁸⁷ to the Forum, or prin­cipal square of the city; where the consuls ascended their tribunal, and seated themselves in the curule chairs, which were framed after the fashion of ancient times. They immediately ex­ercised an act of jurisdiction, by the manumission of a slave, who was brought before them for that purpose; and the ceremony was intended to re­present the celebrated action of the elder Brutus, the author of liberty and of the consulship, when he admitted among his fellow-citizens the faith­ful Vindex, who had revealed the conspiracy of the Tarquins ⁸⁸. The public festival was con­tinued during several days in all the principal cities; in Rome, from custom; in Constanti­nople, [Page 38] from imitation; in Carthage, Antioch, and Alexandria, from the love of pleasure and the superfluity of wealth ⁸⁹. In the two capitals of the empire the annual games of the theatre, the circus, and the amphitheatre ⁹⁰, cost four thousand pounds of gold, (about) one hundred and sixty thousand pounds sterling: and if so heavy an expence surpassed the faculties or the in­clination of the magistrates themselves, the sum was supplied from the Imperial treasury ⁹¹. As soon as the consuls had discharged these customary duties, they were at liberty to retire into the shade of private life, and to enjoy, during the remainder of the year, the undisturbed contem­plation of their own greatness. They no longer presided in the national councils; they no longer executed the resolutions of peace or war. Their abilities (unless they were employed in more ef­fective offices) were of little moment; and their names served only as the legal date of the year in which they had filled the chair of Marius and of Cicero. Yet it was still felt and acknowledged, in the last period of Roman servitude, that this empty name might be compared, and even pre­ferred, [Page 39] to the possession of substantial power. The title of consul was still the most splendid ob­ject of ambition, the noblest reward of virtue and loyalty. The emperors themselves, who disdain­ed the faint shadow of the republic, were conscious that they acquired an additional splendour and ma­jesty as often as they assumed the annual honours of the consular dignity ⁹².

The proudest and most perfect separation which The Pa­tricians. can be found in any age or country, between the nobles and the people, is perhaps that of the Pa­tricians and the Plebeians, as it was established in the first age of the Roman republic. Wealth and honours, the offices of the state, and the ceremo­nies of religion, were almost exclusively possessed by the former; who preserving the purity of their blood with the most insulting jealousy ⁹³, held their clients in a condition of specious vassalage. But these distinctions, so incompatible with the spirit of a free people, were removed, after a long struggle, by the persevering efforts of the Tribunes. The most active and successful of the Plebeians accumulated wealth, aspired to ho­nours, [Page 40] deserved triumphs, contracted alliances, and, after some generations, assumed the pride of ancient nobility ⁹⁴. The Patrician families, on the other hand, whose original number was never recruited till the end of the commonwealth, either failed in the ordinary course of nature, or were ex­tinguished in so many foreign and domestic wars, or, through a want of merit or fortune, insensibly mingled with the mass of the people ⁹⁵. Very few remained who could derive their pure and ge­nuine origin from the infancy of the city, or even from that of the republic, when Caesar and Au­gustus, Claudius and Vespasian, created from the body of the senate a competent number of new Patrician families, in the hope of perpetuating an order, which was still considered as honour­able and sacred ⁹⁶. But these artificial supplies [Page 41] (in which the reigning house was always included) were rapidly swept away by the rage of tyrants, by frequent revolutions, by the change of man­ners, and by the intermixture of nations ⁹⁷. Little more was left, when Constantine ascended the throne, than a vague and imperfect tradition, that the Patricians had once been the first of the Ro­mans. To form a body of nobles, whose influ­ence may restrain, while it secures the authority of the monarch, would have been very incon­sistent with the character and policy of Constan­tine; but had he seriously entertained such a de­sign, it might have exceeded the measure of his power to ratify, by an arbitrary edict, an institu­tion which must expect the sanction of time and of opinion. He revived, indeed, the title of PA­TRICIANS, but he revived it as a personal, not as an hereditary distinction. They yielded only to the transient superiority of the annual consuls; but they enjoyed the pre-eminence over all the great officers of state, with the most familiar ac­cess to the person of the prince. This honour­able rank was bestowed on them for life; and as they were usually favourites, and ministers who had grown old in the Imperial court, the true [Page 42] etymology of the word was perverted by igno­rance and flattery; and the Patricians of Con­stantine were reverenced as the adopted Fathers of the emperor and the republic ⁹⁸.

II. The fortunes of the Praetorian praefects The Prae­torian prae­fects. were essentially different from these of the consuls and patricians. The latter saw their ancient great­ness evaporate in a vain title. The former, rising by degrees from the most humble condition, were invested with the civil and military administra­tion of the Roman world. From the reign of Severus to that of Diocletian, the guards and the palace, the laws and the finances, the armies and the provinces, were intrusted to their superintend­ing care; and, like the Vizirs of the East, they held with one hand the seal, and with the other the standard, of the empire. The ambition of the praefects, always formidable, and some­times fatal to the masters whom they served, was supported by the strength of the Praetorian bands; but after those haughty troops had been weakened by Diocletian, and finally suppressed by Constantine, the praefects, who survived their fall, were reduced without difficulty to the sta­tion of useful and obedient ministers. When they were no longer responsible for the safety of the emperor's person, they resigned the jurisdiction which they had hitherto claimed and exercised over all the departments of the palace. They were deprived by Constantine of all military com­mand, as soon as they had ceased to lead into the [Page 43] field, under their immediate orders, the flower of the Roman troops; and at length, by a singular revolution, the captains of the guards were trans­formed into the civil magistrates of the provinces. According to the plan of government instituted by Diocletian, the four princes had each their Praetorian praefect; and, after the monarchy was once more united in the person of Constantine, he still continued to create the same number of FOUR PRAEFECTS, and entrusted to their care the same provinces which they already administered. 1. The praefect of the East stretched his ample juris­diction into the three parts of the globe which were subject to the Romans, from the cataracts of the Nile to the banks of the Phasis, and from the mountains of Thrace to the frontiers of Per­sia. 2. The important provinces of Pannonia, Dacia, Macedonia, and Greece, once acknow­ledged the authority of the praefect of Illyricum. 3. The power of the praefect of Italy was not con­fined to the country from whence he derived his title; it extended over the additional territory of Rhaetia as far as the banks of the Danube, over the dependent islands of the Mediterranean, and over that part of the continent of Africa which lies between the confines of Cyrene and those of Tingitania. 4. The praefect of the Gauls com­prehended under that plural denomination the kindred provinces of Britain and Spain, and his authority was obeyed from the wall of Antoninus to the fort of Mount Atlas ⁹⁹.

[Page 44] After the Praetorian praefects had been dismissed from all military command, the civil functions which they were ordained to exercise over so many subject nations, were adequate to the am­bition and abilities of the most consummate mi­nisters. To their wisdom was committed the su­preme administration of justice and of the finances, the two objects which, in a state of peace, com­prehend almost all the respective duties of the sovereign and of the people; of the former, to protect the citizens who are obedient to the laws; of the latter, to contribute the share of their property which is required for the expences of the state. The coin, the highways, the posts, the granaries, the manufactures, whatever could interest the public prosperity, was moderated by the authority of the Praetorian praefects. As the immediate representatives of the Imperial ma­jesty, they were empowered to explain, to enforce, and on some occasions to modify, the general edicts by their discretionary proclamations. They watched over the conduct of the provincial go­vernors, removed the negligent, and inflicted punishments on the guilty. From all the inferior jurisdictions, an appeal in every matter of im­portance, either civil or criminal, might be brought before the tribunal of the praefect: but his sentence was final and absolute; and the em­perors themselves refused to admit any complaints against the judgment or the integrity of a magi­strate [Page 45] whom they honoured with such unbounded confidence ¹⁰⁰. His appointments were suitable to his dignity ¹⁰¹; and if avarice was his ruling passion, he enjoyed frequent opportunities of col­lecting a rich harvest of fees, of presents, and of perquisites. Though the emperors no longer dreaded the ambition of their praefects, they were attentive to counterbalance the power of this great office by the uncertainty and shortness of its du­ration ¹⁰².

From their superior importance and dignity, The prae­fects of Rome and Constanti­nople. Rome and Constantinople were alone excepted from the jurisdiction of the Praetorian praefects. The immense size of the city, and the experience of the tardy, ineffectual operation of the laws, had furnished the policy of Augustus with a specious pretence for introducing a new magistrate, who alone could restrain a servile and turbulent popu­lace [Page 46] by the strong arm of arbitrary power ¹⁰³. Valerius Messalla was appointed the first praefect of Rome, that his reputation might countenance so invidious a measure: but, at the end of a few days, that accomplished citizen ¹⁰⁴ resigned his office, declaring with a spirit worthy of the friend of Brutus, that he found himself incapable of ex­ercising a power incompatible with public free­dom ¹⁰⁵. As the sense of liberty became less ex­quisite, the advantages of order were more clearly understood; and the praefect, who seemed to have been designed as a terror only to slaves and va­grants, was permitted to extend his civil and cri­minal jurisdiction over the equestrian and noble families of Rome. The praetors, annually created as the judges of law and equity, could not long dispute the possession of the Forum with a vigor­ous [Page 47] and permanent magistrate, who was usually admitted into the confidence of the prince. Their courts were deserted, their number, which had once fluctuated between twelve and eighteen ¹⁰⁶, was gradually reduced to two or three, and their important functions were confined to the expen­sive obligation ¹⁰⁷ of exhibiting games for the amusement of the people. After the office of Roman consuls had been changed into a vain pageant, which was rarely displayed in the ca­pital, the praefects assumed their vacant place in the senate, and were soon acknowledged as the ordinary presidents of that venerable assembly. They received appeals from the distance of one hundred miles; and it was allowed as a principle of jurisprudence, that all municipal authority was derived from them alone ¹⁰⁸. In the discharge of his laborious employment, the governor of Rome was assisted by fifteen officers, some of whom had been originally his equals, or even his superiors. The principal departments were relative to the command of a numerous watch established as a [Page 48] safeguard against fires, robberies, and nocturnal disorders; the custody and distribution of the public allowance of corn and provisions; the care of the port, of the aqueducts, of the common sewers, and of the navigation and bed of the Tyber; the inspection of the markets, the theatres, and of the private as well as public works. Their vigilance ensured the three principal objects of a regular police, safety, plenty, and cleanliness; and as a proof of the attention of government to preserve the splendour and ornaments of the capi­tal, a particular inspector was appointed for the statues; the guardian, as it were, of that inani­mate people, which, according to the extrava­gant computation of an old writer, was scarcely inferior in number to the living inhabitants of Rome. About thirty years after the foundation of Constantinople, a similar magistrate was created in that rising metropolis, for the same uses, and with the same powers. A perfect equality was established between the dignity of the two muni­cipal, and that of the four praetorian, praefects ¹⁰⁹.

Those who, in the Imperial hierarchy, were The pro­consuls, vice-prae­fects, &c. distinguished by the title of Respectable, formed an intermediate class between the illustrious praefects and the honourable magistrates of the provinces. In this class, the proconsuls of Asia, Achaia, and Africa, claimed a pre-eminence, which was yield­ed [Page 49] to the remembrance of their ancient dignity; and the appeal from their tribunal to that of the praefects was almost the only mark of their de­pendence ¹¹⁰. But the civil government of the empire was distributed into thirteen great DIO­CESES, each of which equalled the just measure of a powerful kingdom. The first of these dioceses was subject to the jurisdiction of the count of the east; and we may convey some idea of the im­portance and variety of his functions, by observ­ing, that six hundred apparitors, who would be styled at present either secretaries, or clerks, or ushers, or messengers, were employed in his im­mediate office ¹¹¹. The place of Augustal praefect of Egypt was no longer filled by a Roman knight; but the name was retained; and the extraordi­nary powers which the situation of the country, and the temper of the inhabitants, had once made indispensable, were still continued to the gover­nor. The eleven remaining dioceses, of Asiana, Pontica, and Thrace; of Macedonia, Dacia, and Pannonia or Western Illyricum; of Italy and Africa; of Gual, Spain, and Britain; were go­verned by twelve vicars, or vice-praefects ¹¹², whose [Page 50] name sufficiently explains the nature and depend­ence of their office. It may be added, that the lieutenant-generals of the Roman armies, the mi­litary counts and dukes, who will be hereafter mentioned, were allowed the rank and title of Respectable.

As the spirit of jealousy and ostentation pre­vailed The go­vernors of the pro­vinces. in the councils of the emperors, they pro­ceeded with anxious diligence to divide the sub­stance, and to multiply the titles of power. The vast countries which the Roman conquerors had united under the same simple form of administra­tion, were imperceptibly crumbled into minute fragments; till at length the whole empire was distributed into one hundred and sixteen pro­vinces, each of which supported an expensive and splendid establishment. Of these, three were go­verned by proconsuls, thirty-seven by consulars, five by correctors, and seventy-one by presidents. The appellations of these magistrates were different; they ranked in successive order, the ensigns of their dignity were curiously varied, and their situa­tion, from accidental circumstances, might be more or less agreeable, or advantageous. But they were all (excepting only the proconsuls) alike included in the class of honourable persons; and they were alike entrusted, during the plea­sure of the prince, and under the authority of the praefects or their deputies, with the administration of justice and the finances in their respective di­stricts. The ponderous volumes of the Codes and [Page 51] Pandects ¹¹³ would furnish ample materials for a minute enquiry into the system of provincial go­vernment, as in the space of six centuries it was improved by the wisdom of the Roman statesmen and lawyers. It may be sufficient for the histo­rian to select two singular and salutary provisions intended to restrain the abuse of authority. 1. For the preservation of peace and order, the governors of the provinces were armed with the sword of justice. They inflicted corporal punishments, and they exercised, in capital offences, the power of life and death. But they were not authorised to indulge the condemned criminal with the choice of his own execution, or to pronounce a sentence of the mildest and most honourable kind of exile. These prerogatives were reserved to the praefects, who alone could impose the heavy fine of fifty pounds of gold: their vicegerents were confined to the trifling weight of a few ounces ¹¹⁴. This distinction, which seems to grant the larger, while it denies the smaller degree of authority, was founded on a very rational motive. The smaller degree was infinitely more liable to abuse. The passions of a provincial magistrate might fre­quently provoke him into acts of oppression, [Page 52] which affected only the freedom or the fortunes of the subject; though, from a principle of prudence, perhaps of humanity, he might still be terrified by the guilt of innocent blood. It may likewise be considered, that exile, considerable fines, or the choice of an easy death, relate more particu­larly to the rich and the noble; and the persons the most exposed to the avarice or resentment of a provincial magistrate, were thus removed from his obscure persecution to the more august and impartial tribunal of the Praetorian praefect. 2. As it was reasonably apprehended that the inte­grity of the judge might be biassed, if his interest was concerned, or his affections were engaged; the strictest regulations were established, to ex­clude any person, without the special dispensa­tion of the emperor, from the government of the province where he was born ¹¹⁵; and to prohibit the governor or his son from contracting mar­riage with a native or an inhabitant ¹¹⁶; or from purchasing slaves, lands, or houses, within the extent of his jurisdiction ¹¹⁷. Notwithstanding [Page 53] these rigorous precautions, the emperor Constan­tine, after a reign of twenty-five years, still de­plores the venal and oppressive administration of justice, and expresses the warmest indignation that the audience of the judge, his dispatch of bu­siness, his seasonable delays, and his final sen­tence, were publicly sold, either by himself or by the officers of his court. The continuance, and perhaps the impunity, of these crimes, is attested by the repetition of impotent laws, and inneffec­tual menaces ¹¹⁸.

All the civil magistrates were drawn from the The pro­fession of the law. profession of the law. The celebrated Institutes of Justinian are addressed to the youth of his do­minions, who had devoted themselves to the study of Roman jurisprudence; and the sovereign condescends to animate their diligence, by the assurance that their skill and ability would in time be rewarded by an adequate share in the govern­ment of the republic ¹¹⁹. The rudiments of this lucrative science were taught in all the consider­able cities of the east and west; but the most fa­mous school was that of Berytus ¹²⁰, on the coast [Page 54] of Phoenicia; which flourished above three cen­turies from the time of Alexander Severus, the author perhaps of an institution so advantageous to his native country. After a regular course of education, which lasted five years, the students dispersed themselves through the provinces, in search of fortune and honours; nor could they want an inexhaustible supply of business in a great empire, already corrupted by the multiplicity of laws, of arts, and of vices. The court of the Praetorian praefect of the east could alone furnish employment for one hundred and fifty advocates, sixty-four of whom were distinguished by peculiar privileges, and two were annually chosen with a salary of sixty pounds of gold, to defend the causes of the treasury. The first experiment was made of their judicial talents, by appointing them to act occasionally as assessors to the magistrates; from thence they were often raised to preside in the tribunals before which they had pleaded. They obtained the government of a province; and, by the aid of merit, of reputation, or of fa­vour, they ascended, by successive steps, to the illustrious dignities of the state ¹²¹. In the practice [Page 55] of the bar, these men had considered reason as the instrument of dispute; they interpreted the laws according to the dictates of private interest; and the same pernicious habits might still adhere to their characters in the public administration of the state. The honour of a liberal profession has indeed been vindicated by ancient and modern ad­vocates, who have filled the most important sta­tions, with pure integrity, and consummate wis­dom: but in the decline of Roman jurisprudence, the ordinary promotion of lawyers was pregnant with mischief and disgrace. The noble art, which had once been preserved as the sacred inheritance of the patricians, was fallen into the hands of freedmen and plebeians ¹²², who, with cunning rather than with skill, exercised a sordid and per­nicious trade. Some of them procured admit­tance into families for the purpose of fomenting differences, of encouraging suits, and of prepar­ing a harvest of gain for themselves or their bre­theren. [Page 56] Others, recluse in their chambers, main­tained the dignity of legal professors, by furnish­ing a rich client with subtleties to confound the plainest truth, and with arguments to colour the most unjustifiable pretensions. The splendid and popular class was composed of the advocates, who filled the Forum with the sound of their tur­gid and loquacious rhetoric. Careless of fame and of justice, they are described, for the most part, as ignorant and rapacious guides, who con­ducted their clients through a maze of expence, of delay, and of disappointment; from whence, after a tedious series of years, they were at length dismissed, when their patience and fortune were almost exhausted ¹²³.

III. In the system of policy introduced by Au­gustus, The mili­tary offi­cers. the governors, those at least of the impe­rial provinces, were invested with the full powers of the sovereign himself. Ministers of peace and war, the distribution of rewards and punishments depended on them alone, and they successively appeared on their tribunal in the robes of civil magistracy, and in complete armour at the head of the Roman legions ¹²⁴. The influence of the [Page 57] revenue, the authority of law, and the command of a military force, concurred to render their power supreme and absolute; and whenever they were tempted to violate their allegiance, the loyal province which they involved in their rebellion, was scarcely sensible of any change in its political state. From the time of Commodus to the reign of Constantine, near one hundred governors might be enumerated, who, with various success, erected the standard of revolt; and though the innocent were too often sacrificed, the guilty might be sometimes prevented, by the suspicious cruelty of their master ¹²⁵. To secure his throne and the public tranquillity from these formidable servants, Constantine resolved to divide the mili­tary from the civil administration; and to esta­blish, as a permanent and professional distinction, a practice which had been adopted only as an oc­casional expedient. The supreme jurisdiction ex­ercised by the Praetorian praefects over the armies of the empire, was transferred to the two masters general whom he instituted, the one for the cavalry, the other for the infantry; and though each of these illustrious officers was more peculiarly respon­sible for the discipline of those troops which were under his immediate inspection, they both indif­ferently commanded in the field the several bodies, whether of horse or foot, which were united in the [Page 58] same army ¹²⁶. Their number was soon doubled by the division of the east and west; and as sepa­rate generals of the same rank and title were ap­pointed on the four important frontiers of the Rhine, of the Upper and the Lower Danube, and of the Euphrates, the defence of the Roman em­pire was at length committed to eight masters ge­neral of the cavalry and infantry. Under their orders, thirty-five military commanders were sta­tioned in the provinces: three in Britain, six in Gaul, one in Spain, one in Italy, five on the Upper, and four on the Lower Danube; in Asia eight, three in Egypt, and four in Africa. The titles of counts, and dukes ¹²⁷, by which they were properly distinguished, have obtained in modern languages so very different a sense, that the use of them may occasion some surprise. But it should be recollected, that the second of those ap­pellations is only a corruption of the Latin word, which was indiscriminately applied to any mili­tary chief. All these provincial generals were therefore dukes; but no more than ten among them were dignified with the rank of counts or companions, a title of honour, or rather of fa­vour, which had been recently invented in the [Page 59] court of Constantine. A gold belt was the en­sign which distinguished the office of the counts and dukes; and besides their pay, they received a liberal allowance sufficient to maintain one hundred and ninety servants, and one hun­dred and fifty-eight horses. They were strictly prohibited from interfering in any matter which related to the administration of justice or the re­venue; but the command which they exercised over the troops of their department, was inde­pendent of the authority of the magistrates. About the same time that Constantine gave a legal sanction to the ecclesiastical order, he instituted in the Roman empire the nice balance of the civil and the military powers. The emulation, and sometimes the discord, which reigned between two professions of opposite interests and incom­patible manners, was productive of beneficial and of pernicious consequences. It was seldom to be expected that the general and the civil governor of a province should either conspire for the dis­turbance, or should unite for the service, of their country. While the one delayed to offer the as­sistance which the other disdained to solicit, the troops very frequently remained without orders or without supplies; the public safety was be­trayed, and the defenceless subjects were left ex­posed to the fury of the Barbarians. The divided administration, which had been formed by Con­stantine, relaxed the vigour of the state, while it secured the tranquillity of the monarch.

The memory of Constantine has been deserved­ly Distinction of the troops. censured for another innovation which cor­rupted [Page 60] military discipline, and prepared the ruin of the empire. The nineteen years which pre­ceded his final victory over Licinius, had been a period of license and intestine war. The rivals who contended for the possession of the Roman world, had withdrawn the greatest part of their forces from the guard of the general frontier; and the principal cities which formed the boun­dary of their respective dominions were filled with soldiers, who considered their countrymen as their most implacable enemies. After the use of these internal garrisons had ceased with the civil war, the conqueror wanted either wisdom or firmness to revive the severe discipline of Diocletian, and to suppress a fatal indulgence, which habit had endeared and almost confirmed to the military or­der. From the reign of Constantine a popular and even legal distinction was admitted between the Palatines ¹²⁸ and the Borderers; the troops of the court, as they were improperly stiled, and the troops of the frontier. The former, elevated by the superiority of their pay and privileges, were permitted, except in the extraordinary emergen­cies of war, to occupy their tranquil stations in the heart of the provinces. The most flourishing cities were oppressed by the intolerable weight of quarters. The soldiers insensibly forgot the vir­tues of their profession, and contracted only the [Page 61] vices of civil life. They were either degraded by the industry of mechanic trades, or enervated by the luxury of baths and theatres. They soon be­came careless of their martial exercises, curious in their diet and apparel; and while they inspired terror to the subjects of the empire, they trembled at the hostile approach of the Barbarians ¹²⁹. The chain of fortifications which Diocletian and his colleagues had extended along the banks of the great rivers, was no longer maintained with the same care, or defended with the same vigilance. The numbers which still remained under the name of the troops of the frontier, might be suf­ficient for the ordinary defence. But their spirit was degraded by the humiliating reflection, that they who were exposed to the hardships and dan­gers of a perpetual warfare, were rewarded only with about two-thirds of the pay and emoluments which were lavished on the troops of the court. Even the bands or legions that were raised the nearest to the level of those unworthy favourites, were in some measure disgraced by the title of honour which they were allowed to assume. It was in vain that Constantine repeated the most dreadful menaces of fire and sword against the Borderers who should dare to desert their colours, to connive at the inroads of the Barbarians, or to [Page 62] participate in the spoil ¹³⁰. The mischiefs which flow from injudicious counsels are seldom removed by the application of partial severities: and though succeeding princes laboured to restore the strength and numbers of the frontier garrisons, the empire, till the last moment of its dissolution, continued to languish under the mortal wound which had been so rashly or so weakly inflicted by the hand of Constantine.

The same timid policy, of dividing whatever is Reduction of the legions. united, of reducing whatever is eminent, of dread­ing every active power, and of expecting that the most feeble will prove the most obedient, seems to pervade the institutions of several princes, and particularly those of Constantine. The martial pride of the legions, whose victorious camps had so often been the scene of rebellion, was nou­rished by the memory of their past exploits, and the consciousness of their actual strength. As long as they maintained their ancient establish­ment of six thousand men, they subsisted, under the reign of Diocletian, each of them singly, a visible and important object in the military his­tory of the Roman empire. A few years after­wards, these gigantic bodies were shrunk to a very diminutive size; and when seven legions, with some auxiliaries, defended the city of Amida against the Persians, the total garrison, with the [Page 63] inhabitants of both sexes, and the peasants of the deserted country, did not exceed the number of twenty thousand persons ¹³¹. From this fact, and from similar examples, there is reason to believe, that the constitution of the legionary troops, to which they partly owed their valour and disci­pline, was dissolved by Constantine; and that the bands of Roman infantry, which still assumed the same names and the same honours, consisted only of one thousand thousand or fifteen hundred men ¹³². The conspiracy of so many separate detachments, each of which was awed by the sense of its own weak­ness, could easily be checked; and the successors of Constantine might indulge their love of osten­tation, by issuing their orders to one hundred and thirty-two legions, inscribed on the muster-roll of their numerous armies. The remainder of their troops was distributed into several hundred cohorts of insantry, and squadrons of cavalry. Their arms, and titles, and ensigns, were calcu­lated to inspire terror, and to display the variety of nations who marched under the imperial stan­dard. And not a vestige was left of that severe simplicity, which, in the ages of freedom and victory, had distinguished the line of battle of a Roman army from the confused host of an Asiatic monarch ¹³³. A more particular enumeration, [Page 64] drawn from the Notitia, might exercise the dili­gence of an antiquary; but the historian will con­tent himself with observing, that the number of permanent stations or garrisons established on the frontiers of the empire, amounted to five hundred and eighty-three; and that, under the successors of Constantine, the complete force of the military establishment was computed at six hundred and forty-five thousand soldiers ¹³⁴. An effort so pro­digious surpassed the wants of a more antient, and the faculties of a later, period.

In the various states of society, armies are re­cruited Difficulty of levies. from very different motives. Barbarians are urged by the love of war; the citizens of a free republic may be prompted by a principle of duty; the subjects, or at least the nobles of a mo­narchy, are animated by a sentiment of honour; but the timid and luxurious inhabitants of a de­clining empire must be allured into the service by the hopes of profit, or compelled by the dread of punishment. The resources of the Roman trea­sury were exhausted by the encrease of pay, by the repetition of donatives, and by the invention of new emoluments and indulgences, which, in the opinion of the provincial youth, might com­pensate the hardships and dangers of a military life. Yet, although the stature was lower­ed ¹³⁵, [Page 65] although slaves, at least by a tacit connivance, were indiscriminately received into the ranks, the insurmountable difficulty of procuring a regular and adequate supply of volunteers, obliged the emperors to adopt more effectual and coercive methods. The lands bestowed on the veterans, as the free reward of their valour, were hence­forwards granted under a condition, which con­tains the first rudiments of the feudal tenures; that their sons, who succeeded to the inheritance, should devote themselves to the profession of arms, as soon as they attained the age of man­hood; and their cowardly refusal was punished by the loss of honour, of fortune, or even of life ¹³⁶. But as the annual growth of the sons of the vete­rans bore a very small proportion to the demands of the service, levies of men were frequently re­quired from the provinces, and every proprietor was obliged either to take up arms, or to procure a substitute, or to purchase his exemption by the payment of a heavy fine. The sum of forty-two pieces of gold, to which it was reduced, ascertains the exorbitant price of volunteers, and the reluc­tance [Page 66] with which the government admitted of this alternative ¹³⁷. Such was the horror for the pro­fession of a soldier, which had affected the minds of the degenerate Romans, that many of the youth of Italy, and the provinces, chose to cut off the fingers of their right hand to escape from being pressed into the service; and this strange ex­pedient was so commonly practised, as to deserve the severe animadversion of the laws ¹³⁸, and a pe­culiar name in the Latin language ¹³⁹.

The introduction of Barbarians into the Roman Encrease of Barba­rian auxi­iliaries. armies became every day more universal, more necessary, and more fatal. The most daring of the Scythians, of the Goths, and of the Germans, who delighted in war, and who found it more [Page 67] profitable to defend than to ravage the provinces, were enrolled, not only in the auxiliaries of their respective nations, but in the legions themselves, and among the most distinguished of the Palatine troops. As they freely mingled with the sub­jects of the empire, they gradually learned to despise their manners, and to imitate their arts. They abjured the implicit reverence which the pride of Rome had exacted from their ignorance, while they acquired the knowledge and possession of those advantages by which alone she support­ed her declining greatness. The Barbarian sol­diers who displayed any military talents, were advanced, without exception, to the most im­portant commands; and the names of the tri­bunes, of the counts and dukes, and of the gene­rals themselves, betray a foreign origin, which they no longer condescended to disguise. They were often entrusted with the conduct of a war against their countrymen; and though most of them preferred the ties of allegiance to those of blood, they did not always avoid the guilt, or at least the suspicion, of holding a treasonable cor­respondence with the enemy, of inviting his in­vasion, or of sparing his retreat. The camps, and the palace of the son of Constantine, were governed by the powerful faction of the Franks, who preserved the strictest connection with each other, and with their country, and who resented every personal affront as a national indignity ¹⁴⁰. [Page 68] When the tyrant Caligula was suspected of an in­tention to invest a very extraordinary candidate with the consular robes, the sacrilegious profana­tion would have scarcely excited less astonish­ment, if, instead of a horse, the noblest chieftain of Germany or Britain had been the object of his choice. The revolution of three centuries had produced so remarkable a change in the preju­dices of the people, that, with the public appro­bation, Constantine shewed his successors the ex­ample of bestowing the honours of the consulship on the barbarians, who, by their merit and ser­vices, had deserved to be ranked among the first of the Romans ¹⁴¹. But as these hardy veterans, who had been educated in the ignorance or con­tempt of the laws, were incapable of exercising any civil offices, the powers of the human mind were contracted by the irreconcileable separation of talents as well as of professions. The accom­plished citizens of the Greek and Roman repub­lics, whose characters could adapt themselves to the bar, the senate, the camp, or the schools, had learned to write, to speak, and to act with the same spirit, and with equal abilities.

IV. Besides the magistrates and generals, who Seven mi­nisters of the palace. at a distance from the court diffused their dele­gated [Page 69] authority over the provinces and armies, the emperor conferred the rank of Illustrious on seven of his more immediate servants, to whose fidelity he entrusted his safety, or his counsels, or his treasures. 1. The private apartments of the palace were governed by a favourite eunuch, who, in the language of that age, was styled the praepo­situs The cham­berlain. or praefect of the sacred bed-chamber. His duty was to attend the emperor in his hours of state, or in those of amusement, and to perform about his person all those menial services, which can only derive their splendor from the influence of royalty. Under a prince who deserved to reign, the great chamberlain (for such we may call him) was an useful and humble domestic; but an artful domestic, who improves every occasion of unguarded confidence, will insensibly acquire over a feeble mind that ascendant which harsh wisdom and uncomplying virtue can seldom ob­tain. The degenerate grandsons of Theodosius, who were invisible to their subjects, and con­temptible to their enemies, exalted the praefects of their bed-chamber above the heads of all the ministers of the palace ¹⁴²; and even his deputy, the first of the splendid train of slaves who waited in the presence, was thought worthy to rank be­fore the respectable proconsuls of Greece or Asia. The jurisdiction of the chamberlain was acknow­ledged by the counts, or superintendants, who re­gulated the two important provinces, of the mag­nificence of the wardrobe, and of the luxury of the [Page 70] Imperial table ¹⁴³. 2. The principal administra­tion of public affairs was committed to the dili­gence and abilities of the master of the offices ¹⁴⁴. The master of the of­fices. He was the supreme magistrate of the palace, in­spected the discipline of the civil and military schools, and received appeals from all parts of the empire; in the causes which related to that nu­merous army of privileged persons, who, as the servants of the court, had obtained, for them­selves and families, a right to decline the autho­rity of the ordinary judges. The correspondence between the prince and his subjects was managed by the four scrinia, or offices of this minister of state. The first was appropriated to memorials, the second to epistles, the third to petitions, and the fourth to papers and orders of a miscellaneous kind. Each of these was directed by an inferior master of respectable dignity, and the whole busi­ness was dispatched by an hundred and forty-eight secretaries, chosen for the most part from the profession of the law, on account of the variety of abstracts of reports and references which fre­quently [Page 71] occurred in the exercise of their several functions. From a condescension, which in for­mer ages would have been esteemed unworthy of the Roman majesty, a particular secretary was al­lowed for the Greek language; and interpreters were appointed to receive the ambassadors of the Barbarians: but the department of foreign affairs, which constitutes so essential a part of modern po­licy, seldom diverted the attention of the master of the offices. His mind was more seriously en­gaged by the general direction of the posts and arsenals of the empire. There were thirty-four cities, fifteen in the east, and nineteen in the west, in which regular companies of workmen were perpetually employed in fabricating defensive ar­mour, offensive weapons of all sorts, and military engines, which were deposited in the arsenals, and occasionally delivered for the service of the troops. 3. In the course of nine centuries, the office of The quae­stor. quaestor had experienced a very singular revolu­tion. In the infancy of Rome, two inferior magi­strates were annually elected by the people, to re­lieve the consuls from the invidious management of the public treasure ¹⁴⁵; a similar assistant was granted to every proconsul, and to every praetor, who exercised a military or provincial command; with the extent of conquest, the two quaestors were gradually multiplied to the number of four, [Page 72] of eight, of twenty, and, for a short time, per­haps, of forty ¹⁴⁶; and the noblest citizens ambi­tiously solicited an office which gave them a seat in the senate, and a just hope of obtaining the ho­nours of the republic. Whilst Augustus affected to maintain the freedom of election, he consented to accept the annual privilege of recommending, or rather indeed of nominating, a certain propor­tion of candidates; and it was his custom to select one of these distinguished youths, to read his ora­tions or epistles in the assemblies of the senate ¹⁴⁷. The practice of Augustus was imitated by suc­ceeding princes; the occasional commission was established as a permanent office; and the favour­ed quaestor, assuming a new and more illustrious character, alone survived the suppression of his ancient and useless colleagues ¹⁴⁸. As the ora­tions, [Page 73] which he composed in the name of the em­peror ¹⁴⁹, acquired the force, and, at length, the form of absolute edicts, he was considered as the representative of the legislative power, the oracle of the council, and the original source of the civil jurisprudence. He was sometimes invited to take his seat in the supreme judicature of the Imperial consistory, with the Praetorian praefects, and the master of the offices; and he was frequently re­quested to resolve the doubts of inferior judges: but as he was not oppressed with a variety of sub­ordinate business, his leisure and talents were em­ployed to cultivate that dignified style of elo­quence, which, in the corruption of taste and language, still preserves the majesty of the Roman laws ¹⁵⁰. In some respects, the office of the Im­perial quaestor may be compared with that of a modern chancellor; but the use of a great seal, which seems to have been adopted by the illiterate [Page 74] Barbarians, was never introduced to attest the pub­lic acts of the emperors. 4. The extraordinary title of count of the sacred largesses, was bestowed The pub­lic trea­surer. on the treasurer-general of the revenue, with the intention perhaps of inculcating, that every pay­ment flowed from the voluntary bounty of the monarch. To conceive the almost infinite detail of the annual and daily expence of the civil and military administration in every part of a great empire, would exceed the powers of the most vi­gorous imagination. The actual account em­ployed several hundred persons, distributed into eleven different offices, which were artfully con­trived to examine and controul their respective operations. The multitude of these agents had a natural tendency to encrease; and it was more than once thought expedient to dismiss to their native homes, the useless supernumeraries, who, deserting their honest labours, had pressed with too much eagerness into the lucrative profession of the finances ¹⁵¹. Twenty-nine provincial re­ceivers, of whom eighteen were honoured with the title of count, corresponded with the trea­surer; and he extended his jurisdiction over the mines from whence the precious metals were ex­tracted, over the mints, in which they were con­verted into the current coin, and over the public treasuries of the most important cities, where they were deposited for the service of the state. The foreign trade of the empire was regulated by this minister, who directed likewise all the linen and [Page 75] woollen manufactures, in which the successive operations of spinning, weaving, and dying were executed, chiefly by women of a servile condition, for the use of the palace and army. Twenty-six of these institutions are enumerated in the west, where the arts had been more recently introduced, and a still larger proportion may be allowed for the industrious provinces of the east ¹⁵². 5. Be­sides The pri­vate trea­surer. the public revenue, which an absolute mo­narch might levy and expend according to his pleasure, the emperors, in the capacity of opu­lent citizens, possessed a very extensive property, which was administered by the count, or treasurer of the private estate. Some part had perhaps been the antient demesnes of kings and republics; some accessions might be derived from the fa­milies which were successively invested with the purple; but the most considerable portion flowed from the impure source of confiscations and for­feitures. The Imperial estates were scattered through the provinces, from Mauritania to Bri­tain; but the rich and fertile soil of Cappadocia tempted the monarch to acquire in that country his fairest possessions ¹⁵³, and either Constantine or his successors embraced the occasion of justify­ing avarice by religious zeal. They suppressed [Page 76] the rich temple of Comana, where the high-priest of the goddess of war supported the dignity of a sovereign prince; and they applied to their pri­vate use the consecrated lands, which were inha­bited by six thousand subjects or slaves of the Deity and her ministers ¹⁵⁴. But these were not the valuable inhabitants: the plains that stretch from the foot of Mount Argaeus to the banks of the Sarus, bred a generous race of horses, re­nowned above all others in the ancient world, for their majestic shape, and incomparable swiftness. These sacred animals, destined for the service of the palace and the Imperial games were pro­tected by the laws from the profanation of a vul­gar master ¹⁵⁵. The demesnes of Cappadocia were important enough to require the inspection of a count ¹⁵⁶; officers of an inferior rank were station­ed in the other parts of the empire; and the de­puties of the private, as well as those of the public, treasurer, were maintained in the exercise of their independent functions, and encouraged to con­troul [Page 77] the authority of the provincial magistrates ¹⁵⁷. 6, 7. The chosen bands of cavalry and infantry, which guarded the person of the emperor, were The counts of the do­mestics. under the immediate command of the two counts of the domestics. The whole number consisted of three thousand five hundred men, divided into seven schools, or troops, of five hundred each; and in the east, this honourable service was al­most entirely appropriated to the Armenians. Whenever, on public ceremonies, they were drawn up in the courts and porticos of the palace, their lofty stature, silent order, and splendid arms of silver and gold, displayed a martial pomp, not unworthy of the Roman majesty ¹⁵⁸. From the seven schools two companies of horse and foot were selected, of the protectors, whose advanta­geous station was the hope and reward of the most deserving soldiers. They mounted guard in the interior apartments, and were occasionally dis­patched into the provinces, to execute with cele­rity and vigour the orders of their master ¹⁵⁹. The counts of the domestics had succeeded to the office of the Praetorian praefects; like the prae­fects, they aspired from the service of the palace to the command of armies.

[Page 78] The perpetual intercourse between the court and the provinces was facilitated by the construc­tion of roads and the institution of posts. But Agents, or official spies. these beneficial establishments were accidentally connected with a pernicious and intolerable abuse. Two or three hundred agents or messengers were employed, under the jurisdiction of the master of the offices, to announce the names of the annual consuls, and the edicts or victories of the empe­rors. They insensibly assumed the licence of re­porting whatever they could observe of the con­duct either of magistrates or of private citizens; and were soon considered as the eyes of the mo­narch ¹⁶⁰, and the scourge of the people. Under the warm influence of a feeble reign, they multi­plied to the incredible number of ten thousand, disdained the mild though frequent admonitions of the laws, and exercised in the profitable ma­nagement of the posts a rapacious and insolent op­pression. These official spies, who regularly cor­responded with the palace, were encouraged, by favour and reward, anxiously to watch the pro­gress of every treasonable design, from the faint and latent symptoms of disaffection, to the actual preparation of an open revolt. Their careless or criminal violation of truth and justice was covered by the consecrated mask of zeal; and they might securely aim their poisoned arrows at the breast either of the guilty or the innocent, who had pro­voked [Page 79] their resentment, or refused to purchase their silence. A faithful subject, of Syria per­haps, or of Britain, was exposed to the danger, or at least to the dread, of being dragged in chains to the court of Milan or Constantinople, to defend his life and fortune against the mali­cious charge of these privileged informers. The ordinary administration was conducted by those methods which extreme necessity can alone pal­liate; and the defects of evidence were diligently supplied by the use of torture ¹⁶¹.

The deceitful and dangerous experiment of the Use of tor­ture. criminal quaestion, as it is emphatically styled, was admitted, rather than approved, in the jurispru­dence of the Romans. They applied this san­guinary mode of examination only to servile bo­dies, whose sufferings were seldom weighed by those haughty republicans in the scale of justice or humanity: but they would never consent to violate the sacred person of a citizen, till they possessed the clearest evidence of his guilt ¹⁶². The annals of tyranny, from the reign of Tibe­rius to that of Domitian, circumstantially relate the executions of many innocent victims; but, as long as the faintest remembrance was kept alive [Page 80] of the national freedom and honour, the last hours of a Roman were secure from the danger of ignominious torture ¹⁶³. The conduct of the pro­vincial magistrates was not, however, regulated by the practice of the city, or the strict maxims of the civilians. They found the use of torture established not only among the slaves of oriental despotism, but among the Macedonians, who obeyed a limited monarch; among the Rhodians, who flourished by the liberty of commerce; and even among the sage Athenians, who had asserted and adorned the dignity of human kind ¹⁶⁴. The acquiescence of the provincials encouraged their governors to acquire, or perhaps to usurp, a dis­cretionary power of employing the rack, to ex­tort from vagrants or plebeian criminals the con­fession of their guilt, till they insensibly proceed­ed to confound the distinctions of rank, and to disregard the privileges of Roman citizens. The apprehensions of the subjects urged them to so­licit, and the interest of the sovereign engaged him to grant, a variety of special exemptions, which tacitly allowed, and even authorised, the general use of torture. They protected all per­sons of illustrious or honourable rank, bishops [Page 81] and their presbyters, professors of the liberal arts, soldiers and their families, municipal officers, and their posterity to the third generation, and all children under the age of puberty ¹⁶⁵. But a fatal maxim was introduced into the new jurisprudence of the empire, that in the case of treason, which included every offence that the subtlety of lawyers could derive from an hostile intention towards the prince or republic ¹⁶⁶, all privileges were suspend­ed, and all conditions were reduced to the same ignominious level. As the safety of the emperor was avowedly preferred to every consideration of justice or humanity, the dignity of age, and the tenderness of youth, were alike exposed to the most cruel tortures; and the terrors of a mali­cious information, which might select them as the accomplices, or even as the witnesses, perhaps, of an imaginary crime, perpetually hung over the heads of the principal citizens of the Roman world ¹⁶⁷.

These evils, however terrible they may appear, Finances. were confined to the smaller number of Roman [Page 82] subjects, whose dangerous situation was in some degree compensated by the enjoyment of those advantages, either of nature or of fortune, which exposed them to the jealousy of the monarch. The obscure millions of a great empire have much less to dread from the cruelty than from the avarice of their masters; and their humble hap­piness is principally affected by the grievance of excessive taxes, which gently pressing on the wealthy, descend with accelerated weight on the meaner and more indigent classes of society. An ingenious philosopher ¹⁶⁸ has calculated the universal measure of the public impositions by the degrees of freedom and servitude; and ventures to assert, that, according to an invariable law of nature, it must always increase with the former, and diminish in a just proportion to the latter. But this reflection, which would tend to alleviate the miseries of despotism, is contradicted at least by the history of the Roman empire; which accuses the same princes of despoiling the senate of its authority, and the provinces of their wealth. Without abolishing all the various customs and duties on merchandizes, which are imperceptibly discharged by the apparent choice of the pur­chaser, the policy of Constantine and his succes­sors preferred a simple and direct mode of taxa­tion, more congenial to the spirit of an arbitrary government ¹⁶⁹.

[Page 83] The name and use of the indictions ¹⁷⁰, which serve to ascertain the chronology of the middle ages, was derived from the regular practice of the The gene­ral tribute, or indic­tion. Roman tributes ¹⁷¹. The emperor subscribed with his own hand, and in purple ink, the solemn edict, or indiction, which was fixed up in the principal city of each diocese, during two months previous to the first day of September. And, by a very easy connection of ideas, the word indiction was transferred to the measure of tribute which it prescribed, and to the annual term which it al­lowed for the payment. This general estimate of the supplies was proportioned to the real and ima­ginary wants of the state; but as often as the ex­pence exceeded the revenue, or the revenue fell short of the computation, an additional tax, under the name of superindiction, was imposed on the people, and the most valuable attribute of sove­reignty was communicated to the Praetorian prae­fects, who, on some occasions, were permitted to provide for the unforeseen and extraordinary exi­gencies of the public service. The execution of these laws (which it would be tedious to pursue in [Page 84] their minute and intricate detail) consisted of two distinct operations; the resolving the general im­position into its constituent parts, which were as­sessed on the provinces, the cities, and the indivi­duals of the Roman world; and the collecting the separate contributions of the individuals, the cities, and the provinces, till the accumulated sums were poured into the Imperial treasuries. But as the account between the monarch and the subject was perpetually open, and as the renewal of the de­mand anticipated the perfect discharge of the pre­ceding obligation, the weighty machine of the finances was moved by the same hands round the circle of its yearly revolution. Whatever was honourable or important in the administration of the revenue, was committed to the wisdom of the praefects, and their provincial representatives; the lucrative functions were claimed by a crowd of subordinate officers, some of whom depended on the treasurer, others on the governor of the province; and who, in the inevitable conflicts of a perplexed jurisdiction, had frequent opportu­nities of disputing with each other the spoils of the people. The laborious offices, which could be productive only of envy and reproach, of expence and danger, were imposed on the Decurions, who formed the corporations of the cities, and whom the severity of the Imperial laws had condemned to sustain the burthens of civil society ¹⁷². The [Page 85] whole landed property of the empire (without ex­cepting the patrimonial estates of the monarch) was the object of ordinary taxation; and every new purchaser contracted the obligations of the former proprietor. An accurate census ¹⁷³, or sur­vey, was the only equitable mode of ascertaining the proportion which every citizen should be ob­liged to contribute for the public service; and from the well-known period of the indictions, there is reason to believe that this difficult and expen­sive operation was repeated at the regular dis­tance of fifteen years. The lands were measured by surveyors, who were sent into the provinces; their nature, whether arable or pasture, or vine­yards or woods, was distinctly reported; and an estimate was made of their common value from the average produce of five years. The numbers of slaves and of cattle constituted an essential part of the report; an oath was administered to the proprietors, which bound them to disclose the true state of their affairs; and their attempts to pre­varicate, or elude the intention of the legislator, were severely watched, and punished as a capital crime, which included the double guilt of treason and sacrilege ¹⁷⁴. A large portion of the tribute [Page 86] was paid in money; and of the current coin of the empire, gold alone could be legally accepted ¹⁷⁵. The remainder of the taxes, according to the pro­portions determined by the annual indiction, was furnished in a manner still more direct, and still more oppressive. According to the different na­ture of lands, their real produce, in the various articles of wine or oil, corn or barley, wood or iron, was transported by the labour or at the ex­pence of the provincials to the Imperial maga­zines, from whence they were occasionally distri­buted, for the use of the court, of the army, and of the two capitals, Rome and Constantinople. The commissioners of the revenue were so fre­quently obliged to make considerable purchases, that they were strictly prohibited from allowing any compensation, or from receiving in money the value of those supplies which were exacted in kind. In the primitive simplicity of small com­munities, this method may be well adapted to collect the almost voluntary offerings of the people; but it is at once susceptible of the utmost latitude and of the utmost strictness, which in a corrupt and absolute monarchy must introduce a perpetual contest between the power of oppression and the arts of fraud ¹⁷⁶. The agriculture of the [Page 87] Roman provinces was insensibly ruined, and, in the progress of despotism, which tends to disap­point its own purpose, the emperors were obliged to derive some merit from the forgiveness of debts, or the remission of tributes, which their subjects were utterly incapable of paying. Ac­cording to the new division of Italy, the fertile and happy province of Campania, the scene of the early victories and of the delicious retire­ments of the citizens of Rome, extended between the sea and the Appenine from the Tyber to the Silarus. Within sixty years after the death of Constantine, and on the evidence of an actual survey, an exemption was granted in favour of three hundred and thirty thousand English acres of desert and uncultivated land; which amount­ed to one-eighth of the whole surface of the pro­vince. As the footsteps of the Barbarians had not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation, which is recorded in the laws, can be ascribed only to the administration, of the Roman emperors ¹⁷⁷.

Either from design or from accident, the mode Assessed in the form of a capi­tation. of assessment seemed to unite the substance of a [Page 88] land-tax with the forms of a capitation ¹⁷⁸. The returns which were sent of every province or district, expressed the number of tributary sub­jects, and the amount of the public impositions. The latter of these sums was divided by the for­mer; and the estimate, that such a province con­tained so many capita, or heads of tribute; and that each head was rated at such a price, was uni­versally received, not only in the popular, but even in the legal computation. The value of a tributary head must have varied, according to many accidental, or at least fluctuating circum­stances; but some knowledge has been preserved of a very curious fact, the more important, since it relates to one of the richest provinces of the Roman empire, and which now flourishes as the most splendid of the European kingdoms. The rapacious ministers of Constantius had exhausted the wealth of Gaul, by exacting twenty-five pieces of gold for the annual tribute of every head. The humane policy of his successor reduced the capitation to seven pieces ¹⁷⁹. A moderate pro­portion between these opposite extremes of extra­ordinary oppression and of transient indulgence, may therefore be fixed at sixteen pieces of gold, [Page 89] or about nine pounds sterling, the common stand­ard perhaps of the impositions of Gaul ¹⁸⁰. But this calculation, or rather indeed the facts from whence it is deduced, cannot fail of suggesting two difficulties to a thinking mind, who will be at once surprised by the equality, and by the enor­mity of the capitation. An attempt to explain them may perhaps reflect some light on the inte­resting subject of the finances of the declining empire.

1. It is obvious, that, as long as the immutable constitution of human nature produces and main­tains so unequal a division of property, the most numerous part of the community would be de­prived of their subsistence, by the equal assess­ment of a tax from which the sovereign would derive a very trifling revenue. Such indeed might be the theory of the Roman capitation; but in the practice, this unjust equality was no longer [Page 90] felt, as the tribute was collected on the principle of a real, not of a personal imposition. Several indigent citizens contributed to compose a single head, or share of taxation; while the wealthy pro­vincial, in proportion to his fortune, alone repre­sented several of those imaginary beings. In a poetical request, addressed to one of the last and most deserving of the Roman Princes who reign­ed in Gaul, Sidonius Apollinaris personifies his tribute under the figure of a triple monster, the Geryon of the Grecian fables, and intreats the new Hercules that he would most graciously be pleased to save his life by cutting off three of his heads ¹⁸¹. The fortune of Sidonius far exceeded the customary wealth of a poet; but if he had pursued the allusion, he must have painted many of the Gallic nobles with the hundred heads of the deadly Hydra, spreading over the face of the country, and devouring the substance of an hun­dred families. II. The difficulty of allowing an annual sum of about nine pounds sterling, even for the average of the capitation of Gaul, may be rendered more evident by the comparison of the present state of the same country, as it is now go­verned by the absolute monarch of an industrious, wealthy and affectionate people. The taxes of France cannot be magnified, either by fear or by [Page 91] flattery, beyond the annual amount of eighteen millions sterling, which ought perhaps to be shared among four-and-twenty millions of inha­bitants ¹⁸². Seven millions of these, in the ca­pacity of fathers, or brothers, or husbands, may discharge the obligations of the remaining multi­tude of women and children; yet the equal pro­portion of each tributary subject will scarcely rise above fifty shillings of our money, instead of a proportion almost four times as considerable, which was regularly imposed on their Gallic an­cestors. The reason of this difference may be found, not so much in the relative scarcity or plenty of gold and silver, as in the different state of society in ancient Gaul and in modern France. In a country where personal freedom is the pri­vilege of every subject, the whole mass of taxes, whether they are levied on property or on con­sumption, may be fairly divided among the whole [Page 92] body of the nation. But the far greater part of the lands of ancient Gaul, as well as of the other provinces of the Roman world, were cultivated by slaves, or by peasants, whose dependent con­dition was a less rigid servitude ¹⁸³. In such a state the poor were maintained at the expence of the masters, who enjoyed the fruits of their la­bour; and as the rolls of tribute were filled only with the names of those citizens who possessed the means of an honourable, or at least of a decent subsistence, the comparative smallness of their numbers explains and justifies the high rate of their capitation. The truth of this assertion may be illustrated by the following example: The Aedui, one of the most powerful and civilized tribes or cities of Gaul, occupied an extent of ter­ritory, which now contains above five hundred thousand inhabitants, in the two ecclesiastical dioceses of Autun and Nevers ¹⁸⁴; and with the [Page 93] probable accession of those of Châlons and Ma­çon ¹⁸⁵, the population would amount to eight hundred thousand souls. In the time of Con­stantine, the territory of the Aedui afforded no more than twenty-five thousand heads of capita­tion, of whom seven thousand were discharged by that prince from the intolerable weight of tri­bute ¹⁸⁶. A just analogy would seem to counte­nance the opinion of an ingenious historian ¹⁸⁷, that the free and tributary citizens did not sur­pass the number of half a million; and if, in the ordinary administration of government, their an­nual payments may be computed at about four millions and a half of our money, it would ap­pear, that although the share of each individual was four times as considerable, a fourth part only of the modern taxes of France was levied on the Imperial province of Gaul. The exactions of Constantius may be calculated at seven millions sterling, which were reduced to two millions by the humanity or the wisdom of Julian.

[Page 94] But this tax, or capitation, on the proprietors of land, would have suffered a rich and numerous class of free citizens to escape. With the view Capitation on trade and in­dustry. of sharing that species of wealth which is derived from art or labour, and which exists in money or in merchandise, the emperors imposed a dis­tinct and personal tribute on the trading part of their subjects ¹⁸⁸. Some exemptions, very strictly confined both in time and place, were allowed to the proprietors who disposed of the produce of their own estates. Some indulgence was granted to the profession of the liberal arts: but every other branch of commercial industry was affected by the severity of the law. The honourable mer­chant of Alexandria, who imported the gems and spices of India for the use of the western world; the usurer, who derived from the interest of mo­ney a silent and ignominious profit; the inge­nious manufacturer, the diligent mechanic, and even the most obscure retailer of a sequestered village, were obliged to admit the officers of the revenue into the partnership of their gain: and the sovereign of the Roman empire, who tolerated the profession, consented to share the infamous salary, of public prostitutes. As this general tax upon industry was collected every fourth year, it was styled the Lustral Contribution: and the histo­rian Zosimus ¹⁸⁹ laments that the approach of the fatal period was announced by the tears and ter­rors [Page 95] of the citizens, who were often compelled by the impending scourge to embrace the most ab­horred and unnatural methods of procuring the sum at which their property had been assessed. The testimony of Zosimus cannot indeed be justi­fied from the charge of passion and prejudice, but, from the nature of this tribute, it seems reason­able to conclude that it was arbitrary in the dis­tribution, and extremely rigorous in the mode of collecting. The secret wealth of commerce, and the precarious profits of art or labour, are suscep­tible only of a discretionary valuation, which is seldom disadvantageous to the interest of the trea­sury; and as the person of the trader supplies the want of a visible and permanent security, the pay­ment of the imposition, which, in the case of a land-tax, may be obtained by the seizure of pro­perty, can rarely be extorted by any other means than those of corporal punishments. The cruel treatment of the insolvent debtors of the state, is attested, and was perhaps mitigated by a very humane edict of Constantine, who, disclaiming the use of racks and of scourges, allots a spacious and airy prison for the place of their confine­ment ¹⁹⁰.

These general taxes were imposed and levied by the absolute authority of the monarch; but the Free gifts. occasional offerings of the coronary gold still re­tained the name and semblance of popular con­sent. It was an ancient custom that the allies of the republic, who ascribed their safety or deliver­ance [Page 96] to the success of the Roman arms; and even the cities of Italy, who admired the virtues of their victorious general, adorned the pomp of his triumph by their voluntary gifts of crowns of gold, which, after the ceremony, were consecrated in the temple of Jupiter, to remain a lasting monu­ment of his glory to future ages. The progress of zeal and flattery soon multiplied the number, and increased the size, of these popular donations; and the triumph of Caesar was enriched with two thousand eight hundred and twenty-two massy crowns, whose weight amounted to twenty thou­sand four hundred and fourteen pounds of gold. This treasure was immediately melted down by the prudent dictator, who was satisfied that it would be more serviceable to his soldiers than to the gods: his example was imitated by his suc­cessors; and the custom was introduced, of ex­changing these splendid ornaments for the more acceptable present of the current gold coin of the empire ¹⁹¹. The spontaneous offering was at length exacted as the debt of duty; and instead of being confined to the occasion of a triumph, it was supposed to be granted by the several cities and provinces of the monarchy, as often as the emperor condescended to announce his accession, his consulship, the birth of a son, the creation of a Caesar, a victory over the Barbarians, or any other real or imaginary event which graced the [Page 97] annals of his reign. The peculiar free gift of the senate of Rome was fixed by custom at sixteen hundred pounds of gold, or about sixty-four thousand pounds sterling. The oppressed sub­jects celebrated their own felicity, that their sove­reign should graciously consent to accept this feeble but voluntary testimony of their loyalty and gratitude ¹⁹².

A people elated by pride, or soured by dis­content, Conclu­sion. are seldom qualified to form a just esti­mate of their actual situation. The subjects of Constantine were incapable of discerning the de­cline of genius and manly virtue, which so far degraded them below the dignity of their an­cestors; but they could feel and lament the rage of tyranny, the relaxation of discipline, and the encrease of taxes. The impartial historian, who acknowledges the justice of their complaints, will observe some favourable circumstances which tended to alleviate the misery of their condition. The threatening tempest of Barbarians, which so soon subverted the foundations of Roman great­ness, was still repelled, or suspended, on the fron­tiers. The arts of luxury and literature were cultivated, and the elegant pleasures of society were enjoyed by the inhabitants of a considerable portion of the globe. The forms, the pomp, and the expence of the civil administration contri­buted to restrain the irregular licence of the sol­diers; and although the laws were violated by [Page 98] power, or perverted by subtlety, the sage prin­ciples of the Roman jurisprudence preserved a sense of order and equity, unknown to the despo­tic governments of the east. The rights of man­kind might derive some protection from religion and philosophy; and the name of freedom, which could no longer alarm, might sometimes admo­nish, the successors of Augustus, that they did not reign over a nation of Slaves or Barba­rians ¹⁹³.

THE character of the prince who removed the seat of empire, and introduced such important changes into the civil and religious Character of Con­stantine. constitution of his country, has fixed the atten­tion, and divided the opinions, of mankind. By the grateful zeal of the Christians, the deliverer of the church has been decorated with every at­tribute of a hero, and even of a saint; while the discontent of the vanquished party has compared Constantine to the most abhorred of those tyrants, who, by their vice and weakness, dishonoured the Imperial purple. The same passions have in some degree been perpetuated to succeeding ge­nerations, and the character of Constantine is con­sidered, even in the present age, as an object either of satire or of panegyric. By the impar­tial union of those defects which are confessed by his warmest admirers, and of those virtues which are acknowledged by his most implacable ene­mies, we might hope to delineate a just portrait of that extraordinary man, which the truth and candour of history should adopt without a [Page 100] blush ¹. But it would soon appear, that the vain at­tempt to blend such discordant colours, and to re­concile such inconsistent qualities, must produce a figure monstrous rather than human, unless it is viewed in its proper and distinct lights, by a care­ful separation of the different periods of the reign of Constantine.

The person, as well as the mind of Constan­tine, His vir­tues. had been enriched by nature with her choicest endowments. His stature was lofty, his coun­tenance majestic, his deportment graceful; his strength and activity were displayed in every manly exercise, and from his earliest youth, to a very advanced season of life, he preserved the vi­gour of his constitution by a strict adherence to the domestic virtues of chastity and temperance. He delighted in the social intercourse of familiar conversation; and though he might sometimes indulge his disposition to raillery with less reserve than was required by the severe dignity of his station, the courtesy and liberality of his manners gained the hearts of all who approached him. The sincerity of his friendship has been suspected; yet he shewed, on some occasions, that he was not incapable of a warm and lasting attachment. The disadvantage of an illiterate education had not prevented him from forming a just estimate [Page 101] of the value of learning; and the arts and sciences derived some encouragement from the munificent protection of Constantine. In the dispatch of business, his diligence was indefatigable; and the active powers of his mind were almost continually exercised in reading, writing, or meditating, in giving audience to ambassadors, and in examin­ing the complaints of his subjects. Even those who censured the propriety of his measures were compelled to acknowledge, that he possessed mag­nanimity to conceive, and patience to execute, the most arduous designs, without being checked either by the prejudices of education, or by the clamours of the multitude. In the field, he in­fused his own intrepid spirit into the troops, whom he conducted with the talents of a con­summate general; and to his abilities, rather than to his fortune, we may ascribe the signal victories which he obtained over the foreign and domestic foes of the republic. He loved glory, as the re­ward, perhaps as the motive, of his labours. The boundless ambition, which, from the mo­ment of his accepting the purple at York, ap­pears as the ruling passion of his soul, may be justified by the dangers of his own situation, by the character of his rivals, by the consciousness of superior merit, and by the prospect that his suc­cess would enable him to restore peace and order to the distracted empire. In his civil wars against Maxentius and Licinius, he had engaged on his side the inclinations of the people, who com­pared the undissembled vices of those tyrants, with the spirit of wisdom and justice which seemed [Page 102] to direct the general tenor of the administration of Constantine ².

Had Constantine fallen on the banks of the His vices. Tyber, or even in the plains of Hadrianople, such is the character which, with a few excep­tions, he might have transmitted to posterity. But the conclusion of his reign (according to the moderate and indeed tender sentence of a writer of the same age) degraded him from the rank which he had acquired among the most deserving of the Roman princes ³. In the life of Augustus, we behold the tyrant of the republic, converted, almost by imperceptible degrees, into the father of his country and of human kind. In that of Constantine, we may contemplate a hero, who had so long inspired his subjects with love, and his enemies with terror, degenerating into a cruel and dissolute monarch, corrupted by his fortune, or raised by conquest above the necessity of dissi­mulation. The general peace which he main­tained during the last fourteen years of his reign, A. D. 323—337. [Page 103] was a period of apparent splendor rather than of real prosperity; and the old age of Constantine was disgraced by the opposite yet reconcileable vices of rapaciousness and prodigality. The ac­cumulated treasures found in the palaces of Max­entius and Licinius, were lavishly consumed; the various innovations introduced by the conqueror, were attended with an encreasing expence; the cost of his buildings, his court, and his festivals, required an immediate and plentiful supply; and the oppression of the people was the only fund which could support the magnificence of the sovereign ⁴. His unworthy favourites, enriched by the boundless liberality of their master, usurp­ed with impunity the privilege of rapine and cor­ruption ⁵. A secret but universal decay was felt in every part of the public administration, and the emperor himself, though he still retained the obedience, gradually lost the esteem, of his sub­jects. The dress and manners, which, towards the decline of life, he chose to affect, served only to degrade him in the eyes of mankind. The Asiatic pomp, which had been adopted by the pride of Diocletian, assumed an air of softness and effeminacy in the person of Constantine. He [Page 104] is represented with false hair of various colours, laboriously arranged by the skilful artists of the times; a diadem of a new and more expensive fashion; a profusion of gems and pearls, of col­lars and bracelets, and a variegated flowing robe of silk, most curiously embroidered with flowers of gold. In such apparel, scarcely to be excused by the youth and folly of Elagabalus, we are at a loss to discover the wisdom of an aged monarch, and the simplicity of a Roman veteran ⁶. A mind thus relaxed by prosperity and indulgence, was incapable of rising to that magnanimity which disdains suspicion, and dares to forgive. The deaths of Maximian and Licinius may perhaps be justified by the maxims of policy, as they are taught in the schools of tyrants; but an impartial narrative of the executions, or rather murders, which sullied the declining age of Constantine, will suggest to our most candid thoughts, the idea of a prince, who could sacrifice without reluctance the laws of justice, and the feelings of nature, to the dictates either of his passions or of his interest.

The same fortune which so invariably followed His family. the standard of Constantine, seemed to secure the hopes and comforts of his domestic life. Those among his predecessors who had enjoyed the longest and most prosperous reigns, Augustus, [Page 105] Trajan, and Diocletian, had been disappointed of posterity; and the frequent revolutions had never allowed sufficient time for any Imperial family to grow up and multiply under the shade of the purple. But the royalty of the Flavian line, which had been first ennobled by the Gothic Clau­dius, descended through several generations; and Constantine himself derived from his royal father the hereditary honours which he transmitted to his children. The emperor had been twice married. Minervina, the obscure but lawful object of his youthful attachment ⁷, had left him only one son, who was called Crispus. By Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, he had three daughters, and three sons known by the kindred names of Constantine, Constantius, and Constans. The unambitious brothers of the great Constantine, Julius Constan­tius, Dalmatius, and Hannibalianus ⁸, were per­mitted to enjoy the most honourable rank, and the most affluent fortune, that could be consistent with a private station. The youngest of the three lived without a name, and died without posterity. His two elder brothers obtained in marriage the daughters of wealthy senators, and propagated new branches of the Imperial race. Gallus and [Page 106] Julian afterwards became the most illustrious of the children of Julius Constantius, the Patrician. The two sons of Dalmatius, who had been deco­rated with the vain title of Censor, were named Dalmatius and Hannibalianus. The two sisters of the great Constantine, Anastasia and Eurropia, were bestowed on Optatus and Nepotianus, two senators of noble birth and of consular dignity. His third sister, Constantia, was distinguished by her pre-eminence of greatness and of misery. She remained the widow of the vanquished Lici­nius; and it was by her entreaties, that an inno­cent boy, the offspring of their marriage, pre­served for some time, his life, the title of Caesar, and a precarious hope of the succession. Besides the females, and the allies of the Flavian house, ten or twelve males, to whom the language of modern courts would apply the title of princes of the blood, seemed, according to the order of their birth, to be destined either to inherit or to support the throne of Constantine. But in less than thirty years, this numerous and encreasing family was reduced to the persons of Constantius and Julian, who alone had survived a series of crimes and calamities, such as the tragic poets have deplored in the devoted lines of Pelops and of Cadmus.

Crispus, the eldest son of Constantine, and the Virtues of Crispus. presumptive heir of the empire, is represented by impartial historians as an amiable and accom­plished youth. The care of his education, or at least of his studies, was entrusted to Lactantius, the most eloquent of the Christians; a praeceptor [Page 107] admirably qualified to form the taste, and to excite the virtues, of his illustrious disciple ⁹. At the age of seventeen, Crispus was invested with the title of Caesar, and the administration of the Gallic provinces, where the inroads of the Ger­mans gave him an early occasion of signalizing his military prowess. In the civil war which broke out soon afterwards, the father and son di­vided their powers; and this history has already celebrated the valour as well as conduct displayed by the latter, in forcing the streights of the Hel­lespont, so obstinately defended by the superior fleet of Licinius. This naval victory contributed to determine the event of the war; and the names of Constantine and of Crispus were united in the joyful acclamations of their eastern subjects: who loudly proclaimed, that the world had been sub­dued, and was now governed, by an emperor en­dowed with every virtue; and by his illustrious son, a prince beloved of heaven, and the lively image of his father's perfections. The public fa­vour, which seldom accompanies old-age, dis­fused its lustre over the youth of Crispus. He deserved the esteem, and he engaged the affec­tions, of the court, the army, and the people. The experienced merit of a reigning monarch is acknowledged by his subjects with reluctance, and frequently denied with partial and discon­tented [Page 108] murmurs; while, from the opening vir­tues of his successor, they fondly conceive the most unbounded hopes of private as well as pub­lic felicity ¹⁰.

This dangerous popularity soon excited the at­tention Jealousy of Con­stantine. of Constantine, who, both as a father and as a king, was impatient of an equal. Instead of A. D. 324, Oct. 10. attempting to secure the allegiance of his son, by the generous ties of confidence and gratitude, he resolved to prevent the mischiefs which might be apprehended from dissatisfied ambition. Crispus soon had reason to complain, that while his infant brother Constantius was sent, with the title of Caesar, to reign over his peculiar department of the Gallic provinces ¹¹, he, a prince of mature years, who had performed such recent and signal services, instead of being raised to the superior rank of Augustus, was confined almost a prisoner to his father's court; and exposed, without power or defence, to every calumny which the malice of his enemies could suggest. Under such painful circumstances, the royal youth might not always be able to compose his behaviour, or suppress his discontent; and we may be assured, that he was [Page 109] encompassed by a train of indiscreet or perfidious followers, who assiduously studied to inflame, and who were perhaps instructed to betray, the un­guarded warmth of his resentment. An edict of A. D. 325, October 1. Constantine, published about this time, mani­festly indicates his real or affected suspicions, that a secret conspiracy had been formed against his person and government. By all the allurements of honours and rewards, he invites informers of every degree to accuse without exception his ma­gistrates or ministers, his friends or his most inti­mate favourites, protesting, with a solemn asse­veration, that he himself will listen to the charge, that he himself will revenge his injuries; and con­cluding with a prayer, which discovers some ap­prehension of danger, that the providence of the Supreme Being may still continue to protect the safety of the emperor and of the empire ¹².

The informers, who complied with so liberal Disgrace and death of Crispu's, an invitation, were sufficiently versed in the arts of courts to select the friends and adherents of A. D. 326, July. Crispus as the guilty persons; nor is there any reason to distrust the veracity of the emperor, who had promised an ample measure of revenge and punishment. The policy of Constantine main­tained, however, the same appearances of regard and confidence towards a son, whom he began to consider as his most irreconcileable enemy. Me­dals were struck with the customary vows for the long and auspicious reign of the young Caesar ¹³; [Page 110] and as the people, who was not admitted into the secrets of the palace, still loved his virtues, and respected his dignity, a poet who solicits his recal from exile, adores with equal devotion the ma­jesty of the father and that of the son ¹⁴. The time was now arrived for celebrating the august ceremony of the twentieth year of the reign of Constantine; and the emperor, for that purpose, removed his court from Nicomedia to Rome, where the most splendid preparations had been made for his reception. Every eye, and every tongue, affected to express their sense of the general happiness, and the veil of ceremony and dissimulation was drawn for a while over the darkest designs of revenge and murder ¹⁵. In the midst of the festival, the unfortunate Crispus was apprehended by order of the emperor, who laid aside the tenderness of a father, without assuming the equity of a judge. The examination was short and private ¹⁶; and as it was thought decent to conceal the fate of the young prince from the eyes of the Roman people, he was sent under a [Page 111] strong guard to Pola, in Istria, where, soon after­wards, he was put to death, either by the hand of the executioner, or by the more gentle operation of poison ¹⁷. The Caesar Licinius, a youth of amiable manners, was involved in the ruin of Crispus ¹⁸; and the stern jealousy of Constantine was unmoved by the prayers and tears of his fa­vourite sister, pleading for the life of a son; whose rank was his only crime, and whose loss she did not long survive. The story of these unhappy princes, the nature and evidence of their guilt, the forms of their trial, and the circumstances of their death, were buried in mysterious obscurity; and the courtly bishop, who has celebrated in an elaborate work the virtues and piety of his hero, observes a prudent silence on the subject of these tragic events ¹⁹. Such haughty contempt for the opinion of mankind, whilst it imprints an inde­lible stain on the memory of Constantine, must re­mind us of the very different behaviour of one of [Page 112] the greatest monarchs of the present age. The Czar Peter, in the full possession of despotic power, submitted to the judgment of Russia, of Europe, and of posterity, the reasons which had compelled him to subscribe the condemnation of a criminal, or at least of a degenerate, son ²⁰.

The innocence of Crispus was so universally ac­knowledged, The em­press Fausta. that the modern Greeks, who adore the memory of their founder, are reduced to pal­liate the guilt of a parricide, which the common feelings of human nature forbade them to justify. They pretend, that as soon as the afflicted father discovered the falsehood of the accusation by which his credulity had been so fatally misled, he published to the world his repentance and remorse; that he mourned forty days, during which he ab­stained from the use of the bath, and all the ordi­nary comforts of life; and that, for the lasting instruction of posterity, he erected a golden statue of Crispus, with this memorable inscription: TO MY SON, WHOM I UNJUSTLY CONDEMNED ²¹. A tale so moral and so interesting would deserve to be supported by less exceptionable authority: but if we consult the more ancient and authentic writers, they will inform us, that the repentance of Constantine was manifested only in acts of blood and revenge; and that he atoned for the murder of an innocent son, by the execution, [Page 113] perhaps, of a guilty wife. They ascribe the misfortunes of Crispus to the arts of his step­mother Fausta, whose implacable hatred, or whose disappointed love, renewed in the palace of Constantine the ancient tragedy of Hippolitus and of Phaedra ²². Like the daughter of Minos, the daughter of Maximian accused her son in-law of an incestuous attempt on the chastity of his father's wife; and easily obtained, from the jealousy of the emperor, a sentence of death against a young prince, whom she considered with reason as the most formidable rival of her own children. But Helena, the aged mother of Con­stantine, lamented and revenged the untimely fate of her grandson Crispus: nor was it long before a real or pretended discovery was made, that Fausta herself entertained a criminal connection with a slave belonging to the Imperial stables ²³. Her condemnation and punishment were the instant consequences of the charge; and the adulteress was suffocated by the steam of a bath, which, for that purpose, had been heated to an extra­ordinary degree ²⁴. By some it will perhaps be [Page 114] thought, that the remembrance of a conjugal union of twenty years, and the honour of their common offspring, the destined heirs of the throne, might have softened the obdurate heart of Constantine; and persuaded him to suffer his wife, however guilty she might appear, to ex­piate her offences in a solitary prison. But it seems a superfluous labour to weigh the pro­priety, unless we could ascertain the truth, of this singular event; which is attended with some cir­cumstances of doubt and perplexity. Those who have attacked, and those who have defended, the character of Constantine, have alike disregarded two very remarkable passages of two orations pro­nounced under the succeeding reign. The former celebrates the virtues, the beauty, and the for­tune of the empress Fausta, the daughter, wife, sister, and mother of so many princes ²⁵. The latter asserts, in explicit terms, that the mother of the younger Constantine, who was slain three years after his father's death, survived to weep over the fate of her son ²⁶. Notwithstanding the positive testimony of several writers of the Pagan [Page 115] as well as of the Christian religion, there may still remain some reason to believe, or at least to suspect, that Fausta escaped the blind and sus­picious cruelty of her husband. The deaths of a son, and of a nephew, with the execution of a great number of respectable, and perhaps innocent friends ²⁷, who were involved in their fall, may be sufficient, however, to justify the discontent of the Roman people, and to explain the satirical verses affixed to the palace-gate, comparing the splendid and bloody reigns of Constantine and Nero ²⁸.

By the death of Crispus, the inheritance of the The sons and ne­phews of Constan­tine. empire seemed to devolve on the three sons of Fausta, who have been already mentioned under the names of Constantine, of Constantius, and of Constans. These young princes were successively invested with the title of Caesar; and the dates of their promotion may be referred to the tenth, the twentieth, and the thirtieth years of the reign of their father ²⁹. This conduct, though it tend­ed to multiply the future masters of the Roman world, might be excused by the partiality of pa­ternal affection; but it is not easy to understand [Page 116] the motives of the emperor, when he endangered the safety both of his family and of his people, by the unnecessary elevation of his two nephews, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus. The former was raised, by the title of Caesar, to an equality with his cousins. In favour of the latter, Constantine invented the new and singular appellation of Nobilissimus ³⁰; to which he annexed the flattering distinction of a robe of purple and gold. But of the whole series of Roman princes in any age of the empire, Hannibalianus alone was distinguish­ed by the title of KING; a name which the sub­jects of Tiberius would have detested, as the pro­fane and cruel insult of capricious tyranny. The use of such a title, even as it appears under the reign of Constantine, is a strange and unconnect­ed fact, which can scarcely be admitted on the joint authority of Imperial medals and contempo­rary writers ³¹.

The whole empire was deeply interested in the Their edu­cation. education of these five youths, the acknowledged successors of Constantine. The exercises of the body prepared them for the fatigues of war, and the duties of active life. Those who occasionally mention the education or talents of Constantius, allow that he excelled in the gymnastic arts of [Page 117] leaping and running; that he was a dextrous archer, a skilful horseman, and a master of all the different weapons used in the service either of the cavalry or of the infantry ³². The same assi­duous cultivation was bestowed, though not per­haps with equal success, to improve the minds of the sons and nephews of Constantine ³³. The most celebrated professors of the Christian faith, of the Grecian philosophy, and of the Roman juris­prudence, were invited by the liberality of the emperor, who reserved for himself the important task of instructing the royal youths in the science of government, and the knowledge of mankind. But the genius of Constantine himself had been formed by adversity and experience. In the free intercourse of private life, and amidst the dangers of the court of Galerius, he had learned to com­mand his own passions, to encounter those of his equals, and to depend for his present safety and future greatness on the prudence and firmness of his personal conduct. His destined successors had the misfortune of being born and educated in the Imperial purple. Incessantly surrounded with a train of flatterers, they passed their youth in the enjoyment of luxury and the expectation of a throne; nor would the dignity of their rank per­mit [Page 118] them to descend from that elevated station from whence the various characters of human nature appear to wear a smooth and uniform as­pect. The indulgence of Constantine admitted them, at a very tender age, to share the admini­stration of the empire; and they studied the art of reigning at the expence of the people entrusted to their care. The younger Constantine was ap­pointed to hold his court in Gaul; and his brother Constantius exchanged that department, the an­cient patrimony of their father, for the more opulent, but less martial, countries of the East. Italy, the Western Illyricum, and Africa, were accustomed to revere Constans, the third of his sons, as the representative of the great Constan­tine. He fixed Dalmatius on the Gothic frontier, to which he annexed the government of Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece. The city of Caesarea was chosen for the residence of Hannibalianus; and the provinces of Pontus, Cappadocia, and the Lesser Armenia, were designed to form the extent of his new kingdom. For each of these princes a suitable establishment was provided. A just proportion of guards, of legions, and of auxiliaries, was allotted for their respective dig­nity and defence. The ministers and generals, who were placed about their persons, were such as Constantine could trust to assist, and even to con­trol, these youthful sovereigns in the exercise of their delegated power. As they advanced in years and experience, the limits of their autho­rity were insensibly enlarged: but the emperor always reserved for himself the title of Augustus; [Page 119] and while he shewed the Caesars to the armies and provinces, he maintained every part of the empire in equal obedience to its supreme head ³⁴. The tranquillity of the last fourteen years of his reign was scarcely interrupted by the contemptible in­surrection of a camel-driver in the island of Cy­prus ³⁵, or by the active part which the policy of Constantine engaged him to assume in the wars of the Goths and Sarmatians.

Among the different branches of the human Manners of the Sar­matians. race, the Sarmatians form a very remarkable shade; as they seem to unite the manners of the Asiatic barbarians with the figure and complexion of the ancient inhabitants of Europe. According to the various accidents of peace and war, of al­liance or conquest, the Sarmatians were some­times confined to the banks of the Tanais; and they sometimes spread themselves over the im­mense plains which lie between the Vistula and the Volga ³⁶. The care of their numerous flocks and herds, the pursuit of game, and the exercise of war, or rather of rapine, directed the vagrant [Page 120] motions of the Sarmatians. The moveable camps or cities, the ordinary residence of their wives and children, consisted only of large wag­gons drawn by oxen, and covered in the form of tents. The military strength of the nation was composed of cavalry; and the custom of their warriors, to lead in their hand one or two spare horses, enabled them to advance and to retreat with a rapid diligence, which surprised the security, and eluded the pursuit, of a distant enemy ³⁷. Their poverty of iron prompted their rude in­dustry to invent a sort of cuirass, which was ca­pable of resisting a sword or javelin, though it was formed only of horses hoofs, cut into thin and po­lished slices, carefully laid over each other in the manner of scales or feathers, and strongly sewed upon an under-garment of coarse linen ³⁸. The offensive arms of the Sarmatians were short dag­gers, long lances, and a weighty bow with a quiver of arrows. They were reduced to the ne­cessity of employing fish-bones for the points of their weapons; but the custom of dipping them in a venomous liquor, that poisoned the wounds which they inflicted, is alone sufficient to prove the most savage manners; since a people impres­sed with a sense of humanity would have abhorred so cruel a practice, and a nation skilled in the arts of war would have disdained so impotent a re­source ³⁹. [Page 121] Whenever these Barbarians issued from their deserts in quest of prey, their shaggy beards, uncombed locks, the furs with which they were covered from head to foot, and their fierce coun­tenances, which seemed to express the innate cruelty of their minds, inspired the more ci­vilized provincials of Rome with horror and dis­may.

The tender Ovid, after a youth spent in the en­joyment Their set­tlement near the Danube. of fame and luxury, was condemned to an hopeless exile on the frozen banks of the Da­nube, where he was exposed, almost without de­fence, to the fury of these monsters of the desert, with whose stern spirits he feared that his gentle shade might hereafter be confounded. In his pa­thetic, but sometimes unmanly lamentations ⁴⁰, he describes in the most lively colours, the dress and manners, the arms and inroads of the Getae [Page 122] and Sarmatians, who were associated for the pur­poses of destruction; and from the accounts of history, there is some reason to believe that these Sarmatians were the Jazygae, one of the most nu­merous and warlike tribes of the nation. The allurements of plenty engaged them to seek a per­manent establishment on the frontiers of the em­pire. Soon after the reign of Augustus, they obliged the Dacians, who subsisted by fishing on the banks of the river Teyss or Tibiscus, to retire into the hilly country, and to abandon to the victorious Sarmatians the fertile plains of the Upper Hun­gary, which are bounded by the course of the Danube and the semi-circular inclosure of the Carpathian mountains ⁴¹. In this advantageous position, they watched or suspended the moment of attack, as they were provoked by injuries or appeased by presents; they gradually acquired the skill of using more dangerous weapons; and although the Sarmatians did not illustrate their name by any memorable exploits, they occasion­ally assisted their eastern and western neighbours, the Goths and the Germans, with a formidable body of cavalry. They lived under the irregular aristocracy of their chieftains ⁴²; but after they had received into their bosom the fugitive Van­dals, [Page 123] who yielded to the pressure of the Gothic power, they seem to have chosen a king from that nation, and from the illustrious race of the Astingi, who had formerly dwelt on the shores of the Northern ocean ⁴³.

This motive of enmity must have inflamed the subjects of contention, which perpetually arise on The Go­thic war, the confines of warlike and independent nations. A. D. 331. The Vandal princes were stimulated by fear and revenge, the Gothic kings aspired to extend their dominion from the Euxine to the frontiers of Germany; and the waters of the Maros, a small river which falls into the Teyss, were stained with the blood of the contending Barbarians. After some experience of the superior strength and numbers of their adversaries, the Sarmatians im­plored the protection of the Roman monarch, who beheld with pleasure the discord of the nations, but who was justly alarmed by the progress of the Gothic arms. As soon as Constantine had declared himself in favour of the weaker party, the haughty Araric, king of the Goths, in­stead of expecting the attack of the Legions, boldly passed the Danube, and spread terror and devastation through the province of Maesia. To oppose the inroad of this destroying host, the aged emperor took the field in person; but on this oc­casion either his conduct or his fortune betrayed the glory which he had acquired in so many fo­reign [Page 124] and domestic wars. He had the mortifica­tion of seeing his troops fly before an inconsider­able detachment of the Barbarians, who pursued them to the edge of their fortified camp, and ob­liged him to consult his safety by a precipitate and ignominious retreat. The event of a second and more successful action retrieved the honour of the Roman name; and the powers of art and dis­cipline prevailed, after an obstinate contest, over the efforts of irregular valour. The broken army of the Goths abandoned the field of battle, the wasted province, and the passage of the Danube: and although the eldest of the sons of Constantine was permitted to supply the place of his father, A. D. 332, April 20. the merit of the victory, which diffused universal joy, was ascribed to the auspicious counsels of the emperor himself.

He contributed, at least, to improve this advan­tage, by his negociations with the free and war­like people of Chersonesus ⁴⁴, whose capital situate on the western coast of the Tauric or Crimaean peninsula, still retained some vestiges of a Grecian colony, and was governed by a perpetual magi­strate, assisted by a council of senators, emphati­cally styled the Fathers of the City. The Cher­sonites [Page 125] were animated against the Goths, by the memory of the wars which, in the preceding cen­tury, they had maintained with unequal forces against the invaders of their country. They were connected with the Romans by the mutual bene­fits of commerce; as they were supplied from the provinces of Asia with corn and manufactures, which they purchased with their only productions, salt, wax, and hides. Obedient to the requisition of Constantine, they prepared, under the conduct of their magistrate Diogenes, a considerable army, of which the principal strength consisted in cross­bows and military chariots. The speedy march and intrepid attack of the Chersonites, by divert­ing the attention of the Goths, assisted the opera­tions of the Imperial generals. The Goths, van­quished on every side, were driven into the moun­tains, where, in the course of a severe campaign, above an hundred thousand were computed to have perished by cold and hunger. Peace was at length granted to their humble supplications; the eldest son of Araric was accepted as the most va­luable hostage; and Constantine endeavoured to convince their chiefs, by a liberal distribution of honours and rewards, how far the friendship of the Romans was preferable to their enmity. In the expressions of his gratitude towards the faith­ful Chersonites, the emperor was still more mag­nificent. The pride of the nation was gratified by the splendid and almost royal decorations bestow­ed on their magistrate and his successors. A per­petual exemption from all duties was stipulated for their vessels which traded to the ports of the Black Sea. A regular subsidy was promised, of [Page 126] iron, corn, oil, and of every supply which could be useful either in peace or war. But it was thought that the Sarmatians were sufficiently re­warded by their deliverance from impending ruin; and the emperor, perhaps with too strict an oeco­nomy, deducted some part of the expences of the war from the customary gratifications which were allowed to that turbulent nation.

Exasperated by this apparent neglect, the Sar­matians Expulsion of the Sar­matians, soon forgot, with the levity of Barbarians, the services which they had so lately received, A. D. 334. and the dangers which still threatened their safety. Their inroads on the territory of the empire pro­voked the indignation of Constantine to leave them to their fate; and he no longer opposed the ambition of Geberic, a renowned warrior, who had recently ascended the Gothic throne. Wisu­mar, the Vandal king, whilst alone and unassist­ed, he defended his dominions with undaunted courage, was vanquished and slain in a decisive battle which swept away the flower of the Sarma­tian youth. The remainder of the nation em­braced the desperate expedient of arming their slaves, a hardy race of hunters and herdsmen, by whose tumultuary aid they revenged their defeat, and expelled the invader from their confines. But they soon discovered that they had exchanged a foreign for a domestic enemy, more dangerous and more implacable. Enraged by their former servitude, elated by their present glory, the slaves, under the name of Limigantes, claimed and usurped the possession of the country which they had saved. Their masters, unable to withstand the ungoverned fury of the populace, preferred [Page 127] the hardships of exile, to the tyranny of their ser­vants. Some of the fugitive Sarmatians solicited a less ignominious dependence, under the hostile standard of the Goths. A more numerous band retired beyond the Carpathian mountains, among the Quadi, their German allies, and were easily ad­mitted to share a superfluous waste of uncultivated land. But the far greater part of the distressed nation turned their eyes towards the fruitful pro­vinces of Rome. Imploring the protection and forgiveness of the emperor, they solemnly pro­mised, as subjects in peace, and as soldiers in war, the most inviolable fidelity to the empire which should graciously receive them into its bo­som. According to the maxims adopted by Pro­bus and his successors, the offers of this Barbarian colony were eagerly accepted; and a competent portion of lands in the provinces of Pannonia, Thrace, Macedonia, and Italy, were immediate­ly assigned for the habitation and subsistence of three hundred thousand Sarmatians ¹³⁴.

By chastising the pride of the Goths, and by Death and funeral of Constan­tine, A. D. 335, July 25. accepting the homage of a suppliant nation, Con­stantine [Page 128] asserted the majesty of the Roman em­pire; and the ambassadors of Aethiopia, Persia, and the most remote countries of India, congra­tulated the peace and prosperity of his govern­ment ⁴⁶. If he reckoned, among the favours of fortune, the death of his eldest son, of his ne­phew, and perhaps of his wife, he enjoyed an un­interrupted flow of private as well as public feli­city, till the thirtieth year of his reign; a period which none of his predecessors, since Augustus, had been permitted to celebrate. Constantine survived that solemn festival about ten months; and, at the mature age of sixty-four, after a short illness, he ended his memorable life at the palace of Aquyrion, in the suburbs of Nicomedia, whi­ther he had retired for the benefit of the air, and A. D. 337, May 22. with the hope of recruiting his exhausted strength by the use of the warm baths. The excessive de­monstrations of grief, or at least of mourning, surpassed whatever had been practised on any for­mer occasion. Notwithstanding the claims of the senate and people of ancient Rome, the corpse of the deceased emperor, according to his last re­quest, was transported to the city, which was destined to preserve the name and memory of its founder. The body of Constantine, adorned with the vain symbols of greatness, the purple and [Page 129] diadem, was deposited on a golden bed in one of the apartments of the palace, which for that pur­pose had been splendidly furnished and illuminat­ed. The forms of the court were strictly main­tained. Every day, at the appointed hours, the principal officers of the state, the army, and the household, approaching the person of their sove­reign with bended kees and a composed counte­nance, offered their respectful homage as seriously as if he had been still alive. From motives of po­licy, this theatrical representation was for some time continued; nor could flattery neglect the op­portunity of remarking that Constantine alone, by the peculiar indulgence of heaven, had reigned after his death ⁴⁷.

But this reign could subsist only in empty pa­geantry; Factions of the court. and it was soon discovered that the will of the most absolute monarch is seldom obeyed, when his subjects have no longer any thing to hope from his favour, or to dread from his re­sentment. The same ministers and generals who bowed with such reverential awe before the inani­mate corpse of their deceased sovereign, were en­gaged in secret consultations to exclude his two nephews, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus, from the share which he had assigned them in the succession of the empire. We are too imperfectly acquaint­ed [Page 130] with the court of Constantine to form any judgment of the real motives which influenced the leaders of the conspiracy; unless we should sup­pose that they were actuated by a spirit of jealousy and revenge against the praefect Ablavius, a proud favourite, who had long directed the counsels and abused the confidence of the late emperor. The arguments, by which they solicited the concur­rence of the soldiers and people, are of a more obvious nature: and they might with decency, as well as truth, insist on the superior rank of the children of Constantine, the danger of multiply­ing the number of sovereigns, and the impending mischiefs which threatened the republic, from the discord of so many rival princes, who were not connected by the tender sympathy of fraternal af­fection. The intrigue was conducted with zeal and secrecy, till a loud and unanimous declara­tion was procured from the troops, that they would suffer none except the sons of their lament­ed monarch, to reign over the Roman empire ⁴⁸. The younger Dalmatius, who was united with his collateral relations by the ties of friendship and interest, is allowed to have inherited a consider­able share of the abilities of the great Constantine: but, on this occasion, he does not appear to have concerted any measures for supporting, by arms, the just claims which himself and his royal bro­ther derived from the liberality of their uncle. Astonished and overwhelmed by the tide of po­pular [Page 131] fury, they seem to have remained without the power of flight or of resistance, in the hands of their implacable enemies. Their fate was suspended till the arrival of Constantius, the se­cond ⁴⁹, and perhaps the most favoured, of the sons of Constantine.

The voice of the dying emperor had recom­mended Massacre of the princes. the care of his funeral to the piety of Constantius; and that prince, by the vicinity of his eastern station, could easily prevent the dili­gence of his brothers, who resided in their distant government of Italy and Gaul. As soon as he had taken possession of the palace of Constanti­nople, his first care was to remove the apprehen­sions of his kinsmen, by a solemn oath, which he pledged for their security. His next employment was to find some specious pretence which might release his conscience from the obligation of an imprudent promise. The arts of fraud were made subservient to the designs of cruelty; and a manifest forgery was attested by a person of the most sacred character. From the hands of the bishop of Nicomedia, Constantius received a fa­tal scroll, affirmed to be the genuine testament of his father; in which the emperor expressed his suspicions that he had been poisoned by his bro­thers; and conjured his sons to revenge his death, [Page 132] and to consult their own safety by the punishment of the guilty ⁵⁰. Whatever reasons might have been alleged by these unfortunate princes to de­fend their life and honour against so incredible an accusation, they were silenced by the furious cla­mours of the soldiers, who declared themselves, at once, their enemies, their judges, and their exe­cutioners. The spirit, and even the forms of le­gal proceedings were repeatedly violated in a pro­miscuous massacre; which involved the two uncles of Constantius, seven of his cousins, of whom Dal­matius and Hannibalianus were the most illustri­ous, the Patrician Optatus, who had married a sister of the late emperor, and the Praefect Abla­vius, whose power and riches had inspired him with some hopes of obtaining the purple. If it were necessary to aggravate the horrors of this bloody scene, we might add, that Constantius himself had espoused the daughter of his uncle Julius, and that he had bestowed his sister in marriage on his cousin Hannibalianus. These alliances, which the policy of Constantine, re­gardless of the public prejudice ⁵¹, had formed [Page 133] between the several branches of the Imperial house, served only to convince mankind, that these princes were as cold to the endearments of conjugal affection, as they were insensible to the ties of consanguinity, and the moving entreaties of youth and innocence. Of so numerous a fa­mily, Gallus and Julian alone, the two youngest children of Julius Constantius, were saved from the hands of the assassins, till their rage, satiated with slaughter, had in some measure subsided. The emperor Constantius, who, in the absence of his brothers, was the most obnoxious to guilt and reproach, discovered, on some future occasions, a faint and transient remorse for those cruelties which the perfidious counsels of his ministers, and the irresistible violence of the troops, had extorted from his unexperienced youth ⁵².

The massacre of the Flavian race was succeeded Division of the empire, by a new division of the provinces; which was A. D. 337, Sept. 11. [Page 134] ratified in a personal interview of the three bro­thers. Constantine, the eldest of the Caesars, ob­tained, with a certain pre-eminence of rank, the possession of the new capital, which bore his own name and that of his father. Thrace, and the countries of the east, were allotted for the patri­mony of Constantius; and Constans was acknow­ledged as the lawful sovereign of Italy, Africa, and the western Illyricum. The armies submitted to their hereditary right; and they condescended, after some delay, to accept from the Roman se­nate, the title of Augustus. When they first as­sumed the reins of government, the eldest of these princes was twenty-one, the second twenty, and the third only seventeen, years of age ⁵³.

While the martial nations of Europe followed Sapor king of Persia, the standards of his brothers, Constantius, at the head of the effeminate troops of Asia, was left to A. D. 310. sustain the weight of the Persian war. At the decease of Constantine, the throne of the east was filled by Sapor, son of Hormouz, or Hormisdas, and grandson of Narses, who, after the victory of Galerius, had humbly confessed the superiority of the Roman power. Although Sapor was in the thirtieth year of his long reign, he was still in the vigour of youth, as the date of his accession, by a very strange fatality, had preceded that of his birth. The wife of Hormouz remained pregnant at the time of her husband's death; and the un­certainty [Page 135] of the sex, as well as of the event, ex­cited the ambitious hopes of the princes of the house of Sassan. The apprehensions of civil war were at length removed, by the positive assurance of the Magi, that the widow of Hormouz had conceived, and would safely produce a son. Obe­dient to the voice of superstition, the Persians prepared, without delay, the ceremony of his co­ronation. A royal bed, on which the queen lay in state, was exhibited in the midst of the palace; the diadem was placed on the spot, which might be supposed to conceal the future heir of Arta­xerxes, and the prostrate Satraps adored the ma­jesty of their invisible and insensible sovereign ⁵⁴. If any credit can be given to this marvellous tale, which seems however to be countenanced by the manners of the people, and by the extraordinary duration of his reign, we must admire not only the fortune, but the genius, of Sapor. In the soft sequestered education of a Persian haram, the royal youth could discover the importance of ex­ercising the vigour of his mind and body; and, by his personal merit, deserved a throne, on which he had been seated, while he was yet unconscious of the duties and temptations of absolute power. His minority was exposed to the almost inevitable calamities of domestic discord; his capital was [Page 136] surprised and plundered by Thair, a powerful king of Yemen, or Arabia; and the majesty of the royal family was degraded by the captivity of a princess, the sister of the deceased king. But as soon as Sapor attained the age of manhood, the presumptuous Thair, his nation, and his coun­try, fell beneath the first effort of the young war­rior; who used his victory with so judicious a mixture of rigour and clemency, that he obtained from the fears and gratitude of the Arabs, the title of Dhoulacnaf, or protector of the nation ⁵⁵.

The ambition of the Persian, to whom his ene­mies State of Mesopo­tamia and Armenia. ascribe the virtues of a soldier and a states­man, was animated by the desire of revenging the disgrace of his fathers, and of wresting from the hands of the Romans the five provinces beyond the Tigris. The military same of Constantine, and the real or apparent strength of his govern­ment, suspended the attack; and while the hos­tile conduct of Sapor provoked the resentment, his artful negociations amused the patience of the Imperial court. The death of Constantine was the signal of war ⁵⁶, and the actual condition of the Syrian and Armenian frontier, seemed to en­courage the Persians by the prospect of a rich spoil, and an easy conquest. The example of the massacres of the palace, diffused a spirit of licen­tiousness [Page 137] and sedition among the troops of the east, who were no longer restrained by their ha­bits of obedience to a veteran commander. By the prudence of Constantius, who, from the in­terview with his brothers in Pannonia, imme­diately hastened to the banks of the Euphrates, the legions were gradually restored to a sense of duty and discipline; but the season of anarchy had permitted Sapor to form the siege of Nisibis, and to occupy several of the most important fort­resses of Mesopotamia ⁵⁷. In Armenia, the re­nowned Tiridates had long enjoyed the peace and glory which he deserved by his valour and fidelity to the cause of Rome. The firm alliance which he maintained with Constantine, was productive of spiritual as well as of temporal benefits: by the conversion of Tiridates, the character of a saint was applied to that of a hero, the Christian faith was preached and established from the Eu­phrates to the shores of the Caspian, and Armenia was attached to the empire by the double ties of policy and of religion. But as many of the Ar­menian nobles still refused to abandon the plu­rality of their gods and of their wives, the pub­lic tranquillity was disturbed by a discontented faction, which insulted the feeble age of their sovereign, and impatiently expected the hour of his death. He died at length after a reign of A. D. 342. fifty-six years, and the fortune of the Armenian monarchy expired with Tiridates. His lawful heir was driven into exile, the Christian priests [Page 138] were either murdered or expelled from their churches, the barbarous tribes of Albania were solicited to descend from their mountains; and two of the most powerful governors, usurping the ensigns or the powers of royalty, implored the assistance of Sapor, and opened the gates of their cities to the Persian garrisons. The Christian party, under the guidance of the archbishop of Artaxata, the immediate successor of St. Gregory the Illuminator, had recourse to the piety of Con­stantius. After the troubles had continued about three years, Antiochus, one of the officers of the household, executed with success the Imperial commission of restoring Chosroes, the son of Ti­ridates, to the throne of his fathers, of distribut­ing honours and rewards among the faithful ser­vants of the house of Arsaces, and of proclaiming a general amnesty, which was accepted by the greater part of the rebellious Satraps. But the Romans derived more honour than advantage from this revolution. Chosroes was a prince of a puny stature, and a pusillanimous spirit. Un­equal to the fatigues of war, averse to the society of mankind, he withdrew from his capital to a re­tired palace, which he built on the banks of the river Eleutherus, and in the centre of a shady grove; where he consumed his vacant hours in the rural sports of hunting and hawking. To secure this inglorious ease, he submitted to the conditions of peace which Sapor condescended to impose; the payment of an annual tribute, and the restitution of the fertile province of Atropatene, which the [Page 139] courage of Tiridates, and the victorious arms of Galerius, had annexed to the Armenian mo­narchy ⁵⁸.

During the long period of the reign of Con­stantius, The Per­sian war, the provinces of the east were afflicted by the calamities of the Persian war. The irre­gular A. D. 337—360. incursions of the light troops alternately spread terror and devastation beyond the Tigris, and beyond the Euphrates, from the gates of Ctesiphon to those of Antioch; and this active service was performed by the Arabs of the desert, who were divided in their interest and affections; some of their independent chiefs being enlisted in the party of Sapor, whilst others had engaged their doubtful fidelity to the emperor ⁵⁹. The more grave and important operations of the war were conducted with equal vigour; and the ar­mies of Rome and Persia encountered each other in nine bloody fields, in two of which Constantius himself commanded in person ⁶⁰. The event of Battle of Singara, A. D. 348. [Page 140] the day was most commonly adverse to the Ro­mans, but in the battle of Singara, their impru­dent valour had almost atchieved a signal and de­cisive victory. The stationary troops of Singara retired on the approach of Sapor, who passed the Tigris over three bridges, and occupied near the village of Hilleh an advantageous camp, which, by the labour of his numerous pioneers, he sur­rounded in one day with a deep ditch, and a lofty rampart. His formidable host, when it was drawn out in order of battle, covered the banks of the river, the adjacent heights, and the whole extent of a plain of above twelve miles, which separated the two armies. Both were alike impatient to engage; but the Barbarians, after a slight resist­ance, fled in disorder; unable to resist, or de­sirous to weary, the strength of the heavy legions, who, fainting with heat and thirst, pursued them across the plain, and cut in pieces a line of ca­valry, clothed in complete armour, which had been posted before the gates of the camp to pro­tect their retreat. Constantius, who was hurried along in the pursuit, attempted, without effect, to restrain the ardour of his troops, by represent­ing to them the dangers of the approaching night, [Page 141] and the certainty of completing their success with the return of day. As they depended much more on their own valour, than on the experience or the abilities of their chief, they silenced by their cla­mours his timid remonstrances; and rushing with fury to the charge, filled up the ditch, broke down the rampart, and dispersed themselves through the tents, to recruit their exhausted strength, and to enjoy the rich harvest of their labours. But the prudent Sapor had watched the moment of victory. His army, of which the greater part, securely posted on the heights, had been spectators of the action, advanced in silence, and under the shadow of the night; and his Per­sian archers, guided by the illumination of the camp, poured a shower of arrows on a disarmed and licentious crowd. The sincerity of history ⁶¹ declares, that the Romans were vanquished with a dreadful slaughter, and that the flying remnant of the legions was exposed to the most intolerable hardships. Even the tenderness of panegyric, confessing that the glory of the emperor was sul­lied by the disobedience of his soldiers, chuses to draw a veil over the circumstances of this melan­choly retreat. Yet one of those venal orators, so jealous of the fame of Constantius, relates with amazing coolness, an act of such incredible cruelty, as, in the judgment of posterity, must imprint a far deeper stain on the honour of the Imperial name. The son of Sapor, the heir of his crown, [Page 142] had been made a captive in the Persian camp. The unhappy youth, who might have excited the compassion of the most savage enemy, was scourg­ed, tortured, and publicly executed by the inhu­man Romans ⁶².

Whatever advantages might attend the arms of Siege of Nisibis. Sapor in the field, though nine repeated victories diffused among the nations the fame of his valour and conduct, he could not hope to succeed in the execution of his designs, while the fortified towns of Mesopotamia, and above all, the strong and antient city of Nisibis, remained in the posses­sion of the Romans. In the space of twelve years, Nisibis, which, since the time of Lucullus, had been deservedly esteemed the bulwark of the east, sustained three memorable sieges against the power A. D. 338. 346. 350. of Sapor; and the disappointed monarch, after urging his attacks above sixty, eighty, and an hundred days, was thrice repulsed with loss and ignominy ⁶³. This large and populous city was situate about two days journey from the Tigris, in the midst of a pleasant and fertile plain at the foot of mount Masius. A treble inclosure of brick walls was defended by a deep ditch ⁶⁴; and [Page 143] the intrepid resistance of Count Lucilianus, and his garrison, was seconded by the desperate cou­rage of the people. The citizens of Nisibis were animated by the exhortations of their bishop ⁶⁵, in­ured to arms by the presence of danger, and con­vinced of the intentions of Sapor to plant a Per­sian colony in their room, and to lead them away into distant and barbarous captivity. The event of the two former sieges elated their confidence; and exasperated the haughty spirit of the Great King, who advanced a third time towards Nisi­bis, at the head of the united forces of Persia and India. The ordinary machines, invented to bat­ter or undermine the walls, were rendered inef­fectual by the superior skill of the Romans; and many days had vainly elapsed, when Sapor em­braced a resolution worthy of an eastern monarch, who believed that the elements themselves were subject to his power. At the stated season of the melting of the snows in Armenia, the river Myg­donius, which divides the plain and the city of Nisibis, forms, like the Nile ⁶⁶, an innundation [Page 144] over the adjacent country. By the labour of the Persians, the course of the river was stopped be­low the town, and the waters were confined on every side by solid mounds of earth. On this ar­tificial lake, a fleet of armed vessels, filled with soldiers, and with engines which discharged stones of five hundred pounds weight, advanced in or­der of battle, and engaged, almost upon a level, the troops which defended the ramparts. The irresistible force of the waters was alternately fatal to the contending parties, till at length a portion of the walls, unable to sustain the accumulated pressure, gave way at once, and exposed an ample breach of one hundred and fifty feet. The Per­sians were instantly driven to the assault, and the fate of Nisibis depended on the event of the day. The heavy-armed cavalry, who led the van of a deep column, were embarrassed in the mud, and great numbers were drowned in the unseen holes which had been filled by the rushing waters. The elephants, made furious by their wounds, encreas­ed the disorder, and trampled down thousands of the Persian archers. The Great King, who from an exalted throne beheld the misfortunes of his arms, sounded, with reluctant indignation, the signal of the retreat, and suspended for some hours the prosecution of the attack. But the vigilant citizens improved the opportunity of the night; and the return of day discovered a new wall of six feet in height, rising every moment to fill up the interval of the breach. Notwithstanding the dis­appointment of his hopes, and the loss of more than twenty thousand men, Sapor still pressed the [Page 145] reduction of Nisibis with an obstinate firmness, which could have yielded only to the necessity of defending the eastern provinces of Persia against a formidable invasion of the Massagetae ⁶⁷. Alarm­ed by this intelligence, he hastily relinquished the siege, and marched with rapid diligence from the banks of the Tigris to those of the Oxus. The danger and difficulties of the Scythian war en­gaged him soon afterwards to conclude, or at least to observe, a truce with the Roman em­peror, which was equally grateful to both princes; as Constantius himself, after the deaths of his two brothers, was involved, by the revolutions of the west, in a civil contest, which required and seem­ed to exceed the most vigorous exertion of his un­divided strength.

After the partition of the empire, three years Civil war, and death of Con­stantine, had scarcely elapsed, before the sons of Constan­tine seemed impatient to convince mankind that they were incapable of contenting themselves A. D. 340, March. with the dominions which they were unqualified to govern. The eldest of those princes soon complained, that he was defrauded of his just proportion of the spoils of their murdered kins­men; and though he might yield to the superior guilt and merit of Constantius, he exacted from Constans the cession of the African provinces, as an equivalent for the rich countries of Macedo­nia and Greece, which his brother had acquired [Page 146] by the death of Dalmatius. The want of sin­cerity, which Constantine experienced in a te­dious and fruitless negociation, exasperated the fierceness of his temper; and he eagerly listened to those favourites, who suggested to him that his honour, as well as his interest, was concerned in the prosecution of the quarrel. At the head of a tumultuary band, suited for rapine rather than for conquest, he suddenly broke into the domi­nions of Constans, by the way of the Julian Alps, and the country round Aquileia felt the first ef­fects of his resentment. The measures of Con­stans, who then resided in Dacia, were directed with more prudence and ability. On the news of his brother's invasion, he detached a select and disciplined body of his Illyrian troops, proposing to follow them in person with the remainder of his forces. But the conduct of his lieutenants soon terminated the unnatural contest. By the artful appearances of flight, Constantine was be­trayed into an ambuscade, which had been con­cealed in a wood, where the rash youth, with a few attendants, was surprised, surrounded, and slain. His body, after it had been found in the obscure stream of the Alsa, obtained the honours of an Imperial sepulchre; but his provinces trans­ferred their allegiance to the conqueror, who, re­fusing to admit his elder brother Constantius to any share in these new acquisitions, maintained the undisputed possession of more than two-thirds of the Roman empire ⁶⁸.

[Page 147] The fate of Constans himself was delayed about ten years longer, and the revenge of his brother's death was reserved for the more ignoble hand of Murder of Constans, a domestic traitor. The pernicious tendency of A. D. 350, February. the system introduced by Constantine, was dis­played in the feeble administration of his sons; who, by their vices and weakness, soon lost the esteem and affections of their people. The pride assumed by Constans, from the unmerited success of his arms, was rendered more contemptible by his want of abilities and application. His fond partiality towards some German captives, distin­guished only by the charms of youth, was an ob­ject of scandal to the people ⁶⁹; and Magnentius, an ambitious soldier, who was himself of Barbarian extraction, was encouraged by the public discon­tent to assert the honour of the Roman name ⁷⁰. The chosen bands of Jovians and Herculians, who acknowledged Magnentius as their leader, maintained the most respectable and important [Page 148] station in the Imperial camp. The friendship of Marcellinus, count of the sacred largesses, sup­plied with a liberal hand the means of seduction. The soldiers were convinced by the most specious arguments, that the republic summoned them to break the bonds of hereditary servitude; and, by the choice of an active and vigilant prince, to re­ward the same virtues which had raised the an­cestors of the degenerate Constans from a pri­vate condition to the throne of the world. As soon as the conspiracy was ripe for execution, Marcellinus, under the pretence of celebrating his son's birth-day, gave a splendid entertainment to the illustrious and honourable persons of the court of Gaul, which then resided in the city of Autun. The intemperance of the feast was artfully pro­tracted till a very late hour of the night; and the unsuspecting guests were tempted to indulge themselves in a dangerous and guilty freedom of conversation. On a sudden the doors were thrown open, and Magnentius, who had retired for a few moments, returned into the apartment, in­vested with the diadem and purple. The con­spirators instantly saluted him with the titles of Augustus and Emperor. The surprise, the ter­ror, the intoxication, the ambitious hopes, and the mutual ignorance of the rest of the assembly, prompted them to join their voices to the general acclamation. The guards hastened to take the oath of fidelity; the gates of the town were shut; and before the dawn of day, Magnentius became master of the troops and treasure of the palace and city of Autun. By his secrecy and diligence he [Page 149] entertained some hopes of surprising the person of Constans, who was pursuing in the adjacent fo­rest his favourite amusement of hunting, or per­haps some pleasures of a more private and cri­minal nature. The rapid progress of fame al­lowed him, however, an instant for flight, though the desertion of his soldiers and subjects deprived him of the power of resistance. Before he could reach a sea-port in Spain, where he intended to embark, he was overtaken near Helena ⁷¹, at the foot of the Pyrenees, by a party of light cavalry, whose chief, regardless of the sanctity of a temple, executed his commission by the murder of the son of Constantine ⁷².

As soon as the death of Constans had decided Magnen­tius and Vetranio assume the purple, this easy but important revolution, the example of the court of Autun was imitated by the provinces of the west. The authority of Magnentius was A. D. 350, March 1. acknowledged through the whole extent of the two great praefectures of Gaul and Italy; and the usurper prepared, by every act of oppression, to collect a treasure, which might discharge the ob­ligation of an immense donative, and supply the expences of a civil war. The martial countries [Page 150] of Illyricum, from the Danube to the extremity of Greece, had long obeyed the government of Vetranio, an aged general, beloved for the sim­plicity of his manners, and who had acquired some reputation by his experience and services in war ⁷³. Attached by habit, by duty, and by gra­titude, to the house of Constantine, he imme­diately gave the strongest assurances to the only surviving son of his late master, that he would expose, with unshaken fidelity, his person and his troops, to inflict a just revenge on the traitors of Gaul. But the legions of Vetranio were seduced, rather than provoked, by the example of rebel­lion; their leader soon betrayed a want of firm­ness, or a want of sincerity; and his ambition de­rived a specious pretence from the approbation of the princess Constantina. That cruel and aspiring woman, who had obtained from the great Constantine her father the rank of Augusta, placed the diadem with her own hands on the head of the Illyrian general; and seemed to expect from his victory, the accomplishment of those unbounded hopes, of which she had been disappointed by the death of her husband Hannibalianus. Perhaps it was without the consent of Constantina, that the new emperor formed a necessary, though disho­nourable, alliance with the usurper of the west, [Page 151] whose purple was so recently stained with her brother's blood ⁷⁴.

The intelligence of these important events, Constan­tius refuses to treat. which so deeply affected the honour and safety of the Imperial house, recalled the arms of Constan­tius A. D. 350. from the inglorious prosecution of the Persian war. He recommended the care of the east to his lieutenants, and afterwards to his cousin Gal­lus, whom he raised from a prison to a throne; and marched towards Europe, with a mind agi­tated by the conflict of hope and fear, of grief and indignation. On his arrival at Heraclea in Thrace, the emperor gave audience to the am­bassadors of Magnentius and Vetranio. The first author of the conspiracy, Marcellinus, who in some measure had bestowed the purple on his new master, boldly accepted this dangerous com­mission; and his three colleagues were selected from the illustrious personages of the state and army. These deputies were instructed to soothe the resentment, and to alarm the fears, of Con­stantius. They were empowered to offer him the friendship and alliance of the western princes, to cement their union by a double marriage; of Constantius with the daughter of Magnentius, and of Magnentius himself with the ambitious Constantina; and to acknowledge in the treaty the pre-eminence of rank, which might justly be claimed by the emperor of the east. Should pride and mistaken piety urge him to refuse these equi­table [Page 152] conditions, the ambassadors were ordered to expatiate on the inevitable ruin which must at­tend his rashness, if he ventured to provoke the sovereigns of the west to exert their superior strength; and to employ against him that valour, those abilities, and those legions, to which the house of Constantine had been indebted for so many triumphs. Such propositions and such ar­guments appeared to deserve the most serious at­tention; the answer of Constantius was deferred till the next day; and as he had reflected on the importance of justifying a civil war in the opinion of the people, he thus addressed his council, who listened with real or affected credulity: ‘Last night, said he, after I retired to rest, the shade of the great Constantine, embracing the corpse of my murdered brother, rose before my eyes; his well-known voice awakened me to revenge, forbade me to despair of the republic, and assured me of the success and immortal glory which would crown the justice of my arms.’ The authority of such a vision, or ra­ther of the prince who alleged it, silenced every doubt, and excluded all negociation. The igno­minious terms of peace were rejected with disdain. One of the ambassadors of the tyrant was dis­missed with the haughty answer of Constantius; his colleagues, as unworthy of the privileges of the law of nations, were put in irons; and the contending powers prepared to wage an impla­cable war ⁷⁵.

[Page 153] Such was the conduct, and such perhaps was the duty, of the brother of Constans towards the perfidious usurper of Gaul. The situation and Deposes Vetranio, character of Vetranio admitted of milder mea­sures; A. D. 350, Dec. 25. and the policy of the eastern emperor was directed to disunite his antagonists, and to sepa­rate the forces of Illyricum from the cause of re­bellion. It was an easy task to deceive the frank­ness and simplicity of Vetranio, who, fluctuating some time between the opposite views of honour and interest, displayed to the world the insincerity of his temper, and was insensibly engaged in the snares of an artful negociation. Constantius ac­knowledged him as a legitimate and equal col­league in the empire, on condition that he would renounce his disgraceful alliance with Magnen­tius, and appoint a place of interview on the fron­tiers of their respective provinces; where they might pledge their friendship by mutual vows of fidelity, and regulate by common consent the fu­ture operations of the civil war. In consequence of this agreement, Vetranio advanced to the city of Sardica ⁷⁶, at the head of twenty thousand horse, and of a more numerous body of infantry; a power so far superior to the forces of Constan­tius, that the Illyrian emperor appeared to com­mand the life and fortunes of his rival, who, de­pending on the success of his private negocia­tions, had seduced the troops, and undermined [Page 154] the throne, of Vetranio. The chiefs, who had secretly embraced the party of Constantius, pre­pared in his favour a public spectacle, calculated to discover and inflame the passions of the multi­tude ⁷⁷. The united armies were commanded to assemble in a large plain near the city. In the centre, according to the rules of ancient disci­pline, a military tribunal, or rather scaffold, was erected, from whence the emperors were accus­tomed, on solemn and important occasions, to harangue the troops. The well-ordered ranks of Romans and Barbarians, with drawn swords, or with erected spears, the squadrons of cavalry, and the cohorts of infantry, distinguished by the va­riety of their arms and ensigns, formed an im­mense circle round the tribunal; and the atten­tive silence which they preserved was sometimes interrupted by loud bursts of clamour or of ap­plause. In the presence of this formidable assem­bly, the two emperors were called upon to explain the situation of public affairs: the precedency of rank was yielded to the royal birth of Constantius; and though he was indifferently skilled in the arts of rhetoric, he acquitted himself, under these difficult circumstances, with firmness, dexterity, and eloquence. The first part of his oration seemed to be pointed only against the tyrant of Gaul; but while he tragically lamented the cruel murder of Constans, he insinuated, that none, except a brother, could claim a right to the suc­cession [Page 155] of his brother. He displayed, with some complacency, the glories of his Imperial race; and recalled to the memory of the troops, the va­lour, the triumphs, the liberality of the great Constantine, to whose sons they had engaged their allegiance by an oath of fidelity, which the in­gratitude of his most favoured servants had tempt­ed them to violate. The officers, who surrounded the tribunal, and were instructed to act their parts in this extraordinary scene, confessed the irresistible power of reason and eloquence, by saluting the emperor Constantius as their lawful sovereign. The contagion of loyalty and repentance was communicated from rank to rank; till the plain of Sardica resounded with the universal acclama­tion of ‘Away with these upstart usurpers! Long life and victory to the son of Constantine! Under his banners alone we will fight and con­quer.’ The shout of thousands, their me­nacing gestures, the fierce clashing of their arms, astonished and subdued the courage of Vetranio, who stood, amidst the defection of his followers, in anxious and silent suspence. Instead of em­bracing the last refuge of generous despair, he tamely submitted to his fate; and taking the diadem from his head, in the view of both armies, fell prostrate at the feet of his conqueror. Con­stantius used his victory with prudence and mo­deration; and raising from the ground the aged suppliant, whom he affected to style by the en­dearing name of Father, he gave him his hand to descend from the throne. The city of Prusa was assigned for the exile or retirement of the abdi­cated [Page 156] monarch, who lived six years in the enjoy­ment of ease and affluence. He often expressed his grateful sense of the goodness of Constantius, and, with a very amiable simplicity, advised his benefactor to resign the sceptre of the world, and to seek for content (where alone it could be found) in the peaceful obscurity of a private condi­tion ⁷⁸.

The behaviour of Constantius on this memo­rable Makes war against Magnen­tius, occasion was celebrated with some appear­ance of justice; and his courtiers compared the studied orations which a Pericles or a Demo­sthenes A. D. 351. addressed to the populace of Athens, with the victorious eloquence which had persuaded an armed multitude to desert and depose the object of their partial choice ⁷⁹. The approaching con­test with Magnentius was of a more serious and bloody kind. The tyrant advanced by rapid marches to encounter Constantius, at the head of a numerous army, composed of Gauls and Spa­niards, of Franks and Saxons; of those provin­cials who supplied the strength of the legions, and of those barbarians who were dreaded as the most formidable enemies of the republic. The [Page 157] fertile plains ⁸⁰ of the Lower Pannonia, between the Drave, the Save, and the Danube, presented a spacious theatre; and the operations of the civil war were protracted during the summer months by the skill or timidity of the combat­ants ⁸¹. Constantius had declared his intention of deciding the quarrel in the fields of Cibalis, a name that would animate his troops by the re­membrance of the victory which, on the same auspicious ground, had been obtained by the arms of his father Constantine. Yet, by the impreg­nable fortifications with which the emperor en­compassed his camp, he appeared to decline, ra­ther than to invite, a general engagement. It was the object of Magnentius to tempt or to com­pel his adversary to relinquish this advantageous position; and he employed, with that view, the various marches, evolutions, and stratagems, which the knowledge of the art of war could sug­gest to an experienced officer. He carried by as­sault the important town of Siscia; made an at­tack on the city of Sirmium, which lay in the rear of the Imperial camp; attempted to force a passage over the Save into the eastern provinces of [Page 158] Illyricum; and cut in pieces a numerous detach­ment, which he had allured into the narrow passes of Adarne. During the greater part of the sum­mer, the tyrant of Gaul shewed himself master of the field. The troops of Constantius were ha­rassed and dispirited; his reputation declined in the eye of the world; and his pride condescended to solicit a treaty of peace, which would have re­signed to the assassin of Constans the sovereignty of the provinces beyond the Alps. These offers were enforced by the eloquence of Philip, the Im­perial ambassador; and the council as well as the army of Magnentius were disposed to accept them. But the haughty usurper, careless of the remonstrances of his friends, gave orders that Philip should be detained as a captive, or at least as a hostage; while he dispatched an officer to re­proach Constantius with the weakness of his reign, and to insult him by the promise of a pardon, if he would instantly abdicate the purple. ‘That he should confide in the justice of his cause, and the protection of an avenging Deity,’ was the only answer which honour permitted the em­peror to return. But he was so sensible of the difficulties of his situation, that he no longer dared to retaliate the indignity which had been offered to his representative. The negociation of Philip was not, however, ineffectual; since he determined Sylvanus the Frank, a general of merit and reputation, to desert with a consider­able body of cavalry, a few days before the battle of Mursa.

[Page 159] The city of Mursa, or Essek, celebrated in mo­dern times for a bridge of boats five miles in length, over the river Drave, and the adjacent Battle of Mursa, morasses ⁸², has been always considered as a place A. D. 351, Sept. 28. of importance in the wars of Hungary. Mag­nentius directing his march towards Mursa, set fire to the gates, and, by a sudden assault, had almost scaled the walls of the town. The vigi­lance of the garrison extinguished the flames; the approach of Constantius left him no time to con­tinue the operations of the siege; and the em­peror soon removed the only obstacle that could embarrass his motions, by forcing a body of troops which had taken post in an adjoining amphi­theatre. The field of battle round Mursa was a naked and level plain: on this ground the army of Constantius formed, with the Drave on their right; while their left, either from the nature of their disposition, or from the superiority of their cavalry, extended far beyond the right slank of Magnentius ⁸³. The troops on both sides re­mained under arms in anxious expectation during the greatest part of the morning; and the son of Constantine, after animating his soldiers by an eloquent speech, retired into a church at some distance from the field of battle, and committed [Page 160] to his generals the conduct of this decisive day ⁸⁴. They deserved his confidence by the valour and military skill which they exerted. They wisely began the action upon the left; and advancing their whole wing of cavalry in an oblique line, they suddenly wheeled it on the right flank of the enemy, which was unprepared to resist the im­petuosity of their charge. But the Romans of the West soon rallied, by the habits of discipline; and the Barbarians of Germany supported the re­nown of their national bravery. The engage­ment soon became general; was maintained with various and singular turns of fortune; and scarcely ended with the darkness of the night. The sig­nal victory which Constantius obtained is attri­buted to the arms of his cavalry. His cuirassiers are described as so many massy statues of steel, glittering with their scaly armour, and breaking with their ponderous lances the firm array of the Gallic legions. As soon as the legions gave way, the lighter and more active squadrons of the se­cond line rode sword in hand into the intervals, and completed the disorder. In the mean while, the huge bodies of the Germans were exposed al­most naked to the dexterity of the oriental archers; and whole troops of those barbarians were urged [Page 161] by anguish and despair to precipitate themselves into the broad and rapid stream of the Drave ⁸⁵. The number of the slain was computed at fifty-four thousand men, and the slaughter of the con­querors was more considerable than that of the vanquished ⁸⁶; a circumstance which proves the obstinacy of the contest, and justifies the obser­vation of an ancient writer, that the forces of the empire were consumed in the fatal battle of Mursa, by the loss of a veteran army, sufficient to defend the frontiers, or to add new triumphs to the glory of Rome ⁸⁷. Notwithstanding the invectives of a servile orator, there is not the least reason to believe that the tyrant deserted his own standard in the beginning of the engage­ment. He seems to have displayed the virtues of a general and of a soldier till the day was irreco­verably lost, and his camp in the possession of the enemy. Magnentius then consulted his safety, [Page 162] and throwing away the Imperial ornaments, es­caped with some difficulty from the pursuit of the light horse, who incessantly followed his rapid flight from the banks of the Drave to the foot of the Julian Alps ⁸⁸.

The approach of winter supplied the indolence Conquest of Italy, of Constantius with specious reasons for deferring A. D. 352. the prosecution of the war till the ensuing spring. Magnentius had fixed his residence in the city of Aquileia, and shewed a seeming resolution to dispute the passage of the mountains and morasses which fortified the confines of the Venetian pro­vince. The surprisal of a castle in the Alps by the secret march of the Imperialists, could scarcely have determined him to relinquish the possession of Italy, if the inclinations of the people had sup­ported the cause of their tyrant ⁸⁹. But the me­mory of the cruelties exercised by his ministers, after the unsuccessful revolt of Nepotian, had left a deep impression of horror and resentment on the minds of the Romans. That rash youth, the son of the princess Eutropia, and the nephew of Con­stantine, had seen with indignation the sceptre of the West usurped by a perfidious barbarian. [Page 163] Arming a desperate troop of slaves and gladiators, he overpowered the feeble guard of the domestic tranquillity of Rome, received the homage of the senate, and assuming the title of Augustus, pre­cariously reigned during a tumult of twenty-eight days. The march of some regular forces put an end to his ambitious hopes: the rebellion was ex­tinguished in the blood of Nepotian, of his mo­ther Eutropia, and of his adherents; and the pro­scription was extended to all who had contracted a fatal alliance with the name and family of Con­stantine ⁹⁰. But as soon as Constantius, after the battle of Mursa, became master of the sea-coast of Dalmatia, a band of noble exiles, who had ven­tured to equip a fleet in some harbour of the Ha­driatic, sought protection and revenge in his vic­torious camp. By their secret intelligence with their countrymen, Rome and the Italian cities were persuaded to display the banners of Constan­tius on their walls. The grateful veterans, en­riched by the liberality of the father, signalized their gratitude and loyalty to the son. The ca­valry, the legions, and the auxiliaries of Italy, renewed their oath of allegiance to Constantius; and the usurper, alarmed by the general deser­tion, was compelled, with the remains of his faithful troops, to retire beyond the Alps into the [Page 164] provinces of Gaul. The detachments, however, which were ordered either to press or to intercept the flight of Magnentius, conducted themselves with the usual imprudence of success; and allow­ed him, in the plains of Pavia, an opportunity of turning on his pursuers, and of gratifying his despair by the carnage of a useless victory ⁹¹.

The pride of Magnentius was reduced, by re­peated Last defeat and death of Mag­nentius, misfortunes, to sue, and to sue in vain, for peace. He first dispatched a senator, in whose abilities he confided, and afterwards several bi­shops, A. D. 353, August 10. whose holy character might obtain a more favourable audience, with the offer of resigning the purple, and the promise of devoting the re­mainder of his life to the service of the emperor. But Constantius, though he granted fair terms of pardon and reconciliation to all who abandoned the standard of rebellion ⁹², avowed his inflexible resolution to inflict a just punishment on the crimes of an assassin, whom he prepared to overwhelm on every side by the effort of his victorious arms. An Imperial fleet acquired the easy pos­session of Africa and Spain, confirmed the waver­ing faith of the Moorish nations, and landed a considerable force, which passed the Pyrenees, and advanced towards Lyons, the last and fatal station of Magnentius ⁹³. The temper of the ty­rant, [Page 165] which was never inclined to clemency, was urged by distress to exercise every act of oppres­sion which could extort an immediate supply from the cities of Gaul ⁹⁴. Their patience was at length exhausted; and Treves, the seat of Prae­torian government, gave the signal of revolt, by shutting her gates against Decentius, who had been raised by his brother to the rank either of Caesar or of Augustus ⁹⁵. From Treves, Decen­tius was obliged to retire to Sens, where he was soon surrounded by an army of Germans, whom the pernicious arts of Constantius had introduced into the civil dissensions of Rome ⁹⁶. In the mean time, the Imperial troops forced the passages of the Cottian Alps, and in the bloody combat of Mount Seleucus irrevocably fixed the title of Re­bels on the party of Magnentius ⁹⁷. He was un­able [Page 166] to bring another army into the field; the fidelity of his guards was corrupted; and when he appeared in public to animate them by his exhort­ations, he was saluted with an unanimous shout of "Long live the emperor Constantius!" The tyrant, who perceived that they were preparing to deserve pardon and rewards by the sacrifice of the most obnoxious criminal, prevented their design by falling on his sword ⁹⁸; a death more easy and more honourable than he could hope to obtain from the hands of an enemy, whose revenge would have been coloured with the specious pretence of justice and fraternal piety. The example of sui­cide was imitated by Decentius, who strangled himself on the news of his brother's death. The author of the conspiracy, Marcellinus, had long since disappeared in the battle of Mursa ⁹⁹, and the public tranquillity was confirmed by the exe­cution of the surviving leaders of a guilty and un­successful faction. A severe inquisition was ex­tended over all who, either from choice or from compulsion, had been involved in the cause of rebellion. Paul, surnamed Catena, from his su­perior [Page 167] skill in the judicial exercise of tyranny, was sent to explore the latent remains of the conspiracy in the remote province of Britain. The honest in­dignation expressed by Martin, vice-praefect of the island, was interpreted as an evidence of his own guilt; and the governor was urged to the neces­sity of turning against his breast the sword with which he had been provoked to wound the Im­perial minister. The most innocent subjects of the West were exposed to exile and confiscation, to death and torture; and as the timid are always cruel, the mind of Constantius was inaccessible to mercy ¹⁰⁰.

THE divided provinces of the empire were again united by the victory of Constantius; but as that feeble prince was destitute of personal Power of the eu­nuchs. merit, either in peace or war; as he feared his generals, and distrusted his ministers; the triumph of his arms served only to establish the reign of the eunuchs over the Roman world. Those un­happy beings, the ancient production of Oriental jealousy and despotism ¹, were introduced into Greece and Rome by the contagion of Asiatic luxury ². Their progress was rapid; and the eu­nuchs, who, in the time of Augustus, had been abhorred, as the monstrous retinue of an Egyp­tian queen ³, were gradually admitted into the fa­milies [Page 169] of matrons, of senators, and of the em­perors themselves ⁴. Restrained by the fevere edicts of Domitian and Nerva ⁵, cherished by the pride of Diocletian, reduced to an humble station by the prudence of Constantine ⁶, they multiplied in the palaces of his degenerate sons, and in­sensibly acquired the knowledge, and at length the direction, of the secret councils of Constan­tius. The aversion and contempt which man­kind has so uniformly entertained for that im­perfect species, appears to have degraded their character, and to have rendered them almost as incapable as they were supposed to be, of con­ceiving any generous sentiment, or of perform­ing any worthy action ⁷. But the eunuchs were [Page 170] skilled in the arts of flattery and intrigue; and they alternately governed the mind of Constan­tius by his fears, his indolence, and his vanity ⁸. Whilst he viewed in a deceitful mirror the fair appearance of public prosperity, he supinely per­mitted them to intercept the complaints of the injured provinces, to accumulate immense trea­sures by the sale of justice and of honours; to disgrace the most important dignities, by the pro­motion of those who had purchased at their hands the powers of oppression ⁹, and to gratify their re­sentment against the few independent spirits, who arrogantly refused to solicit the protection of slaves. Of these slaves the most distinguished was the chamberlain Eusebius, who ruled the monarch and the palace with such absolute sway, that Con­stantius, according to the sarcasm of an impartial historian, possessed some credit with this haughty [Page 171] favourite ¹⁰. By his artful suggestions, the em­peror was persuaded to subscribe the condemna­tion of the unfortunate Gallus, and to add a new crime to the long list of unnatural murders which pollute the honour of the house of Constan­tine.

When the two nephews of Constantine, Gallus Education of Gallus and Julian. and Julian, were saved from the fury of the sol­diers, the former was about twelve, and the latter about six, years of age; and, as the eldest was thought to be of a sickly constitution, they ob­tained with the less difficulty a precarious and de­pendent life, from the affected pity of Constan­tius, who was sensible that the execution of these helpless orphans would have been esteemed, by all mankind, an act of the most deliberate cruelty ¹¹. Different cities of Ionia and Bithynia were assigned for the places of their exile and education; but, as soon as their growing years excited the jealousy of the emperor, he judged it more prudent to secure those unhappy youths in the strong castle of Macellum, near Caesarea. The treatment which they experienced during a six years confinement, was partly such as they could hope from a careful guardian, and partly such as they might dread from a suspicious ty­rant ¹². [Page 172] Their prison was an ancient palace, the residence of the kings of Cappadocia; the situa­tion was pleasant, the buildings stately, the inclo­sure spacious. They pursued their studies, and practised their exercises, under the tuition of the most skilful masters; and the numerous house­hold appointed to attend, or rather to guard, the the nephews of Constantine, was not unworthy of the dignity of their birth. But they could not disguise to themselves that they were deprived of fortune, of freedom, and of safety; secluded from the society of all whom they could trust or esteem, and condemned to pass their melancholy hours in the company of slaves, devoted to the commands of a tyrant, who had already injured them beyond the hope of reconciliation. At length, however, the emergencies of the state compelled the emperor, or rather his eunuchs, to invest Gallus, in the twenty-fifth year of his age, with the title of Caesar, and to cement this poli­tical Gallus de­clared Caesar, connection by his marriage with the princess Constantina. After a formal interview, in which A. D. 351, March 5. the two princes mutually engaged their faith never to undertake any thing to the prejudice of each other, they repaired without delay to their respective stations. Constantius continued his march towards the West, and Gallus fixed his re­sidence [Page 173] at Antioch, from whence, with a delegat­ed authority, he administered the five great dio­ceses of the eastern praefecture ¹³. In this fortu­nate change, the new Caesar was not unmindful of his brother Julian, who obtained the honours of his rank, the appearances of liberty, and the restitution of an ample patrimony ¹⁴.

The writers the most indulgent to the memory Cruelty and impru­dence of Gallus. of Gallus, and even Julian himself, though he wished to cast a veil over the frailties of his bro­ther, are obliged to confess that the Caesar was in­capable of reigning. Transported from a prison to a throne, he possessed neither genius nor appli­cation, nor docility to compensate for the want of knowledge and experience. A temper naturally morose and violent, instead of being corrected, was soured by solitude and adversity; the remem­brance of what he had endured, disposed him to retaliation rather than to sympathy; and the un­governed sallies of his rage were often fatal to those who approached his person, or were sub­ject to his power ¹⁵. Constantina, his wife, is [Page 174] described, not as a woman, but as one of the in­fernal furies tormented with an insatiate thirst of human blood ¹⁶. Instead of employing her in­fluence to insinuate the mild counsels of prudence and humanity, she exasperated the fierce passions of her husband; and as she retained the vanity, though she had renounced the gentleness of her sex, a pearl necklace was esteemed an equivalent price for the murder of an innocent and virtuous nobleman ¹⁷. The cruelty of Gallus was some­times displayed in the undissembled violence of popular or military executions; and was some­times disguised by the abuse of law, and the forms of judicial proceedings. The private houses of Antioch, and the places of public resort, were be­sieged by spies and informers; and the Caesar himself, concealed in a plebeian habit, very fre­quently condescended to assume that odious cha­racter. Every apartment of the palace was adorn­ed with the instruments of death and torture, and a general consternation was diffused through the capital of Syria. The Prince of the East, as if he [Page 175] had been conscious how much he had to fear, and how little he deserved to reign, selected for the objects of his resentment, the provincials accused of some imaginary treason, and his own courtiers, whom with more reason he suspected of incensing, by their secret correspondence, the timid and sus­picious mind of Constantius. But he forgot that he was depriving himself of his only support, the affection of the people; whilst he furnished the malice of his enemies with the arms of truth, and afforded the emperor the fairest pretence of ex­acting the forfeit of his purple, and of his life ¹⁸.

As long as the civil war suspended the fate of Massacre of the Im­perial mi­nisters, the Roman world, Constantius dissembled his knowledge of the weak and cruel administration to which his choice had subjected the East; and A. D. 354. the discovery of some assassins, secretly dispatched to Antioch by the tyrant of Gaul, was employed to convince the public, that the emperor and Caesar were united by the same interest, and pur­sued by the same enemies ¹⁹. But when the vic­tory was decided in favour of Constantius, his de­pendent colleague became less useful and less for­midable. Every circumstance of his conduct was severely and suspiciously examined, and it was pri­vately resolved, either to deprive Gallus of the [Page 176] purple, or at least to remove him from the indo­lent luxury of Asia to the hardships and dangers of a German war. The death of Theophilus, consular of the province of Syria, who in a time of scarcity had been massacred by the people of Antioch, with the connivance, and almost at the instigation, of Gallus, was justly resented, not only as an act of wanton cruelty, but as a dan­gerous insult on the supreme majesty of Constan­tius. Two ministers of illustrious rank, Domi­tian, the Oriental praefect, and Montius, quaestor of the palace, were empowered by a special com­mission to visit and reform the state of the East. They were instructed to behave towards Gallus with moderation and respect, and, by the gentlest arts of persuasion, to engage him to comply with the invitation of his brother and colleague. The rashness of the praefect disappointed these prudent measures, and hastened his own ruin, as well as that of his enemy. On his arrival at Antioch, Domitian passed disdainfully before the gates of the palace, and alleging a slight pretence of in­disposition, continued several days in sullen re­tirement, to prepare an inflammatory memorial, which he transmitted to the Imperial court. Yielding at length to the pressing solicitations of Gallus, the praefect condescended to take his seat in council; but his first step was to signify a con­cise and haughty mandate, importing that the Caesar should immediately repair to Italy, and threatening that he himself would punish his de­lay or hesitation, by suspending the usual allow­ance of his household. The nephew and daughter [Page 177] of Constantine, who could ill brook the insolence of a subject, expressed their resentment by in­stantly delivering Domitian to the custody of a guard. The quarrel still admitted of some terms of accommodation. They were rendered im­practicable by the imprudent behaviour of Mon­tius, a statesman, whose art and experience were frequently betrayed by the levity of his disposi­tion ²⁰. The quaestor reproached Gallus in haughty language, that a prince, who was scarcely au­thorised to remove a municipal magistrate, should presume to imprison a Praetorian praefect; con­voked a meeting of the civil and military officers; and required them, in the name of their sove­reign, to defend the person and dignity of his re­presentatives. By this rash declaration of war, the impatient temper of Gallus was provoked to embrace the most desperate counsels. He order­ed his guards to stand to their arms, assembled the populace of Antioch, and recommended to their zeal the care of his safety and revenge. His com­mands were too fatally obeyed. They rudely seized the praefect and the quaestor, and tying their legs together with ropes, they dragged them through the streets of the city, inflicted a thousand insults and a thousand wounds on these unhappy victims, and at last precipitated their [Page 178] mangled and lifeless bodies into the stream of the Orontes ²¹.

After such a deed, whatever might have been Dangerous situation of Gallus. the designs of Gallus, it was only in a field of battle that he could assert his innocence with any hope of success. But the mind of that prince was formed of an equal mixture of violence and weak­ness. Instead of assuming the title of Augustus, instead of employing in his defence the troops and treasures of the East, he suffered himself to be deceived by the affected tranquillity of Con­stantius, who, leaving him the vain pageantry of a court, imperceptibly recalled the veteran le­gions from the provinces of Asia. But as it still appeared dangerous to arrest Gallus in his capital, the slow and safer arts of dissimulation were prac­tised with success. The frequent and pressing epistles of Constantius were filled with professions of confidence and friendship; exhorting the Caesar to discharge the duties of his high station, to re­lieve his colleague from a part of the public cares, and to assist the West by his presence, his coun­sels, and his arms. After so many reciprocal in­juries, Gallus had reason to fear and to distrust. But he had neglected the opportunities of flight and of resistance; he was seduced by the flatter­ing assurances of the tribune Scudilo, who, under the semblance of a rough soldier, disguised the [Page 179] most artful insinuation; and he depended on the credit of his wife Constantina, till the unseasonable death of that princess completed the ruin in which he had been involved by her impetuous pas­sions ²².

After a long delay, the reluctant Caesar set for­wards His dis­grace and death, on his journey to the Imperial court. From Antioch to Hadrianople, he traversed the wide A. D. 354, December. extent of his dominions with a numerous and stately train; and as he laboured to conceal his apprehensions from the world, and perhaps from himself, he entertained the people of Constan­tinople with an exhibition of the games of the circus. The progress of the journey might, how­ever, have warned him of the impending danger. In all the principal cities he was met by ministers of confidence, commissioned to seize the offices of government, to observe his motions, and to pre­vent the hasty sallies of his despair. The persons dispatched to secure the provinces which he left behind, passed him with cold salutations, or af­fected disdain; and the troops, whose station lay along the public road, were studiously removed on his approach, lest they might be tempted to offer their swords for the service of a civil war ²³. [Page 180] After Gallus had been permitted to repose him­self a few days at Hadrianople, he received a mandate, expressed in the most haughty and ab­solute style, that his splendid retinue should halt in that city, while the Caesar himself, with only ten post-carriages, should hasten to the Imperial residence at Milan. In this rapid journey, the profound respect which was due to the brother and colleague of Constantius, was insensibly changed into rude familiarity; and Gallus, who discovered in the countenances of the attendants that they already considered themselves as his guards, and might soon be employed as his exe­cutioners, began to accuse his fatal rashness, and to recollect with terror and remorse the conduct by which he had provoked his fate. The dissi­mulation which had hitherto been preserved, was laid aside at Petovio in Pannonia. He was con­ducted to a palace in the suburbs, where the ge­neral Barbatio, with a select band of soldiers, who could neither be moved by pity, nor corrupted by rewards, expected the arrival of his illustrious victim. In the close of the evening he was ar­rested, ignominiously stripped of the ensigns of Caesar, and hurried away to Pola in Istria, a se­questered prison, which had been so recently pol­luted with royal blood. The horror which he felt, was soon increased by the appearance of his im­placable enemy the eunuch Eusebius, who, with the assistance of a notary and a tribune, proceeded to interrogate him concerning the administration of the East. The Caesar sunk under the weight of shame and guilt, confessed all the criminal [Page 181] actions, and all the treasonable designs with which he was charged; and by imputing them to the advice of his wife, exasperated the indignation of Constantius, who reviewed with partial prejudice the minutes of the examination. The emperor was easily convinced, that his own safety was incom­patible with the life of his cousin: the sentence of death was signed, dispatched, and executed; and the nephew of Constantine, with his hands tied behind his back, was beheaded in prison like the vilest malefactor ²⁴. Those who are inclined to palliate the cruelties of Constantius, assert that he soon relented, and endeavoured to recal the bloody mandate; but that the second messenger entrusted with the reprieve, was detained by the eunuchs, who dreaded the unforgiving temper of Gallus, and were desirous of re-uniting to their empire the wealthy provinces of the East ²⁵.

Besides the reigning emperor, Julian alone The dan­ger and escape of Julian. survived, of all the numerous posterity of Con­stantius Chlorus. The misfortune of his royal birth involved him in the disgrace of Gallus. From his retirement in the happy country of Ionia, he was conveyed under a strong guard to [Page 182] the court of Milan; where he languished above seven months, in the continual apprehension of suffering the same ignominious death, which was daily inflicted, almost before his eyes, on the friends and adherents of his persecuted family. His looks, his gestures, his silence, were scru­tinized with malignant curiosity, and he was perpetually assaulted by enemies, whom he had never offended, and by arts to which he was a stranger ²⁶. But in the school of adversity, Julian insensibly acquired the virtues of firmness and discretion. He defended his honour, as well as his life, against the ensnaring subtleties of the eunuchs, who endeavoured to extort some de­claration of his sentiments: and whilst he cau­tiously suppressed his grief and resentment, he nobly disdained to flatter the tyrant, by any seeming approbation of his brother's murder. Julian most devoutly ascribes his miraculous de­liverance to the protection of the Gods, who had exempted his innocence from the sentence of de­struction pronounced by their justice against the impious house of Constantine ²⁷. As the most ef­fectual instrument of their providence, he grate­fully [Page 183] acknowledges the steady and generous friend­ship of the empress Eusebia ²⁸, a woman of beauty and merit, who, by the ascendant which she had gained over the mind of her husband, counter­balanced, in some measure, the powerful con­spiracy of the eunuchs. By the intercession of his patroness, Julian was admitted into the Imperial presence: he pleaded his cause with a decent freedom, he was heard with favour; and, not­withstanding the efforts of his enemies, who urged the danger of sparing an avenger of the blood of Gallus, the milder sentiment of Eusebia prevail­ed in the council. But the effects of a second in­terview were dreaded by the eunuchs; and Ju­lian was advised to withdraw for a while into the neighbourhood of Milan, till the emperor thought He is sent to Athens, proper to assign the city of Athens for the place A. D. 355, May. of his honourable exile. As he had discovered, from his earliest youth, a propensity, or rather passion, for the language, the manners, the learn­ing, and the religion of the Greeks, he obeyed with pleasure an order so agreeable to his wishes. Far from the tumult of arms, and the treachery of courts, he spent six months amidst the groves of the academy, in a free intercourse with the philosophers of the age, who studied to cultivate the genius, to encourage the vanity, and to in­flame the devotion of their royal pupil. Their [Page 184] labours were not unsuccessful; and Julian in­violably preserved for Athens that tender regard, which seldom fails to arise in a liberal mind, from the recollection of the place where it has discover­ed and exercised its growing powers. The gentle­ness and affability of manners, which his temper suggested and his situation imposed, insensibly engaged the affections of the strangers, as well as citizens, with whom he conversed. Some of his fellow-students might perhaps examine his beha­viour with an eye of prejudice and aversion; but Julian established, in the schools of Athens, a ge­neral prepossession in favour of his virtues and talents, which was soon diffused over the Roman world ²⁹.

Whilst his hours were passed in studious retire­ment, Recalled to Milan, the empress, resolute to atchieve the ge­nerous design which she had undertaken, was not unmindful of the care of his fortune. The death of the late Caesar had left Constantius invested with the sole command, and oppressed by the ac­cumulated weight of a mighty empire. Before the wounds of civil discord could be healed, the provinces of Gaul were overwhelmed by a deluge of Barbarians. The Sarmatians no longer re­spected [Page 185] the barrier of the Danube. The im­punity of rapine had increased the boldness and numbers of the wild Isaurians: those robbers de­scended from their craggy mountains to ravage the adjacent country, and had even presumed, though without success, to besiege the important city of Seleucia, which was defended by a garri­son of three Roman legions. Above all, the Per­sian monarch, elated by victory, again threatened the peace of Asia, and the presence of the em­peror was indispensably required, both in the West, and in the East. For the first time, Con­stantius sincerely acknowledged, that his single strength was unequal to such an extent of care and of dominion ³⁰. Insensible to the voice of flattery, which assured him that his all-powerful virtue, and celestial fortune, would still continue to triumph over every obstacle, he listened with complacency to the advice of Eusebia, which gra­tified his indolence, without offending his suspi­cious pride. As she perceived that the remem­brance of Gallus dwelt on the emperor's mind, she artfully turned his attention to the opposite characters of the two brothers, which from their infancy had been compared to those of Domitian and of Titus ³¹. She accustomed her husband to con­sider [Page 186] Julian as a youth of a mild unambitious dis­position, whose allegiance and gratitude might be secured by the gift of the purple, and who was qualified to fill, with honour, a subordinate sta­tion, without aspiring to dispute the commands, or to shade the glories, of his sovereign and bene­factor. After an obstinate, though secret struggle, the opposition of the favourite eunuchs submitted to the ascendency of the empress; and it was re­solved that Julian, after celebrating his nuptials with Helena, sister of Constantius, should be ap­pointed, with the title of Caesar, to reign over the countries beyond the Alps ³².

Although the order which recalled him to court was probably accompanied by some intimation of his approaching greatness, he appeals to the people of Athens to witness his tears of undissem­bled sorrow, when he was reluctantly torn away from his beloved retirement ³³. He trembled for his life, for his fame, and even for his virtue; and his sole confidence was derived from the persua­sion, that Minerva inspired all his actions, and that he was protected by an invisible guard of angels, whom for that purpose she had borrowed from the Sun and Moon. He approached, with horror, the palace of Milan; nor could the in­genuous youth conceal his indignation, when he found himself accosted with false and servile re­spect by the assassins of his family. Eusebia, re­joicing [Page 187] in the success of her benevolent schemes, embraced him with the tenderness of a sister; and endeavoured, by the most soothing caresses, to dispel his terrors, and reconcile him to his for­tune. But the ceremony of shaving his beard, and his awkward demeanour, when he first ex­changed the cloak of a Greek philosopher for the military habit of a Roman prince, amused, during a few days, the levity of the Imperial court ³⁴.

The emperors of the age of Constantine no longer deigned to consult with the senate in the choice of a colleague; but they were anxious that their nomination should be ratified by the con­sent of the army. On this solemn occasion, the guards, with the other troops whose stations were in the neighbourhood of Milan, appeared under arms; and Constantius ascended his lofty tri­bunal, holding by the hand his cousin Julian, who entered the same day into the twenty-fifth year of his age ³⁵. In a studied speech, conceived and delivered with dignity, the emperor repre­sented the various dangers which threatened the prosperity of the republic, the necessity of naming a Caesar for the administration of the West, and his own intention, if it was agreeable to their wishes, of rewarding with the honours of the purple, the promising virtues of the nephew of Constantine. The approbation of the soldiers was [Page 188] testified by a respectful murmur: they gazed on the manly countenance of Julian, and observed with pleasure, that the fire which sparkled in his eyes was tempered by a modest blush, on being thus exposed, for the first time, to the public view of mankind. As soon as the ceremony of his investiture had been performed, Constantius addressed him with the tone of authority, which his superior age and station permitted him to as­sume; and exhorting the new Caesar to deserve, by heroic deeds, that sacred and immortal name, the emperor gave his colleague the strongest as­surances of a friendship which should never be impaired by time, nor interrupted by their sepa­ration into the most distant climates. As soon as the speech was ended, the troops, as a token of applause, clashed their shields against their knees ³⁶; while the officers who surrounded the tribunal expressed, with decent reserve, their sense of the merits of the representative of Constan­tius.

The two princes returned to the palace in the and de­clared Caesar, same chariot; and during the slow procession, Ju­lian repeated to himself a verse of his favourite A. D. 355, Nov. 6. Homer, which he might equally apply to his for­tune and to his fears ³⁷. The four-and-twenty [Page 189] days which the Caesar spent at Milan after his in­vestiture, and the first months of his Gallic reign, were devoted to a splendid, but severe captivity; nor could the acquisition of honour compensate for the loss of freedom ³⁸. His steps were watched, his correspondence was intercepted; and he was obliged, by prudence, to decline the visits of his most intimate friends. Of his former domestics, four only were permitted to attend him; two pages, his physician, and his librarian; the last of whom was employed in the care of a valuable col­lection of books, the gift of the empress, who studied the inclinations as well as the interest of her friend. In the room of these faithful ser­vants, an household was formed, such indeed as became the dignity of a Caesar: but it was filled with a crowd of slaves, destitute, and perhaps in­capable of any attachment for their new master, to whom, for the most part, they were either un­known or suspected. His want of experience might require the assistance of a wise counsel; but the minute instructions which regulated the ser­vice of his table, and the distribution of his hours, were adapted to a youth still under the discipline of his praeceptors, rather than to the situation of a prince entrusted with the conduct of an im­portant [Page 190] war. If he aspired to deserve the esteem of his subjects, he was checked by the fear of dis­pleasing his sovereign; and even the fruits of his marriage-bed were blasted by the jealous artifices of Eusebia ³⁹ herself, who, on this occasion alone, seems to have been unmindful of the tenderness of her sex, and the generosity of her character. The memory of his father and of his brothers re­minded Julian of his own danger, and his appre­hensions were encreased by the recent and un­worthy fate of Sylvanus. In the summer which Fatal end of Sylva­nus, preceded his own elevation, that general had been chosen to deliver Gaul from the tyranny of the A. D. 355, September. Barbarians; but Sylvanus soon discovered that he had left his most dangerous enemies in the Im­perial court. A dexterous informer, counte­nanced by several of the principal ministers, pro­cured from him some recommendatory letters; and erazing the whole of the contents, except the signature, filled up the vacant parchment with matters of high and treasonable import. By the industry and courage of his friends, the fraud was however detected, and in a great council of the [Page 191] civil and military officers, held in the presence of the emperor himself, the innocence of Sylvanus was publicly acknowledged. But the discovery came too late; the report of the calumny, and the hasty seizure of his estate, had already provoked the indignant chief to the rebellion of which he was so unjustly accused. He assumed the purple at his head-quarters of Cologne, and his active powers appeared to menace Italy with an invasion, and Milan with a siege. In this emergency, Ur­sicinus, a general of equal rank, regained, by an act of treachery, the favour which he had lost by his eminent services in the East. Exasperated, as he might speciously allege, by injuries of a similar nature, he hastened with a few followers to join the standard, and to betray the confidence, of his too credulous friend. After a reign of only twenty-eight days, Sylvanus was assassinated: the soldiers who, without any criminal intention, had blindly followed the example of their leader, immediately returned to their allegiance; and the flatterers of Constantius celebrated the wis­dom and felicity of the monarch who had ex­tinguished a civil war without the hazard of a battle ⁴⁰.

The protection of the Rhaetian frontier, and Constan­tius visits Rome, the persecution of the Catholic Church, detained Constantius in Italy above eighteen months after A. D. 357, April 28. the departure of Julian. Before the emperor re­turned into the East, he indulged his pride and [Page 192] curiosity in a visit to the ancient capital ⁴¹. He proceeded from Milan to Rome along the Aemi­lian and Flaminian ways; and as soon as he ap­proached within forty miles of the city, the march of a prince who had never vanquished a foreign enemy, assumed the appearance of a triumphal procession. His splendid train was composed of all the ministers of luxury; but in a time of pro­found peace, he was encompassed by the glitter­ing arms of the numerous squadrons of his guards and cuirassiers. Their streaming banners of silk, embossed with gold, and shaped in the form of dragons, waved round the person of the em­peror. Constantius sat alone in a lofty car re­splendent with gold and precious gems; and, ex­cept when he bowed his head to pass under the gates of the cities, he affected a stately demeanour of inflexible, and, as it might seem, of insensible gravity. The severe discipline of the Persian youth had been introduced by the eunuchs into the Imperial palace; and such were the habits of patience which they had inculcated, that, during a slow and sultry march, he was never seen to move his hand towards his face, or to turn his eyes either to the right or to the left. He was received by the magistrates and senate of Rome; and the emperor surveyed, with attention, the civil honours of the republic, and the consular images of the noble families. The streets were lined [Page 193] with an innumerable multitude. Their repeated acclamations expressed their joy at beholding, after an absence of thirty-two years, the sacred person of their sovereign; and Constantius him­self expressed, with some pleasantry, his affected surprise that the human race should thus suddenly be collected on the same spot. The son of Con­stantine was lodged in the ancient palace of Augustus: he presided in the senate, harangued the people from the tribunal which Cicero had so often ascended, assisted with unusual courtesy at the games of the Circus, and accepted the crowns of gold, as well as the panegyrics which had been prepared for this ceremony by the deputies of the principal cities. His short visit of thirty days was employed in viewing the monuments of art and power, which were scattered over the seven hills and the interjacent vallies. He admired the awful majesty of the capitol, the vast extent of the baths of Caracalla and Diocletian, the severe simplicity of the Pantheon, the massy greatness of the amphitheatre of Titus, the elegant archi­tecture of the theatre of Pompey and the Temple of Peace, and, above all, the stately structure of the Forum and column of Trajan; acknowledg­ing, that the voice of fame, so prone to invent and to magnify, had made an inadequate report of the metropolis of the world. The traveller, who has contemplated the ruins of ancient Rome, may conceive some imperfect idea of the senti­ments which they must have inspired when they reared their heads in the splendour of unsullied beauty.

[Page 194] The satisfaction which Constantius had received from this journey excited him to the generous emulation of bestowing on the Romans some me­morial A new obelisk. of his own gratitude and munificence. His first idea was to imitate the equestrian and colossal statue which he had seen in the Forum of Trajan; but when he had maturely weighed the difficulties of the execution ⁴², he chose rather to embellish the capital by the gift of an Egyptian obelisk. In a remote but polished age, which seems to have preceded the invention of alpha­betical writing, a great number of these obelisks had been erected, in the cities of Thebes and He­liopolis, by the ancient sovereigns of Egypt, in a just confidence that the simplicity of their form, and the hardness of their substance, would resist the injuries of time and violence ⁴³. Several of these extraordinary columns had been trans­ported to Rome by Augustus and his successors, as the most durable monuments of their power and victory ⁴⁴; but there remained one obelisk, [Page 195] which, from its size or sanctity, escaped for a long time the rapacious vanity of the conquerors. It was designed by Constantine to adorn his new city ⁴⁵; and, after being removed by his order from the pedestal where it stood before the Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis, was floated down the Nile to Alexandria. The death of Constantine suspended the execution of his purpose, and this obelisk was destined by his son to the ancient capital of the empire. A vessel of uncommon strength and capaciousness was provided to con­vey this enormous weight of granite, at least an hundred and fifteen feet in length, from the banks of the Nile to those of the Tyber. The obelisk of Constantius was landed about three miles from the city, and elevated, by the efforts of art and labour, in the great Circus of Rome ⁴⁶.

The departure of Constantius from Rome was The Qua­dian and Sarmatian war, hastened by the alarming intelligence of the distress and danger of the Illyrian provinces. The distractions of civil war, and the irreparable A. D. 357, 358, 359. loss which the Roman legions had sustained in the battle of Mursa, exposed those countries, almost without defence, to the light cavalry of [Page 196] the Barbarians; and particularly to the inroads of the Quadi, a fierce and powerful nation, who seem to have exchanged the institutions of Ger­many for the arms and military arts of their Sar­matian allies ⁴⁷. The garrisons of the frontier were insufficient to check their progress; and the indolent monarch was at length compelled to assemble, from the extremities of his dominions, the flower of the Palatine troops, to take the field in person, and to employ a whole campaign, with the preceding autumn and the ensuing spring, in the serious prosecution of the war. The emperor passed the Danube on a bridge of boats, cut in pieces all that encountered his march, penetrated into the heart of the country of the Quadi, and severely retaliated the calami­ties which they had inflicted on the Roman pro­vince. The dismayed Barbarians were soon re­duced to sue for peace: they offered the restitution of his captive subjects, as an atonement for the past, and the noblest hostages as a pledge of their future conduct. The generous courtesy which was shewn to the first among their chieftains who implored the clemency of Constantius, encou­raged the more timid, or the more obstinate, to imitate their example; and the Imperial camp was crowded with the princes and ambassadors of the most distant tribes, who occupied the plains of the Lesser Poland, and who might have deemed themselves secure behind the lofty ridge of the Carpathian mountains. While Constantius gave [Page 197] laws to the Barbarians beyond the Danube, he distinguished with specious compassion the Sar­matian exiles, who had been expelled from their native country by the rebellion of their slaves, and who formed a very considerable accession to the power of the Quadi. The emperor, em­bracing a generous but artful system of policy, released the Sarmatians from the bands of this humiliating dependence, and restored them, by a separate treaty, to the dignity of a nation united under the government of a king, the friend and ally of the republic. He declared his reso­lution of asserting the justice of their cause, and of securing the peace of the provinces by the ex­tirpation, or at least the banishment, of the Li­migantes, whose manners were still infected with the vices of their servile origin. The execution of this design was attended with more difficulty than glory. The territory of the Limigantes was protected against the Romans by the Danube, against the hostile Barbarians by the Teyss. The marshy lands which lay between those rivers, and were often covered by their inundations, formed an intricate wilderness, pervious only to the inha­bitants, who were acquainted with its secret paths and inaccessible fortresses. On the approach of Constantius, the Limigantes tried the efficacy of prayers, of fraud, and of arms; but he sternly rejected their supplications, defeated their rude stratagems, and repelled with skill and firmness the efforts of their irregular valour. One of their most warlike tribes, established in a small island towards the conflux of the Teyss and the [Page 198] Danube, consented to pass the river with the in­tention of surprising the emperor during the security of an amicable conference. They soon became the victims of the perfidy which they meditated. Encompassed on every side, tram­pled down by the cavalry, slaughtered by the swords of the legions, they disdained to ask for mercy; and with an undaunted countenance still grasped their weapons in the agonies of death. After this victory a considerable body of Romans was landed on the opposite banks of the Danube; the Taifalae, a Gothic tribe engaged in the service of the empire, invaded the Limigantes on the side of the Teyss; and their former masters, the free Sarmatians, animated by hope and revenge, penetrated through the hilly country into the heart of their ancient possessions. A general conflagration revealed the huts of the Barbarians, which were seated in the depth of the wilderness; and the soldier fought with confidence on marshy ground, which it was dangerous for him to tread. In this extremity the bravest of the Limigantes were re­solved to die in arms, rather than to yield: but the milder sentiment, enforced by the authority of their elders, at length prevailed; and the suppliant crowd, followed by their wives and children, repaired to the Imperial camp, to learn their fate from the mouth of the conqueror. After celebrating his own clemency, which was still inclined to pardon their repeated crimes, and to spare the remnant of a guilty nation, Con­stantius assigned for the place of their exile a re­mote country, where they might enjoy a safe and [Page 199] honourable repose. The Limigantes obeyed with reluctance; but before they could reach, at least before they could occupy, their destined habita­tions, they returned to the banks of the Danube, exaggerating the hardships of their situation, and requesting, with fervent professions of fidelity, that the emperor would grant them an undisturb­ed settlement within the limits of the Roman provinces. Instead of consulting his own ex­perience of their incurable perfidy, Constantius listened to his flatterers, who were ready to repre­sent the honour and advantage of accepting a colony of soldiers, at a time when it was much easier to obtain the pecuniary contributions, than the military service of the subjects of the empire. The Limigantes were permitted to pass the Da­nube; and the emperor gave audience to the multitude in a large plain near the modern city of Buda. They surrounded the tribunal, and seem­ed to hear with respect an oration full of mildness and dignity; when one of the Barbarians, cast­ing his shoe into the air, exclaimed with a loud voice, Marha! Marha! a word of defiance, which was received as the signal of the tumult. They rushed with fury to seize the person of the em­peror; his royal throne and golden couch were pillaged by these rude hands; but the faithful defence of his guards, who died at his feet, allow­ed him a moment to mount a fleet horse, and to escape from the confusion. The disgrace which had been incurred by a treacherous surprise was soon retrieved by the numbers and discipline of the Romans; and the combat was only terminated [Page 200] by the extinction of the name and nation of the Limigantes. The free Sarmatians were reinstated in the possession of their ancient seats; and al­though Constantius distrusted the levity of their character, he entertained some hopes that a sense of gratitude might influence their future conduct. He had remarked the lofty stature and obsequious demeanour of Zizais, one of the noblest of their chiefs. He conferred on him the title of King; and Zizais proved that he was not unworthy to reign, by a sincere and lasting attachment to the interest of his benefactor, who, after this splendid success, received the name of Sarmaticus from the acclamations of his victorious army ⁴⁸.

While the Roman emperor and the Persian The Per­sian nego­ciation, monarch, at the distance of three thousand miles, defended their extreme limits against the Bar­barians A. D. 358. of the Danube and of the Oxus, their intermediate frontier experienced the vicissitudes of a languid war, and a precarious truce. Two of the eastern ministers of Constantius, the Prae­torian praefect Musonian, whose abilities were disgraced by the want of truth and integrity, and Cassian duke of Mesopotamia, a hardy and vete­ran soldier, opened a secret negociation with the Satrap Tamsapor ⁴⁹ These overtures of peace, translated into the servile and flattering language of Asia, were transmitted to the camp of the Great King; who resolved to signify, by an am­bassador, [Page 201] the terms which he was inclined to grant to the suppliant Romans. Narses, whom he invested with that character, was honourably received in his passage through Antioch and Con­stantinople: he reached Sirmium after a long jour­ney, and, at his first audience, respectfully un­solded the silken veil which covered the haughty epistle of his sovereign. Sapor, King of Kings, and Brother of the Sun and Moon (such were the lofty titles affected by Oriental vanity), ex­pressed his satisfaction that his brother, Constan­tius Caesar, had been taught wisdom by adver­sity. As the lawful successor of Darius Hystaspes, Sapor asserted, that the river Strymon in Mace­donia was the true and ancient boundary of his empire; declaring, however, that as an evidence of his moderation, he would content himself with the provinces of Armenia and Mesopotamia, which had been fraudulently extorted from his ancestors. He alleged, that, without the re­stitution of these disputed countries, it was im­possible to establish any treaty on a solid and per­manent basis; and he arrogantly threatened, that if his ambassador returned in vain, he was pre­pared to take the field in the spring, and to sup­port the justice of his cause by the strength of his invincible arms. Narses, who was endowed with the most polite and amiable manners, endeavour­ed, as far as was consistent with his duty, to soften the harshness of the message ⁵⁰. Both the style [Page 202] and substance were maturely weighed in the Im­perial council, and he was dismissed with the following answer: ‘Constantius had a right to disclaim the officiousness of his ministers, who had acted without any specific orders from the throne: he was not, however, averse to an equal and honourable treaty; but it was highly indecent, as well as absurd, to propose to the sole and victorious emperor of the Roman world, the same conditions of peace which he had indignantly rejected at the time when his power was contracted within the narrow limits of the East: the chance of arms was uncertain; and Sapor should recollect, that if the Romans had sometimes been vanquished in battle, they had almost always been successful in the event of the war.’ A few days after the departure of Narses, three ambassadors were sent to the court of Sapor, who was already returned from the Scythian expedition to his ordinary residence of Ctesiphon. A count, a notary, and a sophist, had been selected for this important commission; and Constantius, who was secretly anxious for the conclusion of the peace, entertained some hopes that the dignity of the first of these ministers, the dexterity of the second, and the rhetoric of the third ⁵¹, would persuade the Persian monarch [Page 203] to abate of the rigour of his demands. But the progress of their negociation was opposed and de­feated by the hostile arts of Antoninus ⁵², a Ro­man subject of Syria, who had fled from oppres­sion, and was admitted into the councils of Sapor, and even to the royal table, where, according to the custom of the Persians, the most important business was frequently discussed ⁵³. The dex­terous fugitive promoted his interest by the same conduct which gratified his revenge. He inces­santly urged the ambition of his new master, to embrace the favourable opportunity when the bravest of the Palatine troops were employed with the emperor in a distant war on the Danube. He pressed Sapor to invade the exhausted and defence­less provinces of the East, with the numerous ar­mies of Persia, now fortified by the alliance and accession of the fiercest Barbarians. The ambas­sadors of Rome retired without success, and a second embassy, of a still more honourable rank, was detained in strict confinement, and threatened either with death or exile.

[Page 204] The military historian ⁵⁴, who was himself dis­patched to observe the army of the Persians, as they were preparing to construct a bridge of boats Invasion of Mesopo­tamia by Sapor, over the Tigris, beheld from an eminence the plain of Assyria, as far as the edge of the horizon, A. D. 359. covered with men, with horses, and with arms. Sapor appeared in the front, conspicuous by the splendor of his purple. On his left hand, the place of honour among the Orientals, Grumbates, king of the Chionites, displayed the stern coun­tenance of an aged and renowned warrior. The monarch had reserved a similar place on his right hand for the king of the Albanians, who led his independent tribes from the shores of the Caspian. The fatraps and generals were distributed ac­cording to their several ranks, and the whole army, besides the numerous train of Oriental luxury, consisted of more than one hundred thou­sand effective men, inured to fatigue, and selec­ted from the bravest nations of Asia. The Ro­man deserter, who in some measure guided the councils of Sapor, had prudently advised, that, instead of wasting the summer in tedious and dif­ficult sieges, he should march directly to the Eu­phrates, and press forwards without delay to seize the feeble and wealthy metropolis of Syria. But the Persians were no sooner advanced into the plains of Mesopotomia, than they discovered that every precaution had been used which could re­tard their progress, or defeat their design. The inhabitants, with their cattle, were secured in [Page 205] places of strength, the green forage through­out the country was set on fire, the fords of the river were fortified by sharp stakes; mili­tary engines were planted on the opposite banks, and a seasonable swell of the waters of the Eu­phrates deterred the Barbarians from attempting the ordinary passage of the bridge of Thapsacus. Their skilful guide, changing his plan of opera­tions, then conducted the army by a longer cir­cuit, but through a fertile territory, towards the head of the Euphrates, where the infant river is reduced to a shallow and accessible stream. Sapor overlooked, with prudent disdain, the strength of Nisibis; but as he passed under the walls of Amida, he resolved to try whether the majesty of his presence would not awe the garrison into im­mediate submission. The sacrilegious insult of a random dart, which glanced against the royal tiara, convinced him of his error; and the indig­nant monarch listened with impatience to the advice of his ministers, who conjured him, not to sacrifice the success of his ambition to the gratifi­cation of his resentment. The following day Grumbates advanced towards the gates with a se­lect body of troops, and required the instant sur­render of the city, as the only atonement which could be accepted for such an act of rashness and insolence. His proposals were answered by a ge­neral discharge, and his only son, a beautiful and valiant youth, was pierced through the heart by a javelin, shot from one of the balistae. The fu­neral of the prince of the Chionites was celebrated according to the rites of his country; and the [Page 206] grief of his aged father was alleviated by the so­lemn promise of Sapor, that the guilty city of Amida should serve as a funeral pile to expiate the death, and to perpetuate the memory, of his son.

The ancient city of Amid or Amida ⁵⁵, which Siege of Amida. sometimes assumes the provincial appellation of Diarbekir ⁵⁶, is advantageously situate in a fertile plain, watered by the natural and artificial chan­nels of the Tigris, of which the least inconsider­able stream bends in a semicircular form round the eastern part of the city. The emperor Constan­tius had recently conferred on Amida the honour of his own name, and the additional fortifications of strong walls and lofty towers. It was provided with an arsenal of military engines, and the ordi­nary garrison had been reinforced to the amount of seven legions, when the place was invested by the arms of Sapor ⁵⁷. His first and most san­guine hopes depended on the success of a general [Page 207] assault. To the several nations which followed his standard their respective posts were assigned; the south to the Vertae, the north to the Alba­nians, the east to the Chionites, inflamed with grief and indignation; the west to the Segestans, the bravest of his warriors, who covered their front with a formidable line of Indian elephants ⁵⁸. The Persians, on every side, supported their ef­forts, and animated their courage; and the mo­narch himself, careless of his rank and safety, dis­played in the prosecution of the siege, the ardor of a youthful soldier. After an obstinate combat, the Barbarians were repulsed; they incessantly returned to the charge; they were again driven back with a dreadful slaughter, and two rebel le­gions of Gauls, who had been banished into the East, signalized their undisciplined courage by a nocturnal sally into the heart of the Persian camp. In one of the fiercest of these repeated assaults, Amida was betrayed by the treachery of a de­serter, who indicated to the Barbarians a secret and neglected staircase, scooped out of the rock that hangs over the stream of the Tigris. Se­venty chosen archers of the royal guard ascended in silence to the third story of a lofty tower which [Page 208] commanded the precipice; they elevated on high the Persian banner, the signal of confidence to the assailants, and of dismay to the besieged; and if this devoted band could have maintained their post a few minutes longer, the reduction of the place might have been purchased by the sacrifice of their lives. After Sapor had tried, without success, the efficacy of force and of stratagem, he had recourse to the slower but more certain opera­tions of a regular siege, in the conduct of which he was instructed by the skill of the Roman de­serters. The trenches were opened at a conve­nient distance, and the troops destined for that service advanced under the portable cover of strong hurdles, to fill up the ditch, and under­mine the foundations of the walls. Wooden towers were at the same time constructed, and moved forwards on wheels, till the soldiers, who were provided with every species of missile wea­pons, could engage almost on level ground with the troops who defended the rampart. Every mode of resistance which art could suggest, or courage could execute, was employed in the de­fence of Amida, and the works of Sapor were more than once destroyed by the fire of the Ro­mans. But the resources of a besieged city may be exhausted. The Persians repaired their losses, and pushed their approaches; a large breach was made by the battering-ram, and the strength of the garrison, wasted by the sword and by disease, yielded to the fury of the assault. The soldiers, the citizens, their wives, their children, all who [Page 209] had not time to escape through the opposite gate, were involved by the conquerors in a promiscuous massacre.

But the ruin of Amida was the safety of the Of Sin­gara, &c. Roman provinces. As soon as the first transports of victory had subsided, Sapor was at leisure to A. D. 360. reflect, that to chastise a disobedient city, he had lost the flower of his troops, and the most favour­able season for conquest ⁵⁹. Thirty thousand of his veterans had fallen under the walls of Amida, during the continuance of a siege which lasted seventy-three days; and the disappointed mo­narch returned to his capital with affected triumph and secret mortification. It is more than prob­able, that the inconstancy of his Barbarian allies was tempted to relinquish a war in which they had encountered such unexpected difficulties; and that the aged king of the Chionites, satiated with revenge, turned away with horror from a scene of action where he had been deprived of the hope of his family and nation. The strength as well as [Page 210] spirit of the army with which Sapor took the field in the ensuing spring, was no longer equal to the unbounded views of his ambition. Instead of aspiring to the conquest of the East, he was ob­liged to content himself with the reduction of two fortified cities of Mesopotamia, Singara and Bezabde ⁶⁰; the one situate in the midst of a sandy desert, the other in a small peninsula, surrounded almost on every side by the deep and rapid stream of the Tigris. Five Roman legions, of the di­minutive size, to which they had been reduced in the age of Constantine, were made prisoners, and sent into remote captivity on the extreme confines of Persia. After dismantling the walls of Singara, the conqueror abandoned that soli­tary and sequestered place; but he carefully re­stored the fortifications of Bezabde, and fixed in that important post a garrison or colony of ve­terans; amply supplied with every means of de­fence, and animated by high sentiments of ho­nour and fidelity. Towards the close of the cam­paign, the arms of Sapor incurred some disgrace by an unsuccessful enterprize against Virtha, or Tecrit, a strong, or, as it was universally esteem­ed till the age of Tamerlane, an impregnable fortress of the independent Arabs ⁶¹.

[Page 211] The defence of the East against the arms of Sapor, required and would have exercised the abilities of the most consummate general; and it Conduct of the Romans. seemed fortunate for the state, that it was the actual province of the brave Ursicinus, who alone deserved the confidence of the soldiers and people. In the hour of danger, Ursicinus ⁶² was removed from his station by the intrigues of the eunuchs; and the military command of the East was be­stowed, by the same influence, on Sabinian, a wealthy and subtle veteran, who had attained the infirmities, without acquiring the experience, of age. By a second order, which issued from the same jealous and inconstant counsels, Ursicinus was again dispatched to the frontier of Mesopota­mia, and condemned to sustain the labours of a war, the honours of which had been transferred to his unworthy rival. Sabinian fixed his indo­lent station under the walls of Edessa; and while he amused himself with the idle parade of military exercise, and moved to the sound of flutes in the Pyrrhic dance, the public defence was abandoned to the boldness and diligence of the former gene­ral of the East. But whenever Ursicinus recom­mended any vigorous plan of operations; when he proposed, at the head of a light and active army, to wheel round the foot of the mountains, to intercept the convoys of the enemy, to harass the wide extent of the Persian lines, and to re­lieve [Page 212] the distress of Amida; the timid and en­vious commander alleged, that he was restrained by his positive orders from endangering the safety of the troops. Amida was at length taken; its bravest defenders, who had escaped the sword of the Barbarians, died in the Roman camp by the hand of the executioner; and Ursicinus himself, after supporting the disgrace of a partial enquiry, was punished for the misconduct of Sabinian by the loss of his military rank. But Constantius soon experienced the truth of the prediction which honest indignation had extorted from his injured lieutenant, that as long as such maxims of go­vernment were suffered to prevail, the emperor himself would find it no easy task to defend his eastern dominions from the invasion of a foreign enemy. When he had subdued or pacified the Barbarians of the Danube, Constantius proceeded by slow marches into the East; and after he had wept over the smoking ruins of Amida, he formed, with a powerful army, the siege of Bezabde. The walls were shaken by the reiterated efforts of the most enormous of the battering-rams; the town was reduced to the last extremity; but it was still defended by the patient and intrepid valour of the garrison, till the approach of the rainy season ob­liged the emperor to raise the siege, and inglo­riously to retreat into his winter-quarters at An­tioch ⁶³. The pride of Constantius, and the in­genuity [Page 213] of his courtiers, were at a loss to dis­cover any materials for panegyric in the events of the Persian war; while the glory of his cousin Julian, to whose military command he had en­trusted the provinces of Gaul, was proclaimed to the world in the simple and concise narrative of his exploits.

In the blind fury of civil discord, Constantius Invasion of Gaul by the Germans. had abandoned to the Barbarians of Germany the countries of Gaul, which still acknowledged the authority of his rival. A numerous swarm of Franks and Alemanni were invited to cross the Rhine by presents and promises, by the hopes of spoil, and by a perpetual grant of all the territo­ries which they should be able to subdue ⁶⁴. But the emperor, who for a temporary service had thus imprudently provoked the rapacious spirit of the Barbarians, soon discovered and lamented the difficulty of dismissing these formidable allies, after they had tasted the richness of the Roman soil. Regardless of the nice distinction of loyalty and rebellion, these undisciplined robbers treated as their natural enemies all the subjects of the em­pire, who possessed any property which they were desirous of acquiring. Forty-five flourishing cities, Tongres, Cologne, Treves, Worms, Spires, Strasburgh, &c. besides a far greater number of [Page 214] towns and villages, were pillaged, and for the most part reduced to ashes. The Barbarians of Germany, still faithful to the maxims of their an­cestors, abhorred the confinement of walls, to which they applied the odious names of prisons and sepulchres; and fixing their independent ha­bitations on the banks of rivers, the Rhine, the Moselle, and the Meuse, they secured themselves against the danger of a surprise, by a rude and hasty fortification of large trees, which were felled and thrown across the roads. The Alemanni were established in the modern countries of Al­sace and Lorraine; the Franks occupied the island of the Batavians, together with an extensive dis­trict of Brabant, which was then known by the appellation of Toxandria ⁶⁵, and may deserve to be considered as the original seat of their Gallic monarchy ⁶⁶. From the sources, to the mouth, of the Rhine, the conquests of the Germans ex­tended above forty miles to the west of that river, over a country peopled by colonies of their own [Page 215] name and nation; and the scene of their de­vastations was three times more extensive than that of their conquests. At a still greater distance the open towns of Gaul were deserted, and the inhabitants of the fortified cities, who trusted to their strength and vigilance, were obliged to con­tent themselves with such supplies of corn as they could raise on the vacant land within the inclosure of their walls. The diminished legions, desti­tute of pay and provisions, of arms and disci­pline, trembled at the approach, and even at the name, of the Barbarians.

Under these melancholy circumstances, an un­experienced Conduct of Julian. youth was appointed to save and to govern the provinces of Gaul, or rather, as he expresses it himself, to exhibit the vain image of Imperial greatness. The retired scholastic edu­cation of Julian, in which he had been more con­versant with books than with arms, with the dead than with the living, left him in profound ignorance of the practical arts of war and govern­ment; and when he awkwardly repeated some military exercise which it was necessary for him to learn, he exclaimed with a sigh, ‘O Plato, Plato, what a task for a philosopher!’ Yet even this speculative philosophy, which men of busi­ness are too apt to despise, had filled the mind of Julian with the noblest precepts, and the most shining examples; had animated him with the love of virtue, the desire of fame, and the con­tempt of death. The habits of temperance re­commended in the schools, are still more essen­tial [Page 216] in the severe discipline of a camp. The simple wants of nature regulated the measure of his food and sleep. Rejecting with disdain the delicacies provided for his table, he satisfied his appetite with the coarse and common fare which was allotted to the meanest soldiers. During the rigour of a Gallic winter, he never suffered a fire in his bed-chamber; and after a short and inter­rupted slumber, he frequently rose in the middle of the night from a carpet spread on the floor, to dispatch any urgent business, to visit his rounds, or to steal a few moments for the prosecution of his favourite studies ⁶⁷. The precepts of elo­quence, which he had hitherto practised on fancied topics of declamation, were more usefully applied to excite or to assuage the passions of an armed multitude: and although Julian, from his early habits of conversation and literature, was more fa­miliarly acquainted with the beauties of the Greek language, he had attained a competent know­ledge of the Latin tongue ⁶⁸. Since Julian was not originally designed for the character of a le­gislator, or a judge, it is probable that the civil jurisprudence of the Romans had not engaged any considerable share of his attention: but he [Page 217] derived from his philosophic studies an inflexible regard for justice, tempered by a disposition to clemency; the knowledge of the general prin­ciples of equity and evidence, and the faculty of patiently investigating the most intricate and te­dious questions which could be proposed for his discussion. The measures of policy, and the ope­rations of war, must submit to the various acci­dents of circumstance and character, and the un­practised student will often be perplexed in the ap­plication of the most perfect theory. But in the acquisition of this important science, Julian was assisted by the active vigour of his own genius, as well as by the wisdom and experience of Sallust, an officer of rank, who soon conceived a sincere attachment for a prince so worthy of his friend­ship; and whose incorruptible integrity was adorned by the talent of insinuating the harshest truths, without wounding the delicacy of a royal ear ⁶⁹.

Immediately after Julian had received the His first campaign in Gaul, purple at Milan, he was sent into Gaul, with a feeble retinue of three hundred and sixty soldiers. A. D. 356. At Vienna, where he passed a painful and anxious winter, in the hands of those ministers to whom Constantius had entrusted the direction of his conduct, the Caesar was informed of the siege and [Page 218] deliverance of Autun. That large and antient city, protected only by a ruined wall and pusil­lanimous garrison, was saved by the generous re­solution of a few veterans, who resumed their arms for the defence of their country. In his march from Autun, through the heart of the Gallic provinces, Julian embraced with ardour the earliest opportunity of signalizing his courage. At the head of a small body of archers, and heavy cavalry, he preferred the shorter but the more dangerous of two roads; and sometimes eluding, and sometimes resisting, the attacks of the Barba­rians, who were masters of the field, he arrived with honour and safety at the camp near Rheims, where the Roman troops had been ordered to as­semble. The aspect of their young prince re­vived the drooping spirit of the soldiers, and they marched from Rheims in search of the enemy, with a confidence which had almost proved fatal to them. The Alemanni, familiarized to the knowledge of the country, secretly collected their scattered forces, and seizing the opportunity of a dark and rainy day, poured with unexpected fury on the rear-guard of the Romans. Before the in­evitable disorder could be remedied, two legions were destroyed; and Julian was taught by expe­rience, that caution and vigilance are the most important lessons of the art of war. In a second and more successful action, he recovered and estab­lished his military fame; but as the agility of the Barbarians saved them from the pursuit, his vic­tory was neither bloody nor decisive. He ad­vanced, however, to the banks of the Rhine, [Page 219] surveyed the ruins of Cologne, convinced himself of the difficulties of the war, and retreated on the approach of winter, discontented with the court, with his army, and with his own success ⁷⁰. The power of the enemy was yet unbroken; and the Caesar had no sooner separated his troops, and fixed his own quarters at Sens, in the centre of Gaul, than he was surrounded and besieged by a numerous host of Germans. Reduced in this ex­tremity to the resources of his own mind, he dis­played a prudent intrepidity which compensated for all the deficiencies of the place and garrison; and the Barbarians, at the end of thirty days, were obliged to retire with disappointed rage.

The conscious pride of Julian, who was in­debted His second campaign, only to his sword for this signal deliver­ance, was embittered by the reflection, that he A. D. 357. was abandoned, betrayed, and perhaps devoted to destruction, by those who were bound to assist him by every tie of honour and fidelity. Mar­cellus, master-general of the cavalry in Gaul, in­terpreting too strictly the jealous orders of the court, beheld with supine indifference the distress of Julian, and had restrained the troops under his command from marching to the relief of Sens. If the Caesar had dissembled in silence so danger­ous an insult, his person and authority would have been exposed to the contempt of the world; and if an action so criminal had been suffered to pass [Page 220] with impunity, the emperor would have confirmed the suspicions, which received a very specious co­lour from his past conduct towards the princes of the Flavian family. Marcellus was recalled, and gently dismissed from his office ⁷¹. In his room Severus was appointed general of the cavalry; an experienced soldier, of approved courage and fidelity, who could advise with respect, and exe­cute with zeal; and who submitted, without re­luctance, to the supreme command which Julian, by the interest of his patroness Eusebia, at length obtained over the armies of Gaul ⁷². A very ju­dicious plan of operations was adopted for the ap­proaching campaign. Julian himself, at the head of the remains of the veteran bands, and of some new levies which he had been permitted to form, boldly penetrated into the centre of the German cantonments, and carefully re-established the for­tifications of Saverne, in an advantageous post, which would either check the incursions, or in­tercept the retreat, of the enemy. At the same time Barbatio, general of the infantry, advanced from Milan with an army of thirty thousand men, and passing the mountains, prepared to throw a bridge over the Rhine, in the neighbourhood of Basil. It was reasonable to expect that the Ale­manni, pressed on either side by the Roman arms, [Page 221] would soon be forced to evacuate the provinces of Gaul, and to hasten to the defence of their native country. But the hopes of the campaign were defeated by the incapacity, or the envy, or the se­cret instructions, of Barbatio; who acted as if he had been the enemy of the Caesar, and the secret ally of the Barbarians. The negligence with which he permitted a troop of pillagers freely to pass, and to return almost before the gates of his camp, may be imputed to his want of abilities; but the treasonable act of burning a number of boats, and a superfluous stock of provisions, which would have been of the most essential service to the army of Gaul, was an evidence of his hostile and criminal intentions. The Germans despised an enemy who appeared destitute either of power or of inclination to offend them; and the igno­minious retreat of Barbatio deprived Julian of the expected support; and left him to extricate him­self from a hazardous situation, where he could neither remain with safety, nor retire with ho­nour ⁷³.

As soon as they were delivered from the fears of invasion, the Alemanni prepared to chastise the Battle of Stras­burgh, Roman youth, who presumed to dispute the pos­session A. D. 357, August. of that country, which they claimed as their own by the right of conquest and of treaties. They employed three days, and as many nights, in transporting over the Rhine their military powers. The fierce Chnodomar, shaking the [Page 222] ponderous javelin, which he had victoriously wielded against the brother of Magnentius, led the van of the Barbarians, and moderated by his experience the martial ardour which his example inspired ⁷⁴. He was followed by six other kings, by ten princes of regal extraction, by a long train of high-spirited nobles, and by thirty-five thou­sand of the bravest warriors of the tribes of Ger­many. The confidence derived from the view of their own strength, was encreased by the intelli­gence which they received from a deserter, that the Caesar, with a feeble army of thirteen thou­sand men, occupied a post about one-and-twenty miles from their camp of Strasburgh. With this inadequate force, Julian resolved to seek and to encounter the Barbarian host; and the chance of a general action was preferred to the tedious and uncertain operation of separately engaging the dispersed parties of the Alemanni. The Romans marched in close order, and in two columns, the cavalry on the right, the infantry on the left; and the day was so far spent when they appeared in sight of the enemy, that Julian was desirous of deferring the battle till the next morning, and of allowing his troops to recruit their exhausted strength by the necessary refreshments of sleep and food. Yielding, however, with some reluctance, [Page 223] to the clamours of the soldiers, and even to the opinion of his council, he exhorted them to jus­tify by their valour the eager impatience, which, in case of a defeat, would be universally branded with the epithets of rashness and presumption. The trumpets sounded, the military shout was heard through the field, and the two armies rush­ed with equal fury to the charge. The Caesar, who conducted in person his right wing, depended on the dexterity of his archers, and the weight of his cuirassiers. But his ranks were instantly bro­ken by an irregular mixture of light-horse and of light-infantry, and he had the mortification of beholding the flight of six hundred of his most renowned cuirassiers ⁷⁵. The fugitives were stop­ped and rallied by the presence and authority of Julian, who, careless of his own safety, threw himself before them, and urging every motive of shame and honour, led them back against the vic­torious enemy. The conflict between the two lines of infantry was obstinate and bloody. The Germans possessed the superiority of strength and stature, the Romans that of discipline and tem­per; and as the Barbarians, who served under the standard of the empire, united the respective advantages of both parties, their strenuous efforts, guided by a skilful leader, at length determined the event of the day. The Romans lost four tribunes, and two hundred and forty-three sol­diers, [Page 224] in this memorable battle of Strasburgh, so glorious to the Caesar ⁷⁶, and so salutary to the afflicted provinces of Gaul. Six thousand of the Alemanni were slain in the field, without includ­ing those who were drowned in the Rhine, or transfixed with darts whilst they attempted to swim across the river ⁷⁷. Chnodomar himself was surrounded and taken prisoner, with three of his brave companions, who had devoted themselves to follow in life or death the fate of their chief­tain. Julian received him with military pomp in the council of his officers; and expressing a ge­nerous pity for the fallen state, dissembled his in­ward contempt for the abject humiliation of his captive. Instead of exhibiting the vanquished king of the Alemanni, as a grateful spectacle to the cities of Gaul, he respectfully laid at the feet of the emperor this splendid trophy of his victory. Chnodomar experienced an honourable treatment: but the impatient Barbarian could not long [Page 225] survive his defeat, his confinement, and his exile ⁷⁸.

After Julian had repulsed the Alemanni from Julian sub­dues the Franks, the provinces of the Upper Rhine, he turned his arms against the Franks, who were seated nearer A. D. 358. to the ocean on the confines of Gaul and Ger­many; and who, from their numbers, and still more from their intrepid valour, had ever been esteemed the most formidable of the Barba­rians ⁷⁹. Although they were strongly actuated by the allurements of rapine, they professed a dis­interested love of war; which they considered as the supreme honour and felicity of human nature; and their minds and bodies were so completely hardened by perpectual action, that, according to the lively expression of an orator, the snows of winter were as pleasant to them as the flowers of spring. In the month of December, which followed the battle of Strasburg, Julian attacked a body of six hundred Franks, who had thrown themselves into two castles on the Meuse ⁸⁰. In the midst of that severe season they sustained, with inflexible constancy, a siege of fifty-four days; till at length, exhausted by hunger, and satisfied that the vigilance of the enemy in breaking the ice of the river, left them no hopes of escape, the [Page 226] Franks consented, for the first time, to dispense with the ancient law which commanded them to conquer or to die. The Caesar immediately sent his captives to the court of Constantius, who ac­cepting them as a valuable present ⁸¹, rejoiced in the opportunity of adding so many heroes to the choicest troops of his domestic guards. The ob­stinate resistance of this handful of Franks, ap­prised Julian of the difficulties of the expedition which he meditated for the ensuing spring, against the whole body of the nation. His rapid dili­gence surprised and astonished the active Bar­barians. Ordering his soldiers to provide them­selves with biscuit for twenty days, he suddenly pitched his camp near Tongres, while the enemy still supposed him in his winter-quarters of Paris, expecting the slow arrival of his convoys from Aquitain. Without allowing the Franks to unite or to deliberate, he skilfully spread his legions from Cologne to the ocean; and by the terror, as well as by the success of his arms, soon reduced the suppliant tribes to implore the cle­mency, and to obey the commands, of their con­queror. The Chamavians submissively retired to their former habitations beyond the Rhine: but the Salians were permitted to possess their new establishment of Toxandria, as the subjects and [Page 227] auxiliaries of the Roman empire ⁸². The treaty was ratified by solemn oaths; and perpetual in­spectors were appointed to reside among the Franks, with the authority of enforcing the strict observance of the conditions. An incident is re­lated, interesting enough in itself, and by no means repugnant to the character of Julian, who ingeni­ously contrived both the plot and the catastrophe of the tragedy. When the Chamavians sued for peace, he required the son of their king, as the only hostage in whom he could rely. A mournful silence, interrupted by tears and groans, declared the sad perplexity of the Barbarians; and their aged chief lamented in pathetic lan­guage, that his private loss was now embittered by a sense of the public calamity. While the Chamavians lay prostrate at the foot of his throne, the royal captive, whom they believed to have been slain, unexpectedly appeared before their eyes; and as soon as the tumult of joy was hushed into attention, the Caesar addressed the assembly in the following terms: ‘Behold the son, the prince, whom you wept. You had lost him by your fault. God and the Romans have restored him to you. I shall still preserve and educate the youth, rather as a monument of my own virtue, than as a pledge of your sin­cerity. Should you presume to violate the [Page 228] faith which you have sworn, the arms of the republic will avenge the perfidy, not on the innocent, but on the guilty.’ The Barbarians withdrew from his presence, impressed with the warmest sentiments of gratitude and admira­tion ⁸³.

It was not enough for Julian to have delivered Makes three ex­peditions beyond the Rhine, the provinces of Gaul from the Barbarians of Germany. He aspired to emulate the glory of the first and most illustrious of the emperors; after A. D. 357, 358, 359. whose example, he composed his own commen­taries of the Gallic war ⁸⁴. Caesar has related, with conscious pride, the manner in which he twice passed the Rhine. Julian could boast, that before he assumed the title of Augustus, he had carried the Roman Eagles beyond that great river in three successful expeditions ⁸⁵. The consterna­tion of the Germans, after the battle of Strasburgh, encouraged him to the first attempt; and the reluctance of the troops soon yielded to the persuasive eloquence of a leader, who shared the fatigues and dangers which he imposed on the meanest of the soldiers. The villages on either [Page 229] side of the Meyn, which were plentifully stored with corn and cattle, felt the ravages of an in­vading army. The principal houses, constructed with some imitation of Roman elegance, were consumed by the flames; and the Caesar boldly advanced about ten miles, till his progress was stopped by a dark and impenetrable forest, under­mined by subterraneous passages, which threaten­ed, with secret snares and ambush, every step of the assailant. The ground was already covered with snow; and Julian, after repairing an ancient castle which had been erected by Trajan, granted a truce of ten months to the submissive Bar­barians. At the expiration of the truce, Julian undertook a second expedition beyond the Rhine, to humble the pride of Surmar and Hortaire, two of the kings of the Alemanni, who had been pre­sent at the battle of Strasburgh. They promised to restore all the Roman captives who yet remain­ed alive; and as the Caesar had procured an ex­act account from the cities and villages of Gaul, of the inhabitants whom they had lost, he detected every attempt to deceive him with a degree of readiness and accuracy, which almost established the belief of his supernatural knowledge. His third expedition was still more splendid and im­portant than the two former. The Germans had collected their military powers, and moved along the opposite banks of the river, with a design of destroying the bridge, and of preventing the pas­sage of the Romans. But this judicious plan of defence was disconcerted by a skilful diversion. Three hundred light armed and active soldiers [Page 230] were detached in forty small boats, to fall down the stream in silence, and to land at some distance from the posts of the enemy. They executed their orders with so much boldness and celerity, that they had almost surprised the Barbarian chiefs, who returned in the fearless confidence of intoxi­cation from one of their nocturnal festivals. Without repeating the uniform and disgusting tale of slaughter and devastation, it is sufficient to observe, that Julian dictated his own conditions of peace to six of the haughtiest kings of the Alemanni, three of whom were permitted to view the severe discipline and martial pomp of a Ro­man camp. Followed by twenty thousand cap­tives, whom he had rescued from the chains of the Barbarians, the Caesar repassed the Rhine, after terminating a war, the success of which has been compared to the ancient glories of the Punic and Cimbric victories.

As soon as the valour and conduct of Julian Restores the cities of Gaul. had secured an interval of peace, he applied him­self to a work more congenial to his humane and philosophic temper. The cities of Gaul, which had suffered from the inroads of the Barbarians, he diligently repaired; and seven important posts, between Mentz and the mouth of the Rhine, are particularly mentioned, as having been rebuilt and fortified by the order of Julian ⁸⁶. The van­quished [Page 231] Germans had submitted to the just but humiliating condition of preparing and convey­ing the necessary materials. The active zeal of Julian urged the prosecution of the work; and such was the spirit which he had diffused among the troops, that the auxiliaries themselves, waving their exemption from any duties of fatigue, con­tended in the most servile labours with the dili­gence of the Roman soldiers. It was incumbent on the Caesar to provide for the subsistence, as well as for the safety, of the inhabitants and of the garrisons. The desertion of the former, and the mutiny of the latter, must have been the fatal and inevitable consequences of famine. The tillage of the provinces of Gaul had been inter­rupted by the calamities of war; but the scanty harvests of the continent were supplied, by his pa­ternal care, from the plenty of the adjacent island. Six hundred large barks, framed in the forest of the Ardennes, made several voyages to the coast of Britain; and returning from thence laden with corn, sailed up the Rhine, and distributed their cargoes to the several towns and fortresses along the banks of the river ⁸⁷. The arms of Julian had [Page 232] restored a free and secure navigation, which Con­stantius had offered to purchase at the expence of his dignity, and of a tributary present of two thou­sand pounds of silver. The emperor parsimo­niously refused to his soldiers the sums which he granted with a lavish and trembling hand to the Barbarians. The dexterity, as well as the firm­ness of Julian, was put to a severe trial, when he took the field with a discontented army, which had already served two campaigns, without re­ceiving any regular pay or any extraordinary donative ⁸⁸.

A tender regard for the peace and happiness of Civil ad­ministra­tion of Julian. his subjects, was the ruling principle which di­rected, or seemed to direct, the administration of Julian ⁸⁹. He devoted the leisure of his winter-quarters to the offices of civil government; and affected to assume, with more pleasure, the cha­racter of a magistrate than that of a general. Be­fore he took the field, he devolved on the pro­vincial governors, most of the public and private causes which had been referred to his tribunal; but, on his return, he carefully revised their pro­ceedings, mitigated the rigour of the law, and pronounced a second judgment on the judges themselves. Superior to the last temptation of virtuous minds, an indiscreet and intemperate zeal for justice, he restrained, with calmness and dignity, the warmth of an advocate who prose­cuted, [Page 233] for extortion, the president of the Nar­bonnese province. ‘Who will ever be found guilty, exclaimed the vehement Delphidius, if it be enough to deny?’ ‘and who, replied Julian, will ever be innocent, if it is sufficient to affirm?’ In the general administration of peace and war, the interest of the sovereign is commonly the same as that of his people; but Constantius would have thought himself deeply injured, if the virtues of Julian had defrauded him of any part of the tribute which he extorted from an oppressed and exhausted country. The prince who was invested with the ensigns of royalty, might sometimes presume to correct the rapacious insolence of the inferior agents; to ex­pose their corrupt arts, and to introduce an equal and easier mode of collection. But the manage­ment of the finances was more safely entrusted to Florentius, Praetorian praefect of Gaul, an effe­minate tyrant, incapable of pity or remorse; and the haughty minister complained of the most decent and gentle opposition, while Julian himself was rather inclined to censure the weakness of his own behaviour. The Caesar had rejected with abhorrence, a mandate for the levy of an extra­ordinary tax; a new superdiction, which the prae­fect had offered for his signature; and the faithful picture of the public misery, by which he had been obliged to justify his refusal, offended the court of Constantius. We may enjoy the plea­sure of reading the sentiments of Julian, as he ex­presses them with warmth and freedom in a letter to one of his most intimate friends. After stating [Page 234] his own conduct, he proceeds in the following terms: ‘Was it possible for the disciple of Plato and Aristotle to act otherwise than I have done? Could I abandon the unhappy subjects entrusted to my care? Was I not called upon to defend them from the repeated injuries of these unfeeling robbers? A tribune who de­serts his post is punished with death, and de­prived of the honours of burial. With what justice could I pronounce his sentence, if, in the hour of danger, I myself neglected a duty far more sacred and far more important? God has placed me in this elevated post; his pro­vidence will guard and support me. Should I be condemned to suffer, I shall derive comfort from the testimony of a pure and upright con­science. Would to heaven, that I still possessed a counsellor like Sallust! If they think proper to send me a successor, I shall submit without reluctance; and had much rather improve the short opportunity of doing good, than enjoy a long and lasting impunity of evil ⁹⁰.’ The precarious and dependent situation of Julian dis­played his virtues, and concealed his defects. The young hero who supported, in Gaul, the throne of Constantius, was not permitted to reform the vices of the government; but he had courage to alleviate or to pity the distress of the people. Unless he had been able to revive the martial [Page 235] spirit of the Romans, or to introduce the arts of industry and refinement among their savage ene­mies, he could not entertain any rational hopes of securing the public tranquillity, either by the peace or conquest of Germany. Yet the victories of Julian suspended, for a short time, the inroads of the Barbarians, and delayed the ruin of the Western Empire.

His salutary influence restored the cities of Descrip­tion of Paris. Gaul, which had been so long exposed to the evils of civil discord, Barbarian war, and domestic tyranny; and the spirit of industry was revived with the hopes of enjoyment. Agriculture, ma­nufactures and commerce again flourished under the protection of the laws; and the curiae, or civil corporations, were again filled with useful and respectable members: the youth were no longer apprehensive of marriage; and married persons were no longer apprehensive of posterity: the public and private festivals were celebrated with customary pomp; and the frequent and secure intercourse of the provinces displayed the image of national prosperity ⁹¹. A mind like that of Julian, must have felt the general happiness of which he was the author; but he viewed, with peculiar satisfaction and complacency, the city of Paris; the seat of his winter residence, and the object even of his partial affection ⁹². That splen­did [Page 236] capital, which now embraces an ample terri­tory on either side of the Seine, was originally confined to the small island in the midst of the river, from whence the inhabitants derived a supply of pure and salubrious water. The river bathed the foot of the walls; and the town was accessible only by two wooden bridges. A forest overspread the northern side of the Seine; but on the south, the ground, which now bears the name of the University, was insensibly covered with houses, and adorned with a palace and amphi­theatre, baths, an aqueduct, and a field of Mars for the exercise of the Roman troops. The se­verity of the climate was tempered by the neigh­bourhood of the ocean; and with some precau­tions, which experience had taught, the vine and fig-tree were successfully cultivated. But, in re­markable winters, the Seine was deeply frozen; and the huge pieces of ice that floated down the stream, might be compared, by an Asiatic, to the blocks of white marble which were extracted from the quarries of Phrygia. The licentiousness and corruption of Antioch, recalled to the memory of Julian the severe and simple manners of his beloved Lutetia ⁹³; where the amusements of the theatre were unknown or despised. He indig­nantly contrasted the effeminate Syrians with the brave and honest simplicity of the Gauls, and al­most [Page 237] forgave the intemperance, which was the only stain of the Celtic character ⁹⁴. If Julian could now revisit the capital of France, he might converse with men of science and genius, capable of understanding and of instructing a disciple of the Greeks; he might excuse the lively and grace­ful follies of a nation, whose martial spirit has never been enervated by the indulgence of luxury; and he must applaud the perfection of that inesti­mable art, which softens and refines and embel­lishes the intercourse of social life.

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

In the consideration of a subject which may be Date of the conversion of Con­stantine. examined with impartiality, but cannot be viewed with indifference, a difficulty immediately arises of a very unexpected nature; that of ascertaining the real and precise date of the conversion of Con­stantine. The eloquent Lactantius, in the midst A. D. 306. of his court, seems impatient ¹ to proclaim to the [Page 239] world the glorious example of the sovereign of Gaul; who, in the first moments of his reign, ac­knowledged and adored the majesty of the true and only God ². The learned Eusebius has as­cribed the faith of Constantine to the miraculous sign which was displayed in the heavens whilst he meditated and prepared the Italian expedition ³. A. D. 312. The historian Zosimus maliciously asserts, that the emperor had embrued his hands in the blood of his eldest son, before he publicly renounced the gods of Rome and of his ancestors ⁴. The per­plexity A. D. 326. produced by these discordant authorities, is derived from the behaviour of Constantine him­self. According to the strictness of ecclesiastical language, the first of the Christian emperors was unworthy of that name, till the moment of his death; since it was only during his last illness A. D. 337. that he received, as a catechumen, the imposition [Page 240] of hands ⁵, and was afterwards admitted, by the initiatory rites of baptism, into the number of the faithful ⁶. The Christianity of Constantine must be allowed in a much more vague and qua­lified sense; and the nicest accuracy is required in tracing the slow and almost imperceptible grada­tions by which the monarch declared himself the protector, and at length the proselyte, of the church. It was an arduous task to eradicate the habits and prejudices of his education, to ac­knowledge the divine power of Christ, and to un­derstand that the truth of his revelation was in­compatible with the worship of the gods. The obstacles which he had probably experienced in his own mind, instructed him to proceed with caution in the momentous change of a national religion; and he insensibly discovered his new opinions, as far as he could enforce them with [Page 241] safety and with effect. During the whole course of his reign, the stream of Christianity flowed with a gentle, though accelerated, motion: but its general direction was sometimes checked, and sometimes diverted, by the accidental circum­stances of the times, and by the prudence, or pos­sibly by the caprice, of the monarch. His mini­sters were permitted to signify the intentions of their master in the various language which was best adapted to their respective principles; ⁷ and he artfully balanced the hopes and fears of his sub­jects, by publishing in the same year two edicts; A. D. 321. the first of which enjoined the solemn observance of Sunday, ⁸, and the second directed the regular consultation of the Aruspices ⁹. While this im­portant revolution yet remained in suspense, the Christians and the Pagans watched the conduct of their sovereign with the same anxiety, but with very opposite sentiments. The former were prompted by every motive of zeal, as well as va­nity, to exaggerate the marks of his favour, and the evidences of his faith. The latter, till their just apprehensions were changed into despair and [Page 242] resentment, attempted to conceal from the world, and from themselves, that the gods of Rome could no longer reckon the emperor in the num­ber of their votaries. The same passions and pre­judices have engaged the partial writers of the times to connect the public profession of Chris­tianity with the most glorious or the most igno­minious aera of the reign of Constantine.

Whatever symptoms of Christian piety might His Pagan supersti­tion. transpire in the discourses or actions of Constan­tine, he persevered till he was near forty years of age in the practice of the established religion ¹⁰; and the same conduct which in the court of Nico­media might be imputed to his fear, could be ascribed only to the inclination or policy of the sovereign of Gaul. His liberality restored and enriched the temples of the gods: the medals which issued from his Imperial mint are impressed with the figures and attributes of Jupiter and Apollo, of Mars and Hercules; and his filial piety increased the council of Olympus by the solemn apotheosis of his father Constantius ¹¹. But the devotion of Constantine was more peculiarly di­rected to the genius of the Sun, the Apollo of Greek and Roman mythology; and he was pleased to be represented with the symbols of the [Page 243] God of Light and Poetry. The unerring shafts of that deity, the brightness of his eyes, his laurel wreath, immortal beauty, and elegant accom­plishments, seem to point him out as the patron of a young hero. The altars of Apollo were crowned with the votive offerings of Constantine; and the credulous multitude were taught to be­lieve, that the emperor was permitted to behold with mortal eyes the visible majesty of their tu­telar deity; and that, either waking or in a vision, he was blessed with the auspicious omens of a long and victorious reign. The Sun was universally celebrated as the invincible guide and protector of Constantine; and the Pagans might reasonably expect that the insulted god would pursue with unrelenting vengeance the impiety of his ungrate­ful favourite ¹².

As long as Constantine exercised a limited He pro­tects the Christians of Gaul, sovereignty over the provinces of Gaul, his Chris­tian subjects were protected by the authority, and perhaps by the laws, of a prince, who wisely left A. D. 306—312. to the gods the care of vindicating their own ho­nour. If we may credit the assertion of Constan­tine himself, he had been an indignant spectator of the savage cruelties which were inflicted, by the hands of Roman soldiers, on those citizens whose religion was their only crime ¹³ In the East and [Page 244] in the West, he had seen the different effects of severity and indulgence; and as the former was rendered still more odious by the example of Ga­lerius, his implacable enemy, the latter was re­commended to his imitation by the authority and advice of a dying father. The son of Constan­tius immediately suspended or repealed the edicts of persecution, and granted the free exercise of their religious ceremonies to all those who had al­ready professed themselves members of the church. They were soon encouraged to depend on the favour as well as on the justice of their sovereign, who had imbibed a secret and sincere reverence for the name of Christ, and for the God of the Christians ¹⁴.

About five months after the conquest of Italy, A. D. 313, March. the emperor made a solemn and authentic decla­ration of his sentiments, by the celebrated edict Edict of Milan. of Milan, which restored peace to the Catholic church. In the personal interview of the two western princes, Constantine, by the ascendant of genius and power, obtained the ready concur­rence of his colleague Licinius; the union of their names and authority disarmed the fury of Maximin; and, after the death of the tyrant of the East, the edict of Milan was received as a ge­neral and fundamental law of the Roman world ¹⁵. [Page 245] The wisdom of the emperors provided for the restitution of all the civil and religious rights of which the Christians had been so unjustly deprived. It was enacted, that the places of worship, and public lands, which had been confiscated, should be restored to the church, without dispute, without delay, and without expence: and this severe in­junction was accompanied with a gracious pro­mise, that if any of the purchasers had paid a fair and adequate price, they should be indemnified from the Imperial treasury. The salutary regu­lations which guard the future tranquillity of the faithful, are framed on the principles of enlarged and equal toleration; and such an equality must have been interpreted by a recent sect as an ad­vantageous and honourable distinction. The two emperors proclaim to the world, that they have granted a free and absolute power to the Chris­tians, and to all others, of following the religion which each individual thinks proper to prefer, to which he has addicted his mind, and which he may deem the best adapted to his own use. They carefully explain every ambiguous word, remove every exception, and exact from the governors of the provinces a strict obedience to the true and simple meaning of an edict, which was designed to establish and secure, without any limitation, the claims of religious liberty. They condescend to assign two weighty reasons which have induced them to allow this universal toleration: the hu­mane intention of consulting the peace and hap­piness [Page 246] of their people; and the pious hope, that, by such a conduct, they shall appease and pro­pitiate the Deity, whose seat is in heaven. They gratefully acknowledge the many signal proofs which they have received of the divine favour; and they trust that the same Providence will for ever continue to protect the prosperity of the prince and people. From these vague and inde­finite expressions of piety, three suppositions may be deduced, of a different, but not of an incom­patible, nature. The mind of Constantine might fluctuate between the Pagan and the Christian re­ligions. According to the loose and complying notions of polytheism, he might acknowledge the God of the Christians as one of the many deities who composed the hierarchy of heaven. Or per­haps he might embrace the philosophic and pleas­ing idea, that, notwithstanding the variety of names, of rites, and of opinions, all the sects and all the nations of mankind are united in the wor­ship of the common Father and Creator of the universe ¹⁶.

But the counsels of princes are more frequently influenced by views of temporal advantage, than Use and beauty of the Christ­ian mo­rality. by considerations of abstract and speculative truth. The partial and increasing favour of Constantine [Page 247] may naturally be referred to the esteem which he entertained for the moral character of the Chris­tians; and to a persuasion, that the propagation of the gospel would inculcate the practice of pri­vate and public virtue. Whatever latitude an absolute monarch may assume in his own conduct, whatever indulgence he may claim for his own passions, it is undoubtedly his interest that all his subjects should respect the natural and civil obliga­tions of society. But the operation of the wisest laws is imperfect and precarious. They seldom inspire virtue, they cannot always restrain vice. Their power is insufficient to prohibit all that they condemn, nor can they always punish the actions which they prohibit. The legislators of antiquity had summoned to their aid the powers of educa­tion and of opinion. But every principle which had once maintained the vigour and purity of Rome and Sparta, was long since extinguished in a declining and despotic empire. Philosophy still exercised her temperate sway over the human mind, but the cause of virtue derived very feeble support from the influence of the Pagan supersti­tion. Under these discouraging circumstances, a prudent magistrate might observe with pleasure the progress of a religion which diffused among the people a pure, benevolent, and universal sys­tem of ethics, adapted to every duty and every condition of life; recommended as the will and reason of the Supreme Deity, and enforced by the sanction of eternal rewards or punishments. The experience of Greek and Roman history could not inform the world how far the system of national [Page 248] manners might be reformed and improved by the precepts of a divine revelation; and Constantine might listen with some confidence to the flattering, and indeed reasonable, assurances of Lactantius. The eloquent apologist seemed firmly to expect, and almost ventured to promise, that the esta­blishment of Christianity would restore the inno­cence and felicity of the primitive age; that the worship of the true God would extinguish war and dissension among those who mutually considered themselves as the children of a common parent; that every impure desire, every angry or selfish passion, would be restrained by the knowledge of the gospel; and that the magistrates might sheath the sword of justice among a people who would be universally actuated by the sentiments of truth and piety, of equity and moderation, of harmony and universal love ¹⁷.

The passive and unresisting obedience, which Theory and prac­tice of pas­sive obedi­ence. bows under the yoke of authority, or even of op­pression, must have appeared, in the eyes of an absolute monarch, the most conspicuous and use­ful of the evangelic virtues ¹⁸. The primitive Christians derived the institution of civil govern­ment, not from the consent of the people, but from the decrees of heaven. The reigning em­peror, though he had usurped the sceptre by trea­son [Page 249] and murder, immediately assumed the sacred character of vicegerent of the Deity. To the Deity alone he was accountable for the abuse of his power; and his subjects were indissolubly bound, by their oath of fidelity, to a tyrant, who had violated every law of nature and society. The humble Christians were sent into the world as sheep among wolves; and since they were not permitted to employ force, even in the defence of their religion, they should be still more criminal if they were tempted to shed the blood of their fellow-creatures, in disputing the vain privileges, or the sordid possessions, of this transitory life. Faithful to the doctrine of the apostle, who in the reign of Nero had preached the duty of un­conditional submission, the Christians of the three first centuries preserved their conscience pure and innocent of the guilt of secret conspiracy, or open rebellion. While they experienced the rigour of persecution, they were never provoked either to meet their tyrants in the field, or indignantly to withdraw themselves into some remote and se­questered corner of the globe ¹⁹. The protestants of France, of Germany, and of Britain, who as­serted with such intrepid courage their civil and religious freedom, have been insulted by the in­vidious comparison between the conduct of the [Page 250] primitive and of the reformed Christians ²⁰. Per­haps, instead of censure, some applause may be due to the superior sense and spirit of our an­cestors, who had convinced themselves that re­ligion cannot abolish the unalienable rights of human nature ²¹. Perhaps the patience of the primitive church may be ascribed to its weakness, as well as to its virtue. A sect of unwarlike ple­beians, without leaders, without arms, without fortifications, must have encountered inevitable destruction in a rash and fruitless resistance to the master of the Roman legions. But the Christians, when they deprecated the wrath of Diocletian, or solicited the favour of Constantine, could allege, with truth and confidence, that they held the prin­ciple of passive obedience, and that, in the space of three centuries, their conduct had always been conformable to their principles. They might add, that the throne of the emperors would be established on a fixed and permanent basis, if all their subjects embracing the Christian doctrine, should learn to suffer and to obey.

In the general order of Providence, princes and Divine right of Constan­tine. tyrants are considered as the ministers of Heaven, appointed to rule or to chastise the nations of the earth. But sacred history affords many illustrious [Page 251] examples of the more immediate interposition of the Deity in the government of his chosen people. The sceptre and the sword were committed to the hands of Moses, of Joshua, of Gideon, of David, of the Maccabees; the virtues of those heroes were the motive or the effect of the Divine favour, the success of their arms was destined to atchieve the deliverance or the triumph of the church. If the judges of Israel were occasional and tem­porary magistrates, the kings of Judah derived from the royal unction of their great ancestor, an hereditary and indefeasible right, which could not be forfeited by their own vices, nor recalled by the caprice of their subjects. The same extraor­dinary providence, which was no longer confined to the Jewish people, might elect Constantine and his family as the protectors of the Christian world; and the devout Lactantius announces, in a pro­phetic tone, the future glories of his long and universal reign ²². Galerius and Maximin, Max­entius and Licinius, were the rivals who shared with the favourite of heaven the provinces of the empire. The tragic deaths of Galerius and Maxi­min soon gratified the resentment, and fulfilled the sanguine expectations, of the Christians. The success of Constantine against Maxentius and Li­cinius, removed the two formidable competitors who still opposed the triumph of the second David, and his cause might seem to claim the peculiar interposition of Providence. The cha­racter [Page 252] of the Roman tyrant disgraced the purple and human nature; and though the Christians might enjoy his precarious favour, they were ex­posed, with the rest of his subjects, to the effects of his wanton and capricious cruelty. The con­duct of Licinius soon betrayed the reluctance with which he had consented to the wise and hu­mane regulations of the edict of Milan. The convocation of provincial synods was prohibited in his dominions; his Christian officers were ig­nominiously dismissed; and if he avoided the guilt, or rather danger, of a general persecution, his partial oppressions were rendered still more odious, by the violation of a solemn and volun­tary engagement ²³. While the East, according to the lively expression of Eusebius, was involved in the shades of infernal darkness, the auspicious rays of celestial light warmed and illuminated the provinces of the West. The piety of Constantine was admitted as an unexceptionable proof of the justice of his arms; and his use of victory con­firmed the opinion of the Christians, that their hero was inspired, and conducted, by the Lord of Hosts. The conquest of Italy produced a gene­ral edict of toleration: and as soon as the defeat of Licinius had invested Constantine with the sole dominion of the Roman world, he immediately, A. D. 324. by circular letters, exhorted all his subjects to imitate, without delay, the example of their sove­reign, [Page 253] and to embrace the divine truth of Christi­anity ²⁴.

The assurance that the elevation of Constan­tine Loyalty and zeal of the Christ­ian party. was intimately connected with the designs of Providence, instilled into the minds of the Christ­ians two opinions, which, by very different means, assisted the accomplishment of the prophecy. Their warm and active loyalty exhausted in his favour every resource of human industry; and they confidently expected that their strenuous ef­forts would be seconded by some divine and mira­culous aid. The enemies of Constantine have imputed to interested motives the alliance which he insensibly contracted with the Catholic church, and which apparently contributes to the success of his ambition. In the beginning of the fourth century, the Christians still bore a very inadequate proportion to the inhabitants of the empire; but among a degenerate people, who viewed the change of masters with the indifference of slaves, the spirit and union of a religious party might as­sist the popular leader, to whose service, from a principle of conscience, they had devoted their lives and fortunes ²⁵. The example of his father had instructed Constantine to esteem and to re­ward the merit of the Christians; and in the dis­tribution [Page 254] of public offices, he had the advantage of strengthening his government, by the choice of ministers or generals, in whose fidelity he could repose a just and unreserved confidence. By the influence of these dignified missionaries, the pro­selytes of the new faith must have multiplied in the court and army; the Barbarians of Germany, who filled the ranks of the legions, were of a care­less temper, which acquiesced without resistance in the religion of their commander; and when they passed the Alps, it may fairly be presumed, that a great number of the soldiers had already consecrated their swords to the service of Christ and of Constantine ²⁶. The habits of mankind, and the interest of religion, gradually abated the horror of war and bloodshed, which had so long prevailed among the Christians; and in the coun­cils which were assembled under the gracious pro­tection of Constantine, the authority of the bishops was seasonably employed to ratify the obligation of the military oath, and to inflict the penalty of excommunication on those soldiers who threw away their arms during the peace of the church ²⁷. While Constantine, in his own dominions, en­creased the number and zeal of his faithful ad­herents, he could depend on the support of a [Page 255] powerful faction in those provinces, which were still possessed or usurped by his rivals. A secret disaffection was diffused among the Christian subjects of Maxentius and Licinius; and the re­sentment which the latter did not attempt to con­ceal, served only to engage them still more deeply in the interest of his competitor. The regular correspondence which connected the bishops of the most distant provinces, enabled them freely to communicate their wishes and their designs, and to transmit without danger any useful intelli­gence, or any pious contributions, which might promote the service of Constantine, who publicly declared that he had taken up arms for the deli­verance of the church ²⁸.

The enthusiasm which inspired the troops, and Expecta­tion and belief of a miracle. perhaps the emperor himself, had sharpened their swords while it satisfied their conscience. They marched to battle with the full assurance, that the same God, who had formerly opened a passage to the Israelites through the waters of Jordan, and had thrown down the walls of Jericho at the sound of the trumpets of Joshua, would display his vi­sible majesty and power in the victory of Constan­tine. The evidence of ecclesiastical history is pre­pared [Page 256] to affirm, that their expectations were justi­fied by the conspicuous miracle to which the conversion of the first Christian emperor has been almost unanimously ascribed. The real or ima­ginary cause of so important an event, deserves and demands the attention of posterity; and I shall endeavour to form a just estimate of the fa­mous vision of Constantine, by a distinct consi­deration of the standard, the dream, and the celestial sign; by separating the historical, the natural, and the marvellous parts of this extraordinary story, which, in the composition of a specious argument, have been artfully confounded in one splendid and brittle mass.

I. An instrument of the tortures which were in­flicted The Laba­rum, or standard of the cross. only on slaves and strangers, became an object of horror in the eyes of a Roman citizen; and the ideas of guilt, of pain, and of ignominy, were closely united with the idea of the cross ²⁹. The piety, rather than the humanity, of Constan­tine, soon abolished in his dominions the punish­ment which the Saviour of mankind had conde­scended to suffer ³⁰; but the emperor had already [Page 257] learned to despise the prejudices of his education, and of his people, before he could erect in the midst of Rome his own statue, bearing a cross in its right hand; with an inscription, which referred the victory of his arms, and the deliverance of Rome, to the virtue of that salutary sign, the true symbol of force and courage ³¹. The same sym­bol sanctified the arms of the soldiers of Constan­tine; the cross glittered on their helmet, was en­graved on their shields, was interwoven into their banners; and the consecrated emblems which adorned the person of the emperor himself, were distinguished only by richer materials and more exquisite workmanship ³². But the principal standard which displayed the triumph of the cross was stiled the Labarum ³³, an obscure, though [Page 258] celebrated name, which has been vainly derived from almost all the languages of the world. It is described ³⁴ as a long pike intersected by a trans­versal beam. The silken veil which hung down from the beam, was curiously enwrought with the images of the reigning monarch and his children. The summit of the pike supported a crown of gold which inclosed the mysterious monogram, at once expressive of the figure of the cross, and the initial letters of the name of Christ ³⁵. The safety of the labarum was entrusted to fifty guards, of approved valour and fidelity; their station was marked by honours and emoluments; and some fortunate accidents soon introduced an opinion, that as long as the guards of the labarum were engaged in the execution of their office, they were secure and invulnerable amidst the darts of the enemy. In the second civil war Licinius felt and dreaded the power of this consecrated banner, the sight of which, in the distress of battle, animated the soldiers of Constantine with an invincible en­thusiasm, and scattered terror and dismay through the ranks of the adverse legions ³⁶. The Christian [Page 259] emperors, who respected the example of Constan­tine, displayed in all their military expeditions the standard of the cross; but when the degenerate successors of Theodosius had ceased to appear in person at the head of their armies, the labarum was deposited as a venerable but useless relic in the palace of Constantinople ³⁷. Its honours are still preserved on the medals of the Flavian fa­mily. Their grateful devotion has placed the monogram of Christ in the midst of the ensigns of Rome. The solemn epithets of, safety of the re­public, glory of the army, restoration of public happiness, are equally applied to the religious and military trophies; and there is still extant a medal of the emperor Constantius, where the standard of the labarum is accompanied with these memorable words, BY THIS SIGN THOU SHALT CONQUER ³⁸.

II. In all occasions of danger or distress, it was The dream of Con­stantine. the practice of the primitive Christians to fortify their minds and bodies by the sign of the cross, which they used, in all their ecclesiastical rites, in [Page 260] all the daily occurrences of life, as an infallible preservative against every species of spiritual or temporal evil ³⁹. The authority of the church might alone have had sufficient weight to justify the devotion of Constantine, who in the same prudent and gradual progress acknowledged the truth, and assumed the symbol, of Christianity. But the testimony of a contemporary writer, who in a formal treatise has avenged the cause of reli­gion, bestows on the piety of the emperor a more awful and sublime character. He affirms with the most perfect confidence, that in the night which preceded the last battle against Maxentius, Constantine was admonished in a dream to inscribe the shields of his soldiers with the celestial sign of God, the sacred monogram of the name of Christ; that he executed the commands of heaven, and that his valour and obedience were rewarded by the decisive victory of the Milvian bridge. Some considerations might perhaps incline a sceptical mind to suspect the judgment or the veracity of the rhetorician, whose pen, either from zeal or interest, was devoted to the cause of the prevail­ing faction ⁴⁰. He appears to have published his [Page 261] deaths of the persecutors at Nicomedia about three years after the Roman victory; but the in­terval of a thousand miles, and a thousand days, will allow an ample latitude for the invention of declaimers, the credulity of party, and the tacit approbation of the emperor himself; who might listen without indignation to a marvellous tale, which exalted his fame, and promoted his de­signs. In favour of Licinius, who still dissembled his animosity to the Christians, the same author has provided a similar vision, of a form of prayer, which was communicated by an angel, and re­peated by the whole army before they engaged the legions of the tyrant Maximin. The frequent repetition of miracles serves to provoke, where it does not subdue, the reason of mankind ⁴¹; but if the dream of Constantine is separately consider­ed, it may be naturally explained either by the policy or the enthusiasm of the emperor. Whilst his anxiety for the approaching day, which must decide the fate of the empire, was suspended by a short and interrupted slumber, the venerable [Page 262] form of Christ, and the well-known symbol of his religion, might forcibly offer themselves to the active fancy of a prince who reverenced the name, and had perhaps secretly implored the power, of the God of the Christians. As readily might a consummate statesman indulge himself in the use of one of those military stratagems, one of those pious frauds, which Philip and Sertorius had employed with such art and effect ⁴². The prae­ternatural origin of dreams was universally ad­mitted by the nations of antiquity, and a consider­able part of the Gallic army was already prepared to place their confidence in the salutary sign of the Christian religion. The secret vision of Con­stantine could be disproved only by the event; and the intrepid hero who had passed the Alps and the Apennine, might view with careless despair the consequences of a defeat under the walls of Rome. The senate and people, exulting in their own deliverance from an odious tyrant, acknow­ledged that the victory of Constantine surpassed the powers of man, without daring to insinuate that it had been obtained by the protection of the Gods. The triumphal arch, which was erected [Page 263] about three years after the event, proclaims, in ambiguous language, that, by the greatness of his own mind, and by an instinct or impulse of the Divinity, he had saved and avenged the Roman republic ⁴³. The Pagan orator, who had seized an earlier opportunity of celebrating the virtues of the conqueror, supposes that he alone enjoyed a secret and intimate commerce with the Supreme Being, who delegated the care of mortals to his subordinate deities; and thus assigns a very plau­sible reason why the subjects of Constantine should not presume to embrace the new religion of their sovereign ⁴⁴.

III. The philosopher, who with calm suspicion Appear­ance of a cross in the sky. examines the dreams and omens, the miracles and prodigies, of profane or even of ecclesiastical history, will probably conclude, that if the eyes of the spectators have sometimes been deceived by fraud, the understanding of the readers has much more frequently been insulted by fiction. Every event, or appearance, or accident, which seems to deviate from the ordinary course of na­ture, has been rashly ascribed to the immediate action of the Deity; and the astonished fancy of the multitude has sometimes given shape and co­lour, language and motion, to the fleeting but [Page 264] uncommon meteors of the air ⁴⁵. Nazarius and Eusebius are the two most celebrated orators, who in studied panegyrics have laboured to exalt the glory of Constantine. Nine years after the Ro­man victory, Nazarius ⁴⁶ describes an army of di­vine A. D. 321. warriors, who seemed to fall from the sky: he marks their beauty, their spirit, their gigantic forms, the stream of light which beamed from their celestial armour, their patience in suffering themselves to be heard, as well as seen, by mor­tals; and their declaration that they were sent, that they flew, to the assistance of the great Con­stantine. For the truth of this prodigy, the Pagan orator appeals to the whole Gallic nation, in whose presence he was then speaking; and seems to hope that the ancient apparitions ⁴⁷ would now obtain credit from this recent and public event. The Christian fable of Eusebius, which, in the space of twenty-six years, might arise from the A. D. 338. original dream, is cast in a much more correct and elegant mould. In one of the marches of Constantine, he is reported to have seen with his [Page 265] own eyes the luminous trophy of the cross, placed above the meridian sun, and inscribed with the following words: BY THIS, CONQUER. This amaz­ing object in the sky astonished the whole army, as well as the emperor himself, who was yet un­determined in the choice of a religion; but his astonishment was converted into faith by the vi­sion of the ensuing night. Christ appeared be­fore his eyes; and displaying the same celestial sign of the cross, he directed Constantine to frame a similar standard, and to march, with an assur­ance of victory, against Maxentius and all his enemies ⁴⁸. The learned bishop of Caesarea ap­pears to be sensible, that the recent discovery of this marvellous anecdote would excite some sur­prise and distrust among the most pious of his readers. Yet, instead of ascertaining the precise circumstances of time and place, which always serve to detect falsehood, or establish truth ⁴⁹; instead of collecting and recording the evidence of so many living witnesses, who must have been spectators of this stupendous miracle ⁵⁰; Eusebius contents himself with alleging a very singular testimony; that of the deceased Constantine, who, many years after the event, in the freedom of con­versation, [Page 266] had related to him this extraordinary incident of his own life, and had attested the truth of it by a solemn oath. The prudence and gra­titude of the learned prelate forbade him to suspect the veracity of his victorious master; but he plainly intimates, that, in a fact of such a na­ture, he should have refused his assent to any meaner authority. This motive of credibility could not survive the power of the Flavian fa­mily; and the celestial sign, which the Infidels might afterwards deride ⁵¹, was disregarded by the Christians of the age which immediately fol­lowed the conversion of Constantine ⁵². But the Catholic church, both of the East and of the West, has adopted a prodigy which favours, or seems to favour, the popular worship of the cross. The vision of Constantine maintained an honourable place in the legend of superstition, till the bold and sagacious spirit of criticism presumed to de­preciate the triumph, and to arraign the truth, of the first Christian emperor ⁵³.

[Page 267] The protestant and philosophic readers of the present age will incline to believe, that, in the ac­count of his own conversion, Constantine attested The con­version of Constan­tine might be sincere. a wilful falsehood by a solemn and deliberate per­jury. They may not hesitate to pronounce, that, in the choice of a religion, his mind was deter­mined only by a sense of interest; and that (ac­cording to the expression of a profane poet ⁵⁴) he used the altars of the church as a convenient foot­stool to the throne of the empire. A conclusion so harsh and so absolute is not, however, warrant­ed by our knowledge of human nature, of Con­stantine, or of Christianity. In an age of religious fervour, the most artful statesmen are observed to feel some part of the enthusiasm which they in­spire; and the most orthodox saints assume the dangerous privilege of defending the cause of [Page 268] truth by the arms of deceit and falsehood. Per­sonal interest is often the standard of our belief, as well as of our practice; and the same motives of temporal advantage which might influence the public conduct and professions of Constantine, would insensibly dispose his mind to embrace a religion so propitious to his fame and fortunes. His vanity was gratified by the flattering assurance, that he had been chosen by Heaven to reign over the earth; success had justified his divine title to the throne, and that title was founded on the truth of the Christian revelation. As real virtue is sometimes excited by undeserved applause, the specious piety of Constantine, if at first it was only specious, might gradually, by the influence of praise, of habit, and of example, be matured into serious faith and fervent devotion. The bishops and teachers of the new sect, whose dress and man­ners had not qualified them for the residence of a court, were admitted to the Imperial table; they accompanied the monarch in his expeditions; and the ascendant which one of them, an Egyp­tian or a Spaniard ⁵⁵, acquired over his mind, was imputed by the Pagans to the effect of magic ⁵⁶. Lactantius, who has adorned the precepts of the [Page 269] gospel with the eloquence of Cicero ⁵⁷; and Eu­sebius, who has consecrated the learning and phi­losophy of the Greeks to the service of religion ⁵⁸, were both received into the friendship and fami­liarity of their sovereign: and those able masters of controversy could patiently watch the soft and yielding moments of persuasion, and dexterously apply the arguments which were the best adapted to his character and understanding. Whatever advantages might be derived from the acquisition of an Imperial proselyte, he was distinguished by the splendour of his purple, rather than by the superiority of wisdom or virtue, from the many thousands of his subjects who had embraced the doctrines of Christianity. Nor can it be deemed incredible, that the mind of an unlettered soldier should have yielded to the weight of evidence, which, in a more enlightened age, has satisfied or subdued the reason of a Grotius, a Pascal, or a Locke. In the midst of the incessant labours of his great office, this soldier employed, or affected to employ, the hours of the night in the diligent study of the Scriptures, and the composition of theological discourses; which he afterwards pro­nounced in the presence of a numerous and applauding audience. In a very long discourse, [Page 270] which is still extant, the royal preacher expatiates on the various proofs of religion; but he dwells with peculiar complacency on the Sybilline verses ⁵⁹, and the fourth eclogue of Virgil ⁶⁰. The fourth eclogue of Virgil. Forty years before the birth of Christ, the Man­tuan bard, as if inspired by the celestial muse of Isaiah, had celebrated, with all the pomp of Ori­ental metaphor, the return of the Virgin, the fall of the serpent, the approaching birth of a godlike child, the offspring of the great Jupiter, who should expiate the guilt of human kind, and go­vern the peaceful universe with the virtues of his father; the rise and appearance of an heavenly race, a primitive nation throughout the world; and the gradual restoration of the innocence and felicity of the golden age. The poet was perhaps unconscious of the secret sense and object of these sublime predictions, which have been so unworthily applied to the infant son of a consul, or a trium­vir ⁶¹: but if a more splendid, and indeed specious, interpretation of the fourth eclogue contributed to the conversion of the first Christian emperor, Vir­gil [Page 271] may deserve to be ranked among the most suc­cessful missionaries of the gospel ⁶².

The awful mysteries of the Christian faith and Devotion and privi­leges of Constan­tine. worship were concealed from the eyes of strangers, and even of catechumens, with an affected se­crecy, which served to excite their wonder and curiosity ⁶³. But the severe rules of discipline which the prudence of the bishops had instituted, were relaxed by the same prudence in favour of an Imperial proselyte, whom it was so important to allure, by every gentle condescension, into the pale of the church; and Constantine was per­mitted, at least by a tacit dispensation, to enjoy most of the privileges, before he had contracted any of the obligations, of a Christian. Instead of retiring from the congregation, when the voice of the deacon dismissed the profane multitude, he prayed with the faithful, disputed with the bishops, preached on the most sublime and intricate sub­jects of theology, celebrated with sacred rites the vigil of Easter, and publicly declared himself, not only a partaker, but, in some measure, a priest [Page 272] and hierophant of the Christian mysteries ⁶⁴. The pride of Constantine might assume, and his ser­vices had deserved, some extraordinary distinction: an ill-timed rigour might have blasted the un­ripened fruits of his conversion; and if the doors of the church had been strictly closed against a prince who had deserted the altars of the gods, the master of the empire would have been left destitute of any form of religious worship. In his last visit to Rome, he piously disclaimed and in­sulted the superstition of his ancestors, by refusing to lead the military procession of the equestrian order, and to offer the public vows to the Jupiter of the Capitoline Hill ⁶⁵. Many years before his baptism and death, Constantine had proclaimed to the world, that neither his person nor his image should ever more be seen within the walls of an idolatrous temple; while he distributed through the provinces a variety of medals and pictures, which represented the emperor in an humble and suppliant posture of Christian devo­tion ⁶⁶.

The pride of Constantine, who refused the pri­vileges Delay of his baptism till the ap­proach of death. of a catechumen, cannot easily be ex­plained or excused; but the delay of his baptism may be justified by the maxims and the practice of ecclesiastical antiquity. The sacrament of bap­tism ⁶⁷ [Page 273] was regularly administered by the bishop himself, with his assistant clergy, in the cathedral church of the diocese, during the fifty days between the solemn festivals of Easter and Pen­tecost; and this holy term admitted a numerous band of infants and adult persons into the bosom of the church. The discretion of parents often suspended the baptism of their children till they could understand the obligations which they con­tracted: the severity of ancient bishops exacted from the new converts a noviciate of two or three years; and the catechumens themselves, from different motives of a temporal or a spiritual na­ture, were seldom impatient to assume the cha­racter of perfect and initiated Christians. The sacrament of baptism was supposed to contain a full and absolute expiation of sin; and the soul was instantly restored to its original purity, and entitled to the promise of eternal salvation. Among the proselytes of Christianity, there were many who judged it imprudent to precipitate a salutary rite, which could not be repeated; to throw away an inestimable privilege, which could never be recovered. By the delay of their baptism, they could venture freely to indulge their passions in [Page 274] the enjoyment of this world, while they still re­tained in their own hands the means of a sure and easy absolution ⁶⁸. The sublime theory of the gospel had made a much fainter impression on the heart than on the understanding of Constantine himself. He pursued the great object of his am­bition through the dark and bloody paths of war and policy; and, after the victory, he abandoned himself, without moderation, to the abuse of his fortune. Instead of asserting his just superiority above the imperfect heroism and prophane phi­losophy of Trajan and the Antonines, the mature age of Constantine forfeited the reputation which he had acquired in his youth. As he gradually advanced in the knowledge of truth, he propor­tionably declined in the practice of virtue; and the same year of his reign in which he convened the council of Nice, was polluted by the execution, or rather murder, of his eldest son. This date is alone sufficient to refute the ignorant and mali­cious [Page 275] suggestions of Zosimus ⁶⁹, who affirms, that, after the death of Crispus, the remorse of his fa­ther accepted from the ministers of Christianity the expiation which he had vainly solicited from the Pagan pontiffs. At the time of the death of Crispus, the emperor could no longer hesitate in the choice of a religion; he could no longer be ignorant that the church was possessed of an in­fallible remedy, though he chose to defer the ap­plication of it, till the approach of death had removed the temptation and danger of a relapse. The bishops, whom he summoned, in his last illness, to the palace of Nicomedia, were edified by the fervour with which he requested and re­ceived the sacrament of baptism, by the solemn protestation that the remainder of his life should be worthy of a disciple of Christ, and by his hum­ble refusal to wear the Imperial purple after he had been clothed in the white garment of a Neo­phyte. The example and reputation of Constan­tine seemed to countenance the delay of bap­tism ⁷⁰. Future tyrants were encouraged to be­lieve, that the innocent blood which they might shed in a long reign would instantly be washed away in the waters of regeneration; and the abuse of religion dangerously undermined the founda­tions of moral virtue.

[Page 276] The gratitude of the church has exalted the virtues and excused the failings of a generous patron, who seated Christianity on the throne of Propaga­tion of Christian­ity. the Roman world; and the Greeks, who cele­brate the festival of the Imperial saint, seldom mention the name of Constantine without adding the title of equal to the Apostles ⁷¹. Such a com­parison, if it alludes to the character of those di­vine missionaries, must be imputed to the extra­vagance of impious flattery. But if the parallel is confined to the extent and number of their evangelic victories, the success of Constantine might perhaps equal that of the Apostles them­selves. By the edicts of toleration, he removed the temporal disadvantages which had hitherto retarded the progress of Christianity; and its active and numerous ministers received a free per­mission, a liberal encouragement, to recommend the salutary truths of revelation by every argu­ment which could affect the reason or piety of mankind. The exact balance of the two religions continued but a moment; and the piercing eye of ambition and avarice soon discovered, that the profession of Christianity might contri­bute to the interest of the present, as well as of a future, life ⁷². The hopes of wealth and honours, the example of an emperor, his exhortations, his [Page 277] irresistible smiles, diffused conviction among the venal and obsequious crowds which usually fill the apartments of a palace. The cities which signalized a forward zeal, by the voluntary de­struction of their temples, were distinguished by municipal privileges, and rewarded with popular donatives; and the new capital of the East gloried in the singular advantage, that Constantinople was never profaned by the worship of idols ⁷³. As the lower ranks of society are governed by imitation, the conversion of those who possessed any eminence of birth, of power, or of riches, was soon followed by dependent multitudes ⁷⁴. The salvation of the common people was purchased at an easy rate, if it be true, that, in one year, twelve thousand men were baptized at Rome, be­sides a proportionable number of women and children; and that a white garment, with twenty pieces of gold, had been promised by the em­peror [Page 278] to every convert ⁷⁵. The powerful influence of Constantine was not circumscribed by the nar­row limits of his life, or of his dominions. The education which he bestowed on his sons and nephews, secured to the empire a race of princes, whose faith was still more lively and sincere, as they imbibed, in their earliest infancy, the spirit, or at least the doctrine, of Christianity. War and commerce had spread the knowledge of the gospel beyond the confines of the Roman provinces; and the Barbarians, who had disdained an humble and proscribed sect, soon learned to esteem a religion which had been so lately embraced by the greatest monarch and the most civilized na­tion of the globe ⁷⁶. The Goths and Germans, who enlisted under the standard of Rome, re­vered the cross which glittered at the head of the legions, and their fierce countrymen received at the same time the lessons of faith and of humanity. The kings of Iberia and Armenia worshipped the [Page 279] God of their protector; and their subjects, who have invariably preserved the name of Christians, soon formed a sacred and perpetual connection with their Roman brethren. The Christians of Persia were suspected, in time of war, of prefer­ring their religion to their country; but as long as peace subsisted between the two empires, the persecuting spirit of the Magi was effectually re­strained by the interposition of Constantine ⁷⁷. The rays of the gospel illuminated the coast of In­dia. The colonies of Jews, who had penetrated into Arabia and Aethiopia ⁷⁸, opposed the progress of Christianity; but the labour of the missionaries was in some measure facilitated by a previous knowledge of the Mosaic revelation; and Abys­sinia still reveres the memory of Frumentius, who, in the time of Constantine, devoted his life to the conversion of those sequestered regions. Under the reign of his son Constantius, Theophilus ⁷⁹, who was himself of Indian extraction, was in­vested with the double character of ambassador [Page 280] and bishop. He embarked on the Red Sea with two hundred horses of the purest breed of Cappa­docia, which were sent by the emperor to the prince of the Sabaeans, or Homerites. Theo­philus was entrusted with many other useful or cu­rious presents, which might raise the admiration, and conciliate the friendship, of the Barbarians; and he successfully employed several years in a pastoral visit to the churches of the torrid zone ⁸⁰.

The irresistible power of the Roman emperors Change of the nation­al religion. was displayed in the important and dangerous change of the national religion. The terrors of a military force silenced the faint and unsupported murmurs of the Pagans, and there was reason to expect, that the cheerful submission of the Christian clergy, as well as people, would be the result of conscience and gratitude. It was long since established, as a fundamental maxim of the Ro­man constitution, that every rank of citizens were alike subject to the laws, and that the care of religion was the right as well as duty of the civil magistrate. Constantine and his successors could not easily persuade themselves that they had forfeited, by their conversion, any branch of the Imperial prerogatives, or that they were incapable of giving laws to a religion which they had pro­tected and embraced. The emperors still con­tinued to exercise a supreme jurisdiction over the ecclesiastical order; and the sixteenth book of the A. D. 312—438. [Page 281] Theodosian code represents, under a variety of titles, the authority which they assumed in the government of the Catholic church.

But the distinction of the spiritual and temporal Distinction of the spi­ritual and temporal powers. powers ⁸¹, which had never been imposed on the free spirit of Greece and Rome, was introduced and con­firmed by the legal establishment of Christianity. The office of supreme pontiff, which, from the time of Numa to that of Augustus, had always been exercised by one of the most eminent of the senators, was at length united to the Imperial dignity. The first magistrate of the state, as often as he was prompted by superstition or policy, performed with his own hands the sacerdotal func­tions ⁸²; nor was there any order of priests, either at Rome or in the provinces, who claimed a more sacred character among men, or a more intimate communication with the Gods. But in the Christian church, which entrusts the service of the altar to a perpetual succession of consecrated mi­nisters, the monarch, whose spiritual rank is less honourable than that of the meanest deacon, was seated below the rails of the sanctuary, and con­founded with the rest of the faithful multitude ⁸³. [Page 282] The emperor might be saluted as the father of his people, but he owed a filial duty and reverence to the fathers of the church; and the same marks of respect, which Constantine had paid to the per­sons of saints and confessors, were soon exacted by the pride of the episcopal order ⁸⁴. A secret con­flict between the civil and ecclesiastical jurisdic­tions, embarrased the operations of the Roman government; and a pious emperor was alarmed by the guilt and danger of touching with a pro­fane hand the ark of the covenant. The separation of men into the two orders of the clergy and of the laity was, indeed, familiar to many nations of an­tiquity; and the priests of India, of Persia, of As­syria, of Judea, of Aethiopia, of Egypt, and of Gaul, derived from a celestial origin the temporal power and possessions which they had acquired. These venerable institutions had gradually assimilated themselves to the manners and government of their respective countries ⁸⁵; but the opposition or [Page 283] contempt of the civil power served to cement the discipline of the primitive church. The Christi­ans had been obliged to elect their own magistrates, to raise and distribute a peculiar revenue, and to regulate the internal policy of their republic by a code of laws, which were ratified by the consent of the people, and the practice of three hundred years. When Constantine embraced the faith of the Christians, he seemed to contract a perpetual alliance with a distinct and independent society; and the privileges granted or confirmed by that emperor, or by his successors, were accepted, not as the precarious favours of the court, but as the just and inalienable rights of the ecclesiastical order.

The Catholic church was administered by the State of the bishops under the Christian emperors. spiritual and legal jurisdiction of eighteen hundred bishops ⁸⁶; of whom one thousand were seated in the Greek, and eight hundred in the Latin, pro­vinces of the empire. The extent and boundaries of their respective dioceses, had been variously and accidentally decided by the zeal and success of the first missionaries, by the wishes of the people, and by the propagation of the gospel. Episcopal churches were closely planted along the banks of the Nile, on the sea-coast of Africa, in the pro­consular [Page 284] Asia, and through the southern provinces of Italy. The bishops of Gaul and Spain, of Thrace and Pontus, reigned over an ample ter­ritory, and delegated their rural suffragans to exe­cute the subordinate duties of the pastoral office ⁸⁷. A Christian diocese might be spread over a pro­vince, or reduced to a village; but all the bishops possessed an equal and indelible character: they all derived the same powers and privileges from the apostles, from the people, and from the laws. While the civil and military, professions were se­parated by the policy of Constantine, a new and perpetual order of ecclesiastical ministers, always respectable, sometimes dangerous, was established in the church and state. The important review of their station and attributes may be distributed under the following heads: I. Popular election. II. Ordination of the clergy. III. Property. IV. Civil jurisdiction. V. Spiritual censures. VI. Exercise of public oratory. VII. Privilege of legislative assemblies.

I. The freedom of elections subsisted long after 1. Election of bishops. the legal establishment of Christianity ⁸⁸; and the [Page 285] subjects of Rome enjoyed in the church the pri­vilege which they had lost in the republic, of chusing the magistrates whom they were bound to obey. As soon as a bishop had closed his eyes, the metropolitan issued a commission to one of his suffragans to administer the vacant see, and prepare, within a limited time, the future elec­tion. The right of voting was vested in the in­ferior clergy, who were best qualified to judge of the merit of the candidates; in the senators or nobles of the city, all those who were distinguished by their rank or property; and finally in the whole body of the people, who, on the appointed day, flocked in multitudes from the most remote parts of the diocese ⁸⁹, and sometimes silenced, by their tumultuous acclamations, the voice of reason, and the laws of discipline. These acclamations might accidentally fix on the head of the most deserving competitor; of some ancient presbyter, some holy monk, or some layman, conspicuous for his zeal and piety. But the episcopal chair was solicited, especially in the great and opulent cities of the empire, as a temporal, rather than as a spiritual dignity. The interested views, the selfish and angry passions, the arts of perfidy and dissimulation, the secret corruption, the open and even bloody violence which had formerly dis­graced the freedom of election in the common­wealths [Page 286] of Greece and Rome, too often influenced the choice of the successors of the apostles. While one of the candidates boasted the honours of his family, a second allured his judges by the deli­cacies of a plentiful table, and a third, more guilty than his rivals, offered to share the plunder of the church among the accomplices of his sacri­legious hopes ⁹⁰. The civil as well as ecclesiastical laws attempted to exclude the populace from this solemn and important transaction. The canons of ancient discipline, by requiring several epis­copal qualifications of age, station, &c. restrained in some measure the indiscriminate caprice of the electors. The authority of the provincial bishops, who were assembled in the vacant church to con­secrate the choice of the people, was interposed to moderate their passions, and to correct their mis­takes. The bishops could refuse to ordain an unworthy candidate, and the rage of contending factions sometimes accepted their impartial medi­ation. The submission, or the resistance of the clergy and people, on various occasions, afforded different precedents, which were insensibly con­verted into positive laws, and provincial customs ⁹¹: but it was every where admitted, as a fundamental maxim of religious policy, that no bishop could be imposed on an orthodox church, without the consent of its members. The emperors, as the [Page 287] guardians of the public peace, and as the first citizens of Rome and Constantinople, might ef­fectually declare their wishes in the choice of a primate: but those absolute monarchs respected the freedom of ecclesiastical elections; and while they distributed and resumed the honours of the state and army, they allowed eighteen hundred perpetual magistrates to receive their important offices from the free suffrages of the people ⁹². It was agreeable to the dictates of justice, that these magistrates should not desert an honourable station from which they could not be removed; but the wisdom of councils endeavoured, without much success, to enforce the residence, and to prevent the translation of bishops. The discipline of the West was indeed less relaxed than that of the East; but the same passions which made those regulations necessary, rendered them ineffectual. The reproaches which angry prelates have so vehemently urged against each other, serve only to expose their common guilt, and their mutual indiscretion.

II. The bishops alone possessed the faculty of II. Ordi­nation of the clergy. spiritual generation; and this extraordinary pri­vilege might compensate, in some degree, for the painful celibacy ⁹³ which was imposed as a virtue, [Page 288] as a duty, and at length as a positive obligation. The religions of antiquity, which established a separate order of priests, dedicated a holy race, a tribe or family to the perpetual service of the Gods ⁹⁴. Such institutions were founded for pos­session, rather than conquest. The children of the priests enjoyed, with proud and indolent security, their sacred inheritance; and the fiery spirit of enthusiasm was abated by the cares, the pleasures, and the endearments of domestic life. But the Christian sanctuary was open to every am­bitious candidate, who aspired to its heavenly promises, or temporal possessions. The office of priests, like that of soldiers or magistrates, was strenuously exercised by those men, whose temper and abilities had prompted them to embrace the ecclesiastical profession, or who had been selected by a discerning bishop, as the best qualified to promote the glory and interest of the church. The bishops ⁹⁵ (till the abuse was restrained by [Page 289] the prudence of the laws) might constrain the reluctant, and protect the distressed; and the im­position of hands for ever bestowed some of the most valuable privileges of civil society. The whole body of the Catholic clergy, more nume­rous perhaps than the legions, was exempted by the emperors from all service, private or public, all municipal offices, and all personal taxes and contributions, which pressed on their fellow-citizens with intolerable weight; and the duties of their holy profession were accepted as a full discharge of their obligations to the republic ⁹⁶. Each bishop acquired an absolute and indefeasible right to the perpetual obedience of the clerk whom he ordained: the clergy of each episcopal church, with its dependent parishes, formed a regular and permanent society; and the cathedrals of Con­stantinople ⁹⁷ and Carthage ⁹⁸ maintained their pe­culiar [Page 290] establishment of five hundred ecclesiastical ministers. Their ranks ⁹⁹ and numbers were in­sensibly multiplied by the superstition of the times, which introduced into the church the splendid ceremonies of a Jewish or Pagan temple; and a long train of priests, deacons, sub-deacons, aco­lythes, exorcists, readers, singers, and door­keepers, contributed, in their respective stations, to swell the pomp and harmony of religious worship. The clerical name and privilege were extended to many pious fraternities, who devoutly supported the ecclesiastical throne ¹⁰⁰. Six hun­dred parabolani, or adventurers, visited the sick at Alexandria; eleven hundred copiatae, or grave­diggers, buried the dead at Constantinople; and the swarms of monks, who arose from the Nile, overspread and darkened the face of the Christian world.

III. The edict of Milan secured the revenue as III. Pro­perty. well as the peace of the church ¹⁰¹. The Christians not only recovered the lands and houses of which A. D. 313. they had been stripped by the persecuting laws of [Page 291] Diocletian, but they acquired a perfect title to all the possessions which they had hitherto enjoyed by the connivance of the magistrate. As soon as Christianity became the religion of the emperor and the empire, the national clergy might claim a decent and honourable maintenance: and the payment of an annual tax might have delivered the people from the more oppressive tribute, which superstition imposes on her votaries. But as the wants and expences of the church encreased with her prosperity, the ecclesiastical order was still supported and enriched by the voluntary oblations of the faithful. Eight years after the edict of Milan, Constantine granted to all his A. D. 321, subjects the free and universal permission of be­queathing their fortunes to the holy Catholic church ¹⁰²; and their devout liberality, which during their lives was checked by luxury or avarice, flowed with a profuse stream at the hour of their death. The wealthy Christians were encouraged by the example of their sovereign. An absolute monarch, who is rich without pa­trimony, may be charitable without merit; and Constantine too easily believed that he should purchase the favour of heaven, if he maintained the idle at the expence of the industrious; and distributed among the saints the wealth of the republic. The same messenger who carried over [Page 292] to Africa the head of Maxentius, might be en­trusted with an epistle to Caecilian, bishop of Carthage. The emperor acquaints him, that the treasurers of the province are directed to pay into his hands the sum of three thousand folles, or eighteen thousand pounds sterling, and to obey his farther requisitions for the relief of the churches of Africa, Numidia, and Mauritania ¹⁰³. The liberality of Constantine encreased in a just proportion to his faith, and to his vices. He assigned in each city a regular allowance of corn, to supply the fund of ecclesiastical charity; and the persons of both sexes who embraced the mo­nastic life, became the peculiar favourites of their sovereign. The Christian temples of Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem, Constantinople, &c. dis­played the ostentatious piety of a prince, am­bitious in a declining age to equal the perfect labours of antiquity ¹⁰⁴. The form of these re­ligious edifices was simple and oblong; though they might sometimes swell into the shape of a dome, and sometimes branch into the figure of a cross. The timbers were framed for the most part of cedars of Libanus; the roof was covered [Page 293] with tiles, perhaps of gilt brass; and the walls, the columns, the pavement, were incrusted with variegated marbles. The most precious orna­ments of gold and silver, of silk and gems, were profusely dedicated to the service of the altar; and this specious magnificence was supported on the solid and perpetual basis of landed property. In the space of two centuries, from the reign of Constantine to that of Justinian, the eighteen hundred churches of the empire were enriched by the frequent and unalienable gifts of the prince and people. An annual income of six hundred pounds sterling may be reasonably assigned to the bishops, who were placed at an equal distance between riches and poverty ¹⁰⁵, but the standard of their wealth insensibly rose with the dignity and opulence of the cities which they governed. An authentic but imperfect ¹⁰⁶ rent-roll specifies some houses, shops, gardens, and farms, which belonged to the three Basilicae of Rome, St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. John Lateran, in the provinces of Italy, Africa, and the East. They produce, besides a reserved rent of oil, linen, paper, aro­matics, &c. a clear annual revenue of twenty­two thousand pieces of gold, or twelve thousand [Page 294] pounds sterling. In the age of Constantine and Justinian, the bishops no longer possessed, perhaps they no longer deserved, the unsuspecting confi­dence of their clergy and people. The eccle­siastical revenues of each diocese were divided into four parts; for the respective uses, of the bishop himself, of his inferior clergy, of the poor, and of the public worship; and the abuse of this sacred trust was strictly and repeatedly check­ed ¹⁰⁷. The patrimony of the church was still subject to all the public impositions of the state ¹⁰⁸. The clergy of Rome, Alexandria, Thessalonica, &c. might solicit and obtain some partial exemp­tions; but the premature attempt of the great council of Rimini, which aspired to universal freedom, was successfully resisted by the son of Constantine ¹⁰⁹.

[Page 295] IV. The Latin clergy, who erected their tri­bunal on the ruins of the civil and common law, have modestly accepted as the gift of Constan­tine ¹¹⁰, IV. Civil jurisdic­tion. the independent jurisdiction which was the fruit of time, of accident, and of their own industry. But the liberality of the Christian em­perors had actually endowed them with some legal prerogatives, which secured and dignified the sacerdotal character ¹¹¹. 1. Under a despotic government, the bishops alone enjoyed and as­serted the inestimable privilege of being tried only by their peers; and even in a capital accusa­tion, a synod of their brethren were the sole judges of their guilt or innocence. Such a tri­bunal, [Page 296] unless it was inflamed by personal resent­ment or religious discord, might be favourable, or even partial to the sacerdotal order: but Con­stantine was satisfied ¹¹², that secret impunity would be less pernicious than public scandal: and the Nicene council was edified by his public declara­tion, that if he surprised a bishop in the act of adultery, he should cast his Imperial mantle over the episcopal sinner. 2. The domestic juris­diction of the bishops was at once a privilege and a restraint of the ecclesiastical order, whose civil causes were decently withdrawn from the cog­nizance of a secular judge. Their venial offences were not exposed to the shame of a public trial or punishment; and the gentle correction, which the tenderness of youth may endure from its pa­rents or instructors, was inflicted by the temperate severity of the bishops. But if the clergy were guilty of any crime which could not be sufficiently expiated by their degradation from an honourable and beneficial profession, the Roman magistrate drew the sword of justice, without any regard to ecclesiastical immunities. 3. The arbitration of the bishops was ratified by a positive law; and the judges were instructed to execute, without appeal or delay, the episcopal decrees, whose va­lidity had hitherto depended on the consent of the parties. The conversion of the magistrates themselves, and of the whole empire, might gra­dually remove the fears and scruples of the Chris­tians. [Page 297] But they still resorted to the tribunal of the bishops, whose abilities and integrity they esteemed; and the venerable Austin enjoyed the satisfaction of complaining that his spiritual func­tions were perpetually interrupted by the invidious labour of deciding the claim or the possession of silver and gold, of lands and cattle. 4. The ancient privilege of sanctuary was transferred to the Christian temples, and extended, by the liberal piety of the younger Theodosius, to the precincts of consecrated ground ¹¹³. The fugitive, and even guilty, suppliants, were permitted to im­plore, either the justice, or the mercy, of the Deity and his ministers. The rash violence of despotism was suspended by the mild interposition of the church; and the lives or fortunes of the most eminent subjects might be protected by the mediation of the bishop.

V. The bishop was the perpetual censor of the V. Spiri­tual cen­sures. morals of his people. The discipline of penance was digested into a system of canonical jurispru­dence ¹¹⁴, which accurately defined the duty of [Page 298] private or public confession, the rules of evidence, the degrees of guilt, and the measure of punish­ment. It was impossible to execute this spiritual censure, if the Christian pontiff, who punished the obscure sins of the multitude, respected the con­spicuous vices and destructive crimes of the ma­gistrate: but it was impossible to arraign the conduct of the magistrate, without controuling the admini­stration of civil government. Some considerations of religion, or loyalty, or fear, protected the sacred persons of the emperors from the zeal or resent­ment of the bishops; but they boldly censured and excommunicated the subordinate tyrants, who were not invested with the majesty of the purple. St. Athanasius excommunicated one of the mi­nisters of Egypt; and the interdict which he pro­nounced, of fire and water, was solemnly trans­mitted to the churches of Cappadocia ¹¹⁵. Under the reign of the younger Theodosius, the polite and eloquent Synesius, one of the descendants of Hercules ¹¹⁶, filled the episcopal seat of Ptolemais, [Page 299] near the ruins of ancient Cyrene ¹¹⁸, and the phi­losophic bishop supported, with dignity, the cha­racter which he had assumed with reluctance ¹¹⁹. He vanquished the monster of Libya, the presi­dent Andronicus, who abused the authority of a venal office, invented new modes of rapine and torture, and aggravated the guilt of oppression by that of sacrilege ¹²⁰. After a fruitless attempt to reclaim the haughty magistrate by mild and religious admonition, Synesius proceeds to inflict the last sentence of ecclesiastical justice ¹²¹, which [Page 300] devotes Andronicus, with his associates and their families, to the abhorrence of earth and heaven. The impenitent sinners, more cruel than Phalaris or Sennacherib, more destructive than war, pesti­lence, or a cloud of locusts, are deprived of the name and privileges of Christians, of the partici­pation of the sacraments, and of the hope of Paradise. The bishop exhorts the clergy, the magistrates, and the people, to renounce all society with the enemies of Christ; to exclude them from their houses and tables; and to refuse them the common offices of life, and the decent rites of burial. The church of Ptolemais, obscure and contemptible as she may appear, addresses this declaration to all her sister churches of the world; and the profane who reject her decrees, will be involved in the guilt and punishment of Andro­nicus and his impious followers. These spiritual terrors were enforced by a dexterous application to the Byzantine court; the trembling president implored the mercy of the church; and the de­scendant of Hercules enjoyed the satisfaction of raising a prostrate tyrant from the ground ¹²². Such principles and such examples insensibly pre­pared the triumph of the Roman pontiffs, who have trampled on the necks of kings.

VI. Every popular government has experienced VI. Free­dom of public preaching. the effects of rude or artificial eloquence. The coldest nature is animated, the firmest reason is moved, by the rapid communication of the prevailing impulse; [Page 301] and each hearer is affected by his own passions, and by those of the surrounding multitude. The ruin of civil liberty had silenced the demagogues of Athens, and the tribunes of Rome; the custom of preaching, which seems to constitute a con­siderable part of Christian devotion, had not been introduced into the temples of antiquity; and the ears of monarchs were never invaded by the harsh sound of popular eloquence, till the pulpits of the empire were filled with sacred orators, who possessed some advantages unknown to their pro­fane predecessors ¹²³. The arguments and rhetoric of the tribune were instantly opposed, with equal arms, by skilful and resolute antagonists; and the cause of truth and reason might derive an accidental support from the conflict of hostile passions. The bishop, or some distinguished pres­byter, to whom he cautiously delegated the powers of preaching, harangued, without the danger of interruption or reply, a submissive multitude, whose minds had been prepared and subdued by the awful ceremonies of religion. Such was the strict subordination of the catholic church, that the same concerted sounds might issue at once from an hundred pulpits of Italy or Egypt, if they were tuned ¹²⁴ by the master hand of the Roman or [Page 302] Alexandrian primate. The design of this insti­tution was laudable, but the fruits were not always salutary. The preachers recommended the prac­tice of the social duties; but they exalted the perfection of monastic virtue, which is painful to the individual, and useless to mankind. Their charitable exhortations betrayed a secret wish, that the clergy might be permitted to manage the wealth of the faithful, for the benefit of the poor. The most sublime representations of the attributes and laws of the Deity were sullied by an idle mixture of metaphysical subtleties, puerile rites, and fictitious miracles: and they expatiated, with the most fervent zeal, on the religious merit of hating the adversaries, and obeying the ministers, of the church. When the public peace was distracted by heresy and schism, the sacred orators sounded the trumpet, of discord, and perhaps of sedition. The understandings of their congre­gations were perplexed by mystery, their passions were inflamed by invectives: and they rushed from the Christian temples of Antioch or Alexan­dria, prepared either to suffer or to inflict martyr­dom. The corruption of taste and language is strongly marked in the vehement declamations of the Latin bishops; but the compositions of Gre­gory and Chrysostom have been compared with the most splendid models of Attic, or at least of Asiatic, eloquence ¹²⁵.

[Page 303] VII. The representatives of the Christian re­public were regularly assembled in the spring and autumn of each year: and these synods diffused VII. Privi­lege of le­gislative as­semblies. the spirit of ecclesiastical discipline and legislation through the hundred and twenty provinces of the Roman world ¹²⁶. The archbishop or metropoli­tan was empowered, by the laws, to summon the suffragan bishops of his province; to revise their conduct, to vindicate their rights, to declare their faith, and to examine the merit of the candidates who were elected by the clergy and people to sup­ply the vacancies of the episcopal college. The primates of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Carthage, and afterwards Constantinople, who exercised a more ample jurisdiction, convened the numerous assembly of their dependent bishops. But the convocation of great and extraordinary synods, was the prerogative of the emperor alone. When­ever the emergencies of the church required this decisive measure, he dispatched a peremptory summons to the bishops, or the deputies of each province, with an order for the use of post-horses, and a competent allowance for the expences of their journey. At an early period, when Con­stantine was the protector, rather than the pro­selyte, A. D. 314. of Christianity, he referred the African controversy to the council of Arles; in which the bishops of York, of Treves, of Milan, and of [Page 304] Carthage, met as friends and brethren, to debate in their native tongue on the common interest of the Latin or Western church ¹²⁷. Eleven years afterwards, a more numerous and celebrated A. D. 325. assembly was convened at Nice in Bithynia, to extinguish, by their final sentence, the subtle disputes which had arisen in Egypt on the subject of the Trinity. Three hundred and eighteen bishops obeyed the summons of their indulgent master; the ecclesiastics of every rank, and sect, and denomination, have been computed at two thousand and forty-eight persons ¹²⁸; the Greeks appeared in person; and the consent of the Latins was expressed by the legates of the Roman pon­tiff. The session, which lasted about two months, was frequently honoured by the presence of the emperor. Leaving his guards at the door, he seated himself (with the permission of the council) on a low stool in the midst of the hall. Constan­tine listened with patience, and spoke with mo­desty: and while he influenced the debates, he humbly professed that he was the minister, not the judge, of the successors of the apostles, who had been established as priests and as gods upon earth ¹²⁹. Such profound reverence of an absolute [Page 305] monarch towards a feeble and unarmed assembly of his own subjects, can only be compared to the respect with which the senate had been treated by the Roman princes who adopted the policy of Augustus. Within the space of fifty years, a philosophic spectator of the vicissitudes of human affairs might have contemplated Tacitus in the senate of Rome, and Constantine in the council of Nice. The fathers of the capitol and those of the church had alike degenerated from the virtues of their founders; but as the bishops were more deeply rooted in the public opinion, they sustained their dignity with more decent pride, and some­times opposed, with a manly spirit, the wishes of their sovereign. The progress of time and super­stition erazed the memory of the weakness, the passion, the ignorance, which disgraced these ecclesiastical synods; and the Catholic world has unanimously submitted ¹³⁰ to the infallible decrees of the general councils ¹³¹.

THE grateful applause of the clergy has consecrated the memory of a prince who indulged their passions and promoted their in­terest. Constantine gave them security, wealth, honours, and revenge: and the support of the orthodox faith was considered as the most sacred and important duty of the civil magistrate. The edict of Milan, the great charter of toleration, had confirmed to each individual of the Roman world, the privilege of chusing and professing his own religion. But this inestimable privilege was soon violated: with the knowledge of truth, the emperor imbibed the maxims of persecution; and the sects which dissented from the Catholic church, were afflicted and oppressed by the triumph of Christianity. Constantine easily believed that the Heretics, who presumed to dispute his opinions, or to oppose his commands, were guilty of the most absurd and criminal obstinacy; and that a seasonable application of moderate severities might save those unhappy men from the danger of an everlasting condemnation. Not a moment was lost in excluding the ministers and teachers of the separated congregations from any share of the rewards and immunities which the emperor had [Page 307] so liberally bestowed on the orthodox clergy. But as the sectaries might still exist under the cloud of royal disgrace, the conquest of the East was immediately followed by an edict which announced their total destruction ¹. After a preamble filled with passion and reproach, Constantine absolutely prohibits the assemblies of the Heretics, and con­fiscates their public property to the use either of the revenue or of the Catholic church. The sects against whom the Imperial severity was directed, appear to have been the adherents of Paul of Samosata; the Montanists of Phrygia, who main­tained an enthusiastic succession of prophecy; the Novatians, who sternly rejected the temporal efficacy of repentance; the Marcionites and Va­lentinians, under whose leading banners the various Gnostics of Asia and Egypt had insensibly rallied; and perhaps the Manichaeans, who had recently imported from Persia a more artful composition of Oriental and Christian theology ². The design of extirpating the name, or at least of restraining the progress of these odious Heretics, was prose­cuted with vigour and effect. Some of the penal regulations were copied from the edicts of Diocle­tian; and this method of conversion was applauded [Page 308] by the same bishops who had felt the hand of op­pression, and had pleaded for the rights of huma­nity. Two immaterial circumstances may serve, however, to prove that the mind of Constantine was not entirely corrupted by the spirit of zeal and bigotry. Before he condemned the Mani­chaeans and their kindred sects, he resolved to make an accurate enquiry into the nature of their religious principles. As if he distrusted the im­partiality of his ecclesiastical counsellors, this delicate commission was entrusted to a civil magistrate; whose learning and moderation he justly esteemed; and of whose venal character he was probably ignorant ³. The emperor was soon convinced, that he had too hastily proscribed the orthodox faith and the exemplary morals of the Novatians; who had dissented from the church in some articles of discipline which were not per­haps essential to salvation. By a particular edict, he exempted them from the general penalties of the law ⁴; allowed them to build a church at Constantinople, respected the miracles of their saints, invited their bishop Acesius to the council of Nice; and gently ridiculed the narrow tenets of his sect by a familiar jest; which, from the [Page 309] mouth of a sovereign, must have been received with applause and gratitude ⁵.

The complaints and mutual accusations which African contro­versy, assailed the throne of Constantine, as soon as the death of Maxentius had submitted Africa to his A. D. 312. victorious arms, were ill adapted to edify an im­perfect proselyte. He learned, with surprise, that the provinces of that great country, from the con­fines of Cyrene to the columns of Hercules, were distracted with religious discord ⁶. The source of the division was derived from a double election in the church of Carthage; the second, in rank and opulence, of the ecclesiastical thrones of the West. Caecilian and Majorinus were the two rival pri­mates of Africa; and the death of the latter soon made room for Donatus, who, by his superior abilities and apparent virtues, was the firmest support of his party. The advantage which Caecilian might claim from the priority of his ordination, was destroyed by the illegal, or at least indecent, haste, with which it had been per­formed, without expecting the arrival of the [Page 310] bishops of Numidia. The authority of these bishops, who, to the number of seventy, con­demned Caecilian, and consecrated Majorinus, is again weakened by the infamy of some of their personal characters; and by the female intrigues, sacrilegious bargains, and tumultuous proceedings which are imputed to this Numidian council ⁷. The bishops of the contending factions main­tained, with equal ardour and obstinacy, that their adversaries were degraded, or at least dishonoured, by the odious crime of delivering the Holy Scrip­tures to the officers of Diocletian. From their mutual reproaches, as well as from the story of this dark transaction, it may justly be inferred, that the late persecution had embittered the zeal, without reforming the manners, of the African Christians. That divided church was incapable of affording an impartial judicature; the con­troversy was solemnly tried in five successive tribunals, which were appointed by the emperor; and the whole proceeding, from the first appeal to the final sentence, lasted above three years. A severe inquisition, which was taken by the Praetorian vicar, and the proconsul of Africa, the report of two episcopal visitors who had been sent [Page 311] to Carthage, the decrees of the councils of Rome and of Arles, and the supreme judgment of Con­stantine himself in his sacred consistory, were all favourable to the cause of Caecilian; and he was unanimously acknowledged by the civil and eccle­siastical powers, as the true and lawful primate of Africa. The honours and estates of the church were attributed to his suffragan bishops, and it was not without difficulty, that Constantine was satis­fied with inflicting the punishment of exile on the principal leaders of the Donatist faction. As their cause was examined with attention, perhaps it was determined with justice. Perhaps their complaint was not without foundation, that the credulity of the emperor had been abused by the insidious arts of his favourite Osius. The influence of falsehood and corruption might pro­cure the condemnation of the innocent, or aggra­vate the sentence of the guilty. Such an act, however, of injustice, if it concluded an impor­tunate dispute, might be numbered among the transient evils of a despotic administration, which are neither felt nor remembered by posterity.

But this incident, so inconsiderable that it Schism of the Do­natists, scarcely deserves a place in history, was productive of a memorable schism; which afflicted the pro­vinces A. D. 315 of Africa above three hundred years, and was extinguished only with Christianity itself. The inflexible zeal of freedom and fanaticism ani­mated the Donatists to refuse obedience to the usurpers, whose election they disputed, and whose spiritual powers they denied. Excluded from the civil and religious communion of mankind, [Page 312] they boldly excommunicated the rest of mankind, who had embraced the impious party of Caecilian, and of the Traditors, from whom he derived his pretended ordination. They asserted with con­fidence, and almost with exultation, that the Apostolical succession was interrupted; that all the bishops of Europe and Asia were infected by the contagion of guilt and schism; and that the prerogatives of the Catholic church were confined to the chosen portion of the African believers, who alone had preserved inviolate the integrity of their faith and discipline. This rigid theory was supported by the most uncharitable conduct. Whenever they acquired a proselyte, even from the distant provinces of the East, they carefully repeated the sacred rites of baptism ⁸ and ordina­tion; as they rejected the validity of those which he had already received from the hands of here­tics or schismatics. Bishops, virgins, and even spotless infants, were subjected to the disgrace of a public penance, before they could be admitted to the communion of the Donatists. If they ob­tained possession of a church which had been used by their Catholic adversaries, they purified the unhallowed building with the same jealous care which a temple of Idols might have required. They washed the pavement, scraped the walls, [Page 313] burnt the altar, which was commonly of wood, melted the consecrated plate, and cast the Holy Eucharist to the dogs, with every circumstance of ignominy which could provoke and perpetuate the animosity of religious factions ⁹. Notwith­standing this irreconcilable aversion, the two par­ties, who were mixed and separated in all the cities of Africa, had the same language and man­ners, the same zeal and learning, the same faith and worship. Proscribed by the civil and eccle­siastical powers of the empire, the Donatists still maintained in some provinces, particularly in Numidia, their superior numbers; and four hun­dred bishops acknowledged the jurisdiction of their primate. But the invincible spirit of the sect sometimes preyed on its own vitals; and the bosom of their schismatical church was torn by intestine divisions. A fourth part of the Donatist bishops followed the independent standard of the Maximianists. The narrow and solitary path which their first leaders had marked out, con­tinued to deviate from the great society of mankind. Even the imperceptible sect of the Rogatians could affirm, without a blush, that when Christ should descend to judge the earth, he would find his true religion preserved only in a few nameless villages of the Caesarean Mau­ritania ¹⁰.

[Page 314] The schism of the Donatists was confined to Africa: the more diffusive mischief of the Trini­tarian controversy successively penetrated into The Trini­tarian con­troversy. every part of the Christian world. The former was an accidental quarrel, occasioned by the abuse of freedom; the latter was a high and mysterious argument, derived from the abuse of philosophy. From the age of Constantine to that of Clovis and Theodoric, the temporal interests both of the Romans and Barbarians were deeply involved in the theological disputes of Arianism. The histo­rian may therefore be permitted respectfully to withdraw the veil of the sanctuary; and to deduce the progress of reason and faith, of error and pas­sion, from the school of Plato to the decline and fall of the empire.

The genius of Plato, informed by his own The system of Plato. Before Christ 360. meditation, or by the traditional knowledge of the priests of Egypt ¹¹, had ventured to explore the mysterious nature of the Deity. When he had elevated his mind to the sublime contempla­tion of the first self-existent, necessary cause of the universe, the Athenian sage was incapable of con­ceiving how the simple unity of his essence could [Page 315] admit the infinite variety of distinct and successive ideas which compose the model of the in­tellectual world; how a Being purely incorporeal could execute that perfect model, and mould with a plastic hand the rude and independent chaos. The vain hope of extricating himself from these difficulties, which must ever oppress the feeble powers of the human mind, might induce Plato to consider the divine nature under the threefold modification; of the first cause, the reason or Logos, and the soul or spirit of the universe. The LO­GOS His poetical imagination sometimes fixed and animated these metaphysical abstractions; the three archical or original principles were represented in the Platonic system as three Gods, united with each other by a mysterious and ineffable genera­tion; and the Logos was particularly considered under the more accessible character of the Son of an Eternal Father, and the Creator and Governor of the world. Such appear to have been the secret doctrines which were cautiously whispered in the gardens of the academy; and which, ac­cording to the more recent disciples of Plato, could not be perfectly understood, till after an assiduous study of thirty years ¹².

The arms of the Macedonians diffused over taught in the school of Alex­andria. Asia and Egypt the language and learning of Before Christ 300. [Page 316] Greece; and the theological system of Plato was taught, with less reserve, and perhaps with some improvements, in the celebrated school of Alex­andria ¹³. A numerous colony of Jews had been invited, by the favour of the Ptolemies, to settle in their new capital ¹⁴. While the bulk of the nation practised the legal ceremonies, and pursued the lucrative occupations of commerce, a few Hebrews, of a more liberal spirit, devoted their lives to religious and philosophical contempla­tion ¹⁵. They cultivated with diligence, and em­braced with ardour, the theological system of the Athenian sage. But their national pride would have been mortified by a fair confession of their former poverty: and they boldly marked, as the sacred inheritance of their ancestors, the gold and jewels which they had so lately stolen from their Egyptian masters. One hundred years before the Before Christ 100. birth of Christ, a philosophical treatise, which manifestly betrays the stile and sentiments of the school of Plato, was produced by the Alexandrian Jews, and unanimously received as a genuine and valuable relic of the inspired Wisdom of Solo­mon ¹⁶. A similar union of the Mosaic faith, and [Page 317] the Grecian philosophy, distinguishes the works of Philo, which were composed, for the most part, under the reign of Augustus ¹⁷. The material soul of the universe ¹⁸ might offend the piety of the Hebrews: but they applied the cha­racter of the LOGOS to the Jehovah of Moses and the patriarchs; and the Son of God was introduced upon earth under a visible, and even human appearance, to perform those familiar offices which seem incompatible with the nature and attributes of the Universal Cause ¹⁹.

The eloquence of Plato, the name of Solomon, Revealed by the Apostle St. John, the authority of the school of Alexandria, and the A. D. 97. [Page 318] consent of the Jews and Greeks, were insufficient to establish the truth of a mysterious doctrine, which might please, but could not satisfy, a ra­tional mind. A prophet, or apostle, inspired by the Deity, can alone exercise a lawful dominion over the faith of mankind; and the theology of Plato might have been for ever confounded with the philosophical visions of the Academy, the Porch, and the Lycaeum, if the name and divine attributes of the Logos had not been confirmed by the celestial pen of the last and most sublime of the Evangelists ²⁰. The Christian Revelation, which was consummated under the name of Nerva, dis­closed to the world the amazing secret, that the LOGOS, who was with God from the beginning, and was God, who had made all things, and for whom all things had been made, was incarnate in the person of Jesus of Nazareth; who had been born of a virgin, and suffered death on the cross. Besides the general design of fixing on a perpetual basis the divine honours of Christ, the most ancient and respectable of the ecclesiastical writers have ascribed to the evangelic theologian, a particular intention to confute two opposite heresies, which disturbed the peace of the primitive church ²¹. [Page 319] I. The faith of the Ebionites ²², perhaps of the Nazarenes ²³, was gross and imperfect. They revered Jesus as the greatest of the prophets, The Ebionites and Do­cetes. endowed with supernatural virtue and power. They ascribed to his person and to his future reign all the predictions of the Hebrew oracles which relate to the spiritual and everlasting kingdom of the promised Messiah ²⁴. Some of them might confess that he was born of a virgin; but they obstinately rejected the preceding existence and divine perfections of the Logos, or Son of God, which are so clearly defined in the Gospel of St. John. About fifty years afterwards, the Ebionites, whose errors are mentioned by Justin Martyr with less severity than they seem to deserve ²⁵, formed a very inconsiderable portion of the Christian name. II. The Gnostics, who were distinguished by the epithet of Docetes, deviated into the contrary ex­treme; and betrayed the human, while they [Page 320] asserted the divine, nature of Christ. Educated in the school of Plato, accustomed to the sublime idea of the Logos, they readily conceived that the brightest Aeon, or Emanation of the Deity, might assume the outward shape and visible appearances of a mortal ²⁶; but they vainly pretended, that the imperfections of matter are incompatible with the purity of a celestial substance. While the blood of Christ yet smoked on Mount Calvary, the Docetes invented the impious and extravagant hypothesis, that, instead of issuing from the womb of the Virgin ²⁷, he had descended on the banks of the Jordan in the form of perfect manhood; that he had imposed on the senses of his enemies, and of his disciples; and that the ministers of Pilate had wasted their impotent rage on an airy phantom, who seemed to expire on the cross, and, after three days, to rise from the dead ²⁸.

The divine sanction, which the Apostle had Mysterious nature of the Tri­nity. bestowed on the fundamental principle of the [Page 321] theology of Plato, encouraged the learned prose­lytes of the second and third centuries to admire and study the writings of the Athenian sage, who had thus marvellously anticipated one of the most surprising discoveries of the Christian revelation. The respectable name of Plato was used by the orthodox ²⁹, and abused by the heretics ³⁰, as the common support of truth and error: the authority of his skilful commentators, and the science of dialectics, were employed to justify the remote consequences of his opinions; and to supply the discreet silence of the inspired writers. The same subtle and profound questions concerning the nature, the generation, the distinction, and the equality of the three divine persons of the myste­rious Triad, or Trinity ³¹, were agitated in the philosophical, and in the Christian, schools of Alexandria. An eager spirit of curiosity urged [Page 322] them to explore the secrets of the abyss; and the pride of the professors, and of their disciples, was satisfied with the science of words. But the most sagacious of the Christian theologians, the great Athanasius himself, has candidly confessed ³², that whenever he forced his understanding to meditate on the divinity of the Logos, his toilsome and un­availing efforts recoiled on themselves; that the more he thought, the less he comprehended; and the more he wrote, the less capable was he of ex­pressing his thoughts. In every step of the enquiry, we are compelled to feel and acknowledge the immeasurable disproportion between the size of the object and the capacity of the human mind. We may strive to abstract the notions of time, of space, and of matter, which so closely adhere to all the perceptions of our experimental knowledge. But as soon as we presume to reason of infinite substance, of spiritual generation; as often as we deduce any positive conclusions from a negative idea, we are involved in darkness, perplexity, and inevitable contradiction. As these difficulties arise from the nature of the subject, they oppress, with the same insuperable weight, the philosophic and the theological disputant; but we may observe two essential and peculiar circumstances, which discriminated the doctrines of the Catholic church from the opinions of the Platonic school.

I. A chosen society of philosophers, men of a Law of the Christians. liberal education and curious disposition, might [Page 323] silently meditate, and temperately discuss, in the gardens of Athens or the library of Alexandria, the abstruse questions of metaphysical science. The lofty speculations, which neither convinced the understanding, nor agitated the passions, of the Platonists themselves, were carelessly over­looked by the idle, the busy, and even the studious part of mankind ³³. But after the Logos had been revealed as the sacred object of the faith, the hope, and the religious worship of the Christians; the mysterious system was embraced by a numerous and increasing multitude in every province of the Roman world. Those persons who, from their age, or sex, or occupations, were the least qua­lified to judge, who were the least exercised in the habits of abstract reasoning; aspired to con­template the oeconomy of the Divine Nature: and it is the boast of Tertullian ³⁴, that a Christian mechanic could readily answer such questions as had perplexed the wisest of the Grecian sages. Where the subject lies so far beyond our reach, the difference between the highest and the lowest of human understandings may indeed be calculated as infinitely small; yet the degree of weakness may perhaps be measured by the degree of obsti­nacy and dogmatic confidence. These specula­tions, [Page 324] instead of being treated as the amusement of a vacant hour, became the most serious business of the present, and the most useful preparation for a future, life. A theology, which it was incum­bent to believe, which it was impious to doubt, and which it might be dangerous, and even fatal, to mistake, became the familiar topic of private meditation and popular discourse. The cold in­difference of philosophy was inflamed by the fer­vent spirit of devotion; and even the metaphors of common language suggested the fallacious prejudices of sense and experience. The Christians, who abhorred the gross and impure generation of the Greek mythology ³⁵, were tempted to argue from the familiar analogy of the filial and paternal relations. The character of Son seemed to imply a perpetual subordination to the voluntary author of his existence ³⁶; but as the act of generation, in the most spiritual and abstracted sense, must be supposed to transmit the properties of a common nature ³⁷, they durst not presume to circumscribe [Page 325] the powers or the duration of the Son of an eternal and omnipotent Father. Fourscore years after the death of Christ, the Christians of Bithynia de­clared before the tribunal of Pliny, that they in­voked him as a god: and his divine honours have been perpetuated in every age and country, by the various sects who assume the name of his dis­ciples ³⁸. Their tender reverence for the memory of Christ, and their horror for the profane worship of any created being, would have engaged them to assert the equal and absolute divinity of the Logos, if their rapid ascent towards the throne of heaven had not been imperceptibly checked by the apprehension of violating the unity and sole supremacy of the great Father of Christ and of the Universe. The suspense and fluctuation pro­duced in the minds of the Christians by these op­posite tendencies, may be observed in the writings of the theologians who flourished after the end of the apostolic age, and before the origin of the Arian controversy. Their suffrage is claimed, with equal confidence, by the orthodox and by the heretical parties; and the most inquisitive critics have fairly allowed, that if they had the good fortune of possessing the Catholic verity, they have delivered their conceptions in loose, [Page 326] inaccurate, and sometimes contradictory lan­guage ³⁹.

II. The devotion of individuals was the first Authority of the church. circumstance which distinguished the Christians from the Platonists: the second was the authority of the church. The disciples of philosophy asserted the rights of intellectual freedom, and their re­spect for the sentiments of their teachers was a liberal and voluntary tribute, which they offered to superior reason. But the Christians formed a numerous and disciplined society; and the juris­diction of their laws and magistrates was strictly exercised over the minds of the faithful. The loose wanderings of the imagination were gra­dually confined by creeds and confessions ⁴⁰; the freedom of private judgment submitted to the public wisdom of synods; the authority of a theo­logian was determined by his ecclesiastical rank; and the episcopal successors of the apostles inflicted the censures of the church on those who deviated from the orthodox belief. But in an age of re­ligious controversy, every act of oppression adds new force to the elastic vigour of the mind; and the zeal or obstinacy of a spiritual rebel was some­times stimulated by secret motives of ambition or [Page 327] avarice. A metaphysical argument became the cause or pretence of political contests; the subtle­ties of the Platonic school were used as the badges Factions. of popular factions, and the distance which sepa­rated their respective tenets was enlarged or mag­nified by the acrimony of dispute. As long as the dark heresies of Praxeas and Sabellius laboured to confound the Father with the Son ⁴¹, the orthodox party might be excused if they adhered more strictly and more earnestly to the distinction, than to the equality of the divine persons. But as soon as the heat of controversy had subsided, and the progress of the Sabellians was no longer an object of terror to the churches of Rome, of Africa, or of Egypt; the tide of theological opinion began to flow with a gentle but steady motion toward the contrary extreme; and the most orthodox doctors allowed themselves the use of the terms and defi­nitions which had been censured in the mouth of the sectaries ⁴². After the edict of toleration had restored peace and leisure to the Christians, the Trinitarian controversy was revived in the ancient seat of Platonism, the learned, the opulent, the tumultuous city of Alexandria; and the flame of religious discord was rapidly communicated from the schools, to the clergy, the people, the pro­vince, [Page 328] and the East. The abstruse question of the eternity of the Logos was agitated in ecclesiastic conferences, and popular sermons; and the hete­rodox opinions of Arius ⁴³ were soon made public Arius. by his own zeal, and by that of his adversaries. His most implacable adversaries have acknow­ledged the learning and blameless life of that eminent presbyter; who, in a former election, had declared, and perhaps generously declined, his pretensions to the episcopal throne ⁴⁴. His com­petitor Alexander assumed the office of his judge. The important cause was argued before him; and if at first he seemed to hesitate, he at length pro­nounced his final sentence, as an absolute rule of faith ⁴⁵. The undaunted presbyter, who presumed to resist the authority of his angry bishop, was separated from the communion of the church. But the pride of Arius was supported by the applause of a numerous party. He reckoned among his immediate followers two bishops of [Page 329] Egypt, seven presbyters, twelve deacons, and (what may appear almost incredible) seven hun­dred virgins. A large majority of the bishops of Asia appeared to support or favour his cause; and their measures were conducted by Eusebius of Caesarea, the most learned of the Christian pre­lates; and by Eusebius of Nicomedia, who had acquired the reputation of a statesman without forfeiting that of a saint. Synods in Palestine and Bithynia were opposed to the synods of Egypt. The attention of the prince and people was at­tracted by this theological dispute; and the deci­sion, at the end of six years ⁴⁶, was referred to the A. D. 318—325. supreme authority of the general council of Nice.

When the mysteries of the Christian faith were Three sys­tems of the Trinity. dangerously exposed to public debate, it might be observed, that the human understanding was capable of forming three distinct, though imper­fect, systems, concerning the nature of the Divine Trinity; and it was pronounced, that none of these systems, in a pure and absolute sense, were exempt from heresy and error ⁴⁷. I. According Arianism. to the first hypothesis, which was maintained by Arius and his disciples, the Logos was a depend­ent [Page 330] and spontaneous production, created from nothing by the will of the Father. The Son, by whom all things were made ⁴⁸, had been begotten before all worlds, and the longest of the astrono­mical periods could be compared only as a fleet­ing moment to the extent of his duration; yet this duration was not infinite ⁴⁹, and there had been a time which preceded the ineffable genera­tion of the Logos. On this only begotten Son the Almighty Father had transfused his ample spirit, and impressed the effulgence of his glory. Visible image of invisible perfection, he saw, at an im­measurable distance beneath his feet, the thrones of the brightest archangels: yet he shone only with a reflected light, and, like the sons of the Roman emperors, who were invested with the titles of Caesar or Augustus ⁵⁰, he governed the universe in obedience to the will of his Father and Monarch. II. In the second hypothesis, the Logos Tritheism. possessed all the inherent, incommunicable per­fections, which religion and philosophy appro­priate to the Supreme God. Three distinct and infinite minds or substances, three co-equal and co-eternal beings, composed the Divine Essence ⁵¹; [Page 331] and it would have implied contradiction, that any of them should not have existed, or that they should ever cease to exist ⁵². The advocates of a system which seemed to establish three independent Deities, attempted to preserve the unity of the First Cause, so conspicuous in the design and order of the world, by the perpetual concord of their administration, and the essential agreement of their will. A faint resemblance of this unity of action may be discovered in the societies of men, and even of animals. The causes which disturb their harmony proceed only from the im­perfection and inequality of their faculties: but the omnipotence which is guided by infinite wis­dom and goodness, cannot fail of chusing the same means for the accomplishment of the same ends. III. Three Beings, who, by the self-derived Sabellian­ism. necessity of their existence, possess all the divine attributes in the most perfect degree; who are eternal in duration, infinite in space, and inti­mately present to each other, and to the whole universe; irresistibly force themselves on the asto­nished mind, as one and the same Being ⁵³, who, in the oeconomy of grace, as well as in that of [Page 332] nature, may manifest himself under different forms, and be considered under different aspects. By this hypothesis, a real substantial Trinity is refined into a trinity of names, and abstract modi­fications, that subsist only in the mind which conceives them. The Logos is no longer a per­son, but an attribute; and it is only in a figurative sense, that the epithet of Son can be applied to the eternal reason which was with God from the beginning, and by which, not by whom, all things were made. The incarnation of the Logos is re­duced to a mere inspiration of the Divine Wisdom, which filled the soul, and directed all the actions of the man Jesus. Thus, after revolving round the theological circle, we are surprised to find that the Sabellian ends where the Ebionite had begun; and that the incomprehensible mystery which excites our adoration, eludes our en­quiry ⁵⁴.

If the bishops of the council of Nice ⁵⁵ had Council of Nice, been permitted to follow the unbiassed dictates A. D. 325. [Page 333] of their conscience, Arius and his associates could scarcely have flattered themselves with the hopes of obtaining a majority of votes, in favour of an hypothesis so directly adverse to the two most popular opinions of the Catholic world. The Arians soon perceived the danger of their situa­tion, and prudently assumed those modest virtues, which, in the fury of civil and religious dissen­tions, are seldom practised, or even praised, except by the weaker party. They recommended the exercise of Christian charity and moderation; urged the incomprehensible nature of the contro­versy; disclaimed the use of any terms of defini­tions which could not be found in the scriptures; and offered, by very liberal concessions, to satisfy their adversaries, without renouncing the integrity of their own principles. The victorious faction received all their proposals with haughty suspicion; and anxiously sought for some irreconcileable mark of distinction, the rejection of which might in­volve the Arians in the guilt and consequences of heresy. A letter was publicly read, and ignomi­niously torn, in which their patron, Eusebius of Nicomedia, ingenuously confessed, that the ad­mission of the HOMOOUSION, or Consubstantial, The Ho­moousion. a word already familiar to the Platonists, was in­compatible with the principles of their theological system. The fortunate opportunity was eagerly embraced by the bishops, who governed the reso­lutions of the synod; and according to the lively expression of Ambrose ⁵⁶, they used the sword, [Page 334] which heresy itself had drawn from the scabbard, to cut off the head of the hated monster. The consubstantiality of the Father and the Son was established by the council of Nice, and has been unanimously received as a fundamental article of the Christian faith, by the consent of the Greek, the Latin, the Oriental, and the Protestant churches. But if the same word had not served to stigmatize the heretics, and to unite the Catho­lics, it would have been inadequate to the purpose of the majority, by whom it was introduced into the orthodox creed. This majority was divided into two parties, distinguished by a contrary ten­dency to the sentiments of the Tritheists and of the Sabellians. But as those opposite extremes seemed to overthrow the foundations either of natural, or revealed, religion, they mutually agreed to qualify the rigour of their principles: and to disavow the just, but invidious, conse­quences, which might be urged by their an­tagonists. The interest of the common cause inclined them to join their numbers, and to con­ceal their differences; their animosity was softened by the healing counsels of toleration, and their disputes were suspended by the use of the myste­rious Homoousion, which either party was free to interpret according to their peculiar tenets. The Sabellian sense, which, about fifty years before, had obliged the council of Antioch ⁵⁷ to prohibit [Page 335] this celebrated term, had endeared it to those theologians who entertained a secret but partial affection for a nominal Trinity. But the more fashionable saints of the Arian times, the intrepid Athanasius, the learned Gregory Nazianzen, and the other pillars of the church, who supported with ability and success the Nicene doctrine, appeared to consider the expression of substance, as if it had been synonimous with that of nature; and they ventured to illustrate their meaning, by affirming that three men, as they belong to the same com­mon species, are consubstantial or homoousian to each other ⁵⁸. This pure and distinct equality was tempered, on the one hand, by the internal connection, and spiritual penetration, which in­dissolubly unites the divine persons ⁵⁹; and on the other, by the pre-eminence of the Father, which was acknowledged as far as it is compatible with the independence of the Son ⁶⁰. Within these limits the almost invisible and tremulous ball of orthodoxy was allowed securely to vibrate. On either side, beyond this consecrated ground, the [Page 336] heretics and the daemons lurked in ambush to surprise and devour the unhappy wanderer. But as the degrees of theological hatred depend on the spirit of the war, rather than on the importance of the controversy, the heretics who degraded, were treated with more severity than those who annihilated, the person of the Son. The life of Athanasius was consumed in irreconcileable op­position to the impious madness of the Arians ⁶¹; but he defended above twenty years the Sabel­lianism of Marcellus of Ancyra; and when at last he was compelled to withdraw himself from his communion, he continued to mention, with an ambiguous smile, the venial errors of his respec­table friend ⁶².

The authority of a general council, to which Arian creeds. the Arians themselves had been compelled to sub­mit, inscribed on the banners of the orthodox party the mysterious characters of the word Homoousion, which essentially contributed, not­withstanding some obscure disputes, some noctur­nal combats, to maintain and perpetuate the uniformity of faith, or at least of language. The Consubstantialists, who by their success have de­served and obtained the title of Catholics, gloried in the simplicity and steadiness of their own creed, [Page 337] and insulted the repeated variations of their adver­saries, who were destitute of any certain rule of faith. The sincerity or the cunning of the Arian chiefs, the fear of the laws or of the people, their reverence for Christ, their hatred of Athanasius, all the causes, human and divine, that influence and disturb the counsels of a theological faction, introduced among the sectaries a spirit of discord and inconstancy, which, in the course of a few years, erected eighteen different models of reli­gion ⁶³, and avenged the violated dignity of the church. The zealous Hilary ⁶⁴, who, from the peculiar hardships of his situation, was inclined to extenuate rather than to aggravate the errors of the Oriental clergy, declares, that in the wide extent of the ten provinces of Asia, to which he had been banished, there could be found very few prelates who had preserved the knowledge of the true God ⁶⁵. The oppression which he had felt, the disorders of which he was the spectator and the victim, appeased, during a short interval, [Page 338] the angry passions of his soul; and in the follow­ing passage, of which I shall transcribe a few lines, the bishop of Poitiers unwarily deviates into the style of a Christian philosopher. ‘It is a thing, says Hilary, equally deplorable and dangerous, that there are as many creeds as opinions among men, as many doctrines as inclinations, and as many sources of blasphemy as there are faults among us; because we make creeds arbitrarily, and explain them as arbitrarily. The Homo­ousion is rejected, and received, and explained away by successive synods. The partial or total resemblance of the Father and of the Son, is a subject of dispute for these unhappy times. Every year, nay every moon, we make new creeds to describe invisible mysteries. We repent of what we have done, we defend those who repent, we anathematise those whom we defended. We condemn either the doctrine of others in ourselves, or our own in that of others; and reciprocally tearing one another to pieces, we have been the cause of each other's ruin ⁶⁶.’

It will not be expected, it would not perhaps Arian sects. be endured, that I should swell this theological digression, by a minute examination of the eighteen creeds, the authors of which, for the most part, disclaimed the odious name of their parent Arius. It is amusing enough to delineate the form, and to trace the vegetation, of a singular plant; but [Page 339] the tedious detail of leaves without flowers, and of branches without fruit, would soon exhaust the patience, and disappoint the curiosity, of the laborious student. One question which gradually arose from the Arian controversy, may however be noticed, as it served to produce and discri­minate the three sects, who were united only by their common aversion to the Homoousion of the Nicene synod. 1. If they were asked, whether the Son was like unto the Father; the question was resolutely answered in the negative, by the here­tics who adhered to the principles of Arius, or indeed to those of philosophy; which seem to establish an infinite difference between the Creator and the most excellent of his creatures. This obvious consequence was maintained by Aetius ⁶⁷, on whom the zeal of his adversaries bestowed the surname of the Atheist. His restless and aspiring spirit urged him to try almost every profession of human life. He was successively a slave, or at least a husbandman, a travelling tinker, a gold­smith, a physician, a schoolmaster, a theologian, and at last the apostle of a new church, which was propagated by the abilities of his disciple Euno­mius ⁶⁸. Armed with texts of scripture, and with [Page 340] captious syllogisms from the logic of Aristotle, the subtle Aetius had acquired the fame of an invin­cible disputant, whom it was impossible either to silence or to convince. Such talents engaged the friendship of the Arian bishops, till they were forced to renounce, and even to persecute, a dan­gerous ally, who, by the accuracy of his reasoning, had prejudiced their cause in the popular opinion, and offended the piety of their most devoted fol­lowers. 2. The omnipotence of the Creator suggested a specious and respectful solution of the likeness of the Father and the Son; and faith might humbly receive what reason could not presume to deny, that the Supreme God might communicate his infinite perfections, and create a being similar only to himself ⁶⁹. These Arians were powerfully supported by the weight and abilities of their leaders, who had succeeded to the management of the Eusebian interest, and who occupied the principal thrones of the East. They detested, perhaps with some affectation, the impiety of Aetius; they professed to believe, either without reserve, or according to the scriptures, that the Son was different from all other creatures, and similar only to the Father. But they denied, that [Page 341] he was either of the same, or of a similar substance; sometimes boldly justifying their dissent, and some­times objecting to the use of the word substance, which seems to imply an adequate, or at least a distinct, notion of the nature of the Deity. 3. The sect which asserted the doctrine of a similar sub­stance, was the most numerous, at least in the provinces of Asia; and when the leaders of both parties were assembled in the council of Seleucia ⁷⁰, their opinion would have prevailed by a majority of one hundred and five to forty-three bishops. The Greek word, which was chosen to express this mysterious resemblance, bears so close an affinity to the orthodox symbol, that the profane of every age have derided the furious contests which the difference of a single diphthong excited between the Homoousians and the Homoiousians. As it frequently happens, that the sounds and cha­racters which approach the nearest to each other, accidentally represent the most opposite ideas, the observation would be itself ridiculous, if it were possible to mark any real and sensible distinction between the doctrine of the Semi-Arians, as they were improperly styled, and that of the Catholics themselves. The bishop of Poitiers, who in his Phrygian exile very wisely aimed at a coalition of parties, endeavours to prove that, by a pious and faithful interpretation ⁷¹, the Homoiousion may be [Page 342] reduced to a consubstantial sense. Yet he confesses that the word has a dark and suspicious aspect; and, as if darkness were congenial to theological disputes, the Semi-Arians, who advanced to the doors of the church, assailed them with the most unrelenting fury.

The provinces of Egypt and Asia, which cul­tivated Faith of the West­ern or La­tin church. the language and manners of the Greeks, had deeply imbibed the venom of the Arian con­troversy. The familiar study of the Platonic system, a vain and argumentative disposition, a copious and flexible idiom, supplied the clergy and people of the East with an inexhaustible flow of words and distinctions; and, in the midst of their fierce contentions, they easily forgot the doubt which is recommended by philosophy, and the submission which is enjoined by religion. The inhabitants of the West were of a less inqui­sitive spirit; their passions were not so forcibly moved by invisible objects; their minds were less frequently exercised by the habits of dispute; and such was the happy ignorance of the Gallican church, that Hilary himself, above thirty years after the first general council, was still a stranger to the Nicene creed ⁷². The Latins had received [Page 343] the rays of divine knowledge through the dark and doubtful medium of a translation. The poverty and stubbornness of their native tongue, was not always capable of affording just equi­valents for the Greek terms, for the technical words of the Platonic philosophy ⁷³, which had been consecrated by the gospel or by the church, to express the mysteries of the Christian faith; and a verbal defect might introduce into the Latin theology, a long train of error or perplexity ⁷⁴. But as the western provincials had the good for­tune of deriving their religion from an orthodox source, they preserved with steadiness the doctrine which they had accepted with docility; and when the Arian pestilence approached their frontiers, they were supplied with the seasonable pre­servative of the Homoousion, by the paternal care of the Roman pontiff. Their sentiments and their temper were displayed in the memorable synod of Council of Rimini, Rimini, which surpassed in numbers the council A. D. 360. of Nice, since it was composed of above four hun­dred bishops of Italy, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Illyricum. From the first debates it appeared, that only fourscore prelates adhered to the party, though they affected to anathematise the name and memory, of Arius. But this inferiority was com­pensated by the advantages of skill, of experience, [Page 344] and of discipline; and the minority was conducted by Valens and Ursacius, two bishops of Illyricum, who had spent their lives in the intrigues of courts and councils, and who had been trained under the Eusebian banner, in the religious wars of the East. By their arguments and negociations, they embarrassed, they confounded, they at last de­ceived, the honest simplicity of the Latin bishops; who suffered the palladium of the faith to be ex­torted from their hands by fraud and importunity, rather than by open violence. The council of Rimini was not allowed to separate, till the mem­bers had imprudently subscribed a captious creed, in which some expressions, susceptible of an here­tical sense, were inserted in the room of the Homoousion. It was on this occasion, that, according to Jerom, the world was surprised to find itself Arian ⁷⁵. But the bishops of the Latin provinces had no sooner reached their respective dioceses, than they discovered their mistake, and repented of their weakness. The ignominious capi­tulation was rejected with disdain and abhorrence: and the Homoousian standard, which had been shaken but not overthrown, was more firmly replanted in all the churches of the West ⁷⁶.

Such was the rise and progress, and such were Conduct of the em­perors in the Arian contro­versy. the natural revolutions of those theological dis­putes, [Page 345] which disturbed the peace of Christianity under the reigns of Constantine and of his sons. But as those princes presumed to extend their despotism over the faith, as well as over the lives and fortunes, of their subjects; the weight of their suffrage sometimes inclined the ecclesiastical balance: and the prerogatives of the King of Heaven were settled, or changed, or modified, in the cabinet of an earthly monarch.

The unhappy spirit of discord which pervaded Indiffe­rence of Constan­tine, the provinces of the East, interrupted the triumph of Constantine; but the emperor continued for some time to view, with cool and careless indif­ference, A. D. 324. the object of the dispute. As he was yet ignorant of the difficulty of appeasing the quarrels of theologians, he addressed to the con­tending parties, to Alexander and to Arius, a mo­derating epistle ⁷⁷; which may be ascribed, with far greater reason, to the untutored sense of a sol­dier and statesman, than to the dictates of any of his episcopal counsellors. He attributes the origin of the whole controversy to a trifling and subtle question, concerning an incomprehensible point of the law, which was foolishly asked by the bishop, and imprudently resolved by the presbyter. He laments that the Christian people, who had the same God, the same religion, and the same wor­ship, should be divided by such inconsiderable [Page 346] distinctions; and he seriously recommends to the clergy of Alexandria the example of the Greek philosophers; who could maintain their argu­ments without losing their temper, and assert their freedom without violating their friendship. The indifference and contempt of the sovereign would have been, perhaps, the most effectual method of silencing the dispute: if the popular current had been less rapid and impetuous; and if Constan­tine himself, in the midst of faction and fanati­cism, could have preserved the calm possession of his own mind. But his ecclesiastical ministers soon contrived to seduce the impartiality of the magistrate, and to awaken the zeal of the prose­lyte. He was provoked by the insults which had His zeal. been offered to his statues; he was alarmed by the A. D. 325. real, as well as the imaginary, magnitude of the spreading mischief; and he extinguished the hope of peace and toleration, from the moment that he assembled three hundred bishops within the walls of the same palace. The presence of the monarch swelled the importance of the debate; his atten­tion multiplied the arguments; and he exposed his person with a patient intrepidity, which ani­mated the valour of the combatants. Notwith­standing the applause which has been bestowed on the eloquence and sagacity of Constantine ⁷⁸; a Roman general, whose religion might be still a subject of doubt, and whose mind had not been enlightened either by study or by inspiration, was indifferently qualified to discuss, in the Greek [Page 347] language, a metaphysical question, or an article of faith. But the credit of his favourite Osius, who appears to have presided in the council of Nice, might dispose the emperor in favour of the orthodox party; and a well-timed insinuation, that the same Eusebius of Nicomedia, who now protected the heretic, had lately assisted the tyrant ⁷⁹, might exasperate him against their ad­versaries. The Nicene creed was ratified by Con­stantine; and his firm declaration, that those who resisted the divine judgment of the synod, must prepare themselves for an immediate exile, anni­hilated the murmurs of a feeble opposition; which from seventeen, was almost instantly reduced to two, protesting bishops. Eusebius of Caesarea yielded a reluctant and ambiguous consent to the Homoousion ⁸⁰; and the wavering conduct of the Nicomedian Eusebius served only to delay, about three months, his disgrace and exile ⁸¹. The im­pious He perse­cutes the Arian Arius was banished into one of the remote provinces of Illyricum; his person and disciples were branded by law, with the odious name of [Page 348] Porphyrians; his writings were condemned to the flames; and a capital punishment was denounced against those in whose possession they should be found. The emperor had now imbibed the spirit of controversy, and the angry sarcastic style of his edicts was designed to inspire his subjects with the hatred which he had conceived against the enemies of Christ ⁸².

But, as if the conduct of the emperor had been and the or­thodox party, guided by passion instead of principle, three years from the council of Nice were scarcely elapsed, A. D. 328—337. before he discovered some symptoms of mercy, and even of indulgence, towards the proscribed sect, which was secretly protected by his favourite sister. The exiles were recalled; and Eusebius, who gradually resumed his influence over the mind of Constantine, was restored to the episcopal throne, from which he had been ignominiously degraded. Arius himself was treated by the whole court with the respect which would have been due to an innocent and oppressed man. His faith was approved by the synod of Jerusalem; and the emperor seemed impatient to repair his injustice, by issuing an absolute command, that he should be solemnly admitted to the communion in the cathedral of Constantinople. On the same day, which had been fixed for the triumph of Arius, he expired;—and the strange and horrid circum­stances of his death might excite a suspicion, that [Page 349] the orthodox saints had contributed, more effica­ciously than by their prayers, to deliver the church from the most formidable of her enemies ⁸³. The three principal leaders of the Catholics, Athana­sius of Alexandria, Eustathius of Antioch, and Paul of Constantinople, were deposed on various accusations, by the sentence of numerous councils; and were afterwards banished into distant pro­vinces by the first of the Christian emperors, who, in the last moments of his life, received the rites of baptism from the Arian bishop of Nicomedia. The ecclesiastical government of Constantine can­not be justified from the reproach of levity and weakness. But the credulous monarch, unskilled in the stratagems of theological warfare, might be deceived by the modest and specious professions of the heretics, whose sentiments he never per­fectly understood; and while he protected Arius, and persecuted Athanasius, he still considered the council of Nice as the bulwark of the Christian faith, and the peculiar glory of his own reign ⁸⁴.

[Page 350] The sons of Constantine must have been admit­ted from their childhood into the rank of cate­chumens, but they imitated, in the delay of their Constan­tius fa­vours the Arians, baptism, the example of their father. Like him, they presumed to pronounce their judgment on mysteries into which they had never been regularly A. D. 337—361. initiated ⁸⁵: and the fate of the Trinitarian con­troversy depended, in a great measure, on the sentiments of Constantius; who inherited the pro­vinces of the East, and acquired the possession of the whole empire. The Arian presbyter or bishop, who had secreted for his use the testament of the deceased emperor, improved the fortunate occa­sion which had introduced him to the familiarity of a prince, whose public counsels were always swayed by his domestic favourites. The eunuchs and slaves diffused the spiritual poison through the palace, and the dangerous infection was com­municated by the female attendants to the guards, and by the empress to her unsuspicious husband ⁸⁶. The partiality which Constantius always expressed towards the Eusebian faction, was insensibly forti­fied by the dexterous management of their leaders; and his victory over the tyrant Magnentius en­creased his inclination, as well as ability, to em­ploy the arms of power in the cause of Arianism. While the two armies were engaged in the plains [Page 351] of Mursa, and the fate of the two rivals depended on the chance of war, the son of Constantine passed the anxious moments in a church of the martyrs, under the walls of the city. His spiritual com­forter, Valens, the Arian bishop of the diocese, employed the most artful precautions to obtain such early intelligence as might secure either his favour or his escape. A secret chain of swift and trusty messengers informed him of the vicissitudes of the battle; and while the courtiers stood trembling round their affrighted master, Valens assured him that the Gallic legions gave way; and insinuated with some presence of mind, that the glorious event had been revealed to him by an angel. The grateful emperor ascribed his success to the merits and intercession of the bishop of Mursa, whose faith had deserved the public and miraculous approbation of Heaven ⁸⁷. The Arians, who considered as their own the victory of Con­stantius, preferred his glory to that of his Father ⁸⁸. Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, immediately composed the description of a celestial cross, encircled with a splendid rainbow; which during the festival of Pentecost, about the third hour of the day, had [Page 352] appeared over the Mount of Olives, to the edifi­cation of the devout pilgrims, and the people of the holy city ⁸⁹. The size of the meteor was gra­dually magnified; and the Arian historian has ventured to affirm, that it was conspicuous to the two armies in the plains of Pannonia; and that the tyrant, who is purposely represented as an idolater, fled before the auspicious sign of ortho­dox Christianity ⁹⁰.

The sentiments of a judicious stranger, who Arian councils. has impartially considered the progress of civil or ecclesiastical discord, are always entitled to our notice: and a short passage of Ammianus, who served in the armies, and studied the character, of Constantius, is perhaps of more value than many pages of theological invectives. ‘The Christian religion, which, in itself, says that moderate historian, is plain and simple, he confounded by the dotage of superstition. Instead of re­conciling the parties by the weight of his autho­rity, he cherished and propagated, by verbal disputes, the differences which his vain curiosity had excited. The highways were covered with troops of bishops, galloping from every side to the assemblies, which they call synods; and while they laboured to reduce the whole sect to their own particular opinions, the public estab­lishment [Page 353] of the posts was almost ruined by their hasty and repeated journies ⁹¹.’ Our more in­timate knowledge of the ecclesiastical transactions of the reign of Constantius, would furnish an ample commentary on this remarkable passage; which justifies the rational apprehensions of Atha­nasius, that the restless activity of the clergy, who wandered round the empire in search of the true faith, would excite the contempt and laughter of the unbelieving world ⁹². As soon as the emperor was relieved from the terrors of the civil war, he devoted the leisure of his winter-quarters at Arles, Milan, Sirmium, and Constantinople, to the amusement or toils of controversy: the sword of the magistrate, and even of the tyrant, was un­sheathed, to enforce the reasons of the theologian; and as he opposed the orthodox faith of Nice, it is readily confessed that his incapacity and igno­rance were equal to his presumption ⁹³. The eunuchs, the women, and the bishops, who go­verned the vain and feeble mind of the emperor, had inspired him with an insuperable dislike to the Homoousion; but his timid conscience was [Page 354] alarmed by the impiety of Aetius. The guilt of that atheist was aggravated by the suspicious favour of the unfortunate Gallus; and even the deaths of the Imperial ministers, who had been massacred at Antioch, were imputed to the sug­gestions of that dangerous sophist. The mind of Constantius, which could neither be mode­rated by reason, nor fixed by faith, was blindly impelled to either side of the dark and empty abyss, by his horror of the opposite extreme: he alternately embraced and condemned the senti­ments, he successively banished and recalled the leaders, of the Arian and Semi-Arian factions ⁹⁴. During the season of public business or festivity, he employed whole days, and even nights, in selecting the words, and weighing the syllables, which composed his fluctuating creeds. The subject of his meditation still pursued and occupied his slumbers; the incoherent dreams of the em­peror were received as celestial visions; and he accepted with complacency the lofty title of bishop of bishops, from those ecclesiastics who forgot the interest of their order for the gratification of their passions. The design of establishing an uniform­ity of doctrine, which had engaged him to con­vene so many synods in Gaul, Italy, Illyricum, and Asia, was repeatedly baffled by his own [Page 355] levity, by the divisions of the Arians, and by the resistance of the catholics; and he resolved, as the last and decisive effort, imperiously to dictate the decrees of a general council. The destructive earthquake of Nicomedia, the difficulty of finding a convenient place, and perhaps some secret mo­tives of policy, produced an alteration in the sum­mons. The bishops of the East were directed to meet at Seleucia, in Isauria; while those of the West held their deliberations at Rimini, on the coast of the Hadriatic; and, instead of two or three deputies from each province, the whole episcopal body was ordered to march. The Eastern council, after consuming four days in fierce and unavailing debate, separated without any definitive conclusion. The council of the West was protracted till the seventh month. Taurus, the Praetorian praefect, was instructed not to dismiss the prelates till they should all be united in the same opinion; and his efforts were supported by a power of banishing fifteen of the most refractory, and a promise of the consulship if he atchieved so difficult an adventure. His A. D. 360. prayers and threats, the authority of the sovereign, the sophistry of Valens and Ursacius, the distress of cold and hunger, and the tedious melancholy of a hopeless exile, at length extorted the reluctant consent of the bishops of Rimini. The deputies of the East and of the West attended the emperor in the palace of Constantinople, and he enjoyed the satisfaction of imposing on the world a pro­fession of faith which established the likeness, with­out expressing the consubstantiality, of the Son of [Page 356] God ⁹⁵. But the triumph of Arianism had been preceded by the removal of the orthodox clergy, whom it was impossible either to intimidate or to corrupt; and the reign of Constantius was dis­graced by the unjust and ineffectual persecution of the great Athanasius.

We have seldom an opportunity of observing, Character and adven­tures of Athana­sius. either in active or speculative life, what effect may be produced, or what obstacles may be sur­mounted, by the force of a single mind, when it is inflexibly applied to the pursuit of a single object. The immortal name of Athanasius ⁹⁶ will never be separated from the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity, to whose defence he consecrated every moment and every faculty of his being. Edu­cated in the family of Alexander, he had vigorously opposed the early progress of the Arian heresy: he exercised the important functions of secretary under the aged prelate; and the fathers of the Nicene council beheld with surprise and respect, the rising virtues of the young deacon. In a time of public danger, the dull claims of age and of [Page 357] rank are sometimes superseded; and within five months after his return from Nice, the deacon Athanasius was seated on the archiepiscopal throne of Egypt. He filled that eminent station above A. D. 326—373. forty-six years, and his long administration was spent in a perpetual combat against the powers of Arianism. Five times was Athanasius expelled from his throne; twenty years he passed as an exile or a fugitive; and almost every province of the Roman empire was successively witness to his merit, and his sufferings in the cause of the Ho­moousion, which he considered as the sole pleasure and business, as the duty, and as the glory, of his life. Amidst the storms of persecution, the arch­bishop of Alexandria was patient of labour, jealous of fame, careless of safety; and although his mind was tainted by the contagion of fanaticism, Atha­nasius displayed a superiority of character and abilities, which would have qualified him, far better than the degenerate sons of Constantine, for the government of a great monarchy. His learning was much less profound and extensive than that of Eusebius of Caesarea, and his rude eloquence could not be compared with the po­lished oratory of Gregory or Basil; but whenever the primate of Egypt was called upon to justify his sentiments or his conduct, his unpremeditated style, either of speaking or writing, was clear, forcible, and persuasive. He has always been revered in the orthodox school, as one of the most accurate masters of the Christian theology; and he was supposed to possess two profane sciences, less adapted to the episcopal character; the know­ledge [Page 358] of jurisprudence ⁹⁷, and that of divination ⁹⁸. Some fortunate conjectures of future events, which impartial reasoners might ascribe to the experience and judgment of Athanasius, were attributed by his friends to heavenly inspiration, and imputed by his enemies to infernal magic.

But as Athanasius was continually engaged with the prejudices and passions of every order of men from the monk to the emperor, the knowledge of human nature was his first and most important science. He preserved a distinct and unbroken view of a scene which was incessantly shifting; and never failed to improve those decisive mo­ments which are irrecoverably past before they are perceived by a common eye. The archbishop of Alexandria was capable of distinguishing how far he might boldly command, and where he must dextrously insinuate; how long he might contend with power, and when he must withdraw from per­secution; and while he directed the thunders of the church against heresy and rebellion, he could assume, in the bosom of his own party, the flexible and indulgent temper of a prudent leader. The election of Athanasius has not escaped the reproach of irregularity and precipitation ⁹⁹; but the pro­priety [Page 359] of his behaviour conciliated the affections both of the clergy and of the people. The Alexandrians were impatient to rise in arms for the defence of an eloquent and liberal pastor. In his distress he always derived support, or at least consolation, from the faithful attachment of his parochial clergy; and the hundred bishops of Egypt adhered, with unshaken zeal, to the cause of Athanasius. In the modest equipage, which pride and policy would affect, he frequently per­formed the episcopal visitation of his provinces, from the mouth of the Nile to the confines of Aethiopia; familiarly conversing with the meanest of the populace, and humbly saluting the saints and hermits of the desert ¹⁰⁰. Nor was it only in ecclesiastical assemblies, among men whose edu­cation and manners were similar to his own, that Athanasius displayed the ascendancy of his genius. He appeared with easy and respectful firmness in the courts of princes; and in the various turns of his prosperous and adverse fortune, he never lost the confidence of his friends, or the esteem of his enemies.

In his youth, the primate of Egypt resisted the Perse­cution against Athana­sius, great Constantine, who had repeatedly signified A. D. 330. [Page 360] his will, that Arius should be restored to the Ca­tholic communion ¹⁰¹. The emperor respected, and might forgive, this inflexible resolution; and the faction who considered Athanasius as their most formidable enemy, were constrained to dis­semble their hatred, and silently to prepare an indirect and distant assault. They scattered rumours and suspicions, represented the arch­bishop as a proud and oppressive tyrant, and boldly accused him of violating the treaty which had been ratified in the Nicene council, with the schismatic followers of Meletius ¹⁰². Athanasius had openly disapproved that ignominious peace, and the emperor was disposed to believe, that he had abused his ecclesiastical and civil power, to persecute those odious sectaries; that he had sacri­legiously broken a chalice in one of their churches of Maraeotis: that he had whipped or imprisoned six of their bishops; and that Arsenius, a seventh bishop of the same party, had been murdered, or at least mutilated, by the cruel hand of the pri­mate ¹⁰³. [Page 361] These charges, which affected his ho­nour and his life, were referred by Constantine to his brother Dalmatius the Censor, who resided at Antioch; the synods of Caesarea and Tyre were successively convened; and the bishops of the East were instructed to judge the cause of Athanasius, before they proceeded to consecrate the new church of the Resurrection at Jerusalem. The primate might be conscious of his innocence; but he was sensible, that the same implacable spi­rit which had dictated the accusation, would direct the proceeding, and pronounce the sentence. He prudently declined the tribunal of his enemies, despised the summons of the synod of Caesarea; and, after a long and artful delay, submitted to the peremptory commands of the emperor, who threatened to punish his criminal disobedience if he refused to appear in the council of Tyre ¹⁰⁴. Before Athanasius, at the head of fifty Egyptian A. D. 335. prelates, sailed from Alexandria, he had wisely se­cured the alliance of the Meletians; and Arsenius himself, his imaginary victim, and his secret friend, was privately concealed in his train. The synod of Tyre was conducted by Eusebius of Caesarea, with more passion, and with less art, than his learning and experience might promise; [Page 362] his numerous faction repeated the names of ho­micide and tyrant; and their clamours were en­couraged by the seeming patience of Athanasius; who expected the decisive moment to produce Arsenius alive and unhurt in the midst of the assembly. The nature of the other charges did not admit of such clear and satisfactory replies; yet the archbishop was able to prove, that, in the village, where he was accused of breaking a con­secrated chalice, neither church nor altar nor chalice could really exist. The Arians, who had secretly determined the guilt and condemnation of their enemy, attempted, however, to disguise their injustice by the imitation of judicial forms: the synod appointed an episcopal commission of six delegates to collect evidence on the spot; and this measure, which was vigorously opposed by the Egyptian bishops, opened new scenes of vio­lence and perjury ¹⁰⁵. After the return of the deputies from Alexandria, the majority of the council pronounced the final sentence of degrada­tion and exile against the primate of Egypt. The decree, expressed in the fiercest language of ma­lice and revenge, was communicated to the em­peror and the catholic church; and the bishops immediately resumed a mild and devout aspect, such as became their holy pilgrimage to the Sepulchre of Christ ¹⁰⁶.

[Page 363] But the injustice of these ecclesiastical judges had not been countenanced by the submission, or even by the presence, of Athanasius. He re­solved His first exile, to make a bold and dangerous experiment, A. D. 336. whether the throne was inaccessible to the voice of truth; and before the final sentence could be pronounced at Tyre, the intrepid primate threw himself into a bark, which was ready to hoist sail for the Imperial city. The request of a formal audience might have been opposed or eluded; but Athanasius concealed his arrival, watched the moment of Constantine's return from an adjacent villa, and boldly encountered his angry sovereign as he passed on horseback through the principal street of Constantinople. So strange an apparition excited his surprise and indignation; and the guards were ordered to remove the importunate suitor; but his resentment was subdued by invo­luntary respect; and the haughty spirit of the emperor was awed by the courage and eloquence of a bishop, who implored his justice, and awakened his conscience ¹⁰⁷. Constantine listened to the complaints of Athanasius with impartial and even gracious attention; the members of the synod of Tyre were summoned to justify their proceedings; and the arts of the Eusebian faction would have been confounded; if they had not aggravated the guilt of the primate by the dex­terous supposition of an unpardonable offence; a criminal design to intercept and detain the corn­fleet [Page 364] of Alexandria, which supplied the subsist­ence of the new capital ¹⁰⁸. The emperor was satisfied that the peace of Egypt would be secured by the absence of a popular leader; but he refused to fill the vacancy of the archiepiscopal throne; and the sentence, which, after long hesitation, he pronounced, was that of a jealous ostracism, rather than of an ignominious exile. In the re­mote province of Gaul, but in the hospitable court of Treves, Athanasius passed about twenty-eight months. The death of the emperor changed the face of public affairs; and, amidst the gene­ral indulgence of a young reign, the primate was and resto­ration, restored to his country by an honourable edict of the younger Constantine, who expressed a deep A. D. 338. sense of the innocence and merit of his venerable guest ¹⁰⁹.

The death of that prince exposed Athanasius to His second exile. a second persecution; and the feeble Constantius, the sovereign of the East, soon became the secret A. D. 341. accomplice of the Eusebians. Ninety bishops of that sect or faction assembled at Antioch, under [Page 365] the specious pretence of dedicating the cathedral. They composed an ambiguous creed, which is faintly tinged with the colours of Semi-Arianism, and twenty-five canons, which still regulate the discipline of the orthodox Greeks ¹¹⁰. It was de­cided, with some appearance of equity, that a bishop, deprived by a synod, should not resume his episcopal functions, till he had been absolved by the judgment of an equal synod; the law was immediately applied to the case of Athanasius; the council of Antioch pronounced, or rather confirmed, his degradation: a stranger named Gregory, was seated on his throne; and Phila­grius ¹¹¹, the praefect of Egypt, was instructed to support the new primate with the civil and military powers of the province. Oppressed by the con­spiracy of the Asiatic prelates, Athanasius with­drew from Alexandria, and passed three ¹¹² years as an exile and a suppliant on the holy threshold [Page 366] of the vatican ¹¹³. By the assiduous study of the Latin language, he soon qualified himself to ne­gotiate with the western clergy; his decent flattery swayed and directed the haughty Julius: the Ro­man Pontiff was persuaded to consider his appeal as the peculiar interest of the Apostolic see; and his innocence was unanimously declared in a coun­cil of fifty bishops of Italy. At the end of three years, the primate was summoned to the court of Milan by the emperor Constans, who, in the in­dulgence of unlawful pleasures, still professed a lively regard for the orthodox faith. The cause of truth and justice was promoted by the influence of gold ¹¹⁴, and the ministers of Constans advised their sovereign to require the convocation of an ecclesiastical assembly, which might act as the representatives of the Catholic church. Ninety-four A. D. 346. bishops of the West, seventy-six bishops of the East, encountered each other at Sardica, on the verge of the two empires, but in the domi­nions [Page 367] of the protector of Athanasius. Their de­bates soon degenerated into hostile altercations; the Asiatics, apprehensive for their personal safety, retired to Philippopolis in Thrace; and the rival synods reciprocally hurled their spiritual thunders against their enemies, whom they piously con­demned as the enemies of the true God. Their decrees were published and ratified in their respec­tive provinces; and Athanasius, who in the West was revered as a saint, was exposed as a criminal to the abhorrence of the East ¹¹⁵. The council of Sardica reveals the first symptoms of discord and schism between the Greek and Latin churches, which were separated by the accidental difference of faith, and the permanent distinction of lan­guage.

During his second exile in the West, Athanasius and resto­ration, was frequently admitted to the Imperial presence; A. D. 349. at Capua, Lodi, Milan, Verona, Padua, Aqui­leia, and Treves. The bishop of the diocese usually assisted at these interviews; the master of the offices stood before the veil or curtain of the sacred apartment; and the uniform moderation of the primate might be attested by these respect­able witnesses, to whose evidence he solemnly appeals ¹¹⁶. Prudence would undoubtedly suggest [Page 368] the mild and respectful tone that became a sub­ject and a bishop. In these familiar conferences with the sovereign of the West, Athanasius might lament the error of Constantius; but he boldly arraigned the guilt of his eunuchs and his Arian prelates; deplored the distress and danger of the Catholic church; and excited Constans to emulate the zeal and glory of his father. The emperor declared his resolution of employing the troops and treasures of Europe in the orthodox cause; and signified, by a concise and peremptory epistle to his brother Constantius, that unless he con­sented to the immediate restoration of Athanasius, he himself, with a fleet and army, would seat the archbishop on the throne of Alexandria ¹¹⁷. But this religious war, so horrible to nature, was pre­vented by the timely compliance of Constantius; and the emperor of the East condescended to solicit a reconciliation with a subject whom he had injured. Athanasius waited with decent pride, till he had received three successive epistles full of the strongest assurances of the protection, the favour, and the esteem of his sovereign; who in­vited him to resume his episcopal seat, and who added the humiliating precaution of engaging his principal ministers to attest the sincerity of his in­tentions. They were manifested in a still more public manner, by the strict orders which were dispatched into Egypt to recall the adherents of [Page 369] Athanasius, to restore their privileges, to pro­claim their innocence, and to eraze from the public registers the illegal proceedings which had been obtained during the prevalence of the Euse­bian faction. After every satisfaction and security had been given, which justice or even delicacy could require, the primate proceeded, by slow journeys, through the provinces of Thrace, Asia, and Syria; and his progress was marked by the abject homage of the Oriental bishops, who ex­cited his contempt without deceiving his penetra­tion ¹¹⁸. At Antioch he saw the emperor Con­stantius; sustained, with modest firmness, the embraces and protestations of his master, and eluded the proposal of allowing the Arians a single church at Alexandria, by claiming, in the other cities of the empire, a similar toleration for his own party; a reply which might have appeared just and moderate in the mouth of an independent prince. The entrance of the archbishop into his capital was a triumphal procession; absence and persecution had endeared him to the Alexandrians; his authority, which he exercised with rigour, was more firmly established; and his fame was diffused from Aethiopia to Britain, over the whole extent of the Christian world ¹¹⁹.

[Page 370] But the subject who has reduced his prince to the necessity of dissembling, can never expect a sincere and lasting forgiveness; and the tragic Resent­ment of Constan­tius, fate of Constans soon deprived Athanasius of a powerful and generous protector. The civil war A. D. 351. between the assassin and the only surviving bro­ther of Constans, which afflicted the empire above three years, secured an interval of repose to the Catholic church; and the two contending parties were desirous to conciliate the friendship of a bishop, who, by the weight of his personal autho­rity, might determine the fluctuating resolutions of an important province. He gave audience to the ambassadors of the tyrant, with whom he was afterwards accused of holding a secret correspond­ence ¹²⁰; and the emperor Constantius repeatedly assured his dearest father, the most reverend Atha­nasius, that, notwithstanding the malicious ru­mours which were circulated by their common enemies, he had inherited the sentiments, as well as the throne, of his deceased brother ¹²¹. Gra­titude and humanity would have disposed the pri­mate of Egypt to deplore the untimely fate of Constans, and to abhor the guilt of Magnentius; but as he clearly understood that the apprehen­sions of Constantius were his only safeguard, the [Page 371] servour of his prayers for the success of the righte­ous cause might perhaps be somewhat abated. The ruin of Athanasius was no longer contrived by the obscure malice of a few bigoted or angry bishops, who abused the authority of a credulous monarch. The monarch himself avowed the re­solution, which he had so long suppressed, of avenging his private injuries ¹²²; and the first winter after his victory, which he passes at Arles, was employed against an enemy more odious to him than the vanquished tyrant of Gaul.

If the emperor had capriciously decreed the Councils of Arles and Milan, death of the most eminent and virtuous citizen of the republic, the cruel order would have been A. D. 353—355. executed without hesitation, by the ministers of open violence or of specious injustice. The cau­tion, the delay, the difficulty with which he pro­ceeded in the condemnation and punishment of a popular bishop, discovered to the world that the privileges of the church had already revived a sense of order and freedom in the Roman govern­ment. The sentence which was pronounced in the synod of Tyre, and subscribed by a large majority of the eastern bishops, had never been expressly repealed; and as Athanasius had been once degraded from his episcopal dignity by the judgment of his brethren, every subsequent act might be considered as irregular, and even cri­minal. But the memory of the firm and effectual support which the primate of Egypt had derived [Page 372] from the attachment of the western church, en­gaged Constantius to suspend the execution of the sentence, till he had obtained the concurrence of the Latin bishops. Two years were consumed in ecclesiastical negociations; and the important cause between the emperor and one of his subjects was solemnly debated, first in the synod of Arles, and afterwards in the great council of Milan ¹²³, which consisted of above three hundred bishops. Their integrity was gradually undermined by the arguments of the Arians, the dexterity of the eunuchs, and the pressing solicitations of a prince, who gratified his revenge at the expence of his dignity; and exposed his own passions, whilst he influenced those of the clergy. Corruption, the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty, was successfully practised: honours, gifts, and immunities, were offered and accepted as the price of an episcopal vote ¹²⁴; and the condemnation of the Alexandrian primate was artfully represented, as the only measure which could restore the peace and union of the Catholic church. The friends of Athanasius were not, however, wanting to their [Page 373] leader, or to their cause. With a manly spirit, which the sanctity of their character rendered less dangerous, they maintained, in public debate, and in private conference with the emperor, the eternal obligation of religion and justice. They declared, that neither the hope of his favour, nor the fear of his displeasure, should prevail on them to join in the condemnation of an absent, an inno­cent, a respectable brother ¹²⁵. They affirmed, with apparent reason, that the illegal and obsolete decrees of the council of Tyre had long since been tacitly abolished by the Imperial edicts, the ho­nourable re-establishment of the archbishop of Alexandria, and the silence or recantation of his most clamorous adversaries. They alleged, that his innocence had been attested by the unanimous bishops of Egypt, and had been acknowledged in the councils of Rome and Sardica ¹²⁶, by the im­partial judgment of the Latin church. They deplored the hard condition of Athanasius, who, after enjoying so many years his seat, his reputa­tion, and the seeming confidence of his sovereign, was again called upon to confute the most ground­less [Page 374] and extravagant accusations. Their language was specious; their conduct was honourable: but in this long and obstinate contest, which fixed the eyes of the whole empire on a single bishop, the ecclesiastical factions were prepared to sacrifice truth and justice, to the more interesting object of defending, or removing, the intrepid champion of the Nicene faith. The Arians still thought it prudent to disguise in ambiguous language, their real sentiments and designs: but the orthodox bishops, armed with the favour of the people, and the decrees of a general council, insisted on every occasion, and particularly at Milan, that their adversaries should purge themselves from the suspicion of heresy, before they presumed to arraign the conduct of the great Athanasius ¹²⁷.

But the voice of reason (if reason was indeed on Condem­nation of Athana­sius, the side of Athanasius) was silenced by the cla­mours of a factious or venal majority; and the councils of Arles and Milan were not dissolved A. D. 355. till the archbishop of Alexandria had been so­lemnly condemned and deposed by the judgment of the Western, as well as of the Eastern, church. The bishops who had opposed, were required to subscribe, the sentence; and to unite in religious communion with the suspected leaders of the ad­verse party. A formulary of consent was trans­mitted by the messengers of state to the absent bishops: and all those who refused to submit their private opinion to the public and inspired wisdom of the councils of Arles and Milan, were [Page 375] immediately banished by the emperor, who affect­ed to execute the decrees of the Catholic church. Among those prelates who led the honourable band of confessors and exiles, Liberius of Rome, Osius of Cordova, Paulanus of Treves, Diony­sius of Milan, Eusebius of Vercellae, Lucifer of Cagliari, and Hilary of Poitiers, may deserve to be particularly distinguished. The eminent station of Liberius, who governed the capital of the em­pire; the personal merit and long experience of the venerable Osius, who was revered as the fa­vourite of the great Constantine, and the father of the Nicene faith; placed those prelates at the head of the Latin church: and their example, either of submission or resistance, would probably be imitated by the episcopal crowd. But the re­peated attempts of the emperor to seduce or to intimidate the bishops of Rome and Cordova, were for some time ineffectual. The Spaniard declared himself ready to suffer under Constan­tius, as he had suffered threescore years before under his grandfather Maximian. The Roman, in the presence of his sovereign, asserted the in­nocence of Athanasius, and his own freedom. When he was banished to Beraea in Thrace, he sent back a large sum which had been offered for the accommodation of his journey; and insulted the court of Milan by the haughty remark, that the emperor and his eunuchs might want that gold to pay their soldiers and their bishops ¹²⁸. The [Page 376] resolution of Liberius and Osius was at length subdued by the hardships of exile and confine­ment. The Roman pontiff purchased his return by some criminal compliances; and afterwards ex­piated his guilt by a seasonable repentance. Per­suasion and violence were employed to extort the reluctant signature of the decrepid bishop of Cor­dova, whose strength was broken, and whose faculties were perhaps impaired, by the weight of an hundred years; and the insolent triumph of the Arians provoked some of the orthodox party to treat with inhuman severity the character, or rather the memory, of an unfortunate old man, to whose former services Christianity itself was so deeply indebted ¹²⁹.

The fall of Liberius and Osius reflected a Exiles. brighter lustre on the firmness of those bishops who still adhered, with unshaken fidelity, to the cause of Athanasius and religious truth. The ingenious malice of their enemies had deprived them of the benefit of mutual comfort and ad­vice, separated those illustrious exiles into distant provinces, and carefully selected the most inho­spitable spots of a great empire ¹³⁰. Yet they [Page 377] soon experienced that the deserts of Libya, and the most barbarous tracts of Cappadocia, were less inhospitable than the residence of those cities in which an Arian bishop could satiate, without restraint, the exquisite rancour of theological hatred ¹³¹. Their consolation was derived from the consciousness of rectitude and independence, from the applause, the visits, the letters, and the liberal alms of their adherents ¹³²; and from the satisfaction which they soon enjoyed of observing the intestine divisions of the adversaries of the Nicene faith. Such was the nice and capricious taste of the emperor Constantius, and so easily was he offended by the slightest deviation from his imaginary standard of Christian truth; that he persecuted, with equal zeal, those who defended the consubstantiality, those who asserted the similar substance, and those who denied the likeness, of the Son of God. Three bishops degraded and ba­nished for those adverse opinions, might possibly meet in the same place of exile; and, according to the difference of their temper, might either pity or insult the blind enthusiasm of their an­tagonists, whose present sufferings would never be compensated by future happiness.

[Page 378] The disgrace and exile of the orthodox bishops of the West were designed as so many preparatory steps to the ruin of Athanasius himself ¹³³. Six Third ex­pulsion of Athana­sius from Alexan­dria, and twenty months had elapsed, during which the Imperial court secretly laboured, by the most insidious arts, to remove him from Alexandria, and to withdraw the allowance which supplied his A. D. 356. popular liberality. But when the primate of of Egypt, deserted and proscribed by the Latin church, was left destitute of any foreign support, Constantius dispatched two of his secretaries with a verbal commission to announce and execute the order of his banishment. As the justice of the sentence was publicly avowed by the whole party, the only motive which could restrain Constantius from giving his messengers the sanction of a writ­ten mandate, must be imputed to his doubt of the event; and to a sense of the danger to which he might expose the second city, and the most fer­tile province of the empire, if the people should persist in the resolution of defending, by force of arms, the innocence of their spiritual father. Such extreme caution afforded Athanasius a spe­cious pretence respectfully to dispute the truth of an order, which he could not reconcile, either with the equity, or with the former declarations, [Page 379] of his gracious master. The civil powers of Egypt found themselves inadequate to the task of persuading or compelling the primate to abdicate his episcopal throne; and they were obliged to conclude a treaty with the popular leaders of Alexandria, by which it was stipulated, that all proceedings and all hostilities should be suspended till the emperor's pleasure had been more distinctly ascertained. By this seeming moderation, the Catholics were deceived into a false and fatal security; while the legions of the Upper Egypt, and of Libya, advanced, by secret orders and hasty marches, to besiege, or rather to surprise, a capital, habituated to sedition, and inflamed by religious zeal ¹³⁴. The position of Alexandria, between the sea and the lake Mareotis, facilitated the approach and landing of the troops; who were introduced into the heart of the city, before any effectual measures could be taken, either to shut the gates, or to occupy the important posts of desence. At the hour of midnight, twenty-three days after the signature of the treaty, Syri­anus duke of Egypt, at the head of five thousand soldiers, armed and prepared for an assault, unex­pectedly invested the church of St. Theonas, where the archbishop, with a part of his clergy and people, performed their nocturnal devotions. The doors of the sacred edifice yielded to the impetu­osity [Page 380] of the attack, which was accompanied with every horrid circumstance of tumult and blood­shed; but, as the bodies of the slain, and the fragments of military weapons, remained the next day an unexceptionable evidence in the possession of the Catholics, the enterprise of Syrianus may be considered as a successful irruption, rather than as an absolute conquest. The other churches of the city were profaned by similar outrages; and, during at least four months, Alexandria was ex­posed to the insults of a licentious army, stimu­lated by the ecclesiastics of an hostile faction. Many of the faithful were killed; who may de­serve the name of martyrs, if their deaths were neither provoked nor revenged; bishops and presbyters were treated with cruel ignominy; con­secrated virgins were stripped naked, scourged, and violated; the houses of wealthy citizens were plundered; and, under the mask of reli­gious zeal, lust, avarice, and private resentment, were gratified with impunity, and even with ap­plause. The Pagans of Alexandria, who still formed a numerous and discontented party, were easily persuaded to desert a bishop whom they feared and esteemed. The hopes of some peculiar favours, and the apprehension of being involved in the general penalties of rebellion, engaged them to promise their support to the destined suc­cessor of Athanasius, the famous George of Cap­padocia. The usurper, after receiving the con­secration of an Arian synod, was placed on the episcopal throne by the arms of Sebastian, who had been appointed Count of Egypt for the exe­cution [Page 381] of that important design. In the use, as well as in the acquisition, of power, the tyrant George disregarded the laws of religion, of jus­tice, and of humanity; and the same scenes of violence and scandal which had been exhibited in the capital, were repeated in more than ninety episcopal cities of Egypt. Encouraged by suc­cess, Constantius ventured to approve the conduct of his ministers. By a public and passionate epistle, the emperor congratulates the deliverance of Alexandria from a popular tyrant, who deluded his blind votaries by the magic of his eloquence; expatiates on the virtues and piety of the most reverend George, the elected bishop; and aspires, as the patron and benefactor of the city, to sur­pass the fame of Alexander himself. But he solemnly declares his unalterable resolution to pursue with fire and sword the seditious adherents of the wicked Athanasius, who, by flying from justice, has confessed his guilt, and escaped the ignominious death which he had so often de­served ¹³⁵.

Athanasius had indeed escaped from the most His beha­viour. imminent dangers; and the adventures of that extraordinary man deserve and fix our attention. On the memorable night when the church of St. Theonas was invested by the troops of Syrianus, the archbishop, seated on his throne, expected, with calm and intrepid dignity, the approach of death. While the public devotion was inter­rupted [Page 382] by shouts of rage, and cries of terror, he animated his trembling congregation to express their religious confidence, by chanting one of the psalms of David, which celebrates the triumph of the God of Israel over the haughty and impious tyrant of Egypt. The doors were at length burst open; a cloud of arrows was discharged among the people; the soldiers, with drawn swords, rushed forwards into the sanctuary; and the dread­ful gleam of their armour was reflected by the holy luminaries which burnt round the altar ¹³⁶. Athanasius still rejected the pious importunity of the Monks and Presbyters, who were attached to his person; and nobly refused to desert his epis­copal station, till he had dismissed in safety the last of the congregation. The darkness and tu­mult of the night favoured the retreat of the archbishop; and though he was oppressed by the waves of an agitated multitude, though he was thrown to the ground, and left without sense or motion, he still recovered his undaunted courage; and eluded the eager search of the soldiers, who were instructed by their Arian guides, that the head of Athanasius would be the most acceptable present to the emperor. From that moment the primate of Egypt disappeared from the eyes of his enemies, and remained above six years concealed in impenetrable obscurity ¹³⁷.

[Page 383] The despotic power of his implacable enemy filled the whole extent of the Roman world; and the exasperated monarch had endeavoured, by a His retreat, very pressing epistle to the Christian princes of A. D. 356—362. Aethiopia, to exclude Athanasius from the most remote and sequestered regions of the earth. Counts, praefects, tribunes, whole armies, were successively employed to pursue a bishop and a fugitive; the vigilance of the civil and military powers were excited by the Imperial edicts; liberal rewards were promised to the man who should produce Athanasius, either alive or dead; and the most severe penalties were denounced against those who should dare to protect the public enemy ¹³⁸. But the deserts of Thebaïs were now peopled by a race of wild, yet submissive fanatics, who preferred the commands of their abbot to the laws of their sovereign. The numerous disciples of Antony and Pachomius received the fugitive primate as their father, admired the patience and humility with which he conformed to their strictest institutions, collected every word which dropt from his lips as the genuine effusions of inspired wisdom; and persuaded themselves, that their prayers, their fasts, and their vigils, were less meritorious than the zeal which they expressed, [Page 384] and the dangers which they braved, in the de­fence of truth and innocence ¹³⁹. The monasteries of Egypt were seated in lonely and desolate places, on the summit of mountains, or in the islands of the Nile; and the sacred horn or trum­pet of Tabenne was the well-known signal which assembled several thousand robust and determined Monks, who, for the most part, had been the peasants of the adjacent country. When their dark retreats were invaded by a military force, which it was impossible to resist, they silently stretched out their necks to the executioner; and supported their national character, that tortures could never wrest from an Egyptian the confession of a secret which he was resolved not to dis­close ¹⁴⁰. The archbishop of Alexandria, for whose safety they eagerly devoted their lives, was lost among a uniform and well-disciplined multitude; and on the nearer approach of danger, he was swiftly removed, by their officious hands, from one place of concealment to another, till he reached the formidable deserts, which the gloomy and credulous temper of superstition had peopled with daemons and savage monsters. The retire­ment of Athanasius, which ended only with the life of Constantius, was spent, for the most part, in the society of the Monks, who faithfully served him as guards, as secretaries, and as messengers; [Page 385] but the importance of maintaining a more inti­mate connection with the Catholic party, tempted him, whenever the diligence of the pursuit was abated, to emerge from the desert, to introduce himself into Alexandria, and to trust his person to the discretion of his friends and adherents. His various adventures might have furnished the subject of a very entertaining romance. He was once secreted in a dry cistern, which he had scarcely left before he was betrayed by the trea­chery of a female slave ¹⁴¹; and he was once con­cealed in a still more extraordinary asylum, the house of a virgin, only twenty years of age, and who was celebrated in the whole city for her ex­quisite beauty. At the hour of midnight, as she related the story many years afterwards, she was surprised by the appearance of the archbishop in a loose undress, who, advancing with hasty steps, conjured her to afford him the protection which he had been directed by a celestial vision to seek under her hospitable roof. The pious maid ac­cepted and preserved the sacred pledge which was entrusted to her prudence and courage. Without imparting the secret to any one, she instantly con­ducted Athanasius into her most secret chamber, and watched over his safety with the tenderness of a friend and the assiduity of a servant. As long as the danger continued, she regularly supplied him with books and provisions, washed his feet, ma­naged [Page 386] his correspondence, and dexterously con­cealed from the eye of suspicion, this familiar and solitary intercourse between a saint whose character required the most unblemished chastity, and a female whose charms might excite the most dangerous emotions ¹⁴². During the six years of persecution and exile, Athanasius repeated his visits to his fair and faithful companion; and the formal declaration, that he saw the councils of Rimini and Seleucia ¹⁴³, forces us to believe that he was secretly present at the time and place of their convocation. The advantage of personally negociating with his friends, and of observing and improving the divisions of his enemies, might justify, in a prudent statesman, so bold and dan­gerous an enterprise: and Alexandria was con­nected by trade and navigation with every sea­port of the Mediterranean. From the depth of his inaccessible retreat, the intrepid primate waged an incessant and offensive war against the protector of the Arians; and his seasonable writings, which were diligently circulated, and eagerly perused, contributed to unite and animate the orthodox party. In his public apologies, which he ad­dressed to the emperor himself, he sometimes [Page 387] affected the praise of moderation; whilst at the same time, in secret and vehement invectives, he exposed Constantius as a weak and wicked prince, the executioner of his family, the tyrant of the republic, and the antichrist of the church. In the height of his prosperity, the victorious mo­narch, who had chastised the rashness of Gallus, and suppressed the revolt of Sylvanus, who had taken the diadem from the head of Vetranio, and vanquished in the field the legions of Magnen­tius, received from an invisible hand a wound, which he could neither heal nor revenge; and the son of Constantine was the first of the Christian princes who experienced the strength of those principles, which, in the cause of religion, could resist the most violent exertions of the civil power ¹⁴⁴.

The persecution of Athanasius, and of so many Arian bishops. respectable bishops, who suffered for the truth of their opinions, or at least for the integrity of their conscience, was a just subject of indignation and discontent to all Christians, except those who were blindly devoted to the Arian faction. The people regretted the loss of their faithful pastors, whose banishment was usually followed by the in­trusion [Page 388] of a stranger ¹⁴⁵ into the episcopal chair; and loudly complained, that the right of election was violated, and that they were condemned to obey a mercenary usurper, whose person was un­known, and whose principles were suspected. The Catholics might prove to the world, that they were not involved in the guilt and heresy of their ecclesiastical governor, by publicly testifying their Divisions. dissent, or by totally separating themselves from his communion. The first of these methods was invented at Antioch, and practised with such suc­cess, that it was soon diffused over the Christian world. The doxology, or sacred hymn, which celebrates the glory of the Trinity, is susceptible of very nice, but material, inflexions; and the sub­stance of an orthodox, or an heretical, creed, may be expressed by the difference of a disjunctive, or a copulative, particle. Alternate responses, and a more regular psalmody ¹⁴⁶, were introduced into the public service by Flavianus and Diodorus, two devout and active laymen, who were attached to the Nicene faith. Under their conduct, a swarm of Monks issued from the adjacent desert, bands of well-disciplined singers were stationed in the cathedral of Antioch, the Glory to the Father, [Page 389] AND the Son, AND the Holy Ghost ¹⁴⁷, was tri­umphantly chanted by a full chorus of voices; and the Catholics insulted, by the purity of their doctrine, the Arian prelate, who had usurped the throne of the venerable Eustathius. The same zeal which inspired their songs, prompted the more scrupulous members of the orthodox party to form separate assemblies, which were governed by the presbyters, till the death of their exiled bishop allowed the election and consecration of a new episcopal pastor ¹⁴⁸. The revolutions of the court multiplied the number of pretenders; and the same city was often disputed, under the reign of Constantius, by two, or three, or even four bishops, who exercised their spiritual jurisdiction over their respective followers, and alternately lost and regained the temporal possessions of the church. The abuse of Christianity introduced into the Roman government new causes of tyranny and sedition; the bands of civil society were torn asunder by the fury of religious factions; and the obscure citizen, who might calmly have surveyed the elevation and fall of successive em­perors, [Page 390] imagined and experienced, that his own life and fortune were connected with the interests of a popular ecclesiastic. The example of the two capitals, Rome and Constantinople, may serve to represent the state of the empire, and the temper of mankind, under the reign of the sons of Constantine.

I. The Roman pontiff, as long as he main­tained Rome. his station and his principles, was guarded by the warm attachment of a great people; and could reject with scorn the prayers, the menaces, and the oblations of an heretical prince. When the eunuchs had secretly pronounced the exile of Liberius, the well-grounded apprehension of a tumult engaged them to use the utmost precau­tions in the execution of the sentence. The capital was invested on every side, and the Prae­fect was commanded to seize the person of the bishop, either by stratagem or by open force. The order was obeyed; and Liberius, with the greatest difficulty, at the hour of midnight, was swiftly conveyed beyond the reach of the Roman people, before their consternation was turned into rage. As soon as they were informed of his ba­nishment into Thrace, a general assembly was convened, and the clergy of Rome bound them­selves, by a public and solemn oath, never to desert their bishop, never to acknowledge the usurper Faelix; who, by the influence of the eu­nuchs, had been irregularly chosen and conse­crated within the walls of a profane palace. At the end of two years, their pious obstinacy sub­sisted entire and unshaken; and when Constan­tius [Page 391] visited Rome, he was assailed by the impor­tunate solicitations of a people, who had preserved, as the last remnant of their ancient freedom, the right of treating their sovereign with familiar in­solence. The wives of many of the senators and most honourable citizens, after pressing their hus­bands to intercede in favour of Liberius, were ad­vised to undertake a commission, which, in their hands, would be less dangerous, and might prove more successful. The emperor received with po­liteness these female deputies, whose wealth and dignity were displayed in the magnificence of their dress and ornaments: he admired their in­flexible resolution of following their beloved pastor to the most distant regions of the earth; and con­sented that the two bishops, Liberius and Faelix, should govern in peace their respective congre­gations. But the ideas of toleration were so re­pugnant to the practice, and even to the senti­ments, of those times, that when the answer of Constantius was publicly read in the Circus of Rome, so reasonable a project of accommodation was rejected with contempt and ridicule. The eager vehemence which animated the spectators in the decisive moment of a horse-race, was now directed towards a different object; and the Cir­cus resounded with the shout of thousands, who repeatedly exclaimed, ‘One God, One Christ, One Bishop.’ The zeal of the Roman people in the cause of Liberius, was not confined to words alone; and the dangerous and bloody sedi­tion which they excited soon after the departure [Page 392] of Constantius, determined that prince to accept the submission of the exiled prelate, and to restore him to the undivided dominion of the capital. After some ineffectual resistance, his rival was ex­pelled from the city by the permission of the em­peror, and the power of the opposite faction; the adherents of Faelix were inhumanly murdered in the streets, in the public places, in the baths, and even in the churches; and the face of Rome, upon the return of a Christian bishop, renewed the horrid image of the massacres of Marius, and the proscriptions of Sylla ¹⁴⁹.

II. Notwithstanding the rapid increase of Christ­ians under the reign of the Flavian family, Rome, Constan­tinople. Alexandria, and the other great cities of the em­pire, still contained a strong and powerful faction of Infidels, who envied the prosperity, and who ridiculed, even on their theatres, the theological disputes of the church. Constantinople alone enjoyed the advantage of being born and educated in the bosom of the faith. The capital of the East had never been polluted by the worship of Idols; and the whole body of the people had deeply imbibed the opinions, the virtues, and the passions, which distinguished the Christians of that age from the rest of mankind. After the death of Alexander, the episcopal throne was dis­puted by Paul and Macedonius. By their zeal [Page 393] and abilities they both deserved the eminent sta­tion to which they aspired; and if the moral cha­racter of Macedonius was less exceptionable, his competitor had the advantage of a prior election and a more orthodox doctrine. His firm attach­ment to the Nicene creed, which has given Paul a place in the calendar among saints and martyrs, exposed him to the resentment of the Arians. In the space of fourteen years he was five times driven from his throne; to which he was more frequently restored by the violence of the people, than by the permission of the prince; and the power of Ma­cedonius could be secured only by the death of his rival. The unfortunate Paul was dragged in chains from the sandy deserts of Mesopotamia to the most desolate places of Mount Taurus ¹⁵⁰, confined in a dark and narrow dungeon, left six days without food, and at length strangled, by the order of Philip, one of the principal ministers of the emperor Constantius ¹⁵¹. The first blood which stained the new capital was spilt in this ec­clesiastical contest; and many persons were slain on [Page 394] both sides, in the furious and obstinate seditions of the people. The commission of enforcing a sen­tence of banishment against Paul, had been en­trusted to Hermogenes, the master-general of the cavalry; but the execution of it was fatal to him­self. The Catholics rose in the defence of their bishop; the palace of Hermogenes was consumed; the first military officer of the empire was dragged by the heels through the streets of Constantinople, and, after he expired, his lifeless corpse was ex­posed to their wanton insults ¹⁵². The fare of Hermogenes instructed Philip, the Praetorian prae­fect, to act with more precaution on a similar oc­sion. In the most gentle and honourable terms, he required the attendance of Paul in the baths of Zeuxippus, which had a private communication with the palace and the sea. A vessel, which lay ready at the garden-stairs, immediately hoisted fail; and, while the people were still ignorant of the meditated sacrilege, their bishop was already embarked on his voyage to Thessalonica. They soon beheld, with surprise and indignation, the gates of the palace thrown open, and the usurper Macedonius seated by the side of the praefect on a lofty chariot, which was surrounded by troops of guards with drawn swords. The military proces­sion advanced towards the cathedral; the Arians and the Catholics eagerly rushed to occupy that important post; and three thousand one hundred and fifty persons lost their lives in the confusion of [Page 395] the tumult. Macedonius, who was supported by a regular force, obtained a decisive victory; but his reign was disturbed by clamour and sedition; and the causes which appeared the least connected with the subject of dispute, were sufficient to nourish and to kindle the flame of civil discord. As the chapel in which the body of the great Con­stantine had been deposited was in a ruinous con­dition, the bishop transported those venerable re­mains into the church of St. Acacius. This pru­dent and even pious measure was represented as a wicked profanation by the whole party which ad­hered to the Homoousian doctrine. The factions immediately flew to arms, the consecrated ground was used as their field of battle; and one of the ecclesiastical historians has observed, as a real fact, not as a figure of rhetoric, that the well be­fore the church overflowed with a stream of blood, which filled the porticoes and the adjacent courts. The writer who should impute these tumults solely to a religious principle, would betray a very im­perfect knowledge of human nature; yet it must be confessed, that the motive which misled the sincerity of zeal, and the pretence which disguised the licentiousness of passion, suppressed the re­morse which, in another cause, would have suc­ceeded to the rage of the Christians of Constan­tinople ¹⁵³.

[Page 396] The cruel and arbitrary disposition of Constan­tius, which did not always require the provoca­tions of guilt and resistance, was justly exasperated Cruelty of the Arians. by the tumults of his capital, and the criminal behaviour of a faction, which opposed the autho­rity and religion of their sovereign. The ordinary punishments of death, exile, and confiscation were inflicted with partial rigour; and the Greeks still revere the holy memory of two clerks, a reader and a sub-deacon, who were accused of the murder of Hermogenes, and beheaded at the gates of Constantinople. By an edict of Constantius against the Catholics, which has not been judged worthy of a place in the Theodosian code, those who refused to communicate with the Arian bishops, and particularly with Macedonius, were deprived of the immunities of ecclesiastics, and of the rights of Christians; they were compelled to relinquish the possession of the churches; and were strictly prohibited from holding their assem­blies within the walls of the city. The execution of this unjust law, in the provinces of Thrace and Asia Minor, was committed to the zeal of Ma­cedonius; the civil and military powers were directed to obey his commands; and the cruelties exercised by this Semi-Arian tyrant in the support of the Homoiousion, exceeded the commission, and disgraced the reign, of Constantius. The sacra­ments of the church were administered to the reluctant victims, who denied the vocation, and abhorred the principles, of Macedonius. The rites of baptism were conferred on women and chil­dren, who, for that purpose, had been torn from [Page 397] the arms of their friends and parents; the mouths of the communicants were held open, by a wooden engine, while the consecrated bread was forced down their throat; the breasts of tender virgins were either burnt with red-hot egg-shells, or in­humanly compressed between sharp and heavy boards ¹⁵⁴. The Novatians of Constantinople, and the adjacent country, by their firm attachment to the Homoousian standard, deserved to be con­founded with the Catholics themselves. Macedo­nius was informed, that a large district of Pa­phlagonia ¹⁵⁵ was almost entirely inhabited by those sectaries. He resolved either to convert or to ex­tirpate them; and as he distrusted, on this occa­sion, the efficacy of an ecclesiastical mission, he commanded a body of four thousand legionaries to march against the rebels, and to reduce the territory of Mantinium under his spiritual domi­nion. The Novatian peasants, animated by de­spair and religious fury, boldly encountered the invaders of their country; and though many of the Paphlagonians were slain, the Roman legions were vanquished by an irregular multitude, [Page 398] armed only with scythes and axes; and, except a few who escaped by an ignominious flight, four thousand soldiers were left dead on the field of battle. The successor of Constantius has express­ed, in a concise but lively manner, some of the theological calamities which afflicted the empire, and more especially the East, in the reign of a prince who was the slave of his own passions, and of those of his eunuchs. ‘Many were imprisoned, and persecuted, and driven into exile. Whole troops of those who are stiled heretics were massacred, particularly at Cyzicus, and at Samo­sata. In Paphlagonia, Bithynia, Galatia, and in many other provinces, towns and villages were laid waste, and utterly destroyed ¹⁵⁶.’

While the flames of the Arian controversy con­sumed the vitals of the empire, the African pro­vinces The revolt and fury of the Dona­tist Cir­cumcel­lions, were infested by their peculiar enemies the savage fanatics, who, under the name of Circum­cellions, formed the strength and scandal of the A. D. 345, &c. Donatist party ¹⁵⁷. The severe execution of the laws of Constantine had excited a spirit of discon­tent and resistance; the strenuous efforts of his son Constans, to restore the unity of the church, exasperated the sentiments of mutual hatred, which had first occasioned the separation; and the me­thods [Page 399] of force and corruption employed by the two Imperial commissioners, Paul and Macarius, furnished the schismatics with a specious contrast between the maxims of the apostles and the con­duct of their pretended successors ¹⁵⁸. The pea­sants who inhabited the villages of Numidia and Mauritania, were a ferocious race, who had been imperfectly reduced under the authority of the Roman laws; who were imperfectly converted to the Christian faith; but who were actuated by a blind and furious enthusiasm in the cause of their Donatist teachers. They indignantly supported the exile of their bishops, the demolition of their churches, and the interruption of their secret assemblies. The violence of the officers of justice, who were usually sustained by a military guard, was sometimes repelled with equal vio­lence; and the blood of some popular ecclesiastics, which had been shed in the quarrel, inflamed their rude followers with an eager desire of re­venging the death of these holy martyrs. By [Page 400] their own cruelty and rashness, the ministers of persecution sometimes provoked their fate; and the guilt of an accidental tumult precipitated the criminals into despair and rebellion. Driven from their native villages, the Donatist peasants assembled in formidable gangs on the edge of the Getulian desert; and readily exchanged the habits of labour for a life of idleness and rapine, which was consecrated by the name of religion, and faintly condemned by the doctors of the sect. ‘The leaders of the Circumcellions assumed the assumed the title of captains of the saints; their principal weapon, as they were indifferently pro­vided with swords and spears, was a huge and weighty club, which they termed an Israelite; and the well-known sound of "Praise be to God," which they used as their cry of war, diffused con­sternation over the unarmed provinces of Africa.’ At first their depredations were coloured by the plea of necessity; but they soon exceeded the measure of subsistence, indulged without controul their intemperance and avarice, burnt the villages which they had pillaged, and reigned the licen­tious tyrants of the open country. The occupa­tions of husbandry, and the administration of justice, were interrupted; and as the Circumcel­lions pretended to restore the primitive equality of mankind, and to reform the abuses of civil society, they opened a secure asylum for the slaves and debtors, who flocked in crowds to their holy standard. When they were not resisted, they usually contented themselves with plunder, but the slightest opposition provoked them to acts of [Page 401] violence and murder; and some Catholic priests, who had imprudently signalized their zeal, were tortured by the fanatics with the most refined and wanton barbarity. The spirit of the Circumcel­lions was not always exerted against their defence­less enemies; they engaged, and sometimes de­feated, the troops of the province; and in the bloody action of Bagai, they attacked in the open field, but with unsuccessful valour, an advanced guard of the Imperial cavalry. The Donatists who were taken in arms, received, and they soon deserved, the same treatment which might have been shewn to the wild beasts of the desert. The captives died, without a murmur, either by the sword, the axe, or the fire; and the measures of retaliation were multiplied in a rapid proportion, which aggravated the horrors of rebellion, and excluded the hope of mutual forgiveness. In the beginning of the present century, the example of the Circumcellions has been renewed in the per­secution, the boldness, the crimes, and the en­thusiasm of the Camisards; and if the fanatics of Languedoc surpassed those of Numidia, by their military atchievements, the Africans maintained their fierce independence with more resolution and perseverance ¹⁵⁹.

Such disorders are the natural effects of religious tyranny; but the rage of the Donatists was in­flamed Their re­ligious suicides. by a frenzy of a very extraordinary kind; [Page 402] and which, if it really prevailed among them in so extravagant a degree, cannot surely be paral­leled in any country, or in any age. Many of these fanatics were possessed with the horror of life, and the desire of martyrdom; and they deemed it of little moment by what means, or by what hands, they perished, if their conduct was sanctified by the intention of devoting them­selves to the glory of the true faith, and the hope of eternal happiness ¹⁶⁰. Sometimes they rudely disturbed the festivals, and profaned the temples of paganism, with the design of exciting the most zealous of the idolaters to revenge the insulted honour of their gods. They sometimes forced their way into the courts of justice, and compelled the affrighted judge to give orders for their im­mediate execution. They frequently stopped tra­vellers on the public highways, and obliged them to inflict the stroke of martyrdom, by the pro­mise of a reward, if they consented, and by the threat of instant death, if they refused to grant so very singular a favour. When they were disap­pointed of every other resource, they announced the day on which, in the presence of their friends and brethren, they should cast themselves head­long from some lofty rock; and many precipices were shewn, which had acquired fame by the number of religious suicides. In the actions of these desperate enthusiasts, who were admired by one party as the martyrs of God, and abhorred by [Page 403] the other, as the victims of Satan, an impartial philosopher may discover the influence and the last abuse of that inflexible spirit, which was ori­ginally derived from the character and principles of the Jewish nation.

The simple narrative of the intestine divisions, General character of the Christian sects, which distracted the peace, and dishonoured the triumph, of the church, will confirm the remark of a pagan historian, and justify the complaint of a A. D. 312—361. venerable bishop. The experience of Ammianus had convinced him, that the enmity of the Christ­ians towards each other, surpassed the fury of savage beasts against man ¹⁶¹; and Gregory Nazianzen most pathetically laments, that the kingdom of heaven was converted, by discord, into the image of chaos, of a nocturnal tempest, and of hell itself ¹⁶². The fierce and partial writers of the times, ascribing all virtue to themselves, and imputing all guilt to their adversaries, have painted the battle of the angels and daemons. Our calmer reason will reject such pure and perfect monsters of vice or sanctity, and will impute an equal, or at least an indiscri­minate, measure of good and evil to the hostile sectaries, who assumed and bestowed the appella­tions of orthodox and heretics. They had been educated in the same religion, and the same civil society. Their hopes and fears in the present, or in a future, life, were balanced in the same pro­portion. On either side, the error might be in­nocent, [Page 404] the faith sincere, the practice meritorious or corrupt. Their passions were excited by simi­lar objects; and they might alternately abuse the favour of the court, or of the people. The meta­physical opinions of the Athanasians and the Arians, could not influence their moral character; and they were alike actuated by the intolerant spi­rit, which has been extracted from the pure and simple maxims of the gospel.

A modern writer, who, with a just confidence, Toleration of pagan­ism has prefixed to his own history the honourable epithets of political and philosophical ¹⁶³, accuses the timid prudence of Montesquieu, for neglect­ing to enumerate, among the causes of the decline of the empire, a law of Constantine, by which the exercise of the pagan worship was absolutely sup­pressed, and a considerable part of his subjects was left destitute of priests, of temples, and of any public religion. The zeal of the philosophic historian for the rights of mankind, has induced him to acquiesce in the ambiguous testimony of those ecclesiastics, who have too lightly ascribed to their favourite hero the merit of a general per­secution ¹⁶⁴. Instead of alleging this imaginary [Page 405] law, which would have blazed in the front of the Imperial codes, we may safely appeal to the ori­ginal epistle, which Constantine addressed to the followers of the ancient religion; at a time when he no longer disguised his conversion, nor dreaded the rivals of his throne. He invites and exhorts, in the most pressing terms, the subjects of the Roman empire to imitate the example of their master; but he declares, that those who still re­fuse by Con­stantine, to open their eyes to the celestial light, may freely enjoy their temples, and their fancied gods. A report, that the ceremonies of paganism were suppressed, is formally contradicted by the em­peror himself, who wisely assigns, as the principle of his moderation, the invincible force of habit, of prejudice, and of superstition ¹⁶⁵. Without violating the sanctity of his promise, without alarming the fears of the pagans, the artful mo­narch advanced, by slow and cautious steps, to undermine the irregular and decayed fabric of polytheism. The partial acts of severity which he occasionally exercised, though they were se­cretly prompted by a Christian zeal, were colour­ed by the fairest pretences of justice, and the public good; and while Constantine designed to ruin the foundations, he seemed to reform the abuses, of the ancient religion. After the example [Page 406] of the wisest of his predecessors, he condemned, under the most rigorous penalties, the occult and impious arts of divination; which excited the vain hopes, and sometimes the criminal attempts, of those who were discontented with their present condition. An ignominious silence was imposed on the oracles, which had been publicly con­victed of fraud and falsehood; the effeminate priests of the Nile were abolished; and Constan­tine discharged the duties of a Roman censor, when he gave orders for the demolition of several temples of Phoenicia; in which every mode of prostitution was devoutly practised in the face of day, and to the honour of Venus ¹⁶⁶. The Im­perial city of Constantinople was, in some mea­sure, raised at the expence, and was adorned with the spoils, of the opulent temples of Greece and Asia; the sacred property was confiscated; the statues of gods and heroes were transported, with rude familiarity, among a people who con­sidered them as objects, not of adoration, but of curiosity: the gold and silver were restored to cir­culation; and the magistrates, the bishops, and the eunuchs, improved the fortunate occasion of gratifying, at once, their zeal, their avarice, and their resentment. But these depredations were confined to a small part of the Roman world; and the provinces had been long since accustomed to [Page 407] endure the same sacrilegious rapine, from the tyranny of princes and proconsuls, who could not be suspected of any design to subvert the established religion ¹⁶⁷.

The sons of Constantine trod in the footsteps of and his sons. their father, with more zeal, and with less dis­cretion. The pretences of rapine and oppression were insensibly multiplied ¹⁶⁸; every indulgence was shewn to the illegal behaviour of the Chris­tians; every doubt was explained to the disad­vantage of paganism; and the demolition of the temples was celebrated as one of the auspicious events of the reign of Constans and Constan­tius ¹⁶⁹. The name of Constantius is prefixed to a concise law, which might have superseded the necessity of any future prohibitions. ‘It is our pleasure, that in all places, and in all cities, the temples be immediately shut, and carefully guarded, that none may have the power of offending. It is likewise our pleasure, that all [Page 408] our subjects should abstain from sacrifices. If any one should be guilty of such an act, let him feel the sword of vengeance; and after his execution, let his property be confiscated to the public use. We denounce the same penalties against the governors of the pro­vinces, if they neglect to punish the crimi­nals ¹⁷⁰.’ But there is the strongest reason to believe, that this formidable edict was either composed without being published, or was pub­lished without being executed. The evidence of facts, and the monuments which are still extant of brass and marble, continue to prove the public exercise of the pagan worship during the whole reign of the sons of Constantine. In the East, as well as in the West, in cities, as well as in the country, a great number of temples were respected, or at least were spared; and the devout multi­tude still enjoyed the luxury of sacrifices, of festi­vals, and of processions, by the permission, or by the connivance, of the civil government. About four years after the supposed date of his [Page 409] bloody edict, Constantius visited the temples of Rome; and the decency of his behaviour is re­commended by a pagan orator as an example worthy of the imitation of succeeding princes. ‘That emperor, says Symmachus, suffered the privileges of the vestal virgins to remain inviolate; he bestowed the sacerdotal dignities on the nobles of Rome, granted the customary allowance to defray the expences of the pub­lic rites and sacrifices: and, though he had embraced a different religion, he never at­tempted to deprive the empire of the sacred worship of antiquity ¹⁷¹.’ The senate still pre­sumed to consecrate, by solemn decrees, the divine memory of their sovereigns; and Constan­tine himself was associated, after his death, to those gods whom he had renounced and insulted during his life. The title, the ensigns, the pre­rogatives of SOVEREIGN PONTIFF, which had been instituted by Numa, and assumed by Augustus, were accepted, without hesitation, by seven Christ­ian emperors; who were invested with a more absolute authority over the religion which they had deserted, than over that which they pro­fessed ¹⁷².

[Page 410] The divisions of Christianity suspended the ruin of paganism ¹⁷³; and the holy war against the in­fidels was less vigorously prosecuted by princes and bishops, who were more immediately alarmed by the guilt and danger of domestic rebellion. The extirpation of idolatry ¹⁷⁴ might have been [Page 411] justified by the established principles of intole­rance: but the hostile sects, which alternately reigned in the Imperial court, were mutually ap­prehensive of alienating, and perhaps exasperat­ing, the minds of a powerful, though declining faction. Every motive of authority and fashion, of interest and reason, now militated on the side of Christianity; but two or three generations elapsed, before their victorious influence was universally felt. The religion which had so long and so lately been established in the Roman em­pire was still revered by a numerous people, less attached indeed to speculative opinion, than to ancient custom. The honours of the state and army were indifferently bestowed on all the sub­jects of Constantine and Constantius; and a con­siderable portion of knowledge and wealth and valour was still engaged in the service of poly­theism. The superstition of the senator and of the peasant, of the poet and the philosopher, was derived from very different causes, but they met with equal devotion in the temples of the gods. Their zeal was insensibly provoked by the insult­ing triumph of a proscribed sect; and their hopes [Page 412] were revived by the well-grounded confidence, that the presumptive heir of the empire, a young and valiant hero, who had delivered Gaul from the arms of the Barbarians, had secretly em­braced the religion of his ancestors.