VI

THE VISION OF THE CROSS AND THE EDICT OF MILAN

 

IT was during the course of the successful invasion of Italy, which culminated in the battle of the Milvian Bridge and the capture of Rome, that there took place—or was said to have taken place—the famous vision of the cross, surrounded by the swords, “Conquer by This”, which accompanied the triumph of Constantine's arms. There are two main authorities for the legend, Eusebius and Lactantius, both, of course, Christians and uncompromising champions of Constantine, with whom they were in close personal contact. A third, though he makes no mention of the cross, is Nazarius, the author of the Tenth Panegyric. The variations which subsequent writers introduce into the story relate merely to details, or are obvious embroideries upon an original legend, such, for example, as the statement of Philostorgius that the words of promise around the cross were written in stars. We need not trouble, therefore, with the much later versions of Sozomen, Socrates, Gregory of Nazianzen, and Nicephorus it will be enough to study the more or less contemporary statements of Eusebius, Lactantius, and Nazarius. And of these by far the fullest and most important is that of Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, who explicitly declares that he is repeating the story as it was told to him by Constantine himself.

Eusebius shows us the Emperor of Gaul anxiously debating within his own mind whether his forces were equal to the dangerous enterprise upon which he had embarked. Maxentius had a formidable army. He had also laboured to bring over to his side the powers of heaven and hell. Constantine's information from Rome apprised him that Maxentius was assiduously employing all the black arts of magic and wizardry to gain the favour of the gods. And Constantine grew uneasy and apprehensive, for no one then disbelieved in the efficacy of magic, and he considered whether he might not counterbalance this undue advantage which Maxentius was obtaining by securing the protecting services of some equally potent deity. Such is the only possible meaning of Eusebius's words, “He thought in his own mind what sort of god he ought to secure as ally”,—words which seem strange in the twentieth century, but were natural enough in the fourth. And then, says his biographer, the idea occurred to him that though his predecessors in the purple had believed in a multiplicity of gods, the great majority of them had perished miserably. The gods, at whose altars they had offered rich sacrifice and plenteous libation, had deserted them in their hour of trouble, and had looked on unmoved while they and their families were exterminated from off the face of the earth, leaving scarcely so much as a name or a recollection behind them. The gods had cheated them and lured them to their doom with suave promises of treacherous oracles. Whereas, on the other hand, his father, Constantius, had believed in but one god, and had marvellously prospered throughout his life, helped and protected by this single deity who had showered every blessing upon his head. From such a contrast, what other deduction could be drawn than that the god of Constantius was the deity for Constantius’s son to honour? Constantine resolved that it would be folly to waste time or thought upon deities who were of no account. He would worship no other god than the god of his father.

Such, according to Eusebius, is the first phase of the Emperor’s conversion, a conviction not of sin, but of the folly of worshipping gods who cannot or will not do anything for their votaries. But this god of his father, this single unnamed divinity, who was it? Was it one of the gods of the Roman Pantheon, Jupiter, or Apollo, or Hercules, whose special protection Constantine had claimed for himself, as Augustus had claimed that of Apollo, and Diocletian that of Jupiter? Or was it the vague spirit of deity itself, the Theo of the Greek philosophers, the divinitas of the cultured Roman, whose delicacy was offended by the grossness of the exceedingly human passions of the Roman gods and goddesses? Obviously, it must be the latter, and Eusebius tell us that Constantine offered up a prayer to this god of his father, beseeching him, “to declare himself who he was," and to stretch forth his right hand' to help. “To declare himself who he was!”. That had ever been the stumbling-block in the way of the acceptance by the masses of the immaterial principles propounded by the philosophers. Constantine must have a god with a name, and he must have a sign from heaven in visible proof. Many have asked for such a sign just as importunately as Constantine, but without success. To him it was vouchsafed.

The answer came one afternoon, when the sun had just passed its zenith and was beginning to decline. Lifting his eyes, the Emperor saw in the heavens just above the sun the figure of a cross, a cross of radiant light, and attached to it was the inscription, “Conquer by This”. Eusebius admits that if anyone else had told the story it would not have been easy to believe it, but it was told to him by the Emperor himself, who had confirmed his words with a royal oath. How then was it possible to doubt? Constantine was awe-struck at the vision, which Eusebius expressly declares was seen also by the entire army. All that afternoon the Emperor pondered long upon the significance of the words, and night fell while he was still asking himself what they could mean. Then, as he slept, Christ appeared to him in a dream, bearing with Him the sign that had flamed in the sky, and bade the sleeper make a copy of it and use it as a talisman whenever he gave battle. As soon as dawn broke, Constantine summoned his friends and told them of the message he had received. Workers in gold and precious stones were hastily sent for, and, sitting in the midst of them, Constantine carefully described the outline of the vision and bade them execute a replica of it in their most precious materials. This was the famous Labarum, fashioned from a long gilded spear and a transverse bar. Above was a crown of gold, with jewels encircling the monogram of Christ, and from the bar depended a rich purple cloth, heavily embroidered with gold, blazing with jewels, and bearing the busts of Constantine and his sons. It suggested the Cross just as much but no more than did the ordinary cavalry standards of the Roman armies; the sacred monogram alone indicated the supreme change which had come over the Emperor, who, in answer to his prayer, had thus found that the single Deity which his father, Constantius, had worshipped was none other than Christ, the God of the Christians. For the Emperor, desiring to know more of the Cross and the Christ, summoned certain Christian teachers in his camp to explain these things more fully to him, and they told him that “Christ was God, the only begotten Son of the one true God, and that the vision he had seen was the symbol of immortality and of the victory which Christ had won over death”. Such, according to Eusebius, was the conversion of Constantine, and such was the Emperor's own account of the circumstances which led up to it. This was the official story, as it might have appeared in a Roman Court Circular at the time when Eusebius wrote.

But when did Eusebius write The Life of Constantine, from which we have taken this narrative? Not until Constantine himself was dead, not, that is to say, until after 337; fully a quarter of a century after the event described. The date is important. In twenty-five years a story may be transfigured out of all knowledge through constant repetition by the narrator, to say nothing of the changes it suffers if it passes in active circulation from mouth to mouth. Has this been the fate of the story of the Vision of the Cross? The Life of Constantine was not the first volume of contemporary history published by Eusebius. He had already written a History of the Church, which he issued to the world in 326. What, then, had the author to say in that year about this marvellous vision? Nothing. There is not a word about the flaming cross, or the coming of Christ to Constantine in a dream, or the fashioning of the Labarum. All Eusebius says, in his History, of the conversion of Constantine, is that the Emperor “piously called to his aid the God of Heaven and his son Jesus Christ”. It is a strange silence. If the heavenly cross had been seen by the whole army; if the current version of the story had been the same in 326 as it was in 337, it is at least difficult to understand why Eusebius omitted all mention of an event which must have been the talk of the whole Roman world and must have made the heart of every Christian exult. Such manifest signs from Heaven were scarcely so common in the opening of the fourth century that an ecclesiastical historian would think any allusion to it unnecessary. The argument from silence is never absolutely conclusive, but the reticence of Eusebius in 326 at least warrants a strong suspicion that the legend had not then crystallized itself into its final shape.

Of even greater importance are the extraordinary discrepancies between the versions of Eusebius and Lactantius. Lactantius wrote his treatise On the Deaths of the Persecutors very shortly after the battle of the Milvian Bridge, and it has a special value, therefore, as containing the earliest account of the vision. The author, who was the tutor of the Emperor's son, Crispus, must have known all there was to be known of the incident, for he lived in the closest intimacy with the court circle. We should confidently expect, therefore, that the author who retails verbatim the conversation of Diocletian and Galerius in the penetralia of the palace of Nicomedia would be fully aware of what took place in full view of Constantine’s army.

What then is the version of Lactantius? It is that just before the battle of the Milvian Bridge, Constantine was warned in a dream to have the divine sign of the cross inscribed on the shields of his soldiers before leading them to the attack. He did as he was bidden, and the letter X, with one of the bars slightly bent—thus, -r—to form the sacred monogram, was placed upon his legionaries' shields. Such is the legend in its earliest guise. There is not a word about Constantine's anxiety and searching of soul. The event is placed, not at the opening of the campaign, as Eusebius would seem to suggest though he does not expressly say so, but on the eve of the decisive battle. There is nothing about the cross flaming in the afternoon sky, nothing of the inscription, “Conquer by This”, nothing of the entire army being witness of the portent. Constantine simply has a dream and is warned to place the initial of Christ on his soldiers' shields. It is not even said who gave the warning; there is not a hint that it was Christ Himself—as in the story of Eusebius—who appeared to Constantine; there is no mention of the Labarum. Obviously, Lactantius was aware of no triumphant answer to Constantine's prayer for a sign. According to him, the Emperor was merely warned in a dream that victory would reward him if he dedicated his weapons to the honour and service of Christ.

We come back, therefore, to the official version of Eusebius somewhat shaken in our belief of its literal accuracy. Let us note, too, the extreme vagueness of the time and the place where the incident is reported to have taken place, and remember that one who had dwelt with Diocletian and Galerius when they signed the edicts of persecution could not possibly have been ignorant of the principles of Christianity, which was no longer the religion of an obscure sect. We need not, indeed, find any difficulty in accepting the first part of the story of Eusebius in so far as it represents Constantine anxiously enquiring after divine protection. It has been urged, very shrewdly, that the story would have been idealized if it had been altogether invented. Constantine was afraid that he had rashly committed himself and that Maxentius had already secured the favour of the Roman gods. His objective, too, was Rome, still regarded with superstitious dread and reverence throughout the world, and reverenced all the more, no doubt, in proportion as distance lent enchantment to the view. What then more natural than that he should take for granted that, if ever the gods of Rome had interfered in mortal affairs, they would do so now on behalf of Maxentius, who had been raised to empire as Rome's champion? Constantine was not one of those rarer and choicer spirits, who seek truth for its own sake without regard for material advantage. Conversion in his case did not mean some sudden or even gradual change permanently altering his outlook upon life, and refining and transmuting personal character. It merely meant worshipping at another shrine, entering another temple, reciting another formula. His ruling motive was ambition. He would worship the god who should bring victory to his arms. The intensity of his conviction was to be measured by the extent of his success and by the height to which he carried his fortunes.

But what of the second part of the story—the vision of the cross flaming in the sky in full view of Constantine and his army? Even those who admit miracles into critical history allow that the evidence for this one is exceedingly inconclusive. We need not doubt that Eusebius related the story just as it was told to him by Constantine, though the Bishop, if there were choice versions, would unhesitatingly accept the one which contained most of the miraculous and the abnormal. Nor does the oath which Constantine swore in support of his story add anything to its credibility. It was his habit to swear an oath when he wished to be emphatic. Are we, then, to consider that the whole legend was an invention of the Emperor's from beginning to end? In this connection it is important to take into account the narrative of Nazarius, a rhetorician who delivered a formal panegyric upon Constantine on the anniversary of his tenth year of rule, and took the opportunity of reviewing the whole campaign against Maxentius. Nazarius was a pagan; what then was (the pagan version, if any, of the miracle described by Eusebius and the Emperor? Did the pagans attribute divine assistance to Constantine throughout this critical campaign? The answer is unmistakable. They did so most unequivocally. Nazarius tells us that all Gaul was talking with awe and wonder of the marvels which had taken place, how the soldiers of Constantine had seen in the sky celestial armies marching in battle array and had been dazzled by their flashing shields and glittering armour. Not only had the dull eyes of earthly men for once availed to look upon heavenly brightness; Constantine's soldiery had also heard the shouts of these armies in the sky, “We seek Constantine; we are marching to the aid of Constantine”. Clearly the pagan as well as the Christian world insisted upon attributing divine assistance to Constantine and had its own version of how that succour came. Nazarius's explanation was simple. According to him, it was Constantius Chlorus, the deified Emperor, who was leading up the hosts of heaven, and such miraculous intervention was due to the supreme virtue of the father, which had descended to the son.

The question at once arises whether this is merely a pagan version of the Christian legend. Unable to deny the miracle, did the pagans, in order to rob the Christians of this wonderful testimony to the truth of their religion, invent the story of Constantius and the heavenly hosts? Such a theory is absolutely untenable. It leaves out of sight the all-important fact that public opinion in the fourth century—as indeed for many centuries both before and after—was not only willing to believe in supernatural intervention at moments of great crisis, but actually insisted that there should be such intervention. The greater the crisis, the more entirely reasonable it was that some deity or deities should make their influence especially felt and turn the scale to one side or the other. Every Roman believed that Castor and Pollux had fought for Rome in the supreme struggle against Hannibal. Julius believed that the favour of Venus Genetrix, the special patroness of the Julian House, had helped him to win the battle of Pharsalus. Augustus was just as certain that Apollo had fought on his side at Philippi and at Actium. It was easy—and modest —for the winner to believe in his protecting deity's strength of arm.

One curious phrase employed by Nazarius is worth noting. It is that in which he claims that the special interference of Heaven on behalf of Constantine was not merely an extraordinary and gratifying tribute to the Emperor's virtues, but that it was no more than his due. In short, the crisis was so tremendous that Heaven would have stood convicted of a strange failure to see events in their just proportion if it had not done “some great thing”, and wrought some corresponding wonder. Such was the idea at the back of Nazarius’s mind; we suspect that it was not wanting in the mind of Eusebius or of Constantine. We may put the matter paradoxically and say that a miracle in those days was not much considered unless it was a very great one. People who were accustomed to see—or to think that they saw—statues sweating blood, and to hear words proceeding from lips of bronze or marble, and were accustomed to treat such untoward events merely as portents denoting that something unusual was about to happen, must have been difficult people to surprise. Naturally, therefore, legends grew more and more marvellous with repetition after the event. The oftener a man told such a story the less appeal it would make to his own wonder, unless he fortified it with some new incident. But to impress one’s auditors it is above all things necessary to be impressed oneself. Hence the well-garnished narrative of Nazarius. The idea of armies marching along the sky was common enough. Any one can imagine he sees the glint of weapons as the sun strikes the clouds. But this does not satisfy the professional rhetorician. He bids us see the proud look in the faces of the heavenly hosts, and distinguish the cries with which they move to battle. But if Nazarius is suspect, why not Eusebius and Constantine? Unless, indeed, there is to be one standard for pagan and another for Christian miracles!

But was there some unusual manifestation in the sky which was the common basis of the stories of Eusebius and Nazarius? It is not unreasonable to suppose so. Scientists say that the natural phenomenon known as the parhelion not infrequently assumes the shape of a cross, and Dean Stanley, while discussing this possible explanation in his Lectures on the Eastern Church, instanced the extraordinary impression made upon the minds of the vulgar by the aurora borealis of November, 1848. He recalled how, throughout France, the people thought they saw in the sky the letters L. N.—the initials of Louis Napoleon—and took them as a clear indication from Heaven of how they ought to vote at the impending Presidential election, and as an omen of the result. That was the interpretation in France. In Rome—where the people knew and cared nothing for Louis Napoleon—no one saw the Napoleonic initials. The lurid gleam in the sky was there thought to be the blood of the murdered Rossi, which had risen to heaven and was calling for vengeance. In Oporto, on the other hand, the conscience-stricken populace thought the fire was coming down from heaven to punish them for their profligacy. If such varying interpretations of a natural if rare phenomenon were possible in the middle of the nineteenth century, what interpretation was not possible in the fourth? The world was profoundly superstitious. When people believe in manifest signs they usually see them. Some Polonius, gifted either with better vision or livelier imagination than his fellows, declares that he can distinguish clear and definite shapes amid the vague outline of the clouds; the report spreads; the legend grows. And when legends are found to serve a useful purpose the authorities lend them countenance, guarantee their accuracy, and even take to themselves the credit of their authorship. At the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese war a strange story came from St. Petersburg that the Russian moujiks were passing on from village to village the legend that St. George had been seen in the skies leading his hosts to the Far East against the infidel Japanese. Had Russian victories followed, what better “proof” of celestial aid could have been desired? But as disaster ensued, it is to be supposed that St. George remembered midway that he also had interests in the Anglo-Japanese alliance, and remained strictly neutral.

But though we may be justly sceptical of the circumstances attending the conversion of Constantine, there is no room to doubt the conversion itself. We do not believe that he fought the battle of the Milvian Bridge as the avowed champion of Christianity, but the probabilities are that he had made up his mind to become a Christian when he fought it. The miraculous vision in the heavens, the dream in the quiet of the night, the appearance of Christ by the bedside of the Emperor—as to these things we may keep an open mind, but the fashioning of the Labarum—the sacred standard which was preserved for so many centuries as the most precious of imperial heirlooms and was seen and described as late as the ninth century—this was the outward and visible proof of the change which had come over the Emperor. He had abandoned Apollo for Christ. The sun-god had been the favourite deity of his youth and early manhood, as it had been of Augustus Cesar, the founder of the Empire, and the originator of the close association between the worship of Apollo and the worship of the reigning Cesar. Constantine would not fail to note that many of the most gracious attributes of Apollo belonged also to Christ.

He soon manifested the sincerity of his conversion. After a short stay in Rome, he went north to Milan, where he gave the hand of his sister, Constantia, to his ally, Licinius. Diocletian was invited, but declined to make the journey. The two Emperors, no doubt, desired to secure the prestige of his moral support in their mutual hostility to the Emperor of the East, and the benefit of his counsel in their deliberations upon the state of the Empire. But even if Diocletian had been tempted to leave his cabbages to join in the marriage festivities and the political conference at Milan, we imagine that he would still have declined if he had been given any hint of the intentions of Constantine and Licinius with respect to the great question of religious toleration or persecution. He might have been candid enough to admit the failure of his policy, but he would still have shrunk from proclaiming it with his own lips. For, before the festivities at Milan were interrupted by the news that Maximin had thrown down the gage of battle, Constantine and Licinius issued in their joint names the famous Edict of Milan, which proclaimed for the first time in its absolute entirety the noble principle of complete religious toleration. Despite their length, it will be well to give in full the more important clauses. They are found in the text which has been happily preserved by Lactantius in the original Latin, while we also have the edict in Greek in the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius . It runs as follows:

“Inasmuch as we, Constantine Augustus and Licinius Augustus, have met together at Milan on a joyful occasion, and have discussed all that appertains to the public advantage and safety, we have come to the conclusion that, among the steps likely to profit the majority of mankind and demanding immediate attention, nothing is more necessary than to regulate the worship of the Divinity.

“We have decided, therefore, to grant both to the Christians and to all others perfect freedom to practice the religion which each has thought best for himself, that so whatever Divinity resides in heaven may be placated, and rendered propitious to us and to all who have been placed under our authority. Consequently, we have thought this to be the policy demanded alike by healthy and sound reason—that no one, on any pretext whatever, should be denied freedom to choose his religion, whether he prefers the Christian religion or any other that seems most suited to him, in order that the Supreme Divinity, whose observance we obey with free minds, may in all things vouchsafe to us its usual favors and benevolences.

“Wherefore, it is expedient for your Excellency to know that we have resolved to abolish every one of the stipulations contained in all previous edicts sent to you with respect to the Christians, on the ground that they now seem to us to be unjust and alien from the spirit of our clemency.

“Henceforth, in perfect and absolute freedom, each and every person who chooses to belong to and practice the Christian religion shall be at liberty to do so without let or hindrance in any shape or form.

“We have thought it best to explain this to your Excellency in the fullest possible manner that you may know that we have accorded to these same Christians a free and absolutely unrestricted right to practice their own religion.

“And inasmuch as you see that we have granted this indulgence to the Christians, your Excellency will understand that a similarly free and unrestricted right, conformable to the peace of our times, is granted to all others equally to practice the religion of their choice. We have resolved upon this course that no one and no religion may seem to be robbed of the honour that is their due”.

Then follow the most explicit instructions for the restoration to the Christians of the properties of which they had been robbed during the persecutions, though the robbery had been committed in accordance with imperial command. Whether a property had been simply confiscated, or sold, or given away, it was to be handed back without the slightest cost and without any delays or ambiguities. Purchasers who had bought such properties in good faith were to be indemnified from the public treasury by grace of the Emperor.

But the abiding interest of this celebrated edict lies in the general principles there clearly enunciated. Every man, without distinction of rank or nationality, is to have absolute freedom to choose and practice the religion which he deems most suited to his needs. The phrase is repeated with almost wearisome iteration, but the principle was novel and strange, and one can see the anxiety of the framers of this edict that there shall be no possible loophole for misunderstanding. Everybody is to have free choice; all previous anti-Christian enactments are annulled; not only is no compulsion to be employed against the Christian, he is not even to be troubled or annoyed. The novelty lay not so much in the toleration of the existence of Christianity, —both Constantine and Licinius had two years before signed the edict whereby Galerius put an end to the persecution,—but in its formal official recognition by the State.

What motives, then, are assigned by the Emperors for this notable change of policy? Certainly not humanity. Nothing is said of the terrors of the late persecutions and the horrible sufferings of the Christians—there is merely a bald reference to previous edicts which the Emperors consider “unjust and alien from the spirit of our clemency”. There is no appeal to political necessity, such as the exhaustion of the world and its palpable need of rest. The motives assigned are purely religious. The Emperors proclaim religious toleration in order that they and their subjects may continue to receive the blessings of Heaven. One of them at least had just emerged victoriously from the manifold hazards of an invasion of Italy. Surely we can trace a reference to the battle of the Milvian Bridge and the overthrow of Maxentius in the mention of “the Divine favour towards us, which we have experienced in affairs of the highest moment”. What Constantine and Licinius hope to secure is a continuance of the favor and benevolence of the Supreme Divinity, the patronage of the ruling powers of the sky. The phraseology is important. The name of God is not mentioned—only the vague Summa Divinitas, Divinus favor, and the still more curious and non­committal phrase, whatever Divinity resides in heaven. In Eusebius the same phrase appears in a form still more nebulous: Whatever Divinity there is and heavenly substance. A pagan philosopher, more than half sceptical as to the existence of a personal God, might well employ such language, but it reads strangely in an official edict.

But then this edict was to bear the joint names of Constantine and Licinius. Constantine might be a Christian, but Licinius was still a pagan, and Licinius was not his vassal, but his equal. He would certainly not have been prepared to set his name to an edict which pledged him to personal adherence to the Christian faith. Constantine, in the flush of triumph, would insist that the persecution of the Christians should cease, and that the Christian religion should be officially recognized. Licinius would raise no objection. But they would speedily find, when it came to drafting a joint edict, that the only religious ground common to them both was very limited in extent, and that the only way to preserve a semblance of unity was to employ the vaguest phraseology which each might interpret in his own fashion. If we can imagine the Pope and the Caliph drafting a joint appeal to mankind which necessitated the mention of the Higher Power, they would find themselves driven to use words as cloudy and indistinct as the Whatever Divinity there is and heavenly substance of Eusebius. No, it was not that Constantine's mind was in the transitional stage; it was rather that he had to find a common platform for himself and Licinius.

But to have converted Licinius at all to an official recognition of the Christians and complete toleration was a great achievement, for the principle, as we have said, was entirely new. M. Gaston Boissier, in discussing this point, recalls how even the broad-minded Plato had found no place in his ideal republic for those who disbelieved in the gods of their fatherland and of the city of their birth. Even if they kept their opinions to themselves and did not seek to disturb the faith of others, Plato insisted upon their being placed in a House of Correction—it is true he calls it a Sophronisterion, or House of Wisdom—for five years, where they were to listen to a sermon every day; while, if they were zealous propagandists of their pernicious doctrines, he proposed to keep them all their lives in horrible dungeons and deny their bodies after death the right of sepulchre. How, one wonders, would Socrates have fared in such a state? No better, we fancy, than he fared in his own city of Athens. But, throughout antiquity, every lawgiver took the same view, that a good citizen must accept without question the gods of his native place who had been the gods of his fathers; and it was a simple step from that position to the stern refusal to allow a man, in the vigorous words of the Old Testament, to go a-whoring after other gods. “For I, thy God, am a jealous God”. The God of the Jews was not more jealous than the gods of the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, or the Romans would like to have been, had they had the same power of concise expression.

What was the theory of the State religion in Rome? Cicero tells us in a well- known passage in his treatise On the Laws, where he quotes the ancient formula, “Let no man have separate gods of his own: nor let people privately worship new gods or alien gods, unless they have been publicly admitted”. Nothing could be more explicit. But theory and practice in Rome had a habit of becoming divorced from one another. It is a notorious fact that, as Rome's conquering eagles flew farther afield, the legions and the merchants who followed in their track brought all manner of strange gods back to the city, where every wandering Chaldean thaumaturgist, magician, or soothsayer found welcome and profit, and every stray goddess—especially if her rites had mysteries attached to them—received a comfortable home. In a word, Rome found new religions just as fascinating—for a season or two—as do the capitals of the modern world, and these new religions were certainly not “publicly admitted” by the Pontiff Maximus and the representatives of the State religion. Occasionally, usually after some outbreak of pestilence or because an Emperor was nervous at the presence of so many swarthy charlatans devoting themselves to the Black Arts, an order of expulsion would be issued and there would be a fluttering of the dove-cotes. But they came creeping back one by one, as the storm blew over. While, therefore, in theory the gods of Rome were jealous, in practice they were not so. The easy scepticism or eclecticism of the cultured Roman was conducive to tolerance. Cicero’s famous sentence in the Pro Flacco, “Each state has its own religion, Laelius: we have ours”, shows how little of the religious fanatic there was in the average Roman, who stole the gods of the people he conquered and made them his own, so that they might acquiesce in the Roman domination The Roman was tolerant enough in private life towards other people's religious convictions: all he asked was reciprocity, and that was precisely what the Christian would not and could not give him. If the Christian would have sacrificed at the altars of the State gods, the Roman would never have objected to his worship of Christ for his own private satisfaction. There lies the secret of the persecutions, and of the fierce anti-Christian hatreds.

Constantine and Licinius, by their edict of recognition and toleration, “publicly admitted” into the Roman worship the God of the Christians.

 

 

VII

THE DOWNFALL OF LICINIUS