Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/105

 XV. OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 87 edi, would be succeeded by a jo3ful sabbath of a CIIAP thousand years; and that Christ, with the triumphant band of the saints and the elect who had escaped death, or who had been miraculously revived, would reign upon earth till the time appointed for the last and general resurrection. So pleasing was this hope to the mind of believers, that the new Jerusalem, the seat of this blissful kingdom, was quickly adorned with all the gayest colours of the imagination. A felicity consisting only of pure and spiritual pleasure, would have appeared too refined for its inhabitants, who were still supposed to possess their human nature and senses. A garden of Eden, with the amusements of the pastoral life, was no longer suited to the advanced state of society which prevailed under the Roman em- pire. A city was therefore erected of gold and pre- cious stones, and a supernatural ]denty of corn and wine was bestowed on the adjacent territory ; in the free enjoyment of whose spontaneous productions, the happy and benevolent people was never to be re- strained by any jealous laws of exclusive property'. The assurance of such a millennium was carefully in- culcated by a succession of fathers from Justin Martyr' and Irenaeus, who conversed with the immediate dis- ciples of the apostles, down to Lactantius, who was preceptor to the son of Constantino*. Though it ^ The primitive church of Antioch computed almost six thousand years from the creation of the world to the birth of Christ. Africanus, Lactantius, and the Greek church, have reduced that number to five thousand five hun- dred, and Eusebius has contented himself with five thousand two hundred years. These calculations were formed on the Septuagint, which was uni- versally received during the six first centuries. The authority of the Vul- gate and of the Hebrew text has determined the moderns, protestanls as well as catholics, to prefer a period of about four thousand years; though, in the study of profane antiquity, they often find themselves straitened by those narrow limits. ■^ Most of these pictures were borrowed from a misinterpretation of Isaiah, Daniel, and the Apocalypse. One of the grossest images may be found in Irenseus, (1. v. p. 455.^ the disciple of I'apias, who had seen the apostle St. John. of Lactantius. It is unnecessary to allege all the intermediate fathers, as the fact is not disputed. Vet the curious reader may consult Daille de Usu Patrum, 1. ii. c. 4. ' The testimony of Justin, of his own faith and that of his orthodox hre- thien, in the doctrine of d millennium, is delivered in the clearest and most
 * See the second dialogue of Justin with Tryphon, and the seventh book