Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/230

 212 THE DECLINE AND FALL C EI A p. dom, a great number of Phrygians with their wives and !__ children ^. Subsequent Somc shght disturbances, though they were sup- edicts, pressed ahnost as soon as excited, in Syria and the frontiers of Armenia, afforded the enemies of the church a very plausible occasion to insinuate, that those troubles had been secretly fomented by the in- trigues of the bishops, who had already forgotten their ostentatious professions of passive and unlimited obe- dience ^ The resentment, or the fears of Diocletian, at length transported him beyond the bounds of mo- deration, which he had hitherto preserved ; and he declared, in a series of cruel edicts, his intention of abohshing the christian name. By the first of these edicts, the governors of the provinces were directed to apprehend all persons of the ecclesiastical order; and the prisons, destined for the vilest criminals, w^ere soon filled with a multitude of bishops, presbyters, deacons, readers, and exorcists. By a second edict, the magistrates were commanded to employ every me- thod of severity which might reclaim them from their odious superstition, and oblige them to return to the established worship of the gods. This rigorous order was extended, by a subsequent edict, to the whole body of christians, who were exposed to a violent and general persecution ^ Instead of those salutary re- venticulum, with its congregation. Eusebius (viii. 11.) extends it to a whole city, and introduces something very like a regular siege. His ancient Latin translator, Ilufinus, adds the important circumstance of the permission given to the inhabitants of retiriiig from thence. As Phrygia reached to the con- fines of Isauria, it is possible that the restless temper of those independent barbarians may have contributed to this misfortune. » Eusebius, 1. viii. c. 6. M. de Valois, with some probability, thinks that he has discovered the Syrian rebellion in an oration of Libanius; and that it was a rash attempt of the tribune Eugenius, who with only five hundred men seized Antioch, and might perhaps allure the christians by the piomise of religious toleration. From Eusebius, (1. ix. c. 8.) as well as from Moses of Chorene, (Hist. Arnien. 1. ii. c. 77, etc.) it may be inferred tliat Christianity was already introduced into Armenia. '' See Mosheim, p. 938. The text of Eusebius very plainly shows, that the governors, whose powers were enlarged, not restrained, by the new laws, could punish v/ith death the most ol)stinate christians, as an example to their brethren.
 * Lactantius (Institut. Divin. v. 11.) confines the calamity to the con-