Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/424

 406 THE DECLINE AND FALL CHAP, suited god would pursue with unrelenting vengeance ^ • the impiety of his ungrateful favourite"'. He protects As long as Constantine exercised a limited sove- tians of rcigntj over the provinces of Gaul, his christian sub- ^^a'V) jects were protected by the authority, and perhaps by 306—312. the laws, of a prince, who wisely left 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". In the east and in the west, he had seen the different eflects of severity and indulgence ; and as the former was ren- dered 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 re- pealed 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". A. D. 313, About five months after the conquest of Italy, the Edict of emperor made a solemn and authentic declaration of Milan. j,jg sentiments, by the celebrated edict 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 ™ The panegyric of Eumenius, (vii. inter Panegyr. Vet.) which was pro- nounced a few months before the Italian war, abounds with the most un- exceptionable evidence of tlie pagan superstition of Constantine, and of his particular veneration for Apollo, or the sun; to which Julian alludes, Orat. vii. p. 228. aTToXciTTwv at. See Commentaire de Spanheim sur les Cesars, p. 317. ° Constantin. Orat. ad Sanctos, c. 25. But it might easily be shown, that the Greek translator has improved the sense of the Latin original; and the aged emperor might recollect the persecution of Diocletian with a more lively abhorrence than he had actually felt in the days of his youth and paganism. " See Euseh. Hist. Eccles. 1. viii. 13. 1. ix. 9. and in Vit. Const. 1. i. c. 16, 17; Lactant. Divin. Institut. i. 1 ; Caecilius de iUort. Persecut. c. 25.