Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/440

 4^2 THE DECLINE AND FALL CHAP, was converted into faith by the vision of the ensuing ' night. Christ appeared before his eyes ; and display- ing 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''. The learned bishop of Caesarea appears to be sensible, that the recent discovei-y of this mar- vellous anecdote would excite some surprise and dis- trust among the most pious of his readers. Yet, in- stead of ascertaining the precise circumstances of time and place, which always serve to detect falsehood, or establish truth '^; instead of collecting and recording the evidence of so many living witnesses, who must have been spectators of this stupendous miracle*^; Eusebius contents himself with alleging a very singular testi- mony; that of the deceased Constantine, who, many years after the event, in the freedom of conversation, 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 pre- late forbade him to suspect the veracity of his victori- ous 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 celes- tial sign, which the infidels might afterwards deride *, was disregarded by the christians of the age which im- mediately followed the conversion of Constantine ^ But Ecclesiastical History, is deeply felt by those advocates for the miracle who are not absolutely callous. •^ The narrative of Constantine seems to indicate, that he saw the cross in the sky before he passed the Alps against Maxentius. The scene has been fixed by provincial vanity at Treves, Besan^on, etc. See Tillemont, Hist, des Erapereurs, torn. iv. p. 573. '' The pious Tillemont (Mem. Eccles. tom. vii. p. 1317.) rejects with a sigh the useful Acts of Artemius, a veteran and a martyr, who attests as an eyewitness the vision of Constantine. e Gelasius Cyzic. in Act. Concil. Nicen. 1. i. c. 4. f The advocates for the vision are unable to produce a single testimony from the fathers of tlie fourth and fifth centuries, who, in their voluminous writings, repeatedly celebrate the triumph of the church and of Constantine. As these venerable men had not any dislike to a miracle, we may suspect (and the suspicion is confirmed by the ignorance of .lerome) that they were
 * • Eusebius, 1. i. c. 28, 29, 30. The silence of the same Eusebius, in his