Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/447

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 429 date is alone sufficient to refute the iffnorant and niali- CHAP, cious suggestions of Zosimus^, who affirms that, after " the deatli of Crispus, the I'emorse of his father accepted from the ministers of Christianity the expiation which he had vainly solicited from the pagan pontiffs. At the time of the death of Crispus, the emperor could no longer hesitate in the choice of a religion ; he could no longer he ignorant that the church was possessed of an infallihle remedy, though he chose to defer the appli- cation of it till the approach of death had removed the temptation and danger of a relapse. The bishops whom he summoned, in his last illness, to the palace of Nicomedia, were edified by the fervour with which he requested and received the sacrament of baptism, by the solemn protestation that the remainder of his life should be worthy of a disciple of Christ, and by his humble refusal to wear the imperial purple after he had been clothed in the white garment of a neophyte. The example and reputation of Constantine seemed to countenance the delay of baptism". Future tyrants were encouraged to believe, that the innocent blood which they might shed in a long reign would instantly be washed away in the waters of regeneration ; and the abuse of religion dangerously undermined the founda- tions of moral virtue. The gratitude of the church has exalted the virtues Propao-atio and excused the failings of a generous patron, who o^'chnsti- seated Christianity on the throne of the Roman world ; and the Greeks, who celebrate the festival of the im- perial saint, seldom mention the name of Constantine without adding the title of "equal to the apostles^" Such a comparison, if it alludes to the character of and experienced the harshest treatment from all the ecclesiastical writers, except cardinal Baronius, (A. D. 324. No. 15 — 28.) who had occasion to employ the infidel on a particular service against the Arian Kusebius. » Eusebius, 1. iv. c. 61, 62, 63. The bishop of Cssarea supposes the salvation of Constantine with ihe most perfect confidence. Russians, and, in the darker ages, the Latins themselves, have been desirous of placing Constantine in the catalogue of saints.
 * Zosimus, 1. ii. p. 104. For tliis disingenuous falsehood he has deserved
 * See Tillemont, Hist, des Kmpereurs, torn. iv. p. 429. The Greeks, the