DEATH OF THE EMPEROR CONSTANTIUS CHLORUS. 335.

been his visionary projects, when, within less than eighteen months, two unexpected revolutions overturned the ambitious schemes of Galerius.

In the year 306 the emperor Constantius, then on his way to our own country, finding his end approaching, applied to Galerius to send him his own son, Constantine, who, instead of accompanying his father into Gaul and Britain, had remained in the service of Diocletian. For some time the policy of Galerius supplied him with delays and excuses; but it was impossible long to refuse so natural a request of his associate, without maintaining his refusal by arms. The permission was at last granted that the son should visit his father, and whatever precautions Galerius might have taken to intercept a return, the consequences of which he with so much reason apprehended, they were effectually disappointed by the incredible diligence of Constantine. Leaving the palace of Nicomedia in the night, he travelled post through Bithynia, Thrace, Dacia, Pannonia, Italy, and Gaul, and, amidst the joyful acclamations of the people, reached the port of Boulogne in the very moment when his father was preparing to embark for Britain. Arriving in this country with the army under his command, Constantius marched into Caledonia, and obtained an easy victory over the barbarians of that country, which was among the last exploits of the reign of Constantius. He then returned to York, and ended his life in the imperial palace there, on the 15th July, A. D. 306. His death was immediately succeeded by the elevation of his son Constantine to the dignity of emperor; a most important event in the history of the Christian church, inasmuch as it paved the way, in a short time, for putting a final period to the persecution of the Christians by the heathen magistrates, with other signal occurrences, which will presently come under our consideration. In the mean time it will be proper for us to return to the emperor Galerius, and his treatment of the Christians.

When Galerius received the information that the army had invited Constantine to assume the imperial dignity, the first emotions of his mind were those of surprise, disappointment, and rage; and, as he could seldom restrain his passions, he loudly threatened that he would commit to the flames both the letter of Constantine, which informed him of the event, and also

the messenger who brought it. But his resentment insensibly subsided, and, making a virtue of necessity, he accepted the son of his late colleague as the sovereign of the provinces beyond the Alps; but he gave him only the title of Cæsar, and the fourth rank among the Roman princes, whilst he conferred the vacant place of Augustus on his favourite Severus. But his ambitious spirit was scarcely reconciled to the event now mentioned before the unexpected loss of Italy wounded his pride as well as his power in a still more sensible part. His Italian subjects revolted and chose Maxentius, the son of the emperor Maximian, who had married the daughter of Galerius, to fill the imperial throne. "The gloomy passions of his soul," says Gibbon, "shame, vexation and rage, were inflamed by envy on the news of Constantine's success; but when Maxentius, invested with imperial ornaments, was acknowledged by the applauding senate and people of Rome, as the protector of the Roman freedom and dignity, Galerius lost no time in putting himself at the head of his troops to chastise his refractory subjects, and recover his usurped dominions. In this contest he was engaged from the early part of the year 307 to the year 311, the victim of much disappointment and mortification during the former part of that period, having been obliged to retreat with his army from Italy, an event which he survived only four years. His death was preceded not only by a dreadful and lingering illness, in which he suffered horrors indescribable, but also what has been thought great remorse of conscience for the injuries which he had inflicted upon the Christians. But you shall have the account in Mr. Gibbon's words, whose well known scepticism must exempt him from all suspicion of exaggeration in the matter :

"The frequent disappointments of his ambitious views, the experience of six years of persecution, and the salutary reflection which a lingering and painful distemper suggested to the mind of Galerius, at length convinced him that the most violent efforts of despotism are insufficient to extirpate a whole people, or to subdue their religious prejudices. Desirous of repairing the mischief which he had occasioned, he published in his own name, and in those of Licinius and Constantine, a general edict, which, after a pompous recital of the imperial titles, proceeded in the following manner :

EDICT OF GALERIUS IN FAVOUR OF THE CHRISTIANS. 337

"

Among the important cares which have occupied our mind for the utility and preservation of the empire, it was our intention to correct and re-establish all things according to the ancient laws and public discipline of the Romans. We were particularly desirous of reclaiming into the way of reason and nature the deluded Christians, who had renounced the religion and ceremonies instituted by their fathers; and, presumptuously despising the practice of antiquity, had invented extravagant laws and opinions according to the dictates of their fancy, and had collected a various society from the different provinces of our empire. The edicts which we have published to enforce the worship of the gods having exposed many of the Christians to danger and distress, many having suffered death, and many more, who still persist in their impious folly, being left destitute of any public exercise of religion, we are disposed to extend to these unhappy men the effects of our wonted clemency. We permit them therefore freely to profess their private opinions, and to assemble in their conventicles without fear or molestation [a thing which he ought never to have deprived them of, since, to worship the God of heaven agreeably to the dictates of conscience is the inalienable birthright of every human being, and a privilege which neither emperor nor king should interfere with] provided always that they preserve a due respect to the established laws and government. By another rescript we shall signify our intentions to the judges and magistrates; and we hope that our indulgence will engage the Christians to offer up their prayers to the Deity whom they adore for our safety and prosperity, and for that of the republic."*

Such is the edict of Galerius, which put an end to this protracted and sanguinary persecution, and secured the peace of the church, at least as far as external persecution was concerned. But I cannot dismiss it without pointing to a few of the many inconsistencies contained in it, and the discoveries which it makes of the total ignorance of the first principles of Christianity on the part of the unhappy emperor and his ministers of state, by whom it was drawn up. It has been common with

Eusebius, lib. 8, c. 17, and Lactantius de Mort. Persecut. c. 34. The latter gives the Latin original of this famous edict-the former has given us a Greek version.

the writers of Ecclesiastical History to hold it up as a proof of the remorse and repentance of Galerius; but I confess myself unable to find any traces of either the one or the other in it, What, for instance, does this edict say of the conduct of the Christians in adhering to the worship of the one living and true God, and rejecting the worship of idols? why, that they were a "deluded" people, who had renounced the religion and ceremonies instituted by their forefathers-that they presumptuously despised the practice of antiquity; in other words, they are stigmatized as presumptuous fools, for rejecting the doctrines and commandments of men, renouncing a system of the vilest superstition and the most abominable idolatry, and purifying themselves from all connexion with it: this is denominated

impious folly” on the part of these" unhappy men." But what could Nero or Caligula, Celsus or Porphyry, have said of them beyond this? It is indeed freely admitted, by the framers of this edict, that the Christians had been most cruelly treatedtheir opportunities of public worship had been denied them—they had been subjected to danger, distress, and death for following out their convictions of duty; yet the emperor talks of his wonted clemency, forsooth, and hopes his indulgence will engage the Christians to pray for his safety and prosperity! What a strange request, after denouncing their religion as "impious folly," and themselves as unhappy, deluded persons, who had “invented extravagant laws and opinions, according to the dictates of their fancy!" Is it possible to discover greater ignorance of the first principles of Christianity than is here betrayed? Mr. Gibbon, remarking on this edict, says, "It is not usually in the language of edicts and manifestoes that we should search for the real character or the secret motives of princes: but, as these were the words of a dying emperor, his situation, perhaps, may be admitted as a pledge of his sincerity." Be it so: but, after all, to what does it amount? simply, a declaration that he entertained the same opinion of Christianity and its professors that he did while inflicting torture and death upon them--that he was himself the still decided idolatrous heathen, though the intensity of his own sufferings had awakened in him the voice of humanity. But to proceed :

This important edict was issued and set up at Nicomedia, on

CONDUCT OF THE EMPEROR MAXIMIN.

339

the 13th April, 311; but the wretched Galerius did not long survive its publication; for he died about the beginning of May, under torments the most excruciating, and in the nature of his complaint, and manner of his death, very much resembling the case of Herod. "His body," says Mr. Gibbon, "swelled by an intemperate course of life to an unwieldy corpulence, was covered with ulcers, and devoured by innumerable swarms of those insects which have given their name to a most loathsome disease."

On the death of Galerius, Maximin succeeded to the government of the Asiatic provinces. In the first six months of his new reign he affected to adopt the prudent counsels of his predecessor as expressed in the edict of toleration above recorded. He caused a circular letter to be addressed to all the governors and magistrates of the provinces, expatiating on the imperial clemency, acknowledging "the invincible obstinacy of the Christians," and directing the officers of justice to cease their ineffectual prosecutions, and to connive at the secret assemblies of those "enthusiasts." In consequence of these orders, says Mr. Gibbon, "great numbers of the Christians were released from prison and delivered up from the mines. The confessors, singing hymns of triumph, returned into their own countries; and those who had yielded to the violence of the tempest solicited, with tears of repentance, their re-admission into the bosom of the church."

This treacherous calm, however, was soon followed by a threatening storm. Cruelty and superstition were the ruling passions of the soul of Maximin; the former suggested the means, the latter pointed out the objects of persecution. He was devoted to the worship of the Heathen deities-to the study of magicand the belief of oracles. But, fortunately, while this superstitious and bigoted monarch was preparing fresh measures of violence against the Christians, with deliberate policy, a civil war ensued between himself and his colleague Licinius, which occupied his whole attention; and his defeat and death, which soon after took place, freed the Christians from his implacable enmity. Having thus brought down the narrative to the times of Constantine the Great-as, by common courtesy, he is now calledit is not my intention to pursue it further in the present lecture.