PART I.

CENT. violent death prevented the execution of his cruel III. purposes. For while, set on by the unjust suggestions of his own superstition, or by the barbarous counsels of a bigoted priesthood, he was preparing a formidable attack upon the Christians, he was obliged to march into Gaul, where he was murdered, in the year 275, before his edicts were published throughout the empire [z]. Few, therefore, suffered martyrdom under his reign, and indeed, during the remainder of this century, the Christians enjoyed a considerable measure of ease and tranquillity. They were, at least, free from any violent attacks of oppression and injustice, except in a small number of cases, where the avarice and superstition of the Roman magistrates interrupted their tranquillity [a].

The attempts of

the philosophers against Christianity.

VIII. While the Roman emperors and proconsuls employed against the Christians the terror of unrighteous edicts, and the edge of the destroying sword, the Platonic philosophers, who have been described above, exhausted against Christianity all the force of their learning and eloquence, and all the resources of their art and dexterity, in rhetorical declamations, subtle writings, and ingenious stratagems. These artful adversaries were so much the more dangerous and formidable, as they had adopted several of the doctrines and institutions of the gospel, and with a specious air of moderation and impartiality were attempting, after the example of their master Ammonius, to reconcile paganism with Christianity, and to form a sort of coalition of

[z] Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. lib. vii. cap. xxx. Lactantius, De mortibus Persequutor. cap. vi.

[a] Among these vexations may be reckoned the cruelty of Galerius Maximian, who, towards the conclusion of this century, persecuted the ministers of his court, and the soldiers of his army, who had professed Christianity. See Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. lib. viii. cap. i. p. 292. iv. p. 295. 317.

III. PART I.

the ancient and the new religion. These philo- CENT sophers had at their head, in this century, Porphyry, a Syrian, or, as some allege, a Tyrian, by birth, who wrote against the Christians a long and laborious work, which was destroyed afterwards by an imperial edict [b]. He was undoubtedly a writer of great dexterity, genius, and erudition, as those of his works that yet remain sufficiently testify. But those very works, and the history of his life, show us, at the same time, that he was a much more virulent than a formidable enemy to the Christians. For by them it appears, that he was much more attentive to the suggestions of a superstitious spirit, and the visions of a lively fancy, than to the sober dictates of right reason and a sound judgment. And it may be more especially observed of the fragments that yet remain of his work against the Christians, that they are equally destitute of judgment and equity, and are utterly unworthy of a wise and a good man [c].

IX. Many were the deceitful and perfidious Comparistratagems by which this sect endeavoured to ob- sons drawn

between the philosophers and

[b] See Holstenius, De vita Porphyr. cap. xi. Fabric. Lux. Christ. Evang. p. 154. Buddeus, Isagoge in Theologiam, tom. ii. p. 1009.

[c] This work of Porphyry against the Christians was burnt by an edict of Constantine the Great. It was divided into fifteen books, as we find in Eusebius, and contained the blackest calumnies against the Christians. The first book treated of the contradictions which he pretended to have found in the sacred writings. The greatest part of the twelfth is employed in fixing the time when the prophecies of Daniel were written. For Porphyry himself found these prophecies so clearly and evidently fulfilled, that, to avoid the force of the argument, deducible from thence in favour of Christianity, he was forced to have recourse to this absurd supposition, that these prophecies had been published under the name of Daniel, by one who lived in the time of Antiochus, and wrote after the arrival of the events foretold. Methodius, Eusebius, and Apollinaris, wrote against Porphyry. But these refutations have been long since lost.

III. PART I.

CENT. Scure the lustre, and to diminish the authority of the Christian doctrine. But none of these were more dangerous than the seducing artifice with which they formed a comparison between the life, actions, and miracles of Christ, and the history of the ancient philosophers; and placed the contending parties in such fallacious points of view, as to make the pretended sages of antiquity appear in nothing inferior to the divine Saviour. With this view, Archytas of Tarentum, Pythagoras, of whom Porphyry wrote the life, ApolIonius Tyanæus, a Pythagorean philosopher whose miracles and peregrinations were highly celebrated by the vulgar, were brought upon the scene, and exhibited as divine teachers, and rivals of the glory of the Son of God. Philostratus, one of the most eminent rhetoricians of this age, composed a pompous history of the life of Apollonius, who was little else than a cunning knave, and did nothing but ape the austerity and sanctity of Pythagoras. This history appears manifestly designed to draw a parallel between Christ and the philosopher of Tyana; but the impudent fictions, and the ridiculous fables, with which this work is filled, must, one would think, have rendered it incapable of deceiving any who were possessed of a sound mind; any, but such as through the corruption of vicious prejudices, were willing to be deceived [d].

The perni

quences of

X. But as there are no opinions, however abcious conse- surd, and no stories, however idle and improbable, this compa- that a weak and ignorant multitude, who are more attentive to the pomp of words than to the truth of things, will not easily swallow; so it happened, that many were ensnared by the absurd attempts

rison.

[d] See Olearius' preface to the life of Apollonius, by Philostratus; as also Mosheim's notes to his Latin translation of Cudworth's Intellectual System, p. 304. 309. 311.

III. PART I

of these insidious philosophers. Some were in- CENT. duced by these perfidious stratagems to abandon the Christian religion, which they had embraced. Others, when they heard that true Christianity (as it was taught by Jesus, and not as it was afterwards corrupted by his disciples) differed almost in nothing from the pagan religion, properly explained and restored to its primitive purity, determined to remain in the religion of their ancestors, and in the worship of their gods. A third sort were led, by these comparisons between Christ and the ancient philosophers, to form to themselves a motley system of religion composed of the tenets of both parties, whom they treated with the same veneration and respect. Such was, particularly, the method of Alexander Severus, who paid indiscriminately divine honours to Christ and to Orpheus, to Apollonius, and the other philosophers and heroes whose names were famous in ancient times.

the Jews

XI. The credit and power of the Jews were The atnow too much diminished to render them as ca- tempts of pable of injuring the Christians, by their influence against the upon the magistrates, as they had formerly been. Christians. This did not, however, discourage their malicious efforts, as the books which Tertullian and Cyprian have written against them abundantly show, with several other writings of the Christian doctors, who complained of the malignity of the Jews, and of their perfidious stratagems [e]. During the persecution under Severus, a certain person called Domninus, who had embraced Christianity, deserted to the Jews, doubtless to avoid the punishments that were decreed against the Christians; and it was to recal this apostate to his duty and his profession, that Serapion, bishop

[e] Hippolytus, Serm. in Susan. et Daniel, tom. i. opp. p. 274. 276.

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CENT. of Antioch, wrote a particular treatise against the III. Jews [f]. We may, however, conclude from this instance, that when the Christians were persecuted, the Jews were treated with less severity and contempt, on account of their enmity against the disciples of Jesus. And from the same fact we may also learn, that though they were in a state of great subjection and abasement, yet they were not entirely deprived of all power of oppressing the Christians.

[f] Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. lib. vi. cap. xii. p. 213.