CHAPTER XLIX

IN WHAT MANNER LICINIUS OPPRESSED THE EAST

FOR he was informed that in that quarter a certain savage beast was besetting both the Church of God and the other inhabitants of the provinces, owing, as it were, to the efforts of the evil spirit to produce effects quite contrary to the deeds of the pious emperor: so that the Roman empire, divided into two parts, seemed to all men to resemble night and day; since darkness overspread the provinces of the East, while the brightest day illumined the inhabitants of the opposite portion. And whereas the latter were receiving manifold blessings at the hand of God, the sight of these blessings proved intolerable to that envy which hates all good, as well as to the tyrant who afflicted the other division of the empire; and who, notwithstanding that his government was prospering, and he had been honoured by affinity with so great an emperor as Constantine, yet cared not to follow the steps of that pious prince, but strove rather to imitate the evil purposes and practice of impious men; choosing to adopt their counsels, of whose ignominious end he had himself been an eyewitness, rather than to maintain amicable relations with him who was his superior.