CHAPTER LII

BANISHMENT OF THE CHRISTIANS, WITH CONFISCATION AND SALE OF THEIR PROPERTY

AND whereas Constantine, the friend of God, had granted to His worshippers freedom of access to the imperial palaces; His enemy, in a spirit the very reverse of this, expelled thence all Christians subject to his authority. He banished those who had proved themselves his most faithful and devoted servants, and compelled others, on whom he had himself conferred honour and distinction as a reward for their former eminent services, to the performance of menial offices as slaves to others: and at length, being bent on seizing the property of all as his prey, he even threatened with death those who professed the Saviour’s name. Moreover, being himself of a nature hopelessly debased by sensuality, and degraded by the continual practice of adultery and other shameless vices, he assumed his own worthless character as a specimen of human nature generally, and denied that the virtue of chastity and continence existed among men.