XXI. A. D. 325. CHAP. distinctions; and he seriously recommends to the clergy of Alexandria the example of the Greek philosophers, who could maintain their arguments without losing their temper, and assert their freedom without violating their friendship. The indifference and contempt of the sovereign would have been, perhaps, the most effectual method of silencing the dispute, if the popular current had been less rapid and impetuous, and if Constantine himself, in the midst of faction and fanaticism, could have preserved the calm possession of his own mind. But his ecclesiastical ministers soon contrived to seduce the impartiality of the His zeal. magistrate, and to awaken the zeal of the proselyte. He was provoked by the insults which had been offered to his statues; he was alarmed by the real, as well as the imaginary, magnitude of the spreading mischief; and he extinguished the hope of peace and toleration, from the moment that be assembled three hundred bishops within the walls of the same palace. The presence of the monarch swelled the importance of the debate; his attention multiplied the arguments; and he exposed his person with a patient intrepidity, which animated the valour of the combatants. Notwithstanding the applause which has been bestowed on the eloquence and sagacity of Constantine,' a Roman general, whose religion might be still a subject of doubt, and whose mind had not been enlightened either by study or by inspiration, was indifferently qualified to discuss, in the Greek Eusebius, in Vit Constantin. 1. iii, c. 13. XXI. language, a metaphysical question, or an article CHAP. of faith. But the credit of his favourite Osius, who appears to have presided in the council of Nice, might dispose the emperor in favour of the orthodox party; and a well-timed insinuation, that the same Eusebius of Nicomedia, who now protected the heretic, had lately assisted the tyrant, might exasperate him against their adversaries. The Nicene creed was ratified by Constantine; and his firm declaration, that those who resisted the divine judgment of the synod must prepare themselves for an immediate exile, annihilated the murmurs of a feeble opposition, which, from seventeen, was almost instantly reduced to two, protesting bishops. Eusebius of Cæsarea yielded a reluctant and ambiguous consent to the homoousion; and the wavering conduct of the Nicomedian Eusebius served only to delay, about three months, his disgrace and exile." The im- He persepious Arius was banished into one of the remote provinces of Illyricum; his person and disciples were branded, by law, with the odious name of Theodoret has preserved (1. i, c. 20) an epistle from Constantine to the people of Nicomedia, in which the monarch declares himself the public accuser of one of his subjects; he styles Eusebius, ο της τυραννικής ωμοτητα συμμυσης ; and he complains of his hostile behaviour during the civil war. See in Socrates (1. 1, c. 8), or rather in Theodoret (l. i, c. 12), an original letter of Eusebius of Cæsarea, in which he attempts to justify his subscribing the homoousion. The character of Eusebius has always been a problem; but those who have read the second critical epistle of Le Clerc (Ars Critica, tom. iii, p. 30–69), must entertain a very unfavourable opinion of the orthodoxy and sincerity of the bishop of Cæsarea. m Athanasius, tom. i, p. 727. Philostorgius, 1. i, c. 10, and Gode froy's Commentary, p. 41. cutes the arian XXI CHAP porphyrians; his writings were condemned to the flames, and a capital punishment was denounced against those in whose possession they should be found. The emperor had now imbibed the spirit of controversy, and the angry sarcastic style of his edicts was designed to inspire his subjects with the hatred which he had conceived against the enemies of Christ." and the orthodox party. A. D. 328-337. But, as if the conduct of the emperor had been guided by passion instead of principle, three years from the council of Nice were scarcely elapsed, before he discovered some symptoms of mercy, and even of indulgence, towards the proscribed sect, which was secretly protected by his favourite sister. The exiles were recalled; and Eusebius, who gradually resumed his influence over the mind of Constantine, was restored to the episcopal throne, from which he had been ignominiously degraded. Arius himself was treated by the whole court with the respect which would have been due to an innocent and oppressed man; his faith was approved by the synod of Jerusalem; and the emperor seemed impatient to repair his injustice, by issuing an absolute command, that he should be solemnly admitted to the communion in the cathedral of Constantinople. On the same day which had been fixed for the triumph of Arius, he expired;--and the strange and horrid circumstances of his death might excite a suspicion, that Socrates, I. i, e. 9. In his circular letters, which were addressed to the several cities, Constantine employed against the heretics the arms of ridicule and comic raillery. XXI. the orthodox saints had contributed more effica- CHAP. ciously than by their prayers, to deliver the church from the most formidable of her enemies. The three principal leaders of the catholics, Athanasius of Alexandria, Eustathius of Antioch, and Paul of Constantinople, were deposed on various accusations, by the sentence of numerous councils, and were afterwards banished into distant provinces by the first of the christian emperors, who, in the last moments of his life, received the rites of baptism from the arian bishop of Nicomedia. The ecclesiastical government of Constantine cannot be justified from the reproach of levity and weakness. But the credulous monarch, unskilled in the stratagems of theological warfare, might be deceived by the modest and specious professions of the heretics, whose sentiments he never perfectly understood; and while he protected Arius, and persecuted Athanasius, he still considered the council of Nice as the bulwark of the christian faith, and the peculiar glory of his own reign. • We derive the original story from Athanasius (tom. i, p. 670), who expresses some reluctance to stigmatize the memory of the dead. He might exaggerate, but the perpetual commerce of Alexandria and Constantinople would have rendered it dangerous to invent. Those who press the literal narrative of the death of Arius (his bowels suddenly burst out in a privy) must make their option be tween poison and miracle. The change in the sentiments, or at least in the conduct, of Constantine, may be traced in Eusebius (in Vit. Constant. 1. iii, c. 23, 1. iv, c. 41), Socrates (l. i, c. 23-39), Sożomen (1. ii, c. 16–34), Theodoret (1. i, c. 14-34), and Philostorgius (1. ii, c. 1-17), But the first of these writers was too near the scene of action, and the others were too remote from it. It is singular enough, that the important task of continuing the history of the church, should Have been left for two laymen and a heretic. CHAP. The sons of Constantine must have been admitXXI. ted from their childhood into the rank of cateConstan- chumens, but they imitated, in the delay of their vours the baptism, the example of their father. Like him, they presumed to pronounce their judgment on 337-361. mysteries into which they had never been regularly tius fa Arians. A. D initiated; and the fate of the trinitarian controversy depended, in a great measure, on the sentiments of Constantius, who inherited the provinces of the East, and acquired the possession of the whole empire. The arian presbyter or bishop, who had secreted for his use the testament of the deceased emperor, improved the fortunate occasion which had introduced him to the familiarity of a prince, whose public counsels were always swayed by his domestic favourites. The eunuchs and slaves diffused the spiritual poison through the palace, and the dangerous infection was com municated by the female attendants to the guards, and by the empress to her unsuspicious husband." The partiality which Constantius always expressed towards the eusebian faction was insensibly fortified by the dexterous management of their leaders; and his victory over the tyrant Magnentius increased his inclination, as well as ability, to employ the arms of power in the cause of arianism. While the two armies were engaged in the plains A Quia etiam tum catechumenus sacramentum fidei merito videletur potuisse nescire. Sulp. Sever. Hist. Sacra. 1. ii, p. 410. Socrates, 1. ii, c. 2. Sozomen, 1. iii, c. 18. Athanas. tom. i, p. 813-831. He observes that the eunuchs are the natural enemies of the Son. Compare Dr. Jortin's Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vpl. iv, p. 3, with a certain genealogy in Candide (ch. iv), which ends with one of the first companions of Christopher Columbus, 1 |