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A.D. 338.]

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS.

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Safety of the republic, Glory of the army, Restoration of public happiness, are equally applied to the religious and military trophies; and there is still extant a medal of the emperor Constantius, where the standard of the labarum is accompanied with these memorable words, "By this sign thou shalt conquer.'

II. In all occasions of danger or distress, it was the practice of the primitive Christians to fortify their minds and bodies by the sign of the cross, which they used in all their ecclesiastical rites, in all the daily occurrences of life, as an infallible preservative against every species of spiritual or temporal evil. The authority of the church might alone have had sufficient weight to justify the devotion of Constantine, who, in the same prudent and gradual progress, acknowledged the truth, and assumed the symbol, of Christianity. But the testimony of a contemporary writer, who in a formal treatise has avenged the cause of religion, bestows on the piety of the emperor a more awful and sublime character. He affirms, with the most perfect confidence, that in the night which preceded the last battle against Maxentius, Constantine was admonished in a dream to inscribe the shields of his soldiers with the celestial sign of God, the sacred monogram of the name of Christ; that he executed the commands of heaven, and that his valour and obedience were rewarded by the decisive victory of the Milvian bridge. Some considerations might perhaps incline a sceptical mind to suspect the judgment or the veracity of the rhetorician whose pen, either from zeal or interest, hope of defence, the promise of victory would have appeared too bold a fiction. * The abbé du Voisin, p. 103, &c. alleges several of these medals, and quotes a particular dissertation of a Jesuit, the père de Grainville, on this subject. [No genuine coins of Constantine have been found with Christian emblema, Eckhel (Num. Vet. 8, 84) rejects, as decidedly spurious, one preserved in the Museum of Pisa, on which they are shewn. The monogram on later coins have two forms the first of which resembles some on early tetradrachms of Athens. Coins of the Ptolemies also are inscribed with the Greek letters X P, the meaning of which is not known. Humphrey's Manual (p. 226, edit. Bohn) exhibits the monogram of Achaia, about 350 BC.

P

and

X, which approaches very nearly to the Christian emblem.—ED.]

The

✦ Tertullian, de Corona, c. 3. Athanasius, tʊm. i, p. 101. learned jesuit, Petavius, (Dogmata Theolog. 1. 15, a 9, 10,) has collected many similar passages on the virtues of the cross, which in the last age TOL. II. 2 A

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CONSTANTINE'S VISION.

[CH. IL was devoted to the cause of the prevailing faction.* He appears to have published his deaths of the persecutors at Nicomedia, about three years after the Roman victory; but the interval of a thousand miles, and a thousand days, will allow an ample latitude for the invention of declaimers, the credulity of party, and the tacit approbation of the emperor himself, who might listen without indignation to a mar vellous tale, which exalted his fame, and promoted his designs. In favour of Licinius, who still dissembled his animosity to the Christians, the same author has provided a similar vision, of a form of prayer, which was communicated by an angel, and repeated by the whole army before they engaged the legions of the tyrant Maximin. The frequent repetition of miracles serves to provoke, where it does not subdue, the reason of mankind; but if the dream of Constantine is separately considered, it may be naturally explained either by the policy or the enthusiasm of the emperor. Whilst his anxiety for the approaching day, which must decide the fate of the empire, was suspended by a short and interrupted slumber, the venerable form of Christ, and the well-known symbol of his religion, might forcibly offer themselves to the active fancy of a prince who reverenced the name, and had perhaps secretly implored the power, of the God of the Christians. As readily might a consummate statesman indulge himself in the use of one of embarrassed our Protestant disputants. [The early influence of such a notion caused the Greek translator of Matthew's Hebrew Gospel, to render Tephillin by phylacteria. (C. xxiii. v.5.) By this, the prayer-signs of the Jews, which are strictly religious symbols, were assimilated to the talismans, which eastern nations imagined possessed the virtue of protecting them against diseases and calamities; and hence arose the still prevailing but mistaken idea, that these remembrancers of devotion were used as "amulets and charms.".-ED.]

* Cæcilius, de M. P. c. 44. It is certain, that this historical decla mation was composed and published, while Licinius, sovereign of the east, still preserved the friendship of Constantine, and of the Christians. Every reader of taste must perceive, that the style is of a very different and inferior character to that of Lactantius; and such indeed is the judgment of Le Clerc and Lardner. (Bibliothèque Ancienne et Moderne, tom. iii, p. 438. Credibility of the Gospel, &c. part 2, vol. vii, p. 94). Three arguments from the title of the book, and from the names of Donatus and Cæcilius, are produced by the advocates for Lac tantius. (See the P. Lestocq, tom. ii, p. 46-60). Each of these proofs is singly weak and defective, but their concurrence has great weight I have often fluctuated, and shall tamely follow the Colbert MS. in calling the author (whoever he was) Cæcilius. + Cæcilius, de M. P.

A.D. 338.]

ITS DOUBTFUL ANNOUNCEMENT.

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those military stratagems, one of those pious frauds, which Philip and Sertorius had employed with such art and effect. The preternatural origin of dreams was universally admitted by the nations of antiquity, and a considerable part of the Gallic army was already prepared to place their confidence in the salutary sign of the Christian religion. The secret vision of Constantine could be disproved only by the event; and the intrepid hero who had passed the Alps and the Appennine, might view with careless despair the consequences of a defeat under the walls of Rome. The senate and people, exulting in their own deliverance from an odious. tyrant, acknowledged that the victory of Constantine surpassed the powers of man, without daring to insinuate that it had been obtained by the protection of the gods. The triumphal arch, which was erected about three years after the event, proclaims in ambiguous language, that by the greatness of his own mind, and by an instinct or impulse of the Divinity, he had saved and avenged the Roman republic. The Pagan orator, who had seized an earlier opportunity of celebrating the virtues of the conqueror, supposes that he alone enjoyed a secret and intimate com. merce with the Supreme Being, who delegated the care of mortals to his subordinate deities; and thus assigns a very plausible reason why the subjects of Constantine should not presume to embrace the new religion of their sovereign.‡

III. The philosopher, who with calm suspicion examines the dreams and omens, the miracles and prodigies, of proc. 46. There seems to be some reason in the observation of M. de Voltaire (Œuvres, tom. 14, p. 307,) who ascribes to the success of Constantine the superior fame of his labarum above the angel of Licinius. Yet even this angel is favourably entertained by Pagi, Tillemont, Floury, &c. who are fond of increasing their stock of miracles.

* Besides these well-known examples, Tollius (Preface to Boileau's translation of Longinus) has discovered a vision of Antigonus, who assured his troops that he had seen a pentagon (the symbol of safety with these words, "In this conquer." But Tollius has most inexcusably omitted to produce his authority; and his own character, literary as well as moral, is not free from reproach. (See Chauffepié, Dictionnaire Critique, tom. iv, p. 460.) Without insisting on the silence of Diodorus, Plutarch, Justin, &c. it may be observed that Polyænus, who in a separate chapter (l. 4, o. 6,) has collected nineteen military stratagems of Antigonus, is totally ignorant of this remarkable vision. + Instinctu Divinitatis, mentis magnitudine. The inscription on the triumphal arch of Constantine, which has been copied by Baronius, Gruter, &c. may still be perused by every curious traveller.

Habeas profecto, aliquid cum illa mente Divinâ secretum; qua

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SUPPOSED PRODIGIES.

[CH. II. fane or even of ecclesiastical history, will probably conclude, that if the eyes of the spectators have sometimes been deceived by fraud, the understanding of the readers has much more frequently been insulted by fiction. Every event, or appearance, or accident, which seems to deviate from the ordinary course of nature, has been rashly ascribed to the immediate action of the Deity; and the astonished fancy of the multitude has sometimes given shape and colour, language and motion, to the fleeting but uncommon meteors of the air.* Nazarius and Eusebius are the two most celebrated orators, who, in studied panegyrics, have laboured to exalt the glory of Constantine. Nine years after the Roman victory, Nazariust describes an army of divine warriors, who seemed to fall from the sky: he marks their beauty, their spirit, their gigantic forms, the stream of light which beamed from their celestial armour, their patience in suffering themselves to be heard as well as seen by mortals; and their declaration that they were sent, that they flew, to the assistance of the great Constantine. For the truth of this prodigy, the Pagan orator appeals to the whole Gallic nation, in whose presence he was then speaking; and seems to hope that the ancient apparitions would now obtain credit from this recent and public event.

The Christian fable of Eusebius, which in the space of twenty-six years, might arise from the original dream, is cast in a much more correct and elegant mould. In one of the marches of Constantine, he is reported to have seen with his own eyes the luminous trophy of the cross, placed above the meridian sun, and inscribed with the following words: "By this, conquer." This amazing object in the sky astonished the whole army, as well as the emperor himself, who was yet undetermined in the choice of a religion; delegata nostra Diis Minoribus cura uni se tibi dignatur ostendere. Panegyr. Vet. 9. 2. * M. Freret (Mémoires de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. iv. p. 411--437,) explains, by physical causes, many of the prodigies of antiquity; and Fabricius, who is abused by both parties, vainly tries to introduce the celestial cross of Constantine among the solar halos. Bibliothec. Græc. tom. iv, p. 8—39.

Nazarius inter Panegyr. Vet. 10. 14, 15. It is unnecessary to name the moderns, whose undistinguishing and ravenous appetite has swallowed even the Pagan bait of Nazarius. The apparitions of

Castor and Pollux, particularly to announce the Macedonian victory, are attested by historians and public monuments. See Cicero de Natura Deorum, ii. 2, iii. 5, 6. Florus, ii. 12. Valerius Maximus, 1. 1, 8. No.1. Yet the most recent cf these miracles is omitted, and indi

▲.D. 338.] THEIR DOUBTFUL AUTHENTICITY.

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but his astonishment was converted into faith by the vision of the ensuing night. Christ appeared before his eyes; and displaying the same celestial sign of the cross, he directed Constantine to frame a similar standard, and to march, with an assurance of victory, against Maxentius and all his enemies. The learned bishop of Cæsarea appears to be sensible, that the recent discovery of this marvellous anec dote would excite some surprise and distrust among the most pious of his readers. Yet, instead of ascertaining the precise circumstances of time and place, which always serve to detect falsehood, or establish truth;t instead of collecting and recording the evidence of so many living witnesses, who must have been spectators of this stupendous miracle;t Eusebius contents himself with alleging a very singular testimony-that of the deceased Constantine, who, many years after the event, in the freedom of conversation, had related to him this extraordinary incident of his own life, and had attested the truth of it by a solemn oath. The prudence and gratitude of the learned prelate forbade him to suspect the veracity of his victorious master; but he plainly intimates, that, in a fact of such a nature, he should have refused his assent to any meaner authority. motive of credibility could not survive the power of the Flavian family; and the celestial sign, which the infidels might afterwards deride.§ was disregarded by the Christians of the age which immediately followed the conversion of Constantine. But the Catholic church, both of the east and of the west, has adopted a prodigy, which favours, or

This

rectly denied by Livy (45. 1). * Eusebius, L 1, c. 28-30. The silence of the same Eusebius, in his Ecclesiastical History, is deeply felt by those advocates for the miracle who are not absolutely callou + The narrative of Constantine seems to indicate, that he saw the cross in the sky before he passed the Alps against Maxentius. The scene has been fixed by provincial vanity at Treves, Besançon, &c. See Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iv, p. 573. The pious Tillemont (Mém. Eccles. tom. vii, p. 1317,) rejects with a sigh the useful acts of Artemius, a veteran and a martyr, who attests as an eye-witness the vision of Constantine. § Gelasius Cyzic. in Act. Concil. Nicen. 1. i, c. 4. The advocates for the vision are unable to produce a single testimony from the fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries, who, in their voluminous writings, repeatedly celebrate the triumph of the church and of Constantine. As these venerable men had not any dis. like to a miracle, we may suspect (and the suspicion is confirmed by the ignorance of Jerome) that they were all unacquainted with the life of Constantine by Eusebius. This tract was recovered by the dili

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