FOURTH CENTURY.

(300-400.)

THE final division of the Roman dominion into the Eastern Empire and Western Empire (395), and the beginning of the migrations of the northern nations, are the national movements of the greatest importance in this century.

ROME. Constantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, unites the whole empire in 323, and makes Byzantium (since called Constantinople) the seat of empire in 330. Under Valentinian I. the division of the Roman territory into the Eastern and Western Empires is first effected in 364. The Roman dominion is reunited under Theodosius I., who is the last emperor who rules over the whole empire; and after his death the division of the empire is completed, between his sons, in 395, into the Western Empire and the Eastern Empire.

NORTHERN NATIONS. Important migrations of the northern tribes which have long been threatening the Roman Empire and involving the Romans in constant wars, begin in the latter part of the century. One of these tribes, the GOTHS, are in the latter part of the century pushed on by the Huns (a Turanian tribe from Asia, who in the latter part of this century begin to invade Europe), and in 376 are permitted to pass the Danube and settle within the Roman dominion. They afterwards spread westward towards Italy. Another Teutonic tribe, the SAXONS, begin to attack Britain in the latter part of the century, but are repulsed by Theodosius.

HUNS. See above, under NORTHERN NATIONS.

PERSIA is a powerful state, though an unequal rival of Rome.

Emperors. (Diocletian, Maximian, Constantius I.), (Galerius, Constantine the Great), Julian the Apostate.

Church Fathers, Ecclesiastical Writers, etc. St. Athanasius, Lactantius, Arius, Eusebius, Basil (the Great), Gregory Nazianzen, St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, Theodoret, Martin (of Tours), Chrysostom, St. Jerome.

VISIGOTHS.

ILLUSTRATIONS.

THE

THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

HE fourth century of the Christian era must be regarded as one of the most important in the history of mankind, witnessing as it did the overthrow of paganism, the accession to the throne of the first Christian emperor, and the consequent establishment of Christianity as the religion of the state, the final dismemberment of the empire into two parts with separate capitals, and the beginning of those great movements of the northern tribes which eventually worked the destruction of Rome. It was a time of great changes leading to that condition of things which prevails in the modern world.

The period was now arrived when Rome was to experience at one and the same time the two most important revolutions that occur in the whole course of her history. She was to cease to be the capital of the Roman Empire; but, by the establishment of Christianity, she was ultimately to become the capital of the Christian world. - DYER.

PERSECUTION OF THE CHRISTIANS.

EARLY in this century the persecution of the Christians, which had been going on at intervals during the previous

three centuries, reached its height; the last and greatest of them all, the tenth, as usually reckoned, taking place under the Emperor Diocletian in the year 303. (See also, for persecution of the Christians, pages 128, 143, 147.)

This is,

In

The great persecutions are generally enumerated as ten. however, an arbitrary division, and we must be careful not to take it too literally. It has arisen in part from that desire to establish a methodical regularity and a certain supposed order of events, which often does violence to fact. It would be an error to assert that persecution burst forth only ten times before the Constantine era. reality it never ceased; checked at one point, it only flamed forth afresh at another. The most prosperous times had their martyrs. It could not be otherwise. Christianity, until the fourth century, was an unauthorized religion, a religion proscribed and illegal. The decree of Trajan, reinforced by many others, was not for a single day withdrawn. Persecution was therefore always lawful, and did not need a special permission. It might become more general and more cruel, according to the disposition of the emperors; but whether they were well affected or otherwise towards the Christians, persecution continued to form a part of the penal legislation of the empire, and any popular tumult, or the mere caprice of the proconsul, sufficed to bring it down in all its violence upon a city or a province. PRESSENSÉ.

The customary reckoning of ten persecutions was occasioned by the popular need of some determinate number and by allegorical predictions. A way was almost always open to those who wished to escape persecution, and for the most part only those suffered to whom life would otherwise have been little worth, or those whose death might serve as a useful warning, slaves and officers of the Church. Down to the time of Origen but few- their number can easily be estimated — had died the death of martyrs. The sweeping persecution that no longer took account of individuals but carried away whole masses of people, and which is said to have occurred under the reigns of Decius and Diocletian, owes its existence largely to the magnifying power of tradition. Executions took place usually in accordance with the forms of law, but occasionally, in consequence of some special imbitterment or terror, dreadful torments were invented. Many saved themselves by denying the name of Christ and