Part 879

"The alleged supernatural conversion of Constantine has afforded a subject of doubt and debate from that age to the present. Up to the date of his war against Maxentius, the Emperor believed, like his father, in one god, whom he represented to himself, not with the attributes of Jupiter, best and greatest, father of gods and men, but under the form of Apollo, with the attributes of the glorified youth of manhood, the god of light and life. … His conversion to Christianity took place at the period of the war with Maxentius. The chief contemporary authorities on the subject are Lactantius and Eusebius. Lactantius, an African by birth, was a rhetorician (or, as we should call him, professor) at Nicomedia, of such eminence that Constantine entrusted to him the education of his eldest son, Crispus. Writing before the death of Licinius, i. e. before the year 314 A. D., or within two, or at most three, years of the event, Lactantius says, 'Constantine was admonished in his sleep to mark the celestial sign of God on the shields, and so to engage in the battle. He did as he was commanded and marked the name of Christ on the shields by the letter X drawn across them, with the top circumflexed. Armed with this sign his troops proceed,' etc. Eusebius, Bishop of Cæsarea, the historian of the early Church, the most learned Christian of his time, was, after Constantine's conquest of the East, much about the court, in the confidence of the Emperor, and one of his chief advisers in ecclesiastical matters. In his 'Life of Constantine', published twenty-six years after the Emperor's death, he gives us an interesting account of the moral process of the Emperor's conversion. {2721} Reflecting on the approaching contest with Maxentius, and hearing of the extraordinary rites by which he was endeavouring to win the favour of the gods, 'being convinced that he needed some more powerful aid than his military forces could afford him, on account of the wicked and magical enchantments which were so diligently practised by the tyrant, he began to seek for divine assistance. … And while he was thus praying with fervent entreaty, a most marvellous sign appeared to him from heaven, the account of which it might have been difficult to receive with credit, had it been related by any other person. But since the victorious emperor himself long afterwards declared it to the writer of this history, when he was honoured with his acquaintance and society, and confirmed his statement by an oath, who could hesitate to credit the relation, especially since the testimony of after time has established its truth? He said that at mid-day, when the sun was beginning to decline, he saw, with his own eyes, the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the sun, and bearing the inscription, "Conquer by this." At this sight he himself was struck with amazement, and his whole army also, which happened to be following him on some expedition, and witnessed the miracle. He said, moreover, that he doubted within himself what the import of this apparition could be. And while he continued to ponder and reason on its meaning, night imperceptibly drew on; and in his sleep the Christ of God appeared to him with the same sign which he had seen in the heavens, and commanded him to procure a standard made in the likeness of that sign, and to use it as a safeguard in all engagements with his enemies.'" The standard which is said to have had this origin was the famous Labarum.

_E. L. Cutts, Constantine the Great, chapter 11._

"He [Constantine] was not lacking in susceptibility to certain religious impressions; he acknowledged the peculiar providence of God in the manner in which he had been delivered from dangers, made victorious over all his pagan adversaries, and finally rendered master of the Roman world. It flattered his vanity to be considered the favourite of God, and his destined instrument to destroy the empire of the evil spirits (the heathen deities). The Christians belonging to court were certainly not wanting on their part to confirm him in this persuasion. … Constantine must indeed have been conscious that he was striving not so much for the cause of God as for the gratification of his own ambition and love of power; and that such acts of perfidy, mean revenge, or despotic jealousy, as occurred in his political course, did not well befit an instrument and servant of God, such as he claimed to be considered. … Even Eusebius, one of the best among the bishops at his court, is so dazzled by what the emperor had achieved for the outward extension and splendour of the church, as to be capable of tracing to the purest motives of a servant of God all the acts which a love of power that would not brook a rival had, at the expense of truth and humanity, put into the heart of the emperor in the war against Licinius. … Bishops in immediate attendance on the emperor so far forgot indeed to what master they belonged, that, at the celebration of the third decennium of his reign (the tricennalia), one of them congratulated him as constituted by God the ruler over all in the present world, and destined to reign with the Son of God in the world to come, The feelings of Constantine himself were shocked at such a parallel."

_A. Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, period 2, section. 1, A._

"As he approached the East, he [Constantine] adopted oriental manners; he affected the gorgeous purple of the monarchs of Persia; he decorated his head with false hair of different colours, and with a diadem covered with pearls and gems. He substituted flowing silken robes, embroidered with flowers, for the austere garb of Rome, or the unadorned purple of the first Roman emperors. He filled his palace with eunuchs, and lent an ear to their perfidious calumnies; he became the instrument of their base intrigues, their cupidity, and their jealousy. He multiplied spies, and subjected the palace and the empire, alike, to a suspicious police. He lavished the wealth of Rome on the sterile pomp of stately buildings. … He poured out the best and noblest blood in torrents, more especially of those nearly connected with himself. The most illustrious victim of his tyranny was Crispus, his son by his first wife, whom he had made the partner of his empire, and the commander of his armies. … In a palace which he had made a desert, the murderer of his father-in-law, his brothers-in-law, his sister, his wife, his son, and his nephew, must have felt the stings of remorse, if hypocritical priests and courtier bishops had not lulled his conscience to rest. We still possess the panegyric in which they represent him as a favourite of Heaven, a saint worthy of our highest veneration; we have also several laws by which Constantine atoned for all his crimes, in the eyes of the priests, by heaping boundless favours on the church. The gifts he bestowed on it, the immunities he granted to persons and to property connected with it, soon directed ambition entirely to ecclesiastical dignities. The men who had so lately been candidates for the honours of martyrdom, now found themselves depositaries of the greatest wealth and the highest power. How was it possible that their characters should not undergo a total change?"

_J. C. L. de Sismondi, History of the Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 4 (volume 1)._

See, also, CHRISTIANITY: A. D. 312-337.

ROME: A. D. 330. Transference of the capital of the Empire to Byzantium (Constantinople).

See CONSTANTINOPLE A. D. 330.

ROME: A. D. 337-361. Redivision of the Empire. Civil wars between the sons of Constantine and their successors. Elevation of Julian to the throne.

Before the death of Constantine, "his three sons, Constantine, Constantius, and Constans, had already been successively raised to the rank of Cæsar about the tenth, twentieth, and thirtieth years of his reign. The royal family contained also two other young princes, sons of Dalmatius, one of the half-brothers of Constantine; the elder of these nephews of the Emperor was called Dalmatius, after his father, the other Hanniballianus. … Constantine shared—not the Empire, but—the imperial power among his three sons. The eldest, Constantine, was to hold the first rank among the three Augusti, and to take the western Gallic provinces under his especial administration; Constantius was to take the east, viz., Asia, Syria, and Egypt; Constans was to take the central portion of the Empire, Italy, Africa, and Western Illyricum."

_E. L. Cutts, Constantine the Great, chapter 33._

{2722}

The father of these three princes was no sooner dead (A. D. 337) than they made haste to rid themselves of all the possible rivals in a family which seemed too numerous for peace. Two uncles and seven cousins—including Dalmatius and Hannibalianus—with other connections by marriage and otherwise, were quickly put out of the way under one and another pretence and with more or less mockery of legal forms. The three brothers then divided the provinces between them on much the same plan as before; but Constantine, the eldest, now reigned in the new capital of his father, which bore his name. There was peace between them for three years. It was broken by Constantine, who demanded the surrender to him of a part of the dominions of Constans. War ensued and Constantine was killed in one of the earliest engagements of it. Constans took possession of his dominions, refusing any share of them to Constantius, and reigned ten years longer, when he was destroyed, A. D. 350, by a conspiracy in Gaul, which raised to his throne one Magnentius, a soldier of barbarian extraction. Magnentius was acknowledged in Gaul and Italy; but the troops in Illyricum invested their own general, Vetranio, with the purple. Constantius, in the East, now roused himself to oppose these rebellions, and did so with success. Vetranio, an aged man, was intimidated by artful measures and driven to surrender his unfamiliar crown. Magnentius advanced boldly to meet an enemy whom he despised, and was defeated in a great battle fought September 21, A. D. 351, at Mursa (Essek, in modern Hungary, on the Drave). Retreating to Italy, and from Italy to Gaul, he maintained the war for another year, but slew himself finally in despair and the empire had a single ruler, once more. The sole emperor, Constantius, now found his burden of power too great, and sought to share it. Two young nephews had been permitted to live, when the massacre of the house of Constantine occurred, and he turned to these. He raised the elder, Gallus, to the rank of Cæsar, and gave him the government of the præfecture of the East. But Gallus conducted himself like a Nero and was disgraced and executed in little more than three years. The younger nephew, Julian, escaped his brother's fate by great prudence of behavior and by the friendship of the Empress Eusebia. In 355, he, in turn, was made Cæsar and sent into Gaul. Distinguishing himself there in several campaigns against the Germans (see GAUL: A. D. 355-361), he provoked the jealousy of Constantius and of the eunuchs who ruled the imperial court. To strip him of troops, four Gallic legions were ordered to the East, for the Persian war. They rose in revolt, at Paris, proclaimed Julian emperor and forced him to assume the dangerous title. He promptly sent an embassy to Constantius asking the recognition and confirmation of this procedure; but his overtures were rejected with disdain. He then declared war, and conducted an extraordinary expedition into Illyricum, through the Black Forest and down the Danube, occupying Sirmium and seizing the Balkan passes before he was known to have left Gaul. But the civil war so vigorously opened was suddenly arrested at this stage by the death of Constantius (A. D. 361), and Julian became sole emperor without more dispute. He renounced Christianity and is known in history as Julian the Apostate.

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 18-22._

ROME: A. D. 338-359. Wars of Constantius with the Persians.

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627.

ROME: A. D. 350-361. Extensive abandonment of Gaul to the Germans. Its recovery by Julian.

See GAUL: A. D. 355-361.

ROME: A. D. 361-363. Julian and the Pagan revival.