Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/140

104 THE HISTORY OF MEDIEVAL EUROPE those persons " enemies of our faith who require us to bear arms for the commonwealth and to slay men." Moreover, the organization of Christians in churches and their fre- quent meetings violated the laws of the emperors against associations, which we have seen one emperor so careful to enforce that he even forbade the establishment of a volun- teer fire department lest it lead to sedition. Consequently the usual penalty for confessing one's self a Christian was death, sometimes in the arena or with torture. Such was the letter of the law, but since the Christians did not actu- ally attack the government, most emperors did not try to ferret them out and to annihilate them by wholesale perse- cution, but did punish any one who was publicly charged with being a Christian and who did not free himself from the accusation by worshiping the statue of the emperor or images of the gods. But anonymous accusations were usu- ally disregarded, and any one who falsely accused another of being a Christian was liable to severe punishment himself. Meanwhile the Christians kept increasing in numbers in pursuance of the injunction of Jesus, "Go ye into all the From perse- wor ^ anc * preach the gospel to every creature, cution to He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; lump but he that believeth not shall be damned." By the third century there were erudite Christian writers to reply to the attacks which cultured pagans now thought it worth while to make upon Christianity. The emperors, too, awoke to the fact that the Christians were increasing rapidly in numbers, wealth, and power, and from the middle of the, third century tried to crush them by systematic persecution. Many Christians suffered martyrdom and more recanted; some did neither, but purchased from corrupt officials certifi- cates that they had performed pagan sacrifice when they really had not; but the Church as a whole successfully weathered the storm. We possess an edict of 311 in which the Emperor Galerius says that he has decided to tolerate even the Christians because persecuting them does no good. Finally with Constantine Christianity triumphed ; and soon began in its turn to persecute all pagans and heretics,