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| Chapter I.—Injustice Shown Towards the Christians.
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In your empire, greatest of sovereigns, different nations
have different customs and laws; and no one is hindered by law or fear of
punishment from following his ancestral usages, however ridiculous these
may be. A citizen of Ilium calls Hector a god, and pays divine honours
to Helen, taking her for Adrasteia. The Lacedæmonian venerates
Agamemnon as Zeus, and Phylonoë the daughter of Tyndarus; and the
man of Tenedos worships Tennes.699
| 699 There
are here many varieties of reading: we have followed the text suggested by
Gesner. | The Athenian sacrifices to Erechtheus as Poseidon. The
Athenians also perform religious rites and celebrate mysteries in
honour of Agraulus and Pandrosus, women who were deemed guilty of
impiety for opening the box. In short, among every nation and people,
men offer whatever sacrifices and celebrate whatever mysteries they
please. The Egyptians reckon among their gods even cats, and crocodiles,
and serpents, and asps, and dogs. And to all these both you and the laws
give permission so to act, deeming, on the one hand, that to believe in no
god at all is impious and wicked, and on the other, that it is necessary
for each man to worship the gods he prefers, in order that through
fear of the deity, men may be kept from wrong-doing. But why—for
do not, like the multitude, be led astray by hearsay—why is a
mere name odious to you?700
| 700 We here
follow the text of Otto; others read ἡμῖν. |
Names are not deserving of hatred: it is the unjust act that calls
for penalty and punishment. And accordingly, with admiration of your
mildness and gentleness, and your peaceful and benevolent disposition
towards every man, individuals live in the possession of equal rights;
and the cities, according to their rank, share in equal honour; and the
whole empire, under your intelligent sway, enjoys profound peace. But
for us who are called Christians701
you have not in like manner cared; but although we
commit no wrong—nay, as will appear in the sequel of this discourse,
are of all men most piously and righteously disposed towards the Deity
and towards your government—you allow us to be harassed, plundered,
and persecuted, the multitude making war upon us for our name alone. We
venture, therefore, to lay a statement of our case before you—and
you will team from this discourse that we suffer unjustly, and contrary to
all law and reason—and we beseech you to bestow some consideration
upon us also, that we may cease at length to be slaughtered at the
instigation of false accusers. For the fine imposed by our persecutors
does not aim merely at our property, nor their insults at our reputation,
nor the damage they do us at any other of our greater interests. These we
hold in contempt, though to the generality they appear matters of great
importance; for we have learned, not only not to return blow for blow,
nor to go to law with those who plunder and rob us, but to those who
smite us on one side of the face to offer the other side also, and to
those who take away our coat to give likewise our cloak. But, when we
have surrendered our property, they plot against our very bodies and
souls,702
| 702 [For three centuries the
faithful were made witnesses for Jesus and the resurrection, even unto
death; with “spoiling of their goods,” not only, but dying
daily, and “counted as sheep for the slaughter.” What can
refuse such testimony? They conquered through suffering.
The reader will be pleased with this citation from
an author, the neglect of whose heavenly writings is a sad token of
spiritual decline in the spirit of our religion:—
“The Lord is sure of His designed advantages out
of the sufferings of His Church and of His saints for His name. He loses
nothing, and they lose nothing; but their enemies, when they rage most
and prevail most, are ever the greatest losers. His own glory grows,
the graces of His people grow; yea, their very number grows,
and that, sometimes, most by their greatest sufferings. This was
evident in the first ages of the Christian Church. Where were the
glory of so much invincible love and patience, if they had not
been so put to it?” Leighton, Comm. on St. Peter, Works,
vol. iv. p. 478. West’s admirable edition, London, Longmans,
1870.] | pouring
upon us wholesale charges of crimes of
which we are guiltless even in thought, but which belong to these idle
praters themselves, and to the whole tribe of those who are like them.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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