Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

214 THE FIRST AGE OF THE MARTYR CHURCH.peror, no Nero or Domitian, but one renowned forhis justice and moderation, praises what the governorhas done ; pronounces that Christians as suchare guilty of a capital crime, and that Pliny wasright in so interpreting the existing law; that,however, it is not desirable to seek them out;that even when brought before justice they are tobe released if they deny their faith, but that if theypersist in it, they are to be punished with death.Here, then, is the law - an original law ofEome before the Christian Faith began-underwhich the martyrs suffered at different times,throughout every province and city, without anythingwhich could be called a general persecutionon the part of the emperor directed to the destructionof the whole religion. This perpetual liabilityto punishment might be called into action anywherein the empire for various causes. The firstin time, and one of the most constant, was the enmityof the Jews; then the dislike of the heathensto Christians and their ways, which was furthsharpened by local calamities or distress irritatingthe mind of the population, or by the jthe heathen priests and worshippers at the desertionof their temples. Then, again, there was theascription to Christian godlessness, as it was called,that is their refusal to acknowledge the Komangods, of famines, pestilences, and whatever troubledthe popular mind. To these we must add acopious harvest of private grudges, and a host of