{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/201/2010494.htm","path":"chr/ecf/201/2010494.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/201/2010494.htm","text":"Chapter XLIX.\u2014Concerning Constantine\u2019s Pious Father, and the Persecutors Diocletian and Maximian.\n\u201cThe former emperors I have been accustomed to regard as those with whom I could have no sympathy, 3197 on account of the savage cruelty of their character. Indeed, my father was the only one who uniformly practiced the duties of humanity, and with admirable piety called for the blessing of God the Father on all his actions, but the rest, unsound in mind, were more zealous of cruel than gentle measures; and this disposition they indulged without restraint, and thus persecuted the true doctrine during the whole period of their reign. Nay, so violent did their malicious fury become, that in the midst of a profound peace, as regards both the religious and ordinary interests of men, they kindled, as it were, the flames of a civil war. 3198\nThe word means \u201chaving no share with,\u201d and sometimes \u201cdisinherited.\u201d It may perhaps mean, \u201cI have been accustomed to think of the former emperors as having been deprived of their possessions on account,\u201d &c.\n512:3198\n[The persecution of the Christians, with its attendant horrors, being the act, not of foreign enemies, but of their countrymen and fellow-citizens.\u2014Bag.]","title":"Nicene and Ante-Nicene Fathers, Ser. II, Vol I: The Life of Constantine with Orations of Constantine and Eusebius.: Chapter XLIX","type":"page"}