more earnest worship of the old gods of Rome, he found in the Christians his most dangerous opponents; hence the stern treatment which the new sect received at his hands; hence the policy of persecution which gathered strength during his reign, and was intensified in the days of his adopted son and successor Marcus.
On the whole, the usual verdict of tradition respecting the condition of Christians under the Antonines must be reversed. The reign of Antoninus Pius is commonly represented as a period of peace for the Church, and little is said about the treatment of Christians under the government of Antoninus Pius and of Marcus Antoninus. This favourable view and usual reticence concerning any Christian sufferings during these reigns is largely owing to the high estimation in which the two Antonines as rulers are universally held;—that these great and good Emperors could persecute and harass the followers of Jesus has been usually deemed unlikely if not impossible.
To regard such men as persecutors would be to inflict a stigma on the character of the two most perfect sovereigns whose lives are recorded in history. The first Antoninus received his beautiful title "Pius" at the urgent wish of the Senate, a wish that was universally endorsed by the public opinion of the Empire; by this title he has been known and revered by all succeeding generations.
Marcus, his adopted son and successor, who, if possible, held a yet more exalted place in the estimation of men of his own generation, and who has handed down to posterity a yet higher reputation for virtue and wisdom, tells us in his own glowing and striking words that he owed everything to the noble example and teaching of his adopted father Antoninus Pius. To this Marcus, when he died, divine honours were voluntarily paid with such universal consent that it was held sacrilege not to set up his image in a house.
To brand such men as persecutors, for centuries would have been for any historian, Christian or pagan, too daring a statement, and such an estimate would have been received with distrust, if not with positive derision; nor is it by any means certain that even now such a conclusion will not be
