[443] Matt. iv, 8-9, free quotation.
[444] Matt. xi, 28-30, with the phrases transposed.
[445] Matt. xxii, 21.
[446] Eutropius, Breviarum ab urbe condita, X, xvi, 1.
[447] Ibid., X, xvii, 1 and 2.
[448] The antipope elected by the Council of Basle in 1439. This reference is one of the clues to the date of Valla’s treatise.
[449] Valla’s statement about Eusebius’ Church History is slightly overdrawn. Some passages, while not definitely saying that Constantine was a Christian from boyhood, would naturally be construed as implying this, especially when taken in connection with the chapter headings in use long before Valla’s time; e.g., ix, 9, §§ 1-12. In his Life of Constantine, i, 27-32, however, Eusebius tells the story of the Emperor’s conversion in the campaign against Maxentius in 312 by the heavenly apparition, thus implying that he was not previously a Christian. Valla does not seem to have known of this latter work. Nor is he aware of the passage in Jerome, Chron. ad. ann., 2353, that Constantine was baptized near the end of his life by Eusebius of Nicomedia.
[450] This is an extract from a spurious letter purporting to be from Melchiades, or Miltiades; as palpable a forgery as the Donation of Constantine itself. The whole letter is given in Migne, P. L., viii, column 566.
For the question when Constantine became a Christian, and of his relations with the Popes and the church, cf. Coleman, Constantine the Great and Christianity, with references to sources and literature.
[451] A number of chapters in Gratian’s Decretum added after Gratian have this word at their head, the one containing the Donation of Constantine among them. Cf. Friedberg’s edition of the Decretum Gratiani, Prima pars, dist. xcvi, c. xiii, in his Corpus Iuris Canonici, Leipsic, 1879-1881.