Arius the Libyan: A Romance of the Primitive Church

by Nathan C. Kouns

And for a whole year Constantine pursued his purpose quietly, unceasingly, intelligently, by the use of a thousand different means and agencies, to reduce the East to a condition of ecclesiastical serfdom to his authority, and to confirm, popularize, and consolidate his power. But the slow, doubtful, hesitating adoption of the imperial church by the Christians of Armenia, and to a less degree by those of Syria, Egypt, and the Gothic provinces along the Danube, to whom he had sent back their teacher Ulfilas after ordaining him to be a royal bishop, inspired the emperor with misgivings of the future, and with an almost unreasoning jealousy and hatred of Crispus Cæsar, his son, who was the favorite of all those regions, and of Licinius, who represented the family of the legitimate sovereign thereof, whom Constantine had dethroned and destroyed.

And the next year the emperor went to Rome to celebrate the Ides of Quintilis, the anniversary of the battle of Lake Regillus, in which, according to the chronicles of pagan Rome, the twin-gods Castor and Pollux had fought in defense of the Eternal City, and brought thereto the welcome news of victory. It was esteemed to be the most sacred ceremony known to the Roman people. During the grand festival, Constantine, believing that after the Council of Nicea his own ecclesiastical system was so powerful and so securely established that he need not longer patronize the heathen, refused to take his proper place in the ancient ritual appropriate to the occasion, and even exhibited his contempt for the empty pageantry of a legion of knights passing in solemn procession, by commenting upon their appearance with that caustic, epigrammatic wit of which few men were more thoroughly master. That large portion of the Romans who yet openly adhered to the ancient religion were insulted and furious at the conduct of the emperor, and there was a fierce riot in the streets, during which stones were hurled at the statues of the emperor, and attempts made to overthrow them.

His wife Fausta, the daughter of the fierce old emperor Maximian, inherited much of her father's cruel nature and imperious ambition. She and Constantine had three sons--Constantine, Constantius, and Constans. She had always envied Crispus Cæsar the superiority which his primogenial rights gave to him as the first-born of Constantine over her own sons, and especially had her jealousy been inflamed by the splendid reputation which young Cæsar had gained by the skill and courage wherewith he had defeated the vastly superior navy of Licinius in the straits of the Hellespont. Next to the great emperor himself stood Crispus Cæsar, not only in official station, but in the love and admiration of the world; and her own sons occupied a far less conspicuous position, which was rendered more galling to her pride by the very prominence derived from the fact that they also were the sons of the emperor. Fausta had remarked with secret joy the open aid and friendship showed by Crispus Cæsar for Arius, which fact had aroused the suspicions, as much as the victory of Crispus had excited the jealousy, of the emperor. She failed not, also, to perceive that the devotion of Constantia, the widow of Licinius, and of the Empress Helena, Constantine's mother, to this same Arius, had created a common interest and friendship between Cæsar, Helena, and Constantia, while Eusebius of Nicomedia was the trusted friend and adviser of all of them, and the tutor of young Licinius. Fausta herself, the daughter of a pagan and the wife of an atheist, was as nearly devoid of religious sentiment as it was ever possible for a woman to become; and, like her husband, thought that all faith is only superstition, which may be advantageously used by a wise ruler for the government of men; and understanding better than any one else that Constantine regarded the free Arian spirit as the most dangerous element in the political future of the empire, she had cunningly employed every artifice and innuendo that could tend to inflame his personal hatred of these religious dissenters. She affected to regard the riot in the streets of Rome as arising from the machinations of the Arian recusants. Knowing that Constantine had only once visited Rome since the overthrow of Maxentius, and that he disliked the place, she pretended to desire that he should fix his imperial residence at Rome, on the ground that Milan was inconveniently situated, and that both Nicomedia and Constantinople, being in the midst of vast Arian communities, were unsafe for him.

She thought that the rioting in Rome gave her the opportunity to take some decisive step in accomplishing her long-cherished designs, and began more vehemently to press her insidious suggestions upon the gloomy soul of the atheist whom she knew to worship only himself.

"If the stone wherewith these Arian strangers who are in the city marred the head of thy statue on the Via Sacra had smitten thee, thou wouldst have been slain at once."

"But," said the emperor, dryly, passing his hand over his forehead, "I feel not the slightest pain from the blow."

"The undirected mob is powerless against thee," she said; "but this infamous act is but the unguarded expression of a sentiment common to the millions of Armenia, and to large numbers of the Egyptians and Syrians, and to nearly all of the Goths."

"What hath caused thee so much uneasiness from such a trifle as the throwing of a stone or two? The royal blood should despise such visionary fears."

"But the guardsman, Pilus, who hath lately come from Illyricum, informeth me that in the garrison it is commonly reported that the heretic Arius saith that, if Christians could lawfully bear arms, the Arians of Armenia and the Goths alone could seat Licinius upon the throne of his father, and Crispus Cæsar upon thine."

"But neither Licinius, nor Crispus, nor the Arians, cherish any such treasonable designs," said Constantine.