"This orthodox Emperor (Theodosius) considered every heretic (as he called those who did not believe as he and his ecclesiastics professed) as a rebel against the supreme powers of heaven and of earth (he being one of the supreme powers of earth) and each of the powers might exercise their peculiar jurisdiction over the soul and body of the guilty.
"The decrees of the Council of Constantinople had ascertained the true standard of the faith, and the ecclesiastics, who governed the conscience of Theodosius, suggested the most effectual methods of persecution. In the space of fifteen years he promulgated at least fifteen severe edicts against the heretics, more especially against those who rejected the doctrine of the Trinity."[382:3]
Thus we see one of the many reasons why the "most holy Christian religion" spread so rapidly.
Arius—who declared that in the nature of things a father must be older than his son—was excommunicated for his so-called heretical notions concerning the Trinity. His followers, who were very numerous, were called Arians. Their writings, if they had been permitted to exist,[383:1] would undoubtedly contain the lamentable story of the persecution which affected the church under the reign of the impious Emperor Theodosius.
FOOTNOTES:
[368:1] The celebrated passage (I. John, v. 7) "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one," is now admitted on all hands to be an interpolation into the epistle many centuries after the time of Christ Jesus. (See Giles' Hebrew and Christian Records, vol. ii. p. 12. Gibbon's Rome, vol. iii. p. 556. Inman's Ancient Faiths, vol. ii. p. 886. Taylor's Diegesis and Reber's Christ of Paul.)
[368:2] That is, the true faith.
[368:3] Dogma Deity Jesus Christ, p. 95.
[369:1] "The notion of a Triad of Supreme Powers is indeed common to most ancient religions." (Prichard's Egyptian Mytho., p. 285.)