[45] 2 Tim. iv, 21. Suet., Vit. Ner., c. 28, 29; Tac., Ann., xv, 37. See also Dio., lxiii, 13.
[46] E.g. Flavia Domitilla, the niece of Domitian, and her husband, Clemens. Their children had been adopted by the Emperor, and designated as his successors. So near came Christianity to grasping the sceptre of the Cæsars in the first century. Dio Cass., Hist., lxvii, 13. Suet. in Domit., xv. The niece of Domitilla, also of the same name, suffered exile for the faith, A. D. 97. She gave the land for the Catacomb which still bears her name.
Marcia, Mammæa, the mother of Alex. Severus, the Emperor Philip, and Prisca and Valeria, the wife and daughter of the arch-persecutor Diocletian, either embraced or greatly favoured Christianity.
[47] Apol., c. 37.
[48] [Transcriber’s note: Footnote missing in the original.]
[49] Religiosum locum unusquisque sua voluntate facit, dum mortuum infert in locum suum. Marcian. Digest., i, 8, 6, § 4.
[50] Cod. Justin., lib. ix, tit. 19, de Sepulchro Violato, leg. 1, 5; Cod. Theod., lib. ix, tit. 17. Proximum sacrilegio majores semper habuerunt. So the poet exclaims:
Res ea sacra, miser; noli mea tangere fata:
Sacrilegae bustis abstinuere manus.—
“Touch not my monument, thou wretch; it is a sacred thing: even sacrilegious hands refrain from the violation of graves.”
[51] Xen., Mem., ii, 2, § 13.