under which Nero lay, of having ordered the city to be fet on fire. To put an end therefore to this report, he laid the guilt, and inflicted the moft cruel punishments upon a set of people, who were held in abhorrence for their crimes, and called by the vulgar Chriftians. The founder of that name was Chrift, who fuffered death in the reign of Tiberius, under his procurator Pontius Pilate. This pernicious fuperftition, thus checked for a while, broke out again; and spread not only over Judea, where the evil originated, but through Rome alfo, whither every thing bad upon earth finds its way, and is practised. Some who confeffed their fect were first seized, and afterwards by their information a vast multitude were apprehended, who were convicted, not fo much of the crime of burning Rome, as of hatred to mankind. Their fufferings at their execution were aggravated by insult and mockery, for fome were disguised in the fkins of wild beasts, and worried to death by dogs-fome were crucified--and others were the were wrapt in pitched fhirts *, and fet on fire when the day clofed, that they might ferve as lights to illuminate the night. Nero lent his own gardens for these executions and exhibited at the fame time a mock Circenfian entertainment, being a spectator of the whole in the drefs of a charioteer, fometimes mingling with the crowd on foot, and fometimes viewing the fpectacles from his car. This conduct made the fufferers pitied; and though they were criminals, and deferving the feverest punishment, yet they were confidered as facrificed, not fo much out of a regard to the public good, as to gratify the cruelty of one man." Our concern with this paffage at present is only fo far, as it affords a prefumption in support of the propofition which we maintain, concerning the activity and fufferings * This is rather a paraphrafe, but is justified by what the Scholiaft upon Juvenal fays-" Nero maleficos homines teda et papyro et cerâ fuperveftiebat, et fic ad ignem admoveri jubebat." Lard. Jewish and Heath. Teft. vol. i. p. 359. of of the first teachers of Christianity. Now, confidered in this view, it proves three things: ift, that the founder of the institution was put to death; 2dly, that, in the same country in which he was put to death, the religion, after a fhort check, broke out again and fpread; 3dly, that it so spread, as that, within thirty-four years from the author's death, a very great number of Chriftians (ingens eorum multitudo) were found at Rome. From which fact, the two following inferences may be fairly drawn: first, that, if, in the space of thirty-four years from its commencement, the religion had fpread throughout Judea, had extended itfelf to Rome, and there had numbered a great multitude of converts, the original teachers and miffionaries of the inftitution could not have been idle; fecondly, that when the author of the undertaking was put to death as a malefactor for his attempt, the endeavours of his followers to eftablish his religion, in the fame country, amongst the fame people, and in the fame age, could not but be attended with danger. 7 Suetonius, Suetonius, a writer contemporary with Tacitus, defcribing the tranfactions of the fame reign, uses these words, "Affecti fuppliciis Chriftiani, genus hominum fuperftitionis novæ et maleficæ." "The Christians, a fet of meri, of a new and mischievous (or magical) fuperftition, were punished." Since it is not mentioned here that the burning of the city was the pretence of the punishment of the Chriftians, or that they were the Chriftians of Rome who alone fuffered, it is probable that Suetonius refers to fome more general perfecution than the short and occafional one which Tacitus describes. Juvenal, a writer of the fame age with the two former, and intending, as it fhould feem, to commemorate the cruelties exercifed un- . der Nero's government, has the following lines t: * Suet. Nero. cap. 16. + Sat. 1, ver. 155. "Pone "Pone Tigellinum, tedâ lucebis in illa, "Describe Tigellinus (a creature of Nero's), and you fhall fuffer the fame punishment with those who ftand burning in their own flame and smoke, their head being held up by a stake fixed to their chin, till they make a long ftream of blood and melted fulphur on the ground." If this paffage were confidered by itself, the fubject of the allufion might be doubtful; but when connected with the teftimony of Suetonius, as to the actual punishment of the Chriftians by Nero; and with the account given by Tacitus of the Species of punishment which they were made to undergo; I think it fufficiently probable, that thefe were the executions to which the poet refers. These things, as hath already been ob *Forfan" deducis." ferved, |