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THE DECLINE AND FALL

CHAP, ed a secret and intimate commerce with the.supreme being, who delegated the care of mor-tals to his subordinate deities; and thus as-signs a very plausible reason why the subjectsOf Constantine should not presume to embracethe new religion of their sovereign . 11Appear- in. The philosopher, who with calm suspi-croslui 3 cion examines the dreams and omens, the mi-tUe sky. rac i es and prodigies, of profane or even ofecclesiastical history, will probably conclude,that if the eyes of the spectators have some-times been deceived by fraud, the understand-ing of the readers has much more frequentlybeen insulted by fiction. Every event, or ap-pearance, or accident, which seems to deviatefrom the ordinary course of nature, has beenrashly ascribed to the immediate action of thedeity ; and the astonished fancy of the multi-tude has sometimes given shape and colour,language and motion, to the fleeting but un-common meteors of the air . 1 Nazarius andEusebius are the two most celebrated orators,who, in studied panegyrics, have laboured toexalt the glory of Constantine . Nine years af-a.i>. 331. ter the Roman victory, Nazarius y describes an

y Habes profecto aliquid cum ilia mente Diviuk sccretum ; quadelegate nostr& Diis Minoribus cura uni se tibi dignatur ostendevc.Pancgyr. Vet. ix, 2.

* M. Freret (Memoires de TAcademie des Inscription*, tom. ivp. 411-437) explains, by physical causes, many of the prodigies of an-tiquity j and Fabricius, who is abused by both parties, vainly tries tointroduce the celestial cross of Constantine among the solar halos. Bi-blrothec. Graec. tom. vi, p. 8-29.

f Nazarius inter Panegyr. Vet. x, 14, 15. It is unnecessary to namethe moderns, whose undistinguishing and ravenous appetite has swaUlowed even the pagan bait of Nazarius.