In the late summer Of A.D. 64, a fire began and burned for six days, devastating the heart of Rome. Tacitus describes Emperor Nero's persecution of Christians as an attempt to dispel the rumor that he had set the fire himself.

From Leon, Harry J., trans., "Selections from Tacitus" in MacKendrick, Paul and Herbert M. Howe, Classics in Translation, Vol. II: Latin Literature, C 1952 (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press). Reprinted by permission of the University of Wisconsin Press.

38 There followed a catastrophe, whether through accident or the design of the emperor is not sure, as there are authorities for both views, but it was the most disastrous and appalling of all the calamities brought on this city through the violence of fire. It had its beginning in the part of the Circus' next to the Palatine and Caelian hills among the shops where inflammable merchandise is sold. Here the fire broke out and, immediately gaining strength, was fanned by the wind and swept through the length of the Circus. No houses surrounded by enclosures or temples girded by walls or any other obstruction served as a check. First the blaze, as it rushed ahead, oveff an the level stretches, then rose to higher ground and again descended to devastate the low-lying areas, moving so swiftly in its destructive path as to outstrip all efforts to fight it, and aided by the fact that the city was vulnerable to fire because of the narrow streets winding in every direction and the irregular blocks of houses, such as old Rome had....

39 During this time Nero was at Antium and did not come back to Rome until the fire approached his palace, with which he had joined the Palatine.... Even so the fire could not be stopped until the Palatine and the palace and everything in the area were devastated. To relieve the homeless refugees he opened up the Campus Martius and the public buildings of Agrippa and even his own gardens, and he built temporary structures to shelter the helpless multitude. Supplies were brought up from Ostia and the neighboring towns and the price of wheat was reduced.... These measures, though in the public interest, were wasted, because a rumor had spread abroad that at the very time when the city was burning, Nero had mounted on his private stage and sung of the destruction of Troy, comparing the present disaster with that ancient catastrophe....

But no amount of human effort, no acts of generosity on the part of the emperor or appeasement of the gods could save Nero's reputation from the general belief that the fire had been set at his command.

In order to put an end to these rumors Nero provided scapegoats and visited most fearful punishments on those popularly called Christians, a group hated because of their outrageous practices. The founder of this sect, Christus, was executed in the reign of Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilatus. Thus the pernicious superstition was suppressed for the while, but it broke out again not only in Judaea, where this evil had its origin, but even in Rome, to which all obnoxious and disgraceful elements flow from everywhere in the world and receive a large following. The first ones to be seized were those who confessed; then on their information a vast multitude was convicted, not so much on the charge of incendiarism as because of their hatred of humanity. Their executions were made into a sport in that they were covered with skins of wild beasts and tom to pieces by dogs, or they were fastened to crosses or wrapped with inflammable materials, so that when the daylight waned, they could be burned to serve as torches in the night. Nero, who had offered his own gardens for this spectacle, gave a chariot racing exhibition in which he mingled with the crowd dressed as a charioteer or drove a chariot. The result was that despite the fact that these people were criminals worthy of the worst kind of punishment, a7 feeling of sympathy arose for them, since they were being destroyed not for the public good but to satisfy the cruelty of one man.

Pliny the Younger, Letters to Emperor Trajan

From Heironimus, John Paul, trans., "Selected Letters of the Younger Pliny," in MacKendrick, Paul and Herbert M. Howe, Classics in Translation, Vol. II.- Latin Literature, C) 1952 (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press). Reprinted by permission of the University of Wisconsin Press.

After a senatorial career and consulship, Pliny the Younger was sent by Emperor Trajan as a special representative to the Roman province of Bithynia in Asia Minor. His task was to keep the peace. When he had trouble dealing with the Christians, Pliny wrote to the emperor asking how he should proceed against them. The emperor replied with a surprisingly humanitarian approach.

The Official Treatment of the Christians

It is my custom, Sire, to refer to you all matters in which I am in doubt. For who can better guide my hesitancy or instruct my ignorance? I have never been present at trials of Christians; therefore I do not know what is sought and punished, nor to what extent. I have been puzzled in no small degree as to whether there is any difference in the treatment of ages or if the young, no matter how young, are treated just like more mature defendants; whether pardon is given to those who repent or it avails not at all to have given up the aberration if one has once been a Christian; whether the name itself, if free from criminal practices, is punished or only the abominations that are associated with the name.

For the present I have followed this procedure in the case of those who were denounced to me as Christians: I asked the defendants in person whether they were Christians. If they admitted it I asked them for a second and third time, threatening punishment: if they persisted, I ordered them to be executed. For I had no doubt that whatever it was they were confessing, their persistence and unbending stubbornness deserved to be punished. There were others of similar folly whom I sent to Rome, since they were Roman citizens. Soon the accusation became common, as usual, from the very fact that cases were being tried, and several variations appeared. An anonymous information was lodged listing a number of names. If defendants who denied that they were now Christians or had been in the past would, following my example, pray to the gods and offer incense and wine to your statue, which I had had placed beside those of the gods for this purpose, and if they would curse Christ, they should, I thought, be dismissed; for it is declared that real Christians cannot be compelled to do any of these acts. Others, named by an informer, said that they were Christians but later denied it; they had indeed been, but had given up the practice, some of them several years ago, one even twenty years ago. All of these also worshipped your image and the statues of the gods, and cursed Christ. However, they asserted that their guilt or mistake had amounted to no more than this, that they had been accustomed on a set day to gather before dawn and to chant in antiphonal form a hymn to Christ as if to a god, and to bind themselves by a pledge, not for the commission of any crime, but rather that they would not commit theft nor robbery nor adultery nor break their promises, nor refuse to return on demand any treasure that had been entrusted to their care; when this ceremony had been completed, they would go away, to reassemble later for a feast, but an ordinary and innocent one. They had abandoned even this custom after my edict in which, following your instruction, I had forbidden the existence of fellowships. So I thought it the more necessary to extract the truth even by torture from two maidservants who were called deaconesses. I found nothing save a vile superstition carried to an immoderate length.

So, postponing further trials, I have resorted to consulting you. For it seemed to me a subject worthy of consultation, especially because of the number of people charged. For many of every age and rank, and of both sexes, are being brought to trial, and will be. The contagion of the superstition has pervaded not only the cities but the villages and country districts as well. Yet it seems that it can be halted and cured. It is well agreed that temples almost desolate have begun to be thronged again, and stated rites that had long been abandoned are revived; and a sale is found for the fodder of sacrificial victims, though hitherto buyers were rare. So it is easy to conjecture what a great number of offenders may be reformed, if a chance to repent is given.

The Emperor's Answer About the Christians

You have followed the proper course, my friend, in examining the cases of those who have been denounced to you as Christians. It is impossible to establish a hard and fast procedure for general use. They are not to be sought out; if they are accused, and the case is proved, they are to be punished, with the restriction, however, that if one denies that he is a Christian and makes it manifest in very deed, that is, by offering sacrifice to our gods, he shall be pardoned because of his repentance, however suspicious his past conduct was. Information lodged anonymously ought not to be regarded in dealing with any charge; it is of an abominable tendency, and not consonant with our enlightened age.

St. Augustine of Hippo, The City of God

In A.D. 41 0, the Visigothic armies of Alaric sacked Rome. Not only was this a major military defeat for the Empire in the West, but the victory of Arian Goths also undermined a basic doctrine widely held in Church circles since the time of Constantine: that people of the wrong religion could not prevail against orthodox Christian rulers.

St. Augustine (A.D. 354-430) of Hippo in North Africa began the task of explaining the Roman debacle in the first of what were to become twenty-two books of The City of God. At the outset, he attempted to refute pagan claims that Rome had done better under its old gods than under the Christian God by recalling positive experiences for the Empire under its Christian rulers and arguing that Christian morality led these emperors, with God's aid and direction, to provide a happier life for Romans than their pagan predecessors had achieved. At the same time, he stressed that true Christians lose nothing of value in worldly calamities, which, of course, rendered the havoc of barbarian invasions relatively unimportant.

For St. Augustine, the City of God, or the Heavenly City, includes God, the angels, and mortals predestined for salvation among its citizens. Those citizens of the Heavenly City who are making their way through earthly life pay no attention to material interests. Consequently, if churchgoers show too much concern about loss of property and physical suffering, they are probably citizens of the Earthly City in this life and doomed to hell in the hereafter. Citizens of the Earthly City are identified through their interests, which are limited to those earthly concerns that are insignificant to saved Christians.

St. Augustine worked on The City of God for thirteen years. Early in the project, he seems to have realized that comprehensive proof of the relative happiness of Christian times should be presented more systematically than he was doing, and so he entrusted that part of his work to Paulus Orosius, a young priest from Spain who had come to serve him and study with him (see Reading 43).

The first selections that follow are from the early books of The City of God; the last two from the much later Book XIX. Two different and influential Christian theories of history emerge in the work of St. Augustine and Orosius. In the early books of The City of God and consistently in Seven Books of History Against the Pagans, God rewards Christian emperors and peoples for faith and good works, rather much as jahweh rewarded the Children of Israel for the same thing. Then, in The City of God as a whole, particularly the later books, a theory unfolds more consistent with New Testament values: The Christian kingdom is not of this world, and true Christians should not worry much about even such momentous, earthly happenings as lost wars and failing empires.

Elements of Christian Emperors' Real Happiness

De civitate Dei libri xxii, ed. Emanuel Hoffman (Vienna: F. Tempsky, 1899-1900), extracts from Books I-V and Book XIX, passim, trans. Henry A. Myers.

We call the Christian emperors happy if they rule justly; if they are not carried away by conceit in the midst of voices praising them extravagantly and by men hailing them with a debasing show of excess humility, but remember that they are men; if they turn their power to the service of the Divine Majesty, by using it to spread the worship of God as far as they can; and if they fear love, and worship God. We call them happy if they are relatively slow with punishments, inflicting them only when pressed by the requirements of governing and defending the state, but are all the more quick with pardons, not to let crimes go unpunished but in the hope of rehabilitating the offenders; and if they make up for often necessarily harsh decrees with kindness and mercy and with sweeping generosity. We call them happy if they restrict their luxury all the more as their wealth lets them afford it; if they prefer ruling over low desires within themselves to ruling over any nation at all; and if they do all this not out of a passion for vain glory but out of a love for eternal happiness, without failing to offer the sacrifice of humility, mercy and prayer for their sins to their own true God.

The Prosperity God Granted Emperor Constantine

On Emperor Constantine ... God bestowed such an abundance of earthly favors as no man would dare wish for. He permitted him to found a city to share in the imperial rule of Rome, a daughter, so to speak, of Rome herself but without any temples or images of the demons. I He reigned for a long time, maintaining the whole Roman world as sole emperor. He was most victorious in directing and waging wars, and he was always successful in putting down usurpers. He was very old when he died of sickness and age, and he left sons to rule after him.

The Faith and Piety of Emperor Theodosius

Theodosius ... put down the usurper Eugenius, who had illegally installed himself in that emperor's place, prevailing against his very powerful army more by prayer than by the sword. Some soldiers who were there have told me that all the spears they were throwing were snatched from their hands by a very strong wind, which blew away from Theodosius' side in the enemy's direction, and that it not only gave greater force to whatever they threw against them but even turned back the spears which the enemy soldiers were throwing into their own bodies....

About the War in Which King Radagais of the Goths, a Worshipper of Demons, Was Defeated with His Huge Army in a Single Day

When Radagais, King of the Goths, was already threatening the Romans' very necks with his huge and savage army encamped near the city, he was beaten in one day with such speed and in such a way that not one single Roman was wounded, let alone killed, while well over a hundred thousand of his soldiers were struck down, and he was captured and soon put to a deserved death. For if such a godless man with such equally godless troops had entered Rome, who would have been spared by him? What shrines of the martyrs would he have respected? In dealing with what person would the fear of God have restrained him? Whose blood would he have wanted to leave unshed and whose chastity unravaged?

Whether the Sweep of imperial Command ... Is Among Things of Value for Wise and Happy Men

It makes sense that if the true God is worshipped and served with true rites and good morals, it is a benefit for good men to have long reigns over great territories. This is actually not of so much use to themselves as it is to their subjects , because as far as they themselves are concerned their own true. faith and righteousness, which are great gifts from God, are enough to give them the true happiness that lets them live this life well and attain eternal life afterwards. Thus the reign of good men here on earth does not serve their own good so much as it does human concerns.

The Harsh Brutality in the Sack of Rome Corresponded with Established Customs of War, Whereas the Mercy Shown Revealed the Power of Christ's Name

All the destruction, killing, tooting, burning, and suffering which took place in the recent sack of Rome happened in accordance with the customs of waging war. What was altogether new and previously unheard of, however, was that the barbarian brutality [of the Goths] was so tamed that they picked the largest of the basilicas and allowed them to remain sanctuaries, where no one could be struck down and from which no one could be dragged away. Many people were led there to freedom and safety by soldiers showing sympathy for them.... Anyone who does not see fit to credit this to the name of Christ-yes, to Christian times-is blind. Anyone who sees this new turn of events but fails to praise it is most ungrateful.

The Saints Lose Nothing of Value in Losing Material Goods

In the sack of Rome faithful and godly men . . . "lost everything they had." How about their faith? How about their godliness? How about the goods of the inner being which make a person rich before God? Listen to what the Apostle Paul says about the riches of Christianity: ". . Godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into this world and certainly we can carry nothing out. If we have food and clothing, let us be content with them. People who want to be rich fall into temptations and traps. They fall into foolish and harmful desires which drown men in destruction and perdition.112

The Universal Peace, Which the Law of Nature Preserves Through All Disturbances, and the Condition Which Each Person Deserves to Find Himself in, According to the Way He Has Used His Will and According to the Decision of the Just Judge

Domestic peace is a harmonious arrangement in matters of command and obedience among those of the same household, and the peace of a [normal] city is a similar one among its citizens. The peace of the Heavenly City is the most perfectly and harmoniously designed communal relationship in the enjoyment of God and in the fellowship resulting from union with God. Peace for all beings is tranquility within order. Order is the arrangement of equal and unequal things, with each assigned its proper place.

And so we see that miserable people [lacking faith and godliness] ... in the very fact that they justly deserve their misery are confined to a condition of misery by the principle of order. This keeps them from being united with saved people. When they live without obvious disturbances they adapt to their bondage, and so there is a bit of tranquil order among them, and so they enjoy a peace of sons. They still remain miserable, however, since, in spite of not suffering constantly from a total lack of security, they are not within that realm where there is no cause to worry about either suffering or security....

Where Peace and Discord Between the Heavenly and Earthly Cities Come From

The Earthly City, which does not live by faith, desires an earthly peace, seeking to bring it about through harmony of command and obedience among citizens, even though its scope is limited to uniting people's wills on matters pertaining to this mortal life.

The Heavenly City, however, or, to be more precise, those of its members who are living by faith during their mortal pilgrimages, must make use of this peace, although only until they are through with their transient status on earth, which requires it. For this reason, the Heavenly City sojourning either as a captive or a wandering stranger in the Earthly City does not hesitate to obey earthly authority in matters required by the communal life of mortals. With mortal life common to the people of both Cities, a certain harmony between them may be maintained in relation to its requirements.

While the Heavenly City sojourns on earth, it recruits members from all peoples and forms a pilgrim society of men and women speaking all different languages, which pays no attention to the diversity of customs, laws, and institutions among them, by which earthly peace is established and maintained.