The following is an excerpt (pages 273-284) from Ancient and Medieval History (1946) by Francis S. Betten, S.J. Although some information may be outdated, the Catholic historical perspective it provides remains pertinent. Use the link at the bottom of post to read the previous/following pages. Use the Search box above to find specific topics or browse using the Resources tab above.

CHAPTER XXVIII
THE LAST CENTURY OF THE UNITED EMPIRE

DIOCLETIAN (284-305 A.D.)

363. Diocletian, a stern Illyrian officer, the grandson of a slave, was himself a barrack emperor. He possessed a clear insight into the needs of the Empire, an unbendable energy, and that peculiar sagacity which enables great rulers to find efficient and reliable coworkers. Diocletian was convinced that the system of government must be entirely remodeled. He went at his task with consummate thoroughness.

364. RECASTING OF THE ADMINISTRATION. Abolition of Republican Forms. — So far the power of the emperors had been concealed under republican forms and titles (§ 297). The various officers below the emperors went by republican names. There remained, too, some traces of republican assemblies. Diocletian reasoned that it would be much better if the supreme power of the emperors were exteriorly expressed by royal splendor and by the pompous trappings of a king. So he put away all the republican titles, retaining only that of Emperor. In Greek he styled himself Basileus, “King.” He assumed all the external splendor of Oriental despots. The Persian kings became his model. He was no longer the first of fellow citizens (§ 306), but lord and master. The citizens were to be his obedient servants. They could not approach him without prostrating themselves to the ground. He was to take care of them without their cooperation or advice. The republican names of the subordinate offices disappeared, with the exception of high priest, which Diocletian himself appropriated, and that of consul, which became a mere term of honor. The civil and military officers received new titles. The flimsy remnants of republican assemblies also went by the board. Only the Senate remained as a municipal body with no influence upon the laws of the state.

365. New Administrative Divisions. — So far the governors of the forty odd provinces had been immediately under the emperor, which made a close inspection very difficult. Diocletian subdivided the provinces so as to make about 120 of them. Every three or five provinces were formed into a diocese, with a special head called vicar, and a number of dioceses made up a ‘prefecture under a prefect. There were four prefectures, directly under the Emperor. Thus the governor could send important matters up to the vicar; the vicar would handle most of them, and send the rest up to the prefect; who in turn could confer about them with the emperor, if necessary. Unquestionably this helped very greatly to expedite affairs. The governors, vicars, and prefects, moreover, were strictly civil officers. They had no military power. The army was under a separate management (§69).

366. Part Emperors. — Finally, Diocletian divided the imperial duties and privileges among four men. Two had the title Augustus, namely, Diocletian himself and Maximian; two were styled Caesar, Galerius and Constantius Chlorus. Each Augustus had a Caesar attached to him. Thus Diocletian and Galerius ruled the East, Maximian and Constantius the West. Each of the four was at the head of a prefecture, having under him both the prefect and the commanders of the army in that part. The East and the West were roughly separated by a line running north and south through the mouth of the Adriatic. (H. T. F., “Orient and Occident.”) To regulate the succession, it was supposed that all should rule twenty years in their capacity, and that then the two Augustuses should abdicate, the Caesars succeed to their place, and two new Caesars be appointed. There was no thought of dividing the Empire as such or of establishing four separate empires. There was to be one Empire. The four “part-emperors” were to act as one, but each was to limit his care to the sections assigned to him. Diocletian had picked his men with great wisdom. They harmonized wonderfully. To emphasize the unity of the Empire, their decrees were always signed by all four rulers.

367. The system of the Empire, thus radically remodeled, worked excellently. After the disturbances of the barrack emperors law and order returned, and the boundaries of the Empire were efficiently defended. The only great drawback was the expense. There were now so many more governors; there were the new offices of the vicars and prefects; and each of these administrators needed his staff of assistants and clerical help. There were besides four pompous imperial courts with their hundreds of courtiers and retainers. And all these men had to be supported by taxes. The payment of the taxes became indeed a very heavy burden of the population.

368. The Successors. — In 305 Diocletian, following his own plan of succession, abdicated, and Maximian, the other Augustus, willy nilly, did the same. Constantius Chlorus and Galerius were now Augustuses, each with a new Caesar. But when Constantius Chlorus died, the following year (at York in Britain), his soldiers, without waiting for any arrangement to be made by the other emperors, proclaimed his son, Constantine, Emperor — again a barrack emperor. Soon no less than six “emperors” were in the field, partly raised by the soldiers. Civil war raged for eight years. Diocletian’s method of regulating the succession had broken down completely.

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT

369. Accession of Constantine as Sole Ruler. — There were three claimants in the West, Constantine, Maximian, who had resumed the imperial purple again, and Maxentius, who controlled Italy and Africa. Maximian was killed. Maxentius suffered a decisive defeat at the Milvian Bridge, 312, and was drowned in the Tiber. In the East meanwhile a new man, Licinius, had become sole ruler. Constantine and Licinius, then, ruled the Empire, each without any Caesar or part-emperor. After some years a quarrel broke out between the two. Constantine conquered his rival and became sole emperor, 323.

370. THE VICTORY OF CHRISTIANITY is closely connected with the battle of the Milvian Bridge. Constantine had inherited from his father a certain leaning toward Christianity. When he was marching upon Maxentius, one day while he was pondering on the heavy odds that were against him, he and the soldiers who happened to be with him beheld in the skies a fiery cross with the inscription, “ In this thou wilt conquer.” During the following night he had a vision of Christ, Who told him to approach the enemy under the standard of the cross. This he did. The new standard, called the “labarum,” preceded his host in the battle. Constantine himself publicly ascribed the glorious victory to the God of the Christians.

In the following year, 313, the two emperors jointly issued the DECREE OF MILAN, inspired by Constantine, by which full liberty was granted to the Christians. This decree marks the beginning of a new era for Christianity, for the Empire, and for the world at large. It is the greatest document that has ever been issued by any secular ruler.

The Decree of Milan put the Christians entirely on the same level as the pagans. It did away with all obstacles which had made it impossible for them to hold civil or military offices. It also ordered returned to them all churches, with the estates and movable goods owned by the churches. Incidentally it recognized the Christian communities as capable of holding property. The decree made it clear, however, that there was no intention to diminish in the least the rights of the pagans. Christianity was to be one of the two religions now recognized by the state.

371. The Rulers and Christianity. — Licinius always remained a pagan. He probably had given his consent to the decree only because he was urged by Constantine. He later on disregarded the Milan Decree and even started a violent persecution of the Christians. His defeat by Constantine was widely accepted as a divine verdict in favor of Christianity.

Constantine himself showed by his actions all through his life that he sincerely believed Christianity to be the one true religion, though, following an erroneous custom of his time, he delayed his baptism until shortly before his death. He was no doubt also prompted by considerations of statesmanship when he took the momentous step which threw the history of the world into new channels. Numerically, indeed, the Christians were powerless, being at the most about one tenth of the population. Their organization, too, was neither intended nor fitted for military or political purposes. But what the state needed above all was to have morality restored and decaying society renewed, and this could be expected from Christianity. He knew the perfection of its moral code — the Ten Commandments; he knew that the Christians were prepared to die rather than violate their duty. He also knew that the persecutions with their cruel arbitrariness served to demoralize society still more, and that they had no other result than to deprive the state of thousands of its best and most useful citizens. Constantine was clear-minded and unbiased enough to realize these facts, and he possessed the courage and moral strength to go by his conviction and face the antagonism of a pagan world. He followed up his policy by bringing the Roman law more and more into harmony with the demands of Christian morality. He wanted to be a Christian emperor. In him indeed the imperial dignity obtained, the position which Divine Providence had destined for it, namely, that of being the protector of the Church of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, toward the end of his life he also meddled with matters of a purely ecclesiastical character. Taken all in all, the work of his long reign has resulted in rare blessings for the whole world.

372. Constantine the Great as Ruler. — Constantine kept up the external form of the Oriental monarchy which Diocletian had adopted. He also maintained the excellent division and subdivision of the Empire with its many grades of administrative officials. His greatest deed as ruler, next to the recognition of Christianity, was the transfer of the capital from Rome to Byzantium on the Bosphorus. He renamed it Constantinople, i.e., Constantine’s City. In Rome both the old families and the populace clung to the traditions, names, and titles of the republican past. The city was too far away from the Danube and the eastern frontier, then the most threatened points of the boundary. Constantinople was far more fit to become a center of world commerce than old Rome. Constantine spared no expense to make his city a rival of Rome in brilliancy and grandeur, and it became thoroughly Christian. Unofficially, Constantinople was occasionally referred to as Byzantium. Whenever there was, in the years after Constantine, a special emperor of the West, he did not reside at Rome, but at either Milan, Treves, or Ravenna.

This removal of the center of the Orientalized Empire to the Orient greatly strengthened the power of resistance against foreign foes. But in the farther future it was to have consequences which Constantine could not have foreseen. As no emperor ever again took up his residence in Rome, this city more and more changed into the city of the popes. Unhampered by the presence of an imperial court the successors of St. Peter could display the innate power of their office, and gradually they became the most prominent men in Rome and all Italy, nay in the entire West. This transfer, too, made it possible for the West, in later centuries, to drift away from the East and follow its own development, unhindered by eastern conditions, and thus to bring about the peculiar civilization of western Europe, which is our own.

FROM CONSTANTINE TO THEODOSIUS

373. The Sons of Constantine (337-361). — Constantine divided the Empire between his three sons, Constantine II, Constans, and Constantius. The division meant dissension and war. Constantius finally became sole emperor. More than any other ruler did he meddle in ecclesiastical questions.

374. Julian the Apostate (361-363), a cousin of Constantius, was raised to the throne by the legions in Gaul, where he successfully repulsed an invasion of the Alemanni (§ 275, note). He had fallen away from Christianity (hence his surname), and now set his mind to a restoration of paganism. He did not resort to persecution, though he allowed his governors to torture and murder Christians. He excluded Christians from the court and all higher offices, the bench and the bar, and forbade them to teach or study in the higher schools. His aim was to make them appear a contemptible class, fit only to be “hewers of wood and drawers of water.” A number of Christians indeed apostatized, but Julian’s reign though short was long enough to show that this last official attempt to restore paganism was a complete failure.

375. Theodosius the Great (379-395). — After several very brief reigns of emperors raised by the troops, Valentinian (364- 375) ruled with vigor, and again drove back the Alemanni. With him his brother Valens ruled the East. Valens admitted the Visigoths into the Empire, and afterwards was conquered and killed by them, 378 A.D. This is the beginning of the Migration of Nations, to which we shall devote much space later on. Valens was succeeded by Theodosius the Great, who once more united the several sections of the Empire. After Theodosius’ death, 395, the Empire fell apart to remain one in theory, but never again one in fact.

Theodosius the Great was a highly cultured, thoroughly Christian ruler. Though in Rome, chiefly among the senatorial families, paganism still numbered many adherents, the new religion had practically become the dominant one. Theodosius forbade the practice of paganism under pain of death. (H. T. F., “Vestal Virgins.”) With what degree of severity this law was put into effect, we do not know. In the remoter places of the country the gods were still worshiped more than a hundred years later. (Hence the name “pagan,” from a Latin word meaning “rustic.” For a similar reason the Christianized Teutons, at a later time, came to describe the adherents of the old worship as “heathens,” i.e., heath-dwellers.)

CHRISTIANITY

376. The spread of the Christian religion naturally became more rapid after the terror of the persecutions had ceased. Priests and bishops devoted their zeal unchecked to the instruction of prospective converts (“catechumens”). The bulk of city populations gradually accepted Christianity. The truths of the immortality of every human soul, the equality of all men as creatures of God and redeemed with the blood of Christ, the doctrine of charity for God’s sake, penetrated human society and began to show their effect. The destroyed churches were restored. A great period of church building set in, which lasted for centuries. The churches, erected preferably in the “basilica style” (§ 340), helped to give to the cities and towns a Christian aspect. (In the East most of the pagan temples were destroyed; in the West the most beautiful of them remained as works of art, and were even for a long time kept in repairs at public expense.)

377. Lingering Paganism. — The favors shown by the emperors to the Christians caused individuals and whole families to profess Christianity merely to follow what they considered the fashion of the day, and to open to themselves the ascent to high offices. The private and family life of such persons remained to a large extent pagan. Only in the course of many decades did the Christian principles really gain general control. About the year 400 A.D. there was still much immorality in Roman families. Great saints and great sinners often dwelt under the same roof. It was similar with the rabble in the streets. For a long time the emperors did not venture to forbid the gladiatorial shows and other pagan excesses. The presence in the Christian body of members who retained pagan habits could not have a wholesome effect on those who wished to obey God’s laws in every detail. But it should not be overlooked that under the new conditions, which after all were steadily improving, the number of those who reached a high degree of Christian perfection, or at least saved their souls, was infinitely larger than it could have been during the persecutions, and increased as the years and decades passed by.

378. Slavery, the great plague spot of Roman society, could not be abolished with one blow. But the Church constantly and urgently put before the minds of the masters the fact that the slave was their equal as a creature of God and was called to the same Heaven of happiness. She also recommended the liberation of slaves as a very meritorious act of charity. This tended to make the lot of the slave less unbearable. Together with other causes which, if left alone, would have been powerless, the Christian teaching led to a gradual disappearance of the abominable institution of slavery.

379. Arianism — The Council of Nicaea. — There had been heresies among the Christians even during the time of the persecutions. Gnosticism was a kind of disguised paganism; Mani- chaeism attempted in particular to introduce the old religion of the Persians (§ 72). After Constantine the Great had given liberty to the Church other erroneous teachings disturbed the ranks of the faithful. The worst and most powerful of them was Arianism, so called from Arius, a priest of Alexandria, who held that Jesus Christ is not God but only the noblest creature of God. In 325 A.D. a general Council was summoned to Nicaea in Asia Minor. Under the presidency of papal legates the assembled bishops solemnly condemned Arianism, and drew up a brief summary of Christian teaching, the Nicene Creed, which is still sung in our churches on Sundays and feast days. Constantine at first took steps against Arius. Later on he as well as his successors protected and encouraged the heresy, while the Catholic faith was brilliantly defended by great writers and preachers. After half a century Arianism had disappeared from the Roman world.

Unfortunately Arian bishops had spread their heresy among most of the Teutonic tribes which lived on the other side of the lower Danube. When these afterwards forced their way into the Empire, they brought Arianism with them, a fact which greatly affected the shaping of later Europe.

380. The literature of this period is best treated here. It was entirely Christian. Paganism was worn out. The great minds of the age were occupied with defending Catholic doctrine and more and more bringing out its full meaning and hidden beauties. It was the era of the “ Fathers of the Church.” (H. T. F., “ Doctors of the Church.”) It saw also the beginning of Church history and Christian poetry.

St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, widely renowned for his eloquence, was the most powerful champion against Arianism in the West, just as St. Athanasius, the Patriarch of Alexandria, was in the East. St. Augustine, born in northern Africa, the most prominent writer of the age, wrote, among other works, the City of God, a brilliant philosophy of history, to console the Christians in the disasters which followed the Migration of Nations (§§ 393 ff.). St. Jerome, who lived for many years as a hermit in a grotto at Bethlehem, translated the greater part of the Old Testament into Latin, and thus gave us the Vulgate, the official Bible of the Church. St. John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople, is considered the greatest pulpit orator of all times.

In the line of Church history we have the works of Lactantius, a professor of rhetoric; of Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia; and of Socrates, a lawyer at Constantinople. Poetical works, chiefly on Christian subjects, were produced by St. Gregory of Nazianz, St. Hilary of Tours, Paulinus of Bordeaux, Ausonius of Bordeaux, and Sidonius and Avitus, Gallic bishops.

381. The Church and Classical Literature. — All these men had received their training in the ancient schools of the Empire, which cultivated the study of the Greek and Latin classics. There was no opposition, in principle, against these schools and these works. Warnings were indeed heard, and they were well founded, not to make the pagan models the rule for one’s conduct. But prudent teachers could eliminate this danger. It was felt as a very severe blow, when Julian the Apostate (§ 478) forbade the Christians either to study or to teach the classics.

CONCLUSION OF ANCIENT HISTORY

We have now reached the end of ancient history. Whatever there was of human civilization had drifted together in the Roman Empire. The true achievements of the most remote times and the triumphs of Greek culture and learning had become the property of the Mediterranean world. More than this, the religion of the future, Christianity, had obtained full recognition as the greatest factor in human affairs. The worship of the God “ Who made heaven and earth ” was restored to its purity, and was taking untrammeled possession of the hearts and actions of men.
The recognition of Christianity had come, as it were, in the nick of time. It had still a century or two to penetrate to a considerable degree the population of the great Roman Empire. New peoples were to force their way into Roman lands. They found Christianity and its institutions enthroned as a power to be reckoned with. Strange as it was, these children of the wilds, who waged fearless war against the mighty of the earth, bowed to the supernatural majesty of the spiritual kingdom of Jesus Christ. At the feet of Christian teachers they not only learned the way of eternal salvation but at the same time also the essentials of natural culture. Gradually the Church tamed their wild instincts and made their primitive political creations the banner- bearers of human civilization.