Britain, was called publicly to celebrate the saddest and the most joyous of religious ceremonies, the funeral and deification of his father, and his own marriage with Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, the persecutor, both of which he performed with all the splendid rites and observances of the pagan religion. In the fifth year of his reign, he extended his dominion over Italy by conquering his wife's brother, Maxentius, who fell in defeat and death, when Constantine entered Rome and celebrated his victory with a public triumph after the manner of Rome's pagan imperators; and the pagan Senate set up a golden image in the Senate-house to the honour of the god who had recently been the shield and the glory of Italy. "Romæ non ignotam effigiem," adds Baronius; for a former emperor, Alexander, had placed a statue for Christ with Abraham and Orpheus among his household gods (Bar. Ann., A.D. 312, sec. 66 and 69; Gibbon, chap. xvi.).

Constantine was a politician and a warrior more than a Christian. He continued, as did his sons and successors, till the time of Gratian (above seventy years after his capture of Rome), to administer the office of chief pontiff to the gods of heathen Rome, as well as emperor and head of the Church (in the very type of the modern infallible Pontifex Maximus), absolute and undisputed monarch in all things, political, imperial, and spiritual, - pagan and Christian and mixed, - over all Christendom; neither could any man, in his latter years, stand up to resist his will. "Until forty years of age," says the historian of the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," "Constantine's liberality restored and enriched the temples of the gods. The medals which issued from his imperial mint are impressed with the figures and attributes of Jupiter and Apollo. Mars and Hercules; and his filial piety increased the council of Olympus by the solemn

apotheosis of his father Constantius Chlorus. The altars of Apollo (the patron deity of Rome) were crowned with. votive offerings of Constantine; and the credulous multitude were taught to believe that the emperor was per- . mitted with mortal eyes to behold the visible majesty of their tutelar deity."-Gibbon, chap. xx.

Possibly, this favour of Apollo to the emperor helped Eusebius to fashion the following story of the stauros (σταυροῦ τροπαιον are his words, the likeness of the stauros), seen with amazement by the emperor and all his army, followed that night by a vision of the Lord! Eusebius alone tells the story, and then not till twenty years after he had heard it from the emperor's lips himself alone.

STORY OF CONSTANTINE'S VISION, BY EUSEBIUS.

On the eve of the battle with Maxentius, Constantine, revolving in his mind the state of the country and of his gods, together with the god which his father had honoured and had resolved to serve, became so distracted with doubts and distressed, that he prayed and implored, if there were any god, that he would manifest himself, as well by a sign as by propitious aid in this emergency. (How perfectly natural!)

"Then appeared a divine and wonderful vision, which could have been hardly believed had any other man related it. But since the emperor told it to him who now commits it to history a long time after, when I was honoured with his aquaintance; and when, in familiar conversation, he related and confirmed the story with an oath, who could doubt that everything appeared as he represented, especially since the events which followed proved the truth of the testimony.

"When the sun had a little passed mid-day, Constantine said, he saw with his own eyes the sign of the stauros (σтаνρоû тρóπαιov) displayed in splendid light, outshining the sun in the heavens, and upon it an inscription plainly written, TOUT víka, 'By this conquer.' Great astonishment seized him, and his whole army which accompanied him, and was a spectator of this prodigy. He asserted that he was yet in doubt why this display was made to him, and he thought much of it till night. Then, in his sleep, the Christ of God appeared to him with the sign shown him in the heaven, and commanded him to use a standard of the pattern seen in heaven, for protection in joining battle with the enemy.

66 Rising early the next morning, he told the vision to his friends. He called for workmen in gold and precious stones, and ordered them to make an image like it, which image I have seen with my eyes. For the emperor condescended, God graciously granting this, himself to show it me. It was of this form:-A spear, rather long and erect, was covered all over with gold, having a transverse yard in the form of a cross. On the top (of the spear) was a crown of precious stones, woven round with fine gold. Upon this were the salutary marks of the name of the Saviour, expressed by only two letters-the first two letters of the Greek name, Christ, P (rho, R), in the middle of the figure, and X (ki) curiously inserted,—which plainly signifies the whole name Christ, which letters the emperor always afterward wore in his helmet."-Bar. Ann., A.D. 312, sec. 19; and Eus. Life of Constantine, b. i., sec. 28 to 31.

Lactantius, the tutor of Constantine's heir, says that "Constantine was warned in sleep to put the divine mark, the sign of the crux, upon the shields of his soldiers, and so to give battle. He took care to do this, and ordered the

letter X (ki), named in the monogram, to be drawn on all their shields."-Lact. Deaths of the Persecutors, sec. 44. Lond. 1715, 8vo.

This shows unerringly the character of the vision, dream, or sign seen of Constantine in heaven, and marked on his helmet and the shields of his soldiers. It was X (ki) for Christ, not (tau) for his cross.

Thus, by the concurrent testimony of Eusebius and Lactantius, confirmed by existing medals and coins of Constantine at this day, not the sign of the accursed tree, not the pagan sign of Tammuz, but the sign of God, the monogram of Christ, was what Constantine saw in the sky, if he saw anything, and placed on his shield, as instructed in his sleep. "You have on the Labarum," says Baronius, "the name of Christ expressed by XP, (i.e., CHR.); for that by the letter X (ki) the name of Christ used to be understood, even Julian the Apostate declares in his 'Misopogon." "Bar. Ann. 312, sec. 24.

Referring to that satire upon the Antiochians, I find it written:"Neither the X (ki) nor the K (kappa) you say, have hurt your city. I have learned that these letters are the initials of certain names, the one of Constantius, K, the other of Christ, X. Again, you say I have subverted the world (alluding to his removal of the monogram from the Labarum, and his restoration of S.P.Q.R.), and that I wage war against the X, and that you regret the K."-Select Works of Julian, pp. 271 and 279. Lond. 1784, 8vo.

This testimony of the Emperor Julian confirms the fact that in the fourth century the sign of the cross, universally recognised for the mark of a Christian, was X for Christ,

and not

t

for the instrument of His most cruel death.

Do not all the histories say, and the world believe, that

COPIES OF MEDALS AND COINS OF CONSTANTINE.

We admit the story, the belief, and the banner; and here is the copy of the banner, which contradicts the story,

as may be seen and read of all men on the coins, medals, and monuments of Constantine to this day. This banner of Constantine consists of a monogram of Christ, encircled in a wreath of gold, fixed upon the top of the flagstaff. Beneath it, appended to the flagstaff, hangs a silken flag,

on which the head of the emperor, and others of the royal family, appear.-Bar. Ann., A.D. 312, sec. 26.

This below is a coin from the imperial mint, as the first is of a medal. The face of the coin shows the emperor's bust, with his name, "Constantinus Maximus," encircled in a wreath. On the reverse is his banner, holding the monogram protected by two warriors, one on each side, and "Gloria Exercitus," the Glory of the Army, inside of the encircling wreath.-Bar. Ann.