emperors Titus and Domitian,1 and by the Antonines after them, as a cardinal principle of imperial government. In this they were aided by the revulsion of feeling which Christianity had aroused against itself among the masses of the people, and the rumours already current of its impure orgies.2 Long before the close of the century the prophecy of Christ had come true: the Christians were hated of all men ‘because of the name’ (Matt. 10:22). Leaps and bounds are as alien to history as in nature. We