does not seem probable to him. Yet
Valesius, on the authority of Apolinarius and Tertullian, believed that
the miracle was worked through the prayers of the Christian soldiers in
the emperor's army. Rufinus does not give the name of Melitene to this
legion, says Valesius, and probably he purposely omitted it, because he
knew that Melitene was the name of a town in Armenia Minor, where the
legion was stationed in his time.

The emperor, it is said, made a report of his victory to the Senate,
which we may believe, for such was the practice; but we do not know what
he said in his letter, for it is not extant. Dacier assumes that the
emperor's letter was purposely destroyed by the Senate or the enemies of
Christianity, that so honorable a testimony to the Christians and their
religion might not be perpetuated. The critic has however not seen that
he contradicts himself when he tells us the purport of the letter, for
he says that it was destroyed, and even Eusebius could not find it. But
there does exist a letter in Greek addressed by Antoninus to the Roman
people and the sacred Senate after this memorable victory. It is
sometimes printed after Justin's first Apology, but it is totally
unconnected with the apologies. This letter is one of the most stupid
forgeries of the many which exist, and it cannot be possibly founded
even on the genuine report of Antoninus to the Senate. If it were
genuine, it would free the emperor from the charge of persecuting men
because they were Christians, for he says in this false letter that if a
man accuse another only of being a Christian, and the accused confess,
and there is nothing else against him, he must be set free; with this
monstrous addition, made by a man inconceivably ignorant, that the
informer must be burnt alive.[A]

[A] Eusebius (v. 5) quotes Tertullian's Apology to the Roman
Senate in confirmation of the story. Tertullian, he says,
writes that letters of the emperor were extant, in which he
declares that his army was saved by the prayers of the
Christians; and that he "threatened to punish with death those
who ventured to accuse us." It is possible that the forged
letter which is now extant may be one of those which Tertullian
had seen, for he uses the plural number, "letters." A great
deal has been written about this miracle of the Thundering
Legion, and more than is worth reading. There is a dissertation
on this supposed miracle