the first to declare that the inscription had never been
altered, and that the two memorable words--the first proclaiming
officially the name of the true God in the face of imperial
Rome--belonged to the original text, sanctioned by the Senate. The
controversy was settled in 1863, when Napoleon III. obtained from the
Pope the permission to make a plaster cast of the arch. With the help
of the scaffolding, the scholars of the time examined the inscription,
the shape of each letter, the holes of the bolts by which the
gilt-bronze letters were fastened, the joints of the marble blocks,
the color and quality of the marble, and decided unanimously that the
inscription had never been tampered with, and that none of its letters
had been changed.

[Illustration: ARCH OF CONSTANTINE]

The arch was raised in 315. Was Constantine openly professing his
faith at that time? Opinions are divided. Some think he must have
waited until the defeat of Licinius in 323; others suggest the year
311 as a more probable date of his profession. The supporters of the
first theory quote in its favor the fact that the pagan symbols and
images of gods appear on coins struck by Constantine and his sons; but
this fact is easily explained, when we consider that the coinage of
bronze was a privilege of the Senate, and that the Senate was pagan by
a large majority. Many of Constantine's constitutions and official
letters speak in favor of an early declaration of faith. When the
Donatists appealed to him from the verdict of the councils of Arles
and Rome, he wrote to the bishops: _Meum judicium postulant, qui ipse
judicium Christi expecto_: "They appeal to me, when I myself must be
judged by Christ." The verdict of the council of Rome against the
sectarians was rendered on October 2, 313, in the "palace of Fausta in
the Lateran;" the imperial palace of the Lateran, therefore, had
already been handed over to the bishop of Rome, and a portion of it
turned into a place of worship. The basilica of the Lateran still
retains its title of "Mother and head of all churches of Rome, and of
the world," ranking above those of S. Peter and S. Paul in respect to
age.

Such being the state of affairs when the triumphal arch was erected,
nothing prevents us from believing those two words to be original, and
to express the relations then existing between the first Christian
emperor and the old pagan Senate. At all events, nothing is more
uncompromising than these two w