These words that some make him
say when he felt himself wounded: "Thou hast overcome, Nazarene"; or as
others, "Content thyself, Nazarene"; would hardly have been omitted, had
they been believed, by my witnesses, who, being present in the army, have
set down to the least motions and words of his end; no more than certain
other miracles that are reported about it.

And to return to my subject, he long nourished, says Marcellinus,
paganism in his heart; but all his army being Christians, he durst not
own it. But in the end, seeing himself strong enough to dare to discover
himself, he caused the temples of the gods to be thrown open, and did his
uttermost to set on foot and to encourage idolatry. Which the better to
effect, having at Constantinople found the people disunited, and also the
prelates of the church divided amongst themselves, having convened them
all before him, he earnestly admonished them to calm those civil
dissensions, and that every one might freely, and without fear, follow
his own religion. Which he the more sedulously solicited, in hope that
this licence would augment the schisms and factions of their division,
and hinder the people from reuniting, and consequently fortifying
themselves against him by their unanimous intelligence and concord;
having experienced by the cruelty of some Christians, that there is no
beast in the world so much to be feared by man as man; these are very
nearly his words.

Wherein this is very worthy of consideration, that the Emperor Julian
made use of the same receipt of liberty of conscience to inflame the
civil dissensions that our kings do to extinguish them. So that a man
may say on one side, that to give the people the reins to entertain every
man his own opinion, is to scatter and sow division, and, as it were, to
lend a hand to augment it, there being no legal impediment or restraint
to stop or hinder their career; but, on the other side, a man may also
say, that to give the people the reins to entertain every man his own
opinion, is to mollify and appease them by facility and toleration, and
to dull the point which is whetted and made sharper by singularity,
novelty, and difficulty: and I think it is better for the honour of the
devotion of our kings, that not having been able to do what they would,
they have made a show of being willing to do what they could.

CHAPTER XX

THAT WE TASTE NOTHING PURE

The feebleness of our condition is such that things