n imperial times was, practically
speaking, freedom of religion over the whole Empire, could not be extended
to the Jews and the Christians; for it was in the last resort based on
reciprocity, on the fact that worship of the Egyptian or Persian gods did
not exclude worship of the Roman ones. Every convert, on the other hand,
won over to Judaism or Christianity was _eo ipso_ an apostate from the
Roman religion, an _atheos_ according to the ancient conception. Hence, as
soon as such religions began to spread, they constituted a serious danger
to the established religion, and the Roman government intervened. Judaism
and Christianity were not treated quite alike; in this connexion details
are of no interest, but certain principal features must be dwelt on as
significant of the attitude of antiquity towards denial of the gods. To
simplify matters I confine myself to Christianity, where things are less
complicated.

The Christians were generally designated as _atheoi_, as deniers of the
gods, and the objection against them was precisely their denial of the
Pagan gods, not their religion as such. When the Christian, summoned
before the Roman magistrates, agreed to sacrifice to the Pagan gods (among
them, the Emperor) he was acquitted; he was not punished for previously
having attended Christian services, and it seems that he was not even
required to undertake not to do so in future. Only if he refused to
sacrifice, was he punished. We cannot ask for a clearer proof that it is
apostasy as such, denial of the gods, against which action is taken. It is
in keeping with this that, at any rate under the earlier Empire, no
attempt was made to seek out the Christians at their assemblies, to hinder
their services or the like; it was considered sufficient to take steps
when information was laid.

The punishments meted out were different, in that they were left solely to
the discretion of the magistrates. But they were generally severe: forced
labour in mines and capital punishment were quite common. No
discrimination was made between Roman citizens and others belonging to the
Empire, but all were treated alike; that the Roman citizen could not
undergo capital punishment without appeal to the Emperor does not affect
the principle. This procedure has really no expressly formulated basis in
law; the Roman penal code did not, as mentioned above, take cognizance of
denial of the gods. Nevertheless, the sentences on the Christians were
consi