re it possible to
suppose that the penetration of Decius had discovered pride under the
disguise of humility, or that he could foresee the temporal dominion
which might insensibly arise from the claims of spiritual authority, we
might be less surprised, that he should consider the successors of St.
Peter, as the most formidable rivals to those of Augustus.

[Footnote 118: Orosius, l. vii. c. 19, mentions Origen as the object of
Maximin's resentment; and Firmilianus, a Cappadocian bishop of that age,
gives a just and confined idea of this persecution, (apud Cyprian Epist.
75.)]

[Footnote 119: The mention of those princes who were publicly
supposed to be Christians, as we find it in an epistle of Dionysius of
Alexandria, (ap. Euseb. l. vii. c. 10,) evidently alludes to Philip and
his family, and forms a contemporary evidence, that such a report had
prevailed; but the Egyptian bishop, who lived at an humble distance
from the court of Rome, expresses himself with a becoming diffidence
concerning the truth of the fact. The epistles of Origen (which were
extant in the time of Eusebius, see l. vi. c. 36) would most probably
decide this curious rather than important question.]

[Footnote 120: Euseb. l. vi. c. 34. The story, as is usual, has
been embellished by succeeding writers, and is confuted, with much
superfluous learning, by Frederick Spanheim, (Opera Varia, tom. ii. p.
400, &c.)]

[Footnote 121: Lactantius, de Mortibus Persecutorum, c. 3, 4. After
celebrating the felicity and increase of the church, under a long
succession of good princes, he adds, "Extitit post annos plurimos,
execrabile animal, Decius, qui vexaret Ecclesiam."]

[Footnote 122: Euseb. l. vi. c. 39. Cyprian. Epistol. 55. The see
of Rome remained vacant from the martyrdom of Fabianus, the 20th of
January, A. D. 259, till the election of Cornelius, the 4th of June, A.
D. 251 Decius had probably left Rome, since he was killed before the end
of that year.]

The administration of Valerian was distinguished by a levity and
inconstancy ill suited to the gravity of the Roman Censor. In the first
part of his reign, he surpassed in clemency those princes who had been
suspected of an attachment to the Christian faith. In the last three
years and a half, listening to the insinuations of a minister addicted
to the superstitions of Egypt, he adopted the maxims, and imitated the
severity, of his predecessor Decius. [123] The accession of Gallienus,
which increa