XXIII. CHAP. braced, with real or affected zeal, the profession of Arianism. From the love, or the ostentation, of learning, he collected a valuable library of history, rhetoric, philosophy, and theology *; and the choice of the prevailing faction promoted George of Cappadocia to the throne of Athanasius. The entrance of the new archbishop was that of a barbarian conqueror; and each moment of his reign was polluted by cruelty and avarice. The Catholics of Alexandria and Egypt were abandoned to a tyrant, qualified, by nature and education, to exercise the office of persecution; but he oppressed with an impartial and Egypt. hand the various inhabitants of his extensive diocese. The primate of Egypt assumed the pomp and insolence of his lofty station; but he still betrayed the vices of his base and servile extraction. The merchants of Alexandria were impoverished by the unjust, and almost universal, monopoly, which he acquired, of nitre, salt, paper, funerals, &c. : and the spiritual father of a great people condescended to practise the vile and pernicious arts of an informer. The Alexandrians could never forget, nor forgive, the tax, which he suggested, on all the houses of oppresses Alexandria the * After the massacre of George, the emperor Julian repeat edly sent orders to preserve the library for his own use, and to torture the slaves who might be suspected of secreting any books. He praises the merit of the collection, from whence he had borrowed and transcribed several manuscripts while he pursued his studies in Cappadocia. He could wish indeed that the works of the Galilæans might perish: but he requires an exact account even of those theological volumes, lest other treatises more valuable should be confounded in their loss. Julian. Epist. ix. xxxvi. XXIII. the city; under an obsolete claim, that the royal CHAP. founder had conveyed to his successors, the Ptolemies and the Cæsars, the perpetual property of the soil. The Pagans, who had been flattered with the hopes of freedom and toleration, excited his devout avarice; and the rich temples of Alexandria were either pillaged or insulted by the haughty prelate, who exclaimed, in a loud and threatening tone, "How long will these se"pulchres he permitted to stand?" Under the reign of Constantius, he was expelled by the fury, or rather by the justice, of the people; and it was not without a violent struggle, that the civil and military powers of the state could restore his authority, and gratify his revenge. The messenger who proclaimed at Alexandria the accession of Julian, announced the downfal of the archbishop. George, with two of his ob- A. D. 361. sequious ministers, count Diodorus, and Dracontius, master of the mint, were ignominiously dragged in chains to the public prison. At the He is masend of twenty-four days, the prison was forced the people. open by the rage of a superstitious multitude, impatient of the tedious forms of-judicial proceedings. The enemies of gods, and men ex- Dec. 24. pired under their cruel insults; the lifeless bodies of the archbishop and his associates were carried in triumph through the streets on the back of a camel; and the inactivity of the Athanasian party was esteemed a shining example of evangelical * Philostorgius, with cautious malice, insinuates their guilt, was to Alavaois qmqmny sęcrayasei Tus mražews, 1. vii. c. 2. Godes frov, p. 267. Nov. 30. sacred by XXIII. CHAP. evangelical patience. The remains of these guilty wretches were thrown into the sea; and the po pular leaders of the tumult declared their resolution to disappoint the devotion of the Christians, and to intercept the future honours of these martyrs, who had been punished, like their predecessors, by the enemies of their religion The fears of the Pagans were just, and their precautions ineffectual. The meritorious death of the archbishop obliterated the memory of his life. The rival of Athanasius was dear and sacred to the Arians, and the seeming conversion of those sectaries introduced his worship into the bosom of the Catholic church t. The odious stranger, disguising every circumstance of time and place, assumed the mask of a martyr, a saint, and a Christian hero ; and the infamous George of Cineres projecit in mare, id metuens ut clamabat, ne, collectis supremis, ædes illis exstruerent; ut reliquis, qui deviare a religione compulsi, pertulere cruciabiles pœnas, adusque gloriosam mortem intemeratâ fide progressi, et nunc MARTYRES appellantur. Ammian. xxii. 11. Epiphanius proves to the Arians, that George was not a martyr. + Some Donatists (Optatus Milev. p. 60. 303. edit. Dapin; and Tillemont, Mém. Eccles. tom. vi. p. 713. in 4to) and Priscillianists (Tillemont, Mém. Eccles. tom. viii. p. 517. in 4to) have in like manner usurped the honours of Catholic saints and martyrs. The saints of Cappadocia, Basil and the Gregories, were ignorant of their holy companion. Pope Gelasius (A. D. 494.), the first Catholic who acknowledges St George, places him among the martyrs," qui Deo magis quam hominibus no"ti sunt." "" He rejects his Acts as the composition of here ties. Some, perhaps not the oldest, of the spurious Acts, are still extant; and, through a cloud of fiction, we may yet dis tinguish the combat which St George of Cappadocia sustained in the presence of Queen Alexandria, against the magician thanasiuss into the CHAP. - of Cappadocia has been transformed About the same time that Julian was informed of the tumult of Alexandria, he received intelligence from Edessa, that the proud and wealthy faction of the Arians had insulted the weakness of the Valentinians, and committed such disorders as ought not to be suffered with impunity in a well-regulated state. Without expecting the slow forms of justice, the exasperated prince directed his mandate to the magistrates of Edessa, by which he confiscated the whole property of the church: the money was distributed among the soldiers; the lands were added to the domain; and this act of oppression was aggravated by the most ungenerous irony. "Į "shew myself," says Julian, "the true friend 66 of the Galilæans. Their admirable law has "promised the kingdom of heaven to the poor; "and they will advance with more diligence in "the paths of virtue and salvation, when they "are relieved by my assistance from the load of VOL. IV. "temporal K *This transformation is not given as absolutely certain, but as extremely probable. See the Longueruana, tom. i. p. 194. + A curious history of the worship of St George, from the sixth century (when he was already revered in Palestine, in Armenia, at Rome, and at Treves in Gaul), might be extracted from Dr Heylin (History of St George, 2d edition, Lon don, 1633, in 4to, p. 429.), and the Bollandists (Act. SS. Mens. April. tom. iii. p. 100-163. His fame and popula rity in Europe, and especially in England, proceeded from? the Crusades. Julian. Epist. xliii: XXIII. and wor shipped as 5. Bamst hear. 11.11.90.1.. С НА Р. temporal possessions. Take care," pursued "take the monarch, in a more serious tone, 66 66 people; and you will have reason to dread, "not only confiscation and exile, but fire and "the sword." The tumults of Alexandria were doubtless of a more bloody and dangerous nature: but a Christian bishop had fallen by the hands of the Pagans; and the public epistle of Julian affords a very lively proof of the partial spirit of his administration. His reproaches to the Citizens of Alexandria are mingled with expressions of esteem and tenderness; and he la ments, that on this occasion they should have departed from the gentle and generous manners which attested their Grecian extraction. He gravely censures the offence which they had committed against the laws of justice and humanity; but he recapitulates, with visible complacency, the intolerable provocations which they had so long endured from the impious tyranny of George of Cappadocia. Julian admits the principle, that a wise and vigorous government should chastise the insolence of the people: yet, in consideration of their founder Alexander, and of Serapis their tutelar deity, he grants a free and gracious pardon to the guilty city, for which he again feels the affection of a brother *. After *Julian. Epist. x. He allowed his friends to assuage anger. Ammian, xxii, 11, |