Nerva, who succeeded Domitian, only reigned two years, and was followed by the great Trajan: still the persecution of the sect continued. This we learn from Pliny's letter to Trajan, circa A.D. 111-113. Hadrian, who followed Trajan, virtually pursued the same policy.
In the latter years of Hadrian, from A.D. 134-5, the result of the great Jewish rebellion definitely and for ever separated, in the eyes of the government, the Christian from the Jew. Henceforth the Jew generally pursued his quiet way, and found new ideals, new hopes. The State feared the Jew no longer.
Not so the Christian. Rome saw clearly now that a new and influential sect had arisen in their midst; a sect absolutely opposed to the old Roman sacred traditions and worship, a sect, too, that evidently possessed some mighty secret power which enabled the Christians fearlessly to defy the magistracy of the Empire. This partly accounts for the greater severity of the persecution under the Antonine Emperors.
The policy of the Antonines (Pius and Marcus), which endeavoured to restore and to give fresh life to the old Roman traditions and worship, which they looked upon as indissolubly bound up with the greatness and power of Rome, was absolutely hostile to the spirit of Christian thought and teaching.
The First Book brings the history down to A.D. 180, the date of the death of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus.
The "Inner Life" of the Christian congregations is now dwelt on, and forms the subject-matter of Books II., III., IV.
The subject-matter of the Second Book is the everyday life of the Christian in the first, second, and third centuries, during which period the religion of Jesus of Nazareth was in the eyes of the Roman government an unlawful cult, and its adherents were ever liable to the severest punishment, such as confiscation of their goods, rigorous imprisonment, torture, and even death.
