martyrs of Vienne and Lyons, of the Scillitan martyrs in North Africa, of the heroic Mauritanian victims, in the striking and pathetic acts of Perpetua and her companions.[1]
Again it has been not unfrequently urged, and very largely believed, that the Christian traditions exaggerated the number of martyrs who suffered during the long though occasionally interrupted periods of persecution. As regards this early period, the first two centuries, the age we are now especially dwelling on, this supposition, very generally more or less accepted, is absolutely baseless. Indeed, the exact contrary is the case.
So far from exaggerating the numbers of confessors of "the Name," or painting in too vivid colours the story of their martyrdom, the earlier Christian writers dwell very little either on the number of the confessors or on their sufferings. It does not appear that any mention of martyrs or confessors of the second century appears in the oldest extant Church calendars; no allusion in these lists is recorded of martyrs until after the middle of the third century. Only in the case of some celebrated martyrs and confessors is an exception made. As a rule, save in very special cases, no anniversary of second-century martyrs appears to have been kept. It is only from the general tone of the earliest Christian writings[2] that we gather that the community was exposed to an ever-present danger, and that the shadow of persecution was ever brooding over the heads of the followers of "the Name."
By far the most definite account of the great numbers of Christians, the way in which they were looked upon by the imperial government, and the severe measures taken against them, are to be found in the notices of great pagan historians such as Tacitus and Suetonius, and more accurately and precisely in the Letter of Pliny to Trajan and in the
- ↑ Although the usual date given for this last attack on Christianity is a few months after the death of the Emperor Marcus. There is no doubt that they belong to the policy of persecution carried out by Marcus, and that the reaction in favour of Christianity noticeable in the reign of Commodus, his successor, had not had time to make itself felt.
- ↑ Compare the quotations taken from these writings given above.
