ooks. By
admonition from them to Vulcan, Ceres, and Proserpina, supplicatory
sacrifices were made, and Juno propitiated by the matrons, first in the
Capitol, then upon the nearest shore, where, by water drawn from the
sea, the temple and image of the goddess were besprinkled; the ceremony
of placing the goddess in her sacred chair, and her vigil, were
celebrated by ladies who had husbands. But not all the relief that could
come from man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor
all the atonements which could be presented to the gods availed to
relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the
conflagration. Hence, to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the
guilt and punished with the most exquisite tortures the persons commonly
called Christians, who were hated for their enormities.

Christus, the founder of that name, was put to death as a criminal by
Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea, in the reign of Tiberius; but the
pernicious superstition, repressed for a time, broke out again, not only
through Judea, where the mischief originated, but through the city of
Rome also, whither all things horrible and disgraceful flow from all
quarters as to a common receptacle and where they are encouraged.
Accordingly first those were seized who confessed they were Christians;
next on their information a vast multitude were convicted, not so much
on the charge of burning the city as of hating the human race. And in
their deaths they were also made the subjects of sport, for they were
covered with the hides of wild beasts, and worried to death by dogs, or
nailed to crosses, or set fire to, and when day declined, burned to
serve for nocturnal lights. Nero offered his own gardens for that
spectacle, and exhibited a Circensian game, indiscriminately mingling
with the common people in the habit of a charioteer, or else standing in
his chariot. Whence a feeling of compassion arose toward the sufferers,
though guilty and deserving to be made examples of by capital
punishment, because they seemed not to be cut off for the public good,
but victims to the ferocity of one man.

In the mean time, in order to supply money all Italy was pillaged, the
provinces ruined, both the people in alliance with us and the states
which are called free. Even the gods were not exempt from plunder on
this occasion, their temples in the city being despoiled, and all the
gold conveyed away which the Roman people, in every