achment of cavalry and infantry, consisting of three thousand men,
marched from Alexandria into the adjacent desert of Nitria, [75] which
was peopled by five thousand monks. The soldiers were conducted by Arian
priests; and it is reported, that a considerable slaughter was made in
the monasteries which disobeyed the commands of their sovereign. [76]

[Footnote 69: Dr. Jortin (Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. iv. p.
78) has already conceived and intimated the same suspicion.]

[Footnote 70: This reflection is so obvious and forcible, that Orosius
(l. vii. c. 32, 33,) delays the persecution till after the death of
Valentinian. Socrates, on the other hand, supposes, (l. iii. c. 32,)
that it was appeased by a philosophical oration, which Themistius
pronounced in the year 374, (Orat. xii. p. 154, in Latin only.) Such
contradictions diminish the evidence, and reduce the term, of the
persecution of Valens.]

[Footnote 71: Tillemont, whom I follow and abridge, has extracted (Mem.
Eccles. tom. viii. p. 153-167) the most authentic circumstances from the
Panegyrics of the two Gregories; the brother, and the friend, of Basil.
The letters of Basil himself (Dupin, Bibliotheque, Ecclesiastique, tom.
ii. p. 155-180) do not present the image of a very lively persecution.]

[Footnote 72: Basilius Caesariensis episcopus Cappadociae clarus
habetur... qui multa continentiae et ingenii bona uno superbiae
malo perdidit. This irreverent passage is perfectly in the style and
character of St. Jerom. It does not appear in Scaliger's edition of his
Chronicle; but Isaac Vossius found it in some old Mss. which had not
been reformed by the monks.]

[Footnote 73: This noble and charitable foundation (almost a new city)
surpassed in merit, if not in greatness, the pyramids, or the walls of
Babylon. It was principally intended for the reception of lepers, (Greg.
Nazianzen, Orat. xx. p. 439.)]

[Footnote 74: Cod. Theodos. l. xii. tit. i. leg. 63. Godefroy (tom. iv.
p. 409-413) performs the duty of a commentator and advocate. Tillemont
(Mem. Eccles. tom. viii. p. 808) supposes a second law to excuse his
orthodox friends, who had misrepresented the edict of Valens, and
suppressed the liberty of choice.]

[Footnote 75: See D'Anville, Description de l'Egypte, p. 74. Hereafter I
shall consider the monastic institutions.]

[Footnote 76: Socrates, l. iv. c. 24, 25. Orosius, l. vii. c. 33. Jerom.
in Chron. p. 189, and tom. ii. p. 212. The monks of