the country which had given birth to Christianity,
produced at least the sixteenth part of the martyrs who suffered
death within the dominions of Galerius and Maximin; the whole might
consequently amount to about fifteen hundred, a number which, if it is
equally divided between the ten years of the persecution, will allow an
annual consumption of one hundred and fifty martyrs. Allotting the same
proportion to the provinces of Italy, Africa, and perhaps Spain, where,
at the end of two or three years, the rigor of the penal laws was either
suspended or abolished, the multitude of Christians in the Roman empire,
on whom a capital punishment was inflicted by a judicia, sentence, will
be reduced to somewhat less than two thousand persons. Since it cannot
be doubted that the Christians were more numerous, and their enemies
more exasperated, in the time of Diocletian, than they had ever been in
any former persecution, this probable and moderate computation may teach
us to estimate the number of primitive saints and martyrs who sacrificed
their lives for the important purpose of introducing Christianity into
the world.

[Footnote 181a: Perhaps there never was an instance of an author
committing so deliberately the fault which he reprobates so strongly
in others. What is the dexterous management of the more inartificial
historians of Christianity, in exaggerating the numbers of the martyrs,
compared to the unfair address with which Gibbon here quietly dismisses
from the account all the horrible and excruciating tortures which fell
short of death? The reader may refer to the xiith chapter (book
viii.) of Eusebius for the description and for the scenes of these
tortures.--M.]

[Footnote 182: Eusebius de Martyr. Palestin. c. 13. He closes his
narration by assuring us that these were the martyrdoms inflicted in
Palestine, during the whole course of the persecution. The 9th chapter
of his viiith book, which relates to the province of Thebais in Egypt,
may seem to contradict our moderate computation; but it will only lead
us to admire the artful management of the historian. Choosing for the
scene of the most exquisite cruelty the most remote and sequestered
country of the Roman empire, he relates that in Thebais from ten to one
hundred persons had frequently suffered martyrdom in the same day. But
when he proceeds to mention his own journey into Egypt, his language
insensibly becomes more cautious and moderate. Instead of a large, bu