nd fourth books of his life. He was
accustomed to say, that whether Christ was preached in pretence, or in
truth, he should still rejoice, (l. iii. c. 58.)]

[Footnote 73: M. de Tillemont (Hist. des Empereurs, tom. iv. p. 374,
616) has defended, with strength and spirit, the virgin purity of
Constantinople against some malevolent insinuations of the Pagan
Zosimus.]

[Footnote 74: The author of the Histoire Politique et Philosophique
des deux Indes (tom. i. p. 9) condemns a law of Constantine, which gave
freedom to all the slaves who should embrace Christianity. The emperor
did indeed publish a law, which restrained the Jews from circumcising,
perhaps from keeping, any Christian slave. (See Euseb. in Vit. Constant.
l. iv. c. 27, and Cod. Theod. l. xvi. tit. ix., with Godefroy's
Commentary, tom. vi. p. 247.) But this imperfect exception related only
to the Jews, and the great body of slaves, who were the property of
Christian or Pagan masters, could not improve their temporal condition
by changing their religion. I am ignorant by what guides the Abbe Raynal
was deceived; as the total absence of quotations is the unpardonable
blemish of his entertaining history.]

[Footnote 75: See Acta S Silvestri, and Hist. Eccles. Nicephor. Callist.
l. vii. c. 34, ap. Baronium Annal. Eccles. A. D. 324, No. 67, 74.
Such evidence is contemptible enough; but these circumstances are in
themselves so probable, that the learned Dr. Howell (History of the
World, vol. iii. p. 14) has not scrupled to adopt them.]

[Footnote 76: The conversion of the Barbarians under the reign of
Constantine is celebrated by the ecclesiastical historians. (See
Sozomen, l. ii. c. 6, and Theodoret, l. i. c. 23, 24.) But Rufinus, the
Latin translator of Eusebius, deserves to be considered as an original
authority. His information was curiously collected from one of the
companions of the Apostle of Aethiopia, and from Bacurius, an Iberian
prince, who was count of the domestics. Father Mamachi has given an
ample compilation on the progress of Christianity, in the first and
second volumes of his great but imperfect work.]

[Footnote 76a: According to the Georgian chronicles, Iberia (Georgia)
was converted by the virgin Nino, who effected an extraordinary cure on
the wife of the king Mihran. The temple of the god Aramazt, or Armaz,
not far from the capital Mtskitha, was destroyed, and the cross erected
in its place. Le Beau, i. 202, with St. Martin's Notes. ----St.