lerius in 307 granted
some slight indulgence to the Christians without wholly stopping
the persecution. But all favour was again withdrawn from them by his
successor Maximin, who had indeed misgoverned Egypt for some years,
under the title of Caesar, before the rank of Augustus was granted to
him. He encouraged private informers, he set townsman against townsman;
and, as the wishes of the emperor are quickly understood by all under
him, those who wished for his favour courted it by giving him an excuse
for his cruelties. The cities sent up petitions to him, begging that the
Christians might not be allowed to have churches within their walls. The
history of these reigns indeed is little more than the history of the
persecutions; and when the Alexandrian astronomers, dropping the era of
Augustus, began to date from the first year of Diocletian, the Christian
writers in the same way dated from the Era of the Martyrs.

It can be no matter of surprise to us that, in a persecution which
threatened all classes of society, there should have been many who, when
they were accused of being Christians, wanted the courage to undergo
the pains of martyrdom, and escaped the punishment by joining in a pagan
sacrifice. When the storm was blown over, these men again asked to be
received into the Church, and their conduct gave rise to the very
same quarrel that had divided the Christians in the reign of Decius.
Meletius, a bishop of the Thebaid, was at the head of the party who
would make no allowance for the weakness of their brethren, and who
refused to grant to the repentant the forgiveness that they asked for.
He had himself borne the same trials without bending, he had been
sent as a criminal to work in the Egyptian mines, and had returned to
Alexandria from his banishment, proud of his sufferings and furious
against those who had escaped through cowardice. But the larger part of
the bishops were of a more forgiving nature; they could not all boast of
the same constancy, and the repentant Christians were re-admitted
into communion with the faithful, while the followers of Meletius were
branded with the name of heretics.

In Alexandria, Meletius soon found another and, as it proved, a more
memorable occasion for the display of his zeal. He has the unenviable
honour of being the author of the great Arian quarrel, by accusing of
heresy Arius, at that time a presbyter of the church of Baucala near
Alexandria, and by calling upon Alexand