Valerianus was overcome by the Persians, and made use of by Sapor as a slirmp for his foot when lie Avent to take horse.
Julian, in his height of contempt against Christ, was deadly wounded in battle against the Persians, and throwing his blood in the air, died with that despei'ate expression in his mouth, Vicisti tandem GalilceeA
Valentius, being a great favourer of the Arians, and a great per- secutor of the orthodox — the Arians exceeding the heathens in cruelty — was in battle against the Goths in Thracia wounded, and being carried to a house that was near, it was set on fire by the enemy, in which he miserably perished.
Maxentius and his chief officers being put to flight on the other side of the river Tiber, by Constantine, was necessitated to return by a bridge, whereupon he had made devices in a secret way to have drowned Constantine, by which he and those that were with him were drowned in the river; 2 upon which occasion the Christians took occa- sion to sing that word, Ps. ix. 16, ' The Lord is known by the judg- ments which he executeth : the wicked is snared in the work of his own hand:' and that word, Ps. vii. 15, ' He made a pit and digged it, and he himself is fallen into it.'
Dioclesian being sent for by Constantine, upon suspicion, chose rather to poison himself than to see hira.
Maximianus Herculeus, endeavouring again to recover his authority, was discovered in his design by his daughter, Constantine's wife: whereupon he was pursued and besieged by Constantine, and was either killed, or during the siege hanged himself, as is diversely reported by several writers.
Maximinus Jovius, through intemperance, becoming corpulent, was smitten with boils in the secret parts, out of Avhich issued abundance of vermin ; his physicians were either suffocated by the odious smell of his loathsome disease, or else they were killed by him because they could not cure him. One of his physicians told him that it was God's judgment on him for persecuting the Christians, which no man could cure. At last he fell under such convictions, as forced him to confess that the wrongs and injuries that he had done to the ])eo])le of God were the cause of that plague ; and therefore being struck with terror and horror, gave out edicts that the persecution should cease, and that churches should l)e builded, and that in their meetings })rayers should be put up for him, as formerly used to be : which edict is to be found in Eusebius.3 The other tyrant in the east, to wit, ]\Iaximinus, who was called Cresar, had been industrious to invent cruel tortures for the Christians, especially to pull out their eyes ; but at last he was defeated, and in a base habit made to hide himself, and afterwards he was pursued by such a sickness which made l)oth his eyes to drop out of liis head, by which judgment he was necessitated to confess that
' Eiiseb. Hist., lib. ix. c.ip. 8. The Christians coniparod Ins destruction in the water to Pharaoh's drowning in the Red Sea. " Euseb. Hist., lib. viii. cap. 29.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 125
the God of the Christians was the only true God, and that he had been mistaken concerning the gods whom he chose to worship ; which words were uttered by him when he was even expiring, as Eusebius testifies.^ By all these dreadful instances, you may run and read that heavy vengeance that has been inflicted upon those who have shed the blood of the just.
Foelix, Earl of Wurtemburg, was a great persecutor of the saints, and did swear that ere he died he would ride up to the spurs in the blood of the Lutherans : but the very same night wherein he had thus sworn and vowed, he was choked with his own blood.
The judgments of God were so famous and frequent upon those that did shed the blood of the saints in Bohemia, that it was used as a proverb among the adversaries themselves, That if any man be weary of his life, let him but attempt against the Picardines — so they called the Christians — and he should not live a year to an end.
Sir Thomas More, once Lord Chancellor of England, was a sworn enemy to the gospel, and persecuted the saints with fire and faggot ; and among all his praises he reckons this as the chiefest — that he had been a persecutor_of the Lutherans, i.e., the saints. But what became of him ? he was i^rst accused of treason, and then condemned, and at last beheaded.
Judge Morgan was a great persecutor of the people of God ; but shortly after he had passed the sentence of condemnation upon that virtuous lady, the Lady Jane Grey, he fell mad, and in his mad raving fits, he would continually cry out, ' Take away the Lady Jane, take away the Lady Jane from me ! ' and in that horror he ended his wretched life.
Drahomiza, after the death of her husband, usurped the government of Bohemia, and was a cruel persecutor of the people of God ; but by a righteous hand of God it so fell out, that on that very place where the ministers' bones lay unburied, the earth opened of itself, and swal- lowed her up alive with her chariot, and those that were in it ; which place is now to be seen before the castle of Prague. There is no end of instances of a later date. But,
[7.j Seventhly, The strange, miraculous, and iconderful preservation of the lives and blood of the just, speaks out their blood to be precious blood.2 Who can sum up the many miracles of divine love, power, wisdom, and care, &c., that God manifested in the preservation of Joseph in the prison, Jeremiah in the dungeon, Daniel in the den, and the three children in the fiery furnace, and not say. Surely the blood of the saints is very precious in the eyes of the Lord ? I have read of a certain witch that sent her spirits to kill Ambrose ; but they returned her this answer, that God had hedged him in, as he did Job, and there- fore they could not touch him, they could not hurt him. Another came with a drawn sword to his bedside to have killed him, but he could not stir his hand, till, repenting, he was by the prayer of Ambrose restored to the use of his hand again. For Luther, saith my author,
^ Euseb. de vita Constantini, lib. ii. cap. 52.
^ Hesiod speaks of thirty thousand demi-gods that were keepers of men; but what are so many thousand gods to that one God, that neither slumbers nor sleeps, but d;iy and night keeps his people as the apple of his eye, Zeph. v. 8 ; as his jewels, Mai. iii. 17 ; that keeps them in his pavilion, as a prince his favourite ? Ps. xxxi. 20.
1-26 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 2r>.
a poor friar, to slaud it out ngnin.st the pope and all the power of Home, was a great miracle; and tliat he should prevail against all that power, was greater ; and that after all he should die in his bed, was the greatest of all. There are many thousand instances more of the like nature, but enough is as good as a feast.