Again, what were Christians in the array to do when they were ordered to take part in the arrest and even in the execution of Christian civilians during a persecution ? This task often fell to soldiers. Indeed, it was one of their temptations to harshness and extortion (see above, p. 653). Christians who desired to avoid persecution could bribe soldiers, as Tertullian implies [dc Fiiga, 12 : ' Tu autem pro eo pacisceris cun" delatore vel milite . . . quem coram toto miindo Christus emit. . . . Quid enim dicit ille concussor ? Da mihi pecuniam '). A Christian soldier would not be likely to take bribes from a cowardly Christian civilian, and it would be dangerous, if not impos- sible, for him to connive at the escape or exemp- tion of his fellow-believers. What then was he to do? Military discipline left the troops no alterna- tive but to obey such a distasteful command. And yet how could they as Christians participate in the punishment of their fellow-Christians T Eusebius describes one case, during the fierce Decian per- secution of the Church at Alexandria (EE vi. 41. 22 f. ). Four or five legionaries standing beside the tribunal attracted the attention of the court by the marks of violent disapprobation * which they made when a Christian prisoner seemed on the point of recanting. Without waiting to be arrested, ' they ran forward to the presiding magistrate and confessed proudly that they were Christians.' This encouraged the civilian Christians who were await- ing their trial. The legionaries themselves were executed ; but, as Dionysius the Alexandrian bishop, from whom Euseliius quotes the story, is careful to add, their martyrdom was a triumph for their God {dpiai-ifievovTo^ ai)rot>s Ivbb^w^ tov deov ; cf. 2 Co 2"). Half a century earlier, when Perpetua and Felicitas were tortured to a horrible death at Carthage in A.D. 20.3, a humane soldier, Pudens, who was in charge of them was so impressed by
* Rufinus, in translating this, expands it, in order to suggest that they tried by signs to encourage the hesitating prisoner.
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their conduct that he became a Christian [Pds.^io S. Perpetuw, 9, 16). Whctlicr he remained a soldier or not, we are not intHrmed. lie «as by nature a kind man, like .lulius tlic (itliccr wlio had charge of St. Paul (see above, p. (i.'iIJ), but I'uib'us advanced from humane feeling to faith. He did not suH'er with the two women and Saturus, how- ever. The i'rt.Mfo closes with Saturus, on the eve of liis own death, encouraging Pudens to believe with all his heart. There is no claim made that he came forward to seal bis confession along.side of his prisoners. But this infectidus courage .some- times caught up a soldier. When Potamiiena, the beautiful girl-martyr of Alexandria, was being led away to be bnrned, e.g. (Ens. 11 K vi. 5), the Roman ofiicer who was in charge of the prisoner chivalrously protected her from the coarse violence of the mob. In gratitude for his kimlncss, slie told him that she would ask her God, after she died, to reward him. Sliortly afterwards liasilides, the oHicer, declined to take one of the usual military oaths on the ground that he was a Christian. He attributed his conversion to visions of the woman whom be had watched dying for her Lord, and was beheaded for his own confession. Another case occurred during the Decian persecution at Ale.xandria {Ens. HE vi. 41. 16), when a soldier called Besas checked the riotous mob round the martyrs and was beheaded prom]itly. The proba- bility is that he was already a Christian, like bis live fellow-soldiers of the Second Trajan legion (see above), but tlie story leaves it a fair question whether he was not suddenly converted by the bearing of the prisoners.
Another case may be selected. Writing in A.D. 250-251 {Ep. 39), Cyprian w'armly commends Cele- rinus as ' the leader in the battle of our own day, the foremost of Christ's soldiers to advance (ante- signiiints) ,' * a man who, although racked and tortured, defeated the devil his enemy by his con- stancy. He had prevailed, says Lucian, one of his Carthaginian friends (Cj'prian, Ep. 22), 'against the chief Snake, the quartermaster {metatorem) of antichrist' — the nietntores (cf. Lipsius, op. cit., p. 300 f.) being the advance-party who laid out the camp.
Cj'prian'a comment is : *In the case of a servant of God, the glory of the wounds constitutes a victory.' Celerinus came, on botli sides of his family, from a military household. Not only had his grandmother been a martyr, but 'his two uncles, on the father's and the mother's side, Laurentius and Egiialius, once fought themselves in the armies of the world, and, true, spiritual soldiers of God as they were, overthrew the de\ il by confessing Christ, thereby winning palms and crowns from the Lord.'
These two Christian soldiers had not renounced their profession. Tliey sufi'ered rather thiin re- nounce Christ, but at the time of their martyrdom they were still in the army.
The difficulty of reconciling Christianity with military service also met recruits. One case has been preserved, which occurred in 295 in Numidia, where a certain Maximilianus, the son of a veteran, declined to enlist on the ground that he was a Christian : ' I cannot tight, for I .am a Christian.' Militare is for him the same thing as malcfacerc. ' Non milito saeculo sed milito deo meo.' In spite of all threats the youth refused to do his duty, and the recruiting .authorities, who beh.aved with considerable patience, had no alternative except to order bis execution forrlis!oyalty(Ruinart, p. 340 f.). He is reminded that there are Christians already in the army, but tliat does not remove his scruples : ' Ipsi sciunt quod ipsis expediat.'