§ 7. THE DOWNFALL OF HEAT/i>:ivISM. 67
edict, wliicli questioned the existence of heathens.' But in the first place, sucli laws, in the tlien critical condition of the empire amidst the confusion of the great migration, especially in the West, could be but imperfectly enforced ; and in the next place, the frequent repetition of them itself proves that heathenism still had its votaries. This fact is witnessed also by various heatlien wi-iters. Zosiraus wrote his " New History," down to the year 410, imder tlie reign and at the court of thu younger Theodosius (appearing in the high office of comes and advocatus jisci, as he styles himself), in bitter prejudice against the Christian emperors. In many places the Christians, in their work of demolishing the idols, were murdered by the infuriated pagans.
Meantime, however, there was cruelty also on the Christian side. One of the last instances of it was the terrible tragedy of Hypatia. This lady, a teacher of the I^eo-Platonic philoso phy in Alexandria, distinguished for her beauty, her intelligence, her learning, and her virtue, and esteemed both by Chi-istians and by heathens, was seized in the open street by the Christian populace and fanatical monks, perhaps not without the connivance of the violent bishop Cyril, thrust out from her carriage, dragged to the cathedral, completely stripped, barbarously murdered with shells before the altar, and then torn to pieces and burnt, a. d. 415." Socrates, who relates this, adds : " It brought great censure both on Cyril and on the Alexandrian church."
§ 7. The Downfall of Heathenism.
The final dissolution of heathenism in the eastern empire may be dated from the middle of the fifth century. In the
' Theodos. II., in Cod. Theodos. xvi. 10, 22 : " Paganos, qui supersunt, quamquam jam nullos esse credamus, promulgatarum leguni jamdudum praescripta compescant." But between 321 and 426 appeared no less than eight laws against apostasy to heathenism ; showing tljit many nominal Christians changed their religion according to circumstances.
' Socrat. vii. 15 (who considers Cyril guilty); the letters of Synesius, a pupil of Hypatia ; and Philostorg. viii. 9. Comp. also Schruckh, vii. 45 sqq. and Wernsdorf : De Hypatia, philosopha Alex. diss. iv^. Viteb. 1748. The " Hypatia" of Charles Kingsley is a historical didactic romance, with a polemical aim against the Puseyita overvaluation of patristic Christianity.
68' THIRD PERIOD. A.D. 311-o90.
year 435 Theodosius II. commanded tbe temples to bo de Btroyed or turned into churches. There still appear some hea* theiis in civil otiice and at court so late as the beginning of the reign of Justinian I. (527-567). But this despotic emperor prohibited heathenism as a form of worship in the empire on pain of death, and in 529 abolished the last intellectual seminary of it, the philosophical school of Athens, which had stood nine Imndi-ed years. At that time just seven philosophers were teaching in that school,' the shades of the ancient seven sages of Greece, — a striking play of history, like the name of the last west-Roman emperor, E-omulus Augustus, or, in contemptuous diminutive, Augustulus, combining the names of the founder of the city and the founder of the empii'e.
In the West, heathenism maintained itself until near tlie middle of the sixth century, and even later, partly as a private religious conviction among many cultivated and aristocratic families in Rome, partly even in the full form of worship in the remote provinces and on the mountains of Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica,'' and partly in heathen customs and popular usages like the gladiatorial shows still extant in Rome in 404, and the wanton Lupercalia, a sort of heathen carnival, the feast of Lupercus, the god of herds, still celebrated with all its excesses in February, 495. But, in general, it may be said that the Graeco-Roman heathenism, as a system of worship, was buried imder the ruins of the western empire, which sunk under the Btorms of the great migration. It is remarkable that the northern barbarians labored with the same zeal in the destruction of idolatry as in the destruction of the empire, and really promoted the victory of the Christian religion. The Gothic king Alaric, on entering Rome, expressly ordered that the churches of the apostles Peter and Paul should be spared, as inviolable sanctuaries ; and he showed a humanity, which
' Darnascius of Syria, Simpliciiia of Cilicia (the most celebrated), Eulaliua of Phrygia, Priscianus of Lydia, Isidore of Gaza, Ilerraiaa, aud Diogenes. They had the courage to prefer exile to the reiuinciiition of their couvietioris, and found with King Chosroes of Persia a welcome reception, but atlcrwards returned into the Roman empire under promise of toleration. Comp. Schrockh, xvi. p. 74 sqq.
* On tlicse remains of heathenism in tlic West comp. the c.'laiions of Gieaeler [. § 79, not. 22 aud 2o ['. 2. p. a8-40. Engl. ed. of N. Yoik, i. p. 219 sq.).