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what was considered useful and necessary for them they put in a safe place and kept, but what was otherwise superfluous and useless they handed over to the superstitious as a memorial of shame. 8.4 And the wondrous emperor did this too: for as the precious material of the dead idols was plundered in the manner described, he went after the remaining statues made of bronze. And so these gods of myths, prisoners, were led away, wrapped in cloths of aged hair, and in addition to these the great emperor, as if kindling some bright torch, lest any hidden remnant of error should escape him, looked about with the royal eye; 8.5 and as some sky-soaring eagle, sharpest-sighted of birds, might see from on high the things most distant upon the earth, so he himself, attending to the royal hearth of his own fair city, perceived from a distance a terrible snare for souls lying hidden among the nation of the Phoenicians. This was a grove and a sacred precinct, not in the midst of cities nor in market-places and public squares, such as are often ambitiously provided in cities for the sake of adornment, 8.6 but it was outside the beaten path of crossroads and highways, established for the foul demon Aphrodite on a part of the summit of Lebanon. This was a school of wickedness for all the licentious who with great ease corrupted their bodies; for instance, certain effeminate men, not men, who had denied the dignity of their nature, propitiated the demon with a feminine disease, and then unlawful intercourse of women, and secret seductions, and unspeakable and infamous acts were practiced in this temple as in a lawless and unguarded place. And there was no detective of the deeds done, since no decent person dared to go near there. 8.7 But the deeds done there were not able to escape the great emperor, and having seen these things for himself, with imperial foresight he judged that such a temple was not worthy of the sun's rays, and he orders the whole thing, including the dedicated offerings, to be annihilated from its foundations. So it was destroyed; at once by the emperor's command the contrivances of licentious error, and a military hand ministered to the cleansing of the place, and those who had been licentious until then learned to be sober through the emperor's threat. 8.8 But indeed, after the emperor had thus made manifest to all the phantoms of people-deceiving wickedness, he proclaimed his own Savior to all, and there was no one to help or defend the captured, no demon, no god, no oracle-monger, no prophet. For no longer did the souls of men wallow in shadowy darkness, but being enlightened by the rays of unerring piety, they reproached their own ancestors for ignorance and pitied them for their blindness, and they declared themselves blessed as having been freed from a terrible error. 8.9 Thus then, in a short time, by the counsel of the great God and the ministry of the emperor, the whole race of visible and invisible enemies and foes was destroyed, and henceforth a good and nurturing peace took possession of the entire dwelling-place of men, and there were no longer wars, when there were no gods, nor yet battles in the country and in the cities, such as there were before when the affairs of demons flourished, and no longer were there effusions of blood among men, as when the madness of polytheism was at its height. 9.1 It was time, then, to compare the new things with the old and to consider the turn toward better things from the juxtaposition of the worse, and to discern and see how in old times vestibules and precincts and groves and sanctuaries in every city were laboriously adorned by them, and the temples were crowned with very many dedications. 9.2 And there was much talk of gods among the tyrants of that time, and nations and peoples in the country and in every place and even in their houses, in their own storerooms and chambers, honored their ancestral rites with altars and images, but the fruit of their piety was not the peace with one another which is now seen with our eyes, but all things contrary to these: wars and battles and seditions; by which they were worn down throughout their whole life, and filled their own countries with blood and civil slaughters. 9.3 And those in turn honored by them, prophecies on the one hand and

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λυσιτελὲς ὅσον αὐτοῖς ἀναγκαῖον ἐνομίζετο ἐν ἀσφαλεῖ τιθέμενοι συνεῖχον, τὸ δ' ἄλλως περιττὸν καὶ ἄχρηστον εἰς μνήμην αἰσχύνης παρεχώρουν τοῖς δεισιδαίμοσιν. 8.4 οἷον δὲ καὶ τόδ' ἔρεξε βασιλεὺς ὁ θαυμάσιος· ὡς γὰρ καὶ τῶν νεκρῶν εἰδώλων τὰ τῆς πολυτελοῦς ὕλης τὸν ἀποδοθέντα τρόπον ἐσκυλεύετο, τὰ λοιπὰ μετῄει ἀνδρείκελα χαλκοῦ πεποιημένα. δέσμιοι δῆτα καὶ οἵδε μύθων θεοὶ γεγηρακότων τριχῶν ὑφάσμασιν ἤγοντο περιβληθέντες, κἀπὶ τούτοις ὁ μέγας βασιλεὺς ὥσπερ τινὰ πολυφεγγῆ πυρσὸν ἐξάψας, μή πη λανθάνοι κρύφιόν τι πλάνης λείψανον, ὄμματι βασιλικῷ περιεσκόπει· 8.5 οἷα δέ τις οὐρανοπετὴς ἀετῶν ὀξυωπέστατος ἄνωθεν ἀφ' ὑψηλοῦ τὰ πορρωτάτω διεστῶτα κατὰ γῆς ἴδοι, ὧδε καὶ αὐτὸς τῆς αὐτοῦ καλλιπόλεως τὴν βασιλικὴν ἀμφιπολεύων ἑστίαν, δεινόν τι ψυχῶν θήρατρον ἐπὶ τοῦ Φοινίκων λανθάνον ἔθνους ἐξ ἀπόπτου συνεῖδεν. ἄλσος δὲ τοῦτ' ἦν καὶ τέμενος, οὐκ ἐν μέσαις πόλεσιν οὐδ' ἐν ἀγοραῖς καὶ πλατείαις, ὁποῖα τὰ πολλὰ κόσμου χάριν ταῖς πόλεσι φιλοτιμεῖται, 8.6 τὸ δὲ ἦν ἔξω πάτου τριόδων τε καὶ λεωφόρων αἰσχρῷ δαίμονι Ἀφροδίτης ἐπ' ἀκρωρείας μέρει τοῦ Λιβάνου καθιδρυμένον. σχολή τις ἦν αὕτη κακοεργίας ἅπασιν ἀκολάστοις πολλῇ τε ῥᾳστώνῃ διεφθορόσι τὰ σώματα· γύννιδες γοῦν τινες ἄνδρες οὐκ ἄνδρες τὸ σεμνὸν τῆς φύσεως ἀπαρνησάμενοι θηλείᾳ νόσῳ τὴν δαίμονα ἱλεοῦντο, γυναικῶν τε αὖ παράνομοι ὁμιλίαι, κλεψίγαμοί τε φθοραί, ἄρρητοί τε καὶ ἐπίρρητοι πράξεις ὡς ἐν ἀνόμῳ καὶ ἀπροστάτῃ χώρῳ κατὰ τόνδε τὸν νεὼν ἐπεχειροῦντο. φώρ τε οὐδεὶς ἦν τῶν πραττομένων, τῷ μηδένα σεμνῶν αὐτόθι τολμᾶν παριέναι. 8.7 ἀλλ' οὐχὶ καὶ βασιλέα τὸν μέγαν οἷα τε ἦν τὰ τῇδε δρώμενα λανθάνειν, αὐτοπτήσας δὲ ταῦτα βασιλικῇ προμηθείᾳ οὐκ ἄξιον εἶναι ἡλίου αὐγῶν τὸν τοιόνδε νεὼν ἔκρινεν, αὐτοῖς δὲ ἀφιερώμασιν ἐκ βάθρων τὸ πᾶν ἀφανισθῆναι κελεύει. ἐλύετο δῆτα· αὐτίκα βασιλικῷ νεύματι τὰ τῆς ἀκολάστου πλάνης μηχανήματα, χείρ τε στρατιωτικὴ τῇ τοῦ τόπου καθάρσει διηκονεῖτο, σωφρονεῖν δ' ἐμάνθανον ἀπειλῇ βασιλέως οἱ μέχρι τοῦδε ἀκόλαστοι. 8.8 ἀλλὰ γὰρ ὧδε καὶ τὰ τῆς λαοπλάνου φάσματα κακίας ἐμφανῆ τοῖς πᾶσι καταστησάμενος βασιλεύς, τὸν αὐτοῦ σωτῆρα τοῖς πᾶσιν ἀνεκήρυττεν, οὐκ ἦν τε ἀρωγὸς οὐδεὶς οὐδ' ἐπαμύνων τοῖς ἑαλωκόσιν, οὐ δαίμων, οὐ θεός, οὐ χρησμῳδός, οὐ μάντις. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἔτι σκοτίῳ ζόφῳ αἱ τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἐκαλινδοῦντο ψυχαί, θεοσεβείας δὲ ἀπλανοῦς ἀκτῖσι πεφωτισμέναι τοῖς μὲν αὐτῶν προπάτορσι κατεμέμφοντο ἀγνωσίαν ἠλέουν τε αὐτοὺς τῆς ἀβλεψίας, σφᾶς δὲ αὐτὰς μακαρίας ἀπέφαινον ὡς ἂν δεινῆς ἠλευθερωμέναι πλάνης. 8.9 οὕτω δῆτα ἐν βραχεῖ θεοῦ μεγάλου βουλῇ βασιλέως τε ὑπουργίᾳ πᾶν τὸ τῶν ἐχθρῶν καὶ πολεμίων ὁρωμένων τε καὶ ἀφανῶν ἀνῄρητο γένος, εἰρήνη τε λοιπὸν ἀγαθὴ καὶ κουροτρόφος τὸ πάντων ἀνθρώπων διελάμβανεν οἰκητήριον, καὶ οὐκέτ' ἦσαν πόλεμοι, ὅτε μηδὲ θεοί, ἀλλ' οὐδὲ μάχαι κατ' ἀγροὺς καὶ κατὰ πόλεις, οἷαι τὸ πρὶν ὅτε τὰ δαιμόνων ἐπήνθει, καὶ οὐκέθ' αἱμάτων παρ' ἀνθρώποις ἐκχύσεις, ὡς ὅτε τὰ τῆς πολυθέου μανίας ἤκμαζεν. 9.1 Ὥρα δ' οὖν τὰ νέα τοῖς παλαιοῖς ἀντιπαραβάλλειν καὶ τὴν ἐπὶ τὰ κρείττω ῥοπὴν ἐκ τῆς τῶν χειρόνων ἀντιπαραθέσεως ἐπισκοπεῖν, διακρίνειν τε καὶ συνορᾶν ὡς πάλαι μὲν πρόπυλα καὶ τε μένη ἄλση τε καὶ ἱερὰ κατὰ πᾶσαν πόλιν αὐτοῖς φιλοπόνως ἐξησκεῖτο ἀναθήμασί τε πάνυ πολλοῖς ἐστεφανοῦντο οἱ ναοί. 9.2 καὶ θεῶν μὲν πολὺς ἦν ὁ παρὰ τοῖς τότε τυράννοις λόγος, ἔθνη τε καὶ δῆμοι κατ' ἀγροὺς καὶ κατὰ πάντα τόπον ἤδη τε κατ' οἴκους ἐν αὐτοῖς αὐτῶν ταμείοις τε καὶ θαλάμοις βωμοῖς καὶ ἀγάλμασιν ἐτίμων τὰ πάτρια, τῆς δ' εὐσεβείας αὐτοῖς ὁ καρπὸς οὐ τὰ νῦν ὀφθαλμοῖς ὁρώμενα τῆς πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὑπῆρχεν εἰρήνης, πάντα δὲ τἀναντία τούτοις, πόλεμοι καὶ μάχαι καὶ στάσεις· αἷς διὰ παντὸς τοῦ βίου κατατριβόμενοι αἵμασι καὶ φόνοις ἐμφυλίοις τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐπλήρουν χώρας. 9.3 οἱ τ' αὖ πρὸς αὐτῶν τιμώμενοι μαντείας μὲν καὶ