Constantia

“ She listened, therefore, with unspeakable eagerness to this reciter, who detailed to her, as the occasion suggested, the progress of action and opinion on the theatre of France and Poland. Conceived and rehearsed as this was with the energy and copiousness of one who sustained a part in the scene, the mind of Constantia was always kept at the pitch of curiosity and wonder. ”

“ Constantia, the Emperor's favorite sister, who had always been strongly in favor of the Arians, became very ill. The priest who attended her on her deathbed, a friend and tool of Eusebius of Nicomedia, induced her to persuade Constantine, who visited her continually during her illness, that Arius and his friends had been unjustly condemned and that the judgment of God would fall on him and his empire in consequence. ”

“ Not many years afterwards, Constantia, the daughter of the Emperor Constantine, suffering from a long and painful disease, for which she found no relief, heard of the marvellous vision, and was told of many wonderful cures that had been wrought at the tomb and by the intercession of the youthful Saint. ”

“ She entertained but slight hopes that an instrument scarcely known among her neighbours would be bought at any price, however inconsiderable.
She found the keeper of the shop engaged in conversation with a lady, whose person and face instantly arrested the attention of Constantia. A less sagacious observer would have eyed the stranger with indifference. But Constantia was ever busy in interpreting the language of features and looks. ”

“ Prince Constantio was changed into a pigeon, and the Princess Constantia into a dove, because they loved, but were always crossed in love. Constantio found that Constantia was sold by his mother for a slave, and in order to follow her, he was converted into a pigeon. Constantia was seized by a giant, and in order to escape him was changed into a dove. Cupid then took them to Paphos, and they became “examples of a tender and sincere passion; and ever since have been the emblems of love and constancy.”—Comtesse D’Aunoy, Fairy Tales (“The Pigeon and Dove,” 1682) . ”

“ A fog filled the outer world, poured in through the windows, laid a clammy touch on everything. Firelight had done much the night before to redeem the squalor of the room; this morning, daylight showed it in all its 243cold and grisly reality. And where was Constantia? Where was Levi? ”

“ There was also Constantine’s half-sister, Constantia, the widow of Licinius, whose intercession with her brother had secured for her defeated husband an ill-kept promise of pardon and protection. Constantia was to exhibit even more striking proof of her influence a little later on by her skilful advocacy of the cause of Arius and Eusebius of Nicomedia, and her share in procuring the banishment of Athanasius. These great ladies move in shadowy outline across the stage; we can scarcely distinguish their features or their form ”

“ In later years, when Constantine had become the arbiter of the theological disputes which rent the newly established Church and had banished Arius for his heresy, Constantia again acted the part of peacemaker and, on her deathbed, warned the emperor to "consider well lest he should incur the wrath of God and suffer great temporal calamities, since he had been induced to condemn good men to perpetual banishment." ”

“ When her strength was somewhat retrieved, Constantia called to mind a good woman who lived in her former neighbourhood, and from whom she had received many proofs of artless affection. This woman's name was Sarah Baxter. She lived within a small distance of Constantia's former dwelling. The trade of her husband was that of a porter, and she pursued, in addition to the care of a numerous family, the business of a laundress. The superior knowledge and address of Constantia had enabled her to be serviceable to this woman in certain painful and perplexing circumstances. ”

“ Go on cheerfully in the glorious course you have undertaken, and you will quickly find such a peace and satisfaction in your mind which it is not in the power of the world to give.”
Constantia’s heart was so elevated within the discourse of Father Francis, that the very next day she entered upon her vow. As soon as the solemnities of her reception were over, she retired, as it is usual, with the abbess into her own apartment. ”

“ These efforts to render his calamity tolerable, and inure him to the profiting by his own resources, were aided by time, and when reconciled by habit to unrespited gloom, he was sometimes visited by gleams of cheerfulness, and drew advantageous comparisons between his present and former situation. A stillness, not unakin to happiness, frequently diffused itself over their winter evenings. Constantia enjoyed in their full extent the felicities of health and self approbation. ”

“ To those whose lives have been blameless, but harassed by inquietudes to which not their own but the errors of others have given birth, a fortress will hereafter be assigned unassailable by change, impregnable to sorrow.
"O my ill-fated Constantia! I will live to cherish thy remembrance, and to emulate thy virtue. I will endure the privation of thy friendship and the vicissitudes that shall befall me, and draw my consolation and courage from the foresight of no distant close to this terrestrial scene, and of ultimate and everlasting union with thee." ”

“ Zosimus and the heathen historians make it an instance of the emperor's faithlessness (Zos. ii. 28; Victor, Epit. l.c.; Eutrop. Brev. x. 6) , as does also the chronicle of Jerome (ann. 2339. "Licinius Thessalonicae contra jus sacramenti privatus occiditur") . Yet apparently Constantia did not resent the execution of her husband, nor Fausta the death of her father. Constantine was thus master of the whole empire, and his first act was to issue edicts of toleration and favour to the Christians of the East (V. C. ii. 24 seq., cited as Provincialibus Palestinae and 48 seq. Prov. Orientis) . ”

“ He placed his testament in the hands of the presbyter who constantly extolled Arius, and who had been recommended to him as a man of virtuous life by his sister Constantia in her last moments, and commanded him with an added oath to deliver it to Constantius on his return, for neither Constantius nor the other Cæsars were with their dying father. ”

“ A complex theme is ably dealt with and the incidents follow each other rapidly; the scene lies alternately in Rome and on the battle-field. The Emperor Constantine is bent on opposing the incursions of the Scythians, and his general Gallicanus claims the hand of the emperor’s daughter Constantia as a reward for undertaking so dangerous an expedition. Constantia is a convert to Christianity, Gallicanus is a heathen. ”

“ It will be little more than a biographical sketch, in which the facts are distributed and amplified, not as a poetical taste would prescribe, but as the materials afforded me, sometimes abundant and sometimes scanty, would permit.
Constantia, like all the beings made known to us, not by fancy, but experience, has numerous defects. You will readily perceive that her tale is told by her friend ”

“ They are always sad and somebody dies in every one of them. I asked her once why she didn't do a funny one for a change, but she said that wasn't what you wrote poetry for. She said there were funny enough things really happening every day without the trouble of making them up in poetry, and of course that is so.
All during Lent, Constantia never ate her desert once It was the Sunday after she said the apostles were full of wind that she wrote the poem, and then she told me that Aunt Isabel was the only one that hadn't laughed at her. ”

“ Josephine had had a moment of absolute terror at the cemetery, while the coffin was lowered, to think that she and Constantia had done this thing without asking his permission. What would father say when he found out? For he was bound to find out sooner or later. He always did. “Buried. You two girls had me buried!” She heard his stick thumping. Oh, what would they say? What possible excuse could they make? It sounded such an appallingly heartless thing to do. Such a wicked advantage to take of a person because he happened to be helpless at the moment. ”

“ This fact is attested by another letter, which the emperor wrote in acknowledgment, in which, having heard that the city Constantia in our country, the inhabitants of which had been more than commonly devoted to superstition, had been impelled by a sense of religion to abandon their past idolatry, he testified his joy, and approval of their conduct.
Footnotes ↑ [The parchment copies were usually arranged in quaternions, i.e. four leaves made up together, as the ternions consisted of three leaves. The quaternions each contained sixteen pages, the ternions twelve (Valesius in loc.) .—Bag.] ”

“ Constantius was a little, mean-looking man, but he dressed himself up to do his part as Emperor. He had swarms of attendants like any Eastern prince, most of them slaves, who waited on him as if he was perfectly helpless. He had his face painted, and was covered with gold embroidery and jewels on all state occasions, and he used to stand like a statue to be looked at, never winking an eyelid, nor moving his hand, nor doing anything to remind people that he was a man like themselves. He was timid and jealous, and above all others, he dreaded his young cousin Julian, the only relation he had. ”

“ The son of Constantius, Constantine, became emperor in 307. He was in doubt between the two religions; he saw that Christianity made people good, and yet he could not quite leave off believing in the heathen gods, and was afraid of neglecting them. As he was passing the Alps to put down a very powerful and cruel tyrant, who had made himself master of Italy, he and all his army suddenly beheld in the sky, at mid-day, a bright light shaped like a cross, and in glorious letters round it, the Latin words meaning, "In this sign thou shalt conquer." ”

“ XV Not long after, when the German armies were withdrawing from the defence of Gaul, JULIAN was made emperor by the unanimous consent of the army, and, after the lapse of a year, went to take the government of Illyricum, while Constantius was engaged in the war with Parthia. Constantius, hearing what had occurred, and returning to the civil strife, died on his march between Cilicia and Cappadocia, in the thirty-eighth year of his reign, and the forty-fifth of his age, and was deservedly enrolled among the gods. ”

“ Constantius was thus adopted by Maximian, and Galerius by Diocletian, (Mar. 1, A.D. 292) . Each being obliged to repudiate his wife and marry the daughter of his adopted father, Constantius separated from Helena, the daughter of an innkeeper, who was not his legal wife but was mother of Constantine the Great, and married Theodora, stepdaughter of Maximian, by whom he had six children. As his share of the empire, Constantius received the provinces Gaul, Spain, and Britain. ”

“ To the second, Constantius, were assigned the rich provinces of the East, including the seaboard provinces of Asia Minor, together with Syria and Egypt. Constans, the youngest, received as his share Italy, Illyria, and Africa. But there was still a goodly heritage left over, sufficient to make a handsome dowry for a favourite daughter. This was Constantina, eldest of the three daughters of Constantine and Fausta, and she had been married to her half-cousin, Annibalianus, whose father had been the second son of Constantius Chlorus and Theodora. ”

“ The empire had fulfilled its mission. Christianity was born, protected, and rendered triumphant. Nothing more was wanted than the conversion of the barbarians to the new faith before desolation should overspread the world—and a State prepared for new ideas, passions, and interests.
The heirs of Constantine. Constantine left three sons and two daughters, by Fausta, the daughter of Maximian,—Constantine, Constantius, Constans, Constantina, and Helena. The imperial dignity was enjoyed by the sons, and the youngest daughter, Helena, married the emperor Julian, grandson of Constantius Chlorus. ”

“ The empire being thus divided, Constantius who appeared to take pains not to fall short of his father in impiety, began by shedding the blood of his nearest relations. He first caused Constantius, his father’s brother, to be murdered by the soldiers; next to whom he treated Dalmatius in the same manner, as also Optatus whom Constantine had raised to the rank of a Nobilissimate. Constantine indeed first introduced that order, and made a law, that every Nobilissimate should have precedence over the prefects of the court. ”

“ From such a contrast, what other deduction could be drawn than that the god of Constantius was the deity for Constantius’s son to honour? Constantine resolved that it would be folly to waste time or thought upon deities who were of no account (περὶ τούς μηδὲν ὄντας θεοὺς) . He would worship no other god than the god of his father.
Such, according to Eusebius, is the first phase of the Emperor’s conversion, a conviction not of sin, but of the folly of worshipping gods who cannot or will not do anything for their votaries. ”

“ The three sons of Constantine, among whom, by will, he divided the Empire, were adherents of the Christian religion; but Constantius, who soon became the sole ruler, though a weighty factor in the evolution of the Church's doctrine, was no very edifying example of the moral effect of her teaching. His jealousy and implacability almost exterminated the race of Constantine, numerously represented as that sturdy emperor had left himself. The closest ties of relationship did not avail to save the lives of those who might stand in the way of the new ruler's ambitions. ”

“ Constantius was long in the island, and his son, Constantine the Great is said to have first drawn breath upon our soil. Both Constans and Magnentius were here. Theodosius the Emperor fought under his father in Britain. Maximus, who had previously married a British lady, was invested by his soldiers with the purple at York—How comes it that so many of those who boasted of the mastery of this wide world, were induced personally to visit this little isle?—how was it, but that
Coming events cast their shadows before. ”