and should pro- hibit the public disturbance and profanation of the Christian Sabbath, and protect the Christians in their right and duty of its proper observance. Constantino in 321 forbade the sitting of courts and all secular labor in towns on " the venerable day of the sun," as he expresses himself, perhaps with reference at once to the sun-god, Apollo, and to Christ, the true ^un of righteousness; to his pagan and his Christian subjects. But he distinctly permitted the culture of farms and vineyards in the country, because frequently this could be attended to on no other day so well;* though one would suppose that the hard-working peasantry were the very ones who most needed the day of rest. Soon afterward, in June, 321, he allowed the inanumission of slaves on Sunday ; ^ as this, being an act of benevolence, was different from ordinary business, and might be altogether appropriate to the day of resurrection and redemption. According to Eusebius, Constantino also ' "The rash violence of despotism," says even Gibbon, "was suspended by the mild interposition of the church ; and the lives or fortunes of the most eminent sub- jects might be protected by the mediation of the bishop." • This exception is entirely unnoticed by many church histories, but stands in the same law of 321 in the Cod. Justin, lib. iii. tit. 12, de feriis, 1. 3: "Omnes ju- dices, urbansque plebes, et cunctarum artium ofBcia venerabili die Solis quiescant. Ruri tamen positi agrorum culturae libere licenterque inserviant : quoniam frequen- ter evenit, ut non aptius alio die frumenta sulcis, aut vineae scrobibus mandcr.tur, ne occasione moment! pereat commoditas coelesti provisione concessa." Such woik ■wa? formerly permitted, too, on the pagan feast days. Comp. Virgil. Georg. i. v. 263 sqq. Cato, De re rust. c. 2. ^ Cod. Theodos. lib. ii. tit. 8. 1. 1 : " Emancipandi et manimiittendi die festo cuncti licentiam habeant, et super his rebus actus non prohibeantur." 106 THIKD PEEIOD. A.D. 311-o90. prohibited all military exercises on Sunday, and at the same time enjoined the observance of Friday in memory of the death of Christ/ JS^ay, he went so far, in well-meaning but mistaken zeal, as to require of his soldiers, even the ]Dagan ones, the positive observance of Sunday, by pronouncing at a signal the follow- ing prayer, which they mechanically learned : " Thee alone we acknowledge as God ; thee we confess as king ; to thee we call as our heljDer ; from thee we have received victories ; through thee we have conquered enemies. Thee we thank for good received ; from thee we hope for good to come. Thee we all most humbly beseech to keep our Constantine and his God-fearing sons through long life healthy and victorious." " Though this formula was held in a deistical generalness, yet the legal injunction of it lay clearly beyond the province of the civil power, trespassed on the rights of conscience, and un- avoidably