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accordance with the everlasting laws of God and of right; to pay tribute to whomsoever it is due; here in Rome to Cæsar; and, wherever we are, to be loyal and quiet citizens of the state. And the reception of his religion tends to make such of us all. Whoever adopts the faith of the gospel of Jesus will be a virtuous, and holy, and devout man, and therefore, both in Rome, in Persia, and in India, and everywhere, a good subject.
'We defend not nor abet, great Emperor, the act of that holy but impetuous and passionate man, who so lately, in defiance of the imperial edict and before either remonstrance or appeal on our part, preached on the very steps of the capitol, and there committed that violence for which he hath already answered with his life. We defend him not in that; but neither do we defend, but utterly condemn and execrate the unrighteous haste, and the more than demoniac barbarity of his death. God, we rejoice in all our afflictions to believe, is over all, and the wicked, the cruel, and the unjust, shall not escape.
'Yet it must be acknowledged that there are higher duties than those which we owe to the state, even as there is a higher sovereign to whom we owe allegiance than the head of the state, whether that head be king, senate, or emperor. Man is not only a subject and a citizen, he is first of all the creature of God, and amenable to his laws. When therefore there is a conflict between the laws of God and the king, who can doubt which are to be obeyed?--'
'Who does not see,' cried Porphyrius vehemently, 'that in such principles there lurks the blackest treason? for who but themselves are to judge when the laws of the two sovereigns do thus conflict? and what law then may be promulged, but to them it may be an offence?'
'Let not the learned Porphyrius,' resumed Probus, 'rest in but a part of what I say. Let him hear the whole, and then deny the principle if he can. I say, when the law of God and the law of man are opposite the one to the other, we are not to hesit