Of the restoration of allowances to the churches; and of the Emperor's death.

Chapter IV.—Of the restoration of allowances to the churches; and of the Emperor’s death.

When the emperor had received this letter, his former knowledge of and disposition to divine things was confirmed, and he issued a second edict wherein he ordered the amount of corn which the great Constantine had appropriated to the churches to be restored. ⁶⁷⁴ For Julian, as was to be expected of one who had gone to war with our Lord and Saviour, had stopped even this maintenp. 110 ance, and since the famine which visited the empire in consequence of Julian’s iniquity prevented the collection of the contribution of Constantine’s enactment, Jovian ordered a third part to be supplied for the present, and promised that on the cessation of the famine he would give the whole.

After distinguishing the beginning of his reign by edicts of this kind, Jovian set out from Antioch for the Bosphorus; but at Dadastanæ, a village lying on the confines of Bithynia and Galatia, he died. ⁶⁷⁵ He set out on his journey from this world with the grandest and fairest support and stay, but all who had experienced the clemency of his sway were left behind in pain. So, methinks, the Supreme Ruler, to convict us of our iniquity, both shews us good things and again deprives us of them; so by the former means He teaches us how easily He can give us what He will; by the latter He convicts us of our unworthiness of it, and points us to the better life.

Footnotes

109:674

cf. III. 8 page 99.

110:675

At an obscure place called Dadastanæ, half way between Ancyra and Nicæa, after a hearty supper he went to bed in a room newly built. The plaster was still damp, and a brazier of charcoal was brought in to warm the air. In the morning he was found dead in his bed. (Amm. xxv. 10. 12. 13.) This was in February or March, 364.