boast of a whole series of bishops who fell victims to the storm of persecution: Fabianus [Fabian] in A.D. 250, and Cornelius in A.D. 253, probably also Lucius in A.D. 254, and Stephanus in A.D. 257. And as in Rome, so also in the provinces, whole troops of confessors and martyrs met a joyful death, not only from among the clergy, but also from among the general members of the church.--Then again, under =Gallus= (A.D. 251-253), the persecution continued, excited anew by plagues and famine, but was in many ways restricted by political embarrassment. =Valerianus= [Valerian] (A.D. 253-260), from being a favourer of the Christians, began from A.D. 257, under the influence of his favourite Macrianus, to show himself a determined persecutor. The Christian pastors were at first banished, and since this had not the desired effect, they were afterwards punished with death. At this time, too, the bishop of Carthage, Cyprian, who under Decius had for a short season withdrawn by flight into the wilderness, won for himself the martyr’s crown. So, likewise, in A.D. 258, suffered Sixtus II. of Rome. The Roman bishop was soon followed by his deacon Laurentius, a hero among Christian martyrs, who pointed the avaricious governor to the sick, the poor and the orphans of the congregation as the treasures of the church, and was then burnt alive on a fire of glowing coal. But Valerian’s son, =Gallienus= (A.D. 260-268), by an edict addressed to the bishops, abolished the special persecuting statutes issued by his father, without, however, as he is often erroneously said to have done, formally recognising Christianity as a _Religio licita_. The Christians after this enjoyed a forty years’ rest; for the commonly reported cruel persecution of Christians under =Claudius II.=, (A.D. 268-270) has been proved to be a pure fable of apocryphal Acts of the Martyrs; and also the persecution planned by =Aurelian= (A.D. 270-275), toward the close of his reign, was prevented by his assassination committed by a pagan officer.