History joins forces with reason in proving that union of church and state is an intolerable evil. The state religions of antiquity were either the agents of political despotism, or themselves, as in Egypt, formed a special despotism under which both rulers and people were crushed to the earth. Since the advent of Christianity, the rule of the church has never failed to bring disaster. The beginning of the calamity is traceable to the reign of the Roman emperor Constantine, sometimes misnamed "The Great." Of many bad emperors, this man stands out conspicuously among the worst. Usurper, liar, perjurer, thief, murderer, and villain in many other regards, he adopted Christianity as a state religion from motives of an unusually crafty policy. So little did his newly professed faith influence his underlying character, that his crimes of the blackest type continued unabated after his professed conversion. He did not even respect the foundation principles of Christianity sufficiently to become baptized until he lay on his deathbed, when his grossly superstitious mind deluded itself with the fantasy that a few drops of water and a few mumbled incantations would have the magical effect of atoning for a lifetime of infamy, and would carry him straightway into a region of eternal gratification of every desire. During Constantine's reign, organized Christianity began by dividing official honors with the more ancient Roman religion, and ended by usurping the entire authority, and by persecuting those who still clung to the faith of their fathers. Later emperors carried the process still further, ostentatious piety and unbounded corruption going hand in hand, until Rome became a synonym of utter rottenness, and fell an easy prey to the barbarian hordes which poured down from northern Europe.