But we may safely rely upon the account which Eusebius gives us of what he himself saw in Egypt. Many were put to death on the same day, some beheaded and some burnt. The executioners were tired, and the hearts of the pagan judges melted by the unflinching firmness of the Christians. Many who were eminent for wealth, rank, and learning chose to lay down their lives rather than throw a few grains of wheat upon the altar, or comply with any ceremony that was required of them as a religious test. The judges begged them to think of their wives and children, and pointed out that they were the cause of their own death; but the Christians were usually firm, and were beheaded for the refusal to take the test. Among the most celebrated of the Egyptian martyrs were Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, with Faustus, Dius, and Ammonius, presbyters under him; the learned Phileas, Bishop of Thmuis, Hesychius, the editor of the Septuagint, and the Bishops Pachomius and Theodorus; though the pagans must have been still more surprised at Philoromus, the receiver-general of the taxes at Alexandria. This man, after the prefect of Egypt and the general of the troops, was perhaps the highest Roman officer in the province. He sat in public as a judge in Alexandria, surrounded by a guard of soldiers, daily deciding all causes relating to the taxes of Egypt. He was accused of no crime but that of being a Christian, which he was earnestly entreated to deny, and was at liberty indirectly to disprove by joining in some pagan sacrifice. The Bishops of Alexandria and Thmuis may have been strengthened under their trials by their rank in the church, by having themselves urged others to do their duty in the same case, but the receiver-general of the taxes could have had nothing to encourage him but the strength of his faith and a noble scorn of falsehood; he was reproached or ridiculed by all around him, but he refused to deny his religion, and was beheaded as a common criminal. The ready ministers of this persecution were Culeianus, the prefect of the Thebaid, and Hierocles, the prefect of Alexandria. The latter was peculiarly well chosen for the task; he added the zeal of the theologian to the ready obedience of the soldier. He had written against the Christians a work named _Philalethes_ (the lover of truth), which we now know only in the answer by Eusebius of Caesarea. In this he denounced the apostles as impostors, and the Christian miracles as trifling; and, comparing them with the pretended miracles of Apollonius of Tyana, he pronounced the latter more numerous, more important, and better authenticated than the former by the evangelists; and he ridiculed the Christians for calling Jesus a god, while the pagans did not raise Apollonius higher than a man beloved by the gods.