But it is necessary for us now to retrace our steps a little, and to turn back a few leaves of the pages of history. Luke, in his narrative, has conducted Paul to Rome, then proud mistress of the world, containing a population variously estimated from two to four millions. Rome was the central and apparently impregnable fortress of pagan superstition; and it was in Rome, in deadly struggle with her wicked emperors and her degraded populace, that some of the greatest victories of Christianity were won. The strife between paganism and the religion of Jesus continued for centuries, and developed heroism on the part of the Christians to which no parallel can be found in secular annals. It will be remembered, that, when Jesus was crucified as a malefactor upon Mount Calvary,――the sacrificial Lamb of God, bearing in his own wonderful person, as both God and man, the mysterious burden of the world’s atonement,――Tiberius Cæsar, the adopted son and heir of Octavius Cæsar, or Cæsar the August, sat upon the imperial throne. It was in the eighteenth year of the reign of Tiberius that Jesus was crucified. This event, the crucifixion of the Son of God,――probably the most wonderful which has occurred during the annals of eternity,――produced no impression whatever; was unknown in the distant palaces of Rome. The death of Tiberius strikingly illustrates the depravity of the times. He had retired to the Island of Capreæ, where, in a palace of the most luxurious surroundings, he surrendered himself to almost every conceivable indulgence of sin. For six years he remained there, while conspiracies and revolts agitated the empire. There was a young man in his suite by the name of Caligula, son of the renowned general Germanicus, whom Tiberius, through jealousy, had put to death. Caligula was one of the vilest of the vile. He ingratiated himself in the favor of the tyrant by pandering to all his wickedness, and by the most sycophantic adulation. At length, the death-hour of Tiberius tolled. Remorse, with scorpion-lashes, hovered over his dying-bed. He resorted to every expedient to repel reflection, and to close his eyes against the approach of the king of terrors. In pursuit of health, he had left Capreæ, and was at Misenum, near Naples. Caligula had, with many other courtiers, accompanied him.