The pagan revival under the empire was rather like Neo-Catholicism in France. It was patriotic, nationalistic, and conservative, rather than strictly religious. Celsus, in his lost book against the Christians, seems to have appealed to their patriotism, urging them to support their country and its government in dangerous times. As the Church grew in numbers and power, and the old traditions crumbled away, largely from the fall in the birth-rate among the upper and middle classes, the conservatives became more anxiously attached to their own culture, and saw in Christianity a 'shapeless darkness' which threatened to extinguish 'all the beautiful things in the world'. We can partly sympathize with this alarm, though not with the foolish policy which it inspired. The early persecutions were like Russian 'pogroms', instigated or connived at by the government as a safety valve for popular discontent. For at this time the common people hated the Christians, and half believed the monstrous stories about them. The attacks were not continuous, and were half-hearted, very unlike the systematic extermination of Jews and Protestants in Spain. At Alexandria Hadrian found a money-loving population worshipping Christ and Sarapis almost indifferently. A wrong impression is formed if we picture to ourselves two sections of society engaged in constant war. The first real war was the last, under Diocletian; it was to decide whether paganism or Christianity was to be the state religion. However, there is no doubt that the persecutions helped to seal the fate of the old culture.