In consequence of the prominence that has been given to the persecutions of the Christians during the first three centuries, the impression very extensively prevails that the early Christian Church was constantly under the hard pressure of continuous and relentless persecution. This, however, is not the case. There were many periods of peace granted to the Christians. Indeed, their periods of persecution were only occasional, and it is a question if these periods of peace were not more detrimental to Christianity than the seasons of persecution. Milner, under the authority of Origen, says that the long peace granted the Church in the third century, during the reigns of the several emperors, from about 260 A. D. to the opening of the fourth century, produced a great degree of lukewarmness and religious indecorum. "Let the reader," he says, "only notice the indifference which Origen here describes and the conduct of the Christians both in the first and second centuries, and he will be affected with the greatness of the declension." Then he quotes Origen: "Several come to church only on solemn festivals, and then not so much for instruction as diversion. Some go out again as soon as they have heard the lecture, without conferring or asking the pastors questions. Others stay not till the lecturers ended, and others hear not so much as a single word, but entertain themselves in a corner of the church."[A] [Footnote A: Ibid.] Coming to the middle of the third century, just previous to that severe persecution inaugurated by the Emperor Decius, and speaking of Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, Milner exclaims: "A star of the first magnitude, when we consider the time in which he lived! Let us recreate ourselves with the contemplation of it. We are fatigued with hunting for Christian goodness, and we have discovered but little, and that little with much difficulty. We shall find Cyprian to be a character who partook, indeed, of the declensions which we have noticed and lamented, but who was still far superior, I apprehend, in real simplicity and piety, to the Christians of the East."[A] This same Cyprian, in whom Milner delights speaking of the effects of the long peace upon the Church which preceded the Decian persecution, says: [Footnote A: Milner's Ch. Hist. vol. I, cent. iii. ch. vi.]