.—He surpassed all Preceding Emperors in Devotion to God.
, as he did, alone and pre-eminent among the Roman emperors as a
worshiper of God; alone as the bold proclaimer to all men of the
doctrine of Christ; having alone rendered honor, as none before him had
ever done, to his Church; having alone abolished utterly the error of
polytheism, and discountenanced idolatry in every form: so, alone among
them both during life and after death, was he accounted worthy of such
honors as none can say have been attained to by any other; so that no
one, whether Greek or Barbarian, nay, of the ancient Romans themselves, has ever been presented to us as worthy of comparison with him.