perhaps, of a guilty wife. They ascribe the misfortunes of
Crispus to the arts of his step-mother Fausta, whose implacable
hatred, or whose disappointed love, renewed in the palace of
Constantine the ancient tragedy of Hippolitus and of Phaedra. ^22
Like the daughter of Minos, the daughter of Maximian accused her
son-in-law of an incestuous attempt on the chastity of his
father's wife; and easily obtained, from the jealousy of the
emperor, a sentence of death against a young prince, whom she
considered with reason as the most formidable rival of her own
children. But Helena, the aged mother of Constantine, lamented
and revenged the untimely fate of her grandson Crispus; nor was
it long before a real or pretended discovery was made, that
Fausta herself entertained a criminal connection with a slave
belonging to the Imperial stables. ^23 Her condemnation and
punishment were the instant consequences of the charge; and the
adulteress was suffocated by the steam of a bath, which, for that
purpose, had been heated to an extraordinary degree. ^24 By some
it will perhaps be thought, that the remembrance of a conjugal
union of twenty years, and the honor of their common offspring,
the destined heirs of the throne, might have softened the
obdurate heart of Constantine, and persuaded him to suffer his
wife, however guilty she might appear, to expiate her offences in
a solitary prison. But it seems a superfluous labor to weigh the
propriety, unless we could ascertain the truth, of this singular
event, which is attended with some circumstances of doubt and
perplexity. Those who have attacked, and those who have
defended, the character of Constantine, have alike disregarded
two very remarkable passages of two orations pronounced under the
succeeding reign. The former celebrates the virtues, the beauty,
and the fortune of the empress Fausta, the daughter, wife,