in an official State document, need we wonder if the penman of the
postscript of the Smyrnaean letter has written Statius Quadratus
for Ummidius Quadratus? And yet, if we admit this very likely
oversight, the whole chronological edifice which the Bishop of
Durham has been at such vast pains to construct, vanishes like the
dreams and visions of his leading witness, the hypochondriac
Aristides. [44:1]

Archbishop Ussher and others, who have carefully investigated the
subject, have placed in A.D. 169 the martyrdom of Polycarp. The
following reasons may be assigned why this date is decidedly
preferable to that contended for by Dr. Lightfoot.

1. All the surrounding circumstances point to the reign of Marcus
Aurelius as the date of the martyrdom. Eusebius has preserved an
edict, said to have been issued by Antoninus Pius, in which he
announces that he had written to the governors of provinces "not
to trouble the Christians at all, unless they appeared to make
attempts against the Roman government." [44:2] Doubts--it may be,
well founded--have been entertained as to the genuineness of this
ordinance; but it has been pretty generally acknowledged that it
fairly indicates the policy of Antoninus Pius. "Though certainly
spurious," says Dr. Lightfoot, "it represents the conception of
him entertained by Christians in the generations next succeeding
his own." [45:1] In his reign, the disciples of our Lord,
according to the declarations of their own apologists, were
treated with special indulgence. Melito, for example, who wrote
not long after the middle of the second century, bears this
testimony. Capitolinus, an author who flourished about the close
of the third century, reports that Antoninus Pius lived "without