Religious Intolerance in the Later Roman Empire - Bad request ...

control. It would be unreasonable to suppose, that at this early point in the schism,
anyone in Italy would know, or be able to make a reasonable judgement, of just how
long, and to what extent, the controversy was likely to last. At worst, if it became
widespread with entrenched views, Constantine would have done himself a disservice
through any prejudging of the controversy. Moreover, it was in Constantine's interest
not to utterly embrace one party, but rather to keep all parties in a state of suspense,
and waiting to see to whom would fall the advantages of Imperial favour. Thus, it
seems more likely that since Caecilian was indisputably the first candidate elected to
the see of Carthage (possibly as much as six years earlier) and had been accepted as such
by his fellows, 28 then in practice if Constantine wished to distribute funds to the
Church, in Carthage, such largesse could really only be given to Caecilian, known and
acknowledged by other Bishops. To have given it to anyone else would at best have
looked ridiculous and at worst alienated the Bishops in Italy; that most certainly would
be evidence of prejudging the issue. If Constantine was prejudicial to the emerging
Donatist party (or as it may have been at this stage, Majorinus party), then it would be
reasonable to expect some derogatory reference to be made to them in the letter; or at
least a positive indication that Constantine’s sympathies lay squarely with Caecilian,
beyond any assumptions that could be inferred from his receipt of Imperial funds.
In February 313 Constantine wrote to Anullinus, the proconsul of Africa, to
inform him of his decision to exempt all clergy from liturgies. 29 Constantine named
the beneficiaries as those “in the Catholic Church over which Caecilian presides,
bestow their service on this holy worship – those whom they are accustomed to call
clerics.” Much of the rest of this fairly short letter is taken up with the benefits that
flow to the state and to mankind from devotion to worship and the dangers to the
same if such worship is neglected. This would appear to be more prejudicial than the
previous letter in that, by implication, Constantine is excluding those clerics who did
not acknowledge Caecilian’s primacy. Nevertheless Constantine made no derogatory
28 Aug. Contra Epistolam Parm enian i 1.3.5 (PL 43.37)
29 Eus. HE. 10.7.1-2; Maier (1987) 142-144; Corcoran (2000) 155;
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