By the third century, a curious cross-over time had been reached, when ‘the desire for martyrdom was almost out of control’.40 By now Christians deliberately flouted Roman practices–they insulted magistrates and destroyed effigies of the pagan gods, in an attempt to emulate the suffering of Jesus. Persecution was what they sought. ‘For suffering one hour of earthly torture, it was believed, the martyr would gain an eternity of immortal bliss.’41
