It is to the devotion and organization of the Christians, not to their proportionate numbers, that I attributed weight.

If (as Milman says) Gibbon and Beugnot are "clearly right" as regards _the West_--_i.e._, as regards all that vast district which became the area of modern European Christendom, I see nothing in my argument which requires modification.
But why did Christianity, while opposed by the ruling powers, spread "_in the East ?_" In the very chapter from which I have quoted, Dean Milman justifies me in saying, that to this question I may simply reply, "I do not know," without impairing my present argument.

(I myself find no difficulty in it whatever; but I protest against the assumption, that I am bound to believe a religion preternatural, unless I con account for its origin and diffusion to the satisfaction of its adherents.) Dean Milman, vol.ii.pp.

322-340, gives a full account of the Manichaean religion, and its rapid and great spread in spate of violent persecution.

MANI, the founder, represented himself as "a man invested with a divine mission." His doctrines are described by Milman as wild and mystical metaphysics, combining elements of thought from Magianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Buddhism.