Corruption and False Profession

It was in the days of the fourth Gentile monarchy that the Lord Jesus Christ appeared in humiliation on the earth. Judea was then a Roman province, as was evinced by Caesar's image and superscription appearing on the coins. The power to inflict capital punishment seems to have resided in the Roman governor alone. Hence the Jews were unable, except by his consent, to achieve the death of the Holy and the Just One who delivered Himself, and was delivered of God into their hands.
The Roman Empire thus partook, with the Jewish people, in the awful guilt of rejecting and crucifying the Prince of life. And should it be urged by any that Pontius Pilate was only a subordinate agent and representative of the imperial power, the answer is evident: the imperial power itself afterward ratified most fully the deed of its representative by shedding torrents of Christian blood.
It is true that after centuries of persecution, the empire became nominally Christian.