Tertullian (2nd and 3rd century Christian theologian)
“If the Tiber rises as high as the city walls, if the Nile does not rise to the fields, if the weather will not change, if there is an earthquake, a famine, a plague–straightway the cry is heard: ‘Toss the Christians to the lion!’ So many of them for just one beast?”
- From Apology (chapter 40) by Tertullian, translation edition by Rudolph Arbesmann, reprinted in After The New Testament: A Reader In Early Christianity, edited by Bart D. Ehrman. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.