30 How the Church Has Changed the World way. He told her the dream. It was of a shining cross in the heavens, with the words en Toutoi Nika: In this, be victorious. “It is a sign of shame,” he said. “A scandal to the Jews, and folly to the Greeks,” said she. “Death and defeat,” he said. “Life and victory.” “What does it mean?” he said. “It means that the world is not ruled as men have thought.” “I shall have my men bear this sign upon our banners.” The dream indeed came true. And she, Helena, the humble daughter of an innkeeper, became Augusta, the most powerful woman in the world. “Lignum, lignum!” cried the soldiers. “The wood of life,” said she. How can we tell? Helena couldhave spent her later years asDiocletian did, gardening, and enjoying the wealth of an empress. Or that was what she did, in fact. She enjoyed that wealth by giving it away, endowing and planting churches wherever she went, in Rome and Trier and now in Palestine. She took a gold coin from a fold of her garment. She looked at it with an old woman’s ironic eye. “I haven’t looked like that in many years,” she thought, seeing her stamped bust upon it, with full
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