Part 15

Though most humble and mild, he severely reproved the least tepidity or sloth in others. For the virtue of meekness is not further removed from intemperate anger which clouds or dethrones reason, than from a vicious defect or tameness and stupidity which beholds vice with indifference. God has committed to every man a kind of trust and guardianship of virtue, whose rights we are obliged to maintain in proportion to our power not only by example, but also by advice, exhortation, and reproof, as often as it is reasonable. And he who regards the sins of others with a careless unconcernedness, makes himself accountable for them, when it is in his power to prevent them. Superiors especially lie under the most grievous obligations to check and chastise the irregularities and faults of those under their immediate care and inspection. Our saint feared no less the danger of too great lenity and forbearance than that of harshness; and was a true imitator both of the mildness and zeal of the Jewish legislator, whom the Holy Ghost calls “the meekest of all men upon the face of the earth.” St. John was himself a perfect model of all virtues, and tender and compassionate towards all, especially the sick. This compassion for them he learned by his own perpetual infirmities, and weakness of stomach. Such was his humility that he would never be promoted even to Minor Orders, never presumed to approach nearer the altar than was necessary to receive the holy communion, and never would open the church door, but always prayed one in Minor Orders to open it for him. He was very zealous for holy poverty, and would not allow any monasteries to be built in a costly or sumptuous manner, thinking such edifices not agreeable to a spirit of poverty. He founded the monastery of St. Salvi, that of Moscetta, that of Passignano, another at Rozzuolo, and another at Monte Salario. He reformed some other monasteries, and left about twelve houses of his Order at his death. Besides monks he received lay-brothers, who were exempt from choir and silence, and employed in external offices. This is said to be the first example of such a distinction; but it was soon imitated by other Orders. The saint’s charity to the poor was not less active than his love for holy poverty. He would have no poor person sent from his door without an alms, and often emptied all the granaries and stores of his monasteries in relieving them. In a great dearth he supplied, sometimes by miracle, the multitudes of poor people that flocked to his monastery of Rozzuolo. The saint was endowed with the spirit of prophecy, and by his prayers restored many sick persons to perfect health. The holy pope Leo IX. went to Passignano on purpose to see and converse with this holy man. Stephen IX. and Alexander II. had the greatest esteem for him. This latter testifies that the whole country where he lived owed to his zeal the entire extinction of simony. The holy man at length fell sick of a sharp fever at Passignano. He called for all the abbots and superiors of his Order, and telling them he was soon to leave them, strongly exhorted them to watch vigilantly over the most exact observance of their rule, and to maintain peace and fraternal charity. After this, having most devoutly received the last sacraments, he died happily on the 12th of July in 1073, being seventy-four years old. Pope Celestine III. having caused juridical informations to be taken concerning his virtues and miracles, solemnly enrolled him among the saints in the year 1193.

The eminent degree of penance and sanctity to which the divine grace raised this saint, was the fruit of his mildness in forgiving an injury. Christ not only commands us to pardon all offences, but has recommended this precept to us with his expiring breath, with his head crowned with thorns and his hands stretched out for us. We renounce the glorious title of being his disciples if, whilst we behold him hanging on the cross, and hear his last prayers, we trample on his sacred law, and harbor malice in our hearts against a brother whom our dying Redeemer commands us to forgive for his sake. Can we be angry with him who is by so many sacred ties our brother, the living son and member of our common Redeemer and Father, and whom we expect to be the associate of our happiness for all eternity? We owe infinitely more to Christ than any brother can owe to us: the least venial sin is an immense debt. Our Divine Master not only conjures us to forgive our brother for His sake, but also makes it our own infinite interest so to do, promising to pardon us our immense debts in the same manner as we pardon others. Shall we base worms who have nothing to boast of before men only our having concealed from them our baseness and ignominy; and to whom the most cruel outrages from creatures would be too mild a treatment, considering our sins; shall we, I say, complain of injuries which we ought to receive with patience and joy as the easy means of cancelling our own sins, and procuring for ourselves the greatest graces and mercy.

SS. NABOR AND FELIX, MM.

They suffered at Milan under Maximian Herculeus about the year 304. Their bodies were first interred without the walls of the city, but afterward brought into it, and deposited in the place where a church was built over their tomb, to which great multitudes of people resorted with wonderful devotion, as Paulinus testifies in his life of St. Ambrose. In the same church St. Ambrose discovered the relics of SS. Gervasius and Protasius, as himself relates in his letter to his sister Marcellina. The people continued to venerate the relics of SS. Nabor and Felix with the same ardor of devotion, as that holy doctor assures us.[117] They are still honored in the same church, which at present bears the name of St. Francis. See Solier the Bollandist, t. 3, Julij, p. 280.

JULY XIII.

SAINT EUGENIUS, BISHOP OF CARTHAGE, AND HIS COMPANIONS, CC.

From Victor Vitensis, Hist. Persec. Vandal. l. 2 and 3. See Tillemont, t. 16, Ceillier, t. 15, p. 206, Rivet, Hist. Lit. de la Fr. t. p. 38, Ruinart, &c.

A. D. 505.

The Roman provinces in Africa were for a long time one of the richest and most noble portions of the empire. The Carthaginian barbarism and perfidy had given place to the most flourishing reign of the sciences, arts, and religion. The nobles of this country were all princes, and for riches and state, seemed to vie with kings; its peace seemed on every side secure. But the strongest cities and empires are often nearest a fall; they are founded, to be again sooner or later torn to pieces. Every state has even within itself the seeds of its own destruction; these will occasion the dissolution of every body politic no less certainly than the internal weakness of the animal body must bring it to a fatal period. This was the condition of the Roman empire in its decline, when its rulers, to preserve Italy which they regarded as its heart or head, abandoned its extremities to the Goths and Vandals. At a time when Africa thought of no danger, in the reign of the emperor Valentinian III. in 428, Genseric, king of the Vandals and Alans, having lately made a settlement in part of Spain,[118] passed into this country, and in a short time became master of those fertile provinces. This politic barbarian king kept great armies perpetually prepared for any expedition, by which he prevented the vigilance of his enemies, and astonished all the world with the rapidity of his enterprises. The Vandals, who were mostly Christians, but infected with the Arian heresy, laid the whole country waste by fire and sword, plundered all places, even churches and monasteries; burned alive two bishops, and tortured others to extort from them the treasures of their churches; razed the public buildings at Carthage, and banished Quodvultdeus, bishop of that city, with many others. But in 454, at the request of the emperor Valentinian, Genseric allowed the Catholics to choose a bishop of Carthage, and St. Deogratias was raised to that dignity, who died soon after Genseric was returned from the plunder of Rome. The persecution growing hotter, many suffered torments for the faith, and several received the crown of martyrdom. The Arians, by a sacrilege never before heard of, made themselves shirts and breeches of the altar-cloths, and at Tinuzuda spilt and scattered the body and blood of Christ on the pavement.[119] Catholics being by an edict disqualified for bearing any office in the government, Armogastes, a nobleman who held an honorable post in the household of Theodoric the king’s son, was condemned by the tyrant to keep cattle. Genseric dying after a reign of thirty-seven years, was succeeded by his son Huneric, a more barbarous persecutor than his father had ever been.

The episcopal see of Carthage had remained vacant twenty-four years, when in 481, Huneric permitted the Catholics on certain conditions to choose one who should fill it. The people, impatient to enjoy the comfort of a pastor, pitched upon Eugenius, a citizen of Carthage, eminent for his learning, zeal, piety, and prudence; and such was his deportment in this dignity, that he was venerable to the very heretics, and so dear to the Catholics that every one of them would have thought it a happiness to lay down his life for him. His charities to the distressed were excessive, especially considering his poverty. But he always found resources for their necessities in the hearts of his people; and he refused himself everything that he might give all to the poor. When others put him in mind that he ought to reserve something for his own necessaries, his answer was: “If the good pastor must lay down his life for his flock, can it be excusable for me to be solicitous for the necessities of my body?” He fasted every day, and often allowed himself only a most slender evening refection of bread and water. His virtue gained him the respect and esteem even of the Arians; but at length envy and blind zeal got the ascendant in their breasts, and the king sent him an order never to sit in the episcopal throne, preach to the people, or admit into his chapel any Vandals among whom several were Catholics. The saint boldly answered the messenger, that the laws of God commanded him not to shut the door of his church to any that desired to serve him in it. Huneric, enraged at this answer, persecuted the Catholics many ways, especially the Vandals who had embraced the faith. He commanded guards to be placed at the doors of the Catholic churches, who when they saw any man or woman going in clothed in the habit of the Vandals, struck them on the head with short staffs jagged and indented, which being twisted into their hair, and drawn back with great violence, tore off the hair and skin together. Some lost their eyes by this means, and others died with the extreme pain; but many lived a long time after. Women with their heads flayed in this manner, were publicly led through the streets, with a crier going before them to show them to the people. But this barbarous usage did not cause any one to forsake the true religion. Next, the tyrant deprived the Catholics who were at court of their pensions, and sent them to work in the country. He also ordered that none should be admitted to bear any office in his palace, or any public charge, who was not an Arian. He afterward turned them out of their houses, stripped them of all their wealth, and sent them to Sicily, or Sardinia. After this, his persecution fell on all Catholics. One edict followed another against them, and the cloud thickened every day over their heads. Many nuns were so cruelly tortured that several died on the rack. Great numbers of bishops, priests, deacons, and eminent Catholic laymen were banished to the number of four thousand nine hundred and seventy-six, all of whom the tyrant sent into a desert, where they were fed with barley like horses. This desert was filled with scorpions and venomous serpents; but they did not destroy any of the servants of God. The people followed their bishops and priests with lighted tapers in their hands, and mothers carried their little babes in their arms, and laid them at the feet of the confessors, all crying out with tears,--“Going yourselves to your crowns, to whom do you leave us? Who will baptize our children? Who will impart to us the benefit of penance, and discharge us from the bonds of sins by the favor of reconciliation and pardon? Who will bury us with solemn supplications at our death? By whom will divine sacrifices be made?”[120]

The bishop Eugenius was spared in the first storm, probably that the inhabitants of the capital might seem to be somewhat considered. But in May, 483, the king sent him a summons requiring the Catholics, whom he called Homoousians, to hold a conference or disputation with his Arian bishops at Carthage on the 1st day of February ensuing. Eugenius answered the terms were not equal, seeing their enemies were to be judges; and that as it was the common cause of all churches, other foreign churches ought to be invited and consulted, “especially the church of Rome, which is the head of all churches.”[121] About that time one Felix, who had been long blind, addressed himself to St. Eugenius desiring him to pray that he might recover his sight, saying he had been admonished by a vision so to do. The bishop showed great reluctance and confusion, alleging that he was a base sinner; but at length, after blessing the font for the solemn administration of baptism on the Epiphany, he said to the blind man,--“I have told you that I am a sinner, and the last of all men; but I pray God that he show you mercy according to your faith, and restore to you your sight.” Then he made the sign of the cross on his eyes, and the blind man saw; the whole city was witness to the triumph of the faith. The king sent for Felix, and examined himself all the circumstances of the miracle, which he found too evident to be called in question. However, the Arian bishops told him that Eugenius had performed it by recourse to art magic. The Catholics made choice of ten disputants for the conference, which was opened on the 5th of February. Cyrila, patriarch of the Arians, was seated on a throne; the Catholics who were standing, asked who were the commissaries to take down in writing what should pass in the disputation; and were answered that Cyrila would perform that office. The Catholics asked by what authority he claimed the jurisdiction and rank of patriarch. The Arians not being able to produce any sufficient warrant for his usurpation, filled the hall with noise and tumult and obtained an order that every lay Catholic there present should receive a hundred bastinadoes. Cyrila sought various pretences to defer the conference. The Catholics, however, presented a written confession of their faith. This takes up the whole third book of Victor’s history, though he has only inserted the first part, in which the consubstantiality of God the Son is proved from the scriptures. The second part, which confirmed the same from the writings of the fathers, is lost. This confession seems to have been drawn up by St. Eugenius, to whom Gennadius ascribes a confession of faith against the Arians.[122]

When this was read the Arians quarrelled that the orthodox took the name of Catholics, though this was given them by the whole world, even by the heretics themselves, as St. Austin observed a little before this time in that very country. Upon this, however, the Arians abruptly broke up the conference, and the king, on the 25th of February in 484, published a severe edict for a general persecution, which he had already prepared for that purpose. By this all the Catholic clergy were banished out of towns, and forbidden to perform any functions even in the country; all Catholics were declared incapable of inheriting, or disposing of any estates real or personal, with other such articles. Executioners were despatched to all parts of the kingdom, and many Catholics were put to barbarous deaths, and many more inhumanly tormented. One Dionysia, after having been herself cruelly scourged, seeing her son Majoricus, a tender youth, tremble at the sign of the torments prepared for him, she looked on him with a stern countenance, and said,--“Remember, son, we were baptized in the name of the Trinity, and in the bosom of our mother the Church.” The young man, encouraged by these words, suffered martyrdom with undaunted resolution, and his mother buried him within her own house, that she might every day offer to the holy Trinity her prayers over his grave, in the lively hope of a glorious resurrection with him at the last day. Her cousin Emilius, her sister Dativa, and innumerable others in different parts of Africa, received the like crowns. At Typasus, in Mauritania Cæsariensis, certain Catholics who had assisted at the celebration of the divine mysteries in a private house, were informed against; and by the king’s order had their tongues plucked out, and their right hands cut off; yet they spoke as well as ever, as St. Victor Vitensis, an eye-witness, assures us.[123] He says, Reparatus, a subdeacon, one of this number, was entertained when he wrote, in the court of the emperor Zena at Constantinople, and was there highly honored, especially by the empress; and that though entirely deprived of his tongue, he spoke gracefully, and without the least defect or imperfection. Æneas of Gaza, a Platonic philosopher, who was then at Constantinople, and wrote in 533,[124] says, he himself had seen them in that city, and had heard them speak distinctly; and not being able to believe his own ears, he had examined their mouths, and seen that their tongues were plucked out to the very roots, so that he wondered they could have survived so cruel a torment. Procopius, who wrote soon after, says also[125] that he had seen these persons at Constantinople, and had heard them speak freely, without feeling anything of their punishment; but that two of them, by falling into a grievous sin of the flesh, lost the use of their speech, which they had till then enjoyed.

The tyrant wreaked his impotent vengeance on many others, especially on Vandals who had been converted to the Catholic faith; but was not able to overcome their heroic constancy. The streets of Carthage were filled with spectacles of his cruelty; and one was there meeting continually some without hands, others without eyes, nose, or ears, others whose heads appeared sunk in between their shoulders by having been hung up by the hands on the tops of houses for sights to the people. Above four hundred and sixty bishops were brought to Carthage in order to be sent into banishment: of this number eighty-eight died under great hardships at Carthage, some few made their escape, and the rest were banished. St. Eugenius after having long encouraged others to the conflict was himself at length on a sudden carried into exile, without being allowed to take leave of his friends. He found means, however, to write a letter to his flock, which St. Gregory of Tours has preserved.[126] In it he says,--“I with tears beg, exhort, and conjure you by the dreadful day of judgment, and the awful light of the coming of Christ, that you hold fast the Catholic faith. Preserve the grace of the holy baptism, and the unction of the chrism. Let no man born again of water return to the water.” This he mentions, because the Arians in Africa, like the Donatists, rebaptized those that came over to their sect. St. Eugenius protests to his flock that if they remain constant, no distance nor death could separate him from them in spirit; but that he was innocent of the blood of those that should perish, and that this his letter would be read before the tribunal of Christ at the last day for severer condemnation of such base apostates. “If I return to Carthage,” says he, “I shall see you in this life; if not, I shall meet you in the other. Pray for us, and fast; fasting and alms have never failed to move God to mercy. Above all things remember that we are not to fear those who can only kill the body.”

We have a catalogue of all the bishops of the provinces of Africa who came to the conference, and were sent into banishment;[127] namely, fifty-four of the proconsular province, one hundred and twenty-five of Numidia, one hundred and seven of the province of Byzacena, one hundred and twenty of the province of Mauritania Cæsariensis, forty-four from the province of Sitifi, five from that of Tripolis, besides ten from Sardinia and other places; in all four hundred and sixty-four bishops, of which number eighty-eight died at Carthage before their departure into exile, forty-six were banished to Corsica, three hundred and three to other places, and twenty-eight made their escape. St. Eugenius was carried into the uninhabited desert country in the province of Tripolis, and committed to the guard of Antony, an inhuman Arian bishop, who treated him with the utmost barbarity. The saint added to his sufferings voluntary austerities, wore a rough hair-shirt, lay on the ground, and passed great part of the night in prayer and tears. When he was afflicted with a palsy, Antony, because vinegar was contrary to his distemper, obliged him to drink it in large quantities. Yet God was pleased to restore his servant to his health. It is observed by our historian, that the Arian bishops were all cruel persecutors, and went through the cities and provinces, filling all places with scenes of horror, rebaptizing persons by force and violence, scourging, mangling, torturing, and banishing even women and children. The fifth book of the history of this persecution is filled with examples. The apostates signalized themselves above others by the cruelties which they exercised upon the orthodox. Elpidophorus, one of this number, was appointed judge at Carthage to condemn the more zealous to be tortured. Muritta, the deacon who had assisted when he was baptized in the bosom of the Catholic Church, being brought before him, took with him the chrismale or white garment, with which at the time he received the apostate coming out of the font he had clothed him, as an emblem of that innocence which he engaged himself to preserve always unspotted; and producing it before the whole assembly, he says,--“This robe will accuse you when the judge shall appear in majesty at the last day. It will bear testimony against you to your condemnation.”[128] This relation is gathered from Saint Victor, bishop of Vita, in the province of Byzacena; who being banished by king Huneric for the faith in 487, retired to Constantinople, and wrote (probably in that city) in five books, the history of the Vandalic persecution.[129]