Ad Eugipium

The Letter of Paschasius to Eugipius. To the holy lord and always most dear Eugipius, priest, Paschasius, deacon, brother in Christ, most dear. While I consider the sanctity of your learning and the happiness of your leisure, weighing the bitterness and manifold occupations of sinners, you disdain to deal with me: I endure the loss of modesty for the sake of love. You have sent a memorandum, to which the eloquence of the learned can add nothing; and you have briefly disclosed in a compendium a work which the whole Church can review, when you truly set forth the life and character of the blessed Severinus dwelling in the neighboring provinces of the Pannonians, and you have consigned to the memory of posterity the miracles wrought by divine power through him, which will endure for long ages. The deeds of the blessed do not know how to perish with the age: so that all may have him present, and in a certain way feel him dwelling with them, when the account has brought him to them through reading. And therefore, because you have spoken these things which you demanded to be narrated by me more simply, and have set them forth more easily, we believed that nothing should be added to your labor, but to our study. For we narrate things heard in one way, and we set forth things experienced in another. The virtues of teachers are more easily expounded by disciples (which are more frequently suggested by the conversation of the teachers) for cultivating the minds of holy men inspired by divine gifts.

How much benefit the deeds of the saints impart, how much fervor they bestow, how much purity they instill: on this matter, the authority of the apostolic voice, becoming more widely known, declares (1 Peter 5): "Be an example to the flock," and the blessed Paul instructs Timothy (2 Timothy 2) to be an example to the faithful. Hence the same apostle (Hebrews 13), weaving together a catalogue of the just with the highest reverence, beginning from Abel, proceeds to recount the virtues of illustrious men. Likewise, that most faithful Mattathias, already nearing a most glorious death, distributed to his sons, as a hereditary duty, the examples of the saints; roused more famously by their admirable struggles, they would despise their own lives for the eternal laws with the fervor of sanctity. Nor did the father's instruction fail his children. For the deeds of their ancestors so greatly profited them that, armed with open faith, they deterred princes, overcame sacrilegious camps, destroyed demonic cults and altars far and wide, and, adorned with everlasting deeds, provided a civic crown for their shining homeland. Hence we also rejoice that something is provided for the ornaments of the Bride of Christ through fraternal ministry—not because, as I believe, a more brilliant life of the ancestors was ever lacking in any age, but because it is fitting for the house of the Great King to have many banners of trophies. For true virtue is not excluded by a multitude of victors, but is rather amplified by desired successes.