Adversus Damasum Libellus Precum Ad Imperatores

THE BOOK OF PRAYERS OF THE PRESBYTERS FAUSTINUS AND MARCELLINUS OF THE PARTY OF URSINUS AGAINST DAMASUS, ADDRESSED TO THE EMPERORS VALENTINIAN, THEODOSIUS AND ARCADIUS.

PREFACE.

Concerning the same schism of Ursinus.

I. In the times of the emperor Constantius, son of Constantine, a harsher persecution of the Christians arose from the impious Arian heretics, with the consent of Constantius, who both persecuted the bishop Athanasius for resisting the heretics and commanded that he be condemned by all the bishops. And all the pontiffs everywhere, through fear of the prince, were slow to do this, condemning an innocent man unheard. But Liberius, bishop of Rome, and Eusebius of Vercelli, and Lucifer of Cagliari, and Hilary of Poitiers refused to give their sentence. These therefore were sent into exile for keeping the faith. When Liberius was setting out, Damasus his deacon pretended to set out with him; but fleeing from the journey, he returned to Rome, corrupted by ambition. But on the day on which Liberius was departing into exile, all the clergy, that is the presbyters and the archdeacon Felix, and Damasus himself the deacon, and all the offices of the Church, all alike, in the presence of the Roman people, confirmed by oath that, while Liberius lived, they would in no way have another as pontiff. But the clergy, against what is right, which was by no means fitting, with the utmost wickedness of perjury, took Felix the archdeacon to be ordained in place of Liberius. This deed displeased the whole people, and they held themselves aloof from his procession.

Two years later Constantius came to Rome; he was asked by the people on behalf of Liberius, and he immediately agreed, saying: “You have Liberius; he will return better than he was when he set out from you.” He indicated this, however, with reference to his consent, by which he had given his hand to perfidy. In the third year Liberius returned; the Roman people went out to meet him with joy. Felix was denounced by the senate or the people and was driven from the City; and after a short time, at the instigation of the clerics who had perjured themselves, he burst into the City and presumed to hold a station in the Julian basilica across the Tiber. The whole multitude of the faithful and the leading men of the City again cast him out with great disgrace.

II. After eight years, in the consulship of Valentinianus and Valens, on the tenth day before the Kalends of December, Felix died. Liberius showed mercy to the clerics who had perjured themselves and received them into their own places. Likewise, on the eighth day before the Kalends of October, in the consulship of Gratianus and Dagalaifus, Liberius was taken from human affairs. Then the presbyters and deacons Ursinus, Amantius, and Lupus, together with the holy people who had kept faith with Liberius when he was in exile, began to proceed in the Julian basilica and demanded that Ursinus the deacon be ordained bishop in the place of Liberius. But the perjurers demanded Damasus as their bishop in the place of Felix. Paulus, bishop of Tibur, consecrated Ursinus.

When Damasus, who had always sought the episcopate, learned of this, he stirred up all the charioteers and the ignorant crowd with money, and armed with clubs he broke into the basilica of Julius, and raged for three days with great slaughter of the faithful. Seven days later, with all the perjurers and arena-fighters whom he had corrupted with a huge bribe, he seized the Lateran basilica, and there was ordained bishop, and by bribing the judge of the city, Viventius, and the prefect of the grain supply, Julianus, he brought it about that Ursinus, a venerable man who had previously been ordained pontiff, should be sent into exile together with the deacons Amantius and Lupus. When this was done, Damasus began to harass with clubs and various slaughter the Roman people, who did not wish to go over to him. He also endeavored through his officials to drive out of the city seven presbyters who had been detained. But the faithful people, running to meet them, rescued those same presbyters and led them without delay to the basilica of Liberius.

III. Then Damasus, together with the faithless, summoned the arena-fighters, the charioteers, and the ditch-diggers, and all the clergy, with axes, swords, and clubs, and besieged the basilica at the second hour of the day, on the seventh day before the Kalends of November, in the consulship of Gratian and Dagalaifus, and stirred up a grave battle. For when the doors had been broken open and fire had been set beneath, he sought an entrance through which he might burst in. Some also of his household, destroying the roof of the basilica, were killing the faithful people with tiles. Then all the Damasians, rushing into the basilica, killed one hundred and sixty of the common people, both men and women, and wounded very many besides, of whom many died; but from the side of Damasus no one died. After three days, however, the holy people, gathering together into one, began to recite the Lord's commandments against him, saying: Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. They were also singing in praises, and saying: They have made the dead bodies of your servants food for the birds of heaven, the flesh of your saints for the beasts of the earth. They have poured out their blood like water round about Jerusalem; and there was no one to bury them. And so often the same people, gathered together in the basilica of Liberius, cried out, saying: Christian emperor, nothing is hidden from you. Let all the bishops come to Rome: let the case be conducted; now for the fifth time Damasus has made war: drive the murderers from the seat of Peter.

But the people of God kept beseeching the bishops with many prayers to expel by a just sentence the one mentioned above, stained with such great impiety, whom the matrons loved so much that he was called the matrons' ear-pick.

IV. The cries of the people were therefore carried to the emperor Valentinian, who, moved by piety, granted return to the exiles. Then Ursinus, with the deacons Amantius and Lupus, on the seventeenth day before the Kalends of October, in the consulship of Lupicinus and Jovinus, returned to the City, and the holy people ran to meet him with joy. But Damasus, conscious of so many crimes, shaken by no small fear, bought off the whole palace, so that his deeds would not be revealed to the emperor. The emperor, not knowing what Damasus had perpetrated, extended his edict, so that, with Ursinus relegated into exile, no further wicked strife would dash the peoples together. Then bishop Ursinus, a holy man and without crime, consulting the people's good, handed himself over to the empty plots of the wicked, and on the sixteenth day before the Kalends of December, by the emperor's order, hastened willingly into exile. But the people, fearing God and worn down by no persecutions, feared neither the emperor, nor the judge, nor even Damasus himself, the author of crimes and a murderer, but celebrated vigils through the cemeteries of the martyrs without clergy. Hence, when many of the faithful had gathered at Saint Agnes, Damasus rushed in armed with his attendants, and laid low very many in the slaughter of his devastation. This most cruel deed greatly displeased the bishops of Italy.

When he had also solemnly invited them to his birthday feast, and some of them had come, he labored upon them with prayers and money, that they might pronounce sentence against the holy Ursinus. They answered: We have come to the birthday feast, not to condemn a man unheard. Thus his depraved intention lacked the effect it strove for. Thereafter the presbyters were afflicted in various ways and scattered through exiles and foreign places; among them the presbyters Marcellinus and Faustinus, on account of their confession of the true faith, the display of sacred communion, and the persecution of those opposing the truth, offered a petition to the emperors Valentinian, Theodosius, and Arcadius as follows.

HERE BEGINS THE BOOK OF PETITIONS.

I. We beseech your gentleness, most pious emperors, Valentinian, Theodosius, and Arcadius, that, in contemplation of Christ the Son of God who aids your empire, you deign to read these things untiringly. Your sublime kingdom ascends to yet more sublime things by the help of God the Father almighty and of Christ his only-begotten Son, when you neither despise the truth in lowly men nor strengthen falsehood in many or powerful ones. For this is most just and most salutary in a kingdom of justice: that persons be approved by the merit of the truth, not that truth be presumed from the power of persons. Indeed, the law of the world was written for this reason, that power or multitude may not prevail against what is true and fair, even if it is vindicated by the lowly.

But if such great care must be taken, even in the affairs of the state, by the provision of your Tranquility, so that against all force and power, even in the smallest matters, the right of truth may prevail, whereby the state entrusted to your rule may flourish by the will of God: how is it that in divine matters the truth of the holy faith is obscured and crushed by the rabble of the impious and by their most deceitful circumventions? Especially since you, princes of the Roman Empire, vindicate the pious faith and purity of the Christian religion by so many of your constitutions. Indeed, you decree all this because you are worshippers of Christ the Son of God, on behalf of the catholic faith, and with all effort you write against heretics and the treacherous by the authority of your empire. Not as though attempting some new thing of your own judgment, as certain earlier princes attempted to their own and others' destruction, but that you may show that your judgments and your faith agree with the sacred sentences of the divine Scriptures and with pious confessions.

II. But this ought all the more to have helped the holy Church, after the most savage persecutions of the previous time; yet it afflicts her all the more, since those same distinguished bishops who previously persecuted her under the assertion or assent of heresy now persecute her also under the authority of the catholic name; and the more deceitfully they act now under a feigned profession of pious faith, the more perniciously they rage, and the more bitterly truth seethes, because even under you, emperors, who defend the pious faith, it is still not permitted her to breathe. But lest we seem to bring this as an accusation without proof of the matter, we set out the case as best we can. We beseech you as suppliants, that you grant your royal ears to us, the very least, while we show that we are not heretics, and yet are vehemently afflicted as if we were heretics: since not even those who vehemently afflict us, or their associates, can now say or prove that we are heretics. But neither can they deny concerning themselves that in the previous time they either most sharply vindicated heresy, with intolerable punishment of the faithful, or at least surrendered to it, having condemned the catholic faith which they formerly asserted, when they feared to endure exile for Christ the Son of God, for whom even a lay faithful one must undergo any death, however atrocious: because it has been granted to us, as the Apostle says (Philippians 1:29), that for Christ not only should we believe in him, but also that we should suffer for him.

For such a death, or suffering, is an occasion of immortality.

III. Your clemency and your religion devoted to God is not unaware how impious and how pestilent the Arian heresy is, against which by our fathers at Nicaea a decree was written with special vigor: so that the pious confession of the apostolic faith might be preserved, and by the perpetual condemnation of that same heresy it might be firmly established, lest anyone be able to be deceived in later times. But Arius, like the heart of Pharaoh, not believing that the divine sentence had then been given against him, crept in by some means or other with Constantine, hoping that by his support the sentence of the special priests might be rescinded and he might be received into the Church. Finally Constantine himself had ordered that the holy bishop of blessed memory, Alexander, should communicate with him: not that Alexander who was bishop of the divine faith in Alexandria, who, full of wisdom and fervent with the Holy Spirit, first both exposed and expelled the same Arius and condemned him forever; but this Alexander, who was in this city of Constantinople and was himself an admirable bishop. When he saw that Arius was relying on the king of this age, he cried out from the deepest grief of his heart, standing in the place of the sanctuary, to Christ, the true and eternal King and Lord of all kings, that He not permit that stain to enter the Church.

How constant his speech was, how faithful, has been proved from this: that the same Arius, before he entered the Church, paid new and most grievous penalties, even to a shameful death. For when, on the day before he thought that he, an impious man, would enter the holy Church by the emperor's aid, since he was suffering no sickness, no pain in his body, but—what is worse—was incurably ill with the sole disease of his mind, he sought a privy according to human custom; and when he sat there, suddenly tortured by the most grievous pain, he poured out all his entrails, and his very heart, which was the treasury of his impiety, into the filth; and so, wonderful to relate, with all his inward parts emptied out, he was reduced to nothing, and in a moment he was dissolved as if by the decay of a livid body, so that through the narrow passage of the opening and the seat he himself slipped out entirely. Worthy was this punishment for the impious man, worthy this shameful death for the pestilent heretic, and worthy this burial for the most foul members of the devil's spirit. For by a new example he had to be both tortured and destroyed, who had devised new impieties against the only-begotten Son of God, saying that he was not truly born from the Father, and that there was a time when he was not, and that he was made out of nothing, lest he be believed to be of the same substance and divinity and eternity and omnipotence as the Father is.

IV. We have therefore reported this to your august clemency, so that your prudence, truly intent upon it, may observe how venerable is the faith that was written at Nicaea against Arius, to which God gave testimony not only through the authority of the divine Scriptures but also through the most sacred oration of holy Alexander as well; and how execrable is the impious doctrine of Arius, which in the person of Arius himself the divine sentence condemned by a new kind of punishment, not waiting for the day of judgment in his case, so that the rest, terrified by the example of his penalty, might take heed. By this example, certainly, it is not to be doubted that those also are condemned before God who have believed that the impious doctrine of Arius ought to be renewed or received. For how does he separate with perpetual punishment those whom impious doctrine does not separate? Even your laws enclose equal offenders in one prison and strike them with one sentence. But neither can this be doubted, that those are truly catholic who through exiles, through kinds of punishments, through the atrocity of death, vindicate without deceit that faith which was written at Nicaea by evangelical and apostolic reasoning, which God most openly approved by the punishment of Arius who attacked it.

But if these things are true among you, which are confirmed as true in the divine Scriptures, consider, most pious and most religious emperors, in what a position they are who under these divine rules and professions have consecrated their faith and devotion to Christ God, preferring no fear to the fear of God. But although Arius lies buried in dung, he has nevertheless left some heirs of his impiety. In short, there were not lacking worms to be born from his rotting corpse. Through them it is a long task to recount what the devil, the craftsman of error, has done, even if we could recount it; for they are infinite and incredible, yet not false.

V. But now we set forth what pertains to the present case: that those who made the emperor Constantius a participant in the Arian impiety through fraudulent disputation would themselves also have suffered punishment in the present, if it were not necessary, according to the Apostle's statement (1 Cor 11:19), that there be heresies, so that those who are approved might become manifest. Therefore these worms of Arius, whom we have mentioned, having royal power assenting to them, first indeed contend one by one for the Arian impiety, for the overthrow of the catholic faith and the destruction of the sacred religion: so that they attacked those who resisted with calumnies, or tortured and killed them with punishments or exile. Where they raged all the more greatly through their fury, and made a terror for themselves everywhere, no longer content to go about one by one.

Finally they compel the bishops to assemble together from every side into one place, and a meeting-place is given for the synod: for the Easterners, indeed, Seleucia in Isauria, but for the Westerners, the city of Ariminum. And there, first of all, the bishops who had come for the holy faith confirm that exposition which was written at Nicaea, in such a way that nothing was diminished from it, since it set forth the evangelical faith in invincible words and condemned the impious doctrine of Arius by divine authority. Then at last they execrate and condemn the written statement of faith of this kind offered by Ursacius, Valens, Germinius, and Gaius—a statement which both rejected the catholic faith and absolved Arius, and indeed introduced his pestilential doctrine—as well as their impious faith. Nay, they even judge that it would be an inexpiable crime if the Church should suffer the venerable faith of the fathers to be violated, or should tolerate these men so impious and their impious written statement. They also send ten legates to the emperor Constantius, writing what had been done and at the same time urging that he too should keep inviolate the decrees of the fathers for the venerable faith against the heretics. The heretics, of course, also send legates, whom Constantius then received most familiarly and as his own.

Those true legates who had come on behalf of the catholic faith against the heretics, he rejects, and through his own men he now entices them with favor, now terrifies them with threats, and meanwhile torments them with mere delay, so that at last, when they fear the king's anger, when they do not deign to endure exile for Christ the Son of God, when they are delighted by their own seats and by the most destructive possessions of the churches, they may rescind what they had piously vindicated and accept what they had condemned as impious.

VI. Let it be permitted, in this matter of God, to groan more sorrowfully before you, religious emperors: the bishops feared the anger of an earthly king more than Christ, the true God and eternal king. They believed temporal exile to be more grievous than the eternal punishment according to Isaiah of the worm that sleeps not (Isa. 66:24) and the fire that is not extinguished. They held their own homes and possessions sweeter than a blessed and eternal dwelling in the kingdom of Christ. But Constantius, not content with the ruin and disgrace of the ten legates, sends to Ariminum, so that all the bishops there might be turned in like manner. And they too, by that evil example of their legates, reject the pious faith of the fathers which they had vindicated, subscribing to that faith of the Arians which they had condemned by a sound and free judgment. Your wisdom observes that the synod of Ariminum, most piously begun, was most impiously ended. But the same impiety was also committed by the bishops at Seleucia in Isauria.

Judge, most pious and most religious emperors, in what they are guilty, and in what they deserve to be afflicted, those who refuse to meet with such bishops: who, when at first they were vindicating the whole faith and rejecting the impious faith, afterward, when they fear exile, when they are delighted with their possessions and their seats, they change their sentences, condemning at the nod of the heretical emperor that apostolic faith which they had vindicated, or accepting that impiety of Arius which they had rejected.

VII. Ought they not to have held it welcome, if indeed they believed that the judgment of God was to come, to endure all evils, rather than to be betrayers of the venerable faith, whose truth had also been approved by the prayers of holy Alexander and by the punishment of Arius? especially since the example of glorious passion had also gone before, although of very few bishops, who, lest they violate the evangelical and apostolic faith, lest they acquiesce to the impious, refused neither exile, nor punishment, nor any atrocity of death. Finally, before the synod of Ariminum, Paulinus of Trier, a most constant bishop, is given over to exile, vindicating the pious faith and execrating the fellowship of the Arians.

But also the apostolic man Lucifer, bishop of the city of Caralis in Sardinia, because he was well known for his contempt of the world, for his zeal for the sacred Scriptures, for the purity of his life, for the constancy of his faith, and for divine grace, was sent as legate from the Roman Church to Constantius; and because he vindicated the venerable faith, because he exposed and convicted the heretics, he was led into exile with every cruelty of insults. Similarly also Eusebius of Vercellae, and likewise Dionysius of the Milanese, at first a familiar of King Constantius, when he did not yet know him to be a favorer of heretics; but afterwards, when it became known and proven to him that he was defending heretics, he rejected the king's impious familiarity, preferring exile, lest he lose the friendship of Christ God, lest he not have the fellowship of the saints. But also Rodanius is sent into exile, and likewise Hilarius, who also published writings against the heretics and the prevaricators: although afterwards he indeed interrupted them, favoring the prevaricators, so that we may not say for the meantime that he was also with the heretics, against whom he had declaimed with the powers of his eloquence. Maximus also of Naples in Campania, because he was of a weak stomach and more delicate in body, was first long afflicted with insults so that he might fall, then, when by the constancy of his mind and the virtue of his faith he is not overcome by the infirmity of the flesh, he was led into exile, and there he rested as a martyr in the peace of the Lord.

But also Rufinianus, a man of wondrous simplicity indeed, but more admirable in defending the faith, by the shedding of his own blood he anticipated exile. Finally, when he persisted for the integrity of the faith, Epictetus, that fierce and dreadful bishop of Centumcellae, forced him to run before his chariot, and when he had run for a long time, thus on the road, with his vital organs ruptured, pouring out his blood, he breathed his last. The Neapolitans in Campania know this, where the remnants of his blood afflict demons in possessed bodies: by the grace, surely, of that faith of his, for which he shed his blood. There were also other bishops from Egypt, though few, of whom some were put to flight, but others were given over to exile, because they refused to convene with the impious and cruel bishops.

VIII. How salutary indeed it would have been, how beautiful and how glorious, if all those bishops, with equal virtue and similar conspiracy, had preserved to the end the faith which they had always rightly defended, fearing neither exiles nor punishments, so as to receive, surely, the eternal blessedness to come in the kingdom of God and Christ! And we are silent about the fact that they might perhaps even have made it understood that great is the price of this faith, for which no bishop would refuse exile, proscriptions, torments, and death. But, terrified a little, so great a number of bishops in droves gave their hands to impiety, and impiety inclined toward greater madness already by so easy a slaughter of the multitude.

It is no less a sacrilege, no less an impiety, than if under a pagan persecutor sacrifice had been offered to an idol: since to subscribe under terror of heresy is to sacrifice to demons. Indeed, as the divine Scriptures teach, heresy is the doctrine of demons, just as idolatry also is. Meanwhile, because with certain people multitude is preferred to truth, for the reason that it has few followers, and on this account we are afflicted, because in few we follow the inviolable faith, and we avoid many on account of impious heresies and the sacrilegious subscriptions of the prevaricators: what do you judge in this matter, O most just emperors and defenders of the catholic faith, concerning these two parties—to which do you give your vote? One party is that in which there are many bishops. But where there are many, there through prevarication the sacred faith of Christ has been violated, which was always defended before; there through fear of the king, the impiety of Arius was accepted, which was always condemned before. But where there are very few, there through exiles, through tortures, through the shedding of blood, through death itself, the faith of Christ is vindicated, and the impiety of Arius and every heresy are held accursed as the greatest evil.

But even if it is not to be doubted that a few bishops are precious by the merit of confession and inviolable faith, while many are made of no account by the merit of heresy or prevarication—since in the cause of truth, and especially in the cause of the sacred faith of religion, number is not to be compared with number, but that pure apostolic faith, proven by exiles, proven by tortures, though it be the faith of one man, is to be preferred to the faithlessness of many—nevertheless it is necessary also to bring forward the divine and present evidence of condemned prevarication: and just as in Arius his impious sect, punished by divine visitation, prejudges also concerning his followers, that the same punishment awaits them which torments Arius himself, so concerning prevaricators it has been determined by divine judgment through present punishments.

IX. Potamius, bishop of the city of Odyssipona, at first indeed defending the catholic faith, but afterwards, for the reward of a fiscal estate which he had coveted to possess, prevaricated against the faith. Him Osius of Corduba both exposed and repelled among the churches of the Spains as an impious heretic. But even Osius himself, summoned by the complaint of Potamius to King Constantius, and terrified by threats, and fearing lest, an old and rich man, he should suffer exile or proscription, gives his hands to impiety, and after so many years prevaricates against the faith, and returns into the Spains with greater authority, having the king's terrible command, that if any bishop should be unwilling to communicate with him now made a prevaricator, he should be sent into exile.

But a faithful messenger brought word to holy Gregorius, the most steadfast bishop of the city of Eliberis, of the impious prevarication of Osius. For this reason he did not consent, mindful of the sacred faith and of divine judgment, to his nefarious communion. But Osius, who would be tormented the more on this account if anyone, now that he himself had fallen, should stand fast and vindicate the faith entire with unshaken firmness of footing, caused Gregorius, a man of most vigorous mind, to be brought forth by public authority, hoping that by the same terror by which he himself had yielded, this man also could be made to yield. Now at that time Clementinus was vicarius, who, by the agreement of Osius and the general precept of the king, ordered holy Gregorius to be brought forth to Corduba through his office.

X. Meanwhile rumor disturbs all into knowledge of the matter, and the frequent talk of the people is: Who is this Gregorius, who dares to resist Osius? For very many were still ignorant of the prevarication of Osius, and had not yet well ascertained who holy Gregorius was. There was also among those who perhaps knew him, a bishop still untried, though not untried before Christ as a vindicator of the faith, according to the merit of his sanctity. But behold, they came to the vicarius, and many of the administrators were present, and Osius sits as judge—nay, even above the judge—relying on royal power; and holy Gregorius, after the example of his Lord, stands by as a defendant, not from a depraved conscience, but by the condition of the present trial; otherwise he was free in faith. Great was the expectation of each, as to which side victory would incline.

And Osius indeed relies on the authority of his own age, but Gregorius relies on the authority of truth. The one on the confidence of an earthly king, the other on the confidence of the eternal King. And Osius relies on the writing of the emperor, but Gregorius holds the writings of the divine voice. And since Osius is refuted in all things, so that he was vindicated by his own words which he had previously written for the faith and the truth, he, stirred up, said to Clementinus the vicar: "No, the hearing was not entrusted to you, but the execution. You see how he resists the royal commands. Execute therefore what has been commanded; send him into exile." But Clementinus, although he was not a Christian, nevertheless showing reverence to the name of bishop, especially in that man whom he saw to hold his ground reasonably and faithfully, answered Osius: "I do not dare," he said, "to send a bishop into exile, as long as he perseveres in the name of bishop. But do you first give the sentence, casting him down from the honor of the episcopate, and then at last I will execute against him as though a private person what you desire to be done by the command of the emperor." But when holy Gregorius saw that Osius wished to give sentence, so that he might seem to be cast down, he appealed to the true and powerful judge, Christ, crying out with all the strength of his faith: "Christ God, who are to come to judge the living and the dead, do not suffer today a human sentence to be brought forth against me, your least servant, who for the faith of your name stand as a defendant and offer a spectacle.

But do you yourself, I ask, judge in your own case today; deign to pronounce sentence for vengeance yourself. I do not desire this to happen as though I feared exile, since for your name no punishment is not sweet to me; but that many may be freed from the error of prevarication, when they see the present and momentary vengeance. And when he was interpellating God with faithful words much more invidiously and holily, behold suddenly Osius, when he attempts to set forth his sentence, turns his mouth, twisting at the same time his neck as well, is dashed from his seat to the ground, and there breathes his last, or, as some maintain, is struck dumb. Thence nonetheless he is carried out as dead. Then, with all marveling, even that Clementinus, a pagan, was terrified. And although he was a judge, nevertheless fearing lest sentence be passed on himself too with similar punishment, he prostrated himself at the feet of the holy man, beseeching him to spare him, who had sinned against him through ignorance of the divine law, and not so much by his own will as by the command of the one ordering him. There was then stupor in all, and admiration of the divine power: what we know was seen in him was a complete spectacle.

For he who wished to bring forth a human sentence soon suffered a more severe divine one; and the judge who had come to judge, now pale and himself accused, feared to be judged, and he who had stood forth as though an accused man to be sent into exile was begged by the prostrate judge to spare him as though he were the judge. Hence it is that Gregory alone out of the number of the avengers kept the faith whole, neither turned to flight nor suffered exile, and each one feared to take vengeance on him any further.

XI. Do you not see the wondrous proofs of the prevarication condemned by God? All Spain knows better that we do not invent these things. But neither was the prevarication of the sacred faith unavenged in the case of Potamius. Finally, when he was hastening to the estate which he had merited to obtain from the emperor in exchange for his impious subscription to the faith, giving new punishments to the tongue with which he had blasphemed, he died on the way, receiving no fruits of the estate, not even by sight. This torment was no light one for the greedy man. He dies who for the desire of a fiscal estate had violated the sacred faith, and while he hastens to the estate, he is forestalled by a penal death, so that he might not even obtain the solace of seeing it. In the holy Gospel we read the words of the one reproaching the rich man, who was most vainly boasting to himself of his stored-up goods: Fool, he says, this night your soul shall be taken from you; and the things you have prepared, whose shall they be? If anyone considers that this passage also applies to Potamius, he will understand that judgment was not lightly passed upon him, especially as he was to suffer punishment of the tongue, in which that rich man too is more vehemently tormented in hell.

But Florentius also, who knowingly communicated in a certain place with Osius and Potamius, already prevaricators, himself gave new punishments. For when he sits on the throne in the assembly of the people, suddenly he is dashed down and palpitates, and carried outside he recovered his strength. And again, and on another occasion, when he had entered and sat down, he suffers similarly, not yet understanding the punishments of his stained communion. Nevertheless afterwards, when he had persisted in entering, on the third occasion he is shaken from the throne so that he seemed to be repelled as unworthy of the throne, and dashed to the ground, he was tormented so palpitating that with a certain hardness and great tortures his spirit was wrenched out of him. And from there he is now carried out, not to be recovered according to custom, but to be buried. The great city of Emerita knows this which we report, in whose Church the people saw this very thing with their own eyes. But this also must be considered, that Florentius suffered these things, who had not yet subscribed to the impiety, but only because he communicated with the prevaricators of the faith, not ignorant of their prevarication. Have we reported this for this reason, that they may see what they ought to do for themselves, who, although they have not subscribed as prevaricators, are only joined through communion to prevaricators known to them? And I think that they will understand from the example of Florentius what they ought to fear.

XII. But it is tedious to recount all the other proofs of that prevarication which has been condemned by present punishments, and which divine judgment has exercised in various places—evidently to this end, that one who in some manner does not regard the divine Scriptures may understand, even by present divine retribution and punishment, what he ought to pursue and what to avoid. God willed to vindicate, doubtless even in a few, and for that reason, lest what the divine Scripture threatens concerning the future supplications of prevaricators be thought of as a fable, if now in this age He vindicated against no one. Let all bishops who are prevaricators of the faith now understand how most grievous are the supplications reserved for them, since vengeance has been taken upon their associates even in this age, to the astonishment of all. For to this end we have set forth the present punishments of prevarication, that what has been vindicated in a few may be believed to be vindicated also in all their similars, especially since divine Scripture itself asserts this very thing, which has also been demonstrated through present proofs. And let this be considered, most pious emperors, wherein those are guilty who do not join the divine sacraments with such persons, whose both eternal supplications are read in the sacred books and examples of supplications are seen in the age. But we beseech your wondrous benevolence, that for the sake of Christ God you may grant us still an indefatigable patience in hearing, while we still set forth, albeit in summary, how greatly impiety has grown.

XIII. For the detestable Arians in the regions of the East, and especially in Egypt, were not content with this alone—that bishops, having condemned the whole faith, should incline to their impious opinion—but those very men who had first been ordained by catholic bishops, as soon as they had subscribed in accordance with their desires, they reduced to the rank of laymen, and afterwards the same heretics ordained them again as bishops, so that they seemed to condemn not only the catholic faith, but also the ordination performed by catholic bishops. Consider in this, as it were, a certain triumph of the heretics against the catholics, and a wretched and, so to speak, final and most foul captivity, in which these bishops, with pious faith condemned—and catholic bishops too—handed themselves over to their dominion and mockery out of fear of exile, and so that they might seem to retain the name of bishop among men, which in any case they no longer had before God after their impious subscriptions. But for this reason the authority of that name was sought even with every disgrace, lest the possessions of the Church be taken from them—possessions which the Church would that she had never held, so that, living in the apostolic manner, she might possess the whole faith inviolably. And now not to communicate with such men as these is called the height of impiety—and this under you as emperors, who, as your constitutions declare, judge the divine sanctity of the venerable Church to be such. But it is no wonder if you, occupied with the provisions of the state, are ignorant of such atrocious deeds committed by them.

XIII. The bishops who execrated these impieties of theirs—those who were enduring the penalties of exile for the faith, or those who had given themselves over to flight—although they were separated in body by the distances between regions, yet were placed together in spirit, and by mutual letters with apostolic vigor they decree that in no way can communion be granted to such bishops as betrayed the faith in the manner we recounted above, unless they have sought lay communion, grieving over their impieties.

XIV. But when Constantius, the patron of the heretics, had died, Julian alone held the empire, and by his command all catholic bishops are released from exile. The divinity is accustomed to do this, so that even through the adversaries of the Christian religion it may provide for its own, so that all the more those who are worshippers of Christ may labor on behalf of the faithful. But not long after, when Julian had been killed, Jovian is made emperor, who, vindicating the catholic faith, gave his approval to the catholic bishops. But those distinguished bishops, which they had vindicated whole under Constantius, they condemned by a heretical subscription, seeing that by the emperor's judgment bishops are now made heretics from catholics, and the same bishops are turned back from heretics to the catholic faith. But even if certain confessors, worn out, believed in the end that they must join themselves to the communion of such men, overturning perhaps those statutes which they had previously decreed against them by prophetic and apostolic authority—can this perhaps overwhelm the divine truth?

Can this prejudice the teachings of the Gospel? Can it weaken the apostolic sentences, and especially that voice of God saying: He who perseveres to the end, this one will be saved (Matt. 10:22)? But also the Apostle Paul, a vessel of election chosen by Christ the Lord, declares this, whose words written to the Galatians are these: But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel other than what we preached to you, let him be anathema (Gal. 1:8). Hence the same man also continues further on in the same epistle, saying: For if I build again the things I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor (Gal. 2:18). He has surely become a confessor from the Gospels, from the voices of the Prophets, from the teachings of the Apostles, who doubts that the faithful then have no merit of confession, if, subverting the laws of the divine Scriptures, he begins to build up the things that destroy the Gospels.

XV. Are we not attacking the divine Scriptures when the peace of the Church is joined with bishops who deny the Son of God? For who is there who, considering the force of divine religion, would trust that the peace of the faithless is pleasing to God, unless, as has been decreed by the Fathers, they hand themselves over to the number of the laity, grieving for their own faithlessness?

But let this be so: let them have peace with the faithless. Yet in this they offend, in this they injure the emperors, in this they harass the state—those who, out of regard for divine judgment, reject a peace of this kind, which receives the sacrilegious, honors the betrayers of the faith, favors hypocrites, despises the truth, sets up the deniers of Christ, the true Son of God, as lords of the Church, contaminates the people with the stain of perfidy, and overturns the Gospel. Hence we are held guilty, hence under the authority of your name we suffer persecutions from those bishops who, vindicating heresy at the nod of the former emperor, sinned against the catholic faith. Alas, our groaning! The same bishops set the laws of catholic emperors above the faithful and the defenders of the catholic faith. We speak these things with grief in all our inmost being, weeping: not because it is not glorious for the faithful to endure under any boy whatsoever, but because such is the stupor in the world that this impiety of theirs, wrapped in such great perfidies, is not recognized, that no one understands how they always mock even royal ears in the harassment of Christians and faithful priests. But under the name of peace impiety is concealed, and the fair name of truth is set against us as a defense of the faithless.

But it is well that the Savior himself set forth the power of his peace, lest anyone be deceived by the mere word "peace" and join it to the impieties of the world, saying: My peace I leave to you, my peace I give to you: not as this world gives, do I give to you (John 14:27). He distinguished his peace from the peace of the world. For if this peace is pleasing to God which receives faithless bishops into the Church, what need is there, then, in persecutions to endure the heat, to bear prison, to go to meet the swords, and to tolerate every kind of torture and death; since after denial, after the sacrileges of perfidy, on account of this peace which they trust is pleasing to God, each of the faithless is received secure, as if unstained, with his episcopal honor preserved? By this assertion, even the martyrs must now be judged vain. For to what fruit did they prefer to bear punishments and death? For if those who denied the Son of God out of fear of persecution have no punishment, but rather are honored, then the martyrs ought not to have hoped for the crown of passion, but rather should pay the penalties of their own recklessness. For this is necessarily what follows. For it cannot be that contrary things are not judged there. Is it not manifest to what utterance they are driven by the word of this peace—or that they are compelled to pronounce—that if deniers of the Son of God are rightly strengthened in honor, the martyrs are believed to be punished as if for their own recklessness. But far be it; far be it that Christian conscience admit this.

For we believe the Son of God when he declares: Whoever denies me before men, I also will deny him before my Father; and whoever confesses me before men, I will confess him before my Father (Matthew 10:33).

XVI. Yet in this matter as well, know that the divine judgment has been proven by the documents at hand, lest anyone suppose that the peace of such bishops is to be accepted, even if they should return to the confession of the true faith after impious subscriptions, or after the nefarious communions of heretics, to which they knowingly submitted, so as not to lose either the possessions of the Church or their honors. The holy man Maximus, bishop, whom we mentioned above, vindicating the right faith and rejecting the fellowship of heretics, was led into exile. In his place the prevaricators ordain a man named Zosimus, who himself had formerly vindicated the catholic faith. This matter was carried out in the city of Naples in Campania. Saint Maximus learns of this, and writing from exile he passes sentence upon him, enjoying not only episcopal authority but also the zeal and virtue of martyrdom, to the glory of God. But after some years, the blessed Lucifer, journeying from his fourth exile to Rome, entered Naples in Campania; Zosimus attempted to come to him, with that confidence, doubtless, by which he seemed already to have corrected himself of his impiety.

But the confessor Lucifer was unwilling to receive him, not being ignorant of what he had done; indeed, with the fervor of the Holy Spirit he carried out the sentence of the bishop and martyr more vigorously, saying that the episcopate itself, which he claimed for himself as an adulterer, he would not have by the special judgment of God, and that he would thus also feel the punishment of his impiety. But not long afterward, the same Zosimus, when he wished to perform the duties of a priest in the assembly of the people, amid the very priestly words his tongue was stretched out, and he could not draw it back within the passage of his mouth, because contrary to the manner of nature it hung outside his mouth, like that of a panting ox. But when he saw that he had lost the service of his tongue, he went out of the basilica; and, a wondrous thing, outside the tongue was again recalled to its function. And at first it was not understood that the sentence of the martyr and confessor was being fulfilled in him; but when he suffered this very thing again as many times as he attempted to enter the basilica on different days, he himself at last recognized that for this reason his tongue was denied him amid the solemn words of the pontificate, so that he might prove the sentence rightly pronounced against him by the holy bishops. Finally he yielded to the episcopate, so that the tongue which had yielded might be restored. We are not reporting ancient matters, which are accustomed to be called into doubt for some reason. For Zosimus is even today in the body, no longer losing the use of his tongue, after he preferred to live with the loss of the episcopate, grieving over his impieties.

XVII. Has it not also been prejudged in similar cases that it profits them nothing that they persevere as though under the bishop's correction? For this is not correction but illusion, inasmuch as, according to the times of the emperors, faith is turned about. This, this is the thing that deceived even the emperor Valens, when he saw in the heretics constancy in defense, but in these distinguished catholics inconstancy of faith. For it was certainly proven to him that those who asserted themselves to be catholics had first subscribed with the heretics, condemning the faith which they had at first defended; and the heretics were saying: If our faith is evil, why under Constantius was it subscribed for it by those who now call themselves catholics, vindicating this faith which, when they first defended it, being convicted by arguments under Constantius they condemned? Moved by these things, Valens, ignorant of the power of the true faith, and comparing constancy with inconstancy, was avenging the impiety of the heretics with a certain justice. And we are silent about the fact that even under Valens certain men again handed themselves over to the heretics, whom now nonetheless we see named among the catholics. Hence it is that even the congregations of the heretics have been strengthened unto impious faith, while the heretics persevere in evil, and those who are thought to be catholics withdraw from the good, sometimes succumbing to the heretics. For by what authority do such bishops as these preach against heresy, which they cannot deny that they have subscribed to?

and with what confidence do they strive to persuade the people of the catholic faith, when it is established that they have condemned it by impious subscriptions?

XVIII. Do you not see that even in your own times (but, as we believe, with you unaware), the pious faith—and would that it were even truly, yet even if truly, still with a certain injustice—is being vindicated, when through unworthy bishops it is vindicated to the affliction of the priests who defend the pious faith, and to the destruction of the faithful laity? But it is thought a sacrilege to cast down so many prevaricators, to reject the crowd that consents to injustice. And where is the justice of true religion, if it must be surrendered to the impious multitude, and this under the most pious and most religious emperors? It was not so judged in the flood, that the multitude of the faithless should prevail. But that most righteous Noah pleased God all the more for this reason, that in that destruction of the world he alone was found righteous. Nevertheless, in Sodom and Gomorrah too the impious multitude paid heavy penalties: whence the one hospitable Lot was freed for his righteousness with only two daughters. But neither was Elijah, the zealous emulator of God, who was singular, held back, when four hundred and fifty false priests were sent against him. But that whole impious crowd of priests paid the penalty under the hand of one faithful man, and this with King Ahab hoping, who was impiously vindicating the false priests. But neither did Jehu, king of Israel, defer to the impious multitude of priests.

Finally, all the false priests who were under King Ahab in the highest position, when he had summoned them with a religious fraud into the house of impious religion, as though he would reward them after the rites of religion, he ordered them to be killed, so that none of them survived. And we read that because of this deed it so pleased the Lord that the sons of that same king sat on the throne of Israel to the fourth generation.

XIX. There are also many other examples very similar to these. We say these things, indeed, not as though we wished anyone's blood to be shed. Far be this from our vows: for whoever desires this to happen departs from the Christian laws. It was done then, indeed, because even at that time it was permitted by divine law for this very thing to be done, when everything was still being carried out bodily, until spiritual instruction should grow. But it does not follow that, because it is now not permitted for good and faithful men to desire the blood of false priests, therefore the faithful are to be handed over to false priests, so as to be afflicted by their most grievous persecutions. What we say would seem false, if in various places the churches of faithful priests have not been invaded in some places and destroyed in others; if by their denunciations certain holy men have not been seized, and for a long time shut up for insults, and finally sent into exile; if also certain others in prison, while others were dragged forth and, after being beaten, gave up their lives, for no other reason than that, out of fear of divine judgment, they were unwilling to communicate with the faithless or with the allies of the faithless.

In Hispania, Vincentius, a presbyter and champion of the true faith, endured what atrocities from the prevaricators, because he was unwilling to be a partner in their impious prevarication, because he was in communion with the blessed Gregory—that Gregory, I say, whose faith and virtue we have recounted above as best we could. Against him they first appealed to the consular governor of the province of Baetica; then at last, under the pretext of a requested intervention, a mob of common people was gathered from other places; and they rushed into the church on the Lord's day, and indeed they did not find Vincentius, because he himself, having been forewarned, had also told the people beforehand not to come forward on that day, since they were coming with slaughter. For he thought it better that this be done, if he were to give a place to their anger. But those who had come prepared for slaughter, lest their fury be thought to have come without cause, beat down with clubs certain devoted ministers of Christ God that were found there, so that they expired not long afterward. But because the holy people were entreating them more on behalf of Vincentius the presbyter, after those slaughters of theirs which were committed on the Lord's day, the bishops having gone out, so that the whole people might be terrified, they begin with the very leaders.

Then they demanded the production of the decurions of that city, so that they might be shut in prison; one of these, a leading man of his own homeland, because he held the faith firmly as one faithful in God, detesting the stain of prevarication, was himself among them, bound in chains, put to death by hunger and cold, amid the groaning and weeping of that province which had known his honorable life exceedingly well. The egregious and catholic bishops Luciosus and Hyginus were the authors of this cruelty, and in the meantime they indeed invaded the basilica, but they could not invade the faith of the people. Then elsewhere in a small field the same people built a basilica for themselves, to which they came together with the holy Vincentius. But Satan, who nowhere suffers Christ to be piously worshiped, inflamed them, and again, a petition having been set aside, a multitude of decurions and common people was gathered from various cities. At the same time, his presbyters also came to the place. They broke down the doors of that church, plundering from there whatever belonged to the sacred ministries. And finally, which is horrible to say, to the culmination of the sacrilege they had perpetrated, they took the very altar of God from the Lord's house and placed it in a temple beneath the feet of an idol.

XXI. These things, certainly, are done by those who, through penitents, were received into catholic discipline from an impious subscription, for the sake of the good of peace and unity. What harsher thing would a gentile worshipper of idols do, if he had license to persecute the Church? But at Trier the presbyter Bonosus was shut in, intestate, and for a long time the old man paid penalties because of his observance of that undefiled faith, for which also the renowned Paulinus, bishop of the same city, gave up his soul as a martyr in exile. In the city of Rome itself also, how grave persecutions were inflicted upon the faithful, where also the blessed bishop Aurelius, in communion with the most blessed Gregory, was afflicted! But this holy man, although he was often afflicted, nevertheless rested by his own summons. Against the presbyter Macarius, however, many things were committed by the impious. This man was a presbyter in the same city of Rome, of wondrous continence, not relieving his stomach with wine, not caring for his body with the eating of meat, but softening his rather rough food with oil alone, devoting himself to fasts and prayers. Indeed, in accordance with the merit of his faith and abstinence, he had the grace of the Holy Spirit in this, that he cast demons out of possessed bodies. Therefore we have recalled his life and merit, so that those who do not permit such men to live in the Roman empire may be judged all the more impious.

XXII. At the same time a grave persecution had grown fierce against our people, with the excellent archbishop Damasus as its instigator, so that during the sacred days it was not permitted to the faithful priests freely to summon assemblies of the people to serve Christ God. But since, according to the condition of circumstances, at whatever time, even in secret, the sacraments of our salvation must be performed, the same holy presbyter Macarius gives orders to gather the brotherhood for vigils in a certain house, so that at least by night the holy people might strengthen their faith by divine readings. But the devil, who favors the impious—since the impious also favor the devil—does not allow the divine sacraments to be celebrated even in secret. Finally the clerics of Damasus lay snares, and when they learned that the presbyter Macarius was celebrating sacred vigils with the people, they rush with officials into that house, and scatter the people, who did not resist, and seizing the presbyter himself, we do not deign now to lead him, but they drag him over stones, so that a dangerous wound was made on his hip; and on another day they set him before the judge, as a defendant of a great crime. The judge indeed strove to extort from him, as if under an imperial rescript and threats, that he should come into agreement with Damasus. But the presbyter, mindful of the divine judgment, not fearing the present judge, rejected communion with perfidy; and therefore he is given over to exile; and while he was at Ostia, he dies from the severity of that wound.

His holiness was indeed so great that even Florentius, the bishop of that place, who was in communion with Damasus, looked up to him with a certain reverence. For when the brethren had buried him in a certain ancient monument, the same Florentius did not suffer him to lie there, where his burial seemed unworthy; but removing him from there, he buried him in the basilica of the Martyr Asterius, in the place where the priests who have their burial nearby lie. By this pious service of his, as far as he could, he strove to make himself a stranger to the crime of Damasus.

XXIII. Let your Tranquility observe whether you wish this to be done in the Roman empire against the saints and the faithful, by those who are prevaricators; is there not a fear that the blood of the faithful may weigh upon the Roman empire? For the same Damasus, having received royal authority, also pursued other catholic priests, and even laymen, and sent them into exile, pleading this very thing through gentile scholars, with the judges favoring him: although certainly your constitutions were decreed against heretics, not against catholics, and such catholics as did not abandon the whole faith even under heretical emperors, and indeed suffered many grave things.

But recently he also began to persecute grievously the most blessed bishop Ephesius, fervent with zeal for the holy faith, who had been ordained for the undefiled Roman people by the most constant bishop Taorgius, himself also a novice of unblemished faith, under the odium of a falsely imposed surname, appealing through his defenders to the judge Bassus, as though against the Luciferians. But Bassus, who had long venerated the catholic faith, knew that there had been no depravity of heresy in Lucifer; indeed he well knew that he had endured ten years of exile for the catholic faith, and on account of the integrity of his constancy he rejected the accusations of Damasus, refusing to do as asked, namely to pursue catholic men and men of sound faith, saying especially that the very constitutions of the emperors appear to have been promulgated only against heretics, not against those who preserve the most holy faith without ambition for the world.

XXIV. And then for the first time Damasus blushed, because a judge was found who alone, interpreting the imperial writings most piously, would protect them. For this very point also must be necessary, that we discuss the odium of the false surname, by which they boast that we are Luciferians. Who does not know that the surname is given to the followers of him whose new doctrine, whatever it is, has been transmitted to his disciples by the authority of his teaching?

But Christ is our teacher: we follow his doctrine, and therefore we are reckoned by the sacred appellation of his name, so that we ought rightly to be called nothing other than Christians, who follow nothing other than what Christ taught through the Apostles. Heresies, however, are for this reason designated by the names of men, because they have also handed down the inventions of men. For he loses in himself the appellation of the Christian name who does not follow the discipline of Christ. Let them now say what new thing Lucifer taught that was not handed down from the teaching of Christ, that was not transmitted to posterity by the Apostles, the disciples of the Savior. And it is well that he wrote books to Constantius, not like many who seek the glory of talent, but most fittingly gathering divine testimonies against the heretics, and against the very patron of the heretics, inflamed with divine zeal for the love of the Son of God. Let them point out what in that place is contrary to the Scriptures, what he wrote as new, as a heretic. Indeed, when he was treating these books thoroughly in every respect, Athanasius also admired them, as true defenders, and translated them into the Greek style, so that the Greek language might not lack so great a good. It is not enough: indeed the same Athanasius also proclaims these same books in his own letters, as woven together from the doctrines of the Prophets and Evangelists and Apostles and from pious confession.

And although he is extolled with very many praises, yet it does not match the proclamation of his merit, and indeed since it could not praise him more fully: thus the surpassing nature of the matter is overcome by whatever tongue praises it.

XXV. But Lucifer, though ignorant of artificial eloquence, yet so wrote in the prophetic, evangelical, and apostolic manner—which is above all human eloquence—that he had the grace of the Holy Spirit from the merit of right faith and a most sincere conscience, through whom he also performed divine miracles, not only in Sardinia, but also in the four exiles themselves: to such an extent that his adversaries called him great, since they could not deny that apostolic miracles were performed through him. Holy Gregory also came to him, and marveled at such great learning of the divine Scriptures in him, and at his life itself truly as if established in the heavens. How great a man Lucifer was, when even Gregory marvels at him—Gregory who is admirable among all—not only from that clash with Osius, but also from the divine miracles which, having in himself the grace of the Holy Spirit, he performed! What then are they impious in this matter too?

Since Lucifer both believed according to the divine scriptures, and taught, and lived, and performed virtues in the name of Christ, they impose the name of Lucifer for the purpose of oppressing the true defenders of the faith, not knowing, wretched as they are, that they commit the greatest sacrilege when they designate the doctrine of Christ under a man's name; just as in this too they are impious, when they defend sacrilegious institutions issued at the arbitrary will of men under the authority of the Christian name. Is it not the height of impiety to claim their own iniquities and sacrileges under the name of Christ? Is it not impiety to mark out with human appellations a pious doctrine consecrated under the name of Christ? But this fraud, this atrocity, is carried on against the faithful in Hispania, and among the Treviri, and at Roma, and in various regions of Italia.

XXVI. Now it must necessarily be asserted what has been done in these parts; where distinguished bishops, clothed not in the truth of the faith but in the mere appellation of the catholic name, not only through judges nor merely through the military hand, scatter the faithful and true catholics, but sometimes also through their own clerics, with the judges unaware or even feigning ignorance, they perpetrate atrocities. And what end will there be, if we recount all the things that each and every one of the faithful have suffered and are suffering? Yet one atrocious deed of persecution must be reported in brief, which was committed in Aegyptus at Oxyrinchus under the testimony of the whole city.

There is a certain portion of the holy people at Oxyrinchus, in whose sacred number very many, the more intently they have placed their study or care upon divine matters, the more anxiously and diligently they strive to preserve the catholic faith inviolably: so that they commune in the divine sacraments with many heretics and with no prevaricators. In this observance many of them have been instructed by the example and admonition of the blessed Paul, who was in the same times as that most famous Antony, not less in life nor in zeal nor in divine grace than holy Antony was. The city of Oxyrinchus itself knows this, which even today most devoutly celebrates the holy memory of Paul. But that portion of the people also, when it saw the bishop of that city, by name Theodore, had fallen into impious prevarication, so that he not only condemned the whole faith, and not only impiously subscribed, but even suffered himself to be made a layman by the impious George, and was again ordained bishop by that same heretic, execrated his communion, having with them the presbyters and deacons of that unblemished faith, through whom it enjoyed the divine sacraments, together with the above-mentioned most blessed Paul.

But afterward he also had a bishop ordained for them by the catholic bishops of that time, the holy Heraclidas, all the more fit in that he ought to have been ordained the more firmly against heretics and traitors, one who was also distinguished in life, serving God from his earliest age, despising worldly goods, and existing perfect in faith and doctrine. Hence also for the apostolic faith, and for the evangelical doctrine, and for his heavenly manner of life, he is venerable among all there, displeasing only to heretics and traitors. Hence he also pleases God the more when he displeases such men. But this man, so great and such, began to exercise the episcopate in such a way that, at the reputation of his faith and doctrine and of his own most holy manner of life, very many even from the most distant regions came, execrating the nefarious fellowship of the traitors and desiring his sacrosanct communion. But that excellent bishop twice over does not permit this. And first indeed he harasses them through the public authorities, so that several times he carried him off from the city by spearmen, seized alone in the dead of night. But when those same authorities did not persevere in this which they had rashly begun—for what right could they have against a catholic bishop?—hence also they rightly ceased from the persecution they had begun, especially one of them, admonished even by a divine blow.

Then this distinguished twice-made bishop, now relying on his own resources, sends a crowd of clerics to the church of the blessed Heraclidas, the catholic bishop, and overthrows it, tearing down its walls on every side, so that he even smashed the very altar of God with axes, to the horror and groaning of the whole city, because that church was being overthrown whose bishop even men of the opposing party confess to be of right and unblemished faith.

XXVII. Consider, we beseech you, most dutiful emperors and defenders of the right faith, whether you issue edicts on behalf of bishops so impious as these, so that those are afflicted who by the merit of their faith and most holy life are more precious than the world itself. Believe, most religious emperors, that the blessed Heraclidas is one of that number of saints of whom the divine Scripture speaks, saying: They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, afflicted in tribulations and sorrows, of whom the world was not worthy. For how is the blessed Heraclidas not such a man, who, spurning all the delights of the world, through the very bitterness of this rugged life, emulating the Lord's footsteps, naked and unencumbered pursues the saving path of the virtues; who cares for the faith out of love for the divine faith just as we read the saints conspired to do, having nothing from the world except tribulations and sorrows for the faith, living thus, walking thus, just as those saints of whom the testimony was set forth above?

Therefore rightly both the blessed Gregorius and the other holy bishops, by the venerable fellowship of his sanctity, are relieved as though by divine consolations in the evils of the afflicted Church. Nor did Theodorus rage only against so venerable a bishop, but also against his most holy people itself, which was instructed in the doctrine and morals of a most sincere and most faithful priest. And it is long to recount what he plotted against the modesty and purpose of the sacred virgins, whose monasteries the city itself venerates according to the merit of their sanctity. But also the very servants of God he afflicted several times with atrocious injuries, those whom he had proved to be more holy. But what wonder if, as a wolf, he afflicted the sheep whose good shepherd he frequently afflicted?

XXVIII. Behold the man who, under you pious emperors, and those coming for the catholic faith, boasts that he is catholic, overthrowing the Church of the catholics; persecuting the catholic priests and servants of Christ, and also impiously afflicting his sacred virgins.

This is that distinguished and most holy bishop, who, when he had first been ordained bishop by catholic bishops, was afterwards reduced by the impious Georgius to the rank of the laity, and nonetheless was ordained bishop by Georgius himself, to the vexation of the faithful: sitting and communicating in one and the same city with Apollonius, bishop of the Meletians, who consented to the impieties of Georgius, and with this same Apollonius, this same Theodorus persecuted the blessed Heraclidas, the defender of the catholic faith. Behold, to him, as though to a catholic, the basilica of Apollonius has now been handed over by the authority of your general edict: although certainly this same Theodorus, who as though a catholic received the basilica of the heretic Apollonius, acted impiously in the same way as Apollonius also acted: except that Theodorus acted more atrociously, when from a catholic bishop he became a layman, condemning the pious faith and subscribing to the Arian impiety, so that he might be ordained bishop a second time by a heretic. Indeed, from this he wishes to appear a catholic, that he himself now makes certain presbyters or deacons of Apollonius laymen by some persuasion, and ordains them again, so that he may seem to return the favor of that most shameful ordination which he himself suffered. Does he not exceed every sacrilege, claiming these mockeries under the catholic name, to the affliction of faithful priests and laymen?

XXIX. But also in Palestine, at Eleutheropolis, there is a holy virgin of Christ named Hermione, born indeed of noble lineage, but made far nobler by faith and holiness, adorning her very virginity by her contempt for worldly things and for human glory, which many affect, even those who boast that they have renounced the world and the desires of the flesh. Insofar as she guards the chastity of her body with sacred rigor, to that same extent she preserves the purity of her soul by the chaste observance of pious faith: communicating neither with heretics nor with transgressors; because she understands that the virginity of the body profits nothing unless she also guards the integrity of her soul by sacred confession, fleeing the stain of adulterous communion and following the saving sacraments of faithful priests. Finally, she entreats with religious letters that she may be helped by the holy visitations of the blessed Heraclidas. But in place of the blessed Heraclidas, the holy Ephesius visits her, who at that time had come from the city of Rome to the bishop Heraclidas for ecclesiastical utilities. This is Ephesius, whom we mentioned above as ordained bishop of the undefiled Roman people by the most constant bishop Taorgius. But when he had come to Eleutheropolis, not only was Hermione with her holy monastery relieved, but also certain most faithful servants of God.

Among them was also Severus, a man of noble house and a former tribune, religious toward the catholic faith, who for a long time indeed did not communicate with heretics and prevaricators, but had not yet found the sacred communion of the catholics. But when he saw the holy Ephesius, and after many examinations proved him to be catholic, he handed himself over to him for sacred Communion, judging himself blessed that his house had been visited unexpectedly by divine mercy, led into such great admiration by the arrival of the holy priest, not only by the purity of his life but also by certain heavenly proofs. For the blessed Ephesius is of such great faith and holiness that wherever he has gone, divine grace accompanies him. The holy people at Oxyrinchus also proved this, communicating with the blessed Heraclides, which people, bound to him by pious affection on account of the merit of divine grace, escorted him as he set out with great weeping, as the Asians once did the apostle Paul.

XXX. We speak these things not from a desire for praise, but so that you may know how holy and faithful souls, under the authority of your name, are afflicted by the gravest persecutions at the hands of those who, it is agreed—without your knowledge—even now to this day are either heretics, or prevaricators, or associates of such men. But against the holy Ephesius, in Palestine, these men to whom the sacred truth is burdensome attempted a small matter and afterward desisted, fearing in him both the freedom of the faith and his constancy of mind, and thinking this very thing, that their heresy and impiety could be the more exposed if, under you catholic emperors, they had more sharply harassed a bishop of whole and constant faith. But when the same blessed Ephesius, invited by letters of the faithful, sailed to Africa, giving us a command after the apostolic manner, that we should attend to the holy brotherhood in divine and ecclesiastical offices, then the distinguished Turbo, bishop of the city of Eleutheropolis, despising our littleness—with the holy brotherhood there demanding this very thing—began to wish to accomplish against us what he did not dare to accomplish against the holy Ephesius, not knowing that the grace of Christ God also protects his very least servants, especially those laboring for the cause of the right faith. For this Turbo, after he heard that certain ones were joining themselves to whole faith, and that through the grace of God the reality of the truth was growing, threatens us with destruction and throws all into confusion.

But the burning of the house of Severus was also threatened against the truth—a man who vindicates the faith of God all the more, the more faithfully he has also served in military service to the Roman empire. He also attempts to pursue the sacred virgin Hermione, a woman whom anyone who has learned of her has admired as one of the women of the Gospel. But he also sets snares for each and every one who is joined with us in the fellowship of sacred communion—as though charging it as a crime, on the basis of that law of Babylon, that within our dwellings, without the stain of heresy and without communion with perfidy, according to the evangelical and apostolic traditions, we celebrate the divine sacraments for the faithful who desire them. For with a similar fury the Babylonians of old also pursued the holy Daniel with hostile hatred, because in his own house he worshiped God in observance of the divine law. This is Turbo, who was a deacon of the heretic Eutychius, under whom the blessed Lucifer, bishop of the city of Eleutheropolis, was suffering exile; he also vehemently afflicted Lucifer himself, who was freely vindicating the faith, with many cruelties.

XXXI. There are still today in Palestine those who in that time inflicted the most grievous punishments on those who followed them, because they gathered with Lucifer, bishop of the catholic faith. Let them deny it, if it was not among their other atrocities that they broke open a closed door with axes; if they did not rush upon Lucifer, that most faithful priest, and even lay hands on the divine sacraments, punishing each one there of those brothers who had gathered with impious slaughter. Let them deny it, if they do not today keep among themselves the holy mystic vessels which they then impiously plundered from Lucifer, along with the sacred codices. At that time, certainly, Turbo was in league with the heretic Eutychius. From that time on, calling himself catholic, he persecutes catholics under the authority of your name—of you who by the contemplation of pious hope vindicate the catholic faith. Do you permit, most pious emperors, that under the authority of your name impiety should long rule everywhere against the faithful? For is it expedient for the Roman empire—which nonetheless we speak of with affection and with the faith of the devotion you show to Christ God—that those who piously preach Christ should suffer persecutions and deaths, so that it is nowhere permitted to set up pious altars to God, or at any rate, when they have been set up, they are destroyed? Under the impious king Ahab of Israel, when the prophets had been killed and the altars destroyed, Elijah intercedes with God against Israel, saying in the book of Kings: Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have destroyed your altars, and I am left alone, and they seek my life.

Do you allow this invidious accusation to be made to God even in your times by each and every one of the faithful priests? For even if they keep silent, does God not know that these things are being done? What do we think—that these things are perpetrated without offense to God against true catholics and against His true Church, when long ago the things done against the servants of God were most severely avenged by divine punishments? And whence come so many plagues by which the Roman world is shaken and pressed? There is no need now for us to enumerate each one of the plagues, which your Tranquility recognizes with the heat and anxiety of its empire. Let us soften this common grief even by silence, lest we seem not so much to sympathize as to inflame.

XXXII. We ask this, most pious emperors, that you deign to consider from what causes these things come about. Is it because the faithful servants of Christ, fearing the divine laws, are unwilling to assemble with the faithless, or because true catholics are crushed by false priests? For how are they not false priests who are now to be avoided not only for the reason of prevarication set out above, but also because very many of them even now vindicate their own heresies under a false profession of the catholic name before you? For who now fears to proclaim the impiety of bishops, when the impiety committed has so often been honored, when it is in no way cast down from the priesthood?

Finally, since some of them are Origenists, others Anthropomorphites, and others again uphold the sect of the impious Apollinaris, and with a threefold wedge others blaspheme against the Holy Spirit with various pursuits. But even those among them who are thought to believe piously, asserting or rejecting that there are three substances of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, nevertheless all these boast of your edicts and claim the Churches for themselves, although our fathers have always condemned these impious sects by apostolic and evangelical authority. To be sure, to discuss these matters now is not the task of the present little work; but we say only what may move your mind, intent upon the true faith, to horror.

XXXIII. One heresy, as we think, was received at Ariminum under a heretical king, and now under you, pious catholic emperors, so many heresies are defended, no less impious than is the impiety of Arius. And although each one writes books or letters against the others, yet all communicate with one another, either by direct or by oblique connection: striving in the empty zeal of philosophers with mere disputations, not out of devotion to the sacrament avoiding one another as impious; so that now, as in the schools, the contest among them seems to be one of intellect, and not the sacred defense of true religion: since they do not separate the sacraments from one another, although they are separated from one another by impious opinions.

But they do this because some of them pursue human glory, and others indeed avarice; and from this it comes that they collude with one another under impious dissimulation, so that they may lose neither the possessions of the Church nor its honors. And meanwhile, in order to veil so many of their impieties, for the mockery of individuals, as though displaying the marks of a most benign mind, they say that for this reason they are joined in the fellowship of ecclesiastical communion even with those who hold contrary views, lest the good of peace perish in the Church. As if, indeed, this kind of peace were pleasing to Christ God, which admits such great impieties into his Church. But let those who think so hear what is written: And they have not known the way of peace, the fear of God is not before their eyes (Ps. XIII, 3). But we read more openly also in Jeremiah concerning impious and iniquitous peace, as the testimony that follows sets forth: From the least of them even to the great, all have committed iniquity, from the priest even to the false prophet, all have wrought falsehood, and they devised the crushing of my people, esteeming it as nothing and saying, Peace, peace, and where is peace (Jer. VI, 13)? And one must attend to how grievous are the things he sets forth concerning those who glory in this most vain peace. For it follows: They were confounded because they failed, and not even so enduring confusion they came together, and they did not know their own ignominy. Therefore they shall fall in their ruin, and in the time of visitation they shall be weakened (Ibid., 15).

XXXIV. What evil do we commit, what impiety do we do, if, keeping faith with Christ, we reject a peace of this kind, whose great confusion and disgrace and most grievous outcomes are described? But even these distinguished lovers of peace wage war against the faithful priests. For what does the devil want, except that the impious and the transgressors of the world glory in peace? For what does the devil want, except that those who are pious and faithful be harassed by the persecution of their enemies? We have set these things forth for this reason, lest through your ignorance the blood of Christians defending the ancient faith be poured out for a long time. For what does it profit, if you are the champions of the catholic faith, and you allow the followers of the catholic faith to be tortured everywhere? driven out everywhere? nowhere to preach the pious faith freely? Let them have basilicas gleaming with gold, and clothed with the ostentation of precious marbles, or erected with the magnificence of columns; let them have also possessions stretched out at length, on account of which even the sound faith has been endangered: why do they also, by their impieties, claim for themselves the cities common to all Romans, so that they permit no one to live piously in those cities, in which even vain superstition is cultivated by very many without danger, and is defended without their envy? At least let it be permitted to the truth, even amid the most vile and abject mangers, to worship Christ God piously and to adore him faithfully, where also at one time the same Christ, as an infant, deigned to lie according to the flesh.

What we ask, we do not ask as though we were afraid to be killed for the truth. God is witness, who is the true watcher of the heart, that by God's grace it is both the greatest refreshment for us and a sure hope of future blessedness if we are slain for this faithful assertion. It is not, then, as men who fear to suffer that we have pursued these matters, but so that the blood of Christians shed by the impieties and cruelties of others may not long weigh upon the most pious empire of your principate. Especially under you, most religious Theodosius Augustus, who with wondrous devotion conspire against all heretics by the pious confession of the Christian religion, we have believed that it would be a great punishment for us before God if, before you, so religious and so pious an emperor, and consecrated to Christ God with divine and most full fear, whom God Christ truly chose for the empire, we were silent about the things that belong to the true faith and the true Church. After this we do not doubt that you will act with solicitude as a father of the empire, lest in the Roman world the sincerity of the professed faith and communion be afflicted. Whatever you shall have done more holily in the cause of the sacred faith and the professed truth, so much more gloriously shall you reign both here and forever by the favor of Christ. I, Marcellinus the presbyter, wishing for your most blessed empire secure quiet, and in the kingdom of Christ and of God eternal blessedness, most pious emperors.

I, Faustinus, who cannot be called worthy presbyter of God, desiring that both here you may happily rule for many years by the aid of the most merciful divinity, and in the future kingdom of Christ the Son of God you may obtain eternal blessedness with the saints, most glorious emperors.

To these prayers the August law thus responded: THE RESCRIPT OF THEODOSIUS TO MARCELLINUS AND FAUSTINUS, PRESBYTERS.

Greetings, Cynegius, most dear to us. Although no reverence ought to be greater in human hearts than that for the divine law, nor can anything be added to it—whose ambitious preeminence, as moderatrix of the world and the earth, propitiated by the favor of almighty God, guards all that it has willed to be under us—nevertheless, our clemency having been petitioned through Faustinus and Marcellinus, priests most full of faith, we have feared lest, if nothing had been answered by us to those who asked, we might seem to approve those who had added something, contrary to our purpose, to the divine law which we serve. And therefore we moderate each in such a way that we honor the petition which has been offered; but we desire or command nothing to be added to the faith by our own judgment. No one was ever of so profane a mind that, when he ought to follow the catholic teachers, he should himself determine for the teachers what ought to be followed. And indeed the praise of the prayers is commendable and just, since it has encompassed almost the entire series and order of heretical superstition, which is contrary to the catholic faith.

For he revealed both where it arose and by what author it was advanced. Indeed, when, at the persuasion of certain persons, the antiquity of the whole world was changed, innocent men, driven into exile for the faith, ended their lives with the highest praise. But vengeance was not delayed against those who, plotting against good morals and heavenly institutions, for a little while by contention—not by faith, but by faction—perverted the minds of many with a detestable insinuation. For the patience of almighty God was stirred to such a degree that they felt beforehand, by example, the punishment that is owed to the guilty after their deeds. But not even by this deed could they be converted to the precept of God or bent to it: they press upon the catholics with hidden machinations, pursue them, attack them. So great is their perseverance in error that, along with the followers of other observances of a different kind, they prefer to sin daily rather than to think rightly with the catholics. In this the petition of those who ask is to be praised, who, being in communion with Gregory of Hispania and Heraclidas of the East—saints indeed and praiseworthy bishops—desire to live in the catholic faith without any attack or molestation from anyone, and to be struck by no ambushes or circumventions of those who seek after them; for it pleases them to preserve with all religion the faith once received. Let whatever has deserved to be eternal remain inviolate. Let no agreement, no covetousness, no fraud attempt anything belonging to others. Let them use their own purpose in whatever place they wish; let them use it for the catholic faith with divine love.

Cynegius, dearest and most loving father, let your sublimity so order the precept of our serenity, by which we venerate the catholic faith with all favor and without which we cannot be saved, to be observed, that you protect and defend from the injuries of wicked men and heretics Gregorius and Heraclidas, bishops of the sacred law, and the rest of their similar priests who have given themselves to like observance; and let all know that it sits in our mind that we believe the worshipers of almighty God to be none other than catholics.