Epistolae Duae

The two letters of Saint Vigilius. (From Gallandi’s Library, volume VI, pages 203–206.) The First Letter. To Simplicianus, Bishop of Milan. Concerning the martyrdom of Saints Sisinnius, Martyrius, and Alexander. I. To the holy and venerable Father, to be preferred above all good men, Simplicianus, Vigilius, bishop of the Church of Trent, sends greetings. Although, when mention is made of the deeds of the Martyrs, words are not commended by deeds, but deeds by words, and it is rather a matter of constancy to pass over in silence those whose virtue has been proven, nevertheless, because piety has impelled me to set forth the causes, the places, and the struggles of the martyrdom, duty has admonished me, obligation has compelled me; with trembling grief I have not denied my tongue to the page, because neither could a lamp be hidden under a bushel, nor could the voice of pious blood be silenced. For after many degrees of patience and constant struggles, the iniquity of perfidy has recently been added; because the ministers in the churches that had been recently founded were provoked and obtained the titles of martyrdom; ready for everything, willingly enduring everything, giving no one an occasion, they merited glory by the occasion of glory. Their life, to touch upon the highest points of the matter, for the sake of knowledge of the facts, was as singular in its solicitude as in its purpose: for all, free from the bond of marriage, offered to God immaculate souls, like holy sacrifices.

Finally, the first of them, by name Sisinnius, brought a new peace of the Christian name to a barbarous nation: which peace, as far as in him lay, he steadfastly preserved through a series of years, acknowledging no fellowship of polluted hospitality, and, like Lot in Sodom, preserved his religion with an awe-inspiring fear. But the safe sheep, although placed in the midst of wolves, sought a fold, which, enriched by the vows of a faith of little account, he was the first to found in that region. He, whose servant, if you deign to consider with me, through this, as if by right, merited to be, as an old man in age, so also to have preceded in merit. II. Also the lector Martyrius, joined to him by his support, already commended by the pledge of his name, put on the beginnings of a religious profession after temporal military service as a catechumen. For, having cast off his belt, and having rejected the company of his parents and brothers, understanding that he had obtained the grace of God, the author of true light, he was joined in the office among the lectors, and first intoned the song of divine praise to the ears of a deaf region, constantly attentive to spiritual works, wearied by continuous fasts, the teacher of his own reading, anxious in winning souls. For this reason, in a short expenditure of time, he sent ahead such a profit that the crown was deservedly believed to be his. Why should I recount the souls set free, who have proceeded into the bosom of Abraham in full light, whom the faithless observance of superstitious days, having alienated the right of nature, condemned to a cruel death?

But he, weaned from his mother’s milk-swollen breasts, nurtured abroad, always sought a fitting affection for his mother, about to proclaim the resurrection preached by examples to seeing eyes. These are a few out of many. III. Alexander also, a brother in blood of martyrdom, completing the third sacrifice of the Trinity, opened an equal gate of confession. For he abandoned his homeland, a foreigner for the sake of God, and his parents, a faithful companion in trials, magnanimous in faith, inclined to compassion. And if my testimony is in any way believed, they are not, except to themselves, to be preferred one to the other: whom it was not necessary to commend, except perhaps what was fitting. But indeed, annoyances have been raised thus far, if you still willingly admit them to your ears. For smoky paganism grew hot against the vapor of faith with the flame of fury from the devil’s zeal: from there, already creeping with slow tinder, because, as I said, with the poverty of faith devoted to wealth, the first deacon of that place had set up the tabernacle of the church. There also came a just cause for the titles, that he forbade the offering of sacrifices to the devil from a Christian home by the faithful ministry of the deacon, and he forbade the banner of passion to be carried before the banner of the foul lustration. For the hand, invited by a single reward, rushed to blood; and in the early morning hours, worn out by the wounds of the previous day, and found in bed not otherwise, it buried him in deserved rest.

The reader, moreover, never idle, served even before dawn at the ministry, to whom the deacon ministered in the sacrifice; and the aforementioned Martyrius applied medicine to wounds, which they completed by the work in which they were caught. For the reader, withdrawing to the garden adjoining the church, was captured and planted the tree of his life from the root. The doorkeeper also was joined to the passion: caught in the lodging, he neither offered his soul nor denied it. But all, gathered together, were dragged for some distance and breathed out their souls to God. And the body of two was led away lifeless; but for the third, whose life was more tenacious, the punishment was more keenly felt: for he, alive, witnessed his own funeral rites. A pyre was prepared from the sacred roofs or beams of the church: this flame veiled the martyrs. With reverent intention, however, we consider among ourselves that a basilica be built on that spot where they first merited the glorious testimony of faith. Now, unworthy as I am, a partner in both, console me with fatherly love, and with the same, approach the saints as an intercessor before them, so that I, a sinner, having set aside all else, may on that day touch the hem of either priests or martyrs. We greet your holiness with special service: I ask that you deign to commend my grief to the Lord. Another hand adds: I could not deny that what was yours in us might become more glorious by the merit of the receiver, not by the grace of the giver.

The day of the passion of the saints, the fourth before the Kalends of June, on the sixth day of the week, at the break of dawn. EPISTLE II. TO SAINT JOHN CHRYSOSTOM. Concerning the same martyrs. Here begins the Epistle of Saint Vigilius on the praises of the most blessed martyrs Sisinnius, Alexander, and Martyrius, whose relics, through the illustrious man Jacobus, came to John, bishop of the city of Constantinople. I. A new guest of charity would not approach your holy ears otherwise, nor would he, unprovoked, thrust forward the timidity of a first impulse, nor would an unknown address imbue you, were it not for the provocation and the reward. Therefore, from an apostolic man, most dear brother, the tenor and fullness of the present epistle will begin, so that you may easily understand that the praises of the martyrs follow. For Jacobus, a man faithful to heavenly desires, intending to lay down the dignity of the Comitiva among the companions of Christ, requested the relics of the recent saints, still steaming with vapor. I said "intending to lay down," because that dignity which is accumulated in the Lord cannot be set aside. To him, I, sufficiently timid and not a little prudent regarding the cause, struggled with the dispensation within myself. The less suitable a distributor I was, I almost, out of fear, denied what I had always made it my duty to expend, so that one might lend it out.

I confess: I greatly feared the private loss of many private persons with a private fear, had I not looked to James, who was to deliver to Saint John through certain means of reverence, so that by delegated love through the religious names of the martyrs, it might be conveyed, and again be joined by blood, a kinship not foreign. This opinion of faith, among others, I willingly accepted, which smiled well in my grief; I only delayed it, I did not deny it. I delayed it, so that my slowness might again be openly betrayed, I who had least merited to follow my companions. I confess, I wished for it; but the crown of justice is not in desire alone. Now, however, if a fitting order will not be burdensome to thirsty ears, I shall begin from the location of the region or the journey; I shall follow the traces of the highest matters without disdain, so that the flood of merits may flow more readily, if you reach the source of the spring with capacious love. II. For the place situated (to which Anagnia is the name of the dwelling) twenty-five stades distant from the city, enclosed by narrow passes both by treachery and by nature, relaxed by almost a single approach (call it the path of the three martyrs), which, lying back on a gentle ridge, with a rampart sinking on every side, with strongholds placed all around in a crown, with neighboring treacheries conspiring together, exhibits a kind of spectacle, a scene of nature. A cause was lacking to the place; but Christ was a sufficient cause, so that the play of the devil might give pomp to martyrdom. Let the relation of places not be hateful to the ears of the hearer.

For he was always a poor companion to himself, a hollow place echoing among the mountains: when Christ's army first ascended there, the savage pagandom, often roused by trumpets, was inflamed with rival fury and the clamors of war. But the saints' one complete kind of battle was to endure everything, to yield when provoked, to bear patiently, to curb public frenzy with private gentleness when about to suffer, to conquer by refusing to fight: but the predestined glory of a ripe end pressed upon those whom the due order had produced with its titles. For, omitting digressions and cutting off long detours (I will only not be silent about this) by which the virtue of the martyrs was nourished, a loss of praise by a shortcut that would remove it. III. When the Lord's name was still foreign in the aforementioned region, and there was no sign that showed the seal of faith, these were then singular strangers in number, now in merit, both in religion and in race, by whom God, unknown, was not undeservedly proclaimed, composed in the quiet conversation of a long time, while no utility of faith stirred them. But now, if the cause of the hatred rising against the Lord is sought, the title of violated peace was the reason; because one of them, named Sisinnius, more advanced in age in both respects, in whom there was even venerable old age alone, raised a church at his own expense. Richer in faith than in means, wealthy in spirit, poor in property, he handed over the fold to a shepherd. He became the one whose founder he was, the watchman: but the fold was contrary to wolves.

The ruin of the devil begrudged the raised summit. This was the first lot of martyrdom, that the sheep, while they pursued the lamb, would fall. Added was, like a sacrifice, that cause more just to God: because when they wished to conduct the evil purification around the boundaries of the fields with a funereal spectacle, and they trampled and defiled the sprouting crops as much; they, who would also trample Christ's shoots, crowned with mournful ornaments, with the howled song of the devil, with the processions of various beasts, with banners raised in the Lord's temple, were forcing a convert recently from their own people to give victims to the works of darkness. And because the Lord's ministers could scarcely see this happen without their own guilt, since they themselves, by being present, seemed to share in the confused works; the bodies of the saints were pledged that day to a deadly slaughter, yet the palm of victory was deferred. IV. Here, brother, I wish to confer with you briefly on the titles of things, lest anyone think that martyrdom was undertaken with humility as something pedestrian: because every good that is present is considered vile; when it is new and wondrous, raised up without the envy of time, and so completed that neither anything preceded it before, nor follows; but it is singular, which alone is concluded by a given consummation. Because the sheep is guarded by a thief, I think, it is shown to be not a mercenary, but a disciple of Christ; and he who flees is a hireling; he who does not desert is a shepherd. He who gives up his soul, lives; he who saves it, loses it.

For what else did the Master and Lord do, except not abandon the deserters; or the Lamb, except defend the ewe, so that a pious victim might be consummated for the sheep? But as I am about to enter the gate of passions, after having set forth a manifold cause, I shall not contract a foreign praise, nor shall I steal: because neither to desire what belongs to others is the way of martyrs, nor to deceive is the way of priests; except that I confess myself incapable, as I recount these things in pursuing them, and even in this I am not so, because I am about to speak of lesser matters. V. For after the banner of diabolical purifications, which, as we have related, was a sign of the glory soon to come, after a delay of one night, one ascends to the crown. For in the morning hours, with the shadow of the sky suddenly yielding to the dawn, an unexpected but conspired band is gathered, armed with charred stakes and axes, and with whatever weapon the wrath of the devil had fashioned for its searchers; and there, with some Levites having been caught in the church singing the morning hymn, a vast depopulation occurs, a savage plundering: all things, both secret and divine mysteries, are profaned; finally, religion becomes booty. Let no one think this was a common struggle, when either insensible idols are torn down by sensible beings, or masses of rock are moved along with their grinders; so that you are uncertain, regarding the worshiper and the object of worship, which you judge to be harder. Christ the rock was being assailed in all things, the cornerstone was being rejected by the Gentiles, to be tested again; about to build a rising ruin with world-blood. Amid these things, faith had its own spectacle.

The body of Sisinnius, then a deacon, was held on his bed, pierced and wounded also by earlier blows, when he was ordered either to call the ewe back to the sacrifice or to become the sacrifice himself, unless he had consented to the deadly offerings; struck by the trumpet with which they sounded the song of the devil—not undeservedly, he who had first brought forth the sound of faith—cut down by axes, he who defended the axe from the barren tree of paganism. And, not to prolong the matter further, he is found confirmed, as we have said, in the earned repose of his bed; confessed, I believe, so that by a private mystery he might arrive more quickly at the cross, about to free the paralyzed people. VI. By means of wood, the lector Martyrius is also bound with ropes: a confessor likewise and an assertor of his own name; he who had sung a new song, then first, and now alone in a foreign land; amid the roaring and harsh pastoral shouts, even then rendering sweet praises to God, as I recalled above; and he had brought medicine or fomentations to the deacon Sisinnius, about to heal pains, though about to receive wounds; recalling the fleeing soul with exceptional draughts, not for the body, but for the passion. But the saint, already destined for the journey of martyrdom to Christ, refused the drink of water, because he had come for the wine of passion, which he had mixed with the flowing waters of a truer life in the proffered cup.

In this care, then, he was caught—he who was always anxious for the holiness of souls, born not for himself alone, nor certainly about to live only for himself—and he withdrew into the secrecy of the garden that was joined adjacent, that is, he did not depart from the church. For the garden is the church, as you know better, planted with the hedges of the living commandments. He did not thrust forward his body, which he was unwilling to deny; nor did he assume the audacity of rashness, relying on the confidence of piety. As is said in the African regions, those who arm themselves for a voluntary death, which they do without fear, seek it out because of pride. But the future martyr stood: captured, free; fearless, confessed; giving thanks, wounded; injured in body, secure in mind; with his head struck, with baptism denied, washed by his blood. No one deserved to follow him who was thought to flee, whence the withdrawal was a vain thing, akin to fear, not religion; but the just confession of the one seized showed that he stood only to conquer; he withdrew so that the persecutor might perish in his glory. From the garden to which he had fled, Martyrius is led forth. This is a kind of mystery of withdrawal: that the purple flower, a dweller in blooming places, might be dyed as a rose not undeservedly, preceding the new martyr; or that among the white locks of lilies through baptism, with all watered by a recurring death planted, the will of life might be silently declared. He was also pierced with stakes and led to the idol; but he deserved to be a victim before he reached the altar of the devil.

VII. A third also, destined to honor Alexander, completes the Lord’s crown. He who kept watch at Christ’s gates found a familiar entrance; under his guard, the veil of the temple was rent by the hearts of the gentiles, now uncovered. Sought out eagerly by the crowd, because he was well known to all for his zeal in the faith, he was caught, yet not captured; fear was present, but he did not fear. Often was Christ’s disciple mocked, and in this, the greater labor in martyrdom’s torments made his punishment more lively: and thus, about to compensate for his rank by the excess of his passion, he earned by lot that he should be inferior to none of the three. For in the others, fury did not delay the torments; a slow punishment kept this one for the Lord: he felt that he knew what he was enduring, a spectator of his own body; and although the wounds inflicted had deferred the aforementioned martyr from deacon, these torments kept him as their own guardian. For with their bodies bound and linked together, and dragged through the public way like dogs, but not about to return to their vomit, Alexander was led alive among them, his feet entangled, about to leave behind part of his quivering limbs on the rocks, until he was brought to the end of the light—that is, of life. After this, they proceeded against the sacred heights, that is, the high temples of God; after the bodies, the roofs were laid low on the ground, the sacred beams made into a pyre, before the eyes of Saturn, an ancient idol of long-standing age.

Having sent the twin and kindred bodies before him into the fire, the wounded Alexander stood, about to confess again; a reward of life was offered to him, on condition that he forfeit life—if he wished to escape the present flame, he should declare that he had consented to their darkness. But he, looking askance and rejecting the gifts of the impious, had light before his eyes against the light; fear of punishment prevented punishment: the heat of faith repelled the flame; the order of the passion also held its degree of reverence. He is received last: but he is not crowned the least among his brothers. The mystery of the Trinity, brothers, has been fulfilled in the three ministers, now in the banquet of heavenly joy; although others could have suffered as a living sacrifice, with a similar lot, had not all things been deemed complete by the number three. For we were among these things, perhaps not the smallest portion: and on account of these, we are rebuked by the gentiles; nor have we abandoned our companions: but the degree has its own election.

VIII. Moreover, many things in the days approaching the passion were not so much shown as depicted in truth, which we pass over in summary; so that through these few things which were done, we may more fully teach the mysteries. Yet if you will deign patiently to reread what has been related, from its very cradle of the region indeed, Sisinnius was a Cappadocian by race or a Greek, among you once of the first blood; swift in faith, great-hearted in spirit, prodigal of labor, persevering in all things, concluding his goal with a palm not late, about to come in the seventh lot of the promise, always joined by the bond of charity, harmonious in peace, holding the reins of divine discipline, tamer of so great a people of the yoke, a sign of Christ; finally, of the future flock or of the same blood (as is the custom, the master of things speaks), holding the leadership of the way, he is recognized as a bold trampler of danger and an author, so that the following ranks may securely follow close behind. Thus in our morning sign of faith he held the primacy of blood and leadership: who, after showing the way, led to life, or led to glory, a seducer of salvation, a knower of truth; as the Prophet witnesses, "And my sign in the morning.

And so that the accomplished mysteries might accumulate further, and that their own sign might not be lacking to the Indicus, when they dragged the lifeless body of the holy Sisinnius like an animal, they tied a hollow bronze rattle around his neck—what the common people call a bell—insulting the body, reproaching death, taunting Christ as not avenging, and mocking the Lord’s disciple, they fulfilled the saving mystery. For what did that ringing mean, or the sound useful to the following beasts and also fitting for ornament, suspended from the neck? Except that the voice might belch forth the name of Christ, shouting hoarsely to the deaf, and approve the prince, as of the flock, so of the people, in all things. For he first sounded forth the word of a religious voice, he first resounded through the hollow valleys: still near to brute animals, or certainly to cattle, a leader of untouched pasture, a hearer of a new ringer, a ruminator of the flowery law among the peoples. IX. In the proposed order, the name consequent upon his martyrdom also fulfilled the prophecy he held: he set forth the parable of his name, a true revealer in all things; he smiled upon the name by which he was called, and heaped it with merits; he established his natal name, as by origin, so by passion to come. Why should I disclose the secret of the garden aware of the penalty? That he first betook himself to that place, into which the martyr again entered, the gate of paradise, meditating on pure pleasure and the venerable delights of his own spring; an animate flower, still badly clinging to the thorn of the age, about to be planted in verdant places; shown by the virgin, whose garden it was.

Why do you again bring me back to the accomplished mysteries? That rod betrayed, which always desired to hold its own: it wished to dismiss the one it received; it chose the worshiper it approved. Already with the affection of known love, it also held God invited, as Solomon says in the Song of Songs, “Let my brother come down into his garden” (Song 5:1). He came down, and certainly he came down: for the one whom a rich will loved deeply did not wish to go out, even at the time of the passion, so that we might express a matter known in our own times. In the garden, with the Jews, Scariotes seized the Lord. Let no one complain about such a withdrawal of the disciple: thus the Master and Lord is found. He was thought to be a gardener, a waterer of the living, a planter of souls. The garden is therefore not a refuge of one fleeing, but of one taking refuge, for those who understand that the garden has merited paradise.

But as for Alexander, what mystery of death could he confer, who fulfilled everything while alive? Except that, to the vice of the people, the name smiled; so that Alexandria was thought to be Anagnia, filled with private religious monstrosities, teeming with demons, with two-formed Anubises, with multiform idols of half-humans, which are mockers of the law; full of Isis the exile, Serapis the fugitive; finally, a flattering mother of resident crimes, or rather a stepmother; a nursling of vipers' offspring, through a brood poisoned by the race, which cannot conceive unless it rejoices in the father's bereavement; cannot grow unless it is born from death; cannot live unless it has not known its mother; so that in the conversion of faith, the offspring of an evil brood, conceived by the loss of God the Father, born with the head denied, brought forth through the pierced womb of Mother Church, takes its origin of life through the death of the saints; but now it grows more fertile by loss, more lively by death, more joyful after grief. For it is clear and fully seen, what is revealed by the dictating Scriptures (Rom. 11:32), that all things are concluded in one sin, so that all might deserve mercy. These are the hundredfold returns of passion, by which that race already absolves its own guilt: captivity has made them free, indulgence has loosened the bound. Heaven then consented to darkness, light shuddered at the passion, I believe, blinded by the blindness of faithless treachery.

XI. Believe, brother, the eyes of your brother. A certain shadow of a black cloud covered or wove together the entire region; thunderbolts crashed near the earth; a dire roar often thundered; a flashing, ruddy fire blazed forth more intensely: you would have said the sky was conscious of blood. Beyond the shadow of a foreign night, so to speak, it is no longer possible to conceal manifest truth under a cloud. The day also betrayed the horror of the passion, not only in its withdrawal, but in its privation. For the nurturing light of the sixth day had advanced, always after God friendly to the martyrs: reverently holding a part of the Lord's body still, through holy disciples it rendered service to the servants of God, though the envy of religion emulated the coming lot. Thus the Lord asserts himself through his works; thus he presents himself as a companion in all things, so that he is joined in equality and in time. I was a spectator, I confess, among these mysteries, and a watchman over the ashes of the saints: though I did not merit to be a participant, I sensed what I could not attain. I saw, and even today I scarcely believe myself: the deeds exceed the reverence of the reported words; hence it will be for God, brother, to assert what he has chosen, and to bear witness to the witness. Now receive, brother, the gifts of the three youths, or three youths from the furnace, still walking almost amid the fires of panting flame; and had not the envious fury of the flame seized them half-dead, the example of history would have come to life again: thus nearly everything painted itself with similar honor: Voice, Dew, Number, Furnace.

The voice, a consonant faith; dew, rain; a furnace, a pyre; number, the Trinity.